Long weekend, double Monday

You are my upstairs neighbour. It's 3:30 a.m. and you can't sleep. You:

(a) Count sheep.
(b) Read a book.
(c) Masturbate. (Always works for me!)
(d) Find a plastic ball and dribble it, pausing twenty minutes between spells.
(e) Watch lame t.v. until you drift off.

No prizes for guessing (d). Oh, well, I can't complain too much. It was a fantastic weekend--and a long one, since I took Friday off in order to get a jump on things. (An unanticipatedly savvy move, since the system was down much of the afternoon.) While my underlings were twiddling their thumbs, I was strolling through the park and buying too much fun food. By five p.m. Saturday, everything was scrubbed, polished, swept, straightened, mopped, washed, and arranged. By midnight, there were crumbs on my new rugs and dots of wine in my new wineglasses. All in all, we pulled out 15 reference books in the course of the evening's discussions in order to settle various questions, from the Spanish word for "caraway" to the birthplace of St. Boniface. (e., I was this close to ringing you up since I was maddeningly unable to recall the word "orujo".)

As it is wont to do here, it's gone straight from winter to summer, pausing only briefly at spring. Early in the week, it was below freezing; by Friday, it was in the 80's. The azaleas have gone from cautious buds to full flower and violets and dandelions are blooming. Among the trees, only a few hold-outs (like the honey locuts outside my window) are stuck at the swelling bud stage; most are leafing out with abandon. [Cue late killing ice storm.] monshu's building even switched from heat to AC, which was a very welcome development, allowing us to eat baked goat cheese and watch more bad British t.v. in comfort.

Tulip tree

Recently, monshu said something about the "tulip trees" blooming. I asked him the same thing I've asked others--"If you call the magnolias 'tulip trees', then what do you call tulip trees?"--and got the same response I've heard before--"What's a 'tulip tree' then?" I couldn't find a really good image when I did last year's plant quiz, but it turns out it was because I didn't know to search under the Japanese name:

By Her Strigiform Majesty's Request

Goat cheese with thyme and chives, herb-encrusted salame, and sliced manchego
Roast lamb stuffed with goat cheese, apples, and pinenuts.
Apricot-onion-jalapeño chutney
Mint-cucumber-yoghurt chutney
Gingered and creamed sweet potatoes
Pasiaisleipa (Finnish Easter bread)
Steamed (white & green) asparagus with butter and gruyère
Dry Creek Valley Zinfandel
Pots-de-crème Ghiradelli
Banyuls

Do the math

According to figures compiled by Iraqbodycount.net, there have been between 8,875 and 10,725 reported "non-combatant" deaths in Iraq since coalition military intervention began a little over a year ago.

According to figures compiled by the (Iraqi-run!) Human Rights Centre in Kadhimiya (as reported in this article ganked from lhn), the number of people who would've died over the past year if Saddam had remained in power would've been 70,000. ("Not [due to]sanctions," the author hastens to add, "Saddam's tyranny alone.")

For those of you having a little trouble with your long division, the second figure is seven times the midpoint of the range for the first. I know it's simplistic to compare body counts--there's more to morality than just how many corpses you end up with. On the other hand, it's not a bad place to start.

In an interview on the radio, an Iraqi army officier, part of the battalion that refused to support the Marines in Fallujah, was quoted as saying, "We will not fire on our countrymen." It's hard to see how you can run a security force in a country with endemic insurgency if that's your attitude, but it's a refreshing change from Baathism, isn't it? Not to mention an interesting rejoinder to predictions of a bloody civil war. I wonder if one of the occupation's most important contributions won't end up being providing a common target for Iraqi hatred and resistence, thus solidifying feelings of Iraqi solidarity. That much of a contribution to nation-building would be an important accomplishment in itself.