S U N D A E
love
dad
Sunday, October 4, 2026
Saturday, October 3, 2026
Reason
S E L F A W A R E
Vitruvian Man
da Vinci
Humans don't settle for just being.
We have our own specific identity
and we want it to have purpose.
Why do I exist?
What should I do?
How do I fit in?
These are questions requiring reflection -
objective observation of one's own personal
characteristics as well as one's role in society.
Physical sustenance alone is never enough
to sustain the life of the mind.
A G R I C U L T U R E
Farming. Growing crops for future food.
Provide water and protection for the plants.
You understand time as a string of days.
There is a time to plant, time to nurture and
time to harvest. These seasons repeat as a
group into a year. Tracking the paths of stars
in the night sky enabled ancient farmers to
calculate where they were in the plant's
life cycle. Observation and simple math
enabled humanity to harvest a surplus,
providing enough food to support the
creation of towns.
E N G I N E E R I N G
Ziggurat of Ur
2100 BC
You need a plan.
What will it look like?
How long will it take?
How many builders will be needed ?
What kind of material is best to use?
What about the weather?
Where's the money?
We will need engineers and mathematicians.
Of course, this all has to be recorded so hire
a good number of scribes.
P O L I T I C S
What a clever species we are.
We organize to get things done.
Someone has to be in charge.
Rulers were made King.
Laws are made to govern behavior.
Disputes arise between societies that
sometimes require the lethal use of force.
Politics involves the acquiring of power
and then its efficient use for governing.
A R T
Venus of Willendorf
About 30,000 years ago someone carved
the woman of their desire. She was
four inches tall, a token of sensual form.
Her compact curves fit comfortably in the
palm of one's hand - just small enough
to take with you wherever your group
chanced to wander.
The head is under a basket. Could be
this prehistoric artist figured carving
facial features too difficult. Could be
that art doesn't always follow logic.
F A I T H
Life ever lasting. Heaven awaits those
of faith. It is a sacred story involving
redemption, as God had his son crucified
for the sake of cleansing humanity of
their sins.
Stories of faith address questions that have
answers science cannot provide. Like matters
of the spirit, sacred events leave no physical
trance for our detection. Undoubtedly,
much remains beyond the ability of our
current scientific instruments to discover.
But it will still need to be physical to detect.
Organizations promoting spiritual values often
validate human feelings of empathy, as well as
setting standards for decency and fairness.
Love thy neighbor.
What a concept.
* * * * *
© Tom Taylor
OVER EASY
Sunday, September 27, 2026
Saturday, September 26, 2026
Recent Life
H E S P E R O C Y O N / A N C I E N T D O G F A M I L Y
The long muzzled face looks like a dog.
The stance could be shared with a cat.
Long neck. Long tail. Too long for a
modern dog. The long torso allows for
considerable bend - like a greyhound.
The spring of the back adds to the animal's
propulsion. The leg's backward knee is
actually the animal's ankle. Beneath it
are the foot bones that never touch ground.
I C E A G E E L E P H A N T
The Pleistocene extends back over two million years.
It was a time of fluctuating cooling and warming climates.
At its peak the last Ice Age covered 30 percent of the
globe's land area. The fossils of this species of elephant
were uncovered in South America. Elephants populated
the Earth everywhere.
P A L A E O L O X O D O N A N T I Q U U S
Thirteen feet tall at the shoulders.
Just about fifteen tons on the scale.
It's hard to come up with the name
of a four-legged mammal that is larger.
The diverse and widespread family of
elephants is now reduced to a shrinking
pool, mostly domesticated or protected
inhabitants of government lands.
A L L I N T H E F A M I L Y
Flat footed. Every member of this family of species
uses its foot bones for feet, and not a leg extension.
The tree dwellers, Gibbons and Orangutan,
have arms that reach the full length of their body to
touch the ground. The Gorilla's head is larger than the
human's but half of its skull is made up of a massive jaw.
Only the human stance is totally vertical. What truly
stands out, though, is the size of the human cranium,
where the brain resides, holding within its confines
the ability of reason and imagination.
P R I M A T E R E S O R T
This lakeside resort is representative of a Pleistocene
environment that primates of all sorts continue to favor.
It has a healthy forest, access to plenty of water as well
as providing a comfortable, mild climate for lounging.
It's ideal for gibbons, orangutans, chimpanzees and
gorillas. Humans would add a Hyatt.
S A B E R T O O T H
11,000 years ago Ice Age saber toothed tigers
inhabited what is now Los Angeles. There were likely
human witnesses to the likes of these Saber Tooths,
Mammoth Elephants and Giant Sloughs.
It is in this arena that human awareness may first
separate these people from the ancients.
It is the isolation of human consciousness.
A new story begins.
* * * * *
© Tom Taylor
OVER EASY
Sunday, September 20, 2026
Saturday, September 19, 2026
Asteroid
A G E O F D I N O S A U R S
The dinosaurs dominated the landscape for
175 million years.
A S T E R O I D I M P A C T
One day 66 million years ago an asteroid 7 miles across
hit the Earth with the force of a speeding bullet.
The impact liquified rock twenty miles deep.
A mile high tsunami resulted. Clouds of debris blocked
sunlight for years, destroying photosynthesis because
of the widespread plant die offs. 75% of all animal
species were swept from existence as starvation and
toxins took their toll.
T O X I C V O L C A N T I C G A S
A second source of catastrophic death was also
occurring in India as volcanic eruptions belched
toxic gases, rich in sulfur, into the atmosphere.
The Earth's plants were not only cut off from
their ultimate energy bar, the sun, but the rain
came laced with chemicals only a refinery
would appreciate.
A G E O F M A M M A L S
The world is an empty place.
The noise and nuisances of life are gone.
Every life strategy you can think of is available
to those able to show up. Recovery from mass extinction
begins immediately.
First off, who are our survivors?
Generally speaking, small seed-eating animals
that can survive long periods without food.
Eventually DNA fills this land of opportunities
with animal improvisations of every sort.
The species best engineered to meet the
circumstance wins out over time. But
success is not guaranteed. There are always
new challenges that must first be met.
E L E P H A N T B I R D
The large bipedal predator like T. rex was gone.
An ostrich type bird eventually developed enough
to occupy this long empty niche. The musclebound
legs say this bird would never get off the ground.
A small head with a bird bill replaces a massive
jaw filled with teeth as in the earlier dinosaur version.
Apparently useless wings replace clawed forearms.
No need for a tail as counterbalance to the weight
of a heavy head and neck up front because of
its nonexistence.
This bird was a dinosaur with feathers.
P R I M A T E A N C E S T O R
The oldest known species of primate lineage.
Purgatorius appears in the fossil record about
100,000 years following the Cretaceous - Paleocene
extinction. It probably ate seeds and lived in trees
like a squirrel. The prominent nose makes it
easier to track down buried seeds.
How horrified they might have been
once they found out their distant offspring
would turn out to be apes.
* * * * *
© Tom Taylor
OVER EASY
Sunday, September 13, 2026
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