Maggie's Farm

For those who know zilch about sailboats, catboats are comfortably beamy, have a mast far forward, and one sail, usually with a gaff rig. Catboats remain popular on Cape Cod. This one, the graceful 16' Lynx, is built by Cape Cod's Arey's Pond Boatyard.

The IRS sends an annoying auditor to audit a synagogue.

The auditor is going through the checks, and turns to the Rabbi and says, "I notice that you buy a lot of candles."

"Yes," answered the Rabbi.

"Well, Rabbi, what do you do with the candle drippings?" he asked.

"A good question," noted the Rabbi. "We actually save them up. When we have enough, we send them back to the candle maker. And every now and then, they send us a free box of candles."

"Oh," replied the auditor somewhat disappointed that his question actually had a practical answer. So he thought he'd try another question.

"Rabbi, what about all these matzo purchases? What do you do ... with the crumbs from the matzo?"Ah, yes," replied the Rabbi calmly, "we actually collect up the crumbs, we send them in a box back to the manufacturer and every now and then, they send a box of matzo balls."

"Oh," replied the auditor, thinking hard how to fluster the Rabbi.

"Well, Rabbi," he went on, "what do you do with all the foreskins from the circumcisions? ""Yes, here too, we do not waste," answered the Rabbi. "What we do is save up all the foreskins. And when we have enough we actually send them to the Internal Revenue Service."

"The Internal Revenue Service?," questioned the auditor in disbelief.

A special edition of the NYT Science Times. Some of it is self-evident, but it's always a fun topic.

I think one common assumption of the researchers has something wrong, though, at least for young men. For young men, the question should be what turns them off, not on: they're always on, otherwise.

It's amusing to read in the NYT about "hearty tumescence," but I thought the funniest quote was this:

“Listening to Noam Chomsky,” said a psychologist in her 50s, “always turns me on."

Good grief. Under what rock did they have to look to find someone who would say that? But at least she didn't say that her favorite was Al Gore with his hockey stick.

If the Easter Bunny didn't make it to your house yesterday, this might be why:

Shut up and Sing Department:

Elton John's Sacrifice, YouTube. I promise that you will like it. (h/t, Tangled Web)

Here's a version with Elton John, Dire Straits, and Clapton

Lyrics here.

Re-posted from April, 2006

"Now the bricks lay on Grand Street,
where the neon madmen climb, they all fall there so perfectly; it all seems so well-timed..."

Photo yesterday, at Ferrara's on Grand St., NYC, to pick up some Easter wheat pies. Creamy, with just the right amount of Citron. Not exactly Yankee food.

Kind of sad to see Little Italy slowly being absorbed by adjacent Chinatown - but Chinatown is great, too. In fact, wonderful. Feels like Asia. Any woman who carries a genuine Gucci or Prada or Kate Spade bag is a big sucker. This is knock-off city, for the folks with brains.

These days, the third-generation Italians have taken the Holland Tunnel and moved out to Soprano-land to try to capture the American Illusion of suburban bliss. But the suburban kids all come back to NY, not to mention the ambitious rural kids from across the USA, and across the world.

What fun it would be to own a little pied a terre in Little Italy, or on University Place, or in Gramercy Park, or anywhere near Zabar's. Thanks to Rudy and now to Bloomberg, NYC is as good as it has ever been - probably better.

Why? The parks have all been re-done, and are welcoming, friendly, with all sorts of stuff going on. The tourists, and the "bridge-and-tunnel" crowd, are back with a vengeance. Interesting things to do and places to see - endless. Places to eat - fuggedaboutit: good everywhere. The cops - out of their patrol cars and just walking their beats like the old days, and seeming reasonably friendly although they have to maintain their NYC cool. The whole place is gleaming, busy, happily crowded, ethnic as anywhere in the world, and full of the usual new construction everywhere. One heck of a town. (Only complaint: Bloomberg says we can't smoke in bars. That is truly nuts, as bad as the UK. If I can handle life, I ought to be able to smoke in a bar without a Mommy telling me what to do. How about having smoking and non-smoking bars? Hmmm, I predict the non-smoking would go out of business.)

We did not forget the cannolis.

This pretty boat has twin 350 Crusader engines.

Speaking of boats, Sippican Cottage does Boatyard. Many can relate, I am sure.

About 5000 anti-war protesters from the US, Britain, France, and Germany braved the dangers to assemble in Baghdad yesterday to protest ongoing Al Quaida activities against the people of Baghdad.

"As long as Al Quaida and Iran continue to create mayhem in Iraq, there can be no peace or security. The good people of Iraq do not deserve this," said a press statement issued by the organizers of the march.

It went on to state "We urge the Islamic terrorists to lay down their arms and bombs and to get a job, get married, open an Individual Retirement Account, and help build the economy of this fine country so all can have happy, normal, peaceful lives."

Carrying placards reading such things as "Stop the war,"  "Al Quaida sucks," "Nice people aren't suicide bombers," "Iran Go Home," "Al Sadr is a Nerd,"and "Guys with bombs won't get dates," the marchers followed a route through the main thoroughfares of downtown Baghdad for about five hours yesterday, and will hold a press conference this morning before returning to their homes.

The march was entirely peaceful, and thousands of curious but supportive Iraqis emerged from their homes and shops to watch the marchers as they banged on pots and pans and chanted "Bombs aren't cool - let peace rule," "Don't be a fool - freedom is cool," and "One, two, three four - we don't want your Jihad war." 

As the marchers broke into John Lennon's deeply moving hymn "All we are saying...is give peace a chance," we asked Omar, a bread merchant whose shop was along the route, for his reaction. "Veddy nice hats," he observed.

Photo of the Baghdad peace march borrowed from Dr. Sanity's piece on the peace movement.

An old southern Baptist country preacher had a teenage son, and it was getting time the boy should give some thought to choosing a profession.

Like many young men, the boy didn't really know what he wanted to do, and he didn't seem too concerned about it.

One day, while the boy was away at school, his father decided to try an experiment. He went into the boy's room and placed on his study table four objects:

A Bible
A silver dollar
A bottle of whisky
A Playboy magazine

"I'll just hide behind the door," the old preacher said to himself, "and when he comes home from school this afternoon, I'll see which object he picks up.  If it's the Bible, he's going to be a preacher like me, and what a blessing that would be!  If he picks up the dollar, he's going to be a businessman, and that would be okay, too.  But if he picks up the bottle, he's going to be a no-good drunkard, and, Lord, what a shame that would be!  And worst of all, if he picks up that magazine he's gonna be a skirt-chasin' bum."

The old man waited anxiously, and soon heard his son's footsteps as he entered the house whistling and headed for his room. The boy tossed his books on the bed, and as he turned to leave the room he spotted the objects on the table.

With curiosity in his eye, he walked over to inspect them.  Finally, he picked up the Bible and placed it under his arm. He picked up the silver dollar and dropped it into his pocket. He uncorked the bottle and took a big drink while he admired this month's Centerfold.

"Lord have mercy," the old preacher muttered in disgust, "he's gonna be a Congressman."

(h/t, Alpha Patriot)

Talked with a friend last night who had just returned from Africa, and who spent ten days at Singita's Ebony Lodge in South Africa's huge Kruger National Park.

It sounds like a trip of a lifetime, and Singita's lodges (each with a small number of guest suites) sound like the most comfortable places in Africa with service which silently anticipated their every want. They even had his favorite cigars in a humidor waiting for him on arrival.

They got to the lodge by chartering a plane from Johannesberg, which he described as becoming a lawless, white-hating and frightening city. The famous Saxon Hotel is surrounded by walls, barbed wire, with dogs on patrol and armed guards.

We may be fated to watch this amazing country deteriorate into a third world country.

You can fantasize about, or plan, your trip to Singita here. The lodges here. Conde Nast Traveller named Singita the 2004 Best Hotel in the World.

With Roger McGuinn, Chris Hillman, David Crosby, and Bob. YouTube

The Byrds, I'll feel a whole lot better when you're gone. YouTube

One more photo of our friend fishing the Upper Malleo River in Patagonia this past January.

Long-time readers know that Maggie's Farm doesn't do ads. I suppose we'd consider it if the money were big enough, though. Anyway, we sort-of linked up with the Pajamas Media team (without taking their ads) and have added their button to our sidebar.

Thanks to Roger Simon for expediting. 

From Tom Shales' review of the "Planet Earth" series on the Discovery Channel: