Hi Folks,

The Latin phrase above, incorrectly attributed to Aristotle, which some of you might recall from Umberto Eco's, 'The Name of the Rose,' was actually uttered by the physician, Galen, in 200 B.C. The full quote is:

Profound thinking, eh? You can't help but wonder what the HENS would have had to say about that one. Speaking of chooks, I have received some interesting, and I believe, essential insights into 'bird flu' which you can find further down below. As this potential 'crisis' could possibly affect all of us, and those you love, I hope you will take a minute to read it over. It is a memorable article.

FAVOURITE READER COMMENTS OF THE WEEK

Dear Joe,
Thanks so much for your beautiful latest Granny Lalla issue!! Your newsletter is water in the desert sometimes...and then sometimes it BECOMES dessert! ... especially needed in these Terrorist law /totalitarian fear times - I suspect that the big beat up on the Avian flu bug is just another fear tactic to get people to huddle behind the government...(We dont agree with what theyre doing -but at least they can protect us). But there's always hope - Met Patch Adams yesterday - what a breeze of delight to hear such a clear radical espouse immediate love and justice and dump the rest of society's stupid norms.. I suppose he (and I) would be locked up as a terrorist threat under our (sic) government's proposed Gestapo Like Anti-Terrorism Bill. I think November 11 is the proposed date that they want to rubber stamp it in Parliament...maybe the pollies will just pass it round for "no comment" during the one minutes silence??!! Anyway Long Live Lalla and all the poets!!! Long Live Water in the Dessert!! Ciao and Baci, Giri

(Note: Giri, I also saw Patch Adams, the clown doctor, give a lecture and demonstration of miming, when he came here a few years before the Robin Williams film was made about him, when he was still part of the extended Ian Gawler network of alternative healers. He is a very skilled performer, as well as being an innovative medical thinker. He founded the Gesundheit Institute! which practices the following principles:
* All the healing arts are welcome.
* All patients are treated as friends.
* There is no charge for health services.
* No third party reimbursement is accepted.
* The health care experience is infused with fun.
* No malpractice insurance is carried by the Institute.
* The health of the staff is valued equally with the health of the patients.
* The health of an individual is nested in the health of family, community, society and the natural environment.
(Cool Gesundheit Institute, website, too!)

Ciao sweet Joe,
I'm a regular recipient of your legendary email mailout, but don't think I've yet established personal contact. Have been meaning to for ages - I have quite an appetite for reading your newsletter - there's just so much that goes into it - you must be thinking and researching and writing all the time! Maybe you don't sleep? Whatever, I really appreciate so many of the quotes you dig out for us - edifying and uplifting. . . Peace and Love, Gisele, fellow musician and songwriter
(Gisele's Website)

Joe,
Hey, I was just browsing the web, procrastinating and avoiding doing my end of semester essays as usual. Out of curiosity I was looking for hits on www.ishotmyself.com and www.beautifulagony.com when i came across your newsletter for April this year and one of your readers responses about it the following week. I'm a model on both sites and I have just started to work behind the scenes for the company as well and I'm glad to see it being recommended within Australia, as I think the majority of the subscribers are in the UK and the States. It's pretty innovative stuff . . and there's more projects coming too. I'm proud to be a part of it, and glad to see it being praised here. Liandra Dahl

(Note: Both of these websites are creative alternatives to mainstream erotic art/porn - where anyone can submit their OWN photos and videos to the sites. Beautifulagony features both men and women, taken from the shoulders up only! And ishotmyself has a restriction that you have to primarily self-photograph yourself, while holding your own camera!)

Dear Joe,
Finally found your website & thought I would share this with you.  I do not remember when or where I was  when I first heard your song but it is burned in my mind forever.  Whenever my newborn granddaughter is fussy I carry her around & sing ShaddapYou Face  to her.  She just loves it & it seems to calm her down!  I did forget one set of verses but I have now found the complete lyrics & have got them to add to the song. Thanks a million, Mary, Pensacola, Florida.

(Note: Fellow grandparents, pay attention to the above wisdom. . . )

Hi Joe,
I'm consulting with a young composer in Cotati, Nick A., on the book for a musical based on Morningstar Ranch [Commune]. He's very talented, and also very sensitive to the open land 'vibe.' He found your 'Hey Lou Gottlieb, He Opened Up His Land,' lyrics online and wants your okay to include them. What chu thinkest? I think it's a good cause. . . Of course we're using Lou's setting of "Love To All In You That Loves, (And To All In You That Does Not Know That It Loves.)" Bananas, peel and all, Ramon

(Note: Dr Lou Gottlieb (1924-1996), Phd Music, was a founding member, vocalist, vocal arranger and the standup bassplayer of the legendary LIMELITERS folk group in the US, in the 60s, sang bass in the Sonoma Bach Choir, and was a student of Arnold Schoenberg. With the money earned from the Limeliter's success, he bought a piece of land, 'Morningstar Ranch,' in the 70s, legally deeded it to 'God' and declared that it was now 'open' land, that anyone could live on, and no one had the right or authority to ask anyone else to leave. Lou believed that only the people who couldn't live anywhere else would end up staying. It was an unforgettable and influential experiment in social community and 'freelove' of about 200 settlers for years until it was bulldozed by the local council. Lou was my first serious 'music teacher,' in a manner of speaking.)

Ramon's Morningstar Ranch Scrapbook
Lou Gottlieb Tribute Website

Dear Joe,
Another cracker of a newsletter!!! With baby due any day I was about to ask for a temporary "suspension" of my "subscription" because I figure I won't have much time to read and be sidetracked and distracted by all the wild and wonderful bits and pieces you offer up. But your last couple of editions have been so excellent I've decided that a bit of such esoteric exploration will go well with 2am feeds!! (Both being outside of the "normal experience"...then again perhaps sleep deprivation combined with information that will make me rethink my whole life experience will turn me into a member of a Shaddapofile cult!) . . . I personally totally agree with your Nick Cave critique and have been heard to utter the phrase "Emperor's New Clothes" in regard to him and a few other alternative/art darlings...which was an interesting connection with the naked Granny Lalla.....and just one other thing - yes, Wild Roses was the worst song ever but in culinary terms, is highly recommended. For your reader's benefit, I think you should specify organically-grown roses for your recipes...nothing worse (except perhaps dead toads in your tank) than the ingesticide of a little pesticide with your cake (perhaps unknowingly if you, like my mother, favour surreptitiously snipping the best specimens you spy on your morning walk. Not all grannies are down at the recruiting office, although we salute those who are!!!!) Kind regards, Justine

(Note: Justine, If you look at the recipes again, sweetie, you will notice that I did stipulate organic roses in both of them! And here's a grannie update for you:)

'Raging Granny' Gets Marine Recruitment Letter

ALBUQUERQUE, New Mexico - Sally-Alice Thompson had to laugh when she got a letter from the Marine Corps' commanding general, telling her the military "is in need of your service" and inviting her to find out more by sending in an enclosed card.
"What else could I do? I mean, I'm 82 years old," Thompson said.
Not only that, Thompson is a well-known local peace activist who is a charter member of the Center for Peace & Justice in Albuquerque and belongs to Veterans for Peace and Raging Grannies. (article)

Top 5 Ugliest Bands
1. Hanson
2. The Darkness
3. The Cheeky Girls
4. Ugly Kid Joe
5. Joe Dolce Music Theatre
The Cat, Musical Fascist since 1967, Mass Hibsteria

(Note: Now that's different! I always knew I was a little catwalk-challenged but I didn't know I was a whole BAND of them. My coked-out surfie inner drummer is NOT going to like that one bit as his last reported job was working as a neck model, for Count Calvin Klein, in Romania.)

Thundabox - 'Here To Ruffle Ya Feathers'
Ever wondered what Joe Dolce would have sounded like if he went punk? No? Neither did we, but it looks like Thundabox have answered that question anyway with the release of their album,' Here to Ruffle Ya Feathers'. Like some sort of unholy union between Lobby Lloyd and the Coloured Balls, Joe Dolce and the Hard Ons. Nowland

Shaddap You Face - Joe Dolce
If you ever see a list of the worst records ever, you can guarantee Joe will be in there. I'd like to take this opportunity to stand up for Mr Dolce on this one. 'Itsa not so bad', as the song says, and I've deemed it worthy of Three Stars in the iTunes playlist, which is more than I'd give the dreary Ultravox song 'Vienna', which Joe famously kept off the top spot back in 1981. Joe Williams

(Note: By the way, fans of Ultravox should have a look at the recently released UK DVD, Filthy, Rich And Catflap - The Complete Series 1 [1987] There is a lusty rendition of Shaddap You Face, performed by Nigel Planer and Rik Mayall, sung on the doorstep and in the face of none other than MIDGE URE.

Fever and the Mystery Disease SARS (and the "Asian Bird Flu")

By Marshall Smith
Editor, BroJon Gazette

Most flu comes from China, as in Asian Flu, Hong Kong Flu or Swine Flu, since it is mostly caused by rare avian or bird viruses crossing species with pig viruses.
 
Many rural Chinese farmers raise flocks of geese side-by-side with herds of swine or pigs. Geese and pigs are a traditional Chinese food source. Humans have no natural immunity to avian bird viruses, and are able to "catch" pig or porcine viruses because of the similarity of human and porcine lung and organ tissue. If a pig is ill with porcine flu and then eats droppings from an avian-virus-infected goose the result is a new cross-species flu virus, with the outer lining of a pig and the inner viral core of a goose, which spreads from central China around the world and usually kills about 100,000 or more each year in the U.S.  Several new variations of goose-pig generated influenza occur each year coming mostly from China.
 
Skip all the CDC recommended flu shots. They are much more dangerous killers than any Influenza. Here's why.

The problem is the method of treatment. The viral core molecule of RNA cannot reproduce if the body temperature is above 101 degrees. Humans have genetically developed a natural method to defeat viral infections called a fever. With a mild fever of 101 degrees the telomers on the ends of the RNA molecule cannot attach and the virus cannot reproduce itself, and the body's white blood cells quickly destroy the invading virus.
 
But the modern 'regular' treatment for a fever from a cold or flu is to reduce the fever to ease the discomfort. This is wrong. By lowering the fever below 100 degrees, the invading virus is allowed to reproduce and spread massively throughout the body. If the multitude of viruses finally cross the blood/brain barrier the result is a fever of 104 or more, causing brain damage or death. This is often called Reyes Syndrome or Viral Encephalitis and is not a disease but the result of improper treatment with aspirin or other NSAIDs to lower the natural viral infection fever.

In the last 50 years a whole new large section in your local drug store has arisen called 'Cold and Flu' medications. There seems to be a vast variety of various types to choose from, but really there are only two 'flavors': those containing Ibuprofen and those with Acetaminophen. These are commonly known as Advil and Tylenol. There are many other similar NSAIDs, but in cold medications those are the two most commonly found. They are about the same, which is why they both remain side-by-side on the store shelves. These are both NSAIDs (Non Steroidal Anti-Inflammatory Drugs) or synthetic forms of aspirin.
 
Since aspirin is an old Native-American Indian traditional medication, made from Aspen Tree bark hence the name Aspirin, its patent ran out over a century ago. But the newer synthetic forms are still patent medicines; and thus the reason for the multi-million dollar ad campaigns each year to get you to buy the higher cost synthetics whenever you get a cough or cold.
 
Don't buy them.

If you become infected with even a single cold or flu virus, it quickly within minutes will enter one of your nose or lung cells, make many copies of itself and then the copies burst out of the damaged cell carrying with them a covering made from the old cell wall material. This covering is to protect the virus from attack since your body will attack and destroy all "foreign" invaders. But since the new viruses are covered with cell wall material made from your own body the white blood cells of your immune system can't see them. These many new viruses also within minutes, invade other nearby healthy cells and repeat the process.
 
If there weren't anything to stop it, within several hours that one single virus will have copied itself many millions of times and would quickly overwhelm your body.

But there is a natural protection and that is that when the very first infected cell was destroyed by the infecting virus, it sent out a hormonal signal that was created by bursting the cell wall which then causes two things to occur.
 
First, the white blood cells stored in your lymph nodes are sent out to seek and find the cause of the damaged cell.
 
Second, a fever is induced.
 
Ever wonder where "the chills" came from? In order to raise your body temperature to create a fever the heat losses through your extremities, such as the hands, feet and skin are reduced by slowing down and constricting the peripheral blood flow. This causes your hands, feet and skin to feel cold. You may even shiver. This occurs within several minutes of the first viral damage.
 
This is called 'catching a cold' and the cold feeling is the first step to raising your core body temperature to above 101 degrees to stop any further viral reproduction and infection. . . .

. . .The medical term 'influenza' comes from the Spanish word 'influence.' This comes from the times of the Crusades in the middle ages when armies of knights from western Europe, mostly England, France, Spain and Germany, first came into contact in the Middle Eastern Holy Land with merchant camel caravans from far Asia, carrying with them not only trade goods but many cases of pig-goose viral infections from China. The viral infections were probably in dried form on the Asian cloth and trade goods, which only needed to be moistened to become re-activated. The Europeans had no clue where the deadly disease causing viral-pneumonia and swift death was coming from. It was named and identified by the medieval Spanish doctors as the 'Influenza de Diablo' or Influence of the Devil. Today we simply call it the flu. (more) (article)
(thanks to Russell & Susan Salamon)

(Aspirin: In the 1890's an American chemist made an improvement on an old home folk remedy called Willow or Aspen Tea. It seemed to relieve the pains of old-age gout, arthritis and other assorted pains. But the evil tasting tea containing acetylsalicylic acid was so strong that it caused many people to have nausea and vomiting, along with the pain relief if they could tolerate drinking the tea. This potion was later neutralized, synthesized and buffered, and then sold to the German Bayer company as a pain reliever. The German Bayer company, in order to sell to both the American and European markets, used a name familiar in both markets. In America the common folk remedy form was called "Aspen Tea" made from boiling willow bark from the Aspen tree family. In Europe, the same home remedy was called "Spirain Tea" made from boiling the leaves of the common European shrub Spirae. Both preparations were found to contain large amounts of natural acetylsalicylic acid, but unbuffered. Combining the common home-remedy folklore names Aspen and Spirain comes up with the Euro-American brand name Aspirin. (more) (article)

Best natural advice: Do not try to lower a fever, it is your genetically derived natural human defense against any viral infection. Stay wrapped up and warm to cause a sweat. Drink fluids to replace the water lost by sweating. And within 6 to 8 hours overnight the cold or flu is gone. Many older doctors knew this, which is the reason for the old docs advice, 'go to bed, stay warm, drink fluids.' But younger docs just out of med school have been taught there is a drug or pill to treat everything. The result of using expensive pills or over-the-counter medications to reduce the fever from colds and flu is prolonged illness, the epidemic spread of viral diseases and the unneeded deaths of hundreds of thousands each year.)

"DO NOT RESUSCITATE" TATTOOED ON 85 YR OLD WOMAN

An 85-year-old woman has had the words Do Not Resuscitate tattooed on her chest to make sure her intentions are known if she is taken seriously ill. Frances Polack, a former nurse, said she did it to prevent any doctor and her relatives from getting into trouble for obeying her wishes to be allowed to die when seriously ill. Mrs Polack, who lives in the New Forest, Hampshire, told the Nursing Standard magazine that she has carried around a living will in her handbag for years but felt this might not be checked during an emergency. (article)

Lincoln and Kennedy

(You may have seen this one before - I have - but it is still remarkable, especially the last entry - which is recent.)

Abraham Lincoln was elected to Congress in 1846.
John F. Kennedy was elected to Congress in 1946.

Abraham Lincoln was elected President in 1860.
John F. Kennedy was elected President in 1960.

Both were particularly concerned with civil rights.
Both wives lost their children while living in the White House.

Both Presidents were shot on a Friday.
Both Presidents were shot in the head.

(Now it gets really weird.)

Lincoln's secretary was named Kennedy.
Kennedy's Secretary was named Lincoln.

Both were assassinated by Southerners.
Both were succeeded by Southerners named Johnson.

Andrew Johnson, who succeeded Lincoln, was born in 1808.
Lyndon Johnson, who succeeded Kennedy, was born in 1908.

John Wilkes Booth, who assassinated Lincoln, was born in 1839.
Lee Harvey Oswald, who assassinated Kennedy, was born in 1939.

Both assassins were known by their three names.
Both names are composed of fifteen letters.

(Now hang on to your seat.)

Lincoln was shot at the theater named 'Ford.'
Kennedy was shot in a car called ' Lincoln' made by 'Ford.'

Lincoln was shot in a theater and his assassin ran and hid in a warehouse.
Kennedy was shot from a warehouse and his assassin ran and hid in a theater.

Booth and Oswald were assassinated before their trials.

(And here's the kicker...)

A week before Lincoln was shot, he was in Monroe, Maryland
A week before Kennedy was shot, he was in Marilyn Monroe. (Badda Bing!!!)

I Will Eat Your Dollars
By Robyn Dixon

'Let us be thankful for the fools. But for them the rest of us could not succeed.'
Mark Twain

FESTAC, Nigeria - As patient as fishermen, the young men toil day and night, trawling for replies to the e-mails they shoot to strangers half a world away.

Most recipients hit delete, delete, delete, delete without ever opening the messages that urge them to claim the untold riches of a long-lost deceased second cousin, and the messages that offer millions of dollars to help smuggle loot stolen by a corrupt Nigerian official into a U.S. account.

But the few who actually reply make this a tempting and lucrative business for the boys of Festac, a neighborhood of Lagos at the center of the cyber-scam universe. The targets are called maghas - scammer slang from a Yoruba word meaning fool, and refers to gullible white people.

Samuel is 19, handsome, bright, well-dressed and ambitious. He has a special flair for computers. Until he quit the game last year, he was one of Festac's best-known cyber-scam champions. (more) (article)
(thanks to Frank Dolce)

HUMOUR

The Story of Rindercella and Her Sugly Isters
by Ronnie Barker (RIP)

Rindercella and her sugly isters lived in a marge lansion. Rindercella worked very hard frubbing sloors, emptying poss pits, and shivelling shot. At the end of the day, she was knucking fackered.

The sugly isters were right bugly astards. One was called Mary Hinge, and the other was called Betty Swallocks; they were really forrible huckers; they had fetty sweet and fetty swannies. The sugly isters had tickets to go to the ball, but the cotton runts would not let Rindercella go.

Suddenly there was a bucking fang, and her gairy fodmother appeared. Her name was Shairy Hithole and she was a light rucking fesbian. She turned a pumpkin and six mite wice into a hucking cuge farriage with six dandy ronkeys who had buge hollocks and dig bicks. The gairy fodmother told Rindercella to be back by dimnlight otherwise, there would be a cucking falamity.

At the ball, Rindercella was dancing with the prandsome hince when suddenly the clock struck twelve. "Mist all chucking frighty!!!" said Rindercella, and she ran out tripping barse over ollocks, so dropping her slass glipper.

The very next day the prandsome hince knocked on Rindercella's door and the sugly isters let him in. Suddenly, Betty Swallocks lifted her leg and let off a fig bart. "Who's fust jarted??" asked the prandsome hince. "Blame that fuglyucker over there!!" said Mary Hinge. When the stinking brown cloud had lifted, he tried the slass glipper on both the sugly isters without success and their feet stucking funk.

Betty Swallocks was ducking fisgusted and gave the prandsome hince a knack in the kickers. This was not difficult as he had bucking fuge halls and a hig bard on.

He tried the slass glipper on Rindercella and it fitted pucking ferfectly.

Rindercella and the prandsome hince were married. The pransome hince lived his life in lucking fuxury, and Rindercella lived hers with a follen swanny.
(thanks to Joe Creighton)

Tattoo my head with anything anti-Bush!

The tattoo advertising boom began in 2003 when Jim Nelson, a 22 year old from Illinois sold off the back of his head for about $7,000 to CI Host. For the next five years, Jim is to keep the tattoo visible, and pitch the brand to the public. So far he's been averaging well over a hundred new customers a month for them, and other skulls are lining up on auction sites, eager to sell their flesh to the highest bidder. These days there are almost always ads on eBay from people selling their skin to advertisers - "your anti-Bush message tattooed on my skull, starting bid $10,000.' (article)

RECIPE

Romanian Cabbage Rolls

(Goot Eeeevening! Greetinzs fvrom Count Al Zeimers. Today I hav vun brilliante family recipe forra you fvrum my hometown uv Transylvania, und za mountains uv Rumania. You can serve dis deesh vit a nice glassh uv vater if you vant - because . . . (vait for eet!) -

I don dreenk . . . . . VINE!)

Serves 4

350 g minced beef or lamb
100 g rice
1 onions, finely chopped
salt & pepper
1 Savoy or green cabbage
olive oil
beef or chicken stock
2 lemons
75 g brown sugar

Make the stock the day before by boiling some chicken or beef bones with a bay leaf, some cut up onions and carrots, a clove of GARLIC (ARGHHHHH!!) and salt and pepper to taste. Make sure you wash the bones beforehand to remove any impurities or DRIED BLOOD. (ARGHHHHH!!) Strain. Put in the fridge overnight. In the MORNING (ARGHHHHH!!), skim off the fat or 'schmaltz' and save it for matzo balls. Set the stock aside.

Preheat oven to 160 degrees C.
Mix the meat, rice, half the onion, salt and pepper and set aside. To remove the cabbage leaves, use a pointed knife or WOODEN STAKE (ARGHHHHH!!) to cut a deep cone or CROSS (ARGHHHHH!!) into the core at the stem end of the cabbage.

Plunge the whole cabbage into a large pan of boiling, salted water (important: not HOLY WATER (ARGHHHHH!!) for a couple of minutes, to loosen the leaves. As each leaf comes free, remove it and place in a drainer, and continue until all the leaves are separated. Cut out the thick ribs from the centre of each leaf.

Lay each leaf on a wooden or SILVER PLATE (ARGHHHHH!!), place a spoonful of meat and rice mixture in the centre and roll up, tucking in both sides to form a little parcel or TINY COFFIN (ARGHHHHH!!).

Brown the remainder of the onion in some oil in an oven-proof casserole and set the cabbage rolls on top. Add enough stock to cover and some extra salt and pepper. Cover with one whole leaf of cabbage (helps prevent the top burning), cover and bake for two - three hours. (Slow cooking is the secret!) Open the kitchen curtains to let in plenty of BRIGHT SUNLIGHT (ARGHHHHH!!).

Add the lemon juice and brown sugar, stir in gently and return to the oven for one more hour.

(Use any leftover cabbage leafs to make cabbage soup with bacon or a ham hock. This soup is particularly savoured by old Romanians with BAD TEETH (ARGHHHHH!!).

My favourite XXX rated DIABLO Tattoo. Open with care! Not for the squeamish! You have been warned! No children allowed! You must be 18 yrs old to view! Only with adult supervision! (Have I covered everything?) YE WHO ENTER HERE ABANDON ALL HOPE!