Things I am wondering about today

First, what is it about Winter that makes me so listless and unmotivated? Is is the Holidays? Is it that December in Ohio is like living on one of Saturn's moons sans the lakes of Methane? (and the new arsenic-based life. Or...not.) I haven't finished a book in a week or so. I can't seem to concentrate on the one I'm reading and it's a bunch of short stories about the devil. Who doesn't like reading about the devil? I remember I used to work with some fundamentalist people and they were into this book called The Adversary-which is actually the literal Hebrew translation of Satan, I'm always amazed when fundamental types stumble on a legitimate fact-about how Beelzebub was hiding under your bed and making you watch porn and sleep late on Sundays. Satan, he brings readers together. Not even Old Scratch is motivating me currently though. After I work out, I want to sit in front of the television and wish I had a Snuggie.

There seem to be several books called The Adversary so I dunno which one they were getting so excited about.  One of those same people also told me very seriously that Ouija boards are a way that demons can attack you. Ok, making fun of people who believe this stuff is such a cliche but really I'm fascinated. FASCINATED. How can someone be so irrational about one thing but otherwise a functioning, reasonably intelligent member of society? For a cheap thrill, go to Amazon and read the Ouija board reviews. Too many silly parodies but still, intriguing psychologically. Some people are offended they would make a pink one, the better to snag the Hello Kitty crowd.



I did at least find a book on flags of the world at the library that I've been reading. Being able to identify world flags is my new obsession--along with my old obsession of reading reference books cover to cover. I learned that the Confederate flag (obviously not a world flag, thankfully) is an example of a saltire or Southern Cross (or crux decussata if you dig the whole Latin thing.) It's actually the second official flag design the Confederacy came up with and was intended as a battle flag. Some people complained it was "too white" (which is kind of what was wrong with the Confederacy) and looked like a surrender flag. The original flag looked too much like the US flag and apparently troops got confused on the battlefield. Funny the little illuminating details you can pick up in the most random of ways.

I had a history professor in college who said the Civil War was just about States Rights and not slavery which was doomed to end anyways and everyone knew it by then. I repeated this for a few years-the guy was an American history professor so he's know, right? I dunno if that's really accurate though. Wasn't the state's right to allow slavery the question? Lincoln apparently went through several mindsets on the slaves and thought at one point that people would never accept them as citizens and wanted to ship them to Liberia.

Moving on--the damn dog pulled a muscle or something a few weeks ago in the park and I had to take him to the vet. He was prescribed an NSAID called Previcox. What I found curious is the package says it's not for human ingestion. Ok, why not? Not that I need to take my dog's arthritis meds (I have my own-yay?) but I'm curious. I can't find an answer online but I did learn it's a Cox 2 Inhibitor which is what Vioxx was. Hence the "cox" in the name I suppose. Cox 2 is an enzyme that is linked to pain and inflammation and maybe cancer.

I Googled about it and found a story about a guy whose lab died from presumably a bad reaction to Previcox. Disturbing. Luckily, my dog didn't have an adverse reaction. Unluckily, he still seems to be having trouble with his front leg so I might be buying xrays in the new year.