CORPSE REVIVER (NO. 2)

   Watching CNBC yesterday morning --  seeing the faces and hearing the voices of the fully employed, highly compensated presenters and guests, including  always-wrong economist Mark Zandi,  when the US Bureau of Labor Statistics announced the May unemployment numbers  -- was sadly revelatory.

      When the 69,000 jobs figure (surely to be revised downward in the usual manner thirty days from now, just as the previously announced April and March 2012 figures were corrected yesterday to hell-level accuracy) and 8.2 % (measured kindly) "upticked" unemployment levels were recited, it seemed like a bomb had exploded CNBC's and the entire news reporting establishment's universe.

   Every single media outlet we surveyed during our morning and afternoon drive north – even zombie, “Yes, Master,” MSNBC – used the same description over and over:  “Disaster.”

 

     Corrupt Labor Secretary Hilda Solis and feckless Council of Economic Advisers head, Prof. Alan Krueger, alone from the administration, were made to speak about the horrible milestone to interviewers.  Rehearsing identical talking points, theirs was sad testimony and both of them looked and sounded as though they were about to cry.  Their boss, he who sits in the Big Chair and who (formerly) relentlessly promised to "pivot back to jobs" remained totally, gutlessly, absent from the scene.

    Two days ago, attending what you might call a hiring hall (the experience reminded me of an attorney version of the longshoremen line-ups in On The Waterfront), signing up for electronic document review assignments (for non-attorney readers, litigation document review is considered to be about the most déclassé  thing one might ever find oneself doing professionally, although I personally have no problem with it; a job's a job, I like to work, and the people seemed very nice), I had an acute pre-vision of yesterday’s debacle. 

    Then again, the last three-and-one-half years of executive branch misanthropy, megalomania, ineptitude, hot air and  graft had already provided sufficient evidence of the pre-crime that robbed so much from so many.

 

    I have been practically teetotal recently and happily so, but yesterday's shocking unemployment numbers made me think a cocktail would be restorative, so I turned to reference guides and researched appropriate spirit-lifting libations to celebrate June in any event.  These dreadful, unnecessary,  insult-to-us-all, circumstances will pass and we will find ourselves again on the way to the Delectable Mountains, the Land of Beulah and beyond.  Perhaps we already are. 

    Harry Craddock’s wonderful 1930 drinks bible, The Savoy Cocktail Book, suggests a Corpse Reviver 2, as the drink of the moment and so do I:

 

Corpse Reviver 2

Ingredients

1/4 cup dry gin

1/4 cup Cointreau or other orange liqueur

1/4 cup Lillet Blanc

1/4 cup fresh lemon juice

2 dashes of absinthe or pastis

Ice cubes

Preparation

Combine first 5 ingredients in cocktail shaker; fill shaker with ice and shake vigorously 30 seconds. Strain into 2 chilled cocktail glasses.  

  To be perfectly honest with you, something I always try to do, last night my beverage of choice was a Cusqueña beer from Peru, which I tried at the very good local Peruvian restaurant Taita in Suffern, New York, before seeing the terrible (except for Charlize Theron and Sam Spruell) Snow White and The Huntsman.  

  I’d never had Cusqueña before and I’m pleased to report that it was excellent.

   As much as possible, I try to avoid making political comments here.  To any reader who believes that I’ve somehow missed the point (or, possibly, merely overstated the problem), I would simply submit that I haven’t.   

  

Heft and Dreadful Beauty -- $1 Million Dinosaur Goes On Sale

"This beautiful Tyrannosaurus skeleton is one of the most complete, most spectacular specimens that we've ever seen," said David Herskowitz, Director of Natural History at Heritage Auctions.

 

NEW YORK, NY.- 4-21-12

       One of the great dinosaurs of the Cretaceous era, an eight-foot tall, 24-foot long, 75% complete Tyrannosaurus bataar — the slightly smaller Asian counterpart to the legendary North American T-Rex — will be the centerpiece of Heritage Auctions May 20 Natural History Signature auction, taking place at Center 548 (548 W. 22nd Street, between 10th Ave. and West Street), in New York. The stupendous, impeccably preserved museum-quality specimen is expected to bring $950,000+.

 "This beautiful Tyrannosaurus skeleton is one of the most complete, most spectacular specimens that we've ever seen," said David Herskowitz, Director of Natural History at Heritage Auctions. "These dinos, distant cousins of the T-Rex, were recently reclassified as Tyrannosaurids. They're incredibly rare to come across in any condition, let alone one as pristine as this." 

 

Detail of assembled Tyrannosaurus bataar.

    The Tyrannosaurus bataar roamed what is now Central Asia in the Cretaceous period, around 80 million years ago. The dino was discovered within the past decade and has been in storage in England, still in its field jackets, for the last 2-1/2 years.

  "Dinosaurs of this size and scarcity almost never come to market fully prepared and fully mounted like this, making it a singular opportunity for the right collector or institution," said Herskowitz. "Consider this: Sue, the famous T-Rex that' Sotheby's sold back in 1997, was neither prepped nor mounted when she came across the auction block, ultimately realizing a price of more than $8 million." 

 

Illustration of Tarbosaurus bataar (aka Tyrannosaurus bataar) confronting Therizinosaurus cheloniformis. (Copyright by Greg Paul.)  “Tarbosaurus” means “alarming lizard.”

   In complement to the full-sized Tyrannosaurus, Heritage will also offer a fantastic Tyrannosaurus bataar tooth with and erupting crown, arguably the finest Tyrannosaurus bataar tooth known and certainly one of the largest, measuring 10-1/2 inches long with 3-3/4 inches of enamel on both crowns, estimated at $18,000+.

    The Tyrannosaurus bataar is not the only spectacular dino specimen offered in the auction, as evidenced by the presence of a truly fantastical ankylosaurid skull from a Cretaceous era Saichania chulsanensis, literally meaning "Beautiful one," estimated at $60,000+. 

  An Ankylosaurid skull from a Tarchia (meaning “brainy one.”) When these skulls were first unearthed, men believed them to be the remains of dragons.

   "Broader than it is long, with two sets of distinctive horn-like protrusions at the rear, it's no wonder dinosaurs like these were thought to be dragon skulls when they were discovered in ancient times," said Herskowitz. "They could grow to about 23-feet in length, roughly six feet high and around 2 tons. Standing next to this thing you can really get a sense of not just its heft, but also its dreadful beauty."

    Other dinosaur highlights of the auction, which will also be on display in New York in May, include a very fine Cretaceous-era Troodontidae, or "Bird-Dinosaur" skeleton, 28 inches in length and 17-1/2 inches high, estimated at $45,000+, a superb "Duck-Billed" dinosaur skull from an Edmontosaurus annectens out of the Hell Creek Formation in Montana, an amazing 75-80% original and 47 inches long overall (estimate: $35,000+), a superlative American Mosasaur skull (Tylosaurus kansasensis) — a family of serpentine marine reptiles, apex predators and the scourge of the many and varied ocean-dwelling creatures with which they shared the ancient waters from the Smoky Hill Chalk, Niobrara Formation in Western Kansas, USA, estimated at $30,000+. 

Artist’s rendering of baby Edmontosaurus annectens – the Duck-Billed dinosaurs.

NOTE:    

Fascinating, full of heft and dreadful beauty of course, but I’ve always thought that offering corporeal or skeletal remains for publicized commercial sale, even for “scientific purposes,” is creepy and dreadful (without the beauty).  It reminds me of the bad feelings I've had viewing anatomical religious relics, such as St. Teresa's mummified finger, which I saw in Avilà one hot July day a long time ago.

Human nature leaves a lot to be desired.  Frightened as I am of lizards (especially,  I imagine “alarming lizards” and “brainy ones”), I wonder whether I would be more fearful living among them than I  am today surrounded by  earth’s current tenders.  Seeing "The Cabin In The Woods" yesterday reinforced that feeling and reminded me throughout of that  grim, funny zeitgeist line in Paul Verhoeven's "Robocop": "I'd buy That for a dollar."  Tried to extinguish the feeling today by seeing “21 Jump Street” again.  It’s really funny and utterly light.   I needed that after reading This.
 

5-22-12 NEWS  ALERTS HERE  AND HERE.