Wiki Governance :East Coast Code

Image via WikipediaWhy shouldn't policymakers design the computer code and device parameters to more closely hew to the desired legal outcome? Because the desired legal outcome is created by committee and the law is not obliged to work only to make people feel like they've done something. Bad laws are passed constantly and by and large if the law is too ludicrous or unrealistic people merely won't enforce it or will enforce it selectively and pretty much forget over time. Bad design is eternal, the physical world does not simply ignore foolish or impossible design decisions consequence happens and usually in a devastating manner. An engine or device that clings to what is legal will often not do what is practical, especially as what is legal can be fluid throughout the design process. We currently have cars that will not start until a breathalyzer is used on the steering column and that is all well and good. What if a similar device was made slightly earlier, say when in some counties women were not allowed to drive without a man present, or devices that keep a car from exceeding the speed limit under any circumstance. These may be silly but are unjust and unsafe. One of the founding ideals of the law is the idea that sometimes the law is wrong and human judgment should be used. Technology cannot apply such judgment. nor in many cases should it try. In the Time of Gilbert and Sullivan some unscrupulous people transmitted their works by telephone and telegraph across the Atlantic to America so that actors could perform bootleg operettas. If the policy makers of the time decided that such illegalities were important and had a hand in designing the phones, would we even have he clear signals we take for granted today? Think of what a printing press that values the local ordinance for obscenity or property over clarity of copy. Would we even have modern faith as we understand it if the Church policy makers chained the press to their requirements instead of those of the people? Technological growth is unfortunately amoral, sometimes our reach exceeds our grasp and the capacities science gives us are ones we are not mature enough to use well, but far more often this increase in capacity is the spark that topples existing injustice simply by making control of the new capacities too expensive to police. I don't want my equipment designed by people who care about what's legal I want it designed by people who care about making good equipment. I have my own moral faculties.

Wiki Government: Patent Leader

Image via WikipediaFundamental problem of current patent law, too many things are patented and people have been offering mutually exclusive patents to multiple people for the same device or concept. The suggestion of the book is that some sort of automagic search system compares patents to see who has what. Sounds like a good idea and steps in this direction are being taken so perhaps all is well. There is a problem, natural language processing. In order for patents to be acessible to the common man and indeed comprehensible at all patents in regular everyday lanuage must eb considered allowable. However, language is fluid and can describe a phenomenon or device in hundred's of ways. A Binary Metallic Decision Making Device is just a complicated way of saying, flip a coin. The taxonomy of ideas that must be involved for a truly comprehensive and comprehensible patent system may well be impossible. Not to say it isn't worth trying but any time parsing a truly stupendous amount (terabytes if you include pictures, text etc.) of data in next to no time is the easy part of your task you have quite the difficult task. I am not certain the optimism of the book is warranted nor am I sure that technology is the appropriate solution. Perhaps a more precise measure of language in encoding the patents in the first place would be worthwhile. Natural language patents could be accepted but then a summary or abstract version would be encoded by a patent worker and then entered into the system. Unfortunately this solution would be wickedly expensive and time consuming but it is hard to imagine a system which isn't.

Pater Familia: Tales of Dukinfield: Yanks

The Yanks are Coming!

I saw them arrive. The Americans came into the village in a quiet procession of just three cars, yet stretching the length of the block. The cars didn’t sound like cars; In fact, they didn’t so much make a noise as suggest it; a hint of a rumble from the hood and tailpipe, overlaid with a shushing of tires. In length, they were absurd, yet impressive; in width, they took up more than half the street. Not with arrogance, but with a confident assurance that Dukinfield would adjust to them and not the other way round. For the first few days, we thought maybe they could fly, with their enormous tailfins and rear lights that could well be retro rocket thrusters; their backs lit up like Blackpool illuminations, all the way across the car; and their flashing lights for turn signals, instead of the little amber arm that sticks out from normal cars.

They set up their heavy equipment on Platt Street, opposite Grandma’s pen, between the railway sidings and the Suttons’ row of houses, hiding it from Astley street. I learned their names, just by hovering around their little group. They didn’t seem to mind. After a while, I approached them.

“Where do you come from?” I asked no one in particular, half expecting a declaration of peaceful intent towards all mankind.

“The Great State of Texas, son.” Answered the lanky one named “Tex”.

“Is that why you’re called Tex?” I asked again.

“Yup.” He answered, just like real T.V. and cinema Americans talk.

“Doesn’t it get confusing,” I inquired, taking this opportunity to ask questions I had pondered for years. “if you’re all called Tex, how do you know who your mum is calling?”

“No, son. We’re only called Tex by outsiders.”

“So what does your mum call you?”

“Leonard.”

“You mean, the Cincinnati Kid might be called Irving at home?” I was slightly stunned and would need time to absorb this revelation later.

“Why have you come to Dukinfield?”

“We’re here to dismantle the Allied War Machine.” He said, with pride. I said “Tara” and walked away as calmly and slowly as I could.

“Bloody Hell!” I yelled to my brothers in the safety of our den. “There’s a fluckin’ Allied War Machine here in Dukinfield and we’ve never even noticed it!”

Tex’s simple statement shook us to our shoes and set off a week-long search for The Allied War Machine. We knew the ins and outs of every building in the village, including the location and type of every machine and yet we’d somehow overlooked an Allied War Machine on our own bloody doorstep.

“Maybe it’s disguised as a cotton loom” said Kenny Hodgin “or a compressor.”

“Nah, it’s got to look like a gun” said Derek.

“Steel lathes look like guns” said Steve.

“Yeah, but they’re still steel lathes”, I said, growing exasperated.

“We’re going about this the wrong way.” I said. “Since we’re always seeing things as guns; sticks, clothes poles, our fingers, we would have noticed a stray Allied War Machine hanging around. So if it isn’t here now, they must be bringing it in somehow. The question is, how?”

Later that day, Grandma arrived with other news.

“Edith, t’ Suttons have done a moonlight flit.” Lots of people were leaving their condemned homes with rent in arrears nowadays. As soon as the renters left, the town council’s Compulsory Purchase Order came into effect, leaving the landlord with neither income nor property, just the pittance paid by the council for the seizure.

“Good God, Mother, you’ve got enough in your hands. Here, let me give you a hand. Neil, Steven, come and help your Grandma.”

“Sure thing, ma’am.” We drawled.

Grandma came through the front door sideways, not entirely because of the shopping bags full of stuff she had looted from the Suttons’ house. She always came in sideways, partly because of her ample girth and partly because it was easier to keep her balance that way as she stepped up and over the stone threshold. We took the bags with glee and began to rummage through them.

“Here, leave that alone. I’ll show it to you when I’ve caught me breath.” She wheezed.

“”Sure thing, ma’am.” We drawled.

“Would you like a cup o’ tea, Mother?” asked my Mum, according to ritual.

“Ooh, yes, please, love. I’m parched.” responded my Gran.

“It won’t be long, I’ve just put t’ kettle on.” Added my Mum, to nobody’s slightest surprise.

Me and my brothers went back to playing with our toy cowboys on the table, knowing that nothing would happen until after the tea ceremony.

“Now the Suttons have left, there’s almost nobody to play with, pardners.” I said, quietly.

“Yeah, that whole block’s vacant, now.” Murmured Steve.

“Hey, pardners, that means we can play there!” Shrieked Derek. You see, we weren’t allowed to play in houses near where people lived.

“Ma’am, can me and my sidekicks go out to play?” I asked, as innocently as I could.

“All right, but remember the rules: no playing near the Conservative Club, or in houses near where people live.”

“We won’t Ma’am. Thank you kindly ma’am.” We drawled, as deeply as we could.

In our most innocent saunter, we went through the back ginnel to Mill Steet and up the block and across Astley Street, where we stopped and surveyed our new territory in awe. We had an entire block of row houses to play with and the back bedroom of each house overlooked the wasteland where the yanks had set up camp.

Methodically, we crept in and out of each house, wary of redskins or bushwhackers, checking each yard, toilet, kitchen and living room. We whooped and danced around imaginary camp fires in the bedrooms, throwing trash in the air and watching which way it fell, a sure-fire way for the spirits to show us which bedroom would make the best wigwam. Being used to underground dens, we needed the guidance of the spirits. We couldn’t decide by ourselves.

“It would be great if we could have them all as dens.” Steve pondered.

“We don’t have enough stuff for that many dens.” I said. “Besides, we’d have to keep climbing up and down the stairs to get to each den.”

“Too bad there’s not doors between all the houses’ bedrooms.” Mused Derek. Me and Steve agreed.

The railway hooter blew noon, so we set off for home, passing Dave Combs and his mates, knocking down the yard wall of Mrs. X’s old house with their sledge hammers.

“They could knock holes in the bedroom walls.” Realized Steve.

We explained our idea to the big kids, after getting them to agree to share the place and not kick us out. When we came back out after dinner, they had already knocked holes in the walls joining three of the seven houses. By teatime, they had done the whole row.

We ran back and forth through the holes in the walls, from house to house, free from the eyes of the outside world. We were lions, jumping through hoops, we were escaping prisoners of war, we were cops and robbers, we were happy. And there were no grown ups to stop us. We played this way for a week, always keeping an eye on the yankee varmints out the back windows and anticipating the arrival of The War Machine.

Looking out of an open front bedroom window one day, Steve lobbed a chunk of plaster into the back of a passing truck. That became the game and when we ran out of chunks of plaster, we used cans and bottles. Then there were no more trucks and I tried to lob a rock on to the roof of a passing car and hit the windshield by mistake. I just hadn’t been thinking. Until, that is, I saw the look of panic, followed by anger, on the face of the driver.

The windshield wasn’t damaged, but he skidded and squealed to a stop and leaped out of his car. He dashed into the first house and up the stairs. We bolted behind the blanket covering the hole and right to the end of the row, across the street and home to safety.

I couldn’t believe I had done something so stupid and sat with my heart pounding for quite some time. I wanted to undo it. I conjured up pictures of what might have happened and couldn’t sleep that night.

After breakfast the following day, I felt a little better. Better enough to realize just what an effective escape route we had created. That morning, we covered all the holes with blankets, tarps and rags, so that we could enter any house in the row and vanish immediately. The covers would slow us down a bit, but not by as much time as we would gain from the confusion of any pursuer.
If we were fast enough, we could get to the upstairs windows and watch which house the enemy entered and go back downstairs in the house next to him, leading him in circles.

We were practicing such a maneuver when we were stopped by a roaring of heavy engines and a clanking and grinding that we had never heard before. We rushed to the back bedroom windows and watched in silent awe as a column of immense tanks and armored personnel carriers rumbled out of the railway sidings and past Grandma’s pen to the wasteland opposite, right up to the back yard gates of the houses we were standing in.

“The Allied War Machine,” Derek muttered, in awe.

“Our secret.” I declared.

“Cross my heart and hope to die.” Swore Steve.

“In a cellar full o’ rats.” Vowed Derek.

It was obvious that this place would be declared off-limits the moment our Mum and Dad found out about the War Machine. We went to the front bedroom to see if anyone on Astley Street had heard or seen anything. Dave Combs and his mates were throwing knives at a telephone pole. I opened the window and shouted to them. Meeting them at the front door, I made them swear the solemn oath, then led them upstairs.

“Fuckin ‘ell” said Dave, hungrily. His mates agreed. We plotted for awhile and, one at a time, went home for provisions for the gang. We sat there for hours, till the yanks went off for dinner. Then we descended on their camp. We found some gum and cigarettes, but not much that we could move. Then Dave got into an armored personnel carrier and started it up with a tremendous roar. I don’t know where he found the keys, but we all piled in.

It took Dave awhile to sort out the gears, but we were all thrown to the back when he got it going. I had always thought tanks and other tracked vehicles were slow, but this thing flew! Dave demolished the back yard and toilet of one of the houses before he figured out how to stop and turn it. He backed it up and aimed for two big, steel ramps the yanks had erected. He hit them square on and we zoomed up the ramps, sailing off the other end and crashing down on another vehicle. Now the yanks had been working on this second vehicle and had almost removed the heavy machine gun mounted on it. The machine gun popped out of its turret and lay beckoning us from the broken glass and cinders.

We scrambled out of our tank and went to pick up the gun. We couldn’t budge it. Everybody ran home to get their grappling hooks and heavy ropes. Derek got our bogey, a go-cart my Dad had welded out of steel, that ran about six inches off the ground. We hung pulleys from the ramps and swung the gun up and on to the bogey. We tore down a blanket from one of the holes in the wall and covered the gun.

The bogey didn’t show the slightest strain, but it took all of us to push it up Mayers’s Brow and down the embankment to the dens. If it hadn’t dug into the ground at the bottom of the banking, it would have rolled right into the canal. We hid it in the dens for over a week, because the yanks were frantic and looking everywhere. But we had to move it because it took up too much space. So we moved it early one morning to our house, since they’d looked there first and often. We mounted it on a dustbin in the ginnel, to show my Dad when he got home from work.

“Enemy approaching!” Called Steve, as my Dad pedaled down the street, black faced and tired.

“Enemy approaching!” I called back to Derek, on gunnery duty.

“Halt! Who goes there?” Challenged Derek as my Dad rounded the corner into the ginnel, squarely in Derek’s sights.

“Bleedin’ ‘ell!” Shouted my Dad, falling off his bike in incredulous terror, his eyes wide open and his voice quavering an octave higher than usual. “Get out from behind there. You could get killed, or kill somebody else!”

“Budda, budda, budda!” Shouted Derek with glee. “I got ‘im! The filthy Nazi’s down!”

Me and Steve jumped on him with our bayonets. “Get the bloody ‘ell off me! I’ve told you them bayonets aren’t bloody toys!”

“Budda, budda, budda!” Squealed Derek, having the time of his life and lobbing bean bag hand grenades on to the filthy Nazi’s head. “Boom! Boom! Boom!”

“I’ve told you, now. Bloody well stop it, or I’ll bloody well hit you!” Repeated the filthy Nazi.

“Budda, budda, budda!” Repeated Derek, bravely refusing to surrender until his machine gun nest was overrun by the filthy Nazi and then running into the kitchen to hide behind my Mum. He forgot, though, that my Mum is a filthy Nazi sympathizer, a collaborator, a traitor who handed him over for torture.

Me and Steve sidled in and made ourselves as small as possible. We ate our tea, washed, brushed our teeth and quietly went to bed. We didn’t talk much, for fear of attracting attention to ourselves. Derek came up and joined us at the foot of the bed, smirking, but he wouldn’t say why and we didn’t feel like torturing it out of him.

Y’know that dizzy, falling sensation you get sometimes when you’re falling asleep? Well, that’s where I was when, with a frightening roar, the filthy Nazi rushed into the bedroom with the coal scuttle on his head (which was, in fact, a bronzed Nazi helmet) and a rolled up newspaper in his hand. He scared the wits out of us, but then we laughed as he pretend-thrashed us with the newspaper. Derek sat up at the bottom of the bed and laughed at us till he almost had an asthma attack.

Then my Dad sat down on the bed.

“Guns have only one purpose, to kill. I’ve told you that. That gun can kill dozens of men in less than a minute. You only have to see one man shot to know that guns are wrong. Where did you get it? From t’ yanks?”

“Yes, Dad.” We said.

“Well, I’ll have a word with them tomorrow.”

“But they don’t know we’ve got it, Dad.” I objected.

“It makes no bloody difference. You don’t leave ordnance lying around, especially when there’s kids about.”

“They didn’t leave it lying around, Dad. It was attached to an armored personnel carrier.” I grimaced with honesty.

“How did you get it off, then?”

“Well, the yanks had it part way off, then we dropped another armored personnel carrier on top of it.” It was a relief to get it all out.

“On top of it?” He yelled.

“Well, there’s them ramps, you see, that you can drive up and off the end.” I explained.

He muttered something under his breath and sat there, shaking his head.

“We’ve told you everything, now, Dad. There’s nothing else to come, except we’ve had the gun for over a week and the yanks looked very hard for it. They couldn’t have expected anyone to drop an armored personnel carrier from the sky to get the gun off. They’re nice blokes, Dad. Really nice.” I pleaded.

“Yanks are nice blokes.” Said my Dad. “Very nice. Except in their love for guns and their hatred for colored people. I’ve seen shore patrols come into a bar and beat the crap out of colored blokes with their clubs and the colored blokes were doing nobody any ‘arm. And the gun crime in America. Any nation with any sense at all would outlaw gun ownership. They have more murders in one city in one day than all of England does in five or ten years. I don’t understand how such likeable people can be capable of these things.”

“But they helped us win the war, din’t they, Dad?”

“1939. That’s when World War Two started. And we had to fight Hitler alone until 1941. Then, just when we had the Germans beaten, the bloody Yanks came in and took all the credit. Y’know, we once got a shipment of American supplies, underwear, mainly. You never saw the like; polka dots, bloody stripes, you name it. You never saw such fancy underwear in your life. We were dancing around in it and really having having fun. And you should see their uniforms. All of them had bloody stripes on their sleeves. If you ran into a real officer, it’s a wonder he could lift his bloody arms up, for all the bloody brass. But they looked bloody smart. That’s why all our women fell for ‘em, but then again, that’s bloody women for you.”

“Were they good fighters, Dad?”

“Once they got the knack of it. They took a right bloody pasting in the D-Day landings. Y’know, we told them how to fly their Flying Fortresses in formation and at night, but they wouldn’t listen, till they lost a terrible lot of men. Just like Pearl Harbor. We had listening stations that warned them the Japanese were going to attack, but they’re a bit big headed, see and if they don’t find something out for themselves, they ignore everything from everybugger else.”

I think my Dad was still talking to us when I fell asleep. I love to listen to his voice as I fall asleep.

Everything got smoothed over between us and the yanks. We apologized and promised not drive tanks or other vehicles and not to remove any weaponry. Even with these restrictions, we would say “hi” everyday and, when nobody was around, we’d climb into the vehicles and pretend, since that wasn’t forbidden.

Then, as abruptly as they came, they left, while we were at school, so we didn’t even have a chance to say goodbye to Tex and his friends. I felt let down and I scuffed my shoes across the wasteland, trying to kick up anything to remember them by, but they had cleaned up thoroughly. Despondent, I stomped slowly up the stairs of the first row house to the bedroom we had made our den.

I plonked myself down on the old mattress, laid back and studied the ceiling. For awhile, I had had a link with the outside world. Not just outside the village or outside Dukinfield, but out there, where life was like on T.V. And now it was over. I rolled over, about to cry, but the mattress was lumpy, so I put my hand underneath, to smooth it out. I pulled out a stack of paper. Superman comics! And at the very bottom of the stack, a Playboy magazine! Thanks, Tex.

Pater Familia: Tales of Dukinfield: Acknowledgements

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A note from My Father.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This is the most intimidating part of the book to write, for I shall surely omit a close friend or helper. So let me begin by thanking those deserving souls who are omitted below. No slight is intended.

Meri Bernstein, you’re a terrific agent. Thanks for steering, pulling and pushing me through the publishing process.

And thanks to Nina, about whom a few words are in order. My friend Nina is not big on literary criticism. I think she feels unsure of her ground and, having helped me through the throes of mania and the ravages of depression, she is probably reluctant to risk tipping the balance. Nina is a very caring person, a truth she would admit only to her nine indoor and four outdoor cats.

Nonetheless, we have persevered with each other and, in reading her my stories for our mutual entertainment, I have tried to convince this self-described “non people person” that a critique of a story is more useful to me than an expression of support, at least when I’m not depressed. Poor Nina, I put such conflicting claims on her.

So I read her about ten new stories one night, easing her into the process of criticism with,

“Tell me what you remember about this story.” and

“Tell me what you didn’t understand”. By the last story, one with which I was not happy, I asked,

“So, what did you think?”

“It stunk.” Said Nina, emphatically.

“Er, thank you, but do you think you could be a little more specific?” I asked, constructively.

“It stunk worse than a rancid polecat.” Said Nina, helpfully.

Thanks to my dear friends Paul and Tim, who not only have encouraged me to keep writing, but have raised my spirits when low and kept a watchful eye on me when high.

Thanks to Kathleen, my former business associate and current E-mail reviewer and source of never-ending support.

Thanks in particular to Sherry Chappelle, who coached me in the art and craft of writing at the University of Delaware Academy of Life Long Learning and whose expert opinion encouraged me to pursue publication.

And thanks to my three harshest critics; my wife, Ellen, who keeps me down-to-earth, however much I might resent it; my son, Ben, whose encyclopedic knowledge, sharp wit and innate kindness make him a far better writer than I; and my son, Steven, whose high standards and mature judgment will not allow me to declare a story finished before it is complete.

Finally, thanks to the people, police force and EMT’s of Lewes, Delaware, who rescued me from my suicidal depressions, helped me cope with my tremendous manic urges and piloted me through stormy mental seas into their Harbor of Refuge.

Pater Familia: Tales of Dukinfield: Bedtime

Image by Craig Walkowicz via Flickr

Bedtime

"Now I lay me down to sleep,

I pray the Lord my soul to keep.

If I should die before I wake,

I pray the Lord my soul to take"

Even on days when I don't want to die, I have to pray about dying before I go to bed. And then it's not easy for me to sleep. I know heaven's supposed to be paradise, but grown-ups are too vague about heaven for my liking. And if it's so good, why is my mom crying softly next to me in Grandma's bed. I'm waiting quietly for her to stop. I think Granddad's dead. They'll tell me in good time. Grandma has gone downstairs with Uncle George. I've never seen a man cry before.

"It's my fault. It's my fault" he's crying. It's not his fault. Granddad was an old man of sixty-five and none of them as was in the trenches in the Great War sees it past sixty-five. Uncle George is crying about a wireless, too. He took Granddad a wireless yesterday, so he could listen to Manchester United. They've gone to play football in Munich, in Germany. Maybe if Granddad's dead, the wireless belongs to the hospital, now and that's why Uncle George is upset. I know it cost him a lot of money.

My mum gets up and tells me to stay in bed. I count to a thousand, then pull on my clothes and climb carefully down Grandma's steep, dark stairs. My mum is cuddling her and they are both crying quietly. They are more placid than I had imagined. "Is Granddad dead?" I ask. "Yes, love. Why don't you make some toast and a pot of tea for everybody?". That's my job, making toast and brewing tea. I'm very good at it, my mum says so. Making breakfast at Grandma's is fun, because you make the toast on a toasting fork over the fire and you set the kettle on a stand that you swing in over the fire. The water seems to boil faster than on a gas stove. The kettle stand is part of her massive black fireplace. Grandma's fireplace has an oven and a warming cupboard on the left and a place for drying wood on the right. It has hooks for hanging pots over the fire and big black knobs to work the damper and the grate. It's more than my height in every direction. She used to have a cat that got shut in the oven by mistake.

The man on the wireless is talking about the Munich air disaster and ice on the wings. I only start listening when he mentions Bobby Charlton. He's the young kid with Manchester United. Grandma says, "Shut it off, will you, Edith?" My mum switches it off and I have to ask, "Why" even though I know it would be better to keep quiet.

"There's been an air crash and almost all of the team has been killed. Your Granddad heard it on the wireless and had a heart attack and passed away."

"Does that mean the same as being dead, Mum?"

"Yes, love. It's kinder to say 'passed away'."

I wonder if he'll see Sputnik on his way to heaven. That would be nice. Death would be less frightening if I knew I could ride Sputnik around the world a few times. I've been looking up at night ever since it was launched, but I haven't noticed anything different, even from the school playing field, where it's dark. We've spent most evenings cleaning the school since Granddad got sick. He's the school janitor. I like being able to walk where I want in school without any teachers telling me not to. Sweeping the corridors tires me out, though, because the brush is so wide and heavy.

Sometimes I fall asleep before my Mum and Auntie Ruth have finished cleaning. One night I fell so fast asleep that, when I needed to pee, I dreamt that I went to the boys toilet and peed. But I didn't, I peed in my pants.

Nobody wants the toast I made, so I wake Steven and Derek, to see if they want it. They like to dunk their toast in their tea. It makes the toast taste nice and sweet, but the tea gets grease pools from the butter, around clotted toast crumbs and smudges of jam. Sometimes I dunk my toast in Derek's tea. He doesn't seem to mind.

Once I've got everybody washed and dressed, we set off for Auntie Ruth's. We meet her at the bottom of Chapel Street, hurrying toward Grandma's and crying more like I expected my Mum and Grandma to do. We cross Chapel Street and kick stones up Underwood Street to number thirty-three. At first, there's no answer to the door knocker, then Ian opens the door, crying. I can see Beryl inside, shaking and sobbing. I'm supposed to keep baby Andrew happy.

After I get Steven and Derek and Andrew playing together in the front room, I go to Ian and Beryl in the kitchen.

"Why are you crying?" I ask, secretly proud of myself for being a big boy, but also a little unnerved at the sight of my favorite big cousins crying. Ian explains that it's what you're supposed to do when somebody you love dies. "You think of all the happy memories you have of them and how you're not going to have any more memories and that makes you sad and want to cry".

I give it a little try and I can see that I could make myself cry, but my Dad is always telling me not to cry and for once I don't feel like I have to. I'm going to tell him tonight. He'll be proud of me. I hope.

Auntie Ruth comes back and tells us Grandma doesn't need any little children under her feet, so we're moving back to our house. I can't wait to get back to our toys, but I'm not sure if I'm supposed to be happy. Anyhow, we all put our wellies on and tramp back down Underwood Street toward Grandma's. We stop in to drop Derek off and get instructions from my Mum (feed the dog, make your Dad's tea, don't get into trouble) then continue on over Mayers's brow, down Astley Street and right on Hadfield Street to number ten.

The front door to our house is bright red. Every time I see it, the door says, "RED!" to me. It seems to leave its jamb to say hello. Which makes me feel welcome. The front room is welcoming, too, with our carpet that greets me with, "GREEN!". But when it rains, we have to use the back door and enter unwelcomed.

There are not many days when it doesn't rain and today is no different, so we trudge around the back to the yard gate. The back gate is a dull, dingy green, the green hardly able to hold its own against dull and dingy. It's six feet tall, so there’s a trick to getting over it. Steven holds my hat and coat and I back up to get a good run-up. I run at the gate, which is not easy in wellies, and plant my right foot about half-way up and push upwards, while I reach for the top with both hands. I catch the top of the gate and pull myself up and over, climbing down the other side by putting my foot on the bolt, then dropping to the flags.

I’m proud of my back gate trick, because I'm not a very good jumper. I'm not a very good runner, either. In fact, I'm pretty bad at all sports. I learned the yard gate trick from Rex, my mongrel. He's who discovered that planting your foot in the middle of the gate gives you a second jump. Unless your wellies skid on the slippery wood. Then you do a Wyle E. Coyote.

I open the gate and let Steven in. We keep our coats on and lay a fire. There's no point lighting it until my Dad gets home. He likes to see a fire, but we don’t have much coal. Steven brings the milk in from the step and I find some bacon in the cupboard. The eggs are next to the bread-box with the butter, so everything's ready for my dad's tea. The frying pan's already on the top of the stove, with a nice amount of bacon fat in it, but I add some lard, because my Dad likes plenty of lard. I like cooking with plenty of lard, too, so I can splash it on top of the eggs like my Mum showed me and cook both sides of the egg at once. And after the eggs and bacon are cooked, lots of lard means I can make slices of fried bread.

My Dad walks in through the back door, goes straight to the kitchen sink and splashes water into his eyes. He’s had a flashback. Must’ve been working in a stainless steel boiler. Maybe with the annealer on, too, so he’d be hot to begin with. Then the stainless would reflect all the heat and light from his welding torch back at him from all angles.

He comes into the living room and lies down on our coal cart, only just missing Peggy with his boots.

“Get me a compress, Steven. Neil, take me boots off.” Steve chuckles all the way to the sink.

I try not to gag, but my Dad’s feet smell worse than a dead cat. “Urrgh!” comes out despite myself.

“Sorry, Dad. I tried not to.” He’s very sensitive about his feet. They hurt him and they stink. It might be standing on hot steel plates all day, I don’t know. But I know it embarrasses him. He washes his feet every night.

Steven is laughing so hard at my misfortune, he drops the flannel, but picks it up quickly, rinses it off and brings it in to my Dad.

“Mmmmm, he says through the pain as he lays the cold, wet cloth on his eyes. “That’s better. Feel in me pocket and see if there’s owt there for thee.” Being careful not to jolt him, we rummage through his jacket pockets.

“Matchbox Cars!” yells Steve. My Dad has been bringing us home Matchbox Cars every Friday now for weeks. We jump up and down for awhile and do our best to make Dad feel better. We open the toy drawer and reach out our other Matchbox Cars and line them all up for a race.

Just when the race gets exciting, my Dad takes the flannel off his eyes and asks us to be quiet. “What are you doing with your coats and wellies on, i’ th’ house? Take ‘em off and I’ll light t’ fire. What’s for tea?” he asks.

“I thought egg and bacon would be nice, Dad. I collected the eggs from Grandma’s pen yesterday.” I suggested.

“Would you like some fish and chips?” He teased, knowing what a treat he was offering.

“I’ll get them!” I squealed.

“I’ll butter t’ bread!” shouted Steven. No point squabbling over who does what, when you’re getting fish and chips.

“Make a brew as well, Steven. Neil, get me pudding, chips and peas, and get two sixes o’ chips for you two and you can share a fish.”

“Can we get peas as well, Dad?”

“Aye, go on.”

I shoot out of the house before he can change his mind. Thank God Steve had the sense to keep the momentum going by volunteering to butter the bread.

We sit down at the table, all three of us at the same time. We’re having us tea with us Dad. All eating our favorite food. Together. We talk a little about Granddad, but then just talk about things. We tell my Dad naughty jokes. And he tells others to us! It’s like getting to know what he must have been like as a kid. What he might be like when he’s not being a Dad. What he might be like at work, with his mates. He smiles and laughs and interrupts us sometimes, when he can’t hold it in. And he listens to us, as if we aren’t just kids.

Before we know it, it’s bedtime and none of us wants to let go, but he has to be our Dad again. And we have to be his kids. So we protest a bit and he says, “Let’s not spoil a nice evening”, so we get undressed and fold our clothes in front of the fire. We open the stair door and start up.

“Don’t forget your torches.”

“Yippee! My Mum had confiscated them, because we couldn’t get to sleep with them. We grab the flashlights, “Thanks, Dad!” and run up the stairs. He climbs solidly behind us.

“All right, time for prayers.”

“Now I lay me down to sleep,

I pray the Lord my soul to keep.

If I should die before I wake,

I pray the Lord my soul to take.

Amen.”

“And God bless Granddad.”

“And God bless Granddad.”

“And God bless Granddad.”

“Amen.”

“Amen.”

“Amen.”

We slide under the covers with our torches.

Some Background (if you haven't been scared off)

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My Father Bleeds History (hi Art)

My father intended to write a book, shopped it around to a few people then died suddenly. I then found a magazine (What it is Weekly) willing to publish parts of it but by that time I had lost the files in question. Recent unearthing of old computers for purposes of playing early video games has caused the unearthing of his texts. Incomplete and rough though they may be they are a link to a time and place far nearer than we think. They are the memories that form a thread, however strained and frayed that leads unbroken across the seas and decades. Here is his preface.

FISHING WITH SHARON

About This Book

Contents

Fishing With Sharon is a collection of short stories, vignettes from the life of a family, as seen from the perspective of the eldest of the five children. The family is technically “working poor” but lives in grinding poverty by today’s standards. The stories have the insight of a precocious child and the morbidity of undiagnosed manic depression, yet they also contain the irrepressible glow of optimism and humor borne of innocence and family love.

To date, approximately twenty stories have been drafted, with a further half-dozen in the pipeline. (these along with some poems were never finished B. Their unfinished forms may be posted here at some point) They follow the life of the family during a six-year period in which the boy grows from age six to age twelve, while “the village”, initially a vibrant neighborhood in an area of abandoned mills, is demolished by the local government and the family is relocated. The child escapes both the neighborhood and the town by competitive examination to a boys’ grammar school in a neighboring town. Yet ultimately, the death of an old lady binds him forever to the now-deserted village.

The stories take the form of individual adventures and are largely self-contained. The central plot is subtle and I am still of two minds whether to weave in a stronger central plot, fearing that it may appear to be too contrived. I would welcome your thoughts on this matter. At present, all of the names used in the stories are those of the actual characters and need to be changed.

Readership

This book is enjoyed by teenagers as an adventure story and by adults as an historical chronicle of working class life in post-WWII England. It brings comfort to parents of children known or suspected to suffer from depression or manic depression; and presents a triumph of innocence to the general public.

International sales potential is expected to be significant, although the Lancashire dialect that I have removed for the American market might have to be reinserted for the English market.

(The unexpurgated version is being posted here so some will be in Lancashire dialect some will not. Some names have been changed others have not. If anyone complains I will take down/edit/alter the information as needed as I do not at present have any of the contact information necessary nor to I have any knowledge of who the principal characters in the story are besides my father and his immediate family. Besides, most of the people are unrecognizable or dead.)

New Series:, Pater Familia: Tales of Dukinfield: Fishing with Sharon

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Fishing with Sharon

There have to be fish in here. They’ll like my maggot: a fat bluebottle. His brothers are wrestling in the sawdust of my aluminum bait-tin. My little sister Sharon is bored, but brightens up at the camera, then gets all shy as Mum clicks the shutter. My float is drifting toward a dead dog. Never know when you’ll need a dead dog; once its belly bursts, there’ll be maggots for everybody, provided it doesn’t hit the oil slick. Oil slicks nearby are good; they cut through the bad egg smell of the dog. Also, fish sometimes lie under the oil, basking in its warmth. They don’t taste too chemical if you wash them well. And once you learn how to spot their dorsal fins, they’re easy to net if you’re quick, because they can’t see you coming through the oil. I like oil slicks, but not if they get the dog and kill the maggots. Then the dog’s no good and he’s supposed to be Man’s Best Friend.

On the far bank of the canal is an elder bush. Their flowers smell sweet. They taste good, too, if you dip them in batter and fry them. You can’t pick them all, though, or else grandma shouts at you. And really, it’s stupid to pick them all, because then there’ll be no berries for elderberry wine. And then grandma won’t be able to give us a nip every morning on the way to school. It’s so sweet and warm.

Behind the elder bush is the safe place where me and Susan Ashmore go to soothe each other and snuggle. She’s sweet and warm, too. The warmth of her insides surprised me at first, but it felt comforting and secret, like when your mum tucks you into bed, even though both of you know you’re too old for that. We’ve been best friends since we were eight, even though we live at opposite ends of town. Being top of the class meant the teachers always sat us together and we could whisper and stroke each other while they taught the dunces.

We used to take turns being top of the class by making deliberate mistakes in the Friday test. If we were upset with each other, we’d both get them all right on purpose. So when one of us got a perfect score, we were happy, but if we both got a perfect score, we’d cry. It gave the teachers conniptions.

We talked about failing, but decided we ought to pass our exams for our mums’ and dads’ sake. Now Susan has gone to the girls’ grammar school in Dukinfield, while I have to take the bus to the boys’ grammar school in Hyde. I haven’t seen her in almost a year. I wish we had a telephone or a motor car. Maybe I’ll get a bike next Christmas.

Anyhow, what I was going to say is, there’s an old cotton mill behind the elder bush too, where a gang of us stripped the lead off the roof to weigh it in. We had two prams full, but as we were struggling to steer them along the towpath we saw two coppers coming, so we dumped the whole lot into the canal, right across from where I’m fishing, now. We ran back across the top of the lock gate, where the coppers were scared to follow.

We laughed at them struggling to pull the prams back out. Silly buggers broke the handles, so we had to come back at night with our grappling hooks. Same ones we use for dead dogs. Same ones we use for German helmets, gas masks and other treasure. And Mrs. Mc Arthur. I used to run errands for Mrs. Mc Arthur for a shilling, but my mum told me it was too much, so we settled on sixpence. It was hard for me to do, since I’d already talked her down from two shillings, but I felt responsible for her, so I kept going.

Then the council condemned our street. Talked about us having unsafe gas lights in our houses, unsanitary tippler toilets outside, coal grates inside, no hot water and zinc bathtubs hanging on nails in the ginnels behind the houses. We got two hundred pound for our house, but nobody in the village got enough to buy a new house, so there was this slow-motion explosion of people scattering out to the council estates. All my friends went away. Except Mrs. Mc Arthur, who hadn’t got a council house or an old-age home yet. She couldn’t walk very well, and the shops had closed down and left, so I stopped by every morning before school to get her list and shopped for her after school.

It was a long walk to the shops that were still open and I started to miss a day here and there. Gradually, I began to ignore her and spend more time with the boys from my new school in Hyde. I won a prize for scholarship in my first term. In my second term, they found her clothes neatly folded on the canal bank, with her purse in her shoes. She kept her underwear on. Her bra only came off when one of the grappling hooks came out of her shoulder. It was indecent, the way they towed her in like a barge, that one breast with its own bow wave in front and lots of little fish following behind, rooting at her, like she was abandoning all her little babies. I shouted at the men to cover her up, but they couldn’t and I was ashamed. I tried not to, but I cried when they lifted her out and the bones pulled up through her flesh like an overcooked chicken. I washed my hook and went behind the elder bush to cry.

I’m fishing here with Sharon because the canal is the only place I want to go to. I think Mum sent Sharon to keep an eye on me because I’m sad again. Maybe Mum’s taking our photograph just to get me to smile. She’s saying “cheese”, yet she looks frightened and this picture’s so very important to her. If she doesn’t get it, I think she’ll cry. That’s why I’m smiling, so she’ll have a nice picture of me in my thinking place. I think I’ll remember Mrs. Mc Arthur even when I’m thirty, no, forty.

The post that was supposed to be about strip clubs

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so I am supposed to blog about my recent strip club experience. However, I figured it would be wisest to wait until after the guest of honor has been solidly married and its too late.
So now, Ventrue Theater courtesy of www.biggercheese.com
http://www.biggercheese.com/index.php?comic=815

Sociology

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From www.Stephenfry.com

But as Kipling wrote and Billy Bragg repeated, what do they of England know that only England know? My travels in the last year or so have taken me to Mexico, Brazil, Malaysia, Madagascar, Uganda, Kenya, New Zealand, Indonesia and, more importantly for this occasion, to every one of the 50 states of the USA. I was in America for the run up to the presidential election, but for the ballot itself I was in Kenya, the homeland of course of Barack Obama’s father. I asked a Kenyan with whom we were working whether he was pleased that America looked to be about to have its first black president, and one of Kenyan extraction at that? ‘Very pleased,’ he replied. ‘But you must remember Mr. Obama’s mother is of European extraction. If Barack Obama had stayed here and been elected as our leader, he could have become Kenya’s first white president.’



sociology is weird

Courts (wall of text) part 1 of 5

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The Courts.
The four changeling courts give protection and power to changelings. The true Fey understand the world in a very specific way. In the primal chaos, things are either always the same and immune to the change of their environment or once they change they are changed. A dog may turn into a lamppost and that lamppost into a lemur but it will likely never turn into a dog again, there are so many other shapes it could be. The idea of Cyclical change is as bizarre and alien to the Fey as time travel paradox is to humans, Some of they Fey may talk about it but they don't get it and definitely wouldn't know how to go about making one. The courts may not like each other and may fight over succession or the order of passage of power but all of them know deeply that whatever power they have they must regularly pass to their rivals in the other courts lest they all fall. The Wheel of the seasons may turn forward or backward or out of order but it must turn.
Each court has a virtue associated with it. Winter is Temperance, Summer exemplifies Valor, Spring drinks deeply of Compassion and Fall draws their strength from their Conviction. In order learn the Fleeting contracts of a court you must be a member of a court of have a court's favor of 4 or higher. Every rank can bestow a number of points of favor equal to their rank. To become a member of a court one must have 5 points of favor from that court. To rise in rank in a court one is either promoted by someone of Rank 4 or higher or earns their place by making pacts with the spirits of the seasons themselves. This is a difficult and dangerous process.
Ephemeral court members have no rank in the court, not even a rank of 0, they can be ephemeral members of several courts and their ephemeral contracts will continue to function for as long as they have a single point of court favor in the appropriate court. Ephemeral powers return when favor returns.
Eternal court members have access to all ephemeral contracts and access to eternal contracts equal to their level of rank. To be ennobled of a rank the character must have that court's governing virtue equal to the rank they are gaining. not all of those with virtues at such levels gain rank, and once a character gains a rank their virtues might fall due to trauma they will not lose rank for this drop in virtue although they are encouraged to maintain a virtue equal to their rank.
In Delaware in specific, the Court of Diamond has decreed that those that Host a Freehold are a rank higher while they host. Meaning whomever leads a Corroborative has their rank increased by one until the next Corroborre. This increase of rank can only take place if the changeling to be increased has an appropriate virtue at the appropriate level.
All courts must obey the right of rescue, No matter what court another belongs to, they are bound by oath to rescue a member of a court from kidnapping from anything be if Fey, mortal Police, or whatever else may kidnap a changeling >cough< Lasombra >cough<. There are seven other laws, unique to each court that all members must swear to. Their oaths are not binding with glamour but they may as they see fit take each court's code as a Code of Honour as per the Vampire Codes of Honor with the virtue protection and willpower that comes with said codes.
Each rank has its own titles for each court as follows:
summer winter spring fall
0 - citizen, apprentice, lantern, Acolyte
1 - knight, journeyman, Midwife, deacon
2 - baron, Master, Nurse, brother
3 - count, Doctor, Doctor, father
4 - Duke, Enlightened, Cadecus, Grandfather
5 - Prince, Sophont, Angel, Patriarch

As a note - if one takes these as codes of honor, their eight rules are the rule of rescue and these other seven codes. With a code of honor, the changeling gets 2 willpower per night to spend in the defense of their code. violating their code provokes a challenge vs the virtue of their court or else lose a point of clarity.