The Year of the Dog is officially over and we have begun the Year of the Earth Pig. I asked our dog, Darcy, if she had any words of wisdom as we move on. First, she said that she would like to think that this is now the Year of Groundhog (earth=ground, pig=hog), so we should pay attention to what goes on in the shadows. I told her to stop being silly. Then she suggested that I just go outside and look at the night sky for a few minutes. We went to the back yard and had the following conversation:
ME: It’s really clear tonight, and look at all you can see up there since it’s a new moon. Is that red one Mars? I had thought Mars would be a little lower in the sky.
DARCY: And I would have thought that Mars would not be flashing on and off and moving from southeast to northwest.
ME: Oh. Yeah. Look at that other bright star up by Orion.
DARCY: That’s the Dog Star.
ME: Sirius?
DARCY: Oh, yes. Dogs are very proud of the Dog Star and take it quite seriously – just as we took the Year of the Dog seriously.
ME: I mean the star, Sirius.
DARCY: I don’t know how to tell whether a star is joking. By the way, who’s on first?
ME: You’re right. It was that kind of year.
It was a teaching/learning moment.
So many teaching/learning moments are indeed available under the night sky and from the wisdom of the Dogs. Good to see your blog again after its short disappearance due to cyber infestations, Louis. There are many teaching/learning moments here, and I often revisit your thoughts here for just that benefit to me. May this blog live long and prosper.
Hmm…. This comment sort of resembles one of those short comments floating on the surface of a phish bot, scam or virus which appear from time to time on any blog. I assure you (for a given value of assurance) it is not. I have taken precautions. I soaked my keyboard in a 25% bleach solution for 24 hours.
This comment is being written on my new keyboard, which still has fragments of bubble wrap clinging to it and various pieces of plastic film which I can’t seem to remove. It has never been exposed to the multiverse of cyber world bot-rot and is innocent of any adventures which might have introduced it to any binary-based STD’s. The “S” stands for Socially, btw. I would suggest that you let Darcy have a good sniff at this message anyway The nose will Know.