Swamette to the Vet, Not Yet.

Kentucky Derby-winning racehorse Barbaro was euthanized today. That event had an immediate effect on Swamette and our plans for tomorrow.

Tuesday morning Swamette is scheduled for arthroscopic surgery on her right knee. The original plan was to have Zak the Yak's vet do the surgery. However, after the news about Barbaro, Swami decided that in case there were any complications he did not want to risk having the vet put Swamette down.

In other news today, Swami discovered that a Google search for Swamette turned up an art "masterpiece" by the name of Swamette's Secret. This gem is, unfortunately, in The Museum of Bad Art. Bummer. I would expect to find Swamette in the Met.

Thanks to Susan Gets Native, Zak saw some photos of baby yaks. He thought they might be his nephews. It appears to The Swami that they were just taken out of the washer and dryer during the fluff cycle. This reminds Swami that it is time for today's laundry tip: remember when washing your wife's yak skin thong and your socks, they both go on the top rack with the glasses and cups.

Sex Sells; Who Knew!

The Swami was listening to his wood-burning radio earlier this week when he had a Eureka! moment. The announcer mentioned a story about how some Seattle coffee shops are boosting sales at their drive-thrus by having scantilly clad baristas.

As you can well imagine, Swamette is going to be thrilled out of her gourd when I tell her how sales of yak milk are going to increase once she stands at our window in her two-piece yak fur bikini selling fermenting yak milk. [Yes, I know that was a run-on sentence.]

Wow, Swamette is going to have a great time. milking yaks, selling yak milk; milking yaks, selling yak milk; milking yaks, selling yak milk; milking...well, you get the idea. Don't worry though, she is still going to have enough time to clean out the yak stables and serve Swami his three gourmet meals a day.
THUD!!
Oops, The Swami dozed off there and fell out of his chair while dreaming.
Well, time for me to go clean the stables.

De-toothification

The Swami possesses many great powers. The Swami has never possessed strong teeth. [We shall skip any allusions as to whether Swami is merely possessed --- or whether he should be repossessed].

Swami over the years had slowly progressed to the point where the majority of his teeth had received root canals. One of Swami's less memorable Christmases was when a very nice English dentist did a root canal on Christmas Day 1977 in Dubai, so that Swamette, The Boys and I could leave the next day on a flight to the Far East.

Last Tuesday Swami had the last of several weeks of dental work done. It culminated in having the last six upper teeth removed and the upper denture inserted. Swami now knows the true meaning of the word "sore." Swami, who was awake but numbed, developed a very quick, and deep appreciation for what any dental patient prior to anesthesia had to go through.

The Swami almost had the vapors when the dentist asked his assistant for "the mallet." No folks, Swami is not making funny; that is actually what the dentist said and what he used at one point. Fortunately, prior to that point Swami had not irritated the dentist by attempting to inflict any humor upon him. The good news is that with relatively little [read: no] effort Swami has been able to go from 185 to 175 lbs. in only eight days. I can tell as I ride Zak the Yak up the valley that he appreciates my weight loss.

After seeing what an effective weight loss program this is, Swami may be patenting and franchising the all new Denture Diet Plan. (Opening soon in a strip mall near you).

If you want to get in on the ground floor of "Swami's Denture's In An Hour Weight Loss Plan," start saving for your franchise fee now. Swami may need to begin advertising this and other money-making opportunities (for Swami) on this web site soon.

Hey, you think it is cheap for Swamette to pay for prescriptions to keep Swami semi-sedated?!

No Antifreeze For The Weasel

The Swami is doing some deep-breathing as he types. It is supposed to relieve stress and frustration. Oh, I wish.

After speaking with the ever-friendly wireless phone company, I now have exactly the same service and number of minutes as before I began taking to them. However, I am now going to be paying $20.00 less per month. This is good. But why should you have to check periodically to ask if there are better rates, rather than the newer rates automatically applying. Swami really needed something else to keep track of.

With colder weather finally approaching the steppes of outer Ohio, Swami was busy today putting antifreeze in his turban, as well as in his adhesion meter.

Fortunately, some of the old stand-by tools, such as Swami's Garden Weasel, do not require much maintenance. It is a little known fact (and absolutely true) that about 15-20 years ago Swami received a Garden Weasel as an anniversary present from his son's. Swami, who has always been two mules short of a wagon train, had found the name "Garden Weasel" amusing.

Swami's sons had obviously, and wrongly, assumed that such a gift might put an end to such hilarity.

During one of the Winter Olympics I had suggested something along the lines that the ice skaters should have to perform a Triple Lutz while using a Garden Weasel. Trust me, it was much funnier if you had been there. Well, of course, you are thinking: It could not be less funny.

Some Cheesy Ruminations

The thousands of regular readers of Yak Herder Central may have noticed that The Swami has been a bit remiss (hey, that sounds better than lazy). Swami has developed a greater appreciation for those people who blog daily, or at least five days a week. He has discovered that it actually takes time and --- Horror of horrors --- you have to think! Don't laugh. Intense thinking can, and has, caused Swami's turban to start smoldering from overheating.

Unfortunately, Swami's parents are both deceased. This, as I may have mentioned before, means that I am an orphan. Despite repeated entreaties, Bill Gates has not seen fit to adopt Swami. And before someone suggests that Swami seek adoption by Madonna or Angelina Jolie, remember: Swami does have some standards.

Until such time as the desired adoption occurs, Swami will continue working. Swami has not had as much time to blog since he is, among other things, learning a new computer system since my employer has been acquired by another organization. Swami thinks that it would save a lot of time by cutting out all of the intermediate acquisitions and moving directly to the stage where every business is a division of Walmart! That seems to be the direction we are headed.

Returning to my theme [THEME?,....I HAVE A THEME?!?...Since when does the Swami have a theme? Well, turn up the volume, huh...Oh, NOT that kind of theme?] Easy does it. As I was saying, I now understand why my older son, Geoff, a freelance writer, gave up on writing a daily blog AFTER spending the entire day writing articles, columns or books.

I believe that this is the point where Swami is required to plug Geoff's book which is now available for pre-order on Amazon.

Now to avoid sibling rivalry, of which there is very little. Here is a plug for younger son Kevin's business blog and his book from a couple years ago [a second book of Kevin's will be out in 2008].

You have just seen before your very eyes why, as a change of pace at least, it would be helpful for The Swami to have a theme for his post. This has been the product of Swami ruminating as he munched on some yak cheese. Ruminating is a habit Swami picked up from Zak. I wonder though, can one ruminate and munch at the same time?

See, this is the type of thing that can lead to a smoldering turban.

Is The Swami Ready For A Twelve Step Program?

Well, "they" say the first step to solving a problem is acknowledging that there is a problem. The Swami is at least acknowledging that he might have a problem. The Swami has not yet heard of any supplier of "crack caffeine" but as a close second Swami was supplied for Christmas with some chocolate-covered coffee beans.

Hey, one snack that provides two of the major food groups: chocolate and caffeine. How can you beat that?

When Swami arrived home today, he emptied his pockets and discovered a, Huh ....what is that?!


Well, after examining the object at the left, Swami realized that he had at various times during the day put a vitamin and later a chocolate-covered coffee bean into his suit pocket. Yes, Swami must wear a suit to work. Rest assumed though that Swami's suit and pin-stripe turban make a fine ensemble.

Swami is still in deep thought as to whether this could be the world's next break-thru product: a chocolate-covered coffee bean that is fortified with vitamins!! It's practically a complete meal!


All right, I know that this is not a balanced diet. For that you would have to add: a beaker of yak milk, a hunk of yak cheese and, as a vegetable, a packet of ketchup.

Swami has been keeping an eye on the OSU-Florida football game as he types this. How, you might ask, can The Swami write such meaningful prose and watch TV. You might ask that, but then again you might also need help distinguishing what constitutes great prose. Well, oh wise readers, Swami merely raises the periscope in his turban and turns it toward the TV.

From what Swami has seen so far in the first quarter and a half, it's a good thing that Swamette rolled a couple of extra barrels of fermented yak milk into the cooler.

Toward the Primordial Slime

Swamette and Swami recently participated in National Geographic's Genographic Project. This past week we "received" our results. That is we could view the results and print them from The Genographic Project website. If you have an interest in genealogy (in a macro sense), history, anthropology or just want to have something to bore your friends with, this is it.

If you want the specifics and technical details you might want to roam around their site. Here, however, I can give you a quick overview of our results as interpreted after a few vats of fermented yak milk.

If you are a follower of Bishop Usher and believe that God created the world at 9 am on an October morn in 4004 B.C. --- you might as well stop reading now.

Up until this week Swamette had been suitably impressed that The Swami's ancestry on his mother's side could be traced back to the Earl of Arundel and at least to one of the Sureties at the signing of the Magna Carta. Well, Swami thought he had gone one better by having parts of his genetic code traced back to east Africa between 31,000 - 79,000 years ago. Not bad, I thought.

But no, Swamette has to show off. Her Haplogroup U5 DNA traces back to its oldest common ancestor at about 50,000 years ago. And it is descended (as I believe I understand it) from the much older Haplogroup L1 to between 150,000 - 170,000 years ago.

It is at this point that The Swami's great powers of logic, intuition, deduction, prestidigitation, distrimulation, charlatanism and other mysteries of olde allow us to see a more detailed tableau.

The Swami is confident that it would have been his ancestors who invented the wheel. This is a case of elementary logic: How else would the early nomadic tribesmen have utilized the drive-thru window at Og's Yak Burgerama. By simple extrapolation (and discombobulation) we can conclude that these same ancestors of Swami had to have mastered the making and use of fire to cook the yak burgers. It is as sure as that the knight follows the damsel.

Or as sure as The Swami follows the Swamette.