Angry at Vegetarians?

D. wrote to the neighborhood elist that a couple of human beings took all her vegetables in her garden. A neighbor saw them doing that... but thought D. had hired them.

D. was so angry that she kicked a hole in her picket fence.

I asked my almost 4 year old grandson what he would do. He said that he'd get angry if someone stole his vegetables.

I wonder what the appropriate Buddhist response might be. And I also wonder how to stop the anger chain. The fence became an unintended victim. And what about all those poor souls that the woman confronts during the day or week or month or year. Are they going to have to pay for her vegetables?

BP has certainly caused more harm than the two human beings who were hungry for vegetables. And some are responding with rage as well. So now BP could be responsible for leaking anger as well as leaking oil. And the anger may go on and on... and be even harder to stop. What is all this anger accomplishing, or is it just adding "insult upon injury?"

Certainly some problems arise. For D., how to secure her vegetables. For BP, how to stop the leak. For Mr. Obama, how to insure that this won't happen again. For D.'s fence, how to live with a hole. Can we just forget the anger and solve these problems?

Golfer

I heard a story today that has been bouncing around in my head (and heart).

A golfer from Argentina won a tournament and received a large check for his prize money. As he was walking to his car, he met a woman with tears rolling down her eyes. He asks what's wrong, and she says she has a little boy who is very sick and she is facing enormous medical bills to make him well. He promptly signs his check over to her, wishes her well, and gets into his car.

A few days later, someone who had observed his generosity found out that the woman was a crook, and decides to inform the golfer. He tells the golfer that the whole story was made up, and the woman doesn't even have a son.

"Oh, thank goodness," the golfer said, "that there is no son with such a terrible illness."

iPad drawing #1

No... it didn't come yet. But a friend brought one by for me to play with... and then she worked my drawing a little. I love that you can vary line width and opacity with the speed of your stroke. Wow!

Zen Bird

One grain of rice.

Tickling the Tongue of a Dragon

I saw a Facebook post: Boycott BP.

I wonder why?

Revenge, as in "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth?" Will this make the world a better place?

They will have less money for the cleanup effort. They may have to sell wells to companies that will not serve their customers so well.

Is it a compassionate response to a company that is dealing with a catastrophe? Even if the catastrophe was self-imposed? Suppose a speeding car struck a tree and you could help the driver? Would you pull her out of a flaming car, or leave her to fry because she was speeding?

Will it regulate other companies to be more diligent? What may cause companies to be more diligent will be the lessons learned... that certain failsafe techniques may not work.

In defense of BP, they had two systems to shut off the well in case it exploded. Neither worked. Maybe they were careless. But the entire idea of drilling oil is risking. It is like tickling the tongue of a dragon. Sometimes the dragon will awaken and fire will start coming out in your face.

And then, I wonder, if any one of us is so good as to be able to criticize another? What does it say in the bible about a splinter and a log... "Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye."

Any opinions out there?

More on Squirrels

From our neighborhood elist... after countless suggestions on how to wage war (on squirrels). It just seems to me an outlet for people's anger. Is it possible to not think of something as an enemy, yet to not feel compassion? (Another double negative for my wife... keeps our brains exercised.)

I don't know.

Kim

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: J
Date: Thu, May 27, 2010 at 11:05 AM
Subject: Re: [rosedale] Ending the War on Tomato-Eating Squirrels
To: Kim Mosley , "Rosedale Neighborh.Ass Neighborh.Ass"

Let's be realistic. In some parts of the country tree shortage may be a problem for squirrels, but not in Austin. They also have more pecans then they can eat. I don't think of them as enemies, but I do not feel sorry for them and will keep them off the tomatoes if I can. ( - : Jacoba

On May 27, 2010, at 9:30 AM, Kim Mosley wrote:
I love tomatoes, but my heart is on the side of the squirrels... or at least I'm trying to grasp this issue from both sides. Back in the days of Davy Crockett I understand that there were enough trees in the US that a squirrel could hop from the Atlantic to the Pacific, from treetop to treetop, without touching ground.

Now we've removed most of their hunting territory, and their transportation system. And most of us aren't starving. So let us all be a little more considerate of our "cute" fair feathered (?) friends. At the very least, we could end the war and stop thinking of them as the enemy. We are both inhabitants of the same planet... and they were here first.

Kim

P.S. Looks like this year they'll have some choice pecans to share with us. And, just in case you are hungry for some homegrown tomatoes: http://www.ehow.com/how_4452007_stop-squirrels-eating-tomatoes.html

Let the squirrels eat whatever... a view from Mars

Felt like I was a man from Mars today. First off, I thought it was Thursday and acted like it was Thursday, and felt so stupid when I discovered that it was Wednesday.

Then I saw a motorcycle fly down Guadalupe at 100 miles an hour (speed limit 35 or 40). Definitely a bat out of heaven. Very startling.

Went to a store that closes at 8:04 pm. Does that happen on Earth? Got there at 8:02 pm and was able to get the ingredients for my cereal mix tomorrow.

Went to Walgreens and tried to get Rhuli creme for an attack of mosquitoes on my hands. The young clerk had never heard of it. Then I asked the pharmacist. He said he'd never heard of it. I asked him how long he had worked there. 15 years, he said.

My wife claims that it is now Anti-Itch creme by Band-Aid (I'm not being paid for this ad, but wish I was because I wasted today $10 on some junk iPad accessories and $40 on a junk electric razor)... They didn't have Anti-Itch either. Said I should go to their competitor. Walgreens is always almost empty... very strange how they keep going.

Oh, yes, there's the mud that they are squirting into the gusher, a mile down. Will it work? If only I could remember what we did on Mars.

And Apple surpassed Microsoft today. 10 years ago Apple almost bit the dust. So many times I've heard, "we only support Windows." Now I'm waiting for that time when someone will say, "We only support Apples." I mentioned to someone tonight that Apple is the leading computer company. "Not really computers... that's PCs." "No," I said, "computing is changing." I understand more Internet is seen worldwide on smartphones, and there are more text messages the email messages. So maybe the PC is not how people communicate any more. PCs... the computer of yesterday... written on a PC.

Happy full moon, everyone!