Marine Extinction, Global Warming, Yeah, we're screwed.

What are we doing to ourselves? What are we allowing to be done to the environment? And the population keeps growing, and the food sources are diminishing because we are pressuring it too much, it may even collapse. Lovely. Is anyone listening? Do any of you care? What isn't cuddly about sharks?

This is a great idea for kids to learn about sharks. The only reason people don't think of sharks as cuddly is because they aren't exposed to them like they are other animals. Puppies and kittens are obviously cuddly because we are told that they are and we get to handle them. With dogs and cats (adults) we are taught that they can be dangerous to us under certain conditions. All animals are like that. Sheesh.



Isn't he cute? Major food source, small fish and invertebrates. The only way they would want to bite a human is if they got scared by one, like stepping on them accidentally because they like to hang out motionless on the bottom, and they don't go deeper than 19 meters. Poor lemon sharkie.

Scientists Fear Oceans on the Cusp Of a Wave of Marine Extinctions
By Juliet Eilperin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, August 22, 2005; A04


BIMINI, The Bahamas -- The bulldozers moved slowly at first. Picking up speed, they pressed forward into a patch of dense mangrove trees that buckled and splintered like twigs. As the machines moved on, the pieces drifted out to sea.

Sitting in a small motorboat a few hundred yards offshore on a mid-July afternoon, Samuel H. Gruber -- a University of Miami professor who has devoted more than two decades to studying the lemon sharks that breed here -- plunged into despondency. The mangroves being ripped up to build a new resort provide food and protection that the sharks can't get in the open ocean, and Gruber fears the worst.

"At the end of my career I get to document the destruction of the species I've been documenting for 20 years," he lamented as he watched the bulldozers do their work. "Wonderful."

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Good luck to both the mangroves and the lemon sharks... As well as all the other marine species. They're going to need it. I mean, how are we supposed to stop all of it, so that they aren't driven into extinction? Argh!

October, 1999 - Harper's Magazine

150 Years... Page 24

This is an article clipping that I came across while organizing all my various papers/articles that I've been occasionally collecting over the years. Okay, the furthest back is 1998, possibly 1995. *shrug* I've recently bought a filing cabinet and filing stuff away has been my mission these last few days.

I am not sure if this was supposed to be irony, or actual reality. Part of it reminds me of a scene from Clear and Present Danger where there is a fake secretary who takes Moira's call... Okay, you are either up front and honest, and try and find a partner who is okay with an open marriage, or you keep it in your pants. This goes for both sexes.

This claims that they went into business in 2000, and approaches the subject from a British tongue-in-cheek cheeky manner. So it really is out there. And in this article it makes it clear that it is for both men and women, instead of (as below) just for the privileged male. There was also this smarmy article by the NYC Greenwich Village Gazette. I searched for the companies mentioned and found nary a one. Either they were driven out of business by the moralists, or they went underground and only get people through word of mouth advertisements. This and this are the longest articles so far, and mention an agency supposedly at work directly within the US and claims the business is unethical. What do you think? The statistics of infidelity point to yet another reason why marriage as we know it now should be rethought and redesigned.

[Mission]
IT TAKES A VILLAGE

From a description of services offered by the Alibi Agency Ltd., a company based in Lancashire, England. The Alibi Agency donates a portion of its profits to charities benefiting children from broken homes.

Many of us have occasion to stray from out long-term partners, to dally in a brief sexual relationship with a third party. But with modern communications, it has become increasingly difficult to do so without risk of detection. Public knowledge of such a relationship can put an incredible strain on all parties concerned: family life, the home, the business, and your children's welfare can all be put on the line.
The Alibi Agency was established to provide a way out of this situation. By handling "alibis" for you, we can help you protect your loved ones from undue anxiety, ensuring the financial security and stability of a long-term relationship.
We offer a full and professional alibi service: We'll send invitations for corporate events, seminars, or sporting events to your home, then telephone you or your wife to confirm bookings. If someone tries to contact you, our receptionists will take the call as a hotel receptionist, for example, or a golf-club secretary. We will let the caller hear us try to page you, then offer to take a message when you can't be found. If we know where you are, we can even ring you while the caller is on hold, then patch the call through as if it were to your "room." We also take care of payments for hotels, meals, or gifts, then bill your credit card for car repairs or software purchases.
Most sexual affairs are inconsequential to your long-term relationships. Our aim is to provide total peace of mind for you and your family.

Weirs Times, Thursday, February 25, 1999

another old article, similar to the last, also about marriage and coupledom. Man, it is tough typing/transcribing these things. I only have one more after this and I'll save it for tomorrow - though it is a different topic. I guess part of why I chose these articles is because I'm probably not going to hang onto them anymore and wanted to share their ideas before I toss them into the recycle bin... The other part is that I just witnessed a wedding this past weekend - the one crabbyolbastard shot - and it has me thinking about relationships in general. Good, Bad, and Ugly. Warning: Run on sentence alert in effect. Favorite bit: "we continue to make contracts with each other based more on potential than on past performance" which would actually FAVOR living together on a trial basis for compatibility testing. And as a friend of mine, PJammer recently mentioned: people will delude themselves, and that is unfortunate, but not something we can control. That we are who we are and people have to accept that person, not get into a relationship intending to try and 'change' that person.

W.O.R.K.
Wealth of Resource and KnowledgeBy Cheryl Lukatch

YOU'RE NOT THE ANSWER TO ALL MY PRAYERS

The following column first appeared in The Weirs Times on September 2, 1993.

Our culture demands a great deal of couple relationships - that they be romantic and passionate; partnerships as well as friendships, nurturing, forgiving, understanding, non-judgmental and non-demanding.
This perfect picture comes from storybooks where good always triumphs over evil and men and women don't ever disagree. Though this narrative was created many, many years ago, the perfect man/husband and perfect woman/wife thing still teases us, even though we realize we'll never measure up as " the perfect couple." But we try anyway... since that's what's expected and that's what we want to be: two well-adjusted, well-matched individuals facing life and love together, if not always happily, certainly stoically; assured that after all the "good times and bad," we'll walk off into the final sunset, still hand-in-hand with the partner we fell in love with and married. Unfortunately, rising divorce rates clearly indicate that, while our intentions are good, far too many people aren't crossing the finishing line.
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