Howdy y'all...it's mac from berkeley back after a long exam-related
period of silence. Unfortunately, my email account is due to be wiped in
some solstice-related computer housecleaning here at berkeley, so i`ll be
gone again until january. Happy holidays you and your respective dachsrats.
A few observations before me and buckminster retire for a long winter's
debauch...
re: It doesn't look like food, it doesn't taste like food, i guess i
should eat it
Bucky's just thrilled with her new holiday ration of cat
laxative, and it makes me and the significant other feel a teeny bit more
secure. She, (the weasel, not the girlfriend) recently discovered the
joys of styrofoam packing peanuts and anything made of foam rubber, so
we've had to be vigilant. The buckmonster has also made a hobby out of
nicking banana peels from the trash, so i had to burn her copy of that
mellow yellow song and put the trash up. We supervise her play with
latex squeak toys but we can`t bear to confiscate them outright. I know
all her naughty parts have been removed, but i swear she`s in love with
her orange sputnik thingie. The toliet brush must feel deserted and betrayed.
re: vegan vermin
It was my understanding that the primary reason one doesn't
make cats and ferrets go green is that a taurine deficiency could cause
blindness or heart problems and that the tiny intestinal tract of a true
carnivore has a hard time sucking enough nutrition out of non-animal
based feed. Mink are usually fed a mix of dry feed and fresh animal
byproducts with two main caveats- offal, particularly fish and poultry
produced, must be cooked and raw eggs are a no-no (leads to biotin
deficiency), but, as i understand it, the dry feed is usually a mixture of
cereals, supplements, and choice bits of our barnyard friends. I assume
that the fur farms have tried to use the cheapest possible food, and i also
assume that that would be bulk grain based meal. So, personally, i'd be
cautious about trying to make my vicious meat-eating pet accept twigs and
berries, but i'm interested in any experimental evidence in favor of
greener weasels.
Re: The lies and slander of fuzzy-hating fascist bastards. i.e.
Michigan's governor and willie butthead brown.
The rabies debate is a royal crock...though people have been given
the rabies shot series after being bitten by stray or abused weasels,
it's never been conclusively proved that it was transmitted to them.
Hundreds of animals have had their heads lopped off and for what? Five or
so actually may have had the disease. There is now a federally approved
vaccine for our lil' munchkins (Imrab) but still the dark forces rail on
about the public health threat because there`s no universally accepted
study of development time, onset of obvious symptoms, etc. (That's why
they lop off the heads instead of quaranteening 'em). End analysis? Get
the CDC figures on rabies transmission and send them to the gov. He's
probably read the Dread Doctor Constantine's report on the huge dangers
of legalized mustelids (Cal fish and game in cooperation with public
health), and it is scary. It's also distorted and unreliable. There's a
reason it was published by the state and not in a journal...no journal i
know of would use methodology and estimation like Dr. Constantine's for
anything less than toliet paper. Read it yourself and think about the
"evidence" constantine cites...it's even claimed that escaped ferrets are
a threat to livestock (I am not making this up).
Anyhow, i've gotta go buy christmas presents and send in an anonymous
tip to the FBI that UNABOMB is actually willie brown. Tomorrow the CDFA
will be present along with polecat merchandise at the cat show in golden
gate park, san fran. i'll be there too. Peace!
[Posted in FML issue 1045]
|
