The guy didn’t write back, so I’m posting this purely on spec…. And I do love natural leather, natural fleece-lined suede boots. I like them to look at and I love them to wear. I think it’s the lanolin. If you don’t wear sox in your fleece-lined boots your feet will always feel fine, just like after a good mani-pedi.

Here’s the deal, Mr. Whooga Man. I’ll be happy to make a few bucks with this post, but if you want the real thing, then ship me a pair of the 29cm tall chestnut Whoogas, I’ll do a YouTube video as part of your September promotion, you can have this post gratis, and hang on to your cash! I’ll probably hit a different demographic for you too, the older men with expanding waist-line demographic. Later in the fall I could offer some insight into how they hold up around the barnyard.

http://www.whooga.com/

She comes in colors

The foot is yours; where’er it falls,
It treads your well-wrought leather,
On earthen floor, in marble halls,
On carpet, or on heather.
Still there the sweetest charm is found
Of matron grace or vestal’s,
As Hebe’s foot bore nectar round
Among the old celestials.

Rap, rap!–your stout and bluff brogan,
With footsteps slow and weary,
May wander where the sky’s blue span
Shuts down upon the prairie.
On Beauty’s foot your slippers glance,
By Saratoga’s fountains,
Or twinkle down the summer dance
Beneath the Crystal Mountains!

In Whittier’s day the the word “ugh” (or “ugg” or even “ug”) was simply a grunt, generally signifying laconic approbation.  Some say the word as applied to boots originated with Australian surfers in the late sixties or early seventies.  Others claim that the boot has been common in the outback for more than a century. None will question the use of “ugg” to describe a fleece lined sheepskin boot manufactured in Australia. There have been nasty legal battles fought by the marketeers of Decker’s Ugg Footwear against the manufacturers of ugg style boots everywhere.

I thought “Uggs” were a particular brand of Australian boot favored by co-eds, a boot perhaps to be worn with tight pegged pants, preferably levis–not Donna Karan parachute pants–a boot for bare legs dropping out of a kicky little dress that maybe skims the knee, a brand of boot as practical as it is pretty.

As it happens, “Ugg” is generic. There are a lot of boot makers with uggs to offer, notwithstanding Decker’s efforts to register the name as a trademark and prevent others from using it. So how do you sort the good uggs from the bad uggs?  There’s a Clint Eastwood spaghetti western about that, I think.

Sadly, now that Carrie Bradshaw is deep into re-runs, it is only the Manolo who informs me regarding the fashions of the feminine pedal extremities. And Manolo does not like the Uggs. They are too comfortable to please the Manolo. They are perhaps not fetishistic enough. They are simple in design, practical, affordable and attractive. Manolo likes the gaudy and the extravagant footwear. Uggs are anything but gaudy and extravagant.

Manolo does not like the uggs, but the ladies do. (And actually so do the gents. What’s not to like about a comfortable boot that keeps the foot cool in hot weather and warm when it’s cold)?

Once, the Manolo, he saw the aging minx the Shannon Doherty coming out of the Malibu Country Market, and she had on the Uggs and the miniskirt of the denim.

Perhaps she saw the Manolo frowning at the ugliness of her feetwear, for she scowled at the Manolo as if to say “you are the insect who is not worthy to gaze upon the shoes of the Shannon Doherty.”

Wikipedia says, “While in the boot, the sockless foot is in full contact with the sheepskin lining, thereby maximizing the insulative properties of the boot. The mid-calf shaft, while not encasing the entire lower foot in wool, further enhances the thermal qualities of the boot by encasing the ankle and lower portion of the leg. The wide, rounded toebox, wide shaft, and wide heelbox with a heel-less sole enhance comfort by providing a non-constricting space for the foot.”

Comfy, isn’t it? And oddly stirring, a bow to the erotic qualities of the fresh pedicure, polished toenails concealed in warm comfort. The Manolo probably doesn’t get that, but maybe he should take a closer look.

I’d rather blame Christians, that oppressed group of true believers who—when urged to “turn the other cheek”—are totally lacking in a sense of humor. Faith is color blind… except, I suppose, for the Mormons. In any event, I was saddened to hear a friend in the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgendered, Queer community say that she thought blacks should understand discrimination and therefore oppose Prop. 8. The following excerpt from an SFGate article reflects my thoughts too:

… demographers say the focus on one race not only disregards the complexity of African American identity but also overlooks the most powerful predictors affecting views on same-sex marriage: religion, age and ideology, such as party affiliation. Prop. 8′s racial fallout raises the question of how the groundbreaking multiracial support of a presidential candidate could coincide with the racial scapegoating now following a failed state ballot campaign.

“It’s just a shame to see the sort of coalition that came out behind Obama, and then you come back to California and you see white gays say ‘black people cost us the election,’ ” said David Binder, a white gay San Franciscan and a polling expert who spent the past two years working for the Obama campaign. “It bothers me that people look at the race of the people involved rather than factors that are more explanatory.”

Raymond Leon Roker said in the Huffington Post last week:

Excuse me? I voted against Proposition 8. I’m among the 30 percent of black Californians that did so. And as much as I can condemn the homophobia and intolerance that drove a portion of the 70 percent of blacks that voted in favor of Proposition 8′s ban on gay marriage, it’s an outrage to lay its passage at their feet. I’ve read several editorials already about how the ungrateful blacks betrayed gays right after America gave them their first president. I know there are some wounds and frayed nerves right now, but this type of condescending, divide and conquer isn’t going to help at all. And it’s a gross oversimplification of what happened.

Blacks, whites, Latinos… and everyone else who went to church in California before the election was likely to have heard a call for the passage of Proposition 8 based on Christian principles. What the LGBTQ community needs to do is meet their Christian friends in their homes, their workplaces, and their neighborhoods and educate them, convince them of the righteousness of supporting equal rights for residents of the State of California and the USA. The gay rights message needs to be spread simply and directly. The protests happening now are great in terms of reminding people that an injustice has been done by the passage of this referendum proposition, but to win the next referendum more minds need to be changed and it’s my opinion that demonstrations aren’t likely to change those minds.

See: Wired Science

-and-

See: Threat Level

[tags]drill and pump, pump and drill, kill the whales, eat their krill[/tags]

[tags]Caterpillarian party gear[/tags]

I watched Noam Chomsky explaining away the myth of American democracy with a bow to Robert Dahl’s theory of Polyarchy. Then, as often happens when YouTubated, I found myself watching Ali G’s interview of Professor Chomsky, an interview that explored relationships of many words as only Ali G might be expected to connect them. A baby growing up with two languages might be said to be bilingual. Later, if the child added a third language, then that child would be multilingual. It was easy for Ali G to make the orthogonal shift that permitted entry of bisexuality and cunniligualness to the discussion. Professor Chomsky acquitted himself well and at the end, with but a single old white guy false move toward a handshake, touched fists with Ali G and shared respect.

So how far was that YouTube moment from a click to Ali G’s interview with Posh Spice and Beckham? Not very far, and it was an interview I enjoyed. Perhaps you will enjoy it too.

But that’s not what this post is about. This post is about the Chicxulub crater in Mexico, Deccan traps, and pterosaurs. But I’m hoping this evening’s exposure to Ali G will help me frame my understanding in a way that I can comfortably share with any of the environmentally obsessed people who may come this way looking for an answer to the riddle of what killed the dinosaurs and is it true that fried they taste just like chicken?

Take the National Geographic. The Nat. Geo. suggests that it wasn’t this big smack-down of a huge asteroid boiling the water in the Gulf of Mexico, turning it into a huge basin of bouillabaisse (or more like chicken gumbo probably), punching the planet so hard that a crater fifty miles across was formed, an impact crater that threw so much junk in the air you would think you were driving in LA or something. No, the Nat. Geo says that it likely was huge volcanoes all over the place, but especially in Western India, volcanoes that essentially nullify the bouillabaisse (or chicken gumbo) theory of extinction and suggest something more like a luau, only it was in India, so they probably had nan and dal with that, instead of pineapples and the pu pu platter. But it still tasted like chicken, only more pit roasted than boiled.

So the Nat. Geo. throws out this big Indian oven idea as an alternative to the asteroid punch, but all I’m saying is why should it be either/or? What if Ali G was walking down the street and he saw Norman Mailer walking his poodles. This would be the not-dead Norman Mailer I’m using here for the sake of the story. And suppose Norman said something rude and perhaps somewhat defensive about his poodles not being gay or even signifiers of gay, and it’s not like he has dyed them pink or something. And what if Ali G — whom I respect, but here for the sake of the story is some behavior that we wouldn’t want our children to imitate — just suppose Ali G got very annoyed with Norman Mailer and had to punch him real hard in the stomach. And then what if Norman Mailer vomited because he is very old (not dead yet in this story) and he can’t take a sock in the gut anymore? And what if he got some on the poodles. Might not the poodle barf markage be jointly caused by both the punch in the gut and the ensuing vomiting? I mean the story would not be complete if you just said Norman barfed and got some on the poodles, and I think maybe the Indian subcontinent barfed after the planet took a few heavy punches and so it’s not an either/or thing.

[tags]paleontology, victoria beckham, norman’s poodles, I wonder who they’re staying with[/tags]

[Okay... we need someone to count the end points.  How many boys are depicted as having only one relationship, versus how many girls?  What are their stories?  How many of the 63 monogamous couples will grow up and marry each other?  How many of the 21 triads have experimented twith a three-way?  Do you believe this data when only one bi-sexual relationship structure is reported?

TAPE:  –gooseberries, she said. I said again I thought it was hopeless and no
good going on, and she agreed, without opening her eyes. (Pause.) I asked her to look at me and after a few moments–(pause)–after a few moments she did, but the eyes just slits, because of the
glare. I bent over her to get them in the shadow and they opened. (Pause. Low.) Let me in. (Pause.) We drifted in among the flags and stuck. The way they went down, sighing,
before the stem! (Pause.) I lay down across her with my face in her breasts and my hand on her.
We lay there without moving. But under us all moved, and moved us, gently,
up and down, and from side to side.

WOMAN:  Seventeen copies sold…

JIM hits rewind and there is the familiar screech of backwards audio.

TAPE:  –unshatterable association until my dissolution of storm and night with
the light of the understanding and the fire–

JIM:  It’s art, Woman.  They give people the Pulitzer for this kind of thing.  The fucking Booker prize.  All kinds of honors accrete…

WOMAN:  If you don’t find the back formation offensive.

JIM:  "Accretian…" 

WOMAN:  …and you don’t spell very well either.

JIM:  How would you know that, Woman.  It’s a damned SCRIPT for god’s sake.  How can you tell whether I spell it "accretian," "accretion," or even "a Grecian?"

WOMAN:  Yes… well, you’ve certainly URNED the right…

JIM:  Don’t be doing that now.  Going all truth and beauty on me.

JIM rewinds the tape again amidst much screechery…

TAPE:  –my face in her breasts and my hand on her. We lay there without moving.
But under us all moved, and moved us, gently, up and down, and from side
to side.

The WOMAN hits the stop button and turns on the radio.

WOMAN:  Enough crap…

RADIO:  It was suggested that for an artist of his stature, he had a relatively
small body of work – but only if one measures size by number of words.
Distilling his art to its essence, he produced scores of eloquent plays
and stories, many of those in his later years not strictly defined as
full length.

JIM:  I’m told size doesn’t matter.

WOMAN:  One understands why you may have heard that…