Bloody well right

The other day, on line, where you see everything you never thought you would, I saw someone patiently explain to someone else that there were no dragons roaming the earth in real life. Ever.

Well, oh yeah, came the response! How come the Titanic was carrying dragon's blood in its cargo?

Here's another case of a popular misunderstanding being taken as fact owing to constant repetition, like the way people think a Filet-O-Fish is like a real seafood dinner, or the one spread by Owen Wilson in "Wedding Crashers" about people only using ten percent of their brains. The reality is, we use almost all of our brains. It's just that we don't need that much of it when listening to Owen Wilson.

Dragon's blood, in this case, is a sap, a resin, from a palm tree native to the Canary Islands. It is bright deep red, and it is used in medicine, in art, and in spiritual practices. We talk about antioxidants and anti-inflammatories, and this sap was doing that for doctors long before we even knew how great it was.

Powdered Dragon's Blood 

By the way, the Canary Islands were not named for the yellow birds that came from there. The islands took that name for dogs! There were a lot of BA dogs when the islands were first explored, so early people took the Latin word for dog (canis) and named the islands Canariae Insulae or "Islands of the Dogs."

I love facts! The fact is, I wish I could remember more of them.

Sunday rerun: It's c-c-cold!

  With outside temperatures hovering in the balmy 10° - 14° range this week, thoughts turn to ice cream and that traditional Baltimore favorite, the snowball (known in some areas as a sno-cone).

Whatever your pleasure, be it frozen milk or cream or just good ol' ice, shaved to bits and doused with flavored syrup (make mine egg custard, please), cold treats require proper mouth management, or you will suffer the heartbreak known as "brain freeze" or "ice cream headache."

The reason this happens is that your brain has very little idea what the heck you are up to. It spends its days trying to maintain a nice core temperature for you, and you treat it like this? For shame.

Because, dunking ice or ice cream on the roof of your mouth sends a signal to your brain..."Hey! It's cold in here!"

In turn, your brain tells the blood vessels in your head to constrict, in an effort to maintain a robust core temperature. This is called a "survival reflex," like when you're flipping around on the TV and land on a channel showing nature films or Harry Potter or Snoop Dogg E. Dogg. You can't change the channel fast enough, and that's what your blood vessels do...they get smaller until the cold goes away.

However, there's this. You can now call out sick from work or blind dates just by claiming you've come down with a bad case of “sphenopalatine ganglioneuralgia.” That's doctor talk for brain freeze.

Take two aspirins and call me in the morning.

The Saturday Picture Show, May 16, 2026

 

Running water, some treacle (dark syrup) and vinegar will either cure you of the plague or make you wish you had it! 

What I wouldn't give to prowl through this store! The picture is from 1948, and probably, a lot of the junk they offered for sale is still available!

This week's free wallpaper comes from the sky above, in a state of change...

When Atty. Daniels was in law school, she majored in Apartment Shootings. I don't know where she is located, but maybe that's for the good.

This is Reykjavik at midnight these days. No dark until late August, no matter how late you stay up. 

We have a front door that acts as a prism, but I am not about to sit nekkid in front of it just to get a rainbow photo of me. 

You will have a devil of a time getting this stuff off your mitts.

This is a new thing - getting tattoos that correspond to the body part being inked. For instance, here's a calf on a calf. You could have a 12" ruler on your foot, or maybe a male donkey on your derrière!

You will meet these people in a large auditorium.

I have to eat more chicken because the people coming to see this cow take up half the traffic lanes!

Are you ready

 On Facebook, a woman posted that she wants to get enough signatures on a petition to be placed on the ballot for the upcoming election. She wants to run for Baltimore County Sheriff. The incumbent is not running, and she wishes to toss her hat in the ring, so to speak.

I thought it only fair to ask if she would delineate her qualifications for the job. In our county, the Sheriff, and his/her deputies, while technically law enforcement personnel, do not do police patrol work. Their duties concern court operations, serving legal processes, governmental building security,  prisoner transport, executing warrants, and sheriff's sales.

 I got no answer from the would-be candidate, but someone else replied that all she is asking for is a spot on the ballot. I'm all for giving people a chance, but I don't see any point in endorsing her petition for the ballot if she is not qualified to do the job if elected. And again, she did not reply to the request. For all I know she is eminently qualified and would serve the office well, if elected. 

There is an awful lot of that spirit going around these days, people feeling they are ready to do any job they come across. Maybe it stems from those TV shows in which anyone can be a star. 

Anyone can sing, and when enough people want to hear you sing, you are a star. But let's see some experience in law and court procedures before we hang the sheriff's star on your shirt, please.

(FYI - the Battle of North Point took place on September 12, 1814 during the War of 1812.  Wells and McComas were American sharpshooters credited with firing the shots which killed British commander General Robert Ross, a loss which led to an American win in this battle and in the defense of Ft. McHenry two days later, a battle we still sing about in The Star Spangled Banner.)

So Sue Me

I have heard of Dua Lipa often enough to know that she is a female singer. However, if you begged me over the course of several weeks, I could not pick a picture of her from an array of other young women singing pop songs. 

But she is all worked up because Samsung put her picture on the cardboard boxes that their TVs come in. She is suing Samsung, alleging that the tech company used her image without her permission.

The lawsuit was filed in California federal court on Friday. Lipa uses the magic words "copyright and trademark infringement" and - this is a new one on me - "violating her right of publicity" by sticking her mug on the box that TVs come in.

She says someone took the picture backstage at the Austin City Limits Festival in 2024, and she owns that picture, doggone it!

No way I'm using a picture of Dua Lipa! I don't want to be sued.

But $15 million in damages will help her get over herself.

The hook is that she is claiming that Samsung did this "to improperly capitalize on Ms. Lipa's hard-earned success to promote and sell Samsung's products," the lawsuit alleges. 

And she goes on to claim that the picture deceives customers, so, some guy standing at Best Buy, choosing between the Samsung XLBFD 47" tv and the Visio KMFA 47 incher will say, "Oh look, this Samsung has a picture of Dua Lipa, so that's the one for me!"

OK. I promise you that if Samsung had called Dua Lipa when she was just getting started doing whatever it is she does in show business and offered to put a photo of her on their TV boxes, she would have turned cartwheels for that kind of publicity. Now, she's all, "Pay me!" about it. 

Cheap trick

I got this in the email the other day. Do you notice anything odd about it?

First off, the Social Security Administration spells Social with an o, not a zero, and an i, not a 1.

Second off, they send regular statements by mail.

Third off, I'm certain that "tellusalimentos.com" is not a government email address. 

I share this because many of my fellow SS recipients are not as suspicious of everything as they ought to be, and I want them to know clicking on links like this can lead to all sorts of heartaches and hassles. 

So just don't,  please.

Can you dig this?

Myanmar is the Southeast Asian nation formerly known as Burma, so maybe that name change is why people can't find it on a map.

But if you're into precious rocks and what-have-you, you might want to sidle on over to Myanmar, because that's where their state media reported the discovery of an 11,000-carat ruby last week. A lot of gemstones turn up in that country, but this one just has to be one of the biggest ever.

Kinda looks like a strawberry, does it not?

Coup leader-turned-president Min Aung Hlaing was shown on the cover of the Global New Light of Myanmar newspaper, checking out the 4.8-pound rock at his office. I'm sure he thought, "nice paperweight!"

The government said the ruby is "exceptionally large, rare, and difficult to find," "has a purplish-red color with yellowish undertones and is considered to have a high-quality color grade."

All this took place in the valley of Mogok in the Mandalay region, where there are said to be plenty more of these "unique pigeon-blood" stones hidden in the ground. Many people go to Mogok in search of a fortune, and many others are over there looking for a Mandalay.

Drop me a postcard if you make the trip, won't you?