Bucket definition… The Three Faces of Love

Why is it the worst of life’s disasters always seem to have Love embedded in them somewhere near the middle?  I mean really, what’s going on with this?    Whatever it is its been going on for a long, long time and no one (not that I’ve ever heard of) has ever made much headway at putting a believable reason to the situation. Love is the positive, the good, Love is what makes it worthwhile, to live in a state of Love what everyone wants, what everyone is trying to achieve, right? 

Right, of course.  And yet everyone also knows that when Love is in the picture is when risk is at its’ greatest, when things get the most disoriented and confusing, when it’s so terribly easy to get lost or worse end up suffering exactly what you didn’t want exactly where you didn’t want to be. Something just isn’t right about this picture.  Ironic, isn’t it? That Love (or perhaps say more properly failures in the realms of Love)  resolve out as such a prime source of so much bitter cynicism?  Sure seems that way to me.

This particular conundrum is quite a set of contradictions, and yet by observation undeniable fact.  As a philosopher such things are among my most fascinating challenges.  How can this be?  I know it is, but how did it happen?  What makes it tick?  This one has been simmering back burner for a very long time.  It’s time to take a swing at it, and with your permission that’s exactly what I propose to do.

Drop the B…

===originally published 5/27/2016=== 

Drop the B? WTF?

That one does not fit. When you drop the B it is possible I might start taking you seriously. Yea, drop the B baby, and I am NOT talking about “The Bomb.”

No, the B I’m talking about is the B in LGBTQ.  It does not belong there. Of all the letters in that bowl of soup the B is the only one that is not (holding true to its’ base definition) a way of life that is, by definition, barren and sterile.  L’s only share sex with other L’s, G’s only share sex with other G’s, T’s have no real potential post transition anyway, they’ve chosen to sacrifice sexual functionality for social appearance, and the Q’s are simply the induction phase, those so damaged by society as to shift ranks into any of the first three just as soon as someone tells them where to go.

But B’s? By definition a B can and will share sex with either gender and are therefore not constrained to be barren as a consequence of honoring what they present to the world as a defining characteristic of their life.

Chapter Nine: Round, like a Circle in a Spiral...

The title of this chapter is taken from the lyrics of the theme song to a fine movie, the Steve McQueen/Faye Dunaway version of "The Thomas Crown Affair." If you've not seen the movie ( I recommend it for a slow Saturday night to be accompanied by a high quality light intoxicant… perhaps a brandy, or a light sativa… pick your poison of preference ) I'll kibbutz this much… it is essentially a case study in the psychology of success… and boredom. 

The trajectory of this exploration has brought us to consider the internal psychology of the various collective entities. The question now in focus is how many of humanities quirks and kinks running out to full blown psychosis might have been inherited by these entities? It is a pertinent question given the relationship between the humans and the CE's. As fares one so fares the other, and as is well known to the mental health profession prolonged contact with any serious degree of mental illness is a risk. Crazy can be contagious. 

 Not surprisingly, these are same folks who will assert to you a good size chunk of humanity is, well, somewhat less than rational sane stable… to put it politely. But I'm afraid it would be fool's errand to ask them what sort of emotional environment the CE's might know or create for themselves. Why? Because for them to acknowledge the idea of CE's, and then consider the potentials for a less than benign circular reinforcement with their clients, their host base? That… would be a run of thought likely to discredit about half of what they think they know about the human side of the equation. For them that would be an utterly unacceptable risk to the emotional security provided by the academically cultivated certainty that allows them to work in the first place. Empathy gives they'd not likely be much help and very likely to attempt a squelch and suppress. 

 Seriously, put such a question in front of them and all you can really expect is to watch them buck like a rodeo bronc sidestepping and sunfishing at any and every opportunity while condescendingly vilifying whoever inflicted the discomfort on them with such a question. They know (admitted or not) just like you do that when you step into circles turning in spirals dizzy is to be expected, and dizzy is not something they can afford to be. So no. 

Well, with the professional crew sidelined to a serious conflict of interest what is left for the do it yourself crew to work with? Well, what we always have of course, which are questions to test the limits of understanding so we know where to start looking for answers that might match. 

LIfe Hack: Jello

 Ok, so it went down like this: the little guy wanted some Jello.  Now, he's not really all that good about asking for some things like treats (and to good about being a pest asking for other things, but that's a different story). If he thinks he can get it for himself he'll just growl and go for it most of the time.  Anyhow, even though he's watched me make the Jello at least three dozen times the whole two cups of boiling water, stir in the Jello and then add two cups of cold water just hasn't quite clicked in for him yet.  I arrived in the kitchen just in time to see the big box of Jello go into four cups of cold water.  He was stirring furiously (splashing Jello for 18 inches in all directions) when I interrupted his endeavor.

The old chem plant days kicked in by reflex.  Jello is great stuff, and it is in it's essence a super saturated solution kind of thing.  Two cups of water just will not hold the big box in solution unless it's right on boiling, and the Jello won't really go into solution even in four cups of cold water, most likely a fair amount of it will remain a fine particle suspended in the cold water.  Translation?  Soupy Jello flavored water at best.   The missing ingredient?  Enough heat to get the whole mess into solution so it could do the whole jelly-ing thing as the solution chilled down in the fridge.  

The experiment that amazingly worked?  Into the microwave it went for about three minutes.  The logic?  Water by itself is slow to heat in a microwave, but the tiny suspended Jello particles?  Maybe, just maybe they'd get hot fairly quickly, heat the water around them and finish going into solution.  At the three minute mark the tubber of Jello-juice was close the same temp as when the two cups of cold hit the two cups of hot.  I stirred like crazy with the whisp for about thirty seconds, put the lid on the whole mess and put it in the bottom of the fridge.  I told the kid, who had just returned to the kitchen to find out if he was really in that much trouble, we had one chance in twenty for it to turn into Jello by morning, and ran him out of the kitchen so his mom could cook some dinner.

He... is a lucky little fart.  Come dawn?  Perfectly set Jello.  Now, I fully and totally recommend following the instructions on the box, but, in a case of cold water duress?  Worth giving it a try.  Good luck.