24.05.06     This plant showed up in the garden last year, an uninvited guest. It only had a few leaves, but it looked like a foxglove, so I left it alone. This year it bloomed, as it was definitely not a foxglove. I eventually tracked down its identity as a comfrey, likely Symphytum officinale. It was introduced from Europe and has since spread as a weed. It is one of the most lively plants in the garden, being a veritable hub of bumblebee activity. The purple-pink blossoms are held on an inward curving inflorescence, like the top of a bass clef, to better tune the humming of the bees. Yes, it’s a weed, but weeds are only what one labels plants that one doesn’t like. It’s a nice addition to the garden, and I’m letting it be.
    I mention this because I was outside weeding today when who should walk up to me but the Jehovah’s Witnesses, new ones. I told them about the old ones, whom they said they may know, but they pressed on, undeterred. I thought they would have organized better and divided the territory. But perhaps this is more of a spiritual turf war, with rival factions trying to seek a wider salvation base from which to earn brownie points in the afterlife.
    This was a husband and wife team who ran through the same arguments and used the same metaphors.
    “What do you see as a Garden of Eden?”, the wife asked me.
    “Oh, someplace DIVERSE”, quoth I, setting up my subsequent objections to their proselytizing.
    It went on. The husband was pointing to some red-underlined verses in Psalms as I tried not to go glassy-eyed and his wife took more of an interest in the garden, running her hand over the rosemary to release the scent. Then the husband goes, “Ghandi said that if people lived according to Christ’s sermon on the mount, we could all be happy”.
    It irks me like scabies mites on top of poison ivy sores when they do this. And they do this often, particularly in the literature. They take out of context quotes from credible sources: scientific journals or religious philosophy, and use them to legitimize their beliefs, regardless of the fact that the overall message of their sources disagree with them in the most extreme way. A hint of scientific skepticism from an evolutionary biologist becomes proof that evolution does not exist, or here, a snippet of Ghandi, the Hindu philosopher, becomes part of a ringing endorsement to convert to Christianity.
    If they like Ghandi so much, fine: “Ghandi also said, ‘All religions are true’”.
    “All religions can’t be true… (Word of God and only we have it, only the righteous will be saved, etc.)”
    Ghandi’s not your friend anymore is he? Holding someone up as a supporter of your beliefs then turning on him in your next sentence seems a bit contradictory, if not hypocritical. He’s still talking this whole time, but I’ve heard it all before. More about how the End is coming and soon those who believe will live forever in a perfect state of bliss.
    “Let’s go, dear”, says his wife, “I’m sure he wants to get back to his garden”. Perhaps she’s picked up on the implications of my statements, and has wisely given up. But perhaps not. Well see if they come back.
    “What are you planting anyway?”, he asks.
    “Oh, I’m weeding”, I said.
    “Well, maybe in the new system, there won’t be any weeds”, he says.
    I hope that isn't true, I think as they walk away, leaving me in silence, except for the buzzing of bees around the comfrey.

20.05.06
    Urban flora: the Salmonberry, Rubus spectabilis, is an extremely common native shrub found in wooded areas. In early April, the shrubs are covered in small, pink, five-petaled blooms. The berries start out green and are now ripening to a bright red. They are edible and quite yummy (sometimes).

15.05.06
   Nine deaths since yesterday, all caused, directly or indirectly, through conscious choices: to drive a little faster, to race that other car, to make it through the light, to set fire to an apartment with sleeping children. I don’t generally believe that the world is getting worse, usually I can dismiss it as a result of better access to information and a growing population. More people doing more things, and more sources talking about it. Bad stuff happens, we find out. But on mornings like this, I wonder. Mornings of blockaded streets, sirens, and helicopters, and above the highway, a plane trailing an advertising banner for a captive audience of gridlocked cars, twisted metal, and burning lives. The only sign forthcoming to save us from ourselves.

14.05.06
    So the guestbook is dying by the end of the month. It was a good free service, hosted offsite, but I was able to customize it to fit in with the look and feel of this layout. Unfortunately, this degree of freedom also allowed bad internet denizens to create pages that looked like official guestbook company content, then spam the hell out of other guestbooks (see mine for some examples), leading to much misdirected anger at the company itself. Or something like that anyway. The end result is that the company is folding. Yet another example of the few spoiling everything for the many. I was given a few weeks of notice, and an explanation, which is very nice as far as free online services go. So here’s some gratitude to Flamebook for their services, may you rise reincarnated somewhere in cyberspace. Also, this means you can go nuts in the guestbook since it’ll disappear soon.

07.05.06
    I always have weird dreams when I'm sick, and they're usually unsettling to some degree. Last night I dreamt we were all out in the woods at night trying to covertly exhume a body from a bright green coffin. We were caught before we got around to opening it because SOMEONE is incapable of grave robbing quietly. That's the last time I'm taking you along.

05.05.06
    We've moved past the "is that a sore throat?" phase, through the actual sore throat, the maddening congestion, and are now in the hacking cough stage. Also my lungs seem to have liquified themselves and are trying to escape my body through my nose. Yesterday at work I was moving a sample around under the microscope and it made me motion sick. Blargh.