Is Mexico getting back to normal?

Quote of the week

"Of course it is, don't you see the drug gangs have started killing people again?" a smiling man told the BBC while rushing to catch the green man sign at a road crossing."

Luck-y Khanzir

Link to story

Khanzir is the world's luckiest pig - if only he had a girlfriend.

He lives in a zoo in Afghanistan, given to the zoo by China in 2002, and it was a really good plan because this country is a bacon-free zone. This is not to say, no pigs allowed - just no pork products allowed. While the country may be a hellhole for humans to live in, Khanzir, with no fear of being turned into pork kebabs, lives in porker heaven with deer and goats.

That is, until visitors to the zoo worried that Khanzir, the sole - single - one and only known pig in the whole of Afghanistan - might be carrying the H1N1 virus. Just because he's a pig.

The visitors looked at the only known pig in the whole of Afghanistan and said "Mmm, a pig." Pausing, then "What do we know about pigs?" And then, "Arrgh! A pig! Swine flu!". I know! A real zealous use of exclamation marks.

So Khanzir was sent to quarantine away from his deer and goat pallies, but he gets a large room with a view and plenty of fresh air, so that's not so bad, and it may not be for too long.

In the meantime, the zoo's director, Mr Saqib, is turning his attention to the thought of the girlfriend issue. But he says "It is a dangerous and difficult time to get a new pig for our pig".

Feel the love, this guy dotes on that pig.

And don't even think about bringing swine flu to Australia. You're going to get disinfected!!!

Chanel No. 5

"Coco Chanel commissioned Ernest Beaux to make six perfumes. They were labelled No. 1, No. 2, etc. through No. 6. It was bottle No.5 that was to Chanel's liking and became the chosen formula."

Link - Chanel No. 5

I'd always stupidly thought that Coco Chanel had some direct involvement in the mixing of her famous potion.

Chanel No 5 was a favourite perfume of mine when I was in my twenties. It was not heavy but distinctive. I considered it so, anyway.

I don't wear perfume any more as it happens, I have an allergic reaction to strong smells. Which is not only a shame but a huge handicap since so many others are not so likewise troubled.

However, I read in this article that "Laboratory tests have shown that Chanel No. 5 contains secretions from the perineal glands of civet cats. Civet is a powerful fixative, making the scent last a long time."

After protests that civet is harvested in a cruel way, in 1998 the Chanel company took the generous, and some might say astute, course of replacing civet with a synthetic substitute.

I can't tell you how that's affected the perfume, read above vis a vis the allergy thing.

But I can tell you that I was affected with a special warmth for the Wertheimer family.

Link - Laelaps - Is there a civet in your perfume?

"Why not just cut out the middle-man and press a civet’s butt to your arms, neck, or chest?"

Well said that woman!

The increase of age .. the retention of optimism

At 58 and thinking of my youth - of course I miss the health, the physical strength, the vitality, the exhuberance for life but I also miss the naivity ... sometimes.

And yet I don't really want to go back to being a sweet young thing - and, that, despite that life was very tough sometimes - but youth gave to me a beguiling optimism, a sense that all things would work out alright in the end, that fair play was possible and that we humans would arrive at a watershed, leaving behind the old, ugly way of managing things and, to the fore, a Star Trekkian existence with distant stars in our reach and the cosmos our oyster. The human race or those able to trace their origins back to the human race, living long and prospering - forever after.

And I still love all the old Star Trek films which perhaps more than any individual built into me a belief in human nature as offering solutions to the problems our kind has struggled with century in, century out .. but into the new century it's been kind of hard not to notice that people are still making the same dumb mistakes for the same dumb reasons.

Even so, I still can't quite erase that old feeling of, we're going to make it. Or those who follow in our footsteps will.

But not by waiting for outside help. It's got to come from us.

Because, we're all we've got.

Evolution versus Creation cartoon