Shoveling shit in Louisiana ~ Ray Nagin (part 4) and ~ “Thank you, Jesus!”

Yummy Sewage Recycling

General George Patton could have said, “oh, I can’t fight today, because I must get a job shoveling shit in Louisiana.”

This truth is related to Ray Nagin.  And the shit he will be shoveling in Louisiana pretty soon!  “Thank You, Jesus!”



More recycling coming soon (Tuesday, February 18, 2014)

Overwhelming, awesome ... lab results

Had some overwhelming awesome results in the lab recently, and need a little more time away from writing here to assimilate them ... will keep witting later

"Thank you, Jesus!" ~ Ray Nagin (part 3) ~ Black Betty Had A Baby Bam-ba-Lam

Continued from, "Thank you, Jesus!" ~ Ray Nagin (part 2) ~ the Storm (Katrina) before the Calm (of Testimony) ~ asking "What if?" 

Anyone who consumes art and who does not re-art (re-author) the art is just not getting his or her money's worth.

This includes consuming movies.  Anyone who pays time and money to watch a movie and who does not re-write the movie many times is just not getting his or her money's worth.  Those who do not re-write the movies that they see are on the "Trail of Tyranny" (bottom of Zorro poster) that the movie wants to take them on.

Same with consuming worthless television shows. Like American Idol and other worthless religious television shows.  Except that worthless television shows and other effluents may be worth watching once -- just once -- to see the Surgeon General's warning that watching television shows causes degenerative brain disease and plugs you into The Matrix where you may live in your private toilet bowl existence and where you may think you are free -- because you can prove to yourself that you are free (or enslaved in the "Trail of Tyranny") by choosing to watch American Idol.

Free? Or Esnalved to Idol?

Truth or dare?

Which brings me to the news.  The same is true for consuming news.  Spending time to read the news.  Or spending money to get the news - and then spending time on top of spending money to get -- really get -- the news.  It's important to rewrite the news many times.  To make good news better.  And make bad news redeemable with better endings.

I hope Ray Nagin gets sentenced to lifetime community service -- real community service and not a guest appearance on American Idol -- a real sentence under under restorative justice in order to give back the lifeblood that Nagin bled from citizens of New Orleans.

Why?

Because Black Betty Will Have a Baby Bam-ba-Lam.

Or, hotter.

Black Betty?  Who is Black Betty?

Or what?

And what does Black Betty have to do with this?

Well ... so many theories, so little time.

So, I'm going to take my own advice.  And rewrite the art.  And rewrite the movie.  And rewrite the news.  And rewrite the meaning of Black Betty.  And whip it right into shape.

More coming (in progress Sunday, February 16, 2014) ...

"Thank you, Jesus!" ~ Ray Nagin (part 2) ~ the Storm (Katrina) before the Calm (of Testimony) ~ asking "What if?"

Continued from, "Thank you, Jesus!" - Staying Calm Under Stress - Ray Nagin - and Merida in "Brave!"

Was Nagin’s, “thank you, Jesus,” a part of his elaborate discipline of corrupt business calm or a will–o’-the-wisp spontaneous prayer to get caught and be relieved of the storm shadowed and demon-haunted world that he had long created?

What opportunities to do public good as a public servant did Ray Nagin have as mayor of New Orleans when Katrina hit?  What opportunities lost?  Was the public calm of his court testimony for fraud and corruption,  "Nagin relaxed and confident under questioning by his attorney," a self-serving discipline of calm that Nagin honed during Katrina?  Or before Katrina, a discipline that he honed before his election, that is, in shadowy dark clouds of longstanding business practices, as in “How Successful People Stay Calm”?.

Was Nagin’s journey to conviction for 20 counts of bribery and fraud a matter of disciplined corrupt calm?  A series of spontaneous will–o’-the-wisp choices that rewarded him like an unexpecting Pavlovian drooling dog into his self-generated storm?  Both?  Or?

Will Nagin get sentenced to community service to bleed among those who he bled?

One thing about Nagin’s calm seems consistent with advice prescribed for calm in, “How Successful People Stay Calm.”

The article says that calm-successful people “Avoid Asking ‘What If?’”

This is nonsense.  Faulty research method.  Invert the formula and test what happens to stress levels when people insufficiently ask, “what if”? – when people hit, crash, and burn into walls, like Nagin, that they could have predicted and avoided had they asked – “what if?” – when people only after crashing learn the virtue of asking “what if”?  The research method needs to be corrected by asking dual “what if” questions because, 1) stress levels as penalties for asking questions like “what if” need to be cross-compared against, 2) stress levels for crashing and burning after failures to ask.

The article poses a hypothetical lion in the bush as the appropriate biological antagonist prompting healthy stress.  Run from lion -- that's healthy stress.   Not bad if you live in the bush with lions,  And can run.  Fast.

So just what lion got Nagin?  Did healthy human reactions to the environmental stresses of Katrina become Nagin's opportunity to become the predator?  And stay calm about it?  Did Nagin become the lion?  "What if" - Nagin is the lion?

And just what lion roared an economy into a $5 trillion jungle of investor losses?  Just what lion flushed millions of people out of their homes?

Where are our lions today?

As if predators aren’t, except in the bush. Surely these “what if” questions can cause stress.  Lots of stress. The problem is that there’s no easy way to judge “what if” questions as the causes of more stress than a failure to ask them.

“What if” -- is the question that wants for asking.  Maybe Nagin in his calm trusted exactly that no one around him would ask -- "what if" -- Nagin has become the lion?  Maybe Nagin failed to ask this question enough?  How far do we go in protecting ourselves from the stress of asking stressful questions?  Should a jury not ask -- "what if" -- because the jury is blinded by the epiphany of, "thank you, Jesus!"?  The article, “How Successful People Stay Calm,” missed the point on this one.  It's an otherwise good article for advice on how to stay calm.

As noted in the previous post, to hold calm as a benchmark to define virtue in business or life is no more virtuous than the underlying reasons for practicing calm.  Nagin was one calm customer in his testimony. Calm enough (likely nervous enough) to say, “thank you, Jesus.”

Continued @ "Thank you, Jesus!" ~ Ray Nagin (part 3) ~ Black Betty Had A Baby Bam-ba-Lam

"Thank you, Jesus!" - Staying Calm Under Stress - Ray Nagin - and Merida in "Brave!"

I wanted to write today about Scottish folklore origins and histories about will–o’-the-wisps.

I’m loving the Disney movie, Brave.  I love how fireball redhead, Merida, follows will–o’-the-wisps.

I learned that this movie has some roots in Scottish folklore.  Given universal conditions of parents raising and loving their own head-strong daughters, like mine, it's no surprise the Scots have their local version, and, it’s a bit predictable that Merida will go chasing will–o’-the-wisps on her journeys to individual freedom – because will–o’-the-wisps lead you to your destiny!

In Merida’s case, will–o’-the-wisps led her into a cave with a demon-possessed bear. Oh, my!

Alas. I cannot write about Merida following her will–o’-the-wisps.  Not today.

Today is Ray Nagin’s lucky day.

Ray Nagin followed his will–o’-the-wisps of personal freedom into his personal demon-possessed caves and then into a bearish courtroom – convicted for 20 counts of bribery and fraud.

Saying, "Thank you, Jesus!," in his testimony along the way.

"Thank you, Jesus!"  Saying it calmly.  Cooly. Collectedidly. Calm as calm can be. "Nagin relaxed and confident under questioning by his attorney."

Calmly thanking Jesus – calmly enough to make me wonder if Nagin read his good-ole Bible in one hand, while Nagin read Forbes business magazine, “How Successful People Stay Calm,” (calm businessman that Nagin was) in his other?

Jesus, Forbes, and calm?  How can a guy go wrong?

It’s possible too – auditing the world of really weird results – that Nagin wanted to get caught.  That Nagin thanked Jesus and Carl Sagan too, because Nagin wanted out of his Demon Haunted World. Perhaps wanting to get caught like Raskolnikov in Crime and Punishment. We will see if Nagin appeals.  And to whom.

See next, "Thank you, Jesus!" ~ Ray Nagin (part 2) ~ the Storm (Katrina) before the Calm (of Testimony) ~ asking "What if?"

A Sweet Kiplingesque Just-so Story about the Invention of the Sit-Down Chair, Jesus, and Da Vinci

Reproduced from the Althouse elsewhere where the backstory may be found.

See, this is all wrong.

“Humans also aren't meant to stand all day. Pretty much it's walking.”

I’ve been chewing on this since the last standing-desk entry (see the elsewhere and do a search - too complicated to reproduce  here).  It’s been bugging me.  Mainly because I’m jealous and I want a standing desk.

But also – biologically.

People do not really spend most of their time standing, sitting, or walking – it’s sleeping.

A theoretical selection advantage to sleeping upright or sleeping at a standing desk or sleeping in a sitting position in your Baroclounger – might ensue if you are members of a tribe of Somali hunter-gatherer feminists thousands of years ago who are guarding against men-on-the-hunt (excuse me, lions) because sleeping in an upright position might give you a flight-escape advantage against the predators in the bush.  It’s not the palpable bitches that you must fear at night – it’s the silent bitch-predators who strike before you know you’ve been stricken.  It's the nighttime bush that grabs you before you know you’ve been grabbed - beware.

Selection advantage goes to those who sleep upright.

The trick then is to sleep upright and then lounge all day long.

This is why I know for sure that Mel Gibson was wrong and that the Jesus in Mel Gibson’s, The Passion, is the false messiah, because that Jesus invents a chair for his mother, Mary, a sit-down chair.  The true messiah would invent a supine vertical table for lounging all day long.  Sort of like they already had in that culture.  Jesus messed it up – ipse dixit  – that Jesus is not the messiah.

Unless, of course, Jesus was just testing his Bayesian subjective (like a few blog members in the Althouse elsewhere asked awhile back) and Jesus was using a sit-down chair as a Bayesian trail run and as a test of his messiahship on his unwitting disciples.

The real Jesus at the end must now tell the truth to his now-sitting-down disciples at the Da Vinci last supper, “guys, guys, guys, why so serious? – I was only guessing   – that I was the messiah, using my best Bayesian subjective, now quit sitting there in those worthless sit-down chairs that I invented, and just hunker back down boys, in a fully supine position, and relax!  .... because at our next dinner, we will cover Malthus and the Book of Revelation, and you will really need to be all the way down and flat out supine for that whopper.”

Moral of this Kinglinqeusqe “just-so” story about how the false messiah invented sit-down chairs (aka - “How Sitting Chairs Destroyed Salvation”) is that the true position for humans is the upright position while asleep at night to guard against “palpable bitches” (see Althouse - this is a jest, the blog is awesome) who have gone into nighttime stealth mode, and then, the ideal position during the day is fully supine.

They’re nice legs, they just don’t work right ...

Out There