Priceless Moment

We went to the Winter Market this morning, and saw a group of people out front holding signs reading FREE HUGS. Naturally, we took them up on it, and were happy to accept their cards, inviting us to join them at Northwest Hills Community Church for their young couples' ministry (nice of them to invite us, in spite of not being in their target demographic :-).

By the time we left, John had rubbed all of their shoulders, and we had bought them a plate of crepes from the crepeurs who were selling them by the door.

We talked with the huggers briefly about Ernest Mann's "Priceless Economic System", which proposes that people give away as much of what they produce as they can give or can bring themselves to give -- we're totally in favor of a revolution, especially one that does not involve shooting people, taking over the government or even organizing a movement.

Mystery Meat: The Mystery Deepens

I have bad news, and possibly-less-bad news, about domestic American meat products.

And the bad news comes with bad news and worse news.

The bad news: fast food retailers are extending their regular ground beef, with all its attendant horrors, with a product known cheerfully within the trade as "pink slime": beef leavings mixed with ammonia in the hope that this will kill the bacteria that swarm in it, as well as the bacteria already present in ordinary ground beef.

The worse news within the bad news: purchasers complained about the latrine stench of pink slime, so the manufacturers reduced the quantity of ammonia, thereby reducing the (possible) bacteria-killing effect.

But despair not, there is some hope for your meat habit: there has been recent progress in culture-growing animal muscle tissue. True, it's squashy and low in protein, but no animals suffered in growing and harvesting it, and it will be a lot cleaner than meat from a slaughterhouse (provided the vats the cultures grow in are kept sanitary, and surely that will be the case).

We still aren't vegetarians in this house, but news like this isn't helping.

Besides, we know where this sort of thing can lead.

Airborne Terrorism: The Shocking Truth About YOUR Chances of Becoming a Victim

http://gizmodo.com/5435954/the-true-odds-of-airborne-terror-chart

The Meaning of Thansgiving

according to Wednesday Addams:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ccj2BH25c0I

Thanks are due to Paul Krugman:

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/11/25/the-meaning-of-thanksgiving/#comments