My Hunt for the Wild Boojum...

Part One of a series of indeterminate length which examines my enduring dream to encounter the Wild Boojum. The purpose of this series is to examine how and why I have come to seek this elusive and fantastical plant.

Yes, for those of you who haven't already listened to me prattle on about this or who are not arid lands succulent afficionados, the Boojum is not some mythical creature out of a Lewis Carroll story (though it's the origin of the name) or a character in another absurd Saturday morning television show. It is a plant, or more specifically, a tree in the in the family Fouquieriaceae which includes the more ubiquitous (but no less facinatingly bizarre) ocotillo. It has a fat, fleshy, whiteish trunk with numerous black or brown spots which is adorned along its whole length with short stout and thorned branches with little tiny leaves on the end. The plant is wider at the bottom than the top, except when it blooms - when it's crowned by a crazy mass of flower-spikes that resemble a fuzzy orb. It's spiky, spiny and generally described as "angry", "upside-down" or "unfriendly" by outsiders.

How could I help but love it? It's like the plant kingdom version of me!

Me and a baby boojum (tamed garden specimens)

Now, like I said ealier, boojums are a tad elusive for a plant. However I do have an advantage. Unlike a reclusive species of lizard, or the infamous man-that-cooks-dances-and-fixes-your-car, I can both outrun and outsmart a boojum. As adaptive as they are, boojums haven't figured out how to run and hide under a rock or pretend they're gay to fend off unwanted marriages. Once I get close to one, it's pretty well caught - and only a moonless nightfall, a total solar eclipse or accidental blindness will prevent me from witnessing the wild boojum in all it's bizarre, pokey glory.

Ah, you say, so why this mysterious "hunt"? Just go find one already. Don't they have one at the UofA, or did they let those evil Californian landscape architects rip it out? Well - I am a big fan of the Krutch Garden Boojums - even signed the petition and showed up at the rally to save them (with a sign that read "Don't Hate Me Just Beacuse I'm Spikey"). I've seen Boojums in captivity in three states and Sonora, Mexico (kinda like another state only funner), I've seen little tiny boojums and the tallest and most imposing boojum in the United States (at the Boyce Thompson Arboretum near Florence -and yes, even a succulent can be imposing). I even have a boojum specimen growing in a clay pot in my back yard. It's a bit like watching the polar bears at the Tucson Zoo, though. Sure, they're really cool and unusual and they offer more entertainment than the lilies or the tree frogs - but it just isn't the same as the thrill of seeing a live, breathing polar bear surrounded by the ice and snow of its native habitat (not that I've seen a wild polar bear, but I can just close my eyes and imagine that it's cooler than seeing one in a tidy-bowl blue kiddy pool). So, I want to see groves of wild boojums, surrounded by the rocks, sticky shrubs and blistering sun rays of its natural environment. I want a 360degree boojum experience, and I don't want fences, rope barriers, two-year olds or interpretive signage to get in my way!

A capive boojum near Bahia Kino, Sonora. Pobrecito

Wild boojums occur only on in Baja Sur Mexico and one tiny costal point on the Sonora side of the Baja gulf. This is what makes them such a challenge to see - they only exist in a place that isn't super easy to travel to, and that I've yet to get! I've tried to reach the point in Sonora - but that's a story for another time (aye yae yae - travel in Me-heee-co!). Until then, the hunt for the Wild Boojum will not be deterred...


Watch for more boojum posts in the future including: Is it Thorny or Spiny? A Boojum by Any Other Name... and How to Raise a Boojum (or Don't Kill Me with Kindness)

Fellow boojum hunters

The Japanese Art of Ear Sex

To start off, thanks to Heidi and Dennis for their introduction to this fascinating and potentially erotic subject.

You see, Heidi-ho and Denner were kind enough to cook me a fabulous dinner on my very auspicious birthday (princes among men, I tell you), and even went a little further in purchasing me a neatly packaged, hooked bamboo stick with a fish on the end: a mimikaki stick. Mimikaki is a traditional Japanese grooming technique in which you use a bamboo stick to remove the cerumen from your aural canal.

For those of you who don't keep your dictionary handy, this boils down to ear wax removal. And, evidently, the Japanese find it very sexy.

Although this could be easily explained by the medical fact that somewhere along the line of genetic evolution, Asians and Native Americans have developed a dry, flaky ear wax that is easily removed with the use of a simple picking motion. Or, one could take the approach even further back and talk about how all other primates use grooming (including earwax and nasal discharge) as a social activity to communicate everything from affection to dominance.

Or, you could just say that some societal groups have odd fetishes and mating rituals. Case in point: text-messaging.

Although mimikaki is practiced in the home - mom might clean out baby's ear, little girl may be asked to help grandpa with his itchy ears - the highest form of the art is generally agreed to be practiced by mimikaki salons. Traditionally, this involved well-to-do business men resting their heads in the laps of attractive young women who then use a variety of techniques - including the all-important bamboo stick - to clean out their flaky ear canal build-up. It seems these treatments often end with a massage, in an effort to bring a sense of total psychological well-being. Newer salons include mini-cameras and television monitors where you can view the state of your ear canal and watch your attendant's work.

New lines of high tech mimikaki equipment will even allow you and your loved one to practice this sexy grooming ritual at home - because the only thing better than looking at your ear wax on the q-tip is seeing it built up inside your head. Talk about psychological well-being.

Thanks, Heidi and Dennis. Watch for the future "how ear wax changed my sexlife" post.

In related but perhaps less useful news, many species of whale also have ear wax build-up. It seems that not only does it help their hearing, but it is deposited in distinct layers over the life of the animal and can be used (upon the poor whale's demise) to determine its age. Maybe whale mimikaki will sprout up as a new discipline, as female whales fight to stay looking and feeling younger...(or do you suppose that young whales would find ways to add layers of wax so they could buy fermented krill juice?)...

Oh, and you really can't miss this hot tune from the unreal Audiology Songs.

Gogol Bordello

Great band that's been around for a while but I'm just getting to know (thanks to my indie music guru Justinioo). Awsome energy - I'm told they're amazing in concert. I like to think of this band as being a little similar to Flogging Molly in that they take a traditional sound and mix it with punk/rock/whatever...only think Eastern Europe and increase the proportion of zaniness... Their music's pure fun - it's been described as: "a bit like The Clash and The Pogues having a fight... in Eastern Europe."

WARNING: if you are a serious, melancholy or stuffy person, don't listen to this stuff. It will be bad for you. You'll hate it. If you don't consider yourself serious, melancholy or stuffy and you still hate this music, you probably just don't have fun taste and you should take the day off and go miniature golfing. Or better yet, watch Hudson Hawk over and over until you think it's funny. Booze will probably help.

And something more traditional:

Makes me want to go to a Zsa Zsas concert.

Research Studies I Can't Belive Were Funded #1

In March of 2008, AP news posted a study completed by researchers at North Carolina State University that found that "co-habitating" men (read: live in boyfriends as opposed to husbands) do more housework than husbands. Interestingly, the study also recorded that these men had sex with their partner more frequently. A separate study, completed around the same time and published by Neil Chethik, found that when men do more of the housework (and it doesn't even have to be 50%), they get to have sex one extra time per week, on average. Talk about positive reinforcement techniques that you can practice at home! It's just like training a puppy!

Now, because of the joyous vagaurtites of research, we don't know if the men are getting more because they're being helpful, or if men who already get more tend to be more helpful, handy people in general. It's that classic "nature-vs-nurture" arguement that has plagued sociologists, psychologists and sceptics for centuries. As with all other arguments in this arena, I tend play it safe with the little-of-both theory. I think that men who to more housework voluntarily probably have happier wives as a result, but I also think that well serviced, sexually happy men are generally easier to talk into doing just about anything. Take your pick, it's a win-win situation - especially for women with dirty houses and out-of-control sex drives.

Perhaps related to these riviting and critical scientific studies, a book was published recently by a group calling themselves the "Cambridge Women's Pornography Cooperative" (dont' worry, not as racy as you're thinking). It captures some highly erotic and stimulating images of men in the midst of the housework act. The images, while racy, are obviously posed however, reinforcing that hot men are about as likely to be doing the dishes in naught but a smile and their sexy jeans as hot women are to give your '68 Mustang a sudsy wash wearing a bikini and 3" spike heels.

Do you suppose that the men who posed for these photos got more sex from their gay partners as a result of having pretendedto do housework to turn on strange women?

So, what's the point you ask? Well, I believe I have three important conclusions from all this amazing work by our academic community:

• If men and women want more sex and housework from eachother, it looks as though a compromise can be reached. I think this work deserves a Nobel Peace Prize.


• Once again, this proves that men you're not married to are usually more useful than those you are. Maybe women as a sex need to reevaluate this whole obsessive need for the wedding thing...


• I'm glad to see that my tax dollars are being spent to have men do careful scientific studies to find out that what women have been telling them for years is indeed true.

Am I Blue?

Just a few days ago, while enjoying the night air on the patio at our favorite local brewpub, an intense debate began about the nature of cheese: specifically, is there REALLY a difference between Gorgonzola and Blue Cheese, or are they really the same thing? Now, while this might not carry the same kind of philosophical weight as whether Superman could beat Flash Gordon at a footrace or what kind of animal Goofy was, I believe the issue still deserves some careful attention. Afterall, like many folks, I find straight blue cheese to be - well - icky, but I'll almost never object to a little Gorgonzola sprinkled on my salad. How is this possible?

From a variety of websites, I managed to deduce that all Gorgonzola is blue cheese, but like the old adage with the cat, not all blue cheese is Gorgonzola. Blue cheese refers to a myriad of different cultured dairy products that include little ribbons of blue or blue-green mold (yeah - and we eat it). Like many other kinds of cheese, Gorgolnzola gets its name from the geographic region from whence it oringinated - Gorgonzola, Italy. It is reported to be smoother and milder than many blue cheeses - in between the Stilton (England) and the Roquefort (French) in texture and flavor. (Stilton is a harder, dryer blue with a sharper flavor, Roquefort is creamer and milder and is made from sheep's milk instead of cow's). The cheese we traditionally call simply "blue cheese" is most probably of a Danish variety and is generally considederd (surprise) low quality and fatty (read inexpensive, the Walmart of the Blue Cheese World).


Now, how do you get little ribbons of mold (which most American houswives spend a lifetime combating) to fill your cheese and give off that oh-so-delightful cheese stink? Well, you start out by making your standard cheese curd to which you have added Penicillum cultures (happy little mold making bacteria), but not squeezing it quite completely together to create voids within the block (I guess those little guys need air, just like Michael Jordan). Then you poke more air holes in the cheese (the guide I read used a Phillips head screwdriver dipped in vodka to sterilize it). This allows the cultures to move through the mixture and leave their blue-green signature marbled throughout the cheese. Thank gawd for this tradition, which has ensured that Lysol and Clorox will never completely kill off ALL of the mold causing bacteria in the world. A major triumph for biodiversity.

So - the answer to the intial question of why I like Gorgonzola and dislike "blue cheese" is totally predictable. Gorgonzola is more expensive. Duh. What is not answered is why we like to eat moldy cheese in the first place. I have a theory, but I bet you guessed that. In a nut shell, my theory is that we like moldy cheese for the same reason we like fermented fruit and grains. At some point, we had to learn to like it or starve/go without alcohol. We evolved. Now we like nothing more than to drink fermented fruits and eat our spoiled milk with mold ribbons while we discuss the finer points of our highly sophisticated society. Damn, ain't progress great!

A chunk of Blue cheese with it's notorious accomplices

You want to know what kind of cheese you are? Knock yourself out. I'm cheddar. Don't know if that's good or not, but at least I like myself. I'd hate to be danish blue cheese - cheap and fatty...

The Beginning of a Great Thing

As if I don't have enough to do in life in general, I thought I'd try my hand at this blogging thing - because I often run into things that I find facinating that I want to share with my fellow human beings. These little jems of information will no doubt enrich their lives, but can be ill-received when presented between war stories over brews or between more clever anecdotes in the hot tub. Let's face it - I just can't wait around until the right moment to talk about the world's largest natural mirror or the geological forces that created Victoria Falls - it's just so unlikely that they will ever come up in conversation. Then there's all the facinating stories of travel and adventure - I never tire of telling them. Finally, there are the numerous bits of advice I've collected in my head, from the best hike in southeast Arizona to the correct way to eat a tostada. Come on, I know someone, somewhere in this crazy world is just dying to know.

With this blog, I hope that I can be witty and informative while avoiding annoying and driving away friends and family. I'm sure scores will be thankful of my efforts here.

Havasu Falls Hike, November 2006