Alternate History and Stepping Back for a Moment

(UPI Photo/Martin H. Simon seen at the monsters and critics website - provided here for educational purposes)

That picture shows Bush last Sunday (9/4) standing under a /p/h/o/t/o (argh! edit!) portrait of Teddy Roosevelt. Ever since seeing that picture I have been thinking about how things would have turned out if we'd elected a Teddy instead of Georgie. I am seriously thinking about putting this into a story or at the very least jotting down my musings on the subject. I'm a huge alternate history fan. I read Harry Turtledove's books the moment they hit the shelves (well, I usually order them online). I also like S. M. Stirling's works of alternate history. Conquistador, Dies the Fire, and The Peshwar Lancers are three recent books of his I've read and enjoyed.

Since I've spent a lot of mental energy the past few days on political stuff the rest of today's post will be about other things that caught my attention.

#1 - Cane toads in Australia. They produce an hallucenigenic toxin and are an environmental nuisance. The Aussies have been trying to eradicate them for ages. They can even kill alligators and can grow as big as a dinner plate.

The Aussies have discovered that they're attracted to black light. The article linked above spun it Disco style but really, when I think black light I think back to all those weird posters in the 60's and 70's. Cane toads produce their own LSD as well, so they must be hippies. Disco, hmph.

#2 - I liked this personality quiz I saw over at Erudite Redneck's blog as I was reading up from the beginning of the month to try and get a sense of the conversation there when I saw his.

I'm an ENTJ if you're into Meyer's Briggs types. My "ID" (Instinctive Drives) number is 6374 (I'm a high Verifier and Completer) . Having a background in HR means you take a lot of these tests. By the way, I'm linking to these to give some context to how those tests score me, not endorsing the companies or sites). Now I've got another data point to keep track of...what city matches my personality. I just can't see myself in a lot of those cities (except L.A. and San Diego) or countries.

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Your personality type is SLOAI

You are social, moody, moderately organized, moderately accommodating, and intellectual, and may prefer a city which matches those traits.

The largest representation of your personality type can be found in the these U.S. cities: Salt Lake City, Oklahoma City, Nashville, Tucson, Phoenix, Memphis, W. Palm Beach, Portland/Salem, Louisville, Cincinnati, San Diego, Los Angeles Area and these international countries/regions Ukraine, South Africa, Greece, Indonesia, Austria, Thailand, Turkey, Philippines, Puerto Rico, Malaysia, Portugal, Japan, Czech Republic, Guam

What Places In The World Match Your Personality?
City Reviews at CityCulture.org

#3. It's pretty hard to explain it, it's one of those "you had to be there' things...but the phrase "Very Tiny Mule" has a special place in my heart. I even created an AV


So when I saw this article in Yahoo's Strange News I had to read up. You can have your horse whisperers, I wanna be a Mule Charmer.

#4. Is there some OTC medicine for allergy symptoms that won't make me either a zombie or get me as jittery as 20 cups of coffee? I don't mind the zombie stuff at bedtime but during the day my job requires that I posess a modicom of sense and not drool infront of the vendors. Sneezing on them isn't nice either.

OK, that's all for now. Thanks for stopping by.