Litterary Aillusions

hmmm... ahmhh... um.. hmm.

my recent flit flight fight into the world of the imaginary imagination has led me farther astray from my usual astral... uh... astraying. yes. i have brandished out from astrophysics into hitherto uncharted charts... specifically, to poetry. um. and in the course of that process i have done my research. yes. and the advice i got from the googlesphere and the wikimagi and the blogobloggers is: poetry is about self expression. expressing your self. ok.

and so i have written a poem, which i believe expresses and illuminates my most innermost being self. and this is the poem, which i will share with you (the poem, that is...). i believe it is quite successful, and so i probably shan't need to compose another. which is a relief, to me at least, and now i can get back to my celestial investigations. so anyway, here it is, my poem:

Kapok.

Kapok, kapok, kapok.

Kay-Pok. Kapok, kapok... kapok.


Kapok! Kapok kapok!! Ka-
pok? Kaaaaaayyyyy...
                             Pok!

Kapockapockapockapokpokpokpok. Kapok.

Kapok, capoc, kapok: kapok.

KAYpok! KaPOCK! KAPOK KAPOK KAPOK!!!

Kapok.
Kapok.
Kapok.

so there it is. i am. since it is an expression of my most inner self. there you are.

they say that if you put a million monkeys in front of a million typewriters and have them all type, they will eventually produce the sonnets of Shakespeare. the internet has not actually disproved them, but apparently it will take longer than we thought. but, i'm doing my part, eh?

more later,
Mr. Eddie

PS: also i should mention: i prefer blake to milton, and basho to pound, and shel silverstein to that damnd cat who wouldn't recognize a poem if it bit her on the pussywillow. just so you know. i've done my homework.
M.E.

Cogitation vs. Illumination

hmm hmmm hm… yes. Well I've been very very busy, yes I have. There is much work to do, and I am doing my part. No need to thank me, I am just one humble servant. uummm uhmmm.

First off I must tell you, I have become interested in constellations. Surprised? I admit, I am too. I had always thought about constellations as mere projections of the human imagination on the unimaginable cosmos, images imagined where no images are actually are. I mean, imaginary. Which sounds like mirage, I think. Anyway, they’re probably not really there...

Worse yet, I thought, was that they probably actually obscure the true nature of the universe, instead of illuminating it. That’s obscure, from L. obscurus "covered over, dark, obscure, indistinct," from ob "over" + -scurus "covered." Of course. Anyway, like take the crab nebulae, for example:


Anyone can see that it's not a crab. No pinchers, no shell, probably bigger than any crab I've ever met--like the one that damnd cat keeps bringing in here for latin lessons. But the point is, because people call it a crab nebulae they look at it and see a crab. Instead of a nebulae. Which is sad, really.

So anyway, I was thinking about this, and going over lists of constellations, and it's kind of interesting what you people imagine. First, there seems to be lots of birds, reptiles, fish. Also dogs, bears, a crab (what's with the crab thing?), a sheep, a goat, a fox, cats (1 lynx, 2 lions), a giraffe.... but... BUT-- NO MONKEYS!!! By now, I should not be surprised. You got a constellation of a freakin' Chemical Furnace, and a Poop Deck for crying out loud… but not one measly ape. Sorry to get worked up here, but Sheesh.

So after I calmed down, I decided: this is actually a great opportunity. The problem of the undiscovered primate constellation. Because obviously there has to be one, the Great Monkey in the Sky, it just hasn’t been discovered yet. Or hadn’t been discovered yet. But never fear, Eddie is here, and I have brought all of my resources to bear on the problem.

It turned out to be pretty easy. Thanks to the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (http://www.sdss.org/), with it's large image database and powerful ability to combine spectra from different sources, coupled with my shrewd intuition, I quickly found it. Here ya go:



Simia Major. I won't insult your intelligence by connecting the dots for you. Just use your imaginationing. Just glad to do my small part, to help.

more later,
Mr. Eddie

sensitive

umhmm.. hmm... yes i am sensitive. on the one hand, this aids in my research. yes. i think the lines between art and science are not so precisely drawn. um. and so while we often talk about the sensitive artist, i think also about the sensitive scientist. einstein was sensitive, and that guy in Omaha who can sense geomagnetic disturbances with his hands...

and i am sensitive, too. it is a blessing, and yet it has it's drawbacks. i get insights, but i also get hurt sometimes too. like when i got this handwritten note in my fortune cookie:


at first i was frightened. then i was sad. who is this ren person, and why is he so upset? and is he upset with me, or some other monkey? am i in danger? is he on some kind of crusade to terrorize monkeys by poisoning the fortune-cookie pool with hate mail? so i tried to find out. perhaps it is this person:

but why would he say this? we have so much in common. i would like to have a cup of coffee with him, discuss plasma physics, and find out what is troubling him. i would also help him spell particle.

i try to be friendly and helpful. but sometimes this is not enough. perhaps he is another sensitive scientist, and (like me) his genius is not recognized. i will recognize his genius, perhaps that will help.

please be kind to all beings. there is room in the world of science for kindness.

more later,
eddie

End of da woild

umm... hmmm..

i'm very very concerned, about sunspot production.

"The sun has been laying low for the past couple of years, producing no sunspots..."

yes that's what they said, NO SUNSPOTS! none. zero. zip.

but that's not all... it's not just a lack of sunspot production, like a baseball player going thru a slump, or a banana tree in the offseason... no... it's worse than that. It's the sun is DEAD.

"It continues to be dead," said Saku Tsuneta with the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan, program manager for the Hinode solar mission. "That's a small concern, a very small concern."

I don't know why that's a small concern. I disagree with that. I think it's a big concern. Dead sun. Big big big. At least I'm concerned, you betcha.

The last cycle reached its peak in 2001 and is believed to be just ending now, Longcope said. The next cycle is just beginning and is expected to reach its peak sometime around 2012. Today's sun, however, is as inactive as it was two years ago, and scientists aren't sure why.

"It's a dead face," Tsuneta said of the sun's appearance.

Dead Face. Yup, that's what he said, and I can confirm this. I've been doing detail observations using my pinhole projector (don't EVER stare directly into the sun, kids, or your tail will fall off), every afternoon. Jack comes in and helps me with the setup, it's very elaborate. And we observe and observe, and I'm here to tell you: No spots. Spotless. Also, no stripes. And, no checkerboards. Nope. Nuttin. I have corroborated my esteemed colleague's findings, and will be publishing my results soon. Dead as a doornail. Dead as a dodo. Dead as a Monty Python stuffed parrot. My theory: the only reason it's still up in the sky is 'cause it's nailed to its perch.

And if you think it's easy to nail a star to a freshwater fish, you're crazy.

fretfully,
Mr. Eddie.

damn their eyes

hmmm hum... so now i am so sad.

umhmmm... so i went to the anagram server and tried my name. i thought it might be nice, or funny, or revelatory, you know? Like "Astronomers" = "No more stars"... or "A telescope" = "To see place"...

and, and... the very first anagram was "a misdirected Sophistry"!?!

which is a big word. so i looked up Sophistry and it said "sophistry n : a deliberately invalid argument displaying ingenuity in reasoning in the hope of deceiving someone".

alas. ANOTHER CONSPIRACY AGAINST ME!!! but i will not break! no. i will just, uh... not go back to the anagram server, that's for sure.

more later
dejected eddie

I'll tell you where to find a Black Hole...

humm... hmm

Locating black holes in distant galaxies... who cares! I could do that with my tail tied behind my back! Anyone could take an out-of-focus picture of bloodcells, draw some blue circles on it, and call it a... a... Locating Black Holes in Distant Galaxies.

I want to find black holes located in OUR galaxy... in OUR Solar System... in OUR OWN BACK YARD!!! Those are the ones that are gonna suck in all the visible light i was planning on using to gaze at... at... at things i was gonna gaze at. THOSE are the ones that are gonna drag you and me and that damned cat into the terrible singular abyss leaving nothing but a gamma ray squib. And... and... if they'd just let me have a crack at that Spittle Space Telescope gizmo, or whatever it's called, I COULD DO IT!!!

OOh, woe is us. Species-ist discrimination against simians again. And who suffers? We all do... you will, especially when some surprise black hole pops up in your closet and sucks your favorite accordion down its 4-dimensional gullet, never to wheeze again...

more later,
mr. eddie