Lift Up Your Hearts!

The Chronological Guide to the Bible (Thomas Nelson, Nashville, 2010)

My review copy of this book arrived from the publisher at a fortuitous time:  I happened to have recently begun reading Susan Wise Bauer's History of the Ancient World.  Each book is good; together they are a great window on the historical and cultural settings for Biblical events.

The book meant to be read with the Chronological Guide, however, is the Bible, and I look forward to that adventure in the future.  A Bible itself, arranged in chronological order, would be easier than flipping back and forth, but the Guide is small (not much over 200 pages) and easy to read even though dense with facts, works with any Bible translation, and lets the reader decide how to proceed in places where historical order is uncertain or controversial.  It really is just a guide; you must do the work of actually opening the Bible yourself.

Each book of the Bible is set in its historical and cultural context, which both brings it to life and provides clues for understanding.  It also leaves me hungry for more—there's only so much a book this size can do—which is not a bad thing.

I have but one complaint:  Although the Guide touches on the Apocrypha and the historical period between the Old and New Testaments, it provides none of the informative analysis for the Apocryphal books themselves that it does for the Canonical books.  Even Martin Luther called them "useful and good to read," and it would be helpful to understand more about the history, culture, and philosophies that set the stage for Jesus' time.

Even so, The Chronological Guide to the Bible is a worthwhile addition to the library of anyone who wishes a better understanding of the Bible and how its stories fit into their cultural and historical context.

Everything I Want to Do Is Illegal:  War Stories from the Local Food Front. by Joel Salatin (Polyface Inc., Swoope, Virginia, 2007)

Until now, I've written more about Joel Salatin than I've read by him:  almost a year ago in Strange Bedfellows?  Not Really, and three months later in my review of The Omnivore's Dilemma.  Wanting to correct that sin of omission, I grabbed the only one of his books available in our local library:  Everything I Want to Do Is Illegal.

On every side, our paternalistic culture is tightening the noose around those of us who just want to opt out of the system.  And it is the freedom to opt out that differentiates tyrannical and free societies.  How a culture deals with its misfits reveals its strength.  The stronger a culture, the less it fears the radical fringe.  The more paranoid and precarious a culture, the less tolerance it offers.  When faith in our freedom gives way to fear of our freedom, silencing the minority view becomes the operative protocol. — Joel Salatin

Salatin wants to opt out of a little more of the system than I do, but I hear his cry.  You could call him bitter, but if you consider the miracle that is Polyface Farms, you have to wonder why our government is working so hard to stamp out such elegant, inexpensive, healthy, delicious, and truly "green" (in a conservationist sense) endeavors.

There's another whole blog post in the answer to that—involving sustainable agriculture, home education, midwives, family businesses, free-range kids, raw milk, and even the Duggar family—so for now I'll move on to the quotation section of this review. Otherwise I'll never get it back to the library tomorrow today, when it's due.

The quotes are selected from collection of pink sticky notes bristling from pages all over the book, as I marked passages I found especially interesting.  Unfortunately, they're rather random, and generally miss the most important thrust of the book, which is that

• Both governmental regulations and societal expectations (i.e. the belief that governmental regulations guarantee safe food) have devasted small, local, sustainable agriculture, because they greatly favor large corporations and factory farming.
• Governmental regulations and inspections do not, in fact, promote a healthier food supply, because the big guys (from Archer-Daniels-Midland to Wal-Mart) can afford high-powered attorneys and lobbyists, and because too many bureaucrats are more concerned with healthy paperwork than with healthy food.  (When you read about what the bureaucrats and  big companies did to the very word "Organic," you will no longer be so happy in that section of your grocery store.)
• Small, local, sustainable agriculture is our best hope for producing safe (from salmonella to bioterrorism threats), healthy food.  And taste!  Don't forget about taste!

When it comes to trying to protect our food system, both from internal carelessness and external attack,

[T]he things we're moving heaven and hell to stop are not the things we need to be concerned about.  The stuff that we turn a blind eye to and don't even care about is the bigger problem.  We really do worry about the wrong things.  And we devote precious resources inspecting, measuring, and vilifying the antidote to the wrong things.

Did you really think food regulations were all about ... food safety?

I spoke with an attorney who represents one of the largest food businesses in the world.  He came to the farm for a visit, a delightful gentleman. ... He said he would put it to me straight, "People don't trust the large corporations.  If you're a large corporation, you need that trust to survive.  How do you get that trust?  You create a system that makes it look like you care.  People want to see you doing something that protects them. ... But, and here's the other part of the equation, if you're the chief executive of a large business, you don't want to pay for it.  Instead, you wine and dine politicians to convince them that they will curry favor with their constituents if they demand this program.  Now you have people's faith without having to pay for it."

 And what did you think an ambassador's job was supposed to be?

Allan Nation, editor of Stockman Grass Farmer magazine ... took a group of American grass farmers to Argentina to tour the world's best grass-based farms and ranches.  When the American ambassador found out a group of American farmers and ranchers was in town, he invited them over to the Embassy for refreshments.

"What are you all doing in Argentina?"  he asked.

"We're here to study grass-based agriculture and see firsthand how to finish beef on grass instead of in feedlots," replied Nation.

At that point, Nation said the ambassador nearly kicked them out of the embassy, proclaiming, "Don't you understand why I am here?  I am here to make Argentina quit grass-finishing beef and begin using corn in a feedlot."  There's the good o' USA, friend of environmental agriculture, respecter of other cultures.  Yessireee.

Salatin may be strident at times, but he's not a conspiracy theorist.

At the risk of sounding completely naïve, I will say flat out that I do not sense a conspiracy behind this effort.  Like so many other government plans, this is another well-intentioned idea with incredibly terrible consequences.  I happen to believe that when the food police say raw milk will kill you, they actually believe it.  When they say my outdoor chickens are dangerous to the Tyson houses, they sincerely believe it.  When they say consumers are too stupid to make food choices, they actually believe it.  I think people sincerely believe a lot of stupid things.  This is just stupidity, not conspiracy.  It's a fraternity of stupidity, to be sure, but we need not label it a conspiracy.

I've never worried much about eggs and salmonella—always let the kids lick the cake bowl and eat raw cookie dough, if they beat me to it.  But I'm less worried about the eggs I scooped from under the hen myself at a local farm than about the free box of factory-farmed eggs I picked up at Target.  The recent salmonella outbreak, due to tainted eggs from large, federally regulated egg farms, makes even more significant the following story of Salatin's encounter with a health department representative who had accused his unwashed eggs of carrying salmonella:

Although she admitted that the regulations did not require washing, she simply sniffed and said, "An unwashed egg is inedible."  Then I told her we did in fact culture the eggs, including the manure, and they were clean.  It was like talking to a fence post:  "An unwashed egg is inedible."  End of discussion.

I hung up and immediately the phone rang, even before I could take my hand off the receiver.  I answered and it was Allan Nation. ...  He and his wife, Carolyn, had just returned from a fact-finding trip to Europe, with a heavy emphasis on range poultry in France.  Without any prompting from me, he started the conversation with, "Hey, guess what?  In France, you can't sell a washed egg.  If it has to be washed, it must go into a pasteurized product in liquid form.  Only unwashed eggs are legal to sell as shell eggs."

More about eggs in Europe:

I was showing my eggs to a chef once and he wanted to buy them right away.  To be perfectly transparent, I warned him that in the winter they wouldn't be as deeply orange as they are in the green grass season. ... He immediately cut in.  "Oh, that's no problem.  In chef's school in Switzerland we had recipes for March eggs, recipes for June eggs, and other recipes for October eggs in order to accentuate the nuances of that particular season's eggs."

Of animals, people, and politics.  One reason I like Salatin is his rejection of the political boundary lines that are hardening like arteries in our society and constricting the healthy flow of ideas:  Republicans and Democrats are both helpful—and hurtful—to his cause.  His views land him squarely on both the Left and the Right.

When the only interaction between people and animals is in a pet situation, it jaundices the historical and natural relationship between the two. 

Amazingly, the [animal rights activists who object to] abortions in the third-trimester of a bovine pregnancy tend to support that action in humans. ...

... It's as inconsistent as the pro-lifers eating disrespected, factory farmed meat out of Costco ... The people who should be most concerned about respecting and honoring animals are the members of the religious right.  Instead these folks defend the right to abuse animals, to disrespect their chickeness and pigness.  And they even applaud their own ability to find the cheapest food.  I wonder if they think the best church comes from hiring the cheapest pastor.

What good is the freedom to worship, the right to keep and bear arms, and the freedom of the press if we don't have the freedom to choose what to feed our bodies so we can go sing, shoot, and speak?  The only reason the founding fathers did not grant the freedom to choose our food was because it was such a basic, fundamental personal right that they could not conceive that special protection would be needed.  Granting citizens the right to choose their food would have been similar to granting them the right to see the sun rise, or to breathe.

We believe that our pluralistic society is stronger for allowing home schooling and private schooling alongside public schooling.  Our culture is stronger by letting people buy different kinds of cars or none at all; have health insurance or none at all; build a house or none at all.  The freedom to opt out of the mainstream paradigm is the cornerstone that preserves the minority view, differentiating between top-down societies and bottom-up societies.  Our opponents favor coercing consumers to buy only government-approved food, thereby denying opt-out freedoms.

[Modern society thinks] we can save things from the top down ... but ... the only safety comes in our communities, our homes, our families, from the bottom up. And these institutions must be free to experiment, to innovate.  I confess that I do not hold optimism for our culture as a whole.  Indeed, we are destroying agrarianism and seeing the same political graft and moral debauchery that brought the Roman culture to ruins.  I am, however, optimistic about the power of one.  The strength of you and me and others, touching our spheres of influence, taking individual responsibility.

And finally, this is a minor side story, but I love it:

I have a friend who at 13 decided he wanted to cut firewood for a living.  His family had an old 1965 International loadstar dump truck with a two-speed rear axle.  A little big for his age, he began cutting firewood—yes, with a chain saw.  He could drive that truck as well as any adult, and delivered a load to a customer in Waynesboro about 15 miles away.

A neighbor saw the load being dumped and walked over to ask for one himself.  The boy said he'd be there the following Saturday with the load.  He cut the wood after school and in a week had another dump truck load.  He arrived at the man's house on schedule.  The customer was dubious about the boy's ability to back the truck around a crooked driveway, swing set, picnic area, and dump it onto a concrete pad in the corner of the back yard.

The boy assured the customer that it was no problem and proceeded to back the truck expertly right up to the pad.  He dumped the load and pulled out.  What I didn't tell you was that this man happened to be a city policeman, and this week happened to be in uniform because he was getting ready to go to work.  When he got ready to pay the boy, he asked him:  "Son, how old are you?"

My friend, who confesses that his heart skipped a beat when he pulled in and realized he was delivering wood to a policeman's house, just looked down from the cab and confidently but with a mischievous grin responded, "How old do you want me to be?"

Taken aback, the policeman asked him, "Do you have a license?"

To which the 13-year-old replied, "I have a couple, but I'm not sure I have the one you're interested in."

Completely enthralled by the whimsical youngster, the policeman said, "Listen son, I'll follow you to the edge of the city limits.  And please, please don't drive that truck back into this city."

Two weeks later, the boy had another load to deliver to Waynesboro.  As luck would have it, when he entered the city, there on routine traffic patrol was his firewood customer friend.  They locked eyes, and the policeman just shook his head, took off his hat, and covered his eyes.  Now there is a true public servant.  That boy could drive that truck as expertly as any adult.  Ho could anyone deny this self-motivated, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed boy his firewood business?  To be honest with you, I wouldn't let my 13-year-old do this.  And it probably wasn't the wisest thing to do.

But for crying out loud, must we criminalize everything we don't think is wise?

For friends and family who prefer to ignore Facebook:

Jonathan:  Dad, the spaceship book gave me an idea, and I'm going to be working on a project. It requires liquid oxygen....

Anyone have some spare LOX for an ambitious six-year-old?

I wasn't going to write about the two recent examples of September 11-related hysteria run amok, because (a) there has already been too much reaction, and (b) believe it or not, the fate of the world does not hinge on what I write on the Internet.  But in another context I was invited to share my opinion, and you know how I love to get double duty out of the effort it takes to write.

First, the "Ground Zero mosque" flap.  Whether a mosque, or Islamic center, or church, or store, or apartment building, or library, or strip club is built in New York City is none of my business.  Nor is it the business of 99% of the others who have weighed in on the issue, including President Obama, foreigners, and talk show hosts.  It is New York City's business, at whatever level zoning regulations are made. If the neighbors object to a proposed project, they have the right, and possibly the duty, to oppose it at zoning board hearings, to write letters to local papers, to make local speeches, to go from door to door with petitions.  My opinion is irrelevant, as is that of the President of the United States.

The second bruhaha hits closer to home, because Terry Jones is in Florida, not much more than two hours away from me. I've been trying to ignore him, because he seems to be the kind of person who revels in publicity, be it positive or negative.  (Like rebellious teenagers, and like terrorists.)  His actions should also have been none of my business:  he's not my pastor, nor my neighbor, and I would no more forbid him to burn a Qur'an—or a cross—on his own property than I would forbid the building of a Mosque within sight of Ground Zero, even though both get people hot under the collar.  But he and the news media together have made it my business, threatening my family, my state, and my country.

Fear and anger make people do very unwise things, and one of the unwisest is the willingness to set aside the Constitution, the very foundation of our country.  I was asked about using hate speech laws to shut Jones down:  the very idea chills me to the marrow.  Freedom of speech is one of our greatest treasures, and that includes the freedom to say very unpopular things.  Even hateful things.  Labelling someone's opinion, however much you think it wrong, as "hate speech," and trying to control it, makes a very wide gate though which totalitarianism can enter.

Refusing to outlaw something is not the same thing as approving or deeming it wise, however.  And in the case of Jones, he himself has deliberately made his actions public business.  The First Amendment notwithstanding, there is precedent for controlling some forms of speech:  laws against slander/libel, yelling "Fire!" in a crowded but flame-less theater, and giving "aid and comfort to the enemy" in time of war, for example.  Jones is most definitely doing the last, giving credence to the enemy's propaganda and deliberately undercutting both military and civilian efforts to promote peace.

If there is anything good about his motives, he is at least incredibly stupid and not acting in accordance with his professed faith.  I haven't read much of the hoopla, but I did catch that he responded to questions of offense with the retort that he, himself, is offended when "they" burn the American flag, or the Bible.  What he obviously misses—besides the idea that we're supposed to love our enemies, or at least behave better than they do—is that an insult to the Qur'an is not nearly the same thing as an insult to the Bible, let alone to a flag.  To a Muslim, if my understanding is correct, it would be more like spitting on the consecrated Host.  The book itself is sacred.  I don't know if that applies to translations, which aren't considered the "real thing," but I suspect the insult would be taken similarly by most Muslims.  And the analogy I made probably wouldn't mean anything to Pastor Jones, since I suspect his church doesn't have a sufficiently high view of Communion to understand it.  But my point is, his analogy is flawed, maybe fatally.

I heard great story about a Canadian medical team in Afghanistan, known for its very good treatment of Taliban prisoners.  Explaining this, the doctor pointed out that, first of all, it was the right thing to do; second, since the battle was over a difference beliefs and values, it was important to act upon those values at all times.  That's also the attitude of the U.S.-based aid organizations that I know about, even though the Taliban is attacking them, verbally and physically.  And, come to think of it, that's the attitude of Jesus on the Cross, which one would hope would give Rev. Jones food for thought.

What's more, the doctor said, good actions, especially in the face of danger and provocation, will cause a cognitive dissonance between what the soldiers have been told by the Taliban and their own experience, which might lead to them questioning Taliban authority.  The Taliban knows this, of course, which probably explains their antipathy towards those who are sacrificing themselves to bring health, education, and infrastructure to these countries.

Jones, however, is doing exactly the opposite; I'm quite sure the Taliban, Al-Qaeda, and other militant Islamic groups are thrilled with his Qur'an-burning plan, no matter how personally offended their members might be.  There are better ways to express your belief that not all religions are equally true, or good, or beautiful (and with that I agree), without making your own look odious, and defaming the name of Christ.

I blame the news media, also.  We would have been much better off if Jones had been ignored, but he makes great copy.  The vast majority of Americans, who think he's nuts, and who are bending over backwards to say so, in word and action—are just boring.  The press is pouring (metaphorical) gasoline on Jones's flames.  Freedom of the press is another essential First Amendment right, but I do wish we all had more common sense.

In George MacDonald's novel, Salted with Fire, I encountered the following statement:

He would never rise from a finished job, however near might be the hour for dropping work, without having begun another to go on with in the morning.

I read it long ago, but it has never left me, and is the inspiration for this month's resolution.   It's likely that Getting Things Done has also inspired me, with its emphasis on "next actions."

Whatever the impetus, I know from experience that finishing a job, however satisfying, soon gives way to feeling at loose ends, uninspired, and sometimes depressed.  I still have plenty to do—so much that I can't seem to get started on any of it.  Life goes much better when I'm in the middle of a project and know just what the next step is.

So this is the crux of this resolution:  to keep my GTD "next actions" lists well-populated with specific, actionable, non-threatening tasks; to remember that a task or a project is not completed until the next task or project is ready for action; and to sleep well, knowing that tomorrow's work is ready to begin when I awake, and needs no attention (a.k.a. "worry") until then. 

Progress Report

#1  Read More Books  August proved once again that it takes determination to read, even for someone who loves it as much as I do.  One of the two books in August's tally I began months ago, but at some 800 pages I'm not beating myself up over having taken so long to finish it.

#2  Rediscover Feasting  Having been away from it for a month and a half, I found it hard to readjust to Fasting Wednesdays—I'd eat breakfast before realizing what day of the week it was.  But I think I'm back into the pattern now.  What still needs a lot of work is an Ordinary Time pattern; too many days still qualify as feasts to make feasting as special as it should be.

#3  Learn to Relax  I continue to think about consciously relaxing my muscles, and it does help.  The GTD process (see #8) is also helping.  But I still have a long, long way to go.  I now have a friend whose working on this whole stress response/reduction thing with me, so maybe that will help.  What I really need to do is give it higher priority.  In a go-go-go society, working on relaxing is hard.

#4  Like More Things  I can now eat very small portions of olives without gagging.  Does that count?  I need to make this less about food and more about other parts of life.

#6  Cast Away Fear  There were a few occasions where I did remember to respond to fear with praise, and it helped.

#7  Talk Less, Listen More  Not much to report here.

#8  Enjoy Spontaneity  I still fret too much about what I could be doing if I weren't trapped in this stupid X situation—but I am making progress.  My GTD post needs an update; the progress I have made thus far in implementing the program has helped me know better both what needs to be done and when I will have a chance to take care of it.  More than once I have been able to say, "I can give my full attention to Y now and enjoy it, because I know W and X are done, and Z can wait till tomorrow."

The resolution I need most is apparently one to remember my other resolutions, so I've added "review resolutions" to my Tickler File.  :)  We'll see if September shows more progress.

This is a short post, because I don't have a lot to say about electricity in Switzerland, but I like their home outlets.  I'd rather the world adopt our 110 volt system, for safety reasons, but if I could I'd change our plugs to the Swiss type.  See how sturdy the prongs are?  No worries about accidentally bending them when you stretch the cord too much, straining to get the vacuum cleaner to reach to the far corner.  Some outlets are combined with light switches, and many are recessed—a neat safety device that makes it impossible for the prongs to be connected to the electricity and touching your fingers at the same time.

Maybe this post should be "readjustments," since I'm now home and experiencing reverse culture shock, but it's still worth talking about transportation.

Basel is a city, albeit one of the nicest cities I know.  It's the third largest in Switzerland, a little smaller in population than Providence, Rhode Island or Tallahassee, Florida, but a lot more dense.  I'm not fond of cities, in general, but if you wanted to design a situation that is perfect for public transit, walking, and biking, you could hardly do better—and Basel made a conscious choice, back in the 1970's, to encourage those modes of transport.

Trams and buses   The best I've ever experienced.  Clean, quiet, frequent, dependable, on time.  You can count on the schedule—for a tram to be late by three minutes is shocking—and at most times, if you miss a tram, there's another coming in just a few minutes.  I love their innovative approach to ticketing, too.  You must have a ticket—which you can buy and punch at the tram stop if you don't have a pass—but don't expect someone to collect it.  You simply hop on the tram or bus, ride it to your destination, and hop off.  (I only wish you could by your ticket on the tram.  It's frustrating to miss your ride because you're still fighting with the ticket machine.)

Do some people ride without buying a ticket?  Sure.  But the penalty, if you're caught, is stiff enough to encourage good behavior.  Rarely—but you never know when—the tram police (in plain clothes, so you get no warning) block all the exits and ask to see everyone's tickets.  If you don't have one, the fine is 80 francs (about $80), and it goes to 100 francs if you don't pay right then and there.  The system works because it is consistently enforced—and not sabotaged by lawsuits, which is what I suspect would happen in this country.

Biking  Trams are great, especially in inclement weather or if you're carrying bulky packages, but they're not as fast as biking from A to B.  Bikers are everywhere, and are accommodated with ramps like the one to the left, and plenty of parking places.  This is one reason backpacks are so popular.  One of my favorite memories is of a nattily-attired man biking along in a business suit, with proper tie—and bright orange backpack.  In the U.S., bikes and backpacks for anything other than recreational purposes are too often associated with children—or losers who have had their drivers licenses revoked.  Switzerland wins this one big time in my book.

(That said, the only way businessmen could reasonably bike to work here in Florida would be if their place of employment provided showers—and in that case, they wouldn't be wearing their suits.)

Bikers are second only to trams and pedestrians when it comes to right-of-way on the road, and drivers are much more aware of their presence than in America.  Still, I wish more of them would wear helmets.  (Kudos to our son-in-law for setting a good example.)

Walking  I walked nearly everywhere I wanted to go in Basel during my visit:  to the grocery store(s), the post office, the train station, the organic farm delivery stop, school, church, the park, and a lot more.  I thought I was getting a lot of exercise tramping all over the city, but a few calculations showed the shocking truth.  Walking distances from home to:

• the corner store:  about 350 feet
• the tram stop:  0.2 miles
• the train station:  0.3 miles
• the big grocery store:  0.5 miles
• the Basel Hilton:  0.5 miles
• Barfüsserplatz: 1.0 miles
• Marktplatz: 1.1 miles
• church: 1.5 miles
• all the way across the Rhine to Claraplatz:  1.7 miles

By contrast, back in Florida, it takes 0.8 miles just to get out of our neighborhood, which is nothing fancy at all, I would say a pretty average middle class neighborhood with comparatively small lots.  We also live in a city, though a small one—the population is a quarter that of Basel.  Walking distances from our house to:

• the bike trail:  0.8 miles
• the playground:  0.8 miles
• Best Buy:  1.3 miles
• the bus stop:  1.4 miles
• the post office:  1.5 miles
• the park:  1.6 miles
• the grocery story:  1.6 miles
• Office Max:  1.7 miles
• the mall:  2.7 miles
• the library:  5.5 miles

Claraplatz seems far away from Janet's home, because it's clear on the other side of the city.  Office Max I consider very close, "just down the street."  Yet they are the same distance.  Blows my mind.  The effect is probably because I go by Office Max more often by car than on foot.

What really makes walking nice in Basel is the traffic lights.  First of all, if there is no light, a pedestrian in any crosswalk has the right of way over anything except a tram.  (That doesn't mean it isn't sometimes necessary to stare down the approaching cars, and it's always important to look before stepping into the intersection, as non-resident drivers do not always know they are expected to stop if they see you at the curb.)  If there is a light, the pedestrian must stop, but the great thing is that the wait is always short.  The cycles are designed to keep pedestrian traffic flowing, unlike the walk lights here, at which a five-minute wait is not unheard of.

Car sharing  By car is not the nicest way to get around Basel—parking is a big problem, for one thing—but there are times when you need one.  For this you can take advantage of a car sharing system, sort of like a short-term rental.  It works quite well, at least if you don't mind driving a stick.

I'd love to import Basel's transit system here, but—as I keep telling European friends who think the only reason the U.S. doesn't have such a system is that we're all a bunch of lazy SUV-lovers—it's not that simple.  What I think could and should be imported is the farsightedness and strength of will that made Basel decide, some 35 years ago, to turn away from the more cars / more and bigger roads transit model, and commit to a cleaner and friendlier path.

I am republishing my initial comments, made in December 2008, when I checked The History of the Ancient World out of the library then discovered I didn't have time to read it.  Now, nearly two years later, I have finally read the book, and my additional comments are added below.

The History of the Ancient World:  From the Earliest Accounts to the Fall of Rome, by Susan Wise Bauer (W. W. Norton, New York, 2007)

Despite having some initial negative reactions to Susan Wise Bauer, I've continued to find her work delightful and invaluable.  (See my reviews of The Well-Trained Mind, The Story of the World, and The Well-Educated Mind.)  I haven't read more than a small part of The History of the Ancient World, but borrowed it from the library in order to determine whether or not to buy it for myself.  I've so enjoyed—and learned from—listening to Jim Weiss read The Story of the World, which was written for elementary-age children, that I wondered if Bauer could bring as much delight into a history book for adults.

Time does not permit me to read through the book, much less review it properly, but let's just say I wish I didn't have to take it back to the library as soon as possible to remove temptation.  The History of the Ancient World is delightful to read.  Much of the delight, I think, comes from the philosophy of her approach, which she explains much better in the introduction than I have time to write, or even to copy, here.  Bauer is interested in people:  their lives, thoughts, fears, hopes, dreams, actions, and relationships.  She minimizes the general and the theoretical in favor of the personal, and includes the myths and stories of a culture as well as verifiable facts.  The stories that have come down with a people from before recorded time should inform our historical speculations as much as potsherds from an archeological dig.

This approach no doubt will anger many, some because she finds historical value in passages from the Bible, and others because she gives similar respect to the ancient stories of other cultures.  To me, it makes for great story-telling.  The History of the Ancient World has earned a place on my wish list, perhaps for the next time Borders offers me a 40% off coupon, and I certainly hope Susan Wise Bauer is working on a sequel.

UPDATE, 1 September 2010. Bauer was, indeed, working on a sequel, and managed to finish writing The History of the Medieval World: From the Conversion of Constantine to the First Crusade  before I finished reading its predecessor.  I've already purchased it, and am looking forward to diving in.  But first, some thoughts on this one.

I enjoyed The Ancient World a good deal, though I expect to enjoy the Medieval book more because of the time period.  I find stories of kings and battles and political intrigue interesting up to a point, but ancient times take me to that point rather quickly, as often that's about all we know about them.  Bauer does a good job of trying to put flesh on the bare bones, but it's still pretty much "second verse, same as the first."  And third, and fourth, and nth.

I can't help feeling the same way about the Old Testament of the Bible at times, too.  One thing Bauer's book has done is to give me a much better feel for the context in which the Old Testament events took place, and the knowledge that as gruesome and cruel and bizarre as they sometimes are, it helps to know that the OT stories are nowhere near as gruesome and cruel and bizarre as stories from the rest of the ancient world.  There's a limit to how much improvement even God can make in human beings all at once, I guess.  Or, to paraphrase C. S. Lewis, before you can judge where someone is, you have to know where he came from.

Speaking of the Bible, in parallel with Ancient World I've been reading the Chronological Guide to the Bible, as part of Thomas Nelson's review blogger program.  (So you'll see a review here when I'm done, but I've only just started the New Testament section.)  That was a brilliant move on my part, as the books dovetail and complement each other nicely.

But back to Bauer's book.  My head is swimming with dates and places and unpronounceable, highly forgettable names.  It will take a lot more learning before I can say I have a good picture in my head of the ancient world.  But I now have a good sketch, and that's better than any of my history teachers were able to give me.  I especially like Bauer's attempt to cover more of the world than just the Middle East and Mediterranean countries, though if I can't keep the Roman rulers straight there's no hope of remembering China's and India's.  Helpful parallel timelines attempt to provide mental links from one culture to another.

I'd give The History of the Ancient World an R rating for sex and violence, but anyone likely to be overly disturbed by reading what those ancient kings did to their enemies—and with their friends—probably won't be reading an 800-page history book.

How to Listen to and Understand Great Music, by Robert Greenberg; a Teaching Company lecture

I've said it before:  For accessible, serious, high-quality, adult-level educational materials (DVD, CD, mp3 download) it's hard to beat The Teaching Company.  Robert Greenberg is one of my favorite lecturers, and this—so far—my favorite of his courses.  

Here are the titles of the 48 lectures, as you can buy the course today.  It is now onto its third edition; our version, which is so old we bought it on cassette tapes,^* differs in minor ways.

1. Music as a Mirror
2. Sources—The Ancient World and the Early Church
3. The Middle Ages
4. Introduction to the Renaissance
5. The Renaissance Mass
6. The Madrigal
7. An Introduction to the Baroque Era
8. Style Features of Baroque-era Music
9. National Styles—Italy and Germany
10. Fugue
11. Baroque Opera, Part 1
12. Baroque Opera, Part 2
13. The Oratorio
14. The Lutheran Church Cantata
15. Passacaglia
16. Ritornello Form and the Baroque Concerto
17. The Enlightenment and an Introduction to the Classical Era
18. The Viennese Classical Style, Homophony, and the Cadence
19. Classical-era Form—Theme and Variations
20. Classical-era Form—Minuet and Trio: Baroque Antecedents
21. Classical-era Form—Minuet and Trio Form
22. Classical-era Form—Rondo Form
23. Classical-era Form—Sonata Form, Part 1
24. Classical-era Form—Sonata Form, Part 2
25. Classical-era Form—Sonata Form, Part 3
26. The Symphony—Music for Every Person
27. The Solo Concerto
28. Classical-era Opera—The Rise of Opera Buffa
29. Classical-era Opera, Part 2—Mozart and the Operatic Ensemble
30. The French Revolution and an Introduction to Beethoven
31. Beethoven's Symphony no. 5 in C Minor, op. 67, Part 1
32. Beethoven's Symphony no. 5 in C Minor, op. 67, Part 2
33. Introduction to Romanticism
34. Formal Challenges and Solutions in Early Romantic Music
35. The Program Symphony—Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique, Part 1
36. The Program Symphony—Berlioz's Symphonie fantastique, Part 2
37. 19th-Century Italian Opera—Bel Canto Opera
38. 19th-Century Italian Opera—Giuseppe Verdi
39. 19th-Century German Opera—Nationalism and Experimentation
40. 19th-Century German Opera—Richard Wagner
41. The Concert Overture, Part 1
42. The Concert Overture, Part 2
43. Romantic-era Musical Nationalism
44. Russian Nationalism
45. An Introduction to Early 20th-Century Modernism
46. Early 20th-Century Modernism—Claude Debussy
47. Early 20th-Century Modernism—Igor Stravinsky
48. Early 20th-Century Modernism—Arnold Schönberg

Forty-eight lectures of 45 minutes each sounds long and intimidating, but even at that length this is a brief, introductory, whirlwind tour of music history—and it never drags.  I find it easy to listen to while driving, and well worth hearing more than once.

My recommendation for this course is as high as I can give, with one small caveat.  Greenberg gears his lectures to adults, specifically college students, and he has obviously learned how to keep the attention of the teenage boys in his classes:  his brief composer biographies sometimes include their sexual proclivities, and if there's musical reference he sees as orgasmic, he doesn't hesitate to mention it.  (He also describes musical stomach rumbles and heartbeats.)

As music history, How to Listen to and Understand Great Music has received the endorsement of our favorite graduate of the Eastman School of Music, so I know it's good.   

Gabriel Kron. Of all the amazing people who have intersected with my life, he is probably the safest to write about, since he died more than 40 years ago.  So I will; he deserves to be better known.

I knew him as my father's friend and mountain climbing partner; my father knew him from their days together at the General Electric Company in Schenectady, New York.  Dad, a Tau Beta Pi engineer (like his father, two of his children, and a grandchild), was no intellectual slouch, but he never pretended to understand anything of Gabe's work. 

It didn't matter.  I myself joined the Kron Klimbing Klub at age seven, and was mighty annoyed when I later learned that some other organization had usurped the acronym, "KKK."

One firm rule of the Klub I remember distinctly:  No eating until you reach the top.

Unfortunately, I don't remember much about this brilliant and unusual man, other than that I enjoyed climbing with him. Here is one memory from Dad's own Remembrances Along the Way.

Beginning in August 1959 Linda went with me on nearly all my climbing trips, her first climb being Buck Mountain on Lake George. There were three trips in 1960 and 1961 up Hunter Mountain, a 4000+-foot peak in the Catskills.

We climbed as members of the Kron Klimbing Klub. Gabe Kron was a mathematician of considerable note who worked for General Electric and who liked to climb mountains that were close enough at hand that he could leave Schenectady at 8 o’clock, drive to the mountain, climb it, and return by 5:00 p.m. Hunter was one of his favorites but such things as inspiring views meant nothing to him. He would get to the top, get out his lunch, sit on a rock and eat lunch and read the New York Times. Then he would go down and home. Ted Dietze and his son Rick also went on these trips and Gabe was infinitely patient with the children.

They were very enjoyable trips. Everyone who climbed with Gabe was a member of the Kron Klimbing Klub. One day we planned to climb Snowy Mountain. We left Schenectady with decent weather that turned to rain before we arrived in the town of Speculator. The children were not shod for wet weather so we bought them overshoes in Speculator. As we started to climb the weather turned cold and the rain turned to snow. The snow began to build up, the trail became slippery, and the climbing became very difficult because of the slipperiness. We turned around and headed back down well below the summit. Linda was so cold that all she wanted to do was to sit down and rest. Of course I would not allow that and I practically dragged her down the trail for several minutes until she warmed up and all was well for the rest of the way down.

The trip up Snowy Mountain I remember for three things:  (1) my new boots may have kept my feet dry, but they did nothing to stop them from getting very, very cold; (2) I was determined not to give up before Ricky Dietze did, as he was older, stronger, male, and thought he could beat me in everything; and (3) my chief fear in turning around before reaching the top lay in believing I would then not be entitled to lunch!

For much more about this remarkable person, read The Evolution of an Engineering Scientist, by Philip Langdon Alger (no relation, that I know of).  You must scroll down a bit to find the beginning.  I'll add some tempting excerpts below.

[T]he youngest child in a family of eight children, [Gabe] was born on July 23, 1901, in ... a town of about 10,000 people in a remote region of the Carpathian Mountains of Hungary. ... A boyhood friend described Gabe in elementary school as plump, always lively, always joyous, always having something to tell.  [P]eople who knew him well understood quite clearly that for him the environment of his home town was too confined and that a day would come when he would act to broaden his horizons."

Before he could escape, however, he needed to learn English.

"Being subjected during my life time to several inoculations with a new language, I gradually developed a technique of my own; that proved to be quite practical for acquiring a reading knowledge of a new language in a place which offered no contact with people speaking it. As young children we had been instructed in Hebrew ... In the Gymnasium we were taught Latin for eight years, German for six, and Greek for four years, each with the aid of the most elaborate grammar the human mind could devise. Under the guise of classical education the professors crammed our heads with an infinite variety of useless rules, exceptions to the rules, and exceptions to the exceptions, so that languages were the most lugubrious subjects taught...."

"Realizing that the manner in which languages were taught was one of the hundred possible ways that should not be employed, I started out to use just the opposite tactics. Instead of memorizing grammar, I memorized the German dictionary. Our school dictionary had about twenty thousand words in it, a hundred words on a page; so, I tore out a page a day and committed it to memory. Then the page was thrown away. When there was no dictionary left, I considered myself an expert in the language. I could sit down, open up a French or German book anywhere, and proceed. Slowly and painfully at first, but nevertheless I could make headway in understanding the text....."

"[Finding no suitable English dictionary available, what] I did was to borrow an English book, which happened to be H.G. Wells' The Food of the Gods, and beginning with the first page I wrote out a hundred words each day and committed them to memory. After eight or ten pages the text began to assume more human form, and past the first chapter the content even became enjoyable."

In 1921, Kron and his brother came to the United States, ending up at the University of Michigan, a school which met their criteria:  "an engineering school that would cost no more than $150 for tuition, located far enough inland to be away from the flood of immigrants."  Gabe graduated in three years despite working to support himself.  He wasn't a typical UM student.  In his words,

"As always happens when a free spirit is obliged to undergo a prescribed routine, I wanted to study everything except what the curriculum called for. How to find time to study what one wishes, and not what the teacher thinks best for one's own good, must be a perennial problem to many an anxious pupil. Finally, I hit on the idea of arranging my schedules so that by Friday noon the classes would be all over. Three full days then each week from Friday noon to Monday morning I was free to pursue my own private schedule of study without the interruptions of regular classwork. The rest of the week I considered as a sacrifice on the altar of mechanized education." 

After securing American citizenship in 1926, he rode a tanker from California to Tahiti.

He lived as a guest in the family of a native in Tahiti for some weeks, then sailed to the Fiji Islands. He walked through the back country, shared native hospitality, swam rivers, and admired the tropical forest. ... In all his travels, his custom was to spend the usual siesta hours under a tree, studying mathematics.

Then he took ship to Sydney, where his money ran out....  After working long enough to clear £35, be bought [another math book] and took to the road again ... On the way he spent many nights in the company of the "sundowners," the Australian tramps who lived without working, with the aid of free food tickets handed out in police stations to anyone who needed them.

Kron sailed from Townsville to Borneo, and thence to Manila, Hongkong, and Saigon. Here, he started out on foot to Angkor Vat, and walked on to Aranha, where he took a train for Bangkok, then joined a caravan that followed the ancient trade route to Cockrake in Burma. He walked to Rangoon, took a boat to Calcutta, walked on to Agra, where he admired the Taj Mahal. He crossed the Indian desert to Karachi by train, took a boat across the Persian Gulf and went on by train to Baghdad, stopping to see the ruins of Ur on the way. He spent $5 for a truck ride across the Arabian desert to Damascus, then set out on foot again to Gaza. He hastened on to Cairo by train, saw the Pyramids, sailed from Alexandria to Constantinople and went by train to Bucharest, arriving at midnight at the home of a friend, with just small change left in his pockets. After an all-night talk, the friend financed his ticket to Baja Mare, where his parents welcomed him. The neighbors wanted to know why he had come home from America with his toes sticking out of his shoes, while every one else came home rich. No one asked about his travels.

Eventually he ended up, as stated above, working for General Electric in Schenectady.

Kron was a puzzle to the company executives who were responsible for his assignments. They wanted to tell him what to do, and to put him in a place where his talents would yield immediate, commercially useful results, and to adjust his salary accordingly. This was difficult, because Kron's value was largely in the inspiration he gave to others and in distant objectives that seemed to business managers to be merely dreams. As they tried to make the best use of him, he was shifted hither and yon. ... Kron had to pursue his own ideas outside of office hours.

This was no real hardship, however, as the company did give Kron complete freedom to publish his ideas, and to maintain contacts with a wide circle of interested men, outside as well as inside the company. Some commercial men, who did not like the engineers to talk about new developments, said that it would do no harm for Kron to write, as no competitor would understand him anyway.

What a dinner guest he must have been!

...while I indulge in a bit of nostalgia.

We moved to Central Florida not long after Disney's EPCOT Center opened.  Our children were four and not-quite-two, so that first year we bought special Florida resident annual passes to the Disney World parks (all two of them).  This was a brilliant investment that enabled us to explore at our leisure and allow the kids to determine when it was time to go home.  We wanted to avoid the all too common scene of childish meltdown, caused by parents determined to squeeze every last minute out of their very expensive vacation.

(Very expensive?  Well, it was, though no one will believe that if I mention that I remember when the price of a one-day ticket went up to $17 for an adult.)

Actually, the girls usually held out better than I did, and we frequently stayed to enjoy the closing fireworks.  Their favorite park by far was EPCOT, perhaps because Disney characters and movies took up very little space in our lives, so the Magic Kingdom did not have the appeal it otherwise would have.  Had we not lived in Central Florida, I doubt we would ever have bothered with that all-American dream, a Disney vacation.  But living here has its perks, and between good deals for Florida residents and many opportunities to earn free tickets, Disney World, and especially EPCOT, played a significant role in shaping our children's memories.

So, for them, I present, Walt Dated World!  I found this site, dedicated to Disney World features that are no more, while searching for the original script for the Spaceship Earth ride.  The first ride that greets you as you walk into the park, it was once sponsored by AT&T, and Porter's AT&T ID card sent us to the front of the line, so we enjoyed it frequently, and watched it change over the years.  I think the best version was narrated by Walter Cronkite (1986-1994), but my personal favorite was the original, as I found its language less prosaic.

Where have we come from, where are we going?  The answers begin in our past.  In the dust from which we were formed, answers recorded on the walls of time.  So let us journey into that past, to seek those walls, to know ourselves and to probe the destiny of our Spaceship Earth.

On fine Phoenician ships, we take our scrolls to sea.

North, south, east, and west, all roads lead from Rome, a mighty network reaching across the land, welding far-flung garrisons into a growing empire.  Glorious Rome, until consumed by the flames of excess.  Imperial Rome, lost in the ashes of darkness!  [To this day I cannot smell lapsang souchong tea without recalling this part of the ride.]

In western abbeys, monks toil endlessly transcribing ancient wisdom into hand-penned books of revelation.

Behold, the majesty of the Sistine ceiling!

Poised on the threshold of infinity, we see our world as it truly is: small, silent, fragile, alive, a drifting island in the midnight sky.  It is our spaceship.  Our Spaceship Earth.

Stop by Walt Dated World and see what other treasures you can find.  I'll throw in a dash of childish delight!

Exposure To Two Languages Carries Far-Reaching Benefits  From this article at ScienceDaily, you can follow links to many other articles on bilingualism and language learning, some of which I'll also include below.

People who can speak two languages are more adept at learning a new foreign language than their monolingual counterparts, according to research conducted at Northwestern University. And their bilingual advantage persists even when the new language they study is completely different from the languages they already know. ... And they believe the bilingual advantage is likely to generalize beyond word learning to other kinds of language learning, including learning new words in one's own language and a very basic ability to maintain verbal information. ... Previous research already indicates that individuals who have formally studied two or more languages as adults more easily acquire a new language than monolinguals. New research even indicates that the onset of Alzheimer's disease in bilinguals is, on average, delayed by four years compared to monolinguals. ... The Northwestern researchers chose to study bilinguals who learned a second language at an early age and in a non-classroom study to avoid suggestions that their subjects simply were exceptionally talented or motivated foreign language learners.

Bilingual Babies: The Roots of Bilingualism in Newborns  It's never too early.

Children who hear two languages regularly in utero can not only recognize both languages after birth, but can distinguish one from the other.

Babies Raised In Bilingual Homes Learn New Words Differently Than [sic] Infants Learning One Language

An important part of language development is the ability to pay attention to native speech sounds to guide word learning. For example, English learners expect that the nonsense words "bih" and "dih" refer to different concepts because "b" and "d" are different consonant categories in English.  ...  [B]ilingual infants failed to notice the minimal change in the object's name until 20 months of age, whereas monolingual infants noticed the change at 17 months. ... This later use of relevant language sounds (such as consonants) to direct word learning is due to the increased demands of learning two languages, the researchers suggest. Ignoring the consonant detail in a new word may be an adaptive tool used by bilingual infants in learning new words. Outside the laboratory, there is little cost to overlooking some of the consonant detail in new words, as there are few similar-sounding words in infants' early vocabularies. By paying less attention to the detailed sound information in the word, bilingual infants can devote more cognitive resources to making the links between words and objects. ... Extending this approach to word learning for a few months longer than monolinguals may help bilinguals "keep up" with their peers. Indeed, previous research has shown that bilinguals and monolinguals achieve language-learning milestones (such as speaking their first word) at similar ages and have vocabularies of similar sizes when words from both languages are taken into account.

Words Influence Infants' Cognition from First Months of Life

Northwestern University researchers have found that even before infants begin to speak, words play an important role in their cognition. For 3-month-old infants, words influence performance in a cognitive task in a way that goes beyond the influence of other kinds of sounds, including musical tones. ... Three-month-old infants were shown a series of pictures of fish that were paired with words or beeps. ... Then infants were shown a picture of a new fish and a dinosaur side-by-side as the researchers measured how long they looked at each picture. If the infants formed the category, they would look longer at one picture than the other.  The results, say the authors, were striking. The researchers found that although infants who heard in the word and tone groups saw exactly the same pictures for exactly the same amount of time, those who heard words formed the category fish; those who heard tones did not.

Use It Or Lose It? Study Suggests The Brain Can Remember A 'Forgotten' Language  Give your child the gift of multiple language exposure, even if you think he'll never use it.

Many of us learn a foreign language when we are young, but in some cases, exposure to that language is brief and we never get to hear or practice it subsequently. Our subjective impression is often that the neglected language completely fades away from our memory. But does “use it or lose it” apply to foreign languages? Although it may seem we have absolutely no memory of the neglected language, new research suggests this “forgotten” language may be more deeply engraved in our minds than we realize. ... [E]xposing young children to foreign languages, even if they do not continue to speak them, can have a lasting impact on speech perception. The authors conclude, “Even if the language is forgotten (or feels this way) after many years of disuse, leftover traces of the early exposure can manifest themselves as an improved ability to relearn the language.”

Bilingual Children More Likely To Stutter  The news isn't all good.

Children who are bilingual before the age of 5 are significantly more likely to stutter and to find it harder to lose their impediment, than children who speak only one language before this age, suggests new research.

There's much more at that site, which I found more addictive than YouTube.  For example, Russian Readers Learn To Read More Accurately And Faster.  Must...Stop...Now....

With all the fuss lately about illness caused by salmonella in eggs from factory farms with highly dubious practices, it was especially delightful to take a trip—farther than the grocery store, but closer than our church—to Lake Meadow Naturals farm.  They have a pick-your-own program on Saturday mornings, and we did just that, reaching under the hens to retrieve a dozen warm-from-the-hen eggs, at a price of $3.50.

Unlike many of that designation, these hens really are free-range:  they were ranging all over the yard when we arrived, along with several other types of fowl, including guinea hens, which are the pest control service, being voracious eaters of ticks and other nasty bugs.

I really liked the look of the place, and the friendliness, and hope to return many times for wonderful, fresh eggs.  I'm a little disappointed that the yolks are not the deep orange color of the eggs Heather gets from her farming friends, and of the eggs we ate at the bed and breakfast in the Ticino part of Switzerland.  But there's no doubt these chickens are healthy, free-range, and lovingly cared for, so I'll be happy with that.  Maybe when their less-common breeds are laying I'll notice more of a difference.

We also bought two duck eggs, which were good, but not sufficiently discernable from chicken eggs to encourage a wholesale switch, since we paid $1 each for them.  Maybe next time we'll try the guinea hen eggs.  :)

I'm attacking my dauntingly long backblog again, applying the delete key ruthlessly on articles that are merely interesting.  Whatever the inverse of to decimate is, that's what I've done, killing off nine of every 10, and putting Li'l Writer Guy to work on what remains.  Casting the Net—which I'm reviving after a layoff long enough to have taken a baby from conception to the time most obstetricians would insist on induction—will pick up the ones of heightened interest that aren't compelling enough to demand a full post.

The good news?  It's getting a lot easier to look good in school:  Be on time, dress neatly, look interested, interact with the professor, do the homework—and the professor will love you, if you don't shock him into a heart attack.

Blunting the American Edge  Kara Miller, who teaches at Babson College in Massachusetts, reports that, as a rule (there are always exceptions), her foreign students are far more knowledgeable, engaged, and ambitious than her American students.

Apology for homeschooling  No, not an "I'm sorry" apology, though there are some elements of adolescent shyness in this new homeschooling father's essay, but apology in the old sense of a defense.  Despite a slightly annoying "we're not that kind of homeschooler" attitude, it's an amusing presentation of "the best way to answer a curious stranger's questions" versus "the whole truth."

Mrs. GSP: Do you use a curriculum?
Me: Oh, sure! Absolutely.
Real answer: Give me a break! These kids are 5 years old. ... That said, you could argue that Leslie has developed a fairly demanding curriculum. But that word comes with certain expectations that don't fit here. It isn't written down, it doesn't run on a set schedule, and it isn't based on lesson plans, piles of worksheets or a fixed rotation from subject to subject....

Mrs. GSP: What do you do about socialization?
Me: Oh, we've got a nice support network. They have a circle of friends. They do lots of classes and activities. They go to birthday parties and stuff.
Real answer: My public answer is OK, as far as it goes. But hang on a minute, lady: What do you mean by "socialization"? ... Ordinary schools tend to socialize children by way of enclosed, age-homogeneous pods, while home schooling tends to socialize children through a wide range of interactions with older kids, younger kids and adults, as well as peers. ... Do we regret not exposing our kids to the intense cultural melting pot of New York's school system? Sometimes, sure. But we're also not exposing them to bullying, arbitrary systems of order and discipline, age-inappropriate standards of behavior, and the hegemony of corporatized kid culture. Desmond and Nini have never heard of "Transformers," and we're OK with that.

The follow-up article is better, a hilarious, yet serious look at the results of their homemade curriculum based on myths and other stories of the ancient world.

[The children] were playing on the floor with a random assemblage of building blocks, figurines and toy vehicles, like a zillion other 5-year-olds around the world. ... I made some wry dad comment: Hindu gods at a Greek temple, ha ha ha. Literally jumping up and down with excitement, Desmond set me straight: "We're playing ancient times, Daddy, when there was trade between Greece and India! They traded stuff, and they traded ideas!"  Now, I'm not vouching for the soundness of Desmond's scholarship. Ancient contact between Greek and Indian civilization is plausible, according to historians, but entirely hypothetical. Furthermore, if it did happen it almost certainly did not involve motor vehicles. See, the way elephant-headed Ganesh and blue-skinned Vishnu are incarnated in Nini and Desmond's game, they look an awful lot like little die-cast metal cars. ...

Like many kids their age, Desmond and Nini had developed a fascination with the world of the Piston Cup and Radiator Springs [from the movie Cars]. They had an encyclopedic knowledge of the movie's characters and personal histories ... Well, I thought, if they can have this complex connection to Lightning McQueen, Doc Hudson, and Tow Mater, why not to Isis, Osiris, and Anubis? Or Zeus, Athena, and Aphrodite? At a time when they were so clearly eager to learn about the world around them, might it be possible to introduce them to its history in an age-appropriate and systematic way? ...

Right now, I have to go watch the story of how Ganesh got his elephant head (after losing his human one in an unfortunate misunderstanding), acted out by a couple of little kids with toy cars.