Jan Å vankmajer: Picnic with Weismann
Part One
Part Two
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The Crucifixion Considered as an Uphill Bicycle Race
The bicycle frame in use today is of relatively recent invention. It appeared around 1890. Previous to that time the body of the machine was constructed of two tubes soldered together at right angles. It was generally called the right-angle or cross bicycle. Jesus, after his puncture, climbed the slope on foot, carrying on his shoulder the bike frame, or, if you will, the cross.
Contemporary engravings reproduce this scene from photographs. But it appears that the sport of cycling, as a result of the well known accident which put a grievous end to the Passion race and which was brought up to date almost on its anniversary by the similar accident of Count Zborowski on the Turbie slope -- the sport of cycling was for a time prohibited by state ordinance. That explains why the illustrated magazines, in reproducing this celebrated scene, show bicycles of a rather imaginary design. They confuse the machine's cross frame with that other cross, the straight handlebar. They represent Jesus with his hands spread on the handlebars, and it is worth mentioning in this connection that Jesus rode lying flat on his back in order to reduce his air resistance.
Note also that the frame or cross was made of wood, just as wheels are to this day.
A few people have insinuated falsely that Jesus's machine was a draisienne , an unlikely mount for a hill-climbing contest. According to the old cyclophile hagiographers, St. Briget, St. Gregory of Tours, and St. Irene, the cross was equipped with adevice which they name suppedaneum. There is no need to be a great scholar to translate this as "pedal."
Lipsius, Justinian, Bosius, and Erycius Puteanus describe an other accessory which one still finds, according to Cornelius Curtius in 1643, on Japanese crosses: a protuberance of leather or wood on the shaft which the rider sits astride -- manifestly the seat or saddle.
This general description, furthermore, suits the definition of a bicycle current among the Chinese: "A little mule which is led by the ears and urged along by showering it with kicks."
-- Alfred Jarry
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Republicans
Chirs Matthews was discussing Bush’s condemnation of those who appease terrorists with conservative radio talk show host Kevin James yesterday on Hardball. Mr. James was haranguing Team Obama’s being in bed with Hamas and the PLO, as evidenced by foreign policies advisers Samantha Power and Robert Malley, pro Hamas people, having been asked to leave Team Obama, showing that they are on the run regarding their pro Hamas stance in the Middle East. So Matthews, a relentless apologist for Obama, asked James what Neville Chamerlain did to appease Adolf Hitler (what Bush was talking about in his speech), James didn’t answer (probably didn’t know), so then, Matthews kept asking him, again and again, making James look foolish at that point, and diverting attention from the points James was making about the nature of Team Obama’s pro Islamic stance.
And Mika Bzrezinski, daughter of pro Hamas senior adviser to Obama, Zbigniew Bzrezinski, kept playing the clip of the part of the Matthews/James discussion where Matthews was badgering James for the answer, making James look to be the idiot, while Matthews is being allowed to have diverted the attention from Team Obama’s anti Israeli staff and associations, to James’ failure to answer one (not so germane) question. It’s plain propaganda for Obama coming out of the talking heads over at MSNBC, so tune in to watch that "objective journalism." It’s a real hoot.
