But first some background about why I decided to write on Lothair….

“Lothar of the Hill people” is an old SNL skit based upon “Lothar of the hand people”, a band of mad dwarves that packed in their synthesizers and took electropop country to the people. Just listen

All that to say “Lothar of the hand people” got me wondering about the original Lothar and how he must’ve handled himself. Actually I thought Lothar might be a good name for a dog and then I “suddenly remembered my Charlemagne”

Once upon a time in the 9th Century there was a European Union Called the Carolingian Empire. It ran from pink to yellow.

The whole thing was ultimately set up by Charlemagne, King of the Franks. Charlemagne was actually Belgian but since we all know Belgium isn’t a real country, we’ll call him what everyone else called him, Charlemagne (Karl= old man + magne= the great). Even today the root “kral” or king comes from the old man’s name. Here you see Charlemagne’s tag as you would find it marking his land and stuff.

Like all Belgian kings of note, Charlemagne spent much of his reign expanding and consolidating his empire. Managing it would be something else. After Charlemagne died, His 3 grandsons were put in charge of the kingdom, according to the color coded map above.

Louis the German got yellow,

Charles the Bald got Pink,

and Lothair I got green.

Lothair’s empire was Lothringen which is today known as Lorraine, an area much sought after in wars through to wwii.

Louis set up Germany, Charles the Bald founded France, but Lothair…. could never get the love from his other two brothers and he ended up brokering a weak peace agreement and leaving his share of the union to HIS three sons.

Son 1 took Nothern Italy, Son 2 Provence and Son 3 (Lothair II) got Lotharingia

There is no Lotharingia today because Lothair II couldn’t get a legitimate heir to the throne. He only produced a bastard child named Hugh to run what is now the Benelux region. But because he was such a bastard, Hugh had his eyes gouged out by Charles the Fat (a son of Louis the German) and things disentigrated from there.

Bottom Line: The empire is always pissed away in a peter principled way when the children come to rule what they themselves never grasped.

Distance to Mars: The closest theoretical point Earth and Mars can be is when Earth is at its aphelion  (most distant point in its elliptical orbit around the sun- average 149,597,888 km), and Mars is at its closest (average 227,939,100 km). At this point, the two planets are separated by only 54.6 million km. The closest point in recent history was back in 2003, when Earth and Mars were separated by only 55 million km.

Emissions of U2 360° Tour: a 100-date, 18-month world tour with 70,000 air miles (113,000km) in a private jet. £90 million pounds or $230 million dollars later the tour has the three 390-ton stages, folded up and caravaned around the globe, with 200 roadies neatly tucked inside.

Opening night in Barcelona’s Nou Camp last week launched the spacestation-esque stage and a satellite phone link-up with the ISS that sure did make those old guys seem fly. But then carbonfootprint.com measured the impact and it came out to 65,000 tonnes of CO2. The company’s environmental consultant Helen Roberts concluded…

“The carbon footprint generated by U2′s 44 concerts this year is equal to carbon created by the four band members travelling the 34.125 million miles* from Earth to Mars in a passenger plane. You also have to add the carbon emissions from the same number of concerts again next year. Just looking at the 44 concerts this year, the band will create enough carbon to fly all 90,000 people attending one of their Wembley concerts to Dublin. To offset this year’s carbon emissions, U2 would need to plant 20,118 trees.”

*34.125 x 1.6 = 54.592 million km …

So fellas I appreciate all you’ve done for the rest of us over the years, the music was really great except the zooropa pop debacle. I also appreciate you guys forgoing your geriatric tours to save the planet, but knowing how much you guys care…. Listen, if you leave soon you all can get the next one-way rocket out to Mars. Now you’re going have to parachute in that last bit. I’d say pack the ipods, some fanta and a few effects pedals… but that’s it. Find the rover when you get there, and we’ll do a link-up with Oprah for St. Patty’s day.

Idea for a new tour t-shirt: Take off the Sunglasses Bono

(via the independent and yesbutnobutyes)

“Bubbles is more fun than a lot of people I know. I saw Bubbles at a wedding in a tux. He has great table manners.”

-Quincy Jones-

Bubbles the chimp and his alpha male master Mike parted ways long ago. What started as a rescue mission from a Cancer research lab, became limelight, uber-military bling, and outright poop on the wall freakdom. Equal toilet rights and jokes about his pampers made Bubbles ornery.  When he tried to eat a little boy, Michael had him sent away. The Enquirer reported that Prince had used remote viewing and mind control to rearrange the monkey’s thought processes, but as of today still no comment from the artist formerly known as.

Whether or not monkey and Michael will be reunited in a plastination Body Worlds exhibit remains to be seen. After all, Bubbles, 26, is still alive. Now that Jesse Jackson is a spokesperson for the Jackson clan in the “deliberanation” of a second autopsy, the remains of the day remain to be dealt with. I’m sure that disembodier extrordanaire, Gunther von Hagens, is foaming at the mouth with cadaver envy.  The addition of a chimp and a moonwalker to his wax body world would really tie the room together.

How different is a Chimp from a Human? In 1952, Paul Maclean proposed that the higher primate brain (including a Bubble brain) may be layered like a cake. The R-complex (reptillian brain) carries out the most basic functions associated with survival- instincts- balance, autonomic muscle control, breathing. Next comes the Limbic System- a hodgepodge of nerve pathways that control our internal and external reactions to pleasure and pain (in use when Bubbles partied in Tokyo). Finally the Neocortex is where higher primates can coordinate, evaluate and imaginate their thought processes (stimulated when Bubbles realized he got dumped for another chimp named Max).

Maclean’s triune brain theory was based on years of studying injured soldiers, injured monkeys, injured cats, injured rats…. It offered an idea of how analytical skills integrate and where they come from. I wonder if he could have done anything for Bubbles.

I attended a dinner party last week, and in a conversation with a German colleague it was divulged that among the possessions of Michael Jackson were the eyes of Albert Einstein. I have no idea whether this is true as receipts for such purchases are difficult to come by. Given the strange misadventures of Einstein’s brain, it is certainly possible that his eyes are also loose. They were last seen in New Jersey in the 1950′s. Would Bubbles know about this? Would Bubbles know anything about  disarming the alarm system Michael had on his bedroom? Was Bubbles around for the sleepovers and the wine drinking?

(www.freebubbles.org)

Today Bubbles is recovering from his bouts of suicide and depression. He spends most of his time reminiscing in a Wauchula, Florida, ape rehab center- trying to teach to teach the other apes how to moonwalk. This song is for you Bub. I feel your pain.

“I can`t think of a better way to spread the message of world peace than by working with the NFL and being part of Super Bowl XXVII.“

Michael Jackson, K.O.P.

thank you finland