Blog- friend Cat Urbigkit is a rancher, sheepherder, and dog breeder who runs stock in southwestern Wyoming and writes wonderful children’s books. She recently told me a tale of the rivalry between a young stock- protection dog and a burro with the same job over who would control the sheep, especially five sheep the young …
Pictureblogging 1: Dogs
Some tazi shots: Vladimir’s enormous five- month old Urtak in Virginia, closely related to ours: And the very different year- old Russian “Semirichenski” male Timur– a bit like our Lashyn– playing with him. Good new genes. Lash and Kyran’s gorgeous daughter Nemrah at Monica’s in the East mountains. I hear someone offered John Burchard an …
Surrender Ye Swords
Last month my friend Buddy completed his master’s degree in art history, presenting a thesis on sword making and the weapon’s eventual supplanting by firearms. As these things happen now, a morning radio announcer from Ireland found Buddy’s thesis online and asked him to comment on the recent banning of samurai swords by the UK. …
Homo erectus and Vitamin D
Another very interesting article from John Noble Wilford of the NY Times. Researchers in Turkey have found evidence of tuberculosis in the cranium of a 500,000 year-old Homo erectus fossil. This sets a record by several hundred thousand years for the oldest known evidence for TB – the previous examples were only a few thousand …
Thumbs Up
Bumpersticker observed last night: “Two Opposable Thumbs Up for Evolution!” Wish I’d had my camera!
Two Quick Links
Via Margory: Bill Buford’s excellent New Yorker review of the continuing dilemma we omnivores face is now on line. I have two of the cookbooks and recommend both, especially the Fearnley- Whittingstall. But why on earth does the third cost $130+?? A good Buford quote: “For all the disarray, there is a coherent ideology. It …
Dog Novels for Kids
A curious phenomenon of the thirties, forties, and fifties was the proliferation of dog novels for kids or rather what would be called “young adults” these days. They may just have been a product of a more “country” time– they were utterly un- pc, generally very good in natural history, and dealt forthrightly with issues …
Real Influences: Travel Writing
While reading Douglas Botting’s 2000 bio of Gerald Durrell I came upon these lines: “Young men woke up to find that the world was once again their oyster, and not just a place you went on a troopship. At almost the same time that the Durrell brothers’ two books werepublished [1953] a galaxy of talened …
Links
A wonderful ancient sculpture. All- female lizard clone species. Several of these are common in the Magdalena area. Terrierman talks about veterinarian bill- padding, kickbacks etc. Luckily ours is an old- fashioned ranch woman– but I have seen both the demand for pre- op bloodwork and the referral kickback. Did a comet contribute to the …
Darren’s Card
Darren says his old Killer Eagle Christmas card is unavailable in my archives. Must fix!