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Associate Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg is out of Memorial Sloan Kettering now and resting at home, but her days may be numbered. Rumors from her round-the-clock caregivers suggest that she is in extremely frail health and will not be walking the dog again anytime soon.

Marine iguanas.

However, joy has been brought into her life in the form of an animal companion. This is a brightly colored marine iguana that Ginsburg’s grandchild left many years ago on a visit, and which no one has succeeded in capturing.

No one, that is, except for Justice Ginsburg, in her motorized at-home hospital bed. She often keeps the iguana beside her, under the sheets.

The lizard, about four feet in length, is the ideal size to share an invalid’s bed. It has reportedly developed a taste for the green Jell-O that often accompanies Ginsburg meals.

Many golden-agers enjoy the comforting presence of cheerful iguanas.

The iguana bonded with the Justice a month ago, and since then they have been inseparable.

In the afternoon, when Justice Ginsburg sits in a recliner chair by the south-facing window and reads the newspaper, her iguana suns himself (or herself) on the windowsill.

Justice Ginsburg is 85. The iguana is about 12 or 13.

ADDENDUM Sept. 20, 2020: Justice Ginsburg has died at 87.

| In Iguanas

In the crime-laden outback of South Florida, few outrages have been as gruesome as the murder of green iguanas with a crossbow.

According to a local news source in Broward County, a crossbow expert has been using the popular invasive species for target practice:

“It’s pretty sad, pretty sick. … You have to think that could be your cat, that could be your dog,” Drake said.

Crossbows themselves have a noble history in Western Culture. Henry V triumphed at Agincourt in 1415 largely through the skill of a hundred bowmen. And a few years later St. Joan of Arc won the Siege of Orleans with a frightening mix of hot coals, boiling oil, and a bevy of French crossbows at the parapets.

The Siege of Orleans

A crossbow can be as accurate as a rifle, at distances of a quarter-mile or less; as well as being quieter and easier to maintain.

The flame-haired Maid of Orleans was assisted by skilled crossbowmen in her battles.

South Florida resident Roger Stone is not known to own a crossbow, but his arrest by FBI thugs in the early hours of January 25th is a reminder of the sort of tyranny that the Maid of Orleans marched against.

 

| In The Press

What can one say about this sad, sad pub conversation?

| In Iguanas

A list of filthy, nasty stories about Julian Assange has been e-mailed to journalists around the the globe from the Wikileaks Corporation. Newspapers and chat-show hosts are being enjoined not to tell these tales, lest they risk a libel suit.

Oddly, one of the most persistent rumors is nowhere on the e-mailed list. That concerns Assange’s pet iguana, which escaped from the Ecuadoran embassy two years ago.

Assange is however vaguely accused of having neglected a pet, species unknown.

‘Rainbow’ presenters Freddy, Jane and Rod have found a new fan in Julian Assange of Wikileaks.

Among the defamatory porkies banned by Wikileaks:

  • Julian Assange does not wash his feet.
  • He is stinky.
  • He bleaches his hair.
  • He reads the Daily Mail.
  • He spends his afternoons drinking himself into a stupor on Jägermeister, and watching old episodes of Blue Peter and Rainbow in a darkened room.
| In The Press

Cockroach Control: Gecko or Iguana?

In a certain large city in America once upon a time, we had no problem with cockroaches. This is because we had powerful insecticides, such as DDT!

Then, in the 1960s, some do-gooders decided to ban DDT. In two years the cucarachas were all over the place. We literally had to put our saltines and animal crackers into Baggies to keep the bugs out.

Bugs were everywhere. And there was this powerful moral suasion against killing them. Seriously. You were supposed to live with cockroaches in peaceful coexistence, because they were here first (uh huh) and killing them is bad.

Geckos do not have eyelids, and this is an issue for many people.

One way of getting rid of cockroaches was by poisoning them. You could spray your whole house with insecticide. That was good for a while, but just for a while. Or you could get some boric acid, and mix it with flour and make little cookies. You’d stick these in every corner, and they’d kill off a lot of your cockroaches.

Or you could get a lizard. The most reliable lizard, 40 years ago, was a gecko. Personally I’ve always had issues with geckoes, because some don’t have eyelids. But they’re good cockroach-hunters.

Then you have iguanas. The iguana is bigger and hardier than your gecko, and it can shut its eyes when it goes to sleep. It will clean up all your cockroaches. But soon it will be four feet long and shit all over the place.

You make the call.

 

 

| In Iguanas

Toy iguanas cause as much distress as the real thing, especially if you happen to be an iguana yourself.

You don’t believe? Check out the link and the video.

One Ontario iguana owner is gonna want to watch their fingers in 2019 after witnessing a vicious territory dispute between Pip, their reptilian pet, and a stuffed doppelgänger.

The Canadian pet owner tells Viral Hog that they “use the toy as a distraction” for Pip while cleaning its enclosure or “socializing with other iguanas.”

Here we are. 

| In Iguanas