Attribution: Photo by Bennet Robin Fabian on Unsplash By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, joins the keeper and Phyllis in their efforts at including all species in the daily commentary by noting that a 20-year-old two-toed sloth has transferred from the Milwaukee zoo to the Vilas Park Zoo in Madison. Incredibly, even as close as it is …
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Kickass and Beagle Rescue
Attribution: Photo by Bill Stokes By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, passes along information to the keeper and Phyllis that 1,500 beagles at the controversial Ridglan Farms at Blue Mounds have been bought by a dog rescue group and will ultimately be up for adoption at various locations around the country. Under a court …
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Kickass and the U.S. King
Attribution: Photo by Mitya Ivanov on Unsplash By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, reports the keeper and Phyllis wondering if King Charles is still in the US and if he plans to apply for the “king” opening now apparently existing in the White House. Up to this point there seemed to be no need for a US …
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Like Nobody’s Ever Seen Before
Attribution: DonkeyHotey, CC BY-SA 2.0, via Wikimedia Commons By Geoff Carter Linguists and educational theorists have argued for centuries over the question of whether thought gives rise to language or whether the reverse, that language affects and determines thought, is true. The once widely-accepted Sapir-Whorf hypothesis postulates that language determines thought, while Fodor’s theory maintains the …
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Kickass and Canadian Visitors
Attribution: Photo by Phyllis Stokes By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, joins the keeper and Phyllis in welcoming Phyllis’s sister and brother-in-law Joan and Bill from Saskatchewan where Phyllis was born and raised and where, from time to time she has expressed a desire to return to. The visit talk has not yet dealt …
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Kickass and Great-Grandson’s Letter
Photo by Bill Stokes By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, looks over the keeper’s shoulder to see that he finally received a piece of mail that was a refreshing departure from the advertising junk that normally clogs up his and Phyllis’s mailbox. The meaningful mail was a personally printed letter from great grandson Trevor, …
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Kickass and Spring Flowers
Photo by Geoff Carter By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, stayed home and napped as the keeper and Phyllis wrestled with the question of “Where have all the flowers gone?” with a windshield survey designed in part to immerse them in something–spring flowers, free of the current narcissistic idiotic political meddling. It turns out …
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The Pen in Hand Guide to the Movies: Review of “The Pitt”
Making Medicine: Television Review of The Pitt ★★★★ By Geoff Carter Illustration by Michael DiMilo I—and many of my boomer friends—grew up watching TV medical dramas. They were everywhere. Medical Center, St. Elsewhere, Dr. Kildare, Ben Casey, Marcus Welby, M.C., M*A*S*H*, and dozens of others kept popping up like weeds on network television. Most were dramas, …
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Kickass and Natural Dinner
Attribution: Photo by James Wainscoat on Unsplash By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, reports that as the keeper promotes the verity that humans are as much a part of the natural world as the birds and the bees, he points to the many natural parallels to the interrupted community feeding at the Correspondents dinner last night. When …
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Kickass and Printer Hookup
Photo by Bill Stokes By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, reports that the keeper will be filing a multimillion-dollar lawsuit against the man in India who spent an inordinate amount of time on the phone with Phyllis as the two of them discussed the intricacies of hooking up a new printer and even at …
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Kickass and the Big Snake
Attribution: Photo by Joshua J. Cotten on Unsplash By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, agrees with the keeper and Phyllis that diversion in these absurd Wizard-of-Odd days is essential, and the discovery of the dead 20-foot Burmese Phython in an Iowa County ditch near the rural Hillside School fills the bill nicely. Community attention immediately and almost …
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Kickass and Flying Through the Night
Attribution: Photo by Chris Briggs on Unsplash By Bill Stokes Kickass, the doorstop dog, notes that while the keeper and Phyllis and their flightless crowd slept through last night, 25.2 million birds were in flight up in the night sky on their way to summer family- rearing haunts as far away as the arctic tundra. That is a …
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