Think of these seasonal blog posts as something like a “blog within a blog.” An easy way to add new content (on a variety of topics). These are subject to editing, right up to when the next seasonal one begins.
New and improved! Now, in reverse chronological order.
(4) (Wednesday, December 31, 2025)
The other day, while I had the car radio on, I happened to catch a portion of World Cafe with Raina Douris. It was a rebroadcast of a June interview with the British trans singer-songwriter Jasmine.4.t (Jasmine Cruickshank). We learn in the interview that her backup band is entirely all trans.
Where am I going with this? I had a stream of thought, while listening to this interview, that ended with this:
What if, the opportunity presents itself, in the future, to CRISPR-out (edit-out), some of our genes, in such a way that, in effect, things like World Wars, the Holocaust, serial killers, murders, assault and battery, and things like that, essentially, would become a thing of the past?
That’s an interesting thought, thought experiment, whatever you want to call it. Both intriguing, and a little chilling, at the same time.
Actually, now that I’m writing this, it almost sounds like a Star Trek episode.
(3) (Wednesday, December 31, 2025) A Rob Reiner Quotation Well Worth Remembering
I was just as shocked as everyone else when I learned of Rob Reiner’s violent death (both he and his wife), weeks ago.
There’s a Rob Reiner quotation that’s on my Quotations page. It’s been there since I launched my website (a dozen years ago). Here it is:
“I hate those movies where hundreds of people get blown up and there are jokes afterward. They poison the soul.”
This might also be a good opportunity to squeeze in another quotation. This one’s not on my Quotations page, but probably should be. It’s something I heard over the radio, decades ago — while tuned into WBAB (a radio station here in the NYC area). One of the callers who got on the air had this to say:
“I believe that if society had advanced to the point that by now I think it should have, we wouldn’t still be paying people to beat each other up.”
Context? There might have been a big upcoming boxing match. That might be what the caller was referring to. Or it might have had to do with the debate over whether to allow mixed martial arts (MMA) bouts here in New York. Then-Governor George Pataki signed a professional ban into law in 1997. (Nineteen years later, New York became the last state in the nation to lift such a ban.)
Oh, and Happy New Year!
Just minutes away
As a brand new year
A w a i t s
Wishing all of humanity
Mankind, womankind
Transkind, Earthkind
Extraterrestrialkind
A Happy and Kind
New Year
(2) (Wednesday, December 31, 2025) A New Search Engine?
I’m not too experienced with AI search engines. I don’t use smartphones, and I don’t use the AI version of Google. I just use Google. And sometimes, Perplexity.ai.
However, a search engine which recently came to my attention, might be worth passing along.
Go to BigEarthData.ai and check the box for “Lil Dr Glen EcoChat.”
I was impressed with it’s ability to handle questions related to saving the planet. It’s no substitute for Ecoideaman — that’s for sure — but I was impressed.
One question I asked is: what are the odds that humanity will do the things that are necessary in time to save the planet?
It’s answer (in short), was: “the odds are distressingly low.”
I don’t disagree. In fact, that’s why you should consider giving me funding. If there’s someone out there (and there is!), with lots of great ideas, big ideas, brilliant ideas, on how to save the planet, wouldn’t it be crazy not to fund them? (Hm, how would “Lil Dr Glen EcoChat” answer that question?)
Maybe 2026 will be the year?
I can’t tell you how much
I yearn for the day
When I can finally tweet:
Help is on the way!
(1) (Tuesday, December 23, 2025) I’ve been unable to look at any of my Sunday editions of The New York Times for a few months now. I’ve instead been focusing on organizing thousands of pages of notes. One of those notes — ironically, one I threw away — gave me an idea for something I’d like to add to my Contact page. (Even one that didn’t seem important enough to save, sparked an idea I’d like to use.)
Another note is jam-packed with stuff related to things I’ve jotted down from Marilyn vos Savant’s “Ask Marilyn” column — which ran for 37 years in Parade magazine. Savant held the Guinness record for highest IQ (until Guinness retired that category). One of the thirteen bullet points included on the note, reads (in part) — these are Savant’s words: “I never think about death unless I need to remind myself to enjoy life as much as possible now.” This gave me a thought. I flipped over the note, and jotted down:
Rather than enjoying life
As much as possible
I think it makes
Much more sense
To seek to make
This planet last
As long as possible
For all future
Generations
On another note, I quote something Bill Maher said: “It’s fun to laugh at QAnon, but if you allow religious faith the kind of exalted respect we do here in America, you’ve already lost the argument that mass delusion is bad.”
Another note has a few things jotted down, including something I read once: “I am a writer in a city where nobody carries a book.” That’s cute. Upon seeing this again, I grabbed my pen, and jotted down: And I am a ‘save the planet’ thinker on a planet where no one gives a poop.