Wikipedia

So, I've been reading articles on Wikipedia all day, and this is one of the chains of articles that I ended up with:

Milan Kundera >> The Joke >> Czechoslovakia >> Communist Party of Czechoslovakia >> Show trial >> Nuremberg Trials >> Nuremberg Race Laws >> JCS 1067 >> Blohm + Voss >> M/V Explorer

I never would have guessed that something I'm actually somewhat acquainted with would come up while primarily reading about Commies and Nazis.

Milan Kundera wrote The Joke, based in Czechoslovakia, under the rule of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, which, in 1952, subjected Rudolf Slánský and several other senior Communists to a show trial, a highly-publicized trial under which the accused is being used as an example and an instrument of warning, such as the Nuremberg Trials, during which time notable members of Nazi Germany were prosecuted, including Wilhelm Frick, the author of the Nuremberg Race Laws, of which one known original copy, signed by Hitler himself, exists in the Skirball Cultural Center, which received the document on June 26, 1999, when the Huntington Library revealed General George S. Patton had secretly handed it over to them, having appropriated it, in violation of JCS (Joint Chiefs of Staff) 1067, the U.S. occupation directive through which Henry Morgenthau Jr. pushed his plans of Allied "industrial disarmament," which sought to destroy Germany's ability to wage war, in part by dismantling/exploding factories, like the Blohm + Voss shipyard in Hamburg, a German shipbuilding and engineering works that was established in 1877, and during its existence, has produced such ships as the Wilhelm Gustloff (sunk during wartime in what is to this day the world's worst maritime disaster), and the M/V Explorer, which is currently in use as the vessel for Semester at Sea, a study abroad program that my friend Brian participated in this winter/spring.

A Pale, Blue Dot

The following is taken directly from the Big Sky Astronomy Club Website. I place it here due to the tendency of the internet to change, and links to break. I love the quote at the end. He was more than an astronomer.

---

On October 13, 1994, the famous astronomer Carl Sagan was delivering a public lecture at his own university of Cornell. During that lecture, he presented this photo:


The photo above was taken by Voyager 1 in 1990 as it sailed away from Earth, more than 4 billion miles in the distance. Having completed its primary mission, Voyager at that time was on its way out of the Solar System, on a trajectory of approximately 32 degrees above the plane of the Solar System. Ground Control issued commands for the distant space craft to turn around and, looking back, take photos of each of the planets it had visited. From Voyager's vast distance, the Earth was captured as a infinitesimal point of light (between the two white tick marks), actually smaller than a single pixel of the photo. The image was taken with a narrow angle camera lens, with the Sun quite close to the field of view. Quite by accident, the Earth was captured in one of the scattered light rays caused by taking the image at an angle so close to the Sun. Dr. Sagan was quite moved by this image of our tiny world. Here is an enlargement of the area around our Pale Blue Dot and an excerpt from the late Dr. Sagan's talk:

"We succeeded in taking that picture [from deep space], and, if you look at it, you see a dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever lived, lived out their lives. The aggregate of all our joys and sufferings, thousands of confident religions, ideologies and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilizations, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every hopeful child, every mother and father, every inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every superstar, every supreme leader, every saint and sinner in the history of our species, lived there on a mote of dust, suspended in a sunbeam.

The earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that in glory and in triumph they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of the dot on scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner of the dot. How frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity -- in all this vastness -- there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. It is up to us. It's been said that astronomy is a humbling, and I might add, a character-building experience. To my mind, there is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly and compassionately with one another and to preserve and cherish that pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known."

Donut

Dear Chocolate Donut,
You were so tasty.
-Thomas

Gravity

You can feel when you are falling. Supposedly, it's because you aren't feeling anything at all.
I can't see the ground coming. I know I need new glasses, but I don't even see the blur of colors in the distance.

Labels

It's kind of strange. Two of the labels on here for my posts are Words and Thoughts. But they are sort of one in the same, aren't they? I mean, I can think in things other than words, but I can't very well show you those without words most of the time. It really goes to show how even something so amazing and powerful as words isn't always quite what you need. I still like them a lot though. They were exactly what I needed to convey this thought. And once again, I'm left wondering - do I call it Words, or do I call this post Thoughts? I guess I will call it both again.

Paper Cutter

I'm so stupid - I always call the paper cutter in here a cutting board
It's most definitely not a cutting board
Although it could be I guess
I could go cut up foodstuffs on it
but nobody does, so it's not [yet] a cutting board.

Fell up

I can't be sure where you've brought us, but
it's wonderful here.

In My Wallet

Titles are for people who have time to think of them

Don't forget the disclaimer on the right-hand side. I'm just amusing myself, I guess. I don't know that it's really about anything in particular. Just words, right?
~~~~
I was walking,
slower than I used to,
with my arms stiff at my sides
because it's cold

and I was breathing,
softer than I used to,
with my mouth shut
because the air is distasteful

and I was thinking,
less clearly than I used to,
with my eyes closed
because the view is distracting

I thought I had seen someone
round the corner.

I would have followed
but I walked too slowly
And I would have cried
but my mouth was closed
I tried to recall exactly what I saw
but my thoughts were hazy

So I walked on,
a little faster
breathing softly,
with my mouth slightly open
and thinking,
more focused now.

Perhaps I'll see them again.

Walking Home

Strange that, as I wander through the night's snow-dampened silence, savoring the desolation of the empty streets, I bemoan my solitude.

Word [Not really of the day]

So, I don't really want to do a word of the day thing, but I may occasionally put up a word and definition if I come across something pretty sweet. Today, this means:

-parlance(from dictionary.com):

1. a way or manner of speaking; vernacular; idiom: legal parlance.
2. speech, esp. a formal discussion or debate.
3. talk; parley.

I just liked it. That is all.

Whatever

The man in the elevator was breathing so loudly. I take small, lethargic steps to the door. I slept for too long. The girl at the third desk turns around to stare at me as I walk by. Her hair falls in her face. I walk past a man with a red shirt to my left. He is working by himself. I passed by a table of three students. All of them had their TI-89s next to their books. One had a black hat on. I stared at him, but he didn't notice. The broken chair is still sitting in its sad position against the blank, south wall. I stare at it as I walk by. A green piece of paper from the posting board has fallen face-down to the floor. I step on it.
I'm sitting down now, waiting for the computer. They've been slow lately. I feel the same. I rest my chin on my fists and stare out the window. My vision distorts every time my heart beats. All I can see is the tops of buildings. It makes the city look dead, so I lean forward to see the street, but it's empty anyway. They won't come out until night, when they can find relief from the week. All of them are weak and I hate them. When I looked at the street, I could see a nice patch of grass that survived the snow. It is cold out, but I want to go sit on it, anyway.