Odd thoughts on the universe while thinking how best to survive in Trump's version of purgatory

Yes, the ugly, turd-brained bankrupt real estate developer is president again and after two months he's showing himself to be even less mindful of unintended consequences than he was the first time around. Is he suffering from dementia?

You would hope both he and his sycophantic butt-lickers would've learned, but no. So now we have to work very hard to take back Congress in 2026 and work hard locally to keep some sanity in state and local governments, and look to our courts to keep the separation of powers and the rights of states before themselves.

I won't go into the BS that Musk, who ought to know better is involved it. I think part of his brain had enough so it got up and went.

Anyway, a couple of photos of a barn in Iowa I shot last summer and a brief essay on the asymmetry of our universe.

 

            Don’t look for symmetry because it isn’t there. If there was symmetry in the universe we wouldn’t be here. What do I mean, you ask? Simple. In the beginning, at the moment when the big began to bang there was matter and there was anti-matter and every time matter mat antimatter – kaboom, they annihilated each other. What’s that got to do with symmetry and us being here, you ask? Well, in the beginning when the big nothing got banged, there should’ve been equal amounts of matter and antimatter and all of it should’ve met and been kaboomed. In a symmetrical universe, no matter, no nothing except the occasional pair of virtual, antithetical particles popping in and little kabooming out of existence.

 

            But in our universe at the beginning when the big banged there was a slight asymmetry – not much, probably one part in a quadrillion billion but enough so that when matter met antimatter, there were enough particles without a dance partner, standing around the punchbowl and snack table, virtual wallflowers, unmatched, unkaboomed, that a universe full of matter could expand and then inflate and expand some more and 14 billion years later I can tell you there is no symmetry in our universe,, at least not true symmetry, only something that looks like an attempt at seeming symmetrical. Let’s call it quasi-symmetry and be glad that this is how it is.

 

 

Permalink

Rutt's Hut for Hot Dogs in Clifton NJ

If anyone is wondering why I haven't posted in several months it's because in September I broke my ankle while riding on my scooter. It slid out from under me as I descended a steep hill with a sharp curve at the bottom. In short, I was arguing with Isaac Newton. The lesson is, he really knew his shit.

On Saturday, February 21 my youngest child, who's not so young, already in their mid-30s and I drove to Clifton, NJ to eat the famous Ripper hot dogs at Rutt's Hut. 

What's so special about Rutt's Hut? It's been around for a long time and they do something different with their dogs, they deep fry them. I first heard of the place more than 25 years ago while watching Rick Sebak's wonderful documentary, "A Hot Dog Program." In the show's enthusiastic hour Mr. Sebak traveled around the USA sampling the regional and local frankfurters of note in those places. He was careful to say that he wasn't claiming they were the best, only that they were excellent examples of the locale. He ate in Atlanta, Chicago, Fairfield CT, Alaska, Los Angles, NYC and at Rutt's Hut in Clifton NJ.

My kid heard about it when they read a book by  Jamie Loftus called Raw Dog: The Naked Truth About Hot Dogs in which she took a road trip to eat hot dogs around the country while also exploring their history and nature. I noticed in a review I read of her book that she visited several of the same ones that Sebak highlighted back in the 1990s leading me to wonder if she was at all inspired by his film.

Rutt's Hut is one of those roadside restaurants that evolved from a stand. The parking lot was full but turnover was rapid. Inside the sit-down restaurant side there were a few tables open but people kept coming in behind us to fill them while others ate, paid and left. Nobody seemed angry or unhappy. At the table next to us, one of the patrons knew the Loftus book but not the Sebak movie.

We had a pretty standard order of two Rippers each with a side of french fries and fried onions. It was definitely a high-fat meal.

Rippers come in three varieties depending on whether you're a poppa bear, momma bear or baby bear. At one extreme are the Cremators, fried until they are black. On the other end, the In-and-Out, quickly fried. In between, the standard Ripper, which is what we had. On the table, their mustard and relish which work very well with the dogs.

We both liked them. They are different from other famous and somewhat more obscure hot dogs I've tried since seeing the Sebak program. Super Duper Weenies stand out for their toppings, Buffalo Texas Red Hots from Ted's are not hot spicy but strong with their garlickiness. All of them are yummy and while I don't eat hot dogs often any more, when I do I want them to be special. This was a special frank.

Permalink