The Deeper Meaning of Columbus Day (2013)

As we do each year at this time, while the wheels of governance lie briefly idle, and ochre and russet creep into the leaf,

the lawnmowers having fallen silent,  the rakes not yet out of the shed,

we offer this classic essay on the discovery of America.

Certain people -- cranks, for the most part, after the fashion of Baconists -- strenuously maintain that the American continents were discovered well before Columbus.   And after extensive researches into ancient evidence, abetted by the most advanced techniques of modern science, we must concur to this extent:  The discovery happened a very very long time ago;  and it was made by none other than penguins.

Thoughts for Columbus Day

[Originally posted Monday, October 10, 2011]

Scene: The Earth.  Time: The last glaciation.

It was cold. -- How cold?

Cold enough for the seas to descend, or to freeze to solidity; so that feet might  dry-shod  pass the Bering Strait, leaving the tired old world  for the undiscovered new.

And such was the route (so historians tell it) by which the New World was first peopled. 

And yet these scholars neglect one simple fact:  It was so d*mned cold, so effing cold, that, any normal person, it’d freeze his f***ing b*lls off.

Which leads, by simple syllogism, to the novel yet suddenly irrefragable fact:  Who passed the Strait on that fateful day, were no men as we now know them, but such Beings as scoff, as laugh at ice -- their laughter bell-like in the frigid air.  And so we are forced to this startling, yet eminently logical conclusion: (I anticipate a Nobel, or at least a MacArthur, for noticing this): Native Americans are the lineal descendents of penguins.

            The contentious might object, that the migration route of the Amerindians went via the northern polar regions, whereas the penguins of today inhabit Antarctica, somewhat to the south. The objection may, however, be overcome, via – mm – symmetry considerations.

            To be sure, a people which could eventually settle in MesoAmerica and the Caribbean  must have lost, over time, their original solid penguinity, much as salamanders, long confined to subterranean caves, in time may lose their eyes; thus leading to the present-day American anthropoid fauna's sadly decayed state.  And this, no doubt, by the same Mendelian-chromosomal processes which originally led to their distant ancestors, beginning from humble vertebrate beginnings, to attain that exalted, richly feathered, impeccably streamlined  pinguinal state. (I invite the lab lackeys to iron out the details.)

Q.E.D.

~

For further, remarkably truth-like funfacts about prehistoric penguins,

simply grasp the mouse firmly in your right hand

(respectively the left, if a southpaw),

carefully place the cursor atop the highlighted text,

and …. CLICK !

=> When Penguins Ruled the Earth <=

(There!  Wasn’t that easy?)

~

~  Posthumous Endorsement ~

"If I were alive today, and in the mood for a mystery,

this is what I'd be reading: "

I Don't Do Divorce Cases

Murphy on the Mount.

(Io sono Cristoforo Colombo, and I approved this message.)

~         ~

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[Update, midafternoon, Columbus Day 2013]  As my handy spying-on-American blogstats inform me, many of you now viewing this page are arriving from the NPR site.  Which means that most of you are probably federal employees, lounging and lolling about on the taxpayer’s dime on this federal holiday.  Whereas, me, I’m diligently blogging on the taxpayer’s dime.

So, to help fill your empty hours on this seemingly endless three-day weekend,

herewith some posts inspired by stories on or about NPR:

Visit beautiful People’s Korea

http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2013/03/the-devil-wore-elevator-shoes-updated.html

NPR “scandal”

http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2011/03/press-excess.html

Secret slush-fund

http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2012/11/the-dark-side-of-world-of-dr-justice.html

Obama vs. LBJ

http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2012/11/making-best-of-bad-bargain.html

On the weasel-words “Well, again …”

http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2011/03/lets-nip-this-one-in-bud.html

And, for those of you fleeing the rigors of the ongoing NPR fund drive:

http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2012/02/winter-fund-drive.html

Essays specially for furloughed federal employees:

Reflections on the furlough (with bonus hamster):

http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2013/09/the-furlough.html

Some improving reading-matter while you suffer heroically through the furlough:

http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2013/10/furlough-reading.html

In which we take back everything we ever said about the furlough:

http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2013/10/this-puts-matters-in-entirely-new-light.html

Furlough reading restricted to non-furloughed (essential) personnel:

“V/R”

http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2013/09/acronym-of-day-vr.html

“They also serve, who only stand and analyze sphincter pads”

http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2013/08/phrase-of-day-sphincter-pad.html

“Scenes from Elevator Life” (close-hold)

http://worldofdrjustice.blogspot.com/2011/11/users-guide.html

(Hey there, you SBA no-load -- Hands off that mouse!)

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