Happy Solstice

Remember your pagan sun worship today.

This is old, but I thought I could publish it today.

An Ode to the Tilt of the Earth's Axis of Rotation Relative to its Orbital Plane

In degrees, you measure twenty three point five,
Though you of constancy nature does deprive.
Over many years, your angle will rise and then dive,
And then at your present angle you will again arrive.

Some folks think that summer has begun
When Earth is closest to the sun
But these are fools of whom we should make fun.
They are ignorant of your power, oh mighty one.

And were their idea widely believed
You would be much aggrieved
And have the right to feel peeved,
For we would be deceived.

Once a year, summer you bring
What a terrible thing!
Dripping with sweat, how the clothing does cling
And with biting mosquitoes at wing
Pain is king.

But in winter, you shield us from the solar heater
Memories of the evil skeeter
Only make the raw cold sweeter.
The awful fires of July
are torture, but I cannot deny
They help the joys of winter to magnify.

Though in winter, there is no baseball
Which begins in spring and ends in fall
Two more seasons you impose upon Nepal.
And of my poem, that is all.

More On Snelling

According to sources on the Internet, Chris Snelling enjoys eating beans. While this news would be fascinating by itself, . We recently received a photo that appears to show Chris Snelling eating beans with his right hand!


As you can see, someone is eating beans and enjoying this eating. Is it Chris Snelling? You can decide for yourself. Consider the similarities.

Both are white, both wear blue hats, both have crazy brown hair, and both enjoy beans. How can there be any doubt?

A Clarification

In my previous post, I included a picture of Chris Snelling in which he appears to be wearing his glove on his left hand, indicated that he is right-handed. To the best of my knowledge, Chris Snelling is actually left-handed. I have come up with a few theories to explain this discrepancy.

1) Chris Snelling is an Australian spy. He is naturally right-handed, but learned to play baseball left-handed as a disguise. When this picture was taken he was caught out of character. If I ever disappear mysteriously, assume it is because the Australian government has kidnapped me for discovering the identity of their secret agent.

2) Perhaps the picture I received was actually the mirror image of the original picture. The speech bubble is not affected by this reversal since it is not actually part of the photo. However, the text on the shirt would be reversed. This means that Snelling's shirt read instead of . Why would such a shirt exist? Exactly for this purpose, so that with a little photo manipulations, left-handers could turn into right-handers. But why would anyone do this? Well, the Nationals are actually run by J.B. Onstoper, an 81-year old man who with lives with his pet bear in a cave in South Dakota and harbors an irrational prejudice against left-handers. Mr. Onstoper delegates most of the management of the team, but he has to approve all new player acquisitions. Since he never leaves his cave, he makes all his decisions based on photos of the players sent by his employees. If the Nationals ever wish to acquire a left-handed player, they make him don the reverse-Nats shirt then perform the appropriate alterations to the photo before sending it to Dakota.

3) Distorted perception of reality

The Vidro Trade In Pictures

Jose Vidro goes to Seattle. Good luck with your new team, Jose.



Chris Snelling comes to DC. Snelling is Australian, which is very exciting. As far as I know, the only other Australian the Nats have in their system is Rhys Taylor, but he barely counts because he disappeared in July.



Emiliano Fruto also comes to the Nats. He has an awesome name. He looks like a turtle, because as reported here, he has gained 70 pounds over the last 6 years.


Jim Bowden is happy. Good job, Jim.

Vitamin C

Nothing rhymes with scurvy, so this is going to be a difficult effort.

When you are sailing across the sea,
I think we can all agree,
That it would benefit thee
To eat vitamin C.

It would not be a crime
If you did not eat a lime,
But your life would run out of time
Because you would get scurvy.

It would afflict your gums
As your body succumbs
And your skin becomes
Gross and covered with spots.

Yeh, that was pretty poor.

An Interview With Jacques Tomlinson

To get things started here, I thought I'd publish an interview I conducted recently.

Narwhal Machine: Who are you?

Jacques Tomlinson: My name is Tullardo Jones. I have controversial theories about language. I have nightmares about giant catfish. I don't eat mushrooms because they remind me of my mother. When I'm alone I twitch uncontrollably and sing songs that have never been written. I want to be a slayer of demons, but I can never find any demons to slay?

NM: Why giant catfish?

JT: Well, the catfish is a symbol of the unfulfilled desires of humanity. It similar to—are you familiar with the concept of a hungry ghost?

NM: No.

JT: Well, a hungry ghost, it's hungry, you see. It desires food, of course, but its mouth is too small to eat.

NM: And so you're afraid of hunger? Or more generally, you're afraid of being unsatisfied?

JT: Yes.

NM: But what is life like with all hungers sated, with all desires fulfilled? Is it desirable?

JT: Perhaps it is desirable to the hermit crab.

NM: The hermit crab?

JT: Yes, the hermit crab, the natural enemy of the catfish.

NM: I thought the hermit crab was God.

JT: Only in the Mandolesian tradition.

NM: Well of course, but—

JT: The Mandolesians cannot grasp it. The hermit crab.

NM: They can't grasp anything.

JT: Of course not, they were all born without fingers.

NM: Can they grasp in a metaphorical sense?

JT: Perhaps if we view their actions, we who grasp, we can construe them as a metaphorical grasping. But, for them, they can't even imagine the concept of grasping. No words for grasping exist in their language.

NM: Is that a deficiency of their language or of their imagination?

JT: In both, undoubtedly. Just as my unsightly appearance is due to both deficiency of aesthetic sensibility and vitamin C.

NM: Deficiency of my aesthetic sensibility or of yours?

JT: Does it matter?

NM: That's preposterous.

JT: I didn't even make a statement. How can it be preposterous?

NM: Your question was preposterous. “Does it matter?” Does it matter if it matters?

JT: Can I answer that question?

NM: No.

JT: How can you constrain me like that?

NM: Fine, answer it if you want.

JT: I won't.

NM: That's how.

JT: I object. That constraint was entirely self-imposed.

NM: That's not what you—wait—

JT: Yes?

NM: Farik?

JT: Yes?

NM: I love you.

JT: What?

NM: I love you.

JT: ...

NM: I love you, Farik, I love you. Let's run away, let's go to the Azures where no one will find us, where no one can judge our love, where we will be free to run and laugh and play—

JT: You mean the Azores?

NM: What?

JT: You said the Azures. They're called the Azores.

NM: How can you let a detail like that get in the way of our love? Oh, it will never work. You always lose our love in details like that. Oh, it was never meant to be.

Nightmares

A few days ago, I had a nightmare in which Ryan Church was traded to the Phillies. This made me realize how much I despise the Phillies. This was truly a horrible dream not because Ryan Church was traded (which is merely bad), but because he was traded to the Phillies. The news of this trade left me in a state of shock, truly shaking my faith in the goodness of the world and of mankind. Thankfully, it was only a dream.