Letters Column for March 2006: Further Letters

Posted on April 12, 2006 by Jenna

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I’m a bit scattered lately! I regret that this has made the update schedule odd and led to the letters column still going on the 12th. ^_^

If we had a greater glory in a past existence, it is for the best that we do not remember. For that gives us a chance to really live in this one.
— duerig

I totally agree!

Like if you were a cat. Can you imagine how difficult it would be living every day knowing that you had been a cat and were no longer?

You’d be running, let’s say, and then you slip, and you suddenly realize, “That was graceless!”

And if you were a cat, you could totally cover over the whole thing by sitting down, looking dignified, and licking your shoulder.

But as a human, that wouldn’t work.

You’d have to live with the shame!

It is similar if you were a dog but are now a human and are no longer able to determine what other people have eaten by smelling their urine on a fire hydrant. The mourning would probably render you unable to perform key human functions like small talk and banking. That’s the worst of both worlds!

That was beautiful, and horrific, and sad.
— Matador

Much like a butterfly formally trained as a mime.

The worst part is that it can’t fly with mime-paint on its wings.

I am like Jane, in that I am no expert in poetry. But I like this! The patterns remind me of the sound of the ocean. Eerily soothing, given the subject matter.
— James Allen

Sometimes I will hear the sound of the ocean.

It will rush and pull, splash and swish, like infinite depths.

It will roar.

It is a creature of undertows, and right now, somewhere in the world, someone is drowning in it, and ten thousand sharks are at their feasts, and in the palaces beneath the sea the dragons twine, and ten million million waves make their way across the ocean’s face.

It is usually actually a faucet but sometimes it is a shell someone has held to my ear while I was not looking.

I’m picturing charging rhinoceroses being all surly because they don’t get the preferential treatment the elephants get from the credit card companies.
— ethan_greer

It is difficult to enforce a predatory debt upon a rhinoceros because of their thick hides. The teeth of the lending companies just bounce off!

I’ve heard that there used to be a metallic hopping vampire. He was called “Eddie.” His wrath was terrible to behold! Eventually, a bunch of Taoist monks got together and defeated Eddie by using sticky rice made of iron. I wouldn’t have thought that would work, since Eddie had powers over metal, but I guess that just shows that my understanding of Taoist philosophy is flawed.
— random

From the day of our birth
We are straw dogs
To Heaven and Earth
And the Master of Dao.
Being gives rise
To unbeing, damn its eyes

Taking everyone for a ride, OH

When Eddie say he doesn’t like wu wei
You know he is an evil thing.
But when he threatens your life
With his hop and his bite—

What a guy!

Makes you cry.

—Tao te Ching.

Elephants also make effective door-to-door sales representatives!
— Penultimate Minion

Really, what job can’t be done better by elephants?

Cats don’t get elemental powers either, yah?
— Archangel Beth

Man! No elemental powers, no thumbs, and hopping vampire stole their place in the zodiac? That bites.

… and I’m sleepy! More after Easter.

Rebecca