Oh, no, you didn't

I'm watching this old episode of Hawaii 5-O and McGarrett just had the gall to say this to someone who had just told him that he didn't want to cooperate: "That's right; I shouldn't even be here. I take orders, too, and it can get very unpleasant for me when I don't obey them. Especially in this case. But I want Mazzini's killer so badly that I'm willing to put neck on the chopping block." With the distinct though unspoken unlike you hanging in the air afterwards.

The thing is - he was talking to a Russian - a Soviet citizen who had just explained why he couldn't cooperate - what was waiting for him, "not a political man", when he got home.

And McGarrett actually had the balls to compare his getting raked over the coals to 15 years in a gulag. Man.

Blog Day

Hmmm. Find five new blogs and recommend them. Okay...

Brand new to me is Not Exactly Rocket Science: "my small attempt to celebrate science and to make it interesting and fun, by giving jargon, confusion and elitism a solid beating with the stick of good writing"
Fairly new to me are Wishydig, a good blog about language and linguistics,
and Babel's Dawn, Edmund Blair Bolles' blog "exploring the origins of speech" (note, speech, not Language),
and Zenobia: Empress of the East: "Exploring Zenobia's World. The Incredible Rise and Fall of the City of Palmyra",
and lastly (though these are in no particular order), and I'm not even sure it counts but wotthehell as Mehibatel remarked, A Don's Life, commentary "on both the modern and the ancient world" by "a professor in classics at Cambridge and classics".

So there's five for you. I hope something pleases you!

This was too predictable

You Are 100% Feminist

You are a total feminist. This doesn't mean you're a man hater (in fact, you may be a man). You just think that men and women should be treated equally. It's a simple idea but somehow complicated for the world to put into action.

Are You a Feminist?

Now you know... I hope

And speaking of Katrina, Paul Krugman writes in today's NY Times (behind the paywall, which I pay for, so here):

Today, much of the Gulf Coast remains in ruins. Less than half the federal money set aside for rebuilding, as opposed to emergency relief, has actually been spent, in part because the Bush administration refused to waive the requirement that local governments put up matching funds for recovery projects — an impossible burden for communities whose tax bases have literally been washed away.

On the other hand, generous investment tax breaks, supposedly designed to spur recovery in the disaster area, have been used to build luxury condominiums near the University of Alabama’s football stadium in Tuscaloosa, 200 miles inland.

But why should we be surprised by any of this? The Bush administration’s response to Hurricane Katrina — the mixture of neglect of those in need, obliviousness to their plight, and self-congratulation in the face of abject failure — has become standard operating procedure. These days, it’s Katrina all the time.

Consider the White House reaction to new Census data on income, poverty and health insurance. By any normal standard, this week’s report was a devastating indictment of the administration’s policies. After all, last year the administration insisted that the economy was booming — and whined that it wasn’t getting enough credit. What the data show, however, is that 2006, while a good year for the wealthy, brought only a slight decline in the poverty rate and a modest rise in median income, with most Americans still considerably worse off than they were before President Bush took office.

Most disturbing of all, the number of Americans without health insurance jumped. At this point, there are 47 million uninsured people in this country, 8.5 million more than there were in 2000. Mr. Bush may think that being uninsured is no big deal — “you just go to an emergency room” — but the reality is that if you’re uninsured every illness is a catastrophe, your own private Katrina.

Yet the White House press release on the report declared that President Bush was “pleased” with the new numbers. Heckuva job, economy!

Mr. Bush’s only concession that something might be amiss was to say that “challenges remain in reducing the number of uninsured Americans” — a statement reminiscent of Emperor Hirohito’s famous admission, in his surrender broadcast, that “the war situation has developed not necessarily to Japan’s advantage.” And Mr. Bush’s solution — more tax cuts, of course — has about as much relevance to the real needs of the uninsured as subsidies for luxury condos in Tuscaloosa have to the needs of New Orleans’s Ninth Ward.

But Krugman has more to say than just "business as usual with W". Here's the point - and it's substantial:

There’s a powerful political faction in this country that’s determined to draw exactly the wrong lesson from the Katrina debacle — namely, that the government always fails when it attempts to help people in need, so it shouldn’t even try. “I don’t want the people who ran the Katrina cleanup to manage our health care system,” says Mitt Romney, as if the Bush administration’s practice of appointing incompetent cronies to key positions and refusing to hold them accountable no matter how badly they perform — did I mention that Mr. Chertoff still has his job? — were the way government always works.

And I’m not sure that faction is losing the argument. The thing about conservative governance is that it can succeed by failing: when conservative politicians mess up, they foster a cynicism about government that may actually help their cause.

Future historians will, without doubt, see Katrina as a turning point. The question is whether it will be seen as the moment when America remembered the importance of good government, or the moment when neglect and obliviousness to the needs of others became the new American way.

I happen to agree with Mitt: I don't want this incarnation of the GOP running the health care system, either.

But here's where I differ: I don't think those people are predestined to run the show forever.

I just hope we can clean house better in 2008 than we did in 2007.

Carnival of the Liberals

The Carnival of the Liberals is up at Truth in Politics. Enjoy!

Who speaks for the trees?

Along the road in front of my apartment building is a row of Japanese lantern trees. In June they're covered in small yellow flowers whose scent hangs heavy in the thick air and they hum with bees, and birds nest inside the trees. In July the seed pods come out, vaguely wedge-shaped and pale whitish green. In late July the pods have begun to grow darker, and by this time of year they're a deep red-brown, covering the trees.

















Until this year. The management company that runs the property has mutilated the Japanese lantern trees. The resident manager says they felt the trees were blocking the sign - which is ridiculous, as you can see:



And even if they had been, it would have only been those near the sign, not the rest of them, not the whole row of them. So now the trees stand with about a third of their branches left, and next June the bees will be in trouble, and the birds will feel odd about nesting in such naked branches.




In my opinion, this mutilation was completely unnecessary and unjustifiable.

Katrina - Two Years On

It's the second anniversary of Katrina - and I'd like to recommend that you head over to The Intersection, Chris Mooney's (author of Storm World) home blog and read a couple of posts, one by co-blogger Sheril Kirshenbaum called ...but We ALL Knew Katrina Was Coming!, which is about

Professor Joe Kelley [who] is a nationally renowned marine geologist whose scientific expertise on the Louisiana coastline has long been sought by private and government organizations. Surely he knew what he was talking about, not to mention he even used to be a professor at the University of New Orleans. So evidently, there was something to all this coastal geology.

In 1984, Joe wrote 'Living With the Louisiana Shore' predicting much of what has come to pass. Obviously, for more reasons than Orwell, we should have paid better attention to what we were warned about that year. The science and history of hurricanes in Louisiana sounded terrifying and it was obvious to me - and everyone in the room - that New Orleans didn't stand a chance.

Sheril makes it clear that this is much older than the current administration... and then you can read the four-part post by Chris himself which is probably the best reading on the topic this week, a series that pulls no punches:

Hurricane Katrina Lessons, Part I: Learning to Live With Scientific Uncertainty
Hurricane Katrina Lessons, Part II: It's Bigger Than New Orleans
Hurricane Katrina Lessons, Part III: Why Aren't We Studying Changing Risks?
Hurricane Katrina Lessons, Part IV: It's the President, Stupid

Saturn's rings and three moons

Saturn and its rings show off three moons in this photo from Cassini, taken edge-on to the rings with the shadows across the northern hemisphere.

Titan is the large one above the ringplane. "Next" to it is Enceladus, actually on the other side of the rings and much closer to Cassini, and bright, so bright. The third moon is much harder to see (you'll probably have to select the image for a larger view) - tiny Epimetheus is out at the far left of the shot, outside the rings and level with them.

Check out the Cassini site for details.

Happy Birthday, Mary

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, born today in 1797 and married to Percy; she's best known for Frankenstein, or, The Modern Prometheus although The Last Man (about the end of humanity due to a plague) is probably a better book.

HappyBirthday, Molly

Today in Monterey, California, in 1944 Molly Ivins was born.

“Although it is true that only about 20 percent of American workers are in unions, that 20 percent sets the standards across the board in salaries, benefits and working conditions. If you are making a decent salary in a non-union company, you owe that to the unions. One thing that corporations do not do is give out money out of the goodness of their hearts.”

Happy Birthday, Ernest

Today in 1871 in Spring Grove, New Zealand, Ernest Rutherford - who famously said: "All science is either physics or stamp collecting."

His work took place in the early days of nuclear physics - he discovered the structure of the atom the cause of radioactivity (atomic decay), and alpha and beta radiation. He was the first person to transmute matter (nitrogen into oxygen) and he figured out the principle of half-lives and radioactive dating. But when he won the Nobel Prize - in 1908 - it was categorized as Chemistry.

far-left loon? or mainstream? YOU decide - not them

ABC took down their poll when Kucinich won. And an independent poll showed that "58% of 150,000 voters chose Kucinich when choosing on the issues, not the candidates. Hillary and Obama resonated with around 3%. If Dennis resonates most with the mainstream, then why is he being dismissed as a far-left loon by the mainstream media?" The guy in the The Largest Minority video thinks it's because ABC aka Disney "loves" us.

I think it's because over the last quarter of a century, or more, the mainstream media has abetted the GOP in driving the so-called "center" so far to the right that someone like Kucinich is perceived as a far-left loon. Honestly - my brother thinks Hillary Clinton is a liberal. A liberal. It makes me laugh... or cry. (And "liberal" is of course a dirty word - it means "Commie". (Hillary is a Commie? Communists everywhere are speechless.))

I fear for my country sometimes, but it's good to know that if the ballot had a list of positions and no names, a man like Kucinich could win.

Unfortunately, it's the names people will see. And the media is assiduously marginalizing most of the Democrats, leaving us with the Big Three, anointed by ... well, by whom? Not the people, that's for sure.

Don't get your news just from ABC/Disney, CNN, MSNBC, and Fox. Read independent sources. Make up your own mind. And get involved.

The poor get sicker, too...

And there's more.

The Census Bureau’s report on the state of American health insurance was as disturbing as its statistics on poverty and income. The bureau reported a large increase in the number of Americans who lack health insurance, data that ought to send an unmistakable message to Washington: vigorous action is needed to reverse this alarming and intractable trend.

The number of uninsured Americans has been rising inexorably over the past six years as soaring health care costs have driven up premiums, employers have scaled back or eliminated health benefits and hard-pressed families have found themselves unable to purchase insurance at a reasonable price. Last year, the number of uninsured Americans increased by a daunting 2.2 million, from 44.8 million in 2005 to 47.0 million in 2006. That scotched any hope that the faltering economic recovery would help alleviate the problem.

...

Sadly, the one area where the nation had made progress — reducing the number of uninsured children — took a turn for the worse. The number of uninsured children under 18 dropped steadily and significantly from 1999 to 2004, thanks largely to an expansion in coverage of low-income children under two programs operated jointly by the states and the federal government, Medicaid and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program. Then last year the number of uninsured children jumped more than 600,000 to reach 8.6 million.

And we know what the current president and his party think about the SCHIP, don't we?

The rich get richer ... you know the drill

The NYTimes has an editorial today that's sort of a "duh" moment (my emphasis):

The Census Bureau reported yesterday that median household income rose 0.7 percent last year — it’s second annual increase in a row— to $48,201. The share of households living in poverty fell to 12.3 percent from 12.6 percent in 2005. This seems like welcome news, but a deeper look at the belated improvement in these numbers — more than five years after the end of the last recession — underscores how the gains from economic growth have failed to benefit most of the population.

The median household income last year was still about $1,000 less than in 2000, before the onset of the last recession. In 2006, 36.5 million Americans were living in poverty — 5 million more than six years before, when the poverty rate fell to 11.3 percent.

...

The gains against poverty last year were remarkably narrow. The poverty rate declined among the elderly, but it remained unchanged for people under 65. Analyzed by race, only Hispanics saw poverty decline on average while other groups experienced no gains.

The fortunes of middle-class, working Americans also appear less upbeat on closer consideration of the data. Indeed, earnings of men and women working full time actually fell more than 1 percent last year.

This suggests that when household incomes rose, it was because more members of the household went to work, not because anybody got a bigger paycheck. The median income of working-age households, those headed by somebody younger than 65, remained more than 2 percent lower than in 2001, the year of the recession.

Over all, the new data on incomes and poverty mesh consistently with the pattern of the last five years, in which the spoils of the nation’s economic growth have flowed almost exclusively to the wealthy and the extremely wealthy, leaving little for everybody else.

Standard measures of inequality did not increase last year, according to the new census data. But over a longer period, the trend becomes crystal clear: the only group for which earnings in 2006 exceeded those of 2000 were the households in the top five percent of the earnings distribution. For everybody else, they were lower.

This stilted distribution of rewards underscores how economic growth alone has been insufficient to provide better living standards for most American families. What are needed are policies to help spread benefits broadly — be it more progressive taxation, or policies to strengthen public education and increase access to affordable health care.

Unfortunately, these policies are unlikely to come from the current White House. This administration prefers tax cuts for the lucky ones in the top five percent.

But we already knew that, didn't we - that is, those of us down here in lower 95%...

Happy Birthday, Preston

Preston Sturges was born today in Chicago in 1898. The first man ever to write and direct a film - and boy howdy, what films. Classics still funny today:

The Great McGinty
Christmas in July
The Palm Beach Story
The Lady Eve
Sullivan's Travels
Hail the Conquering Hero
The Miracle of Morgan's Creek

The New AG

Glenn Greenwald has an important post on Gonzales's replacement. Among other things, he says (my emphasis):

That is not going to happen if the Democrats allow the confirmation of one of the ostensibly less corrupt and "establishment-respected" members of the Bush circle -- Michael Chertoff or Fred Fielding or Paul Clement or some Bush appointee along those lines. The new Attorney General must be someone who is not part of that rotted circle at all -- even if they are supposedly part of the less rotted branches -- since it is that circle which ought to be the subject of multiple DOJ investigations...

Congressional Democrats, insulting the intelligence of their own supporters, have repeatedly claimed to have trusted the Bush administration and its appointees only to be "betrayed" time and again -- they were "betrayed" by allowing the confirmation of Alito and Roberts to the Supreme Court based on false assurances that they would respect precedent; they were "betrayed" again by the agreement on the Military Commissions Act between the White House and Graham/Warner/McCain only to then have the agreement modified severely by last-minute changes; they were "betrayed" again by trusting Mike McConnell on the FISA deal; and they even claim to have been "betrayed" by supporting the confirmation of Gonzales himself based upon assurances at his confirmation hearing that he understood and would honor his independent role as Attorney General.

That excuse is not going to work again. Relying on assurances from some current Bush appointee that they will act independently is woefully and self-evidently insufficient. Only a truly outside figure, one who is entirely independent of the Bush circle, should be acceptable.

Pressuring Senate Democrats right away on this is vital.

He's right.

So, if you have a Democratic Senator, write them now and write them often. It doesn't matter that there are only 49 (48 till Johnson is back) because all they need is 40. So there are no excuses.

Who does this?

Today's Luann had a funny idea totally ruined by pragmatics:



Who does that? If he'd written "CHAPTER 5 7-9" the joke would have worked. But who wouldn't have written "5-9"???? Who says "I hope you all read chapter 5, and 6-9"????

Better get back into town, boys

According to AP, Alberto Gonzales has resigned. Stephen Lee Myers reports for the NY Times that he actually resigned Friday and that

His decision was not announced immediately announced, the official added, until after the president invited him and his wife to lunch at his ranch near here.

Mr. Bush has not yet chosen a replacement but will not leave the position open long, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because the resignation had not yet been made public.

Man.

While it's about time - and I hope they don't let him off the hook - I really hope the Senate gets back into town and reconvened before Bush makes a recess appointment.

Those things ought to be done away with. For crying out loud, this isn't the 19th century; the whole Senate can be back in 24 hours if need be. It's just ripe for abuse - and this president has done so, more than once. (And yes I know he promised he wouldn't, so that Reid didn't have to keep the Senate convened over August, but has he given us any reason to take his word for anything? When you believe you're a warrior for the Good, lying is just another weapon in your holy armory.)

Happy Birthday, Master Kung

K'ung-fu-tzu, or Kǒng Fūzǐ - Confucius to the West (his name was Latinised by Matteo Ricci when his teachings were introduced to Europe - everybody's name was; think of Copernicus) - was born this day in 551 BCE

The man who in view of gain thinks of righteousness; who in the view of danger is prepared to give up his life; and who does not forget an old agreement however far back it extends - such a man may be reckoned a complete man.

Monday Science Links

This week's science links:

• Chris at Creek Running North tells us a story about a River of fire, river of stone
  


• John Hawks at his Anthropology Weblog wonders Did Gen Suwa just save paleoanthropology? (the answer is "maybe")


• Jennifer Ouellette at Cocktail Party Physics discourses on Primordial Ooze - non-Newtonian liquids, quicksand, and dry ice.


• John Hawks (yes, again) talks about The Miracle of Compound Interest and why math-avoiding biologists can't get away with it forever.


• Pamela Gay at Star Stryder tells us that Einstein Was Not Wrong - and what she means (and doesn't mean) when she says it.

Enjoy

The Week in Entertainment

Film: Once - and I loved it! I somehow wasn't prepared for the enormous amount of music in the movie, but Glen Hansard is an excellent songwriter and it all works. This isn't a huge movie, it doesn't have anything spectacular to say - it celebrates doggedness and dreams and hard work. But it does so beautifully.

ps - I see that they're remaking Sleuth. With Michael Caine playing the other role.

DVD: Some The Tick - I do love that show.

TV: The Doctor, of course. Bill Moyers.

Read: Continued with Santa-Khryakus.

Carnival of Maryland

The 14th Carnival of Maryland is up at Tinkerty Tonk: politics, photos, sports, art, antiques, and more! Check it out.

Adding English

Here's an AP article by Erick Gorski about Hispanic churches which makes the point that immigrants learn English, and they do it regularly:

CHICAGO – On Sundays at La Casa del Carpintero, or the Carpenter’s House, they’ve raised twin yellow banners for churchgoers that read “Welcome” and “Bienvenidos.”

As a complement to the regular 11:30 a.m. Spanish service at the independent Pentecostal church, where they’ve worshipped Papi for years, there’s now a 9:30 a.m. English one where the faithful praise God the Father.

While churches from every imaginable tradition have been adding Spanish services to meet the needs of new immigrants, an increasing number of Hispanic ethnic congregations are going the other way – starting English services.

It’s an effort to meet the demands of second- and third-generation Hispanics, keep families together and reach non-Latinos.

Yep. Second and third generation Hispanics - like all immigrants - learn English. As Geoff Nunberg wrote once

English is too useful and important to imagine that any immigrant group would be willing to turn its back on it in order to maintain a marginal, ghettoized existence.

It just doesn't happen.

I cast you in that role

An anonymous commenter over at the Atheist Experience offers this modern version of "And God hardened Pharaoh's heart":

Anon: No matter what you believe God is responsible for the outcome, be it repentance or hardening. I pray in your case it is repentance.

Amazing.

If God is responsible for whether people repent or have their hearts hardened, then in what way is it people's fault? In what way did Pharaoh (much less his people) deserve what happened to them? Though to God's credit he did admit that he was doing it to impress people:

Exodus 7:3-4 And I will harden Pharaoh's heart, and multiply my signs and my wonders in the land of Egypt.But Pharaoh shall not hearken unto you, that I may lay my hand upon Egypt, and bring forth mine armies, and my people the children of Israel, out of the land of Egypt by great judgments. Exodus 10:1-2 And the LORD said unto Moses, Go in unto Pharaoh: for I have hardened his heart, and the heart of his servants, that I might shew these my signs before him: And that thou mayest tell in the ears of thy son, and of thy son's son, what things I have wrought in Egypt, and my signs which I have done among them; that ye may know how that I am the LORD. Exodus 11:9-10 And the LORD said unto Moses, Pharaoh shall not hearken unto you; that my wonders may be multiplied in the land of Egypt. And Moses and Aaron did all these wonders before Pharaoh: and the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart, so that he would not let the children of Israel go out of his land. Exodus 14:1,4, 17-18 And the LORD spake unto Moses, saying, ...And I will harden Pharaoh's heart, that he shall follow after them; and I will be honoured upon Pharaoh, and upon all his host; that the Egyptians may know that I am the LORD. And they did so. ... And I, behold, I will harden the hearts of the Egyptians, and they shall follow them: and I will get me honour upon Pharaoh, and upon all his host, upon his chariots, and upon his horsemen. And the Egyptians shall know that I am the LORD, when I have gotten me honour upon Pharaoh, upon his chariots, and upon his horsemen.

And trust me: if you read Exodus you'll see I took a lot of the "the LORD hardened Pharaoh's heart"s out of that excerpt...

It reminds me of an old Sinfest cartoon


(Granted, I think orthodox Christianity says the devil rebelled against God, but ... isn't this kind of a familiar story by now? God creates someone (devil, Adam, Pharaoh) and then makes him rebel/disobey/refuse to listen) and then punishes him for it. And why? Sinfest's devil puts it like this:


which is exactly the same thing, really, as "that I might shew these my signs before him: And that thou mayest tell in the ears of thy son, and of thy son's son, what things I have wrought in Egypt, and my signs which I have done among them." Isn't it?

But back to Anon - he's seriously saying that if Martin's fate is "hardening" it will be God who "is responsible for the outcome", but Martin who will go to hell.

And Anon will praise God for it.

That is one warped view of life.

Carnival of the Godless

This is a late post because somehow I got out of sync with this carnival! You've probably already seen it, but in case not - Carnival of the Godless has been up at In Defence of Reason for a week now!

I and the Bird 56

I and the Bird #56 is up now at Big Spring Birds - with an appropriate theme of "What I Did On My Summer Vacation". Especially recommended are Wrenaissance's Mother and Child Reunion (bluebirds are certainly brighter than sparrows!) and Ecobirder's Eagle Rescue, but as usual everything's worth reading. Good stories, great pictures ...

Nothing? Or Something?

Here's a good, short video from Davis Fleetwood (the hermit at no cure for that):

Will you be there? If not, will you be somewhere, doing something?

Red and Gray and LBJ

A couple of nice shots, if I do say so myself! Cardinal, mockingbird, and a mob of sparrows.

I passed eighth-grade Spanish!

Wow! My knowledge of other languages paid off - I never actually studied Spanish.

You Passed 8th Grade Spanish

Congratulations, you got 8/8 correct!

Could You Pass 8th Grade Spanish?

Anyone recognize this movie?

I read this in a Russian columnist's writings last fall. I haven't had any luck figuring out what movie he's talking about... Anyone have an idea?

There’s an Italian film where the action takes place in a movie theater. They’re showing a gripping film about a murder. The main character fires a gun from the screen, and in the theater, a member of the audience dies. The scene repeats again, and again there’s a death in the theater. It’s shown a third time—and the same thing happens. And there are no traces of any real murderers! Finally, an investigator comes to a fantastic conclusion: evil is able to materialize itself. If the audience is under the influence of a threatening image, a bullet can come out of nowhere.

Some people will die? We're all going to ...

So Admiral McConnell says:

"The fact we're doing it this way means that some Americans are going to die, because . . . the more we talk about it, the more [the bad guys] will go with an alternative means and when they go to an alternative means, remember what I said..."

Which is just the latest in a line of hand-wringing, fear-mongering speeches about how the most important thing in the universe is staying alive.

I got news for us. Everybody dies. What really matters is how we live.

Do we live like Americans, or do we throw away all our ideals and convictions and just try to eke out mere, (in delicious irony) Darwinian survival? Do we deserve to be saved if we turn into our enemies? As Ben Franklin said, "Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety." Or, as Sarah Vowell put it:

"Whenever I hear the president mention, oh, every 12 minutes, that his greatest responsibility is ''to protect the American people,'' the insufferable civics robot inside my head mutters: ''Actually, sir, your oath, the one with the Bible and the chief justice and the Jumbotron, is to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. For the American people are not mere flesh whose greatest hope is to keep our personal greasy molecules intact; we, sir, are a body politic -- with ideals.''

And another thing...

About that wacky Viet Nam comparison - the president is ignoring the fact that once we finally got out of Viet Nam the country stabilized nicely and become an economically and politically stable place (so stable it could become a player in the area). Sure, it wasn't our dream place (can you say "democratically elected Hamas?"), but it wasn't a chaotic exporter of instability and terror, either. That whole domino thing? Never happened.

I'm still failing to see how the real Viet Nam War - instead of the fantasy one neocons dream about - is relevant.

Santa-Khryakus - Hogfather

I'm now embarked on the Russian translation of Terry Pratchett's Hogfather and so far it's an excellent job - kudos to Mssr Berdennikov and Zhikarentsev!

We can start with the simpler (hah!) things, like the names. To begin with the title - Санта-Хрякус (Santa-Khryakus) for Hogfather - khryak is a boar, and the 'santa' plus the -us catch the 'Father Christmas' analogy; -us is an affectionate suffix, as well.

Then Наверн Чудакулли (Navern Chudakulli) for Mustrum Ridcully - Chudak is an eccentric and Ridcully suggests 'ridiculous', while Navern is a slightly cropped version of the word meaning "for certain" so it echoes the "must" in Mustrum and yet still looks like a name. Archchancellor Weatherwax becomes Ветровоск (Vetrovosk) which is more like "Windwax" but works better with the sounds of his name. Susan Sto-Helit is Сьюзен Сто Гелитская (Syuzen Sto-Helitskaya), and the addition of the adjectival ending to her surname elevates the style, which is appropriate for a duke's daughter.

And then Чайчай (Chaichai) for Teatime - with Тчайтчай (Tchai-Тchai) for his "Teh-ah-ti-meh" pronunciation of his name.

Amusingly, when Jack Frost makes his cameo appearances, they call him Дед Мороз (Ded Moroz), Grandfather Frost. They could have used the cutesier Мороз Красный Нос (Moroz Krasnyy Nos), Frosty Red-Nose, but that is just a nickname for Ded Moroz. And they use Ded Moroz's Christmas associations to come up with a very Pratchett-like footnote of their own:

На Плоском Мире Дед Мороз наконец-то занялся выполнением своих прямых обязенностей.

On the Disc World, Grandfather Frost was finally able to devote himself to carrying out his primary duties.

They don't all work of course. Bergholt Stuttley, or Bloody Stupid, Johnson becomes Бергольд Статли (Bergold Statli), or Чертов Тупица (Chortov Tupitsa), Джонсон (Dzhonson), which is a fine translation, but completely misses the B.S. Johnson joke of his name and nickname. Getting the BS was probably impossible, but instead of just transliterating his name they might have come up with something with the initials CT (ChT, really). Minor, very minor, complaint.

But there's more. There are lots translation choices to look at, most of them interesting. A number of examples are found in this passage (the last paragraph of which is one of my favorites in the whole Pratchett canon):

Time stopped.

But duration continued.

She'd always wondered, when she was small, why visits to her grandfather could go on for days and yet, when they got back, the calendar was still plodding along as if they'd never been away.

Now she knew the why, although probably no human being would ever really understand the how. Sometimes, somewhere, somehow, the numbers on the clock did not count.

Between every rational moment were a billion irrational ones. Somewhere behind the hours there was a place where the Hogfather rode, the tooth fairies climbed their ladders, Jack Frost drew his pictures, the Soul Cake Duck laid her chocolate eggs. In the endless spaces between the clumsy seconds Death moved like a witch dancing through raindrops, never getting wet.

Here's the Russian, and I'll follow that with a fairly literal translation back into English

Время остановилась.

Однако момент продолжал длиться.

В детсве Сьюзен пару раз навещала дедушку, гостила у него по нескольку дней и все равно возбращалась домой в тот же день, когда и уехала, -- согласно настенному календарю. Это всегда ставило ее в тупик, она задавал вопросы, но ответов не получала.

Это было тогда. А сейчас Сьюзен знала -- хотя ни одно из человеческих существ не смогло бы разделить с ней это знание. Просто... иногда, как-то, где-то, часы переставали иметь значение.

Каждый разиональный миг разделяют миллиарды мигов иррациональных. Где-то вне времени едет в своих санях Санта-Хрякус, зубная фея поднимается по лестнице, Дед Мороз рисует свои узоры, а мясленичная утка откладывает шоколадные яички. В бесконечном пространстве между неуклюжими секундами Смерть двигался как ведьма, танцующая меж каплями дождя.

Time stopped.

But the moment continued to endure.

As a child Susan had several times visted her grandfather, stayed for several days each time, and yet returned home on the very same day as she had left -- according to the calendar on the wall. This had always left her confused, and she had asked about it, but had gotten no answers.

That was then. But now she knew - although no other human being would be able to share her knowledge. It was simply that ... sometimes, somehow, somewhere, clocks ceased to have meaning.

Each rational moment was split into billions of irrational ones. Somewhere outside of time the Hogfather rode in his sleigh, the tooth fairy climbed her ladder, Grandfather Frost drew his patterns, and the Shrove-cake duck laid her chocolate eggs. In the infinite space between the clumsy seconds Death moved like a witch dancing between raindrops.

There are several types of translation problems here, and interesting choices made by the translators.

First, yet another culture-bound name: the Soul Cake Duck. Soul cakes are eaten in England on All Souls Day. Russians don't do that. But they do eat blinis, or pancakes, on Shrove Tuesday. So the Soul Cake Duck becomes the мясленичная утка (myslennichnaya utka), the Shrove-cake duck.

There is also a neat depersonification of the calendar. In the original, it "was still plodding along", but in Russian things don't perform actions nearly as often. (A common problem for my students is the ubiquitous indefinite + location, such as "In the Kremlin 'they' said" or "In Izvesitya 'they' published", where we would just have "The Kremlin said" or "Izvestiya published"...)

Also interesting is the way they handled the "Susan had always wondered..." bit. There is no good single verb for "wonder" in Russian; in fact, one of the most common ways to render it is "zadavat' vopros, put a question" (another common one is "ey interesuetsya, it interested her", but that wouldn't have worked well here). Their solution - not "Susan had always wondered how X..." but rather "X had happened when Susan was young, and she had not understood it, and had asked, but had never found out" seems wordy, but is probably the best way to capture the meaning. And it sounds natural and unforced in the Russian.

And there's another little thing: the original English has "Sometimes, somewhere, somehow", but the Russian is "иногда, как-то, где-то (sometimes, somehow, somewhere)". It's a different order, but it's unmarked, just as the English is; that's the kind of rewording that should be done without a second thought.

Yes... I'm really enjoying reading this book.

Happy Birthday, Robert!

Robert Herrick, the great Cavalier poet, born today in 1591 in London
Some of his verse is here, and a few here:

WHENAS in silks my Julia goes
Then, then (methinks) how sweetly flows
That liquefaction of her clothes.

Next, when I cast mine eyes and see
That brave vibration each way free;
Oh how that glittering taketh me


To Blossoms

FAIR pledges of a fruitful tree,
   Why do ye fall so fast?
   Your date is not so past
But you may stay yet here awhile
   To blush and gently smile,
     And go at last.

What! were ye born to be
   An hour or half's delight,
   And so to bid good-night?
'Twas pity Nature brought ye forth
   Merely to show your worth,
     And lose you quite.

But you are lovely leaves, where we
   May read how soon things have
   Their end, though ne'er so brave:
And after they have shown their pride
   Like you, awhile, they glide
     Into the grave.


The Poetry of Dress

A SWEET disorder in the dress
Kindles in clothes a wantonness:—
A lawn about the shoulders thrown
Into a fine distractiòn,—
An erring lace, which here and there
Enthrals the crimson stomacher,—
A cuff neglectful, and thereby
Ribbands to flow confusedly,—
A winning wave, deserving note,
In the tempestuous petticoat,—
A careless shoe-string, in whose tie
I see a wild civility,—
Do more bewitch me, than when art
Is too precise in every part.

Um, well, now you mention it...

"We try to remind people that no one had better resumés than Donald Rumsfeld and Dick Cheney... and that didn't work out so well."

Barack Obama on The Daily Show

My next president will be...

Brought to you by

Little Birds - and a Bigger One

Sunday, sparrows and a couple of finches were mobbing around the grass - or the dust, more like, after this dry summer. They were joined by a mourning dove. Some of the sparrows were babies - adolescents I suppose - still begging for food from their harried parents. Another day in suburbia...

Japan? Seriously?

Bush seriously wants to compare the post-war occupation of Japan and its transformation into a Western nation with what's going on in Iraq? That is bizarre, even for this administration. Talking about Shinto and freedom of religion - people in Japan in the late 40s weren't split into violently warring sects and ethnicities. Nor was there an insurgency. They actually had started the war and were soundly, decisively beaten after a long war that left most of the population glad the fighting was over - and there was no fighting in Japan proper, beyond the bombs that stopped the whole war, no street-to-street fighting, no attacks on American troops. The Emperor was left on the throne. The country was rebuilt, not left to fall apart...

Pretending that the occupation of Japan is a template for Iraq is ludicrous.

But don't hold your breath

Froomkin also writes:

But ideally the media coverage of the speech will remind the public that the group called Al Qaeda in Iraq is only one of large number of players on the Iraqi battlefield, that its affinity with its namesake organization does not appear to extend much beyond a desire to end the U.S. occupation -- and that it wouldn't even exist had Bush not invaded in the first place.

I don't know about you, but I'm not holding my breath waiting for that to happen.

But wouldn't it be nice if it did?

Viet Nam? Bush still doesn't get it

As Dan Froomkin writes in today's White House Watch, Bush's speech about Viet Nam may have pleased his hand-picked audience, but isn't likely to "go over nearly as well with a wider audience -- not to mention with historians":

That's because the obvious lesson of Vietnam is not that leaving a quagmire leads to disaster, but that staying only makes things worse. (And oh yes: that we shouldn't get into them in the first place.)

Joe Biden says:

"The only relevant analogy of Vietnam to Iraq is this: In Iraq, just as we did in Vietnam, we are clinging to a central government that does not and will not enjoy the support of the people."

One of my coworkers immediately pointed out the we basically created the environment that spawned the Khmer Rouge by destabilizing Cambodia. As Bert Chadick puts it:

The thing is, we didn't realize that Norodom Sihanouk had been balancing Cambodia on a political knife edge for a decade or more. When the prince went into exile, civil war broke out, and the rest is the most tragic result of our misreading a foreign situation prior to the current Iraqi horror show. Like the Saudi hijackers of 911's mythical attachment to Baghdad, the administration is now selling the Cambodian Killing Fields as an adjunct to our defeat in Viet Nam. Viet Nam was the country that invaded Cambodia and stopped the slaughter. They understood the local situation, we didn't.

And according to David Jackson and Matt Kelley in USA Today, that's not just Bert's, Sandy's, and my recollection:

Vietnam historian Stanley Karnow said Bush is reaching for historical analogies that don't track. "Vietnam was not a bunch of sectarian groups fighting each other," as in Iraq, Karnow said. In Cambodia, the Khmer Rouge toppled a U.S.-backed government.

In other words, the president's analogy is as crappy as the rest of his comprehension about the way this war - if not the world - works. Or doesn't, as the case may be.

What Is George Running For?

One small problem with the debate:

The moderator talked more than three of the candidates! Sheesh.

I hate the way "marginal" candidates are further marginalized like this. And not just because I want Dennis for President.

Chased by a dino: do we get away?

BBC World News just had a story telling us how fast different dinosaurs ran: Compsognathus 38 mph, Velociraptor 26 mph, T Rex 22. Then they told us that a normal person would be caught even by T Rex, but the world record holder over 100 meters would outrun even a velociraptor.

And all I can think is: Yeah, over 100 meters! How long could they keep it up? Somehow, I don't see them as the cheetahs of the Jurassic (or whenever).

How else?

Sometimes, you just need to say it, like Harold Meyerson does today (my italics):

How else to explain what's historically distinctive about George W. Bush and his administration save to note that this is the only American presidency that takes its moral guidance from Limbkins, Bumble and kindred Dickensian grotesques? How else to explain a president whose concern for the financial interests of private health insurance companies so greatly exceeds his concern for the health of his nation's children?

...

In other words, if a state wants to insure a chronically ill 2-year-old whose parents' employer has dropped his health coverage, it has to wait until he's a chronically ill 3-year-old.

Wrath of ...

Over at headsup: the blog fev has collected a bunch of headlines and ledes about... Well, it's pretty obvious:

Charlotte teen escapes Dean's wrath

City man dodges Dean's wrath

Mexico, Belize brace for Dean's wrath

Jamaica feels Dean's wrath

Jamaica smashed by wrath of Dean

Travel plans altered by wrath of Dean

The wrath of Dean was even felt in space, where Endeavour astronauts scaled back their last spacewalk yesterday and planned to land the space shuttle Tuesday, a day early, NASA said.

A boat sinks in Fort de France, Martinique, after it takes on water from Hurricane Dean's wrath. The storm was Category 3 when it hit land.

While much of the island escaped Hurricane Dean's wrath, the southernmost tip was not so lucky.

Cancún still could face winds with tropical storm force - forecast to extend over about 75,000 square miles, about the size of Nebraska or South Dakota - but city officials told the public Monday night that the area should escape the worst of Dean's wrath.

Strong winds blew down trees in southern towns near the Haitian border but the country was largely spared Dean's wrath.

fev's complaining about the use of "wrath" on a stylistic basis. Certainly a valid complaint.

But, despite its name, Dean is just a storm. Storms don't have emotions. Dean's not "wrathful"; it's indifferent.

This kind of language is essentially religious; it ascribes emotions to a force of nature. The next logical step is to plead with the wrathful Dean to spare you, or thank him for having done so. However, it's God who gets the prayers and praise. And it's really God - if anyone - who is to blame for Dean's "wrath". I suppose newspapers can't quite write "Haiti was largely spared God's wrath"...

Happy Birthday, Ray!

Ray Bradbury is 87!

"I don't try to describe the future. I try to prevent it."

"We are the miracle of force and matter making itself over into imagination and will. Incredible. The Life Force experimenting with forms. You for one. Me for another. The Universe has shouted itself alive. We are one of the shouts."

"Without libraries what have we? We have no past and no future."

Fee - say what?

The apartment complex up the road is in new hands. They got one of those flashing roadside signs and parked it at the entrance.

UNDER
NEW
MANAGEMENT

it says, and goes on to entice you with

EXTREME
MAKEOVER
UNDERWAY

NEW
BATHROOMS
UNDERWAY

NEW
KITCHENS
UNDERWAY

ENERGY
EFFICIENT
WINDOWS

which leads me to believe utilities aren't included

NEW
CLUBHOUSE
COMING

REFRESHING
SWIMMING
POOL

MILITARY
DISCOUNT
AVAILABLE

REFUNDABLE
SECURITY
DEPOSITS

and my personal favorite

FREE
APPLICATION
FEE

Free fee? I mean, "Free application", okay. "No application fee" I could understand.

But - a free fee?

I think they let that three-line format go to their heads.

Muriel vs Jean-Claude

Ummm. A woman whose name I didn't catch (ah, it's Muriel Venair(?)) is on the BBC (radio) complaining that TVE won't broadcast bullfights live. Among her complaints is the standard "it's an art" and "it's part of Spanish culture" and "you can change the channel", all more or less valid. But then she comes up with a new one: that Jean-Claude van Damm is complaining that bullfighting is cruel and bloody when he makes horribly bloody and violent movies, so he's a hypocrite.

Um... Muriel? Those are movies. Nobody actually gets hurt. It's make believe. Bull fighting is real. Bulls are killed, after being tormented, and possibly after killing horses and maybe even crippling or killing people, and it's actual.

Muriel honey, there is a difference.

The Boneyard

The latest edition of The Boneyard is up at Laelaps. No, the Boneyard is a paleo-carnival! Check it out!

Gray Monday

It was a gray, gray day today - rain most of the day. But the leaves are jewel-like in their intensity in this weather, and the drops of rain on the cattails are like big shining gems.

And in the cattails I spotted a song sparrow preening. Nice.

"It was a miracle of God"

Here's something in today's paper:

As Quake Leveled Church, a 'Miracle' Of Survival in Peru

Associated Press
Monday, August 20, 2007

PISCO, Peru, Aug. 19 -- More than 300 relatives and friends filled the towering colonial-era adobe church to pay tribute to the family patriarch, a popular man who managed a fleet of minibuses in this dusty port city and died of a heart attack at age 67.

Just as the Mass was ending, the earth began to heave and the church collapsed. Two minutes later, hundreds of friends and distant relatives were dead or dying in a giant pile of rubble.

But Alejandro Espino's immediate family -- all three generations -- survived unscathed. "It was a miracle of God," said Espino's widow, Dora.

As the Rev. Jose Emilio Torres finished the service, a magnitude-8 earthquake struck, leveling 85 percent of this city of 90,000. At least 540 people were killed.

"The movement was up and down, up and down. The earth jumped. Then it changed direction," swaying laterally, said the Rev. Alfonso Berrade, 67, who was in the priests' residence across a courtyard. "I thought I was dead."

Screaming and begging for mercy, people ran for the exits or clung to columns flanking the pews. Espino's family stayed put.

"We hugged one another while everything fell all around," said Vilma Espino, 38. ... Vilma Espino said at least 50 members of the extended family were killed.

Some miracle. 9% of the people killed in this earthquake - "at least" - were in this church at this funeral and in this family. But it's a "miracle of God" that some of them weren't killed.

Against this mindset the godselves contend in vain, if I may put it that way.

Monday Science Links

Your Monday science links:

• In It's all in a name Brendan at Social Sciences asks "Do long names with good-sounding adjectives correspond with non-democratic governments?" He has numbers!
  


• In Mira the wonderful,Phil Plait at Bad Astronomy tells us about a star that's pretty amazing - and shows us a picture that evokes Yeats' "terrible beauty".


• In Excess Babbage, Jennifer Ouellette at Cocktail Party Physics, inspired by a new nano-chip device, tells us about 19th century English mathematician and engineer Charles Babbage and his famed difference engine - the amazing steam-powered computer.


• In Alien Desires John Pieret at Thoughts in a Haystack tells us about the planet Vulcan, and an important message about the nature of science.


• In Giants and Dwarfs with Barium Pamela Gay at Star Stryder tells us about "a very serious paper that did some very difficult research" and in the process demonstrates "where the incremental advances in science are coming from".

Enjoy the learning!

Happy Birthday, Howard

Today is the birthday of the man who gave us Cthulhu... HP Lovecraft was born in Providence, Rhode Island, in 1890.

Just before dawn Arcturus winks ruddily from above the cemetery on the low hillock, and Coma Berenices shimmers weirdly afar off in the mysterious east; but still the Pole Star leers down from the same place in the black vault, winking hideously like an insane watching eye which strives to convey some strange message, yet recalls nothing save that it once had a message to convey. Sometimes, when it is cloudy, I can sleep. (Polaris)

go here for all things Lovecraftian.

The Week in Entertainment

DVD: a bit more News Radio - the last season wasn't as funny as the other four, but to be fair the loss of Phil Hartman had to hurt. Patrick Warburton is one very funny man, though.

TV: Doctor Who! What's going on with Saxon and the election, hmmmm? And will Martha's mother ever get to like him? I got around to watching Flash Gordon ... very ordinary. And what is it with SciFi and their taking old shows and turning major male characters female? Plus, this Zarkov is pathetic. Also watched an old Spencer Tracy-Frank Sinatra movie called The Devil at 4 O'Clock - impressions here.

Read: Well, I'm not sure it counts as entertainment, but I read Glenn Greenwald's new book - A Tragic Legacy. His depiction of Bush as "a Manichean warrior" seems spot on, and is scary. I defy you to read chapter 4 and not be frightened. Impeachment now! I then took a break and galloped through Chamomile Mourning and The Jasmine Moon Murder (yes, I picked up all six at once); they remain okay, though Childs has awkward syntax and odd breaks in POV every now and then (note: when you're inside Theodosia's head, don't say "she fixed Jory with a winning smile" - it really makes her sound calculating!), and a quick little read called Plato and a Platypus Walked Into a Bar - philosophy through jokes. I'm now embarked on the Russian translation of Terry Pratchett's Hogfather and so far (I got to about page 12) it's an excellent job, full of fun translations - like Санта-Хрякус (Santa-Khryakus) for Hogfather - khryak is a boar, and the 'santa' plus the -us catch the 'Father Christmas' analogy; Чудакулли (Chudakulli) for Ridcully - Chudak is an eccentric and Ridcully suggests 'ridiculous'; and then Чайчай (Chaichai) for Teatime - with Тчайтчай (Tchai-Тchai) for his "Teh-ah-ti-meh" pronunciation of his name.

The Devil at 4 O'Clock

"We detest our sins because they offend thee, o God, who art all good and deserving of our love."

Spencer Tracy's Father Doolan says that and then the island explodes, and there's no irony intended by anyone involved... Yep, it's The Devil at 4 O'Clock, in which everybody (but the doctor) gets religion and then dies. The priest gets his faith back because he extorts three criminals into helping him evacuate the hospital - promising them commutation of their sentences which he is in no position to deliver. Marcel gets his faith back as he is sucked into the quicksand. Charlie gets his faith back because the priest "takes responsibility. He acts like God should act." And Frank Sinatra's Harry? Well, to be honest, maybe he doesn't. Sure, he crosses himself while Doolan prays over Charlie's body as the volcano erupts, but it's not explicit that he's doing it for any reason than to make the priest feel better...

Oh, who am I kidding? Hollywood didn't make many atheist films in 1961 and Spencer Tracy sure didn't star in them. Sure, Harry gets a good line, earlier, responding to Charlie's "Marcel prayed!" with "Yeah, and what good did it do him?" (answer - none, he still died) But I'm sure we're supposed to believe that all four of these lost souls regained their faith just before they died.

But of course, none of them were so much unbelievers as they were mad at god for their various reasons. Atheists aren't mad at god (I remember how annoyed I was at idiot Ma Walton when she ran Ashley Longworth Jr away from Erin because he was an atheist, when it was patently obvious that he still fully believed in god; you can't be as mad at god as he was if you don't still believe he's up there, screwing up...).

All four of these characters were angry at god for one reason or another. The priest had lost his faith because when he established his hospital for children with Hanson's disease, the islanders, fearing leprosy, turned against him and boycotted his church. "Year after year, saying mass to no one but yourself... If God is real, he could have used a little help from up there," the doctor told the young priest who had come to replace Doolan. That sounds like he kept his faith, you say? Ah, but in the last few years he'd lost it, turning to drink and anger and devoting himself only to the hospital. But still, when he needed someone to help him save the kids from the volcano, he turned to God.

As for the convicts, we're never really sure why Charlie is angry but it seems like he believes God is against him because he's a thief. But when he's dying it only takes a little talk about the Good Thief, the one who died on the cross next to Jesus and went to heaven - "in the end, he stole Heaven", says Doolan, "and that's some stealing" - to make him give in. He wanted to all the time. Marcel? His blustery disbelief was never more than anger at being labelled a sinner. And Harry? The ex-altar boy from Jersey City who lost God in Korea? I think, like Longworth in The Waltons, he never really believed that god wasn't real. He only believed that god had abandoned him. Thus, when he saw Doolan ministering to the dying Charlie, two men who had given up their lives to save others, he realized that Charlie was right and that god acts through people. His genuflection at the end of the film was for real.

The only real atheist in that movie was the doctor.

And he lived. (Well, in the movie he did, though I imagine such a volcanic eruption would likely have swamped the schooner... )

Of course, so too did most of the kids (the one little girl's death was to add more burden on Doolan and Harry, but it was never adequately dealt with; it was just one more thing for Harry to despair over), and so too did Camille, the lovely blind girl whom Harry married on a few hours' acquaitance, with Doolan's help (that wasn't adequately explained, but I suppose he felt she'd be better off married to an American who was in jail in Tahiti than on her own... huh?) - in fact, Camille really seems to have been there to give Harry something to renounce at the end besides merely his life. He abandons her to go and die with the other two, knowing that's what he's doing... Religion makes a man funny that way, I guess. But she lives, and so does the matron and all the people on the island who refused to help Doolan and all those who were engaged in evacuating the rest of the people. So the doctor doesn't live because he's an atheist.

Nonetheless, he is and he does. And those who regained their faith during these two days all die in the fiery explosion of the volcano which destroys the little island. But that means they won't ever face the possibility of losing it again.

And this is meant to be uplifting...

Perception versus reality

And speaking of mockingbirds, something strange happened the other morning.

The sun is rising now just about the time I leave the building, maybe a bit later. It's twilight, basically - bat time; I've seen a few skittering through the air chasing insects around the building lights with their jerky, un-bird-like flight and their scalloped, translucent wings. But after I walk around the corner of the building the lights are blocked for the length of it until the sun rises.

Walking across the grass in the quad under the lights the grass looks green, and when I walk around the corner it still looks green. Faint green, but green - and of course, it is green, isn't it, so I don't really think about it. But the other morning as I was walking to the bus stop quite suddenly a piece of the grass flashed white and leapt away from me. It was a mockingbird not ten feet away.

And at that moment, I was looking at the still-green grass and yet was completely unable to see the bird until it moved again. Now mockingbirds are not grass colored, and yet there it was, the same "color" as the grass it was walking through.

Clearly I wasn't seeing green at all. And yet my brain insisted I was.

Perception is a tricky thing.

strange bugs

I was walking home the other day when a tiny speck of red caught my eye against the light gray of the sidewalk. It was moving, and I would have thought it was an ant except that it was too red. It was some kind of strange little bug the like of which I have never seen before. After a moment I realized there were lots of them, and they were piling onto the seed of a maple spinner. They varied among themselves, but were all fairly wide and flat for their size. I've asked and looked around, and I think they might be nymphs of the milkweed bug.