More About Fathers

So, DNA testing reveals that Al Sharpton’s ancestors were owned by Strom Thurmond’s ancestors (or maybe by Thurmond himself –he was old enough to have been a slaveholder, wasn’t he?) back in the day.

For once, Sharpton seemed a little subdued. You can imagine him thinking, sheee-it! If it weren’t for Abe Lincoln I’d probably have been pushing that old fart's wheelchair through the Senate for the past fifty years. Call me “boy.” Have to get my hair processed, like those old Pullman porters. Chattanooga choo-choo. Hoo, boy! Old mutha fucka, Thurmond. Ugly white guy, too. Damn! Good thing he’s dead; I can just hear the sanctimonious shit he’d be sayin’. “Those old days are past.” And “I don’t b’lieve in some Dee-‘n’-A, anyway.” But he’d be thinkin’ “that Sharpton doesn’t look like he could mix a decent mint julep. Looks like he’s better at drinkin’ ‘em! B’longs behind a mule anyhow, plowin’ his forty acres.” And some such. Sayin’ it to all those honkies in the Senate cloakroom. But they can’t say it to my face; fixed ‘em on that! Old Bastards. Maybe my picture’s never gonna be on a quarter; but at least I don’t have to listen to that shit.

But I wonder, now that DNA testing can tell us all which mudhole our ancestors crawled out of, how long it’ll be before people start suing one another because someone’s remote ancestor did something to someone else’s remote ancestor.

The Thurmond-Sharpton connection is too good to have been dreamed up. But, to wrap up this particular bit of idleness, here are my favorite future DNA “finds:”

Mahatma Ghandi – ancestor of Scottie Pippen.
Moses – DNA tests prove he was an ancestor of Charleton Heston. Recall the moment in Exodus where Moses tells Pharoah, “You’ll have to take this staff from my cold, dead hand!”
Dick Clark – DNA testing reveals he is a direct descendant of Dick Clark.
George W. Bush – Testing reveals only DN. No “A” anywhere in his background.
Dick Cheney – His ancestors were owned by the Hudson Bay Company, and were distributed as stock options to the ancestors of Jon Stewart.
Walt Whitman – ancestor of one of the “Queer Eye” boys.
Hillary Clinton – direct descendant of Carmen (from the opera).
Former Secretary General of the UN Boutros Boutros Ghali – DNA tests reveal he’s a direct descendant of Boutros Boutros Boutros. “Golly!” he says.
Jim Carrey – a direct descendant of Moses “Rubberface” Maimonides.

And so on.

Dry Bones

Today comes a reprise of news that has surfaced periodically since the discovery, in the early 1980s, of a burial site near Jerusalem. The site contained “ossuaries” (bone repositories or successor coffins used after the original body had decayed down to a more, well, compact, state) of a family. Their names, carved on the stone, were Jesus, Mary, and Jethro. The producer of the movie Titanic concludes, rather noisily today, that these are the remains of the Christs –Jesus, wifey Mary Magdalene, and little sonny.

So many questions: Did Mary Magdalene keep her “maiden” –insert here your favorite ironic comment about her job, pre-Jesus—name when they got married? And why did she, apparently alone among all the Jews in the New Testament, have two names? If Jesus had a wife and kids, did he have a mortgage, too? Strike that; I mean, did his kids have kids? Are there thousands of people running around who have the DNA of the Eternal One? And (see next story) did any of it get into Strom Thurmond? Al Sharpton?

And, by the way, given Mary Magdalene’s rather, um, colorful past, was Jesus sure those kids were his? Didn’t it seem like, every time he came home for lunch from the carpentry shop, that neighbor guy Morty had just been helping Mary sacrifice turtle doves, or something?

A Catholic priest, interviewed on NPR, was asked if he thought of giving any credence to the argument that Jesus and his family were buried in boxes beneath a Palestinian tire-repair shop. He said (this is only an approximate quote), “for two thousand years we’ve known that Jesus died, that he rose up, and ascended into heaven, where he sits at the right hand of the Father. There’s nothing that could change my mind about that.”

Oh, really? What if the heavens opened up to reveal Jesus sitting at, say, the left hand of the Father? How many hands does the Father have? Did that finger he broke as a kid ever heal straight, and is that ugly scar any less noticeable –it’s been eons, now. What if the “Father” is really a Mother? I can hear Her now: “That Jesus, what a lazy kid. Sits at my right hand all day. Think he’d clean up his room? All the time with his stupid water into wine tricks! He’s a lush. He’s a bum!” And so on. Don’t even get Her started about that tramp of a wife he brought home!

But those bones! Now there’s something you really want to sink your teeth into, metaphorically speaking, of course. Do you suppose they found his wallet, too?

Response to "No Smoking"

You know, this story reminds me of my outrage at mandatory insurance laws, which I vehemently expressed in a letter to president Clinton at age 10 (I think my reasoning on this issue was directly opposed to that of the "non-smoking" kid- down with big government, I say!). But my own political activism aside, I think this kid needs to focus his energy elsewhere, say on the very real and present danger of Little Debbie snacks and Hostess cupcakes which are significantly more dangerous to a child's health (compare the number of kids suffering from lung cancer to childhood obesity) not to mention a MUCH more tempting indulgence.

On a side note, I have been spending enormous amounts of time in the library in the past week and I have several issues to address. First of all, what kind of University library is only open from 8:30am to 11:45pm? aren't those the hours when college kids are supposed to be sleeping? Second, circulating air makes people cold! can't we get some nice, stagnant, stale warmth in here? Third, anyone looking for book-material should head to the nearest library. The number of crazy things I have seen is truly amazing.

-jkw

News From the World of Fruit

My favorite quote of the past week: Ronald Reagan, sweating out the narrow passage of some crucial (to him) piece of legislation, was said to have fervently breathed, "Thank God!" when news of its passage was received.

But a recent article in The Atlantic informs us that, according to an aide who was actually there, what Reagan said was, "Whew! I feel like I just crapped a pineapple!"

Big News

So poor (or rich, depending on which court you believe) Anna Nicole Smith has died, the latest in a generation-long series of personal tragedies brought on, at least in part, by our pop culture obsession with blondes, fame, and, well, the subject of this note.

Every story on the telly, and there've been plenty of them, shows Anna Nicole in her heyday, smirking, winking, posing --okay, sometimes tearful, as when testifying, or, right after the birth of the baby with a thousand fathers, a little bedraggled, for which she can be excused--, usually in some flamboyant costume. And the news stories focus on her storied career, her marriage to Methuselah, inevitably asking some variant of the question, why are we so fascinated by this? It's a rhetorical question, of course: everyone knows, and no one is going to say, at least on the air.

It's her breasts, folks. They were (hell, probably still are!), um, huge. No matter how. It is, to put it mildly, fascinating to behold such a sight. She was a pretty woman, but those traffic-stoppers, well ... it's like slowing down when passing the site of a car wreck. You know you shouldn't, but you just can't help looking.

None of which diminishes this private tragedy that we will insist on making a public spectacle. Hm ... I wonder if on the web I can find ...

No smoking

So, on ABC News tonight, a 10 year-old boy was the "person of the week." His achievement was to suggest legislation in his state to prohibit smoking in cars. Children in those cars get second-hand smoke, he reasoned, which is bad for them.

Well, I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it any more. The next step, obviously, is to ban smoking in houses, because children ... You get the point. At the risk of sounding like some Republic* fuddy-duddy harping about personal responsibility, I must say that people have the responsibility from protecting their own kids from second-hand smoke, sharp knives, the poisons under the kitchen sink, and Rush Limbaugh. This has to stop somewhere. It's enough to make me start smoking in protest. If I could stand the first-hand smoke.

*from Bush on down, the party of fuddy-duddys insists on calling the Democratic Party the "Democrat" Party. So, until they stop, it's "Republic" Party. Why be civil to jerks?

Correction

In that last post, of course I meant to say, in the last paragraph, "self-righteousness." How embarrassing.

Faith and Values (cont'd)

Today on the local all-news radio station I heard a piece of an interview with a woman who has correctly predicted the winner of 17 of the last 21 Super Bowl games. She predicted, um, predictably, that the Bears would win this Sunday. Asked how she did so well, she said, “Well, I read the Football Guide (or whatever –ed.). And, of course, you can’t leave Jesus out of the equation.”

My concerns are: (1) was she also being interviewed on the Indianapolis radio station, predicting that the Indianapolis team (the Saints?) would win; (2) what about those 4 misses –was Jesus on vacation those weekends, or perhaps preoccupied helping us kill Iraqis? Or had she been involved in a spate of sin on those particular occasions? Maybe there is some other explanation: sun spots? An unbeliever at quarterback?

I’d like, at this point, to go on record, once and for all, with my considered opinion that, if there is a God, then surely she regards it as blasphemy for a center fielder to cross himself before stepping up to the plate, or for anyone to explain his good fortune by reference to divine intervention.

What about all those times the guy doesn’t get a hit? Does the magic work only selectively? Or maybe the pitcher said a quick prayer, and it somehow got there first?

What about all the children who die painful, brutal deaths? Poor bastards: they forgot to cross themselves!

This is all sickening. It stinks of the corruption of self-righteous, and it surely will be punished, if only by the law of averages swooping down with a vengeance on hapless, empty-headed America.

email from dad

I can’t find my blog! He’p me!