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Thanx, J. I sort of need one of these cards to play in real life. “Expectation Of Karma” would be a very useful card for me to lay down in many situations. The really wonderful thing would be its simultaneous bonus as a diagnostic tool. Just toss it out, and everyone present thinks they’re about to get what they deserve based on their immediate past . . .
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Speaking of which, some more snap work for Hairy.<span class=”bbcode_spoiler”>http://i1067.photobucket.com/albums/u438/jamais5/2014hm/HerrD-AdmirableForeignPolicy_zps56594826.png</span> Titled, “Admirable Foreign Policy.”
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Beauty parlor technology could go very wrong.
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Pweck was to ride up to the side of the fortress waving the flag of peaceful negotiation.
<span class=”bbcode_spoiler”>http://i1067.photobucket.com/albums/u438/jamais5/2014hm/HerrD-PweckGettingASurprise_zps6b17c0b7.png</span>
The enemy gave Pweck a little surprise.
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Hairy requested an interpretive picture from his descriptions. Apparently people really tried this. He apparently never heard of “Streetcar Named Desire,” so he didn’t get “The Wreck Of The Desire” as a title.
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A visual metaphor for the inter-related problems of immigration control and maintaining ourselves as a leader of innovation. (Snap work for Hairy.)
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More snap work for Hairy, this one titled, “The Quandary Of Security Vs. Freedom.”
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“What It Feels Like To Be Off The Bell Curve”
*What Does The Head Shrinking Process Mean?
It is interesting to note that there is only one place in all the world where the practice of shrinking human heads took place. Lots of cultures practiced human decapitation, threatening displays of human heads, and rituals and superstitions that ascribed meaning to the treatment of the heads of dead human beings. One possible explanation is that the process was never discovered anywhere else. The process IS involved. Multiple stages exist within the process, including heating and drying, treating with tannin solution, sewing, and peg work, all while allowing for shrinkage to avoid damaging the original shape of the face as much as possible.Individually, the facts might seem strange but never cause speculation. To understand why more questions should be asked, you have to look at some of the facts side by side. Like the following summation:
Tannins were well known in most other cultures, including most of the ones that had practices regarding human heads. Tannins were commonly used for dealing with skins and hides for the use of leatherworking, taxidermy, and the making of wines and herbal solutions.
Sewing, peg work, and heating and drying were well-known processes in almost every culture in the world.
The week-long process of shrinking heads was apparently developed in the most primitive conditions by one of the most war-oriented peoples in all world history (the only tribe to ever successfully fight off Spanish conquistadors.) The Jivaro specialized in clandestine raids over blood feuds, meaning experimental processes lasting an entire week would have been much harder to develop than in places where raiding wasn‘t so common. (Additionally, sentries were less efficient in a rainforest climate because of the lack of sight-lines.) The Jivaro were not even the culture that frequently cannibalized their victims, so cooking the heads for any reason makes less sense.
The superstitions of the Jivaro include the universal idea of taking something intangible from an enemy. Fastening shut the eyes and mouths of the shrunken heads fit into the universal notion of containing angry spirits.
At least, that is what they told everyone ELSE; like any other group, they may have been careful of what they let outsiders know . . . They discarded the skull and contents, so the fact is, shrunken heads are really just shrunken faces. What other purpose could they have?
Well, here’s where we prepare to do speculation based on what’s available. One more thing that sounds slightly off is that it was OKAY to kill a relative during a head-hunting raid as long as you didn’t take the head and shrink it. The Jivaro were in fear of their dead relatives, and most of these killings were supposedly in revenge to pacify their dead . . . What? That sounds more like it was okay to kill anybody but bad to shrink the head of your kin. That sounds even more strange.
Is there anything else that doesn’t sound quite right? The last and least explored continent, considered exotic and impassable to most, where almost any secret might stay hidden longer because of terrain, foliage, and cultural practices, South America has, in it’s Amazon, a LACK of something found in most other cultures.
The Celts, one of the other cultures who kept heads, had stories of little people. Certain African tribes who dealt with heads believed in little people who turned out to be real Pygmies. Many older cultures believe in some form of little people. THE JIVARO DON’T. So, why would they SHRINK heads? One culture wore regular-size heads on their person into battle. Another nailed them to their walls. What would it mean if the Jivaro lied about their beliefs? Out of fear, perhaps? What else would they believe?
Not exposing your family’s dead would be like not sharing your DNA? Keeping the face looking human would mean that at a glance their authenticity could be seen? Shrinking them to the size of a fist would probably not mean reducing what is stolen from the enemy. The shrinking must mean SOMETHING. Most experts believe superstition and mythology have some basis in fact. But what exactly would their purpose be?
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Off subject, a number of shipments from South America are stopped by Customs officials, some are allowed through, and, like all shipping, some packages just get lost–
Cartoon made for Hairy.
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“Underwater Rugby” or “Ush Hour” is a very large text file. Hairy commented that he thought I must have been in a trance to have put in so much detail. It was sort of like that. I was depressed over the forums being down and tired from working and my little ones were harmonizing some nonsensical noises for over an hour while we were all supposed to be napping.
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This one was completely my idea, but it just so happened Hairy was doing a bit on what we should do instead of following Shakespeare’s advice to kill all the lawyers. “Best Warning Label”
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I should have spent more time on this one. Gray water systems are a great idea more people should think about.
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I have this problem. I really disapprove of planned obsolescence and deliberate over-fragility. We’re supposed to be made in God’s image, but does this happen?
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Hairy Deewon requested this for his blog. It took a while, but it gave me a perverse sense of enjoyment.
Made this for Hairy’s blog, the episode where ‘Shelob did it.’ A good point was made.
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“Why Flying Heroines Shouldn’t Wear Short Skirts” –The name says it all.
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Snap work for Hairy. Explains the term ‘Window Shopping.’
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[crackling footsteps, miner’s headlamp cuts through the darkness]
“Okay. I’ve made the list. There will be six people working in a tunnel just east of this location. That’s your quota total. We agreed that if you have that total we get another rich vein–eighteen months’ double workload for the whole company and a hint of great wealth further east. Remember–it’s got to look natural and likely enough that the geologists don’t question it.
I’ve hand-picked the men. They’re in good health and have no wives or children that I know of. They’ll still be a big loss. No suffering, right?”
[a single, short burst of air, an audible ‘whuff’]
“Thanks.” [retreating footsteps]
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“Aunt ‘Tilda? What’s this picture?”
“It’s of a miracle, dear. I had what I thought was a horrible day once. I joined a parade for my school.”
“You were in a parade?”
“I did! I was ten years old, and we were trying to raise money through the school for a new dog shelter. I had to wear a hot, scratchy uniform that didn’t fit, I couldn’t walk with the tuba that I wanted to play, the trombone I COULD play fell apart–”
“What did you do?”
“I went to pick up the slide that had fallen and a dog jumped out of this alley and started tearing up my hat! My mother ran up to me, scaring the dog back, picked up my ruined hat and the slide, and said, ‘The show must go on!'”
“What happened then?”
“She put my hat back on and I marched the rest of the way with the band. I couldn’t put the trombone back together. It was bent. I was crying while we stood at the end of the parade with people taking pictures of me in my ruined hat, with my ruined trombone, and I felt just awful.
Then the next day the local newspaper sold five times as many copies as usual. The money was raised for a new dog shelter, our school got new band uniforms, a leash law was passed, I was given a brand new trombone, and three different people I didn’t even know brought brownies by the house for us to eat. I still had to walk in those awful parades, but my cousin, one of the new dogcatchers, was always there at the end of them with a glass of lemonade or hot chocolate waiting for me.”
“And that’s a miracle?”
“I think so, dear.”
YYIM, brand new t.v. station, invited all pundits in the nation to apply to work for them with a ten-grand signing bonus. The only catch? Pass through a supernatural door. It won’t let anyone through unless they’ve NEVER been unfair in criticizing others publicly through being uninformed or unwise.
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Pindo the panda pundit. He might be a panda, but he’s a typical pundit. He’s completely backwards in every way!
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