Around the first of the year, in an impulsive moment, I bought a page-a-day calendar of survival lessons taken from some U.S. Army handbook. I was expecting cool stuff like making a compass from a shoestring and starting a fire with bubble gum. Instead, so far it's mostly been a letdown. There have been a lot of very general tips, like "Get water" and "Avoid mosquitoes." Those are undoubtedly important, but I don't need a weather man to tell me that the wind blows and that I should seek shelter. And I doubt I'm going to be trapped behind enemy lines for an appreciable amount of time.

But one from earlier this week takes the cake. The heading is "Survival With Natives: Dos and Don'ts." It really makes me wonder if this calendar is actually based on genuine Army policy; it would explain so much. If you can't read the picture, here's the text (emphasis added to my favorite line):

Let the natives contact you. Deal with the recognized headman or chief to get what you want. Show friendliness, courtesy, and patience. Don't show fright; don't display a weapon. Treat natives like human beings, and respect their local customs and manners. Respect personal property, especially their women. Don't take offense at pranks played on you -- primitive people especially are fond of practical jokes. Learn all you can from natives about woodcraft and getting food and drink. Take their advice on local hazards. Avoid physical contact without seeming to do so. Whatever you do, leave a good impression. Other men may need this help.

Maybe the natives can teach me how to start a fire.

E. McPan had a post the other day about coming up with brilliant ideas, only to discover that someone beat you to the punch. Mine aren't as interesting or creative as hers, but this sort of thing happens to me all the time, too. Recently, for example, I was shuffling through my iPod, and landed on Dwight Yoakam's version of Johnny Cash's "Understand Your Man." Listening to it, I got to thinking, This sounds a whole lot like Bob Dylan's "Don't Think Twice, It's Alright." Here, compare for yourself:


Naturally, I decided to write about this discovery. Now, I wasn't planning on any kind of startling expose' about how Johnny Cash is a big plagiarist or anything. I was just going to point it out and maybe riff on musical influences, and perhaps find a way to work in one of my favorite music industry anecdotes, about how John Fogerty got sued for plagiarizing himself.

At some point, I decided to do a little investigating, since I never really thought my idea was all that original. In fact, I assumed that someone, somewhere must have commented on the great similarity between the songs. As it turned out, a few seconds of googling turned up hundreds of mentions of the similarity, ranging from those aligned with my thoughts, i.e., that the two artists collaborated and influenced each other, and the overlap between "Understand Your Man" and "Don't Think Twice" is totally understandable, to the bizarre rants that Dylan stole from Cash even though Dylan's song appeared first (and was itself probably a take-off of an older song).

Anyway, I didn't think I was breaking any major new ground here, but it was kind of disappointing to realize that the connection I had just hit upon was glaringly obvious to darn near everyone who ever heard the tunes. Maybe there's just something about me and music, though: It was only a few weeks ago that I discovered that Katy Perry's mega-hit "I Kissed a Girl" was not a cover of Jill Sobule's 1995 song of the same name.

I think I'll go crank my Victrola now.

I've finally figured out what Obama's foreign policy strategy is, and it's brilliant.

Step 1: Open talks with all of the country's adversaries.

Step 2: Offend them with really insulting, poorly interpreted tacky gestures.

Step 3: ??

Step 4: Profit!