What's going on

It's been more than a month since my last posting. In mid-April I received a series of emails from a bicycle enthusiast who offered more information about the history of Schwinn lightweight bicycles and suggestions for how to improve my ride. With his permission, I edited and posted his content on my web site. The new pages are

Schwinn lightweight bicycles history

Suggestions to upgrade my Schwinn Sportabout

My 1965 Ford Falcon Ranchero is still sitting in the driveway with a bent driveshaft as it has since the summer of 2007, but last month I got a replacement tailgate skin for it (not yet installed) and this month I got a spare hood. Both parts were very reasonably priced from a local man who had them left over from his own ranchero restoration project.

Namaste TBG

Don McLeroy betrays America and Christ

Mr. McLeroy is the chair of the Texas State Board of Education. There was a vote yesterday about the standards for students in that state. Since Texas is such a big customer of textbook publishers, the standards for Texas affect the quality of textbooks for the rest of America.

I just read that in Friday's testimony, Mr. McLeroy said: "I disagree with these experts. Someone has got to stand up to experts." This is right up there on the stupid scale with the quote by Ray Mummert, a pastor from Dover PA who said in 2005: "We've been attacked by the intelligent, educated segment of the culture."

So Mr. McLeroy figures that, as a dentist, he is as much of an authority on scientific matters as the experts... I also read that even though the main weasel words were voted down some amendments were passed with weasel words in them so expect some lawsuits folks!

Thank Mr. McLeroy for adding to the financial hardships of Texans in these hard times, as well as for succeeding in at least part of his evil plot to DUMB DOWN our schoolchildren. Does this clown have ANY integrity? He should resign if he isn't fired. Some people are PROUD of being stupid and insist their stupidity is just as valid as someone else's smarts. I don't mind that normally, unless they insist their stupidity is MORE valid and insist that everyone be just as stupid as they are.

so-called "Intelligent Design" is NOT science

In online forums wherever evolution is being debated, some people still claim that intelligent design is a scientific alternative to evolution. I have one word in reply: BULLSHIT!

Okay, I'll say a few more words. The Kitzmiller v. Dover trial in 2005 made it clear beyond any doubt that ID is not science. It was also established beyond any doubt that intelligent design IS religion, although those who advocate it emphatically deny this is the case.

So-called intelligent design is so-called scientific creationism renamed to try to slip past the courts into public school science classrooms, and so-called scientific creationism is nothing more than a literal fundamentalist interpretation of the Book of Genesis of the Christian Bible.

People can believe whatever they want, but a fundamentalist interpretation is not supported by the evidence of the world God created. There have been at least a dozen court cases challenging the teaching of evolution the past forty years, and the creationists lost EVERY TIME. It isn't a conspiracy; it's not the devil. It is simply that the evidence supports evolution and falsifies a literal reading of Genesis.

Some people who used to believe the earth is flat (maybe some still do) would use a fundamentalist interpretation of Bible verses to "prove" it. Churches and people who are in denial of the fact of evolution are modern-day flat-earthers.

Like I said, believe what you want, but don't try to legislate ignorance in the teaching of American children in public schools. Home school your kids or send them to a private school that doesn't conflict with your beliefs if you want them to think the earth is flat.

Bicycling Guitarist jokes thread on BikeForums.net

Hi all.
Last night I saw a headline on MSNBC that said "After pullout, some will stay." To my disappointment, it was about Iraq.

Oh, and the other day I was posting to a science news group and neglected to give a reference link to the source (they get really annoyed at that). So I posted another with the link and said "A Cite for Sore I's."

These and more jokes by me and by other people can be found in the Bicycling Guitarist jokes thread at Bike Forums.

Polishing a brick

No matter how much you polish a brick, it won't become shiny enough to be a mirror. I sometimes think of that when working on my web site. Lately I have been promoting my site and making slight improvements to the HTML code. I don't know exactly how much time I have spent on my web site the past ten years, but it is probably many thousands of hours by now.

For what it's worth, I publish my original songs and essays to share with the world.

Baaaa..d Jokes

Okay, I was being sheepish with the title of this post.

Anyway...

The late actor Patrick McGoohan (see my previous post in this blog) at the Pearly Gates, refusing to conform:
"I will not be pushed, filed, stamped, indexed, briefed, debriefed or numbered. My afterlife is my own...I am not a number; I am a dead man!"

Years ago I had a great marketing idea for a movie merchandising connection with the Harry Potter series: Chia pets! They could have a line of chia pets as the characters in the books and movies and call them "Hairy Pottery."

Yesterday I added to that thought. See the chia pets sprout growth (or grow sprouts) in new places as the characters enter puberty!

Okay, I'll shut up now.

Be Seeing You?

I just learned on MSNBC.com that the star of my all-time favorite television series died yesterday. Patrick McGoohan starred in "The Prisoner," a surreal sci-fi spy story that has impressed me from the first time I watched it more than thirty years ago.

KTEH Channel 54 in San Jose, California, a PBS station of that time (if I recall the name and number correctly) would broadcast an episode every week, followed by a discussion of the episode and the series by some philosophers and theologians.

The series raises questions of the relationship of the individual to society, of the individual to God, and the individual to his or herself. This is much like the question asked by Ramana Maharshi, "Who Am I?"

R.I.P. Patrick, you touched my heart and my mind.

What is REALLY weird is that last night I had a craving to watch the last two episodes of "The Prisoner" (a two-parter finale). I watched the next to last episode last night and the final one this afternoon, just before learning of McGoohan's death. It had been a long time since I had watched any episodes of the series. Cue the music from The Twilight Zone please.