The Forbidden City in China re-earns its name, forbidding Starbucks to keep its store open in the Imperial Palace. The store was originally opened seven years ago, but behind the protests that it tainted the image of the imperial palace and the culture and tradition behind it. With about a half a million online signatures from a petition posted on a television presenters blog, the store finally closed its doors. The palace museum is going to run all of the stores and brands under the imperial palace museum name.

To maintain the integrity of ancient tradition, the people of China hit the web, digitally signing the ousting petition.

Today I opened the paper and on the front page of the Denver Post was an article titled Cock-a-doodle clue. The article was about a "farmer" who was receiving large amounts of roosters in the mail. The post office agent, familiar with the fact that there is only need for one rooster on any chicken farm alerted the authorities. To shorten, the "farmer" was arrested, his home searched and in it the police found fight related materials. He was running an illegal, underground cock fighting ring. The cocks were each physically manipulated for fighting, preparing them to fight in the ring, occasionally to death, other times they would be bloodied and dizzy from the loss of blood and blows.

So of course instead of allowing the cocks to fight in the ring, or removing the metal spikes and razors that had been fit to their spurs, they killed all of them. The man was arrested for animal cruelty, but had not, himself, killed a rooster. Instead, the Colorado department of agriculture painlessly killed all of the fighting cocks . . . That'll fix it. Good thing they caught the guy before the new cocks had a chance to kill each other.

here is a link to the article itself, titled differently online.

Cock-a-doodle clue found in mail

It has been some time since I have posted, or pissed philosophical about life's encounters. It is time to return to the site and let go of some interesting stories. Quite a bit has happened over the past few months. I had, what some of my friends call, a quarter life crisis. To manage through the difficult time, I did what so many mid-life crisis sufferers have done in the past: I bought a Harley. That wasn't quite enough though, I am not sure why, but it wasn't. So I got a tattoo. Oh, and then I started hanging out with the long term sub that had just graduated from Colorado State University.

All three are still constants in my life. I won't be washing the tattoo from my inner-left shin anytime soon. I won't be paying off the rather large loan for the Harley anytime soon. And well, the longterm sub, I think she'll be around for at least a little while.

What was it that caused me to nearly thrash out and reach for such change all at once. . .
A tunneled routine that had no visible light at the end.

I sat down a few weeks ago with a friend from Romania, Ionella. She told me a story of when she was a child and her brother had to go to a handball training camp pretty far from the house, "We didn't have a car, so we had to walk over three hours to get there, I went with him. We knew that if we followed the railroad tracks, we would get to the training camp."

"He was thirteen and I was much younger. The first trying moment of the walk was having to cross a railroad bridge hundreds of feet above a river in the mountains. There were planks missing and a train could have come at any time, at which point there would have been nowhere to go. It was very frightening, but my brother and I made it across. Besides the constant awareness of the wilderness and the animals that hid within it, the second trying moment was the tunnel. We followed the tracks because we were unsure of any other path to get to the hotel where the training camp was held. It wasn't unusual to walk such long distances, even with the whole family. We had done it before with our parents, but they were used to the trails and the wilderness and knew their way. We had to follow the tracks. We started into the tunnel for the train and the light from the opposite end seemed the size of a nickel, and with no lights the entire distance to light our way. At any moment the train could have come, and with nowhere to hide, no where to get out of the way, we would have been hit and crushed by any coming train. After what seemed like ages, we finally made it back to light, resurfacing to the sun and the wild around. Not three minutes after we exited the tunnel, a train followed our steps and came out from the dark. We were lucky that we made it through."

I was lucky that I made it through. What I grasped for, or what I needed was the company to help me make it through. The tunnel is still near, and the tracks may be cyclical, but there are added rails each time you pass through the tunnel with success.

Well, I have been up to quite a lot which adds up to very little. This is in part why there have been no updates since September. My desk no longer looks like I don't use it, well, actually it is so covered that it looks like I cannot use it. I wanted to go in today, but it was so cold during the run, that the will was sapped out of me little by little on each hill repeat. I had one of the guys in the group take a photo with my phone which some day may end up on this blog, but once it makes it through the chain of text messeging to someone who can email it to me.

I had an interesting thing happen to me the other day at school. I remember a rumor [circulating through my grade school or high school] about a student that laced a teacher's soda with acid, which sent the teacher tripping to wonderland and the student tripping to the administration office. My story fortunately has little to do with Terence in Wonderland, but it does have a similarity. I had just arrived to the doors leaving the commons area for lunch duty and as per my daily ritual set my bag and tea down near my post and headed around the corner for a chair so I wouldn't have to spend another 55 minutes on my feet in one spot. The photo class that I usually enter to get a chair was giving presentations, so I returned back around the corner to see a student who I didn't know bent over with his hand near my bag and mug. I made my presence known and ask why his hand was so near my possessions.

"Have you done anything to my bag or tea?"

"No... I didn't do anything." he said nervously.

"Are you sure?" I press a bit.

"Yeah, I didn't do anything," and he heads off with his friend.

I was more than a little curious, but accepted his answer in order to return to my quest for a chair. I hadn't had the opportunity to find a chair or sip on my earl grey when a familiar face appeared through the doors that I keep like a cattle herder at the gate.

He had concern in his eyes and said with a weak voice, "I just came back to tell you that, um, I did put something in your coffee. It was just soda, but I did put something in it."

"It's not coffee, and good thing I haven't had time to drink it yet. But thank you for being honest and coming back to tell me. I am not going to write you up because you came back to tell me, but I am not going to drink the tea now." I handed him the mug and asked him to clean it out and bring it back to me.

He did, and again apologized.

I didn't know his face before, but I now see him everyday as I walk through the halls.

I'll keep my tea closer to my side once I buy another mug, I broke it two days later in the middle of class putting my hands behind my back...