Tuesday, September 8, 2026

Petfinder Post: Chowchows and Domestic Short Hair

Next on the list of dog breeds that bother the Buttinskis of Britain is the Chowchow, often shortened to Chow, a breed of Chinese origin whose popularity peaked a few generations ago in the US. One reason may be that in the US "chowchow" also refers to a kind of seasoning sauce made of mixed pickled vegetables. Not everyone likes the relish and not everyone likes the dogs. 

The American Chowchow is a sort of Spitz-type dog bred to be mostly a watchdog. It is sturdy and chunky and solid, standing 17 to 20 inches high at the shoulder and weighing 45 to 70 pounds. There are fluffy-coated and smooth-coated types. Their life expectancy is 8 to 12 years. They are notoriously clean dogs, said to be as fastidious as cats, with little odor. They are known for having aloof, "dignified," "refined" personalities. 

Eye and thyroid disorders run in some Chowchow bloodlines. While responsible breeders work to screen out these genes, and the genetic joint disorders found in many pedigreed dog breeds, those who really want people not to be able to own dogs scream that it would be better just to let this breed go extinct. 

Even the short-haired Chows have dense coats and need a lot of grooming. The heavy lion-like section of fur around the head can become messy--and these dogs haaate when their coats smell bad and attract parasites, but what can they do? Humans have to clean their "beards" and "manes." 

Chows don't tolerate heat and humidity well, but they do need daily exercise. They can thrive in urban conditions as long as they are walked regularly. Living with lazy humans, they can become lazy too, become obese, and develop expensive, nasty diseases like diabetes. 

Typically intelligent but stubborn, this breed can be hard to train. They need patience and kindness. They are tough and strong, and should not be antagonized. They are valued as watchdogs--"nobody's going to break in and throw THIS dog a treat while he robs our house" is a claim people make. Even a Chow breeder coyly admits that while their male dogs usually take everything into consideration before they attack a potential threat, the females tend to "bite first and ask questions later." I understand that this breed description may be tempting to people who want to rid their homes of annoying relatives and Jehovah's Witnesses, but it can also perturb lawsuit-phobic landlords...If your property is surrounded by a fence with signs warning that your dog may bite, then in most states neither relatives nor Jehovah's Witnesses can sue. Your homeowners' insurance may still rise, because "dangerous dogs" have been known to bite "licensees" such as mail carriers who have some right to approach your home, and insurance companies will never let an excuse to demand more money go to waste. 

Socialists really, really don't like the idea of anyone having a right to protect their property. For people who don't think voting against Socialists is enough, owning a watchdog who won't be disarmed by petting or treats may be an appealing idea. But do consider how you plan to protect your friends' toddlers from a Very Serious Watchdog.

As family pets Chows rate four stars, having neither outstandingly good nor outstandingly bad records. They do recognize their humans' children, and they can be "fluffy teddy bears" for their humans' families. They're not known for having much sense of play or humor, though, and may teach children their boundaries the hard way. They don't have much patience for more playful dogs. They tend to be, to put it charitably, very dominant over other pets. They can learn to coexist with cats, but don't naturally like cats; they are one of the breeds known to kill and eat cats. In fact, since most Chows see themselves as leaders, they can be dominant even with their owners. 

Finally, because they're smart and stubborn and loyal and loving, Chows can be hard to adopt. They don't accept right away that they've been sold, or even "adopted." You probably want to spend some time getting acquainted before you adopt one. If it accepts you as its master, it may be a wonderful pet; if not, you may be sorry you brought it home.

In fact, if you adopt a Chow (or any Spitz-type dog) and love it, you may be tagged by the organization as a Spitzperson and begged at least to foster any other Spitzen who come to the shelter. Some people are delighted with this aspect of being Spitzfolk. You might want to give it a second thought.  

So Chows are definitely not for everyone. There are still a few of them in the United States, however, and occasionally dogs with some Chow ancestry can be found in shelters. For those who don't want these dogs to languish in shelters, here are links to what Petfinder currently shows as Chowchows and crossbreeds. Since most of these dogs are crossbreeds, our cat photo contest will focus on Domestic Short Hair cats.

Zipcode 10101: Nash from the Mexican Border by way of Scarsdale 


Real Chows have blue-black tongues, and see that tongue! He's just a spring puppy, so it's hard to be sure, but they think his other ancestors were short-haired terriers and his weight will stay at the low end of the "medium" range (26-60 pounds). 

George from NYC 


Just another spring kitten whose mother's humans were too lazy or cheap or ignorant to have her spayed. It's one thing to want kittens; it's another thing to let unwanted kittens happen. Anyway, he's a lovable little fellow who needs a good home with another bouncy-pouncy kitten, and at least one good-sized room where shelves are for climbing on and furniture is for hiding behind. 

Zipcode 20202: Sunny from Texas by way of Bethesda


He's from Texas too, but he has a ruff. Four years old, 65 pounds, Sunny loves children, other dogs, riding in the car, and playing in snow whenever he's had the chance. He does have a playful side. He likes long walks. He is absolutely not recommended to homes with cats.

Cookie from Fredericksburg 


This pretty Tortie would prefer (they think) to be adopted together with her solid black buddy, Pepper. She's already been scheduled for spaying in the next few days. She's just another kitten...stop me before I rant again.

Zipcode 30303: Ramen Noodle from Houston by way of Atlanta 


At 49 pounds, thought to be about 7 years old, Ramen Noodle was found wandering on the streets of Houston's Chinatown. He's available for adoption in New York, DC, or Atlanta actually, and in other places, through various "partner organizations." If adopted by people based in Atlanta he's eligible for a discount with a dog trainer there. He has behaved well when exposed to other dogs and children. He's not been exposed to cats.

Cheeky from Atlanta


What does it mean when a cat seems to be purring with delight, then hisses in warning? There are several possibilities. Cats can sustain brain damage from illness, anesthesia, medication, etc., so one possibility might be hallucinations. More likely, though, especially with a diluted orange cat, she's saying "Oh yes, scratch there, rub there--er, NOT there." Anyone who's ever wanted to leap up off a massage table and bolt, towel and oil and all, can relate. The organization are convinced that people who get to know this quirky little cat will love her. So much so, that they'll pay you to be her foster human for up to two months. If you want to adopt her, just save the money! Fostering means you agree to let other people meet and possibly adopt the cat--to forestall that, you'd simply pay the fee and adopt her yourself. 

Bonus Dog: Dallas from Johnson City (Tennessee) 


Taken in as a potentially dangerous stray, Dallas is an older dog who might have outlived his human. He has no criminal record but he needs a good home, from which he will not be allowed to stray on the streets.  

Bonus Kittens: Latte & Cappuccino from Johnson City 


Either they didn't set up a web page for Cappuccino, or someone has already adopted Cappuccino. The web page is all about Latte, but then it says she needs to be adopted with Cappuccino, but then they give no information at all about Cappuccino. Anyway isn't that a pretty diluted Tortie face?
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Butterfly of the Week: Broad-Banded Swallowtail

This week's butterfly, Heraclides astyalus, is well enough known to have an English name: the Broad-Banded Swallowtail. It also has a Spanish name, limonera chica, the Little Lemon/Lime Dealer. North Americans don't usually see it as a small butterfly--we're more likely to mistake it for our "Giant" Swallowtail, if we see it at all--but some of the Heraclides species are bigger. Its wingspread is typically four inches or more--sometimes closer to five inches (12cm). When the wings are spread wide they often show what look like the shadow outline of a smaller, plainer set of wings. Some of its many local nicknames identify it as a smaller relative of H. thoas.


Male drinking buddies at a puddle. Photo Par Peterwchen — Travail personnel, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=99803405 .

This species has been given many names. Apart from having been reclassified from the genus Papilio to the genus Heraclides, individuals have been recorded as species lycophron, mentor, pirithous, oebalus, drepanon, pallas, hozaus,theophron, iraidan, taini, and phanias, most of which names are now considered synonyms. Astyalus or Astyalos, the literary character scientists are currently agreeing to commemorate in this species' name, was a Trojan soldier in the Iliad.


Dark female photographed at the Ultimate Noah's Ark site, whose "Butterflies of Brazil" page is too good to miss, despite some errors in translation: http://www.aultimaarcadenoe.com.br/butterflies-of-brazil/

While some populations may be endangered, the species as a whole is too widely distributed to appear to be in much danger. It can occasionally even become a nuisance, though it seldom does. It can adapt to suburban living conditions; it's found in South American cities.


The band of spots across the underside of the hind wings is "diagnostic" for identifying this species and subspecies. Photo from Gagea on Wikipedia.

As with other Swallowtails, colors can vary. Females can look black or blackish above. Males usually have a broad band of yellow across their upper wings, with borders of black or dark brown; sometimes they are almost all yellow, above and below. 


Yellow male from Paraguay photographed  by Paul Smith, in April, for Faunaparaguay.com.

Males typically have longer "swallow tails" on their hind wings than females have. Males' bodies are usually black above and yellow on the sides; females' are black. Underwings are yellow with black or dark brown markings.


Photo at Ecency.com.

Dark females can fade and look gray, like the Red-Bodied Swallowtails.


Photo by David Sala.

Hind wings have scalloped edges and can look fringed.


Photo by Katia Santos. Though some other subspecies are more likely to have "strongly dentate" hind wings, this individual has been identified as H.a. astyalus.


In some lights they can even be seen as "buff and cream," and some specimens have faded to that color combination. Photo from Panamabiota.org.


Map of the sources of photos for this species in GBIF's huge gallery. Texas to Baja to Peru to Brazil to Trinidad and all points between.

It flies in South America, near the equator. Much of what's been published about these butterflies is written in Spanish or Portuguese. However, the butterflies sometimes visit the Southwestern States and Caribbean islands, and as they catch the eye wherever they go, documents about them are also written in French, German, Dutch, and English. While scientific literature has traditionally been written in a style that sounds awkward in English, this was done to make translation easy; computer translation software is more reliable in translating science documents than in translating most other things.

Heraclides astyalus has also been confused with Byasa alcinous; there is some resemblance. Byasa alcinous has a red body and, typically, black wings, but the wings can fade, become translucent, and admit enough bright sunlight that it can look yellow in the sun. To reduce confusion, instead of placing photos side by side for comparison this web site will direct everyone to our study of Byasa alcinous:


Like the Asian Red-Bodied Swallowtails, which include the genus Byasa, Heraclides astyalus are large and can move their fore and hind wings separately. But they're not red-bodied.


Photo by Lela Cappelli, Brazil.

H. astyalus can easily be confused with H. thoas and H. androgeus, which fly in the same countries.It has been suspected of hybridizing with H. torquatus and producing offspring that have been identified as a separate speries, H. garleppi, which does not appear on most lists. 

This butterfly's habitat does not really have winter, and the butterflies can fly at any time of year, but they are most active in June and July. Another period of high activity occurs in October, suggesting that there may be two main generations each year.

Videos of these butterflies are available free of charge as meditation and relaxation aids. Here they're the next to largest butterflies in a group of drinking buddies that include other Heraclides, some Eurytides, Clearwings, Sulphurs, and other smaller species in Bolivia. If this long slow-motion video doesn't put you either into sleep or into an alpha-wave meditative state, you have a task to finish.


The species is common in most of its habitat, and males spend enough time at mud puddles to be easily photographed. Ian Fraser includes a puddle party in this photo essay about animals that tend to be attracted to mud, beginning with gorgeous tropical birds:


Male butterflies of many species gather at puddles, often favoring salty or nasty puddles, and sit around in groups, drinking. Jorge J. Restrepos observed closely what male butterflies do at these puddle parties. They really do function as part of the kidneys of our planet. They slurp up salty, sometimes oily, or polluted liquid as fast as they can go and then piddle out relatively clean water. The butterflies actually crave the mineral salts, especially sodium and nitrogen; males crave them more because, during the mating process, males transfer part of their supply of minerals to females, allowing the females to focus on sipping sweeter, higher-calorie nectar. (Males sip nectar, too, and both sexes also drink plain water.) 

Humans don't usually notice butterflies' or moths' odors. Butterflies and moths do; they can smell each other literally half a mile away. When males have ingested enough minerals they may go out looking for females. Female Swallowtails, however, usually emerge from their pupal shells full of eggs and eager to mate and start offloading those eggs, while males usually spend a few days drinking saltwater first. As a result, eager female Swallowtails often gather around the edges of the males' puddle parties ("leks"), checking out males and approaching those who seem about ready to mate. (They may be able to see changes in the males' iridescent blue-green-black spots, and probably also smell changes in their scents, that help them identify males who are and are not ready.) About all butterflies seem to want in a mate is fertility; they don't mate for life, after all. After a few minutes females flit off to the important business of placing eggs, and males go back to their puddles, where they may never be approached again, but they never know.

We note also that, although Restrepos is not a lepidopterist and didn't recognize his sighting as a male butterfly even when the female approached and they mated, he recognized the female as "the same kind." Humans usually recognize female Heraclides astyalus when their wings are black, but male butterflies, having access to scent cues, can recognize the ones whose wings are yellow.


Like the Tiger Swallowtails, this big, bold, thirsty species can be a little too friendly when tourists are dripping with fresh, salty sweat.


Photo from GBIF, which identifies it as having been taken in Brazil in October. "Older" females are more likely to drink salty liquids on their own; younger ones can usually afford to sip only nectar and fresh water, waiting to get their mineral salts from their mates.

There are six subspecies, some better documented than others: H.a. astyalus, anchicayaensis, bajaensis, hippomedon, pallas, and phanias. Hippomedon was described as having rounder hind wings and shorter "tails." Phanias has hind wings "more strongly dentate," and averages larger than hippomedon. Pallas also has hind wings "strongly dentate" with the tail sometimes only a little longer than the "teeth" of the scalloped edge. 

Heraclides astyalus anchicayaensis has been named rather recently. Some think it should be counted as a separate species, H. anchicayaensis. Lewis says it looks similar to H. astyalus astyalus but the males' upper wings are missing a spot that astyalus has; the females look alike. If anything anchicayaensis may be slightly larger. The name commemorates the Anchicaya river in Colombia. The last A gets the accent so the Latin name would presumably be an-chi-ca-YAH-ensis...but people pronounce Latin as they choose. The way Julius Caesar said his name, or title, became the words "Kaiser" and "Czar," but Italians now say "Cesare" differently and the English have always thought of old Julius as a bit of a seizer of power...so there we are.


Photo by Indianacristo, September, Colombia. This is the only photo I found for anchicayaensis.

Heraclides astyalus astyalus is the "nominate," perhaps most common, subspecies found across Central and northern South America. The "tails" are sometimes spatulate, widening at the tips, and can show yellow spots on the tips, as if mimicking Heraclides thoas.


Photo from Borboletas do Brasil.


Photo from Wikiborboleta.com, also from Brazil, by Joao Amarildo Ranguetti. 


Photo by Eulogia Lopez, May, Argentina. Do biochemical changes make it easier for this old, damaged male to look "old and gray"?

Some authorities still think pallas and bajaensis should be classified as a separate species, listing bajaensis as a subspecies of pallas. Bajaensis looks, to me, as if it were trying to fit in with other butterflies in the US and Mexico. The name, of course, celebrates Baja California. The males seem to be mimicking Heraclides cresphontes:


Photo by Mayibrago, May, Michoacan.

While the females seem to be part of that group of butterflies that all seem to be imitating Battus philenor:


Photo by Francisco3, August, Mazatlan. She does look a bit like Battus philenor, doesn't she? Apart from being almost twice the size...


"Oh, the bird that ate me was very sick! I think it died! Don't I smell disgusting?" Photo by Marcopolo Amarillas, July, Sinaloa.

Heraclides astyalus hippomedon with its "rounder" wings. Hippomedon was an ancient Greek warlord.


Photo by Will & Gill Carter for ButterfliesOfAmerica.com.


Female with the tail only a little longer than the teeth from Faunayfloradelargentinanativa.blogspot.com.

H.a. pallas is listed as Heraclides pallas pallas at INaturalist. Pallas was a sort of surname or title given to Athena. Poe, in "The Raven," probably had a replica of an ancient image of Athena in mind when he referred to a "pallid bust of Pallas." In some Greek and Roman literature, however, Pallas was a friend of Athena--sometimes described as female, sometimes as male--whom she inadvertently killed while play-fighting with spears. She was said to have added her friend's name to hers as a display of mourning. Some think the meaning of this story was that Pallas was the god or goddess of a rival cult whom the cult of Athena overpowered. Anyway, the butterflies' distinctive features include very short tails. 


Photo by Aztekium, August, Santiago. 


She's already lost one of her tails and she doesn't seem to  miss it. Photo by Eolson, June, Nicaragua.


Photo by Eolson, June, Nicaragua. Note the eye-like spots on the sides of the hump. Someone called a baby bajaensis an "alligator caterpillar." Birds seeing the eye spots and leglike stripes can think it's a baby alligator if they want to.


Photo by Eolson, June, Nicaragua.

H.a. phanias, with hind wings "more strongly dentate" than other subspecies, photographed in Colombia. Phanias, or Phaenias or Phainias, was a Greek writer, a commentator on Aristotle.


Photo by Catalina Tong for Noreste.eu.


Photo by Tommy Andriollo, October, Ecuador. 

For all subspecies of astyalus eggs are little yellow beads laid on citrus tree leaves. These butterflies usually seem to prefer wild species, but will accept tame ones. Again, mixed plantings help prevent population irruptions that can make the species a nuisance.

Caterpillars have been described as similar to Heraclides thoas but "more strongly marmorated." If there are consistent differences among subspecies, they've not been documented. This little one shows no interest in the eggshell beside it...


From GBIF, taken in August in Brazil.


They have osmeteria but don't seem eager to display them. Gasperinbio (October, Brazil) took six photos of this caterpillar, holding and moving the leaf on which it was feeding. The caterpillar held still, pretending to be the dropping of a large sick bird, not putting out its "stink horns."


Jhonatansantos, however, managed to annoy this one. (Also October, also Brazil.)


Some sources also mention that these caterpillars can be yellower than thoas caterpillars, or not. Markings can vary even among litter mates, like these two from Brazil. Caterpillars are large, in proportion to the butterflies they will become, and adhere to the "try to look like droppings from a sick bird" design principle. 


Is this H.a. astyalus caterpillar big enough to convince birds that it's two small animals? Photo by Lindolfo Vieira Souto, of Brazil, for Wikiborboleta.com. Older caterpillars' markings can include two or even more "tiny faces."

Pupae are also compared with those of H. thoas (which is bigger) but have a sharper branchlike projection on top.
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Sunday, September 6, 2026

Web Log for 9.4-5.26

Animals 


Category 4 furricane by Neithan Hador, on the Mirror, where the software allows the dogs to rotate.

Mental Health 

No it's not, Catherine Salgado. The abortion debate has never gone anywhere, never will go anywhere, and makes people tired. When we hear people blaming anything but abortion on the existence of abortion, what we think is that those people's mothers should have chosen abortion. 

The Lindsay Clancy "debate" is the result of drug-induced dementia. Clancy knowingly shopped for doctors who prescribed the pills that seemed to make her feel good, for a short time. That is something a lot of people Out There can relate to. People who've been told that "happiness" is a duty, and therefore aren't able to feel it as a pleasure, want to be able to pop pills on their job and walk around unsupervised. Ooohhh, if they couldn't pop their pills every day, they'd be soooo depreeeesssssed. (There is actually some truth in this, because depression is a symptom of many diseases, including addiction to those pills. People who get off antidepressants usually do feel depressed. And they have to put their big kid pants on, recognize that their moods don't matter to anything except perhaps diagnosing their physical disease if it's not obvious, and muddle through life seeking better physical health until one day they realize that they feel a sort of baseline contentment--once they're (a) not sick, and (b) not poking at their feelings all the time.) 

People, very wrongheaded people in my opinion, are agitating for their opinion that (1) Lindsay Clancy should have been able to walk around in a drug "high" for as long as she felt "high," and (2) should get the "not guilty by reason of insanity" verdict when she finally succumbed to the side effects of the drugs she was on. Since I personally would rather sit on the electric chair than spend my life as a medical experiment in the back of a locked hospital ward, I'm willing to concede Clancy the "right" to suffer. (If, like Jodi Arias, she soon decides she'd rather be in prison, that's not news. We've all heard more than anyone should have to hear about this wreck of a woman. Feed her or don't feed her but don't tell me.) 

What I'm not willing to concede is that people using drugs should be walking around unsupervised. If Clancy was released from the hospital, it should have been in the custody of a responsible caretaker, and she should never have been alone with children, should never have been driving a car, should never have been in a room where she could get her hands on a weapon, should not have been allowed to wear hard-soled shoes, for the months or year or so it takes to identify which SSRI users are going to develop "Prozac Dementia." The debate is about drugs, and people who mindlessly try to dig up the dead abortion debate and drag that in are Part Of The Problem.

It's for reasons like this that I couldn't even consider a job for which I was recommended. I'm not yet a real Chesterton scholar since most of Chesterton's books were out of print for most of my life, but I could easily be one; the man was super-popular in his day because his writing voice was so easy to read and like. I decided not to make a BA in English Lierature my educational goal, but I was close to earning one; the last time I seriously considered enrolment in a college, I was told I'd qualify for the BA in one more four-month "semester." Since then I've had thirty years' more reading. And writing. And writing about reading. I could buy "equivalent experience" BA's in English Literature from every university that recognizes "equivalent experience" if I had the money and wanted to waste it that way. (Actually, I enjoyed the course work; if I went after the BA I'd want to sit through the classes in English Literature, including the ones I sat through in 1984 since teachers and students probably have a different take on the classics by now.) Given four months I could be as familiar with Chesterton as I am with his readers, critics, admirers Dorothy Sayers and C.S. Lewis. And it would be fun. What I could not do is present Chesterton's work from a modern Catholic perspective. There is no way I could join a church that programs people to parrot-squawk "abortion" when they're hearing a jury debate about the moral responsibility of a drug addict.

Clancy is not a representative of the group "women." She is not a representative of the group "Northerners." She is not a representative of the group "nurses." She is a representative of the group "drug addicts, specifically prescription drug addicts who develop homicide-suicide thinking as part of the classic, unmistakable pattern of serotonin-booster reactions commonly known as Prozac Dementia." It is supremely unhelpful to drag in claptrap about her being a woman, or even about her victims being children, because Prozac Dementia is not sex-specific at all. Most cases don't even become famous any more--and when the cases have been reported in detail Lilly, and other pharmaceutical companies, have bribed newspapers to suppress the very relevant information which drugs the homicide-suicides were on. Basically, men occasionally develop homicide-suicide thinking all by themselves., because they are biologically disposable and their average level of sanity is lower, but only SSRIs allow women to start planning homicide-suicides just like men and are involved in the majority of violent crimes committed by women. Male homicide-suicides may be--I've not seen honest large-scale studies of this--more likely to attack people at work or school, females to attack people in "the home," but either a man or a woman who is under the influence of these drugs may decide to attack strangers on the street.

Meanwhile, let's say this to the morons who are seeking attention by posting on social media that women would be less depressed if they all went home and had too many babies: Women who go home and have babies are the ones who are likely to kill those babies. When "home" and "work" are the same thing, there's no selection between two places to act out homicide-suicide thinking, so automatically the kiddies are at greater risk. If Clancy tells us anything about the lifestyle choices "women" should make, it's that "women" should not have babies. There are too many humans on this planet anyway. Women who reach menopause baby-free should probably be given medals with cash awards attached.



"Happy," "fulfilled" mothers all...wrong. Real happiness about the achievement of motherhood starts after the child is 20 or, in some cases, 50 years old...and these fifteen young women were very, very unhappywhen they stayed home and had babies. Not because abortion exists. Because the pills they were encouraged to take made them feel worse not better.

Murder

Some statistics, in case you want to squelch one of the crazier trolls Out There:

Approximately 14,000 murders were reported last year.

Nobody likes to give up hope that a murder suspect will be found and the case can be brought to trial, but in 2025 about two out of three murder cases were brought to trial.

For murder cases where a suspect was brought to trial, nine out of ten suspects were male. 

Both men and women try the "not guilty by reason of insanity" defense, and in some cases the "temporary insanity" defense. "Temporary insanity" works, when it does, usually in cases where the defendant had just been beaten or raped and then saw a chance to take revenge on the assailant. People who can convince a jury that they were lying in the lawn, bleeding, playing dead, and they saw the attacker sit down at a nearby bus bench and spread out their newspaper, and so they remembered where a large rock happened to be, etc., have a chance of getting off with a verdict of temporary insanity. They might be ordered to go to counselling or do some sort of service, but nobody thinks they're dangerous to ordinary people. "Temporary insanity" worked for Lorena Bobbitt and would probably have worked for Jodi Arias if she hadn't told such a wide variety of misleading stories.

People who kill strangers or children don't have a hope of that kind of outcome, though. "Not guilty by reason of insanity" presupposes the kind of psychosis from which sufferers are never going to get out of the hospital. Google doesn't have an estimate of how many murder suspects, altogether, have tried to get ruled "not guilty by reason of insanity." Google does quote unnamed sources as saying that about 70% of suspects who try this line of defense quickly drop it as they realize it carries penalties many find heavier than a prison sentence, and that about 1 in 400 men who try it get the verdict they want. (People often don't think of male homicidal rage as being insanity, though male anger addiction is definitely part of a physical disease pattern that involves the brain and could be classified as a psychosis.) In a nation the size of the US, 1 in 400 means that some 300 to 500 men are found violently insane and sentenced to life in hospitals rather than prisons, every year--and if the victims weren't famous and the crime had not become a media circus, these men's families usually do all that they can to keep the stories out of the news media. 

For those with a higher tolerance for true crime stories than I have, Wikipedia does have a long list of people who achieved some degree of notoriety by being ruled not guilty by reason of insanity. The plea has historically been more likely to work for women than for men.


Music 

Bob Dylan. 


The Young Tradition. (I was fascinated by the clear vocal harmony, free from guitars or drums, as a teenager. I wore out their LPs, marvelling at the fact that I was able to hear different vocal parts in each song.)


Pure Prairie League.


Roy Milton.


The Midnight.


Wynonie Harris.


Hugo Kant.


Big Joe and the Dynaflows.


Dolly Parton.


Natalie Imbruglia.


R.E.M. Oh, but Youtube really doesn't want to play this song. Millions of people listened to it on the radio. Maybe it was the images, on the video, of kids crawling around inside a moving vehicle the way we all somehow survived doing. Youtube made me click through a couple of warnings and then displayed an ad for a suicide prevention hotline before playing "Everybody Hurts." Seriously, Youtube, don't you think that people who want to replay this slow, saddish song have survived any suicidal tendencies it might have triggered back when we were young and hormone-raddled?


Jesse Welles. (It's appropriate to mention that a real blast of ladybird scent wafted in from the window while I was listening to this song. The False Lady beetles who crawl into houses for the winter aren't my favorites; if they're going to broadcast their scents as mating attractions I would prefer they do it out in the garden, but in a neighborhood infested with the kind of loathsome parasite that sprays poison into the air with the intention of harming human beings, any survivor "bug" is a good "bug.")


George Harrison.


Zac Brown Band.


Crystal Gayle.


George Strait.


Tanya Tucker.


Alice in Chains.


Nanci Griffith.


Tom Petty.




Canned Heat.


Traffic.


Cream.


Grass Roots. (The moderator at the forum where this was shared noted that it's not a very wise "message song." It's an historical artefact. If this web site particularly endorses the content of any song linked in the Music category, we'll say so. We recommend that people who are free to listen to music and move their bodies while connected to the Internet use these links for exercise breaks as defined by them. We think quite a lot of songs shared here would be absolute rubbish if used as guides to life.)


The Church.


Kris Kristofferson.


The Beatles.



Incredible String Band.


Steeleye Span.


Mark Knopfler.


Paolo Conte.


Spirit.


Avishai Cohen.


Chic.


Queen.


Pavel Szabo.


Joni Mitchell.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vt2pceRSUMU (from the early stages of video recording, this one came flagged as "terrible recording, but fun")


Pretenders.



J.J. Cale.

 
Quote

Suitable for cross-stitch or needlepoint...

"
Other people will call me a rebel, but I just feel like I'm living my life and doing what I want to do. Sometimes people call that rebellion, especially when you're a woman. —Joan Jett, American Rock Singer
"

Travel 

It doesn't have much of a trunk, but Italians are proud of their Stone Elephant, a natural sculpture formed as decaying bits of rock dropped away.

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Friday, September 4, 2026

Web Log for 9.3.26

Music 

The Seekers.


Judy Collins.


Po' Ramblin' Boys.


Robert Earl Keen.


Avishai Cohen.


Obituary

Gloria Steinem...This is sort of ridiculous, but it needs to be out there.

Gloria Steinem was one of the greatest activists of all time. Leftist? Sure. Live with men she refused to marry, for the express purpose of rerouting their incomes into her campaigns? Absolutely. (After retirement age she did finally marry her current boyfriend.) In bitter disagreement with a majority of the women she claimed to represent? On many things, probably enough to be a majority of the time. But she was dang good at what she did...including the use of heyoka hijinks ("If men could get pregnant, abortion would be a saaacrament!") to distract attention from valid nonpartisan goals like getting banks to treat all their customers with, at least, equal venality. 

Everyone should have her collection of short nonfiction, Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions, for (if nothing else) her guide for what activists should be doing in aid for whatever we're active in aid of. 

Hypersensitive male readers may of course feel bashed in that book, even hypocritically bashed in view of the fact that Steinem did not, in fact, hate men. Most heterosexual women do in fact support social changes to benefit women, and most of us recruit men to support the same things we do, and after all most men don't want to be an oppressor class if women will help them not to be one, but it is doubtful whether any other feminist ever drew or ever will draw so much support from men. (Which goes some distance toward explaining why Steinem made all that noise about abortion rather than safe sex, even knowing that a solid majority of women favor safe sex as the only safe and effective means of birth control.) 

So it seems only fair to those male readers to tell them what I remember best about Outrageous Acts: Toward the end of that book is reprinted an interview with a pornographist and his girlfriend, or star actress, or whatever. They were yanking her chain. They referred, fairly explicitly, to a practice that's not uncommon among women who feel liberated about enjoying sex. There is no hint that Steinem, who edited a magazine that loudly called for women to be liberated in this particular way, realized what they had in mind. 

Politics 

Unfortunately this article does not include evidence that Kamala Harris actually uttered the title phrase...


Privacy 

Yay! Ron!

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Late Summer Haiku

These were submitted to a contest for batches of seasonal haiku. I've not been told yet whose batch won, so apparently it wasn't mine. So I get to inflict them on you here. Please excuse the freaky font; it came from the contest entry form.

Each haiku reflects an actual moment of awareness from some late August or early September in my life; some blogged about here, some not.

spider webs line but
not cross the path where one was
moved aside gently

hummingbird buzzes
through field, scouting for
budding jewelweed

Northern yellow leaves:
summer moves southward into
Southern yellow leaves

busily munching
caterpillar discovers
grass juice on a shoe

the jewelweed she loved
fills garden with hummingbirds
that would have pleased her

little bay mare just
can't wait to run, challenges
her pet goat to race

possum seemed timid
cat slapped it past flybush
to beg for food treats

calendulas' bitter
scent refreshes
perfect fresh veg

smelly green humpbacked
caterpillars clean up
flies' mess on fruit trees

potato grew in
shape of a doughnut
around a stone

dig up the roots of
yellow-leaved clinging vines
some people eat them

Jenny Wren said flit
Johnny Wren said sit
storm backed Jenny

proudly the kitten
shows that it's big enough, at last,
to soil the steps

barren paper wasp
claiming no home guards
bedroom from gnats 
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