Fragments From Floyd

State of Altered Reality

When I raised a concern about the Crichton pseudo-docu-novel "State of Fear" last January, many cried "It's only a book. What are so worked up about?" to which I responded something like "Americans don't have the critical thinking skills to separate fiction from fact if it's glitzed up, hyped and between the covers of a book published by a successful novelist, it passes for REALITY and TRUTH. We assume if somebody is famous and talented in one arena, then them must be a reliable authority no matter what their topic." I suggested that the fiction writer-as-scientist made an unreliable authority on global warming. And Now, this:

WASHINGTON, Sept. 28 - His last book, "State of Fear," a novel that casts doubt on scientific theories of global warming, was published more than nine months ago, but the reviews were still pouring in on Wednesday, even as Michael Crichton folded his 6-foot-9-inch frame into a seat to testify before the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works.

Appearing before the Senate, even though the reviews have run thus:

"More silly than scary," the flier dropped off by the Natural Resources Defense Council said.

"Notable mainly for its nuttiness," an analysis from the Brookings Institution said.

"Does not reflect scientific fact," the Union of Concerned Scientists said.

And the Climatology Folks had some unfavorable opinions of Crichton's state of confusion as well.

But then, it's the Senate--the governmental counterpart of Reality TV. Let them have men about them who are entertaining. And tall.

Friday Jots

Perfect Symmetry ** The week started with a disappeared blog. Wednesday, smack in the middle, I got out of my truck in the Radford U parking lot and a foul-smelling cloud of steam rose from under the hood--a $300 (water pump) problem thankfully fixed by the time I was ready to go home. Woulda been a long walk home. And now, it's Friday, and I have finally incubated Ann's hospital germs to the point where the histamines have taken the castle. But alas, cometh the cavalry: Sir Sudafed to the rescue. I need to at least win a battle; Traveler Trish is heading this way later today for a brief visit to Goose Creek.

Salad Days ** In spite of the prolonged drought (that threatens to bring us a colorless fall) we had nurtured a few dozen heads of Buttercrunch and Valentines lettuce to the point where they were ready for dinner salads. Some of the slips I pulled from tomato plants in July were bearing tommytoes as well, so I went with tupperware bowl in hand to bring in the harvest. Not. More deep deer prints pierced the dust; there were no lettuce plants. Thankfully, deer don't care for tomatoes without Italian dressing and a little coarse-ground pepper.

Why 2k ** We're preparing for a week + of hardship and depravation at our house. At least I am. And, unlike most emergencies, this one is totally predictable in timing and duration. We've begun squirreling away leftovers from meals purposefully larger than they need to be. There are lists tacked on the refrigerator enumerating the drills of various essential tasks that must happen during the impending crisis: where is this, what to do for that, when such-and-such must happen and why. These are times that try men's souls. Or at least one man's: Ann is leaving me and Tsuga here for more than a week soon to fend for ourselves. It won't be pretty. More, as it happens.

Eye of Newt ** When a man reaches 'that certain age' of antiquity, he is graced in his countenance with a patina of character, adorned about his visage anew with epidermis excresences and gibbosities, spots and specks that arise unbidden like barnacles on the hull of a venerable freighter too long in port. The point is, I had a wart. While to others, perhaps, it was barely noticable, to me it sat at my right temple in three-dimensional hideousness, rough and horrid, a 'turreted mound' of ugliness. Often, it lured me to touch it with my fingertip, like a frozen pump handle calls to tongues in winter, and be disgusted and ashamed. I cursed the viral spawn that hid protected in its dermal lair there at my (retreating) hairline. Finally, I had had enough. One evening last week, I willed it away. The next morning, it was gone. I kid you not. Anyone who could explain this at the cellular level would certainly win the Nobel Prize. I encourage you to see what the quintessential Biology-Watcher Lewis Thomas had to say about this psychophysical phenomenon of disappearing warts. This is really worth reading.)

WikiWikiWoo ** Realitive to last year, the semester is experiencing navigable seas and favorable winds. Truth is, I can't tell a great deal of difference between this year's 120 and last year's 70 students. On a typical day now, only about 90 make it to class, the percentage of regular absenses pretty much equating as I had predicted with the number of D's and F's. Average on the first test was 70, versus last year's 56. I have, let us say, lowered my expectations based on last year's experience, and correspondingly have done a better job of leading my young horses to water. "This WILL be on the test" I say repeatedly in a typical lecture, and some of them drink. But as I started on in this bullet to say, the BioWiki I created for the class is working wonderfully well. I made the right choice there. Can something this useful be FREE?

Under (Re)Construction ** The resurrected blog here is still in need of a few final touches, most of which I am incompetent to figure how to do and will rely on my most gracious and beneficent server host DT to tweak in due time. Comments seem to have disappeared just yesterday. I can't make changes to my MT preferences or stylesheet. Bear with me. I've called in FEMA to assist, so not to worry. Just find a piece of floating flotsam to hold on to, don't breathe through your nose or mouth, avoid contact with any surfaces whatsoever, eat your hat if you're hungry, and enjoy communing with raw nature. Help is on the way.

Calling Them By Name

On a clear, crisp afternoon in the first week in September, I spotted my first Monarch of the year over a meadow of white boneset and goldenrod at its peak. The butterfly's presence prompted me to search for its favorite food, milkweed, and sure enough, we found it growing nearby. In my biology classroom a few days before, I had talked about the relationship between this very insect and plant, and so this sighting was a well-timed. Twenty of my students were with me in the field at just that moment to see these creatures together first hand-and for my students, to give these creatures names for the first time. Over the course of that hour outdoors, I held up, pointed out, and indentified a couple of dozen flowering plants and trees. One young lady afterwards asked if we were going to be doing this kind of hands-on outdoor study again. "This is the way I learn best" she said, a fact about herself as a student it seemed she had only that hour discovered.

Only two of a hundred and twenty students had raised their hands on the first day of class when asked who would be able to name a single wildflower in bloom in the nearest forest or pasture. For too many young Americans, back yards and woodlots have become an amorphous tangle of undistinguishable green-a sea of anonymous plants sheltering equally nameless animals. It is as if the greater part of the living world has become invisible and irrelevant. My students, like most, don't see very deeply into nature because they've not had much encouragement to look there. So many electronic and virtual distractions compete far too successfully for their attention. They have grown up in an era when our language in the digital world has grown rich while our vocabulary in the real world of nature has become sadly impoverished.

Beyond the shrink-wrapped plants and animals in our grocery store taxonomies, many of us no longer can call our fellow creatures by name, and there are costs to our ignorance. The naming of things contributes to our understanding of them and to knowing our place among them. Maybe it is significant that God set man the task of naming the creatures early on in Genesis. It was the first and necessary part of assuming our responsibility as stewards. What we have names for we are less likely to ignore, abuse or take for granted. It makes me sad that the eastern hemlock trees are dying. For my students, who have never distinguished hemlock from tulip poplar, this is an irrelevant abstraction. We know our friends by name, and attend to them better than we do rank strangers. We'd be better stewards if we knew nature's citizens on a first name basis, and knew more about their families and their kin.

But we've gradually neglected the memory of the names by which our grandparents knew their world. We don't know nuts or herbs or medicinals. We don't recognize forest trees or know how to use or enjoy their wood or fruits. None of my students could name wild grape, wild lettuce, walnut or cherry. Not a one knew what locust wood is 'good for' and only one recognized poison ivy climbing up a sycamore by the river. Nature-awareness once carried a high value, both for survival and toward an appreciation of personal ecology in the larger world. I think that certainly it still does--or could--if we'd make it an important part of a holistic education again.

I wish that, in our grade schools, we'd take imaginations and curiosity outdoors at recess, and take field trips to actual fields. Computers have their place in our classrooms, but let's use them to identify insects, leaves and flowers only after students have touched and smelled them with the sun on their shoulders. We should resist substituting the counterfeit experience of visiting Charlotte's Webpage for touching Charlotte's actual web in real barns, with real pigs and rats, and grappling with real relationships. I'd like to see a return to the education of naturalists in our colleges and universities where the study of life is too often reduced now to a mathematical model or a sequencing of the DNA mailed in from real creatures from disappearing rain forests. One can get a PhD in biology these days without getting his hands dirty with actual nature. And for our own parts, as touring nature consumers, let's not be content to stop at scenic overlooks and see the forest, but miss the trees entirely. We buy a few postcards of waterfalls or orchids to show the folks back home, not even knowing we've walked right past an endangered twayblade by the visitors' center sidewalk.

But what can a parent, a teacher or a newly-enlightened field trip student do to reclaim the names of the things we've forgotten and ignored from the places just beyond our classrooms, shopping malls and speeding cars? Can we learn to be at home in meadow or forest where our children are so sadly out of touch? Yes, I think we can. Let me suggest this as a first step: teach yourself to see by nurturing intentional vision.

Go slowly in nature and stop often. Look for the particulars. Take notes and draw sketches. Learn a dozen trees and recognize them in leaf, fruit and branch in every season. Learn a dozen wildflowers from spring, from summer and from autumn. And rekindle curiosity and wonder. Each insect or flower holds its own mystery and unique design. Be able to name a dozen birds, first by sight, then by their call alone. Know some salamanders-while they last-and a few dragonflies and even some common spiders and snakes.

Then, teach your children to see deeply. On regular walks around your back yard, pasture or woods show them your own attention to detail and watch how quickly they come to see the small world at their feet and call its creatures by name. Pick twigs from plants like spicebush, sassafras, and teaberry; scratch and sniff them and resurrect the neglected sense of smell that so powerfully builds memories in the out-of-doors. Turn rocks, and pluck blooms (not entire plants.) Use a hand lens to see more detail, and after seeing, find the names for the things you see. This has never been easier to do. The computer is a quick and convenient tool, but my first advice would be over time to accumulate a library of field guides you can carry with you and hold in your hands over the years. Study what you have found while sitting in the grass under the trees and ask for help from your children. Even the smallest can compare pictures.

Never before has the natural world needed each of us to know it, care for it and act on its behalf in such a way as it does in our times. We cannot be responsible stewards of a threatened planet if its creatures are distant, anonymous and irrelevant strangers. Be more aware than you've ever been in this cathedral made without hands, as John Muir called our world. Make friends of its inhabitants and know them by name.

Global Conundrums: You Go First

This is a snipped from the Global Warming module to which I pointed some few weeks ago. And from it, you have an assignment. (If my students have to suffer the fear of public speaking, so should you; so here's their task by tomorrow's class--rhetorically speaking. Don't feel obliged to solve these worldwide dilemmas here in comments. Save your wisdom for real forums.) Be prepared to describe three conundrums (I'm thinking they'll look that one up) in the present and future conflict between rich and poor nations with regard to global warming and energy use. I will call on several of you in class to discuss your answers.

It is no secret that the less-developed nations wish for the industrial nations to cut back on (CO2) emissions, with the argument that "you caused the problem, you bear the consequences." To a neutral observer (such as a scientist is supposed to be) this stance would not seem entirely unreasonable. On the other hand, it is also no secret that few (perhaps none) of those using this argument wish to relinquish their own hopes for increasing energy use, including the right to increased emission of greenhouse gases. So, the developing world’s argument is perhaps better described as "it is our turn now."

Thus is the dilemma for the advanced nations. Any cut they might make, at some expense and possible risk to their economies, might quickly be neutralized (as far as the common good) by increases of emissions by the less-developed nations eager to improve their own economic well-being. Again, a neutral observer might see this as not entirely out of line. Others might point to the fact that the less-developed nations, by and large, have taken a path of extraordinary population growth, which makes it that much more difficult to bring people up to a higher standard of living. In what sense are the industrial nations responsible for the well-being of the rapidly growing number of people elsewhere?

These questions go well beyond science and economics and touch the core of what it means to share a planet as a community. Given the complexity of the problem, a sense of urgency must prevail before a consensus can be found. As it stands, the urgency of the matter is not clear since the extent of the downside to greenhouse gas emissions is uncertain. It is quite probable that problems are created by global warming, but it is impossible to prove in a court of law that man-made emissions caused a given problem, such as a crop failure, a drought, a flood or a hurricane. Thus, the people who sustain most of the damage cannot sue the people who are mostly responsible. Distributed responsibility is not a prod for action...

It is good to appreciate, when observing the discussion among nations, that not all nations are equally at risk from the changes anticipated from global warming. A large country has many options for moving people into more favorable areas if it gets too hot or too dry for comfort in some places, or if sea level rises. Small, less developed, and unluckily-situated nations tend to have greater risks from climate change. In many cases they do not contribute much to the emissions anyway, so their promise to restrain use of energy would have little value in a setting of bargaining about future restraints on emissions.

The rich nations tend to be in favor of the status quo, since that has worked well so far (for them). The poor nations want change and restraint, but without risk to their own aspirations for a better economy. A bargain where "some are supposed to cease to fish so others can fish more" is going to be difficult to strike.

Night Fog

Wednesday has always been Hump Day, but it's not usually been as humpy as it is this fall semester.

I'll leave the house at nine and get home tonight at nine. Lecture at 11 followed by three back to back labs. And tonight when I get home, the moon will have waned two weeks since this shot was taken, hand-held, on arriving home from a meeting in town. There will be no moon, but even so, I'll stand beside the truck for a spell before I go inside. Last night, home at 9:30, the Milky Way overhead was a clear as I've seen it since the summer haze set in, back in late May, the empty darkness of the Coal Sacks the most visible nothingness, as if a million stars had been erased or painted black. A screech owl called from behind the house, and down the valley echoed the WHO--WHO WHO WHO--WHO WHO of a larger owl. Not a Barred. Great Horned, maybe? I'll have to look it up. But it won't happen today.

Today is Hump Day. And I'm already looking forward to stepping out into Hump Night darkness on Goose Creek.

A Billion Busted Birds

They're migrating through southwest Virginia now, on their way, many of them, to what's left of the Gulf Coast, then beyond for some, to Central and South America. It's not easy being winged. And way many don't make it. Part of the problem that kills perhaps as many as a billion birds a year, is city lights and glass windows of skyscrapers. Some cities (like New York) are dimming their lights or taking other measures to reduce the mortality.

These migrations have always been dangerous, but have become even more perilous as birds navigate through and around our cities. It is estimated that 100 million birds are killed every year in the United States alone through collisions with buildings. Second only to habitat loss as a cause of declining populations, some experts believe the number is even higher, perhaps as many as one billion killed annually. The height of tall buildings in New York City, the frequent use of reflective or simply transparent glass, and the illumination of, and within, these structures is a major component of injury and mortality for birds.

Shakey, But in the Saddle Again

Whew! That was a wild ride. Ya come out of the bunkhouse and go ta throw your saddle up your mount one morning, and there's nothing there but an empty hitching post and a ransom note.

I don't have a clue (well, I have a clue) who would find it worth their time to 'disappear' my blog. Point is, I'm back, with the longsuffering patience of my technologically adroit buddy Doug. And this time, I'll be harder to hack (and do a better job of keeping copies of all templates and such, should I ever have to climb out from such again, heaven forbid.)

It may take a while to get all links and blogroll and comments back in place, so be patient with me. And the search engine for the site will take some time to come together. Also, comments to older posts will not work, sorry. We'll move on from where we are.

Okay there, hoss. Let's ride the fence and take in that gorgeous blue sky out there. Giddap.

Imperfect Storms

Though it would make for a great object lesson for those prepared to ever change their minds about future climate change, Katrina and Rita might just be examples of the phrase STORMS HAPPEN. But to throw up the particulars of these two storms to prove a point misses the point and gives business-as-usual happy-talkers an opportunity to toss out the baby with the toxic-wasted bath waters of the hurricane season of 2005.

Unfortunately, cause-effect of large events like this have to be posited in terms of probabilities, not certainties. But read on: the probabilities of future Katrinas is most certainly going up as oceans continue to warm:

There are troubling signs in the meteorological record of a link between global warming and hurricane intensity, says Emanuel, a professor in MIT's Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences. But the best available science suggests that the now-scattered populations of the Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama coasts are the victims of mere happenstance.

There are simply too few examples of catastrophic hurricanes hitting U.S. shores to make out any statistical trend, says Emanuel. "It would be absurd to attribute the Katrina disaster to global warming," Emanuel wrote on his website this month.

What Emanuel does believe is that the average power of many tropical cyclones -- the blanket terms scientists use for hurricanes, typhoons, and cyclones -- has risen sharply over the past several decades, at least in the North Atlantic and North Pacific. Moreover, the increase is closely tied to changes in the surface temperatures of the oceans where tropical cyclones are born. In other words, when the sea surface temperature rises, the energy of the cyclones above that surface also rises -- and at an even faster rate.

And lately, ocean temperatures have been rising more than they've been falling. Emanuel's examination of North Atlantic and North Pacific storm records over the last 50 years show a marked increase in the average intensity of tropical cyclones.

"It's a big effect," says Emanuel. "It's gone up 50 to 80 percent over the last three decades or so."

Bold text is my emphasis. But 'mere happenstance' is a bit misleading. Lack of rigorous stats does not RULE OUT, it only says we can't say with statistical certainty that these storms are in a different subset compared to past storms. This COULD HAVE happened by chance alone, given that we have too few data points in our short climatological history to do the math. What do you think?

Here are some Global Warming Hotspots--some other global alarms--not statistically proven and never likely to be. So. Let's wave our hand at them and go about our business. Ya think?

Disincentivizing Demented Detonations

It has recently been discovered that the "72 Virgins" promised to car-bombers and their ilk is a misinterpretation of the Koranic promises to martyrs for the cause.

It is actually one 72 year old virgin!

Seeing the Light

Just what-if, mind you. What if the room here was not bathed each night in the glow of the monitor screen, no canister lights bathed the kitchen in 200 watts of light, and my desk lamp was nothing more than a gooseneck paperweight? Sure, this is always a possibility as hurricane season, then winter approaches. And toward this risk, we've squirreled away a couple of bags-of-100 chaffing dish candles. We have two wall-mounted gas lights fed by the 300-gallon tank outside, but only one wick between the two of them. And I'm wondering, what if we were seriously out of power, not for a few days, not even for a few weeks, but for long, dark months? We need at least to be able to read when the sun goes down, and have enough light to tune the crank radio, load the woodstove and find each other in the dark.

So I'm looking at Aladdin Oil Lamps, Deitz-type Hurricane Lamps, and the Petromax Lantern as possible solutions to our emergency lighting needs.

In the search, I've found some pages that may be useful to a few others, and in turn, if you have experiences (good or bad) with any of these forms of fueled lighting, do let me know. I'd like to order within a week.

Aladdin Lamp tips

Aladdin parts and products

Nuwick 120 hour candles (can be used for light cooking also)

Petromax BriteLyt. "These lanterns were used during WWII, as a means of lighting, heating, & cooking. The lantern is used by NATO forces, as well as various paramilitary groups around the world. The lantern's appearance & parts have not changed since their development, and they are still being constructed of solid brass, nickel plating." While these pressure-lamps put out a heck of a lot of light, they seem tedious to get going, and also make that backpacking-stove hiss that I'd not enjoy listening to while enjoying the eerie quiet of times without electricity--one of the benefits of power blackouts, I guess.

Let there be light. The kind remains to be determined. Bright ideas?

Web Nursery -- III

It turns out my made-up name for this little series of posts was closer to the truth than I knew: thanks to Susanna's field guide, she's told us this is a Nursery Web Spider.

While I'm still uncertain of the species, I think this is most definitely our spider momma here. Closely related members of the group are called "fishing spiders" and since this web nursery was within six feet of the creek, I'm checking out these interesting spiders for a match.

While investigating the nursery and seeing the momma spider for the first time, to my surprise, climbing up the stalk toward the web was a big, green grasshopper. Momma saw it too, and turned quickly to face him as he approached. What would she do to ward him off? I was pretty certain this was a gound hunting spider, so she wouldn't know how to wrap web around him and hang in up for dinner.

Tension built as the hopper edged closer and closer. But finally, he began slowly backing up, moving down the stem, and finally managed to get turned head down and got out of harm's way.

As you may have noticed, this image has an artificial, flat appearance--as if it were a diorama in a science museum. I was playing with my new flash, without which there would not have been enough light to capture this stand-off.

Bleeding to Death

Yeah, let's go get ANWR's drop of oil, and a smidge from the Florida coast, and make more oil thus cheaper gas. That's the ticket. It's all about me and mine and right now.

Meanwhile, our offshore rigs and coastal storage facilities, designed for Class 3 Hurricanes, bleed Texas Tea into the Louisianna marshes, with Rita preparing for Act Two. I'd opt for upgrading the survivability of what we already have in place, allowing gas prices to go high but stable and stay there, the money to pay down our staggering national debt and fund the next-generation technology. What in heaven's name are we leaving for our children?

Major spills (over 100,000 gallons) -- counts of total oil spills after Katrina between 44 and 65.
Bass Enterprises Production Company (Cox Bay): About 3.78 million gallons discharged, of which 960,000 gallons were recovered, 2 million gallons were contained and 982,000 gallons evaporated.

Shell (Pilot Town): About 1.05 million gallons discharged, of which about 718,000 gallons were recovered, 129,000 were contained and 105,000 gallons evaporated or *dispersed. Some 87,000 gallons have not been contained.

Chevron (Empire): About 991,000 gallons were released, of which 983,000 gallons were naturally *dispersed or evaporated, 4,000 gallons were recovered and 3,600 gallons were contained.

Murphy Oil Corporation (Meraux): About 819,000 gallons discharged, of which 305,000 were recovered, 196,000 gallons were contained and 312,000 gallons evaporated. Some 6,000 gallons were not recovered.

Bass Enterprises (Point a la Hache): About 461,000 gallons of oil discharged, of which half was contained and half evaporated.

* Dispersed? Read: broken down into microdroplets, eaten by filter-feeding oyster fry, small fish and zooplankton, or deposited in the bottom sediments where their chemicals will leach into the water of the gulf's estuarine ecosystem for decades. Dispersed does not mean disappeared or no longer a problem. It just means out of sight. They meant to tell you that. And evaporated? Where you suppose that oil is now? But hey: the solution to pollution is dilution. Right?

Web Nursery - II

So. I went back that afternoon to investigate this unexpected hatchery wrapped in the same web that usually snares and traps rather than protects. I was curious what kind of spider-mom might have put her nursery in such a conspicuous place. I was surprised to find a large female wolf spider guarding her brood. Or so I thought at first.

But I think I've misidentified my subject here, now that I stop and think: Wolf spiders are ground hunters and don't build webs, I thought. Wolf spiders are the ones you see first carrying their globular white egg sacs around on their backs among the garden duff; a week later, a hundred babies climb up on momma's back for a ride.

While this two-inch creature sure looks like a wolf spider, it must not be. Any arachnologists out there that can educate me?

There is one more character in this drama to introduce tomorrow; and later today, I'll go back and see if all the spiderlings have fledged and see if I can find any more clues about the mystery spider.

Has the Other Shoe Dropped?

Recombionics reports...a 9 year old female patient (JM) visited the Raganan Zoo prior to developing bird flu symptoms. She transferred to Sulianti Saroso Hospital on Wednesday from a hospital in Bekasi area. Two other patients were admitted on Wednesday and two patients with bird flu symptoms died.

...JM is the fourth or fifth person linked to the Ragunan Zoo which is cause for concern. The 3 or 4 zoo employees were a tour guide, two food servers, and a trader (the trader may be one of the food servers). These positions would not have close contact with the birds asymptomatically infected with H5N1, so the clustering among a visitor and service personnel is cause for concern.

And from Effect Measure: With the deaths of two young girls (ages 2 and 5), the Indonesian alarm bells are ringing more loudly. WaPo reports ten more hospitalized with high fever, bird flu suspected (numbers of hospitalized patients differ in various news reports). TimesOnline says some of the hospitalized cases come from rural areas where poultry farming is prevalent. But they report also a 9 year old girl who died after visiting the zoo. Her death seems not included in the other reports, so it is unclear what the current toll is. If zoo visitor case is accurate, combined with the reports of infections in a zoo guide and food vendor, it suggests transmission from birds has suddenly become much more efficient.

Web Nursery -- I

It hasn't been a good fall for spider webs. The pasture grass hasn't had enough time to grow tall; first cutting was far too late in the summer, and new growth is still not quite knee high. We've had so little moisture in the air, too, that the morning fogs that give a crystal glaze to a backlit web just have not come as I'd hoped. But one day last week, I stood on the creekbank sweeping the view for a place for my eye and lens to rest as the sun crested the top of the ridge and spilled into the valley. Across the way, a tangle of web held some, but not much, visual interest, so even though the lighting wouldn't be right for another twenty minutes, I took one shot and came inside.

Later, when I saw the image full resolution on the screen, I realized why this particular web was not quite normal: it was a nursery web, and the tiny motes I had thought were fragments of the disintegrating boneset flowerheads from the stalks above it actually were tiny newly hatched spiders. You can see them if you click the image above and view the enlargement. (The filigreed leaf I think is millefoil also growing into the web.)

It's an interesting if not stellar image for viewing, I think. The living three-dimensionality of spider-specks moving out into space gives me the sense of a small world frozen in time--sort of a Big Bang of the Spider Cosmos, maybe.

And there's more to the story: I went back later in the day, after discovering the specks were spiderlings, to investigate. There are two more characters to show you--tomorrow, and Friday. So stay tuned.

Rifts and Subduction Zones

Yes, I know the title has nothing to do with the image, but the terms pretty well describe my morning so far. My heart is out there in the fog that drifts above the meadow this morning, but my head is into more continental forms of drifting. I need to compress two hundred million years of tectonics into no more than ten minutes of class time tomorrow. I've at least found some very good graphics links to the topic here, and now will have to try very hard not to get bogged down in following every one of them. This is a massively interesting topic to a natureophilic closet geologist like me. Check it out. What do YOU know about how we learned about sea floor spreading and such? This only came together as acceptable science in the 1960's and is foundational (no pun intended) in our understanding about the physical existance of the world's land masses and their history. Ok. Back to the work at hand. No more butterflies for me today.

Climate School

What are the basic things an informed, college-educated person should understand about the science and interpretation of data associated with global warming / climate change? Our Intro Biology text has a few bits and pieces, but not enough. This is one of those major issues I'd like for us to dig into a bit deeper.

And through this discussion, a lot of basic concepts can be discussed and terms defined, embedded seamlessly in an extremely relevant real-life matter today's young people will inevitably face.

This full 24-part online course on the subject from The California Space Institute, is authored by a scientist from Scripps Institute of Oceanography. It seems to be about the right level of readability and scientific sophistication for college freshmen, without being dumbed down or simplistic. I plan to work through it to give me more breadth and depth on the subject. It's not one that is going to simply go away in my lifetime, or my children's, or yours.

If anybody has background info on Calspace or Scripps that would indicate leanings or biases on this matter, let me hear from you.

Thistle Visitors

We typically don't let fall thistle get to flower, much less to seed. A few, however, get past our scrutiny. I discovered a small patch up on the hill behind the garden, and while the goldfinches were working the sunflowers, the butterflies were in a frenzy of feeding on this patch of prickly thistle. I like the rosy-warm effect of the barn roof out of focus that gives this composition an eerie radiance.

And there are my thousand words for Monday. The picture will have to represent them. TGIM. I am only marginally prepared for the day and week ahead, wishing there was a mid-term break instead of the week off for Thanksgiving, then only two weeks of class before Christmas break between semesters. But then, they didn't ask me.

Wild Blue

Ann had seen some wild grapes down the road, so we set off with a bucket and a sheet to spread under the vine to catch the ones that would fall when we pulled the vine or shook the tree it clung to. We got a few, but not enough for a batch of jam, and wandered toward home. But she'd left something, so we walked back to the spot.

I stood at the edge of the gravel road waiting for her, with nothing particular on my mind or in my gaze, when suddenly, not twenty feet from me, was the mother load of wild grapes we must have driven past two dozen times in the past month. A vine heavy with fruit had fallen from a little locust, and was suspended at shoulder height by the branches of some little sumacs, perfect for picking by the cluster. More were on a remaining branch of the vine in what remained of the little locust. We cut it the next day, collected the last of the grapes, and it was just exactly the right amount for batch of jam. The kitchen counter this morning holds a dozen dark purple half-pint jars arranged on a checkered dishtowel.

I wish I could hold this bowl up and let you smell. Life is good.

But Teach a Whale to Fish...

And not only does this behavior show learning and planning, but it was copied by other killer whales in the same enclosure. Just how smart are these 'minds in the waters?'

"One day I noticed one of the young whales appeared to have come up with a procedure for luring gulls down to the pool," the professor said. "I found it interesting so I noted it in my log."

First, the young whale spit regurgitated fish onto the surface of the water, then sank below the water and waited.

If a hungry gull landed on the water, the whale would surge up to the surface, sometimes catching a free meal of his own. link

Aural Vignette

"Come" I said, motioning to Ann from the kitchen to follow.

We stood on the front porch in the darkness, listening. Morning on Goose Creek in the September of our lives sounds like this: drops falling from dew-wet branches; bush crickets whirring, one from a goldenrod along the pasture blends with the next higher up, in the meadow and a dozen more in monotone requiem to summer past; and beneath all other sounds, and around them, the rift of water over rock, falling into the hollow of itself, a spattering, tinkling liquid philharmonic of peace. If there were no humans on earth, this is what it would sound like. And there are two, standing utterly still, and blessed.

Friday Jots ~ September 16, 2005

Technical Difficulties ** I've been told we have a comment-aborting problem on our server at the moment. If comments, fail, please email. I'll be looking for diversion while I sit watching 125 students take a test this morning. -- FF

Honeymoon Ends ** Today in class, I'll see the 25% of my class that habitually don't attend. Why they bother to come take the test I don't know. Most of the ones who don't come regularly, if past experience prevails, will make a D or an F, so the class average will fall somewhere in the sixties. There will be weeping, wailing and gnashing of teeth. But my hope and expectation is, there will be more A's this time around than last year. I've simplified the language (fewer of the sometimes A but never B, and all are true, some are true); all questions are multiple choice; and I've limited choices to a, b, c, or d for most, versus all five-choice questions last year. I've made an attempt to teach more broadly for this group of non-majors, to give them an understanding of the forest without so much detail about the stems and twigs of individual trees. We'll see how it shakes out.

Earworms ** Nuthatch has 'em. We all have. Most of mine have come from novelty songs, starting with: The Singing Nuns, The Chipmunks, Hello Mudder, Hello Fadder...some of you know the era. What are your most persistent ear worms that fall within the taxonomy of Earverma? Just remembering them can trigger an outbreak. Be careful what you hum, even in your head!

White Elephants! ** Well, not exactly. But that there is a white giraffe is TRUE! See the image. And I will use this in class next week to reinforce our discussion of variability across the extremes of size, color, behavior, feeding preferences within any given population. This giraffe certainly falls at the extreme for color variation.

Huddle Masses ** How many people lived on planet earth when you were born? Of the babies born the same year as me, 48% are already dead, worldwide. In the US, 81% are still alive. In the US, 18% is older than I am! I didn't know there were so many people I could still be YOUNGER than! This French interactive website on population is very well done, and I may use it later in the semester. It suffers from being 8 years old and doesn't take into account more recent trends that might impact population growth (such as terrorism, infectious disease and cataclysmic storms that may portend future weather disasters as the planet heats up.) Very interesting. Recommended.

Drab Fall Foliage ** If we don't get rain soon, the fall leaf peepers might as well stay home. We are more than 25% off our yearly rainfall totals, and most of that from summer and early fall thus far. Our creek is all but dried up; we can barely hear its burble from the front porch. The pasture crunches when we walk and already the maple leaves are falling before any color change at all. We may go straight from green to brown this year. And so it goes.

Science BiWeekly Blog Repository ** The Tangled Bank is a gathering from across the blogosphere of the best science writing across the web. I don't know how it has escaped my attention til now. I'd like to think maybe soon I'd have something to contribute. I plan to peruse this event's host site at B and B and fully expect to add some kindred-spirits blogs to my bloglines list from the tangle in this particular bank. You might, as well.

September Bouquet

This is the composition of sunflowers against the barn, the one where I waited and waited for the male goldfinch (from Monday) to pose in silhouette using his foot to hold a seed in his mouth while he husked it. (Click image for greater detail.) Only certain photographers south of 221 get that sort of 'luck.' At least, for this shot, Tsuga wasn't helping.

Later the day this shot was taken, I was standing on the creekbank, waiting for the light to strike a certain spiderweb when a kestrel (old name: sparrow hawk) flew low over the creek, so close I could have touched him, and then perched maybe twenty feet away in the little walnut tree. I hesitated for an instant before realizing OH MY GOSH! I had my telephoto AND the 2x telextender on my camera around my neck. I clutched the camera. I raised it toward my eye. The dog ran straight at the walnut. And the viewfinder was empty. And I have only a word picture of the one that got away.

Children Play, and Pump Water

Carousels will pump drinking water in Mozambique through new UN project.

"It is wonderful to see the children having so much fun on these roundabouts while at the same time bringing an essential service to the community," he added.

The roundabout pumps are part of a broader programme called "Flourishing Schools" initiated through a US$444,000 donation from TNT. In the first phase, 30 roundabout play pumps will be installed in schools in the provinces of Maputo, Gaza and Inhambane. In addition, 30 conventional hand pumps will be installed in Manica and Sofala.

"By ensuring children have access to clean water, food and an education, we are giving the children of Mozambique the best possible chance of building a brighter and healthier tomorrow," said WFP Country Director Angela Van Rynbach at the inauguration.

This is an appropriate technology export from 'developed' countries, and we should applaud this kind of human-scale intervention for children's and rural community health in a third-world country. Pretty neat, eh?

Something Blue

They come in late August along the wet edges of the branch beside the house, and decorate the banks along the new road. Even when the air is thick with humidity and paled by summer haze, this blue wildflower makes me think ahead to the clearest skies of all the year when the sky will be, for a few days, this same deep lobelia-blue, and clear enough to see the gossamer spiders.

Google Blog Search

Finally. Now, if a hopeful Googler with an urgent need to know enters the words Tsuga or milkweed into the new Google Blog Search, he or she will come immediately to Fragments and sate their curiosity about our garden, pets, or the latest report about local spiders. Nah.

I suppose for breaking news and for finding political opinion and techy stuff, this new search engine will be useful. I don't see how it will connect a reader with anything I talk about. The personal journal will stay invisible among the burgeoning blogosphere while the talking heads will become more visible. However...

In the future, I wouldn't be surprised to see Google successfully create the blog ecosystem attempted elsewhere--a way to categorize blogs by topic/subtopic, by country/region/state, even by age, sex or temperament, perhaps, as the blogger choses to describe the blog they feed every day. I doubt Google will stop with this rather lackluster front end seen in the search's first days.

The advanced search will come in handy when searching a person's own blog by limiting the date range and by setting other boolean parameters in the search. However, today the search only extends back to March 1 of this year--that to improve as the engine crawls more blogs more completely, I would guess.

Spoken Word Returns to Floyd

No, this does not mean we've had a countywide epidemic of laryngitis. Read on...

It has been a while since the last "Spoken Word Night" sponsored by the Writers Circle of Floyd. Mark your calendars for this coming Sunday night (18 September) at 7:00. Oddfellas in 'downtown' Floyd will host the event. Five minute time slots are available for a limited number of guest readers. Beverages (but not food) will be served. Come early and get a good seat.

Insect Lore and More

We'll be back in the bush today, as it were. This is a really tame field trip and our second, to the edge of campus along the New River Trail. Students will be making some observations and taking some sample data from a plant called wingstem. One of the things I ask them to observe and comment on is the pollinators or other insects that are attracted to this plant as compared to the abundant goldenrod in the same area.

I knew predictably that on the goldenrod, I'd find Goldenrod Soldier Beetles. Frequently, you find these lightning bug relatives two by two, end to end in a lover's embrace. We speculated whether they come to goldenrod for the pollen or the whoopee. Or both. How kinky.

I also forecasted that we would find another insect on the goldenrod. (This always wins points for foretelling fact from what for students is a black hole of the unknown.) Sure enough, I found one, held it tightly in my hand and gave students a peak. "What kind of insect do you think this is?" I asked, just letting them see the black and yellow front end. "It's a wasp!" they guessed. And we wondered if this wasn't exactly what the beetle wanted us to think, a kind of protective resemblance called Batesian mimicry. But I confess: from sheer laziness, I'd been calling this insect a 'goldenrod beetle' solely because that's where I find it, and the only place I see it this time every year. In truth, it's called a locust borer and its grubs do just exactly what its name suggests.

Finally, the insect pictured in the borrowed image above is one more predictable but previously unnamed insect I knew we would see on both goldenrod and wingstem in our study plot. I did not know its name until this week, but now that I find out about its habits, I have other memories of this yellow-spotted, blue-winged insect called a digger wasp (Scolia dubia.)

We had moved to the country in 1981, to our first little farm off the Wilderness Road when both kids were small. Our idyllic Saturday evenings that first August were spent on blankets on the lawn above the house, listening to Prairie Home Companion as the sun settled behind the rolling hills of Wythe County. But the kids were uneasy: dozens of wasps coursed back and forth just above the surface of the grass in some kind of odd searching behavior. I told them not to worry, that they wouldn't hurt them, though I wasn't certain of the fact. Now, I know my advice was accurate, accidentally. These wasps were searching in the grass for the tunnels of beetle grubs (especially June Beetles) which they tunnel into the ground to locate, and then lay their eggs in the grub as food for the young wasps. A few weeks later in the same setting, hundreds of June Beetles appeared (out of the ground) as if by magic, and rose in the warm air of early September--the uneaten survivors of the digger wasps.

So. I don't know if my students are learning anything this semester. I sure am.

Happy Birthday

Once upon a time, a baby was born, and I was there at the delivery. "It" became a she. We hadn't known beforehand then, in the old fashioned way of waiting for the blessed event to go pink or blue. And now she has a little girl-in-pink of her own. And in another twenty years, perhaps our granddaughter will hold a small blue-eyed princess on her knee, or a wiggly little boy.

My my, how time flies. And we pass the torch on, generation to generation, and life goes on, within us and without us. And the birthdays just keep on coming.

Have a good one, dau. Wish you were here. Thanks for being our princess and making me a Dumpster.

Yin and Yang

Morning paints the shadow of night, the day neither dark nor light, and both.

Simple Gifts

...Fights and offensive behavior are extremely rare and the police officer is no longer needed. What happened?

A glance through the halls at Appleton Central Alternative provides the answer. The vending machines have been replaced by water coolers. The lunchroom took hamburgers and french fries off the menu, making room for fresh vegetables and fruits, whole-grain bread and a salad bar.

Is that all? Yes, that's all. Principal LuAnn Coenen is still surprised when she speaks of the "astonishing" changes at the school since she decided to drastically alter the offering of food and drinks eight years ago: "I don't have the vandalism. I don't have the litter. I don't have the need for high security. link"

And...

In ongoing studies by the Human-Environment Research Laboratory at the University of Illinois, researchers have discovered tantalizing evidence for a new view of the syndrome (ADHD). In a 2004 study published in the American Journal of Public Health, the laboratory found that children as young as five showed a significant reduction in ADHD symptoms when they engaged with nature.

...In fifty-four of fifty-six cases, outdoor activities in more natural settings led to a greater reduction in ADHD symptoms than activities in less natural areas. The only instances when symptoms worsened occurred in the artificial environments. In a related experiment, the laboratory found that children could focus on specific tasks better in green settings. link

Healthy foods, healthy natural environments: give your children these simple gifts. Make it the kind of world where these nutrients are available to everyone. What a better place the planet would be.

Fast on the Draw

Pentagon Studies Pre-Emptive Nuclear Strikes - New York Times

"The scenarios for a possible attack described in the draft include one in which an enemy is using "or intending to use" unconventional weapons against the United States, its allies or civilian populations. Another scenario for a possible pre-emptive strike is in the event of an "imminent attack from adversary biological weapons that only effects from nuclear weapons can safely destroy."

Shoot first, and ask questions later--if there's anyone left in the OK Coral to ask. And will our 'intelligence' establishment guage 'intention to attack' or the 'immenence' of an attack in the same way it did in Iraq? With this policy (back) in place, if we had it to do over again, would we have nuked Bagdad instead? Are we setting coordinates for Tehran, ya think?

Seedy Characters

We've been paying a bit of attention (on our lab field trip last week) to seeds and their mechanism for dispersal. Some we saw along the New River Trail, like Poke, bird cherry and privet, are wrapped in thick sweet flesh to entice birds and other feeders to come, eat, poop and disperse the seed inside. Others, like milkweed, wild lettuce and many other asters, send their seeds aloft on sails of pappus bristles that catch the prevailing winds; some of these seeds will find new homes for the latest generation a hundred or more miles away. But sunflower: what big fat seeds it has, wrapped in a thick, dry husk. What a loser in the game of seed dispersal and reproductive success.

I can pretty well say the tender seed inside the woody exocarp doesn't survive the goldfinch. It's beak, for a bird its size, is strong and sharp-pointed. They hang upsidedown from the nodding heads and deftly pluck the disk flower's fruit--a single seed--and crack it with their beak, select the oily, high-fat nut with their tongue, and it's bird 1, plant 0. But in the process of possessing that one tasty morsel, the bird has dislodged a dozen more.

The fallen seed waits on the garden soil for a vole, mouse or squirrel. The rodent will carry it off and bury it, forgetting where it planted some, thus planting a wild garden of sunflowers across the road, beside the barn and beyond the compost pile. The odds of survival probably aren't great with this approach to plant propagation, but then, look how many seeds a single flower produces to improve its odds of success! Depending on how close they grow, a single head will produce from 500 to over 800 seeds.

The goldfinches on the sunflowers don't hang around long enough for an ideal shot when they see the camera aimed at them. Later this week, I'll show you the sunflower cluster where I wanted a bright male to perch, turn toward the camera and smile. I waited and waited, but that didn't happen, but the backdrop made a rather nice image anyway.

Hisself

I am way behind in providing to his public the agreed-upon number of pictures of Tsuga called for in our contract, and HE isn't happy about it. When grasses, sunflowers and butterflies get a higher billing than Mister Big, heads are gonna roll. He isn't very pleased with this shot in particular and has told me always to avoid shots from this 'looking up' perspective as it makes his jowls look droopy and exposes that pink hairless patch on his tummy.

But there I was, down in the branch with my camera taking pictures of Blue Lobelia (image coming later this week) and of course, Tsuga was offering advice up on the edge of the yard above the rock wall. Still experimenting with the new flash, even knowing it wouldn't show his best side and he's not doing a stunt or an engaging pose, I snapped this picture. So fire me.

Meanwhile, while on the subject of Man's Best Camera Subject, I have to tell you: the ol' boy suffers recently from two problems, and I'm wondering if they're related. 1) He wants out the very first thing the last several mornings, and commences the dry heaves. Far as I can see, it's only the grass he eats that comes up. And 2) his breath is awful. Didn't used to be. And I think it's more than the deer poop he finds over in the pasture. Shouldn't be a tooth problem in a pup less than three. He eats regularly and with gusto, shows no signs of lethargy or pain and seems to be full of energy. Hmmm. Reckon a dog can be taught to gargle a minty mouthwash?

Just Give Us That Old Time Pollution

Old-fashioned environmentalism could single out and stop problems of plain ol' pollution like carbon monoxide, Bill McKibben says. But add another oxygen to the molecule and it isn't in the old sense a pollutant. Carbon dioxide is a 'natural product' of combusion and metabolism. Or at least that's all it was until we put far more into the air than our forests and seas can take out. Now, we have global warming--a problem beyond mere environmentalism to solve.

"... environmentalism, by itself, isn't up to the task of stopping global warming. Going after fossil fuels means going after the base of our economy, and hence of our daily habits. That is too central a target for a movement whose successes have involved fixing things around the edges. For instance, the obvious first step to reduce carbon emissions would be to increase the price of fossil fuels--everyone knows that. But political leaders haven't done it because there are strong pressures from vested interests not to, and no pressure at all from the citizenry to do so. The vested interests won't go away, and voters aren't clamoring for higher gas prices now in exchange for a more livable planet down the road. So the best our leaders (even ones like President Clinton who acknowledged the problem) have been willing to do is talk about magic technologies a few decades away, like hydrogen cars, that might somehow allow us to avoid ever making difficult choices."

Personally, I don't think we'll be proactive on this one. Even now, mankind in this regard is too much like children: we want it now, we want it cheap and we don't want to do without and we'll hold our breath (and our votes) if we don't get what we want. So our growing-up lesson we should have learned without the spanking will take one Katrina after another, shorelines disappearing displacing hundreds of millions along the world's coasts, crop cycles disrupted by drought and heat, tropical diseases in mid-latitude population centers, glaciers melting away the drinking water for villagers in Asia and China, and a really bad sunburn to get our attention. And by then, as they say, the cows will have left the barn. And momma earth will say, "I told you so."

Scared Into Fetal Position

There are more than enough looming catastrophes to give the media fodder for fearmongering. Bad idea. We need dialogue, foresight and hope. The worse thing we can do is lose our heads in false hysteria or float above the real terrain in sterilized optimism. It's time for clear and honest communication from our papers, magazines and newscasts, as discussed in this article from the Guardian:

"In every case, we have to avoid hysteria and its by-product, which is fatalism or indifference. Tell people day after day that the world is doomed because of a combination of George Bush and the motor car; or that the west is overrun by murderous nutters, furious about an illegal war that cannot now be sorted out; or tell them that modern life makes pandemics inevitable - tell them, even, that their jobs are doomed because of China and the rising economies of the east, and there is nothing that can be done. What will the result be? Not, as some naturally hysterical journalists hope, a general uprising against global capitalism. No, faced with apparently insurmountable problems, most people will turn back to private life, taking solace in another drink, friends and gossip."

...it seems more than ever that we are left instead with a mere shriek about huge, scary problems we are also told are too big, too complicated, to resolve. At every turn, there is a new threat to worry about, something else to fear and nothing that can be done.

All of which makes people simply shrug and turn away after the initial rush of worry. To engage people at all in finding solutions we need more from journalism than the foot-stamping hysteria that has spread across the national press. The real challenge is to champion a more traditional journalism that informs and discusses, rather than merely shouts. Politics needs it. It is time to stop scaring ourselves.

And where do we go for this kind of reasoned foresight? Here, for starters, in this BusinessWeek piece called, somewhat sensationally, The Next Big One. The author offers concrete disaster planning priorities that cut across all or most of the perils we will certainly face in the years ahead. Let's not repeat our mistakes. Let's not make the mistake of waiting any longer to think that the unthinkable will happen on our soil, in our lifetimes.

Personal Family Preparedness

I think we've seen in recent days that the trickle-down top to bottom assistance individuals might need in a crisis is likely to come too little too late. What measures can your family, neighborhood or community take to cope with an extended emergency under your own power and with resources at hand? From the Flu Wiki, here is a starting place for confronting a pandemic disease locally.

From this link, many other resources are available. And as my mammy used to say, 'a word to the wise is sufficient.'

Up close and personal, I've been thinking more about how disease is transmitted in public places--like college classrooms, church gatherings and restaurants. It's a small thing, but I've started washing my hands more often, realizing that if the handrail down the steps by my classroom building were swabbed and cultured, it would grow a vertible jungle of microbes. Some of them might be lions and tigers and bears. Oh my!

September Web - II

I wandered without any particular purpose as the morning sun spilled over the ridge. It beaded the cleft of valley with diamonds.

I was so intent watching frost on jeweled grass that as I walked head down, it appeared suddenly just in front of my face: A perfect fingerprint of glowing fiber. A spider's concentric cosmos, suspended in space and time.

A portal web, its center pulled me to its spiral, a wormhole to winter.

... excerpt from Fragments / Autumn 2003

September Webs: A Series?

I'd like to think I could add a half dozen 'keepers' this month to my growing collection of spider web pictures that offer themselves to view in our 'front yard' across the creek. Days like this are rare jewels, with just the right combination of mist and light, not to mention spiders and their intricate snares. The pasture grass is not high enough to support webs yet, so I'm walking the pasture road, peeking through the branches for suspended webs, with or without their owners. It's an odd hobby, I suppose, but harmless enough. And someday, maybe I'll be able to hang an entire gallery with the webs of autumn.

Taking a Pounding

I had something on my mind I wanted to put together this morning in a more or less coherent way, since, after all, it is Thursday and I'm NOT teaching today. But alas, SHE WHO BAKES is also home, and two birthdays loom in the coming week. My usual morning quiet is battered and pounded this moment by the strident Chinese water torture whine of a hand-held blender--on, and on, and on it goes. The 'bells, bells, bells' inflicted through an alternate instrument. Ear plugs do no good: the concussive beater-blast vibrates the bone of the skull and jars any complete thought into tiny bits of language, pounding words into a slurry of gibberish before they can reach the page, blending verbs and nouns into a gray goo. Pound cake, indeed.

I wanted to tell you about the field trips we took at Radford this week. And I wanted to tie that in to something I've read recently and want to share with you about computers and children. Out of this, I hope to move toward both a bit for my next space in the Floyd Press and perhaps another move in the direction of a radio essay, now going on six months since my last.

But that will have to wait until the mortar attack from the kitchen has ended. And, look here: even greater distractions! Out the window, the fog has settled over the pasture, an amethyst softness behind the dark silhouttes of maple leaves already touched by the farewell of fall. Should be a good morning for spider webs. And this time, I'll know not to hunker down in the grass with my camera just beyond the little walnut at the edge of the pasture: the yellow jackets are streaming out of a hole in the ground like Tye Fighters out of the Mothership, and I had practically sat on that very spot one day taking pictures last week. I'm leading a charmed life not to have been zapped.

But wait: what's this? All's quiet on the confectionary front. I can take out my earplugs and crawl cautiously out of my foxhole, waving the white flag. Maybe if I show servile compliance and complete surrender, I'll be offered a piece of the sweet object of my distress before it gets boxed and sent to California, ya reckon? NAH.

Zippidee DooDah

I can still remember some of the berzerk children's parties we took our youngest to during the two years we lived in Birmingham in the late 80s. Mercifully, I've forgotten the names of most of them (Chucky Cheeze was one I think I recall.) I happened to think about those places in a generic sort of way, comparing that party setting to the outdoor event we experienced at a neighbor's place, in deep country, on Sunday. Given a choice as a kid, I'd have wanted to party outdoors.

There was the trampoline (without the safety collar, it sort of made me nervous to watch.) And adults manned the giant slingshot for hurling water balloons into the waiting crowd of wet kids. But what caught Ann's fancy was the zipline. (You can see zipriders queued n the background of this image.)

Now, when we go for walks down our valley, she tells me excitedly how our zipline could go from this tree here on the high side, to that one there down near the creek. Maybe if I ignore this latest notion, it will go away. But on second thought, I suppose Ann's zipline could be a great way to get away from the bears.

Sunflower, Sunbird

Ann sent me out to the garden ostensibly to see if any of the volunteer tomatoes were ripe for the salad we were having for dinner. I knew it was mostly an excuse to get me out of the house, where she is convinced, I will shrivel and die from some divine wrath if sun shines and I don't toil under it. So I went, muttering something about designing women, though yes, it was very nice out. And in the end, I turned the trip to my own ends: a goldfinch perched on one of the wizened sunflowers. Maybe, if I were ready with my camera, this sun-colored male would move to some of the beautifully backlit flowers that still had their petals! I ran back up the hill to the house, apologized I didn't have a tomato in hand, and disappeared, back under that sunshine the wife so fervently wished me to be under.

But about the time I got the tripod positioned, here came one of the logger-neighbors in his truck. The bird flushed to another position on the same plant. No problem. But the first logger has a brother, and less than a minute later, I could hear him heading my way on a backhoe. And the bird flew away.

So, I got one mediocre shot off. But I've set an alarm for Thursday at 5:45 when the light is right on the garden sunflowers. I'll try again. And maybe by then, there will be a ripe tomato.

So Little To Please Me

I am all atwitter because finally, after trying a dozen of them, I have found a backup program that is elegantly designed and executes flawlessly. My desktop can now backup files even if they are running (in Word, for instance.) And I've set up a shared folder on my external HD and can back up my laptop (and synchronize it also) with one click.

If you're in the market for such, you can get SyncBackSE for $20 for another week, then at $25, it beats those for $50 I have uninstalled over the years.

The new version of Google Desktop, on the other hand, is a bit of a disappointment. And Google Talk--I have not had an opportunity to try, though am giving my son and new-to-be daughter in law a microphone and headset for a wedding trinket to lower our respective long-distance expenses. Any experience with Google Talk?

So, there's the new software making all giddy inside. That, and the fact that this is one of those days when wispy clouds are morphing shapes of seacreatures against an achingly blue sky, a longsleeve shirt feels good in the shade, and I have my lecture ready for the next day!

(Now, if I can just purge my brain of all the current events of the past six years, I'll be happy as a pig in mud.) Reminds me of one of my favorite sayings:

I'd rather have a bottle in front of me than a frontal lobotomy.

Gotta go. Low cirrus now performing seahorses and leaping dolphin!

Showing a Fella a Good Time

Don't think because we live far from the