PIXEL J U N E 2 0 0 7 Pixel 1 June 2007 J u n e 2 0 0 7 } I trod on a different butterfly during the ~ PIXEL dinosaur hunt Vol. 2 No. 1 (whole number 14) Edited and published monthly by David Burton Contents 5227 Emma Drive, Lawrence IN 46236-2742 E-mail: [email protected] (new address – please note!) Cover: Bark: photo by David Burton Distributed in a PDF version only. Available for downloading at efanzines.com thanks to Bill Burns. 3 Notes From Byzantium A Noah Count Press Publication. column by Eric Mayer Compilation copyright © 2007 by David Burton. Copyright reverts to individual contributors on publication. 6 Much Nothings About Ado AMDG column by Lee Lavell 8 Wisdom of the Jewish-Zen Buddhist Monk humor by everyone’s fave, Anonymous 9 Whither Fandom? column by Ted White For those who missed it last issue, here’s the letter I acci- dentally left off the title of Ted’s column. Please cut it out 12 Found In Collection on the dotted line and paste it on your monitor in the ap- column by Christopher Garcia propriate spot should you re-read the issue. h 14 Being Frank zine reviews by Peter Sullivan 16 Pixelated Lettercolumn Pixel 2 June 2007 NNototeess FFrromom BByyzzaannttiiuumm Eric Mayer Fear of Falling Recently Kurt Vonnegut died as a result of injuries from a fall. The wooden bridge while wearing plastic-spiked shoes. I’ve always same week a memorial service was held for Ahmet Ertegun, the got up – not always laughing these days. I’m only fifty-seven. I founder of Atlantic records, who had also died after falling, in his expect I’ll have no trouble getting up again this year, or for years case, appropriately enough, backstage at a Rolling Stones concert. to come, but at some point (ten years? twenty?) I won’t want to be Both men were in their eighties, an age at which a fall is serious falling down. business. I don’t look forward to the infirmities of old age turning famil- The ability to stand upright is an accomplishment we can all iar surroundings into sinister landscapes. I don’t want to fear claim (provided we’re born healthy) unlike writing bestselling falling. I’m not sure how you tell when that time has arrived, ex- books or founding record companies. To infants, falling down is cept the hard way. I suppose we just need to enjoy getting back to just part of growing up. I watched my kids take countless pratfalls our feet while we still can. while they learned to take their first steps. I don’t remember when I first stood on my own two feet, but I The Case of the Missing Bees do recall racing around the back yard, playing tag or cowboys and When I was a kid I’d often step on honeybees while I was running Indians. I’d crash to the ground again and again and jump up around in my bare feet through the thick clover of the lawn. The laughing. unexpected pain always came as a shock. Like stepping on a hot When you’re in your eighties you don’t usually get up laughing. cigarette butt. That was the first comparison people made, which Often you don’t get up. I don’t need to look beyond my own family shows how long ago it was. for examples of lives hastened towards their ends by falls. When I got over the pain and the stinger had been extracted When I orienteer I invariably end up on my butt, or some body and the wound coated with merthiolate, I felt sorry for the bee part other than my feet, at least once on the course. I step in a because after stinging they die. And unlike wasps, hornets and hole, or trip over a vine or a stick buried in the leaves catches the yellow jackets, honeybees aren’t usually aggressive. Stepping on toe of my shoe and sends me sprawling. My most spectacular them is about the only way you can goad the peaceful laborers wipe-out came on a rainy day when I tried to sprint across a into hurting you. Pixel 3 June 2007 Even though I live in the countryside, I rarely see honeybees In Six For Gold Mary and I wrote about an itinerant Egyptian these days. Their numbers seem to have been dwindling for years beekeeper who periodically loaded his cylindrical clay hives onto and according to a Reuters story, Vanishing honeybees mystify barges in order to follow the blooming of the flowers up and scientists, even commercial beekeepers are being affected: down the Nile. Ancient Egyptians were seeking to maximize the Go to work, come home. Go to work, come home. Go to honey from their bees rather than to pollinate, but the principal work – and vanish without a trace. was the same as used by traveling beekeepers today. Billions of bees have Mankind’s artificial world done just that, leaving the changes rapidly. Smoking is no crop fields they are sup- longer a habit taken for granted. posed to pollinate, and sci- Merthiolate isn’t found in every entists are mystified about medicine cabinet any more. why. Clover, which for a time was con- The phenomenon was sidered a luxurious and desirable first noticed late last year in ground cover, is now a hated en- the United States, where emy of lawns, targeted for death honeybees are used to polli- by specially formulated herbi- nate $15 billion worth of cides. fruits, nuts and other crops However, we can’t yet design annually. Disappearing bees bees that don’t need pollen, or also have been reported in fruit that doesn’t require pollina- ter Europe and Brazil. tion, so beekeepers are still the s o F Commercial beekeepers nomads they have been for thou- would set their bees near a sands of years. It can’t be good ad crop field as usual and come news for us that their bees are Br back in two or three weeks vanishing. to find the hives bereft of foraging worker bees, with only the queen and the immature insects remaining. Whatever worker Brain Booster bees survived were often too weak to perform their tasks. According to an article in the Daily Express wiggling your eyes from left to right helps to boost your memory: Aside from learning that bees are largely responsible for polli- nating a third of our food, I was interested to read that “honeybee Scientists say the eye movement fires up both the left and hives are rented out to growers to pollinate their crops, and bee- right hemispheres of the brain at the same time. keepers move around as the growing seasons change.” And they believe this is the key to improving our ability to Pixel 4 June 2007 remember things like whether we locked the front door or “walk like” me, if she were in the habit of walking on her hind legs, turned the oven off. which she is not. Thank goodness. (Or never when I’m looking at Dr Andrew Parker, who carried out the research, said that any rate.) Technically my cat would be going through the same only 30 seconds of moving eyes from left to right could motions but the the effect would be somewhat different. produce results. Come to think of it, my cat walking would probably provide more entertainment than me walking. I admit I was skeptical when I first read this. Exactly how rig- Which is probably as good an argument as any against orous was Dr Parker’s statistical method? How do we know that analogizing. all of the test subjects weren’t standing with the stoves and front My cat’s name is Sabrina, I should add. (Because she’s giving doors they couldn’t remember just to their right? me a look that clearly says, “If you will insist on putting me into Then I recalled (even without the aid of ocular gymnastics) that drivel you write, the least you can do is use my proper name, Mary’s admonition whenever I find myself confronted with a re- or I might just get up and walk about on my hind legs.”) calcitrant bottle top or screw. But to get back to the point – in spite of Sabrina’s interruptions “Righty tighty!” – I admit to writing like Benchley. It’s been said (which is another Suddenly it made sense. Turning your eyes to the right must way of saying I’m too lazy to look it up) that James Thurber tighten up your memories. confessed that he owed everything to Benchley. Dave Barry I intend to add this exercise to my usual morning workout, recently told an interviewer, “Robert Benchley, I’m a huge fan of which consists of getting out of bed and going downstairs his, and he did everything I did before I did it.” (aerobics) and brushing my teeth (good for upper body strength). I stopped reading Dave Barry years ago. I don’t like Dave The morning seems like the best time. My memories probably Barry. Even if he is honest. come loose with all my tossing or turning. Judging from the Long before Dave Barry appeared on the scene I was quite dreams I have, something in there is loose and rolling around. happily writing away like Robert Benchley without a care in the When I spring out of bed and into action a few of those memories world and no one uttered a peep.