Joe Nation's Final Days

ALL IS CALM, ALL IS BRIGHT...


A memorial fund, farmerman? If you have cash to spare, why don't you get the next round then, huh? <hic>

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What a tragedy!

Such a waste!

Joe Nation
Left the station
All on an autumn's day
He was tried and fried
They led him quite away
His agony
Was hurtful to me
Did they recover his mortal clay?

i dreamed i saw joe nation last night
alive as you and ne
says i but joe your some days dead
i never died says he,
i never died says he

And standing there as big as life
and smiling with his eyes.
Says Joe "What they can never kill
lives on in parentheses,
lives on in parentheses.

dj(with apologies to all folk singers everywhere)jd62

So, does this mean we don't need to send Joe a Christmas card this year?

Any predictions as to when Joe will make his next post here? :wink:

Reyn, Reyn, Reyn...I've told you, Joe is daid.

On Sunday morning, Joe sent me a few photos he took with his cell phone camera before the ceremony. This one shows OiOI and Zju-Jzu and the <shudder> tower. Nobody, not even Joe, could have survived the Zthatzne's Flinging Tower.

I say he's back by next week.

I know you mean well, but it's not nice to give people false hope, Reyn.

It has been very tough for me to lose Joe. He was a good friend, you know. Sometimes when I run across his avatar, I still imagine he is here with us. I'm sure others are grieving as well. Anyway, please don't make this any more difficult than it already is. Okay? <sniff>

Okay, so it has been one week since Joe departed.

I know that Joe would have wanted us to remember him fondly but go on with our lives. So that's what I've been trying to do. But it hasn't been easy. No matter where I go or what I do, I find reminders of Joe.

A few days ago, we had a harvest moon. Looking up into the night sky, I wondered how far out there Joe ended up...or if he is still flying. I went inside and read the paper. I wondered what Joe would have to say about the latest right wing political scandal. I threw the paper down and went into the kitchen to eat dinner. But I just couldn't bring myself to eat it. Mr. Eva had made shish kebab. It reminded me of how Joe had been...um, skewered only a week ago. I lost my appetite.

Finally, I decided that what I really need is a few days away. Some place far away, where there will be no reminders of Joe. I went to the closet to pack, and as soon as I saw it lying there, I remembered.....

Joe sent me back to Tulsa last weekend with a strange suitcase.

In all the commotion, I hadn't even opened it. "What could be inside?" I wondered.

How curious! There were several strange objects...a book, a primitive mask, some indecipherable notes and these two small statues. They're about 11" tall.



What in the world do you think they are?

And...why do you think Joe wanted me to have them?

Beats me.

Eva
Eva, it's obvious. Joe hated having to dust his trinkets.

Happy dusting in memory of Joe.

BBB

Um, I don't think so, BBB. Why would Joe care if they were dusted after he was gone? Dust to dust, y'know. :wink:

There were also those cryptic notes. They look like they're written in some offshoot of Spanish or Indian...maybe Zthatzne, I wonder? I'm taking them to an expert translator this afternoon. Maybe they will provide some insight about the statues. I can't imagine why Joe wanted me to have these.

Eva
Eva, do you think they are one set of Joe's collection of door knockers?

Joe probably selected the one with the big knockers for the front door of his new home in heaven.

Joe's door knocker collection

BBB

Eva
Eva, do you think they are one set of Joe's collection of door knockers?

Joe probably selected the one with the big knockers for the front door of his new condo in heaven.

Joe's door knocker collection

BBB

Hmmm!

I followed your link. It says these are some sort of goddess figures. And something about the symbols representing Birth, the Earth, Nature and the Tides of the Moon.

Okay, maybe he sent them to me because I am, after all, a goddess. I can buy that. But what's this about birth and all the rest? Does it have something to do with the Zthatzne Flinging Tower, or where Joe might be now?

(thinking, thinking)

Aaaaand....

This big, old book was in the suitcase, too. I mean, REALLY old book. It looks four or five hundred years old, probably a first edition.



I'm taking it to a book dealer today. Someone who specializes in antiquities. Maybe they'll know what it is.

Whoa! That book is worth at least $90,000!!

THANK YOU, JOE!!!

Turns out, I was right. It's a first edition of "Foxe's Book of Martyrs," published in 1563. Supposed to be a historic religious artifact. It details the lives and especially deaths...(really gory woodcuts)...of all the martyrs identified by the Catholic church.

I wonder how Joe got his hands on such a thing?

Eva
Eva, I think I've found the answer to your question:

Police move to solve decades-old theft of rare documents from Denmark's Royal Library
ASSOCIATED PRESS
COPENHAGEN, Denmark, Dec. 10

In a breakthrough on solving a 25-year-old crime, investigators have uncovered 1,600 antique books, maps and documents stolen from Denmark's Royal Library. Four suspects also were detained, police said Wednesday.

The thefts of the works, worth millions of dollars, started in the late '60s and stopped in 1977-1978, said Erland Kolding Nielsen, director general of the state-owned library.

''It is without any doubt one of the largest thefts of cultural artifacts in Denmark, ever,'' he said.

Over the years, some 3,200 rare books and documents including first editions by Immanuel Kant, Thomas More, John Milton and several hundreds prints by Martin Luther had disappeared from the downtown library.

Until recently, the Royal Library and the Danish police were without a clue in the theft of the works, dating from the 16th century to the 18th century.

A breakthrough came ''in Britain some months ago when a number
of valuable works ... were sent to an auctioneer,'' the head librarian said. He said the items were worth between $323,000 and $488,000, but gave no other details.

The Royal Library was alerted, identified the books and contacted Danish police.

Copenhagen Police spokesman Henrik Svindt said 1,600 of the
missing books and other items had been rounded up in Denmark and
elsewhere. He did not identify the suspects, or reveal how many books
had been sold or who bought them.

The investigation with the Royal Library started three months ago and is ongoing, said Svindt, who refused to comment on media reports that three of those in custody included the widow of a former Royal Library worker, her son and daughter-in-law.

The 68-year-old widow reportedly was arrested when she tried to sell some of the documents through an auctioneer, the newspaper Politiken reported. Her husband, who died last year, worked for decades as a philologist with the Library's Oriental Collection.

Besides first editions by More, Milton and Kant, the stolen documents also included atlases by Dutch cartographer Willem Blaeu.

The Royal Library, housed since 1999 in a smoked glass-and-steel building known as the Black Diamond on the city's waterfront, has existed as a national library and a museum since 1648 and as the main library for the University of Copenhagen since 1927.

wow, joe left me his rather extensive collection of pornographic pez dispensers

sorry, the TOS prevents me from posting images

dj(i'm not sure i want to eat that candy, ummm, knowing where it's been and all)jd62