The Lexicographer's Rules

;Normally, the tiger that starts the man-eating generation is a female with cubs. When she is injured, either due to gunshot, traps or poison, she would resort to slow-moving prey, including human beings, and train her cubs to do likewise. As these tiger cubs grow, they would continue to hunt for humans and later give birth to a man-eating tigers. (Source Link)

They filled the cattle pens on First Avenue beyond the Fifty-Ninth Street bridge, then they spilled onto Second Avenue, and then they clogged Third Avenue. Convoys of buses on 57th Street waited out the throngs, and an exasperated woman in a fur coat wasn’t quite aware of what she’d walked into. A young boy cried on a side street, afraid of the crowds and the noise, his mother clutching him and petting his head, saying, “It’s for you, honey. It’s for you.” The mood was cheery and friendly. It was New York at its best, briskly feeling that which hasn’t been present since the days following September 11, 2001, when our sense of dismay and pending doom were tempered by friendship and support. The languages were diverse: the whole city was there, and the careerist protesters were outnumbered but not marginalized by out-of-towners and high school students and everday New Yorkers whose eyes gleamed and whose voices grew hoarse with the shouting and singing. The police were unprepared, overwhelmed and incapable of handling the massive crowds pushing forward to be near the heart of the action. Hundreds of thousands of people moved en masse, with drums booming and bands playing, and chants of “Whose street? My street!” would falter as a roaring waves of cheers and noise would wash down the avenues, around corners, and up to the next intersection. Others chanted variatons on “What do we want?” and “Shame! Shame! Shame!” at mounted police who herded unruly protesters to arresting officers. It felt like a beginning. A small photo gallery.

Local parent-teacher association president: “I am against the war.” High school senior: “I am against a war with Iraq because it is an offensive war.” Military journalist: “I am against the war.” “I am a Kurd, and I am against the war in Iraq.” British star: “I am against the war.” Vice president of the Philippiines: “I oppose the war against Iraq.” Los Alamos city councilwoman: “I’ve written my congressman that I am against any war with Iraq.” Imam of a Mosque: “We are against war but against Saddam at the same time.” Representative to Congress: “I totally oppose George Bush’s war on Iraq and voted against it.” German attorney: “I am against this war. There is no such thing as a just war.” Protestor from Madison, Wisconsin: “I feel great about going (to the rally); it was amazing to see the sheer number of people there, and I was doing my part to show I oppose the war.” Worker from Milford, Massachusetts: “I oppose this war and I think that by working with other people we can stop it before it starts.” Idaho student: “I oppose a war with Iraq and I hope that somehow we do not go to war.” Connecticut book store owner: “ “It’s not a secret—you can look at my store and see that I oppose unilateral war in Iraq.” Storrs, Connecticut, resident: “I oppose President Bush’s proposed war against Iraq for economic and moral reasons.” Chief executive officer of two businesses: “Just because I oppose the war doesn’t mean I don’t love my country.” African National Congress spokesperson: “This war is ëunjust, unnecessary and potentially-devastating.‘“ Peace rally coordinator:"We’re lending our voice to the growing national consensus that this war is unjust.” President of the Muslim American Society in San Diego: “This war is unjust. It’s a pre-emptive strike on Iraq. Saddam should be taken out by his own people, not by outside intervention.” Australian politician: “People are queuing up to sign petitions and make banners. Many people have told me that they have never been involved in political protest before, but now they want to take a stand. They can see this war is unjust and won’t solve anything.”

;I stepped into the building and was taken-aback by the devastation. Everything was gone. Doors stood idly, their glass panels stripped. Windows had long gone. Where once a radio studio had stood, former occupants had decided that it would better serve as a toilet. Faeces covered the concrete floor. To the right, the front office was a scene of broken and twisted metal, an old table, covered with dust and debris but still in one piece, stood like a sentinel of better times long-gone. Propped up on the window-sill were two steel army helmets. Each was riddled by bullets. Hopefully, just target practice and not worn by combatants at the time. (Source Link)

;I just had a visit from two FBI agents who requested that I pass the word along on the library listservs. Apparently, our bookstore received a donation from who-knows-where of a book that is still a classified government document. The bookstore sold it for 10 cents to someone who, not really knowing the significance of the book, put it up for sale on E-Bay for $3.00. The FBI actually has a watchgroup monitoring E-Bay and they contacted the seller and confiscated the book (don’t know if they paid the $3 or not!). The agents wanted to know if there was any way we could track who donated the book. Well, naturally, we have no idea, and the agents expected that answer. (Source Link)