TIDBITS 10/22/06

If any of you want Tidbits emailed directly, let me know and I'll take care of it. Tidbits may be reprinted without charge -- with attribution. Additionally, if you know of anyone who you think would enjoy Tidbits, please make them aware of us. URL

formatting link

We encourage you to forward this email to friends and colleagues. ====================================== A Creature With a Different Penchant So here you are ... strolling across a forest floor with your girlfriend ... arm in arm in arm in arm. Or maybe its leg in leg in leg in leg. You look at each other. It's hot out. Wondrous smells waft through the air. The two of you are heady with the scents of summer. So whaddya wanna do, you say. You're ready to acquiesce to her every wish. Your magnanimity can be attributed to the fact that to many you are a symbol of eternal life. She looks at you coyly. Wanna roll around in poop?

You both grin and make a mad dash for a pile of manure freshly deposited and still glistening in the noonday sun. You both dive in ... head first. You frolic and rollick about. For you are the Dung Beetle ... that most revered creature to the ancient Egyptians. You are the Scarab. You are the symbol of the sun and of eternal return. Humans love you. They make gold rings in your image. They make silver amulets. They make bejeweled talismans.

Of course ... they do not know you all that well ... for if they did ... they would be more wary. For should you walk upon their shoes or emerge from one of their shoes ... it is a sure sign of death to come. You sometimes do that just for fun ... just to see their reactions.

And then ... in moments of deviltry ... you occasionally enter a room where a family is seated. Oh the woe of it all ... for this means misfortune will surely befall that family. And the worst of it is ... they dare not kill you ... for if they do ... all the worse for them. When not gamboling in excrement ... you strut among humans with impunity.

Aristotle--that old geezer--thought you arose from putrefying flesh. And he was the bright one. Poor delusional humans ... so immersed in their own sense of self-importance they are unable to see the munificence of you.

Some thought you were the symbol of thunder. In Africa some of your tribe are thrown into a lake as part of a rain-making ceremony. And during the nineteenth century ... it was thought that by suspending one of your cousins around a child's neck ... that child would be cured of the whooping cough.

Poor poor humans. How little they know. For all you really want is to play in feces. Superstition and strange reverence is for humans. Hey Mary, you say to your girlfriend as she grins up at you from the depths of an ever-ripening mound. You hungry?

That all said dear souls ... I bring you this week an image of a bejeweled scarab made of silver and rose gold ... set with diamonds and rubies and other red stones unidentified. It was created toward the end of the 19th century. It's worth ... in 1998 ... was about

10,000 French Francs.

For those of you who are new to this thing called Tidbits...may I direct you to my home page at

formatting link

where you will scroll down the left side menu till you get to the area that says Current Tidbits ... and then click on it in order to view an image of this little dung loving beetle.

And there ya have it. That's it for this week folks. Catch you all next week. Benjamin Mark