Sometimes something just strikes me funny. Maybe it’s something warped in my childhood. Maybe it comes from letting my kids watch too much TV when they were sick.

But this website just cracks me up. There is no nutritional value at all.. www.chucknorrisfacts.com

There are pages of facts. But from the top ten list the following are my particular favs..
and who knows WHY I even care.

Chuck Norris’ tears cure cancer. Too bad he has never cried. Ever.

Chuck Norris does not sleep. He waits.

If you can see Chuck Norris, he can see you. If you can’t see Chuck Norris, you may be only seconds away from death.

Chuck Norris does not hunt because the word hunting implies the probability of failure. Chuck Norris goes killing.

The hawk came back! Or maybe a relative. This one seemed bigger.. perhaps a 4 foot wing span. And when he sat in the tree, I’d guess his legs were at least 8 inches long!

Too bad, the camera wasn’t handy. I’ll be ready next time!

I’m working on painting the mugs and bowls my sister sells in her coffee shop. I like to use interesting quotes as well as the sayings I make up myself. I came across this:

It is simplicity that makes the uneducated more effective than the educated when addressing popular audiences.
— Aristotle (384 BC – 322 BC)

John G. Agno sent me a email that said in part: (the emphasis is mine)

The rules of thumb for assessing leadership illustrate the importance of taking the pulse of followers through interactive conversations in order to stay in attunement with them. If the critical mass of thinking within followers is more complex than proposed leadership, that leadership can only take control through intimidation or force. Once it grasps power, the more complex thinkers will go into hiding, exile or premature graves. Revolution will certainly be on the horizon.

However, if the leadership model is too far ahead of the followers’ developmental level, it will destabilize and overwhelm the group or leave them asking, ‘Where’s this idiot coming from? Does anybody know what he’s talking about?’ Many leaders have been drummed out of the corps or banished into oblivion when their thinking become too complex for the followers to understand.

Sorry, I can’t find the original post to share.

We know from educating the very young that simplicity is the best way to be sure young students “get it.” I admire the person with the ability to communicate the complex in simple terms. My husband’s friend Joe Snyder ate many meals at our dinner table in Mississippi. Whenever the engineers discussed some structural thing that I surely wouldn’t know about, Joe Snyder would stop and explain. It kept me in the conversation. I am forever grateful.

He was certainly not uneducated — I think he’s a college professor now.. (Lucky Students!) But he always took the time to explain. Perhaps the truly uneducated would have been glad to do the dishes and skip the conversation.

If the popular audiences are uneducated, then I suppose simplicity is best. But not everyone is uneducated. And some who are uneducated want to be educated. How else to learn what might be? Besides education does not supply common sense.

I suppose worse is the arrogance of the blissful uneducated. They need not be bothered with learning new things or considering options for what they know must be truth.

This only is certain, that there is nothing certain; and nothing more miserable and yet more arrogant than man.
— Pliny the Elder (23 AD – 79 AD)

And arrogance seems to beg a slap down.

To knock a thing down, especially if it is cocked at an arrogant angle, is a deep delight of the blood.
— George Santayana (1863 – 1952)

I’ve been hearing lots of people… mothers mostly.. complaining that “When I was little there weren’t so many kids taking medication for …” fill in the blank. While I’m sure at least that we didn’t KNOW who was taking medication for what, I suspect more kids are taking medication for a wider variety of problems.

Then I noticed this piece in the Chicago Tribune today.

Girl dies after boy’s peanut kiss

Associated Press
Published November 29, 2005

SAGUENAY, Quebec — A 15-year-old girl with a peanut allergy died after kissing her boyfriend, who had just eaten a peanut butter snack, hospital officials said Monday.

Here’s something I’m curious about..

I don’t remember having many people in my classes in elementary school or even high school who were allergic to stuff — I mean regularly available daily stuff — like white flour or peanuts. I mean I knew that there were people who were deathly allergic. My grandfather was deathly allergic to mustard, my father to bee stings. But peanuts? I didn’t know any one. This does not imply there weren’t any only that I DIDN’T KNOW any.

And now there are all sorts of rules about what kinds of snacks are allowed in class rooms. I read several weeks ago that some people could get sick just being in the same room with peanuts. Is that possible? Is it true?

What has happened to make people so much more sensitive?

Just wondering.

Not sure why this bird thing has me so hooked. I just love watching them play in the bird bath. But it’s getting near winter and I’m wondering how to keep my bird bath inviting for the winter. I have to find something to keep the water in the hammered copper bath from freezing.

It appears that I’m not the only one concerned about birds in the winter..
I’ve learned that just because I have a feeder and sometimes forget to fill it, the birds will not starve. LOTS of people are feeding the birds. And there is stuff around that nature has provided.

I do love watching them. Wonder if my hawk will come back.