The Sweat Lodge

Coming of Age in the 23rd Century: Part One excerpt

noreply@blogger.com (Jack) — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 13:43:00 +0000

COMING OF AGE IN THE 23RD CENTURY PART ONE

Marybell

CHAPTER 1

2264 AD, Western Virginia in October

The man stopped his truck on the overgrown logging trail and switched its fuel cell off. He glanced at the blindfolded girl sitting beside him. She was silent now and seemed calm, but he could feel her tension.

They had chatted and sang happily together while he drove along the highway in the early morning, beginning with nursery ditties and ending with a scat version of Beethoven’s Ninth, joyfully rendering its vocals in excruciatingly poor German.

But the girl had become quiet, and pensive when he turned from the paved road on to the forest track. He knew that when she felt the truck begin to sway over the rough ground, she realized that the first part of her journey was over.

He gazed at her for several long seconds while the many emotions he had repressed all during their drive surged into his thoughts. Then he took a deep breath and set his face in stone, almost. He climbed out of the cab and walked around the truck. He paused for another long moment before he opened the girl’s door and helped her to climb out.

When she stood before him, the man took her hand and led her into the forest, its cool dimness dappled with rays of bright morning sunlight filtering down through the colored foliage of fall. He guided her with care as they walked a hundred meters through the old growth trees and the girl accepted his lead with calm trust.

The man halted her in the center of a small clearing and removed her blindfold. He waited while she blinked her eyes in the sudden light until she could return his gaze.

”Please remove your clothes,” he ordered.

The thirteen-year old girl kicked her moccasins off without hesitation, and stripped out of her shorts, top and underwear then stood at attention before the man. He looked down impassively at her, beautiful in her advancing puberty and her copper-colored skin glowing with health.

”You may ask one question.”

“I have no question, Sir,” she answered as she looked up at him.

The man could not keep a smile from twitching at the corner of his mouth at the girl’s reply. Then he saw her eyes gleam and he knew she had read his face, and realized that her first decision was correct. His pride in her almost overwhelmed him, but he showed no emotion, instead removed a sturdy leather belt from the fanny pack on his hip and offered it to her. He waited while the girl buckled it around her bare waist then he handed her a small knife sheath with a loop of leather thong sewn to it. She accepted it, and draped the thong around her neck so the sheath hung between her budding breasts.

He next offered her a small cloth bag closed with drawstrings. Marybell took it and he watched her feel its contents for a second, until he saw she recognized the shape of the pack of military field rations it contained.

She shook her head and silently offered it back to him.

He refused it with a smile. “Always have something in reserve. You can return to me if you don’t need it.”

She nodded solemnly at his words and tied its drawstrings to her belt, again without speaking.

The man reached in his pouch again and pulled out a coil of stout cord and a little knife. He held them out as he gazed down at the girl with a silent question in his eyes.

She accepted the cord and the knife, and held them as she returned his gaze for a moment, then she shook out the coil and swiftly measured it against her out-stretched arm. She used the knife which had a short blade that was quite dull, to hack three meters from its length. She slid the knife into the sheath on her chest and coiling the shorter piece of cord, tied it to her belt. She then knotted the cut end of the other piece and re-coiled it as well.

“I have all that I will need, Sir. You may keep the rest,” she said as she offered the remaining cord back to the man,

He could not quite control his expression again, and the pride that flickered on her face showed him she had read his expression, again and knew her second decision was also correct.

The man gazed down into the girl’s emerald green eyes for a moment, then when he felt he could safely speak in a normal voice he reached into his pouch a final time.

”We will expect you starting at noon three days from now. The first star that shines in the evening is your deadline. Now please close your eyes until I have gone.”

She clamped her eyelids shut and he lifted her left wrist and looped something around it then hugged her to his chest with a fierce tenderness.

”Don’t worry Marybell, all of your ancestors walk with you, Baby Bird,” he whispered.

”I know Daddy,” she whispered back as she wrapped her arms around his neck and returned his hug with her eyes tight-closed.

”Thank you for everything - and I’ll bring dinner.”

The man kissed his daughter’s forehead then released her. He gathered up her discarded clothing and left the clearing without another word while Marybell stood braced at attention in the bright morning light.

He, who could move like a wraith through the wilderness, crunched on fallen branches and noisily forced his way through the understory brush as he made his way back to the truck. He climbed in the cab - and pressed his forehead on the steering wheel for many moments while he thought with love and pride, and anguished worry about his daughter.

He knew she was strong and resourceful for her age, but he also could not ignore what he knew of the dangers she could find in the wild world where he had left her…

The man raised his head from the steering wheel after another moment then slammed the truck’s door with unnecessary force. He switched on its fuel cell and drove back down the old logging road to the highway.

He increased his speed when reached the main road and began driving the thirty kilometers back to where his wife and the parents of the three other children undergoing the trial waited. As he drove, he occasionally hummed snatches of the Beethoven piece again - but now in a slower and much more somber tempo...

Coming of Age in a Time of War: Part Two excerpt

noreply@blogger.com (Jack) — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 13:39:00 +0000

COMING OF AGE IN A TIME OF WAR, PART TWO

Kristina

CHAPTER 1

2266 A.D, `Clave of S’attl

Kristina Hamier had just turned sixteen, and she and her boyfriend Andy were strolling along the ill-kept streets of the old downtown area of their `Clave of S’attl. Kris, as everyone called her was tall and graceful with a cheerful open face that always seemed to smile. She was an extremely pretty girl with black hair and blue eyes and gave promise of soon becoming a strikingly beautiful woman. Andy, also 16 was taller and stronger than most in his cohort and had honest good looks. The two had been friends and lovers since they were 14 years old.

S’attl had once been the City of Seattle in what had been the State of Washington in the United States, before the Chinese attack and invasion twenty years earlier. As the invaders occupied more territory, land contact was disrupted between the invaded areas in the West, so their local governments were forced to declare martial law in favor of the US military units defending them. The urban areas that had resisted the Chin forces were now protected enclaves, or `Claves in the argot of the time.

Kris and Andy were different from their classmates in that they preferred each other’s company over the group life of their fellow students, and they also chose to be either be out-of-doors or to read in their leisure time rather than to watch the continuous videos on the Network broadcasts furnished by the `Clave governors. They both excelled in school in their classes, and in their mandatory military training.

Kris maintained perfect grades in all of her science and military subjects, as well as always shooting perfect scores in her marksmanship training with rifle and pistol. Therefore, the school administrators grudgingly allowed her to pursue the academy’s meager curriculum in fine arts as well.

She loved her classes in art and dance and music and showed great promise in all three areas, but her passion was history and reading old books. She had quickly exhausted the content of the few instructional discs her mousy little history instructor had given her as take-home assignments, so the gray-haired woman had quietly arranged for Kris to become an assistant monitor for the school’s closed and neglected library. This gave her an access to its musty stacks of paper volumes that was denied to the other students.

The mousey little woman also cautiously invited Kris to visit in her own dingy one-room apartment in a poorer part of the `Clave occasionally, and tutored the young girl in the evenings from her private collection of old books, as well as serving her tea in elegant little china cups.

During the latest session, which Kris instinctively welcomed as secret high points in her happy life, the faded old woman showed her a faded paper photograph of a happily smiling young blond girl wearing a black gown and a strange flat-topped cap with a bright gold tassel hanging over its edge.

She said as she then handed Kris a manuscript in a plastic binder, “That is a picture of me when I graduated with my Bachelor’s, and this is the only hard copy of the dissertation I wrote for my Master’s.

“The war started about that time and before my advisors had a chance to accept it, the Chin bombed Eugene - and killed the University,” she finished with a sigh.

Kristina followed her heart, leaned over the tray with its delicate tea service, and gently hugged the old woman with a wordless moan of sympathy.

Her teacher sighed after several moments and carefully pushed the young girl away from their embrace.

“Kristina, my life has been hard and very disappointing but it has been easy compared to what you will face, because of both the person you are and the times we are in,” she said with a slight smile.

“When they come for me,” she added softly, “Whatever they leave of mine is yours. Now go dear please, for your own good.”

Kris carefully placed her teacup in its saucer on the little table and honored her teacher’s request by rising from her seat with tears suddenly trickling down her cheeks.

“Yes Ma’am,” was all she said as she rushed from the tiny apartment, sobbing from her heart.

Two days after this last visit with her teacher, Kris went to the next scheduled history class at her academy, only to find the classroom door locked and a crudely lettered card taped to its front saying,

“Class canceled permanently. Students are to attend Video Recreation Hall for this hour”.

The tall girl left the building by a side door instead, and ran the four kilometers to the old woman’s apartment building. Her cheeks were pink but she breathed easily as she mounted the stairs two at a time to the top floor. She strode to her teacher’s door only to find it ajar. She pushed it open and stood in the doorway. The little was room bare and empty of all the simple furnishings and piles of books it had contained only two days ago.

She felt a chill as she stepped slowly to the center of the place where her teacher and friend had lived, and gazed about at the bare walls. They now showed only lighter spaces and dirt shadows where the bookcases had stood, and where the old woman’s cheaply framed copies of classic art had hung.

Her eye suddenly caught a gleam of white from the bare wooden floor at one corner of the room. She moved to it with slow steps and stooping, retrieved a broken piece of one of the little china teacups, its delicate handle still attached.

She clutched it to her breast with a deep sob. Then tears coursed down her cheeks as she stepped out of the dusty room and down the dingy stairs and walked slowly back to the academy.

Kristina went to her art instructor in her next class and asked quietly what had happened to her history class and to her teacher. Professor Heurtley only shook his gray head and refused to meet her gaze. Then he addressed the tall girl and the other ten students in the classroom in a hoarse voice.

“Today we begin a unit of practical work for the good of S’attl, and will stop wasting our time drawing flowers.”

“I will briefly show a tri-view of a Chin armored car on the screen, and you will sketch it as accurately as possible.” He continued in a flat monotone in the same dead voice,

“I warn you that there have been small but important modifications to this vehicle which you must note in order to inform your superiors, and in this exercise you must sketch it because your cam is broken.”

“I also will warn you that from now on all of your work will be graded for its usefulness to the Clave and its practicality. Your work will become part of your cadet portfolio of record,” he finished in a rush without meeting the shocked eyes of his class. In a very low voice that cracked he added, “Good Luck…”

Then shouting, “Begin!” he savagely jabbed the start button of the tri-view projector.

The gray-haired artist walked between his students’ desks looking over their shoulders as they furiously marked at their papers, and slowly approached Kristina’s table. He leaned over her shoulder and shouted, “That’s wrong! You’re missing it completely! Dammit you can do better than that!”

He bent over her desk and slapped at her almost finished sketch, then moving his hand he began pointing to various parts of it, and so exposed a carefully placed scrap of paper with its message printed in his architect’s block letters, “The only thing the Administrator told us was, “History is Unnecessary.” I couldn’t learn any more - and don’t you ask anyone else!”

Then standing erect again and retrieving and rolling the paper scrap into a tight cylinder he said gruffly, “See me after class.”

He turned to the room and asked in a normal voice, “Anyone have a light?” as he drew a cheroot from the breast pocket of his frayed tweed jacket.

He lit the rolled paper spill from a match eagerly offered by one of the less capable students, then slowly and carefully lit his cigar from its flame and allowed the spill to burn down to his fingers before discarding its small stub on the floor.

Professor Heurtley called time several minutes later and collected the assignment from the other students, most of which were unfinished. He briefly admonished them on the need to increase their accuracy and speed as he dismissed them, except for Kris. He growled to her, “You stay.”

The girl sat staring ahead with her cheeks red and speechless, both in her confusion, and her embarrassment at the snickers from the other students as they clattered out of the dusty room.

The gray-haired artist returned to his desk and took his seat after they had left. He pulled another chair up beside his and said, “Bring your work over here and have a seat. I will show you what you are doing wrong.”

Kris took the offered seat and placed her completely finished sketch before him. He said in a kinder tone, “I will list your mistakes in the margin. Please pay careful attention.” Then he swiftly sketched in a light set of lettering guidelines and paused in thought for a moment, before making letters at seemingly random places on the spaces he had delineated.

Kris, remembering his earlier message and the way he had delivered it, watched his hand intently.

As she watched, he quickly wrote letter by letter in seemingly random spaces, “TAKE CARE THEY WATCH ALL THE TIME” Then looking at her until she returned his gaze, he smiled and started filling in the rest of his annotation which then made his warning disappear, as it now read,

“EXCELLENT WORK, THE ONLY STUDENT TO COMPLETE WITH TOTAL ACCURACY, ALSO THE ONLY STUDENT TO SPOT THE EXTRA ANTENNA, NEW TIRES AND THE NEW MOTOR EXHAUST”

As she gasped in sudden joy, the old artist added in a free flowing script below his lettered message, “Grade is 4.0”

Then dropping his pencil, he dropped his hand under the desk and gripped her thigh. Kris instinctively jerked her hand down to thwart his attempted grope, then relaxed as he turned his palm up and met hers in a friendly clasp.

He winked to her at her startled glance and said gruffly, “Meet me at the fountain in the park during lunch break tomorrow with your materials, and I will try to give you some more pointers on sketching.”

Then he stood abruptly and said, “Now you are dismissed,” As he strode out of the classroom.

Kris gathered her things and glanced again in wonder at his approving notation on her sketch where it still lay on his desk. Then she walked out of the room as well.

A Sneak Peek of Chapter One of Book Two

noreply@blogger.com (Jack) — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 15:23:00 +0000

...and here is a preview of the first chapter from the sequel to Puss and Boots in the 23rd Century.

***

Chapter 1, "The HOUSEKEEPERS"
July, 2276
Capitol Building, Washington, DC
*

The Chief Housekeeper of the House of Representatives was sitting at his desk and working on a cross-word puzzle in the only newspaper still published on paper in the city when his comset dinged. The newspaper had been published for over four hundred years, but the Network owned it now and they had changed its name. Its masthead was blazoned, "Truth".

"Yes, Sir," The Housekeeper replied after listening for a moment.

"We will do it, Sir."

Then he clicked off and stared at his comset in disbelief. He finally snarled, "Shat!" and punched in the number of the Chief Housekeeper of the Senate.

"Did you get a real funny call from your Senate Clerk just now? Like I did from my House Clerk?

"I don’t know what it means either, but it’s real scary if it’s true.

"What’s next you ask? I’m going to do what the man said, but I’m keeping my head way low while I do it. I’ve got a feeling life is gonna’ get major complicated from now on, and real quick too."

He listened to the other man for a moment then he finished, "Yeah, let’s keep in touch on this - and back up each other too."

The Housekeeper clicked off then and left his office in the basement of the Capitol. He made his way through the dusty lower passageways to a service elevator and selected a floor. The car creaked, and then lurched into motion.

"Hope this old cadge still remembers how to stop, and where," he muttered.

It did and the door slid open with a screech of dry metal. He stepped into a narrow corridor and walked to an ornate, but un-marked door and pulled a ring of old-fashioned mechanical keys from his pocket and a small oilcan. He selected the largest key on the ring and putting two drops of oil on it pushed it in the slot of bronze lock on the door.

He jiggled the key several times then turned it with some effort. When he heard a grating "click" he twisted the bronze door handle of the mahogany door and pulled on it.

The door opened with a creak of un-used hinges and he stepped into a shadowed space behind an elevated podium. He walked around it to stand on the floor of a very large balconied chamber. The Housekeeper looked around the vast dim space, and sighed. Then he shrugged and pulling out his comset, clicked on his group net.

"All House janitors on duty and off, hear me!" He ordered.

"You are to report to the House Chamber with your supplies and equipment.

"Start now, and get here quick!

"Congress has finally decided to convene and the House of Representatives will be called to order here in eight days - and we’ve got over twenty years of dust and cobwebs to clean up before they do!"
The man clicked off then and pocketed his comset in his gray civilian jumpsuit then he turned and walked slowly to the base of the imposing two-tiered podium.

He looked up at the ornately carved device on its paneled front, the Great Seal of the United States with its heraldic spread eagle holding an olive branch in one clawed foot, and in the other, arrows.

The man looked at the carved seal for several more minutes, then sighed again as he pulled a white linen handkerchief from the sleeve of his suit and began gently wiping twenty years of dust from the carved beak of the eagle. As he wiped the dust away his expression changed from that of a bland bureaucrat and he began to smile

But now his smile was not bland ...

Sneak Peek of Chapter Two of Book Two

noreply@blogger.com (Jack) — Fri, 02 Oct 2009 12:59:00 +0000

...and here is a preview of the second chapter from the sequel to Puss and Boots in the 23rd Century.

***

Chapter 2, "The TREATY"
July, 2276 AD
Brussels, EU

"Excellency!"

"Yes Humbert," the small man sitting behind the large desk in the marbled hall of the Supreme Executive Office of the European Union answered in a bland tone.

"We have just received a communiqué on our ultra-net."

"And,"

"President Pitson of The United States has invoked the Treaty."

"His stated reason?" The small man asked with pursed mouth.

"His Position as a Head of State is Threatened by Internal Disorder, specifically the…"

"Enough! I do not need to know the petty details. He used the exact wording given in Our Treaty of Mutual Support Among Heads Of State, did he not?"

"Yes Excellency, that he did," Humbert replied with an unctuous smile…

"Since he did so," the Prime Secretary replied as he leaned back in his throne-like chair and steepeled his fingers, "We therefore are bound by this pact to offer him all necessary aid and support as I recall."

"Oh, most certainly, Excellency, the requirements of the treaty are quite detailed with respect to a request so worded."

"Very well then," the Prime Secretary said with a dry chuckle, "Please inform the Chief Field Marshal and The Chief Air Marshal that I require their presence, at their convenience of course."

"Yes, Excellency," Humbert murmured as he bowed to the small man sitting behind the ornately carved desk with gilt ormolu accents.

Humbert ushered Field Marshal Manfred Von Glück and Air Marshal Jean Marie Valois into the Prime Secretary’s office thirty minutes later. The small man stepped around his desk and greeted the two officers.

"Thank you for attending me on such short notice. I hope my request was not too disruptive of your no doubt busy and complex schedules," he said in a bland tone with a bland smile.

"Not at all, Excellency," Manfred replied with a stiff face as he clicked the heels of his gleaming jack boots.

"We of the military view disruption as normal, Excellency," Jean Marie said as he gave a sweeping salute with a white-gloved hand.

"Good," the Prime Secretary replied in the same bland tone. "Let us seat ourselves, and take a brandy as we begin our deliberations," he continued with a wave toward an exquisitely elaborate Third Empire table and chairs at the other end of his office. It stood under an enormous painting on the wall of Napoleon crowing himself Emperor.

"Humbert, if you would," he then murmured and his aide walked with stately haste to a buffet in the corner of the large room.

"Our own aides await in the anteroom, Excellency," Manfred said with a question in his tone.

"We will coordinate details with them after we three discuss policy," The Prime Secretary responded as he took a seat at the head of the small table. "You have briefing books," he continued as he indicated two beautifully tooled Morocco binders at their places.

The two officers seated themselves and Humbert served brandies from a heavy silver tray, the Air Marshal first as the junior service, the Field Marshal next as the senior service and then the Prime Secretary last as their host and commander.

The small man lifted his large snifter after he had allowed them five minutes to savor their briefing materials, and their brandy.

"Gentlemen, as you can see we have been presented a unique opportunity to extend our precious Order and Tranquility to a region where it has long been absent," he said as he took a sip of the very old brandy, and smiled.

"Very good Excellency, both your brandy, and our opportunity," Jean Marie said after taking a sip.

"Yes Excellency," Manfred added. "Your brandy and your insights are always of the best, but the reason for this opportunity?"

The Prime Secretary took a second, very small sip then set his snifter aside and leaned back in his chair. He steepeled his fingers again and announced in a dry tone, "The President of The United States has just invoked a very important provision of the Treaty of Mutual Support for Heads of State, and it is now our task to plan how we will carry out our binding obligation."

Manfred and Jean Marie smiled and their smiles were grim, but somewhat forced...

"Humbert, I believe our guests require the services of their aides now. Correct, Comrades?" The Prime Secretary asked when he had given the two officers the outline of what the EU response would be.

"Yes Excellency, but a moment," Manfred interrupted. "Most American citizens are not involved with this Restoration movement. We will apply the massive force as you direct, but what about those who are innocent and not involved?"

"Interesting that you should ask this question Chief Field Marshal," the small man said as he leaned back in his chair and steepeled his fingers yet again.

"Normand of Toulouse asked essentially the same question of Arnald, Bishop of Citeaux when he had breached the walls of Bieziers in 1207. Normand was the General of the Army led by Arnald who was the Pope’s Legate tasked to reform heretics in that town.

"Bieziers had 20,000 inhabitants and was the center of a small revolutionary movement calling themselves Albegensins. Those waywards actually believed that the Church elite should live simply, as the little people did. Obviously this was not acceptable to the Church.

"Tuez tous. Le DIEU reconnaîtra Leis seins," Arnald answered Normand.

"I believe Arnald’s solution applies here as well, consenter?" The Prime Secretary purred with another bland smile.

Manfred suppressed a shudder and was silent for a moment, then snapped, "Yes Excellency, it shall be as you wish. Our schedule, Excellency?"

"My dear Manfred, do not be so tiresome. As soon as your excellent forces are ready to deploy of course," The small man in the big chair purred, the ice in his eyes belying his gentle tone.

"This is a very sizable mobilization, Excellency. August at best," Manfred muttered. Air Marshal Jean Marie nodded in agreement.

"Very good gentlemen, I will await your reports of your successes after August – but do not make me wait too long after that..."

"Yes Excellency," Both men shouted as they leaped from their chairs and saluted the small man in the large chair, Jean Marie with an open-handed sweep of his right hand and Manfred with a forward extension of his right arm.

KENTUCKY BURGOO

noreply@blogger.com (Jack) — Sun, 26 Oct 2008 23:37:00 +0000

NOTE: I will post this here until my daughter brings her much better page on burgoo back up.

~oOo~

KENTUCKY BURGOO

This is a dish that is traditionally served at horse races, church picnics, political rallies, and other such out-of-door sporting events. Recipes will vary with the chef, as well as with his or her location in the state; with mutton replacing the veal in Western Kentucky, and with game (such as squirrel) being added to the pot any time and anywhere in the Commonwealth, when it is available. Speaking of the pot, it is best that it is big, black, and of iron, and is heated on a open hardwood fire suitable for the long, slow cooking that makes Burgoo unique.

This particular recipe is traditional for the Bluegrass area of Central Kentucky, and was taken from a collection of Woodford County recipes published some time ago by one of the Presbyterian churches there.

I have added some notes which are based on my experience, and the quantities are greatly reduced in this version of the recipe, in order to make it suitable for use in back yard cooking. However, for the best flavor, Burgoo should really be cooked over an open fire, and in a big iron pot!

INGREDIENTS

2 pounds lean beef, with bone
1 medium hen, dressed
1 pound veal, (replace with lamb for Western Kentucky flavor)
4 quarts water
6 ears of young corn
2 cups of diced raw potato
2 cups of diced raw onion
2 cups of lima beans
3 carrots, diced
2 cups of okra, sliced to the size of the other vegetables
1 clove of garlic, or more to taste
1 dried red pepper, or more to taste
1 cup of minced parsley
1 quart of chopped tomatoes, with juice
1 stalk of celery, diced
2 green peppers, diced

METHOD OF COOKING

Boil the meat until it is falling apart. de-bone it and return it to the pot (it can be pressure-cooked, if one is available, saving you about three hours). Sauté the onions in bacon fat and add to the pot. Add the potatoes, carrots, and celery, bring up to heat, and simmer for 15 minutes, then add the limas and cook for 2 hours. Add the okra, peppers, tomatoes, and the red pepper(s), and cook 1 hour longer. Add the corn and cook for 30 minutes. Stir in the parsley, add salt and pepper to taste, and serve 15 to 20 hungry people!!

NOTES:
1. I think that cabbage and pork are not happy in Burgoo.

2. Add up to 1/4 cup of Worcestershire sauce and a tablespoon or so of Tabasco sauce to this quantity, along with the lamb for a Western Kentucky flavor.

3, When the real cooking starts, after the limas have been added, constant attention and frequent stirring are necessary to prevent scorching; the thickness of the mixture, and the natural sugars that it contains make this easily possible. DO NOT LET THIS HAPPEN TO YOU!! Or your pot may be confiscated by a Squadron of the KENTUCKY STATE MILITIA, and your cooking spoons ceremoniously broken, to the beat of muffled drums!

4. If this recipe is increased 4 or 5 times, it will fit in a 25-gallon lard rendering pot or "wash kettle” as we call them back home and will serve over 100 people, with suitable side dishes.

5. Burgoo freezes well, and you can always send your guests home with roaders of it in plastic containers, if you have any leftovers. It has been my experience however, that usually one or two quarts are all that remains in the bottom of the pot after I had served about 100 people.

6. You may most easily define Burgoo as, "What Virginia’s Brunswick Stew wants to be when it grows up..."

Good Luck,

John E. McClure, Jr.
KENTUCKY COLONEL,
Commissioned by Albert Benjamin Chandler, Governor of
The COMMONWEALTH OF KENTUCKY in 1959 AD, and
The 168th YEAR of the COMMONWEALTH.

ON Fuel Cells & Hydrogen

noreply@blogger.com (Jack) — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 00:28:00 +0000

Hydrogen Blog

I have referenced biological hydrogen generators in Puss & Boots as being the main source of this gas for the highly efficient fuel cells in their time. I extrapolated this occurrence from my reading about microbiology and my direct experience with using the power of these “simple” single-celled organisms to perform difficult tasks.

I worked with a brilliant microbiologist on a trial of my method of cleaning hydrocarbon-contaminated soil in an old rail yard being turned into a Yuppy- paradise development.

We were able to take soil contaminated with 2,000 parts per million of hydrocarbons down to less than 50 ppm in 45 minutes using a soil-washing method with a rich mix of bacteria-enhanced water. The water was then recycled in a tank and we added more oxygen, nutrients and nitrogen as needed until the little bugs were raring to go again.

I learned during this trial that microbes can apparently share their learned or altered DNA, and so a whole culture in an environment as I had in my tank, can learn to eat new foods...

Now to Puss & Boots:
You will have noted, O Happy Readers that I have hydrogen fuel cell-powered machines all throughout the story, and that local bioreactors are everywhere (i.e. Molly’s cabin). This is because that the microbes that emit hydrogen are with us, and have been so for over 500 million years (pre-Pre-Cambrian).

Read below...
---
“Researchers in Oregon State University's Department of Bioengineering are spearheading efforts to develop sustained production of hydrogen fuel by harnessing photosynthetic microbes that use solar energy to split water molecules and make hydrogen.

OSU professors Roger Ely and Frank Chaplen were notified this week that they are receiving $900,000 over the next three years from a U.S. Department of Energy grant to bolster their efforts.

Hydrogen as a fuel source is a hot topic - hydrogen fuel is clean and energy-rich. Fossil fuels such as gasoline or coal generate greenhouse gasses, but burning hydrogen as fuel produces only water. To make hydrogen fuel takes energy, and current methods typically manufacture hydrogen from fossil fuels. To produce hydrogen fuel without emitting greenhouse gasses, a renewable form of energy would need to be used - from the sun, wind or from a biological process.

The technology to do this is not yet fully developed, but Ely and Chaplen hope to change this.

The two bioengineering researchers - who are faculty in both the College of Agricultural Sciences and the College of Engineering - are especially interested in the hydrogen-generating potential of a large group of photosynthetic microorganisms called cyanobacteria. These bacteria, formerly known as blue-green algae, naturally generate energy from sunlight and, under certain conditions, can make hydrogen rather than sugars.

Ely says cyanobacteria may be a perfect living source for a safe, efficient, and economical production of hydrogen for fuel.

"Imagine an ideal energy device," said Ely. "It wouldn't burn fossil fuels, and it wouldn't pollute. It would be made of low-cost, non-toxic materials, would run on the power of the sun, and would be safe, clean and economical.

"Nature has been conducting research and development on solar energy capture for about 3½ billion years and can teach us much," he said. "From looking to nature, we already know three key things: visible light constitutes most of the energy reaching the Earth; we know how organisms capture it; and we know how they convert it into chemical energy."

But the researchers must overcome a major hurdle: In natural systems, during photosynthesis, cyanobacteria stop making hydrogen when oxygen is present. "In the organism we are studying, oxygen interferes with the production of hydrogen by 'gumming up the works,' so to speak," explained Ely.

With the grant, Ely and Chaplen hope to develop, via "metabolic engineering," oxygen-tolerant strains of cyanobacteria that can produce hydrogen continuously in the light. After developing sun-harnessing, hydrogen-producing strains, the plan is to grow them by the millions in systems that could also store the generated hydrogen and, using fuel cells, convert it into electricity on demand. They call these proposed systems "solar bio-hydrogen energy systems."

"These systems can be designed to be relatively simple and economical, and could serve as decentralized sources of clean electrical energy," said Ely. "The process will have one input, sunlight, and two outputs, electricity and heat," he said. "It will be safe, will operate at relatively low temperatures, and could be made in a range of sizes - from home to industry scale - from abundant, inexpensive materials, mostly from carbon and silica."

"I want to make oil obsolete," said Ely. "As I like to say, the Stone Age didn't end because we ran out of rocks. We can do better."
---
As I say, I think I extrapolate from the present to the future pretty good...
Jack

Modern Major Funny!

noreply@blogger.com (Jack) — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 15:37:00 +0000

This was spotted by my sharp-eyed daughter, Clay.

"Jim C. Hines, author of Goblin Quest, has just written lyrics to go with the Gilbert and Sullivan perennial 'Modern Major General' AND he's released them under a Creative Commons license."

I am the Very Model of a Modern SF Novelist
http://jimhines.livejournal.com/382703.html

Go there for a real hoot!

Boer War Scout in The Transvaal in 1901

noreply@blogger.com (Jack) — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 20:18:00 +0000

Here we are now in the Transvaal in 1901, scouting and guiding the 300 or so men of the Irish Transvaal Brigade as they partake of yet another opportunity to fight the Bloody British...

APPROPIATE FOR THE FOURTH, DON’T YOU THINK?

noreply@blogger.com (Jack) — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 19:32:00 +0000

“IN FLANDER’S FIELDS”
By
Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae
Canadian Army Doctor
1872 - 1918.

*

In Flanders Fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky

The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw the sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

Boer War Scout

noreply@blogger.com (Jack) — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 16:24:00 +0000

From the Irish Transvaal Brigade circa 1901

The ITB was made up of some 300 Irish miners from the Transvaal gold fields (the real reason for the British fighting the Boers) and included about 30 Irish immigrants from Chicago. These latter boyos got to South Africa by volunteering as Red Cross ambulance drivers, then exchanging their arm bands for Mausers when they could cross the battle lines. Anything for a chance to shoot at the Brits!

I am portraying a Boer Scout with the ITB at a reenactment at the Potomac Celtic Festival in Leesburg, Virginia earlier this month. My horse's name is Molly, BTW.

JOHN RINGO SHOWS HIS CLASS

noreply@blogger.com (Jack) — Mon, 26 May 2008 17:28:00 +0000

A minor brouhaha erupted in the blog-verse when someone posted an attack on John Ringo, a Mil Sci-Fi author whom I admire. Here is a guy who can type 1,000 words an hour and can think them orders of magnitude faster. He has several dozen titles in print through Baen and more seem to be on the way.

Anyway the first blogger was apparently pretty vicious in displaying his dislike for one of John’s series. I don’t know whether the person was a liberal, but I’ll bet you Swiss Credits to greasy Chin chopsticks (as Puss would say) that he/she/it was. John is a guy who would not only help you bury your bodies but also show you the best place to do it; however he is not liked among the Quiche Crowd or by the pink team – thus the reason for my surmise. This initial nastiness was followed by another blogger defending John, but in a back-handed way and that person is the origin of the phrase, “OH JOHN RINGO NO!”

Go to http://www.cafepress.com/ohjohnringono for the rest of the story about John’s class way of handling this. Note also that Captain Tamara Long, USAF was married, and had a child. Her married name was Long-Archuleta. She died in 2003 in Afghanistan when her chopper crashed on a mission to medi-evac two Afghani girls.

Tamara showed her class as well…

Mission Accomplished! (So far anyway...)

noreply@blogger.com (Jack) — Fri, 09 May 2008 15:41:00 +0000

Well, P & B is now a real book and is up on Amazon.com. The price is now decent too. So what are you waiting for?

Go on and buy it!

Real Science Fiction

noreply@blogger.com (Jack) — Sat, 26 Jan 2008 19:40:00 +0000

I am trying to be a new voice writing Science Fiction, but I want to do in the old way because I honor that way - a way almost ignored today.

Classic science fiction essentially went into remission when Neil Armstrong planted his foot on the moon. When he took that step, Neil and NASA stripped all the mystery away from space travel. Not the glory, just the mystery.

Tolkin’s LOTR came at the right time soon thereafter (whether calculated or not) and captured the huge Sci fi reading audience that craved mystery over fact and felt empty (disenfranchised even) and floating in space. This audience, I submit, became disoriented by the new and harsh reality. The reality that space travel was here now and something they could never dream about, ever again…

Classic science fiction authors really wrote commentaries on the problems they saw in society by selecting one aspect that troubled them, and extrapolating its possible effects into a suggested future. Huxley did this in “Brave New World” and Orwell did it in “1984”, and Pohl and Kornbluth did in “Space Merchants”, to point out just three classic writers of what I call `real’ science fiction.

I have tried to do the same, by writing from the present and looking toward a possible future. I have observed today’s world and now I give you a frightening vision of what our children might face in two hundred and fifty years hence.

“Puss & Boots in The 23rd Century” is a dark tale of my vision – but also of what I see as our ultimate hope as well. Hang on to your straps Gang, because this is one hell of a read!

Jack McClure

On the European Origins of Eastern Woodland American Indians

noreply@blogger.com (Jack) — Sun, 13 Jan 2008 02:27:00 +0000

I have always been mildly fascinated with the culture of American Indians, first by those of the Western Plains because that is what Hollywood gave us (read “Noble Redskins”), but then as I got more into the subject I began looking at the Eastern Indians. Being from Kentucky, yclept “The Dark and Bloody Ground”, or “The Happy Hunting Ground”, (your choice), I sorta’ got interested.

The more I learned the more interested I became, because of factoids I found about them like:

When Daniel Boone came into Kentucky for the first time in the early 1780s, he visited an Indian town at a place in East-Central Kentucky now known as “Indian Old Fields”. Boone noted that it had over 2,000 inhabitants that were what we now as the Adena Culture of central Kentucky Amerinds;
When he came back to Kentucky on his second trip of exploration some twenty years later, he found that the town was deserted and the long houses were abandoned and falling apart, if they had not been burned.

I then learned that the distruction Dan Boone saw at Indian Old Fields was the result of an agreement between the Mohawks of Western New York and the Cherokees of North Georgia, to “ethnically cleanse” the indigenous Adena culture in Kentucky and so allow the land to be a joint hunting preserve for their two tribes. They then sent war parties to Kentucky in the interval between Boone’s first and second trips that were very effective in carrying out their mission of offing the Adena…

I was not interested in the origins of Amerinds when I was younger, since I believed the standard dictat of the Established Experts of a Mongolian origin for them. Then I found some years later about the real origins of the Eastern Woodland Indians, postulated by Dennis Stafford who has been studying the evidence for a number of years. Dr. Stafford is with the National Museum of Natural History at the Smithsonian in Washington. He told me in a personal communication in 2001 that the prehistoric Indian populations on the East Coast have “a mitrochondrial DNA haplogroup known as X… which has not been found in Asia, but occurs in Western Europe, and has been found in some Algonkian speakers,” to paraphrase his words.

This finding seems to substantiate, or at least support the proposal of Farley Mowait’s book, “The Farfarrers” in which he postulates a settlement in Newfoundland by post-Cro-Magnons via a mechanism of following the retreating edge of the Wrum glacier across the northern edge of the North Atlantic some 5,000 years ago.

Based on this information, perhaps I may be allowed to suggest that Pocahontas felt puppy love for John Smith because he was her long-lost cousin, as well as the power dude of the new-coming English...

Some Photos

noreply@blogger.com (Jack) — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 15:10:00 +0000

A reproduction long house at Jamestown Festival Park

The Pamunkey name for the long house is yohacan.

A park reenactor displaying a pagwantun, the traditional dress (basically a small apron) worn by the Pamunkey women in the summer season. This was their Only garment, aside from shell beads...

Chapter 1

noreply@blogger.com (Jack) — Sun, 25 Nov 2007 18:17:00 +0000

Since I did some productive work on my novel both before and after the Thanksgiving ritual eating, you can now read a preview of Chapter 1 of "Puss & Boots in The 23rd Century". You may look upon this posting either as my pre-holiday gift to the world, or as a warning... :o)=)

(Download CH1_Preview.pdf - 614KB)

Map

noreply@blogger.com (Jack) — Sun, 25 Nov 2007 18:09:00 +0000

When I was a kid I always liked novels with maps. These were usually adventure tales of no redeeming social value ("trash" is what my mother called them), but I kept reading them anyway.

Having now written such a tale myself I felt honor bound to include a map, so here it is!
(download PB_Map.pdf - 83KB)

Puss & Boots In the 23rd Century

noreply@blogger.com (Jack) — Sun, 14 Oct 2007 01:02:00 +0000

"Puss & Boots in The 23rd Century”

By Jack McClure

My tale is set in 2276, after the end of thirty years of a war that began when the Chinese demanded that the United States and Canada evacuate their west coast areas.
Beijing announced that California, Oregon, Washington state, Alaska, and British Columbia should be ceded to them, because, “our superior culture requires more space in which to grow and flourish.”

Ottawa gave up British Columbia after a brief hesitation, because they had disbanded their army many years earlier as a gesture of peace to the world. The United States had not however, so the war began...

Puss and Boots are U S special forces veterans of this war, but now two years after it is over, they are bounty hunters for the studios of the omnipotent Network that is the world’s sole media provider. The Network broadcasts videos ranging from blandly sensual 1X shows to ones as violent as the bloody spectacles in the arena of ancient Rome, or more so. The Network rates these particular shows as 5X, and offers them as very expensive pay-per-views and this 5X sector is the most profitable one for the Network…
The governors of the four western states were forced to declare martial law when the Chinese invaded, and this condition still exists perforce. This allows their cynical Military Governors to continue ruling by fiat in support their patrons, the Network - and the White House.

Puss & Boots recognize the danger of martial law as well as the Network during the first ten days of May in 2276, when Boots finally awakens to and then accepts her mission, to restore the Constitution.
A clandestine network of US Army veterans has been waiting for Boots to accept the leadership of the Restoration and when she does, "The drums begin to roll and the bands begin to play!"

My tale closes at Puss’ home on her tribe’s reservation in Virginia. She is a Pamunkey Indian and the most proficient killer in the Army Special Forces but she also has other talents, that she is just beginning to realize.

Puss & Boots face a grim struggle in a totalitarian landscape but their story is full of grit and humor, and this lifts their story above its somber theme and takes the reader on an exciting, and often hilarious roller-coaster ride.

If all of the above sounds like the beginning of a series, it is and I am at work on Book 2 even as we speak!

Welcome

noreply@blogger.com (Jack) — Tue, 02 Oct 2007 14:15:00 +0000

Welcome to Iron Thumb Press, the home of an interesting cast of characters doing interesting things in The 23rd Century - mostly...

I hope they will amuse you while giving you some thrills as well, and perhaps an insight or two about man(and woman)kind - maybe...

Ber Thaq,
2th Century Barbarian Warrior wit' long dangly armses, no forehead an' big axe wid' lotsa' nicks

If

noreply@blogger.com (Jack) — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 18:59:00 +0000

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too:
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or, being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream - and not make dreams your master;
If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim,
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same:.
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build'em up with worn-out tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings,
And never breathe a word about your loss:
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings - nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much:
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son!

--Rudyard Kipling