Nature Redux: animals, weather, plnats, geography, mythology, and so on

Oh for cryin' out loud: I misspelled plants!

By unanimous consent--three in favor and twelve abstentions (on this thread abstentions count as yeas)--we launch the fourth iteration of Nature, Anna from Portland's hastily conceived attempt to oust me from a different thread.

More of the same (except sports has now become our sidebar): poetry, mythological exegeses, ecology, photos, cartoons, music, pronunciation (Or-e-gun not Or-e-gone), relevant blather, recipes, TV shows, road trips (as distinct from directions on how to get from here to there), books (we allow that here), and other stuff as it arises.

Oh...just you wait until this summer. I'm going to explode this thread...

Why, you may ask? WELL I'LL TELL YOU WHY! ROAD TRIP.

(Nevermind. It won't let me post the map of what my trip is going to look like. :( Link is too long, I suppose.)

Excellent, to begin our new thread with new blood! A Texan, no less, to replace the Texan who got out of Dodge. or maybe Abilene (and moved to George-ah), and the Texan who hasn't shown up in a while (aethercowboy, where are you? I do miss his dry summations).

You'll notice that RSHab compelled me to add road trips to our description in retrospect (we're big on rewriting history on the nature threads; I only wish I could rewrite plnats).

I like plnats. I'm imagining bigger, angrier plants possibly that eat people. Maybe like in the little shop of horrors. I also assume that plnats would like me and not die on my hands like plants do.

Saw a great movie this afternoon with Jack Benny, Buddy Ebsen, Eleanor Powell. Buddy Ebsen is a smooth one and Eleanor Powell is Persephone herself. If you don't believe me take Marina Warner's word for it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marina_Warner
Pure joy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UxjEqgNIFqI

Pinats? Love them, says the former Texan.

Pull gnats. I have an awakening to awareness in Japan story, not very important, that I will try to remember to post in October, if the thread is still progressing at the time. How about pull nits? Not too different from picking nits? Plnits.

Robert

They actually pay me to correct that kind of mistake. Suckers.

Some idle thoughts (best I can do, being red-eyed and all, and in the wrong time zone):

Was that the ghost of the Reuthers our friend Porius slipped into the old thread before we moved on? A soupcon of class consciousness. Well, good for him, I say. Being in Detroit can do that, I suppose.

And where is Tani? Once, I would have wondered if I scared her off, but no, she is the embodiment of intrepidity. She's probably busy eating ribs. It's her staple diet.

And nature, of course: a low level hum of insects in the forest at night. Some years you can hardly leave the house, they're so prevalent.

plnats? I am so absolutely disillusioned... lmao!

Nope!!! Steaks marinated in Worcestershire and red potatoes halved, then baked with olive oil, fresh cracked pepper, sea salt, basil then sprinkled with freshly grated parmigiano reggiano cheese and green beans (blech!) for the parental units.

Since I was bored I went to my friend's house to meet her boyfriend's grandchildren and their german shepard/rottweiler named Doc. Big as a house and as sweet as maple syrup. We had a tea party and dressed and groomed little Peyton's Barbies and Surfer Kens. (My nieces better have some girls pretty soon or I will be very disappointed in them)

Pietro, I am perfectly aware of the reasons for moving on to our new digs... was just antsy! ;-) Thank you, Jayne and Anna for movin' us along.

All in all, for a day that started out snowing, I am pleased as punch. Despite the %$@!+*# snow... I have two daffy's ready to bloom with highs in the low 60s on the way!

I LOVE ROAD TRIPS!!!

My fear, however, of road trips, is that Todd's (RSHs) road trip is going to be something from straight out of Into the Wild.

A nipping and eager air tonight. A welcome change from the room service temperatures of So. Cal. I have shed already the Ruether skin. It's not healthy to listen to the noise and static that passes for news, etc. Just a bunch of pelphers making certain that they can pelf on. Has anyone heard from Tony Rezko lately? I didn't think so.

A Frost warning tonight. Whatever can that mean?

oooo... Alaska. Okay, I like roughing it... have been on many long dry camping trips, and have been quite intrigued by the pioneer experiments I have seen on PBS, but Krakauer-esque or should I say "McCandless-esque" road tripping would make even me a little trepidatious.

Yes, it involves a bit of Alaska, but not as much as originally planned. It's turned into a bit of a detour from my/our main plan. We're going out of our way to visit a small town called Hyder, near where The Thing was filmed to get a, er, certificate. Originally we were going to spend a month or more in Skagway, where my sister previously lived, and recently I've been entertaining the thought of going all the way north into the Yukon to Dawson City to get a whole 'nother kind of certiffy I'd probably chicken out on at the sight of what I'd have to do. *shudders* I'd love to go out for that kind of trip, really. The Yukon, the NW Territories, Nunavut...but I can't afford that business.

Actually, I was meaning to make a thread asking for suggestions a few weeks ago, things we'd have to see, places we could stay for cheap.

Oh, I just remembered the existence of tinyurl. Here's what the trip looks like right now. We also considered/are considering including the northeast like Maine and New York but probably can't afford it.

Check out Hyde Park in Chicago. Obama's old neighborhood, and where I went to school.

Todd, your photo link does not work. What is your mode of transport? That looks like an adventure!

Why, Clarabel... How do you do? We have not formally met. I am the Firecracker... (so Pietro says, however, I am still unsure what he means by that)

I've been to a few of those places pinpointed on your map, Todd. Perhaps you chose the route to get free eats and lodging along the way? If not, I'd suggest cutting through the UP near Duluth (Porius might know a bit about the Upper Peninsula of Michigan), an interesting out-of-the-way place, somewhat cheap too in disused hunting lodges in the summer, and where they eat meat pies called pasties ... then go down to Interlaken from there (I see that on your map). And I've camped in the Big Horns, just about where you have a marker in Wyoming. Do you camp? I mean the lazy kind of camping, where you pull your car into a spot in a national forest and plug in an electrical outlet.

If you decide to consider Maine, I've got a ton of places I can tell you about, from Pemaquid (one of the unknown wonders of America) up to Campobello. What I like about Maine is the mix of art and life, unique in America. And lobster, of course.

>15 highdesertlady:
The photo link? the Dawson City-related link? Works on my side...It's a picture of a toe they use in sourtoe cocktails.

My friend and I are going to drive. I'm going to drive from Texas to his place in Port Townsend, and then from there we'll use his much nicer, newer, lesslikelytobreakdown car.

Thanks for the Chicago tip, BTW. I went there about a year ago, and my gawd, I think it was just the circumstances, but I shook my fist at that city that day. I hated the experience. Got completely lost and wasted two or three hours trying to find our way back to the highway in a confusing web of streets with no effing on-ramp to the highway. Took an extra 40 min just to get on that beyotch after spotting it.

Tell you what I'm excited for: ASTORIA. WHERE THE GOONIES WAS FILMED. *squeal* I'm gonna see the jail and the bowling pad and Ecola park along the shore and the twin rocks where the ship came out and the house and and and and...!!!

Oh Yeah! You will abso-floggin-lutely love Astoria and Cannon Beach.

Message when I click on the link:

Forbidden

You don't have permission to access /v3/56/77056/2/46619776.IMG_0044Ed1.jpg on this server.
Apache/2.0.46 (Red Hat) Server at k41.pbase.com Port 80

Doublepost.

16>
I didn't consider a lot of detail on the route except near the pacific northwest (for the most part). Most of it's just random draggings to certain roads and cities I or my buddy want to stop by. (Duluth, for one, is a city I am nuts to see...why? hmm. I used to want to attend the college there, but it's a little late now. The Lovecraftian name and lakeside location help.)

Yes, camping is planned. The only spot I'm definitely sure about is by Martin in BC: The Pacific Rim National Park, where a ton of beautiful day hikes are located, as well as what sounds like the greatest 5-day hike evah in tha whole woild. Gonna do at least SOMETHING there. Martin seemed to say we need to reserve days far in advance, but with our plan of just "do whatever whenever" I've no idea how I can really arrange for anything more than the free dayhikes.

Oh, Maine, it's a dream. Might just have to put it off until next time. Something about Maine...I just have to go there. Camp the great forests, throw lamps at Stephen King's house, go see the Cranberry Isle lobster trade...or somethin'...

Err, yeah, yeah, outoftheway places. That's primarily what I'm interested in. Those are the suggestions I'd love most. The main highways are just such a bore....I want to find all the rich stories hidden away, like the original town of Newcastle, WA that got eaten up by the woods near Seattle, or somethin'.

18>
I've changed the picture to another. It's not as gross, but...yeughhhhh....

Yeah, I almost forgot about him: Stephen, the King of Bangor, Maine.

Eeeewwww! I just threw up in my mouth!!! And it does not mix well with Sweet Dreams/Apple Cinnamon tea!

Oh, and if you are going to be near Glacier National Park in Montana... check out the Going to the Sun road. It is supposed to be spectacular. I have not been, but my best friend has an highly recommends it.

Going to the Sun Road

And then there is Lake Louise and Banff in Alberta. actually, that is probably too touristy, but beautiful.

Will have to cogitate on that some more.

Now this sounds like some fun... Ghost Towns of the Northwest or perhaps

Boom Towns & Relic Hunters of Northeastern Washington by Jerry L. Smith Not sure why the touchstone is not working... hmmm (i put in direct link instead)

so this is where everyone hangs out.

I have no idea what any of you are talking about. Where's the Captain, I need some nyertw˜† ¡∞¶

*Murr falls off his bar stool*

21>
Oh my gawd, thanks for the Going-to-the-Sun suggestion. I'm adding that. By summer it'll be drivable and boy oh boy it sounds great!

The books sound something like what the urban exploration resource could offer. Which reminds me I need to check them out. I just recall their data for Texas was often way outdated. http://www.uer.ca/

Somebody get that cat a drink! Or a dish of cream!

#23 Did not look at the pub date... 2002 My Mom's side of the family dwelled in eastern Washington and north central Oregon back in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Love that part of the northwest.

>24 highdesertlady: I think he's had a few too many already. I believe he actually needs resucitation with a wet herring.

#25 I believe you are right...

BTW, Muse... my cat does the same thing when I read... silly putty. Mine is a 20 pound bulls-eye tabby and almost 4 feet tall on his back haunches and thinks he can still fit on my chest like he did when he was a kitten. (in reference to your profile pic) ;-)

Tani, do you know it never occurred to me that someone would think that was a photo of myself and my cat? Silly of me. It actually isn't - though my cat does do the same only on the lap not the chest, and he is about as big as the one in the pic, but grey. And he gets the same soppy smile on his face too, awwww. :)

I posted the pic on there because it says that thousand words about comfort and happiness and things in life that make up for the existence of other less beautiful things. I really like the comfy old grey jumper on the unknown person too (I guess you people would say 'sweater'). Comfort without elegance, so necessary to life sometimes.

ETA: That's not me playing the cello either :)

Awww! ;-) Funny, I have a sweater very similar to that!

Love my putty... He is hilarious... We have two shi tzu/maltese dogs as well. The dogs will be lying at the end of the recliners at night and dead asleep. All of the sudden the cat will walk by and WAP WAP WAP! Smack the daylights out of those poor dogs. They look around as if to say "What the..." I am a cat by nature and astrologically so I get a real kick out of his antics. Pretty sure the dogs don't feel the same way. But, C'est la vie... what can you do?

dogs are idiots.

Has Porius given up poetry? Perhaps in the upcoming census I should list him twice, a San Diego Porius and a Detroit Porius. In the meanwhile, seems I'll have to take care of business while he vents at Wall Street and Washington.

A coupla cats got an early start here, living as they do on the other side of the date line, whatever that is (I've merely just read about it). So, since it might be the theme of the day (until something else comes along) ...

A cat on a wire

A short chain-link fence
ran along the sidewalk
in front of the old New Englander
the short front yard
just over elbow high
a cluster of birds
landed and flew
from the wire, the bar
to the flowerbed beyond the fence
in the left corner of the side yard
a tabby cat, too young for sense
standing opposite the other end
of the fence
eyed the birds, a quick snack
raised and lowering his head
poised to pounce, to jump
to the top of the fence
walk like on a tightrope walker
a gymnast on the beam
to get his prey, While the poetic

Raymond A. Foss

Today's selected weather and nature report:

Northeast: 70 degrees, sunny; birds twittering and pecking; plnats continue to grow

Northwest: 60 or so degrees, mostly sunny

So. Cal: 60 degrees; less than room temperature, and showers no less (time to move?)

Arkansas: 85 degrees, partly cloudy

Texas: like Arkansas, only less so

Georgia: 80 degrees, sunny

Chicago: almost 60, but cooler by the great lake

Detroit: 60 degrees, sunny, plnats and other things continue to grow

Sydney, Australia: 70 degrees (is this true, and is it still crisp?)

Taiwan: the Weather Service doesn't know

Belgium: 54 degrees, mostly clear, with a soupcon of volcanic ash

So Right! Our outlook is GORgeous!

Poor Poor Belgium... I have lived through this me self when St Helens blew her top 30 years ago. Wearing masks, using A LOT of windshield washer fluid, etc. It was a curious site to behold that day with it's black cauliflower cloud of ash and lightning and creating it's own weather system. Twas a sight to behold.

Feeling better this morning, Murr?

THE SPIRIT OF SHAKESPEARE

Thy greatest knew thee, Mother Earth; un
soured
He knew thy sons. He probed from hell to
hell
Of human passions, but of love deflowered
His wisdom was not, for he knew thee well.
Thence came the honeyed corner at his lips,
The conquering smile wherein his spirit sails
Calm as the God who the white sea-wave
whips,
Yet full of speech and intershifting tales,
Close mirrors of us: thence had he the laugh
We feel is thine: broad as ten thousand beeves
At pasture! thence thy songs, that winnow
chaff
From grain, bid sick Philosophy's last leaves
Whirl, if they have no response - they en-
forced
To fatten earth when from her divorced.
How smiles he at a generation ranked
In gloomy noddings over life! They pass
Not he to feed upon a breast unthanked,
Or eye a beauteous face in a cracked glass.
But he can spy that little twist of brain
Which moved some weighty leader of the
blind,
Unwitting 'twas the goad of personal pain,
To view in curst eclipse our Mother's mind,
And show us of some rigid harridan
The wretched bondmen till the end of time.
That little twist of brain would ring a chime
Of whence it came and what it caused, to start
Thunders of laughter, clearing air and heart.

George Meredith
Born in Portsmith on 12 Feb.
Father a tailor and naval outfitter.
Mother died in 1833.
1849 he married widowed daughter of Thomas Love Peacock.
1851 pub. first vol. poetry.
1855 pub. THE SHAVING OF SHAGPAT
1879 THE EGOIST gave him lasting reputation.
1905 was give The Order of Merit, given to just a few writers.
He died at Flint Cottage on 18 May, 1909.
Burial in Westminster Abbey was refused by the Dean, despite the expressed wish of Edward 7, and he was buried in Dorking Cemetery beside his wife, where he himself had wished to be buried.

Tomorrow is Shakespeare's birthday, 23 April 1564, he deathday is one the same date, 23 April, 1616.

I'm so confused, Por-Man!

EARTH'S SECRET

Not solitarily in fields we find
Earth's secret open, though one page is there;
Her plainest, such as children spell, and share
With bird and beast; raised letters for the
blind.
Not where the troubled passions toss the mind,
In turbid cities, can the key be bare.
It hangs for those who hither thither fare,
Close interthreading nature with our kind.
They, hearing History speak, of what men
were,
And have become, are wise. The gain is great
In vision and solidity; it lives.
Yet at a thought of life apart from her,
Solidity and vision lose their state,
For Earth, that gives the milk, the spirit gives.

George Meredith

Poor Meredith was struggling with the zeitgeist. He accepted without reservation the new Gospel of Evolution. Samuel Butler didn't struggle as much tho he struggled. Read THE WAY OF ALL FLESH. Meredith became a worshipper of Earth as a stern, just mother of all men and all that they are, or arn't, while he continued to to believe confidently in man's spiritual nature. He tried to bridge these two things with intensity of feeling and this sometimes put a strain on the language of his writings, especially his poems. He often attempted to put into words that which could not be put into words. But we love him anyway. His was a sane nature, bravely, even heroically, struggling in an age drunken with material "progress" to maintain some hold on immaterial reality.

Por-Man...

Tomorrow is Shakespeare's birthday, 23 April 1864, he deathday is one the same date, 23 April, 1616. ???

He meant 1564, Tani, not 1864. He got Shakespeare's birth year confused with mine.

Okay, could not wrap my brain around that for some reason and if I had been able to would have googled it for cryin out loud!

You old man, you! Why for you not like that 'site talk' thread and the sarcastic periods? Too flippin' funny..

Back to nature; the inner workings of it: In Seattle, where I mainly drank coffee and ate ordinary meals everyone else raved about, I kept telling myself that, first thing when I got back, I'd take my usual ten mile bike ride to get back in shape. But yesterday I had the excuse of red-eye fatigue. And today, a headache, what with all the translation e-mails concerning what might be a phantom publisher, for all I know. And tomorrow, perhaps another good reason to park my ass on a soft chair.

In the winter, I never procrastinate, I just do.

Friggin' spring.

what with all the translation e-mails concerning what might be a phantom publisher, for all I know. ???

>31 copyedit52: I have no idea if it's 70 degrees here or not - we call it 29 down here, which is definitely warming up. The crispness is wilting, and so are the autumn plnats.

My poor plnats are so dwarved by all this extra winter stuff but they will be colorful!

Uh, Piero?

>32 highdesertlady: yes thank you.

Taiwan: the Weather Service doesn't know...
Typical.

it's freezing cold here and rainy and raw. Yesterday it was boiling hot, sunny and breezy.

I really hate April.

But I really like the Meredith poetry. I've always wanted to read some of his novels, whcih were highly popular in his day, but I just can't find them.

I will stop moaning now and go and find some dogs to beat up.

I have some!!!

It's dark outside. No moon that I can see. No breeze. No sounds. No nothin'. The day Shakespeare was born and died.

In junior high school, it must've been, everyone in English class had to memorize a passage from MacBeth. I was assigned the following soliloquy:

If 'twere done when 'twere done,
Then 'twere well it be done quickly.
If the assassination could trammel up the consequence,
And catch in the surcease success ...

That's it. That's all I can remember. And no doubt incorrectly.

Well, at least you can remember that much¿¡¿¡

Stop me when I become annoying..

TCM, I think you would really like Meredith's DIANA OF THE CROSSWAYS. It is dense in that christmas fruitcake way that you seem to prefer. You'll be glad to know that G.M. was anything but a jejune Englishman. I know how you abhor dull as ditchwater English concerns. He could amuse Peacock enough to ask for his widowed daughters hand, no inconsiderable accomplishment.

Who can tell the dancer . . . . .
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CLYyMJ6XY6U

The lone forsythia on the edge of the backyard overlooking the red ceramic buddha is now more green than yellow. The grass, which thankfully is receding to the greener moss, is actually growing. Oh crap! You know what that means one of these days. And the leaves on the trees ... this place is gonna be a jungle in a few weeks.

You just hold your horseys a darn second! There's Dubbya holdin' hands with African Americans, er, literal Africans, I should say, right? And he's smiling at them, right? But how can that be? I thought Dubbya didn't care about black people?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIUzLpO1kxI&feature=related

Every 6 months or so he'll stand next to one to show you he's not hurting them. He does the same thing with trees.

Oh, dear God.. what is this world comming to¿¡¿¡¿¡

Oh, for crying out loud, Tani: the stunted ellipsis and the upside down q-marks and exclamations! WTF!

Ha!!!! I have been waiting for you to freeque out. Gotcha! Okay, will behave now... tc has been sufficiently spanked.

GWB as Noble Savage:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EkqrI3IibYI

52 - Ha! Sorry about that. I spent the entire morning trying to translate Department of Buildings procedure into plain English - it's pretty much not possible - so I'm a little snippy. I probably could have used those upside down question marks though.

I could teach you how, but I fear that Pietro would pitch a fit.

(My browser's spell check does not like 'Piero')

>56 janemarieprice:. I thought your tree remark pretty funny, Jane. I pictured Bush standing next to one, trying to talk to it.

>57 highdesertlady:. Don't believe everything your spell-check tells you, Tani. According to the detective I hired to look into it, Piero means Peter as much as Pietro does.

;-) I know... just trying to rile you up, Piero... tc is really fiesty today. Must be the sunshine and her daffy's blooming.

Daffy, yes. That's the word that always comes to mind when I encounter people who refer to themselves in the third person.

And you would be correct, Senior Piero!

I've been thinking about this exuberant energy if yours, and your playfulness with words, punctuation, etc. Perhaps you should consider writing a book, a dictionary. Something on the order of: Emoticons, Avant Garde Punctuation, and WTF Other Things, the latter covering LMAO and the like.

We have had a dictionary going in our family since my grandma Bunnie came up with Pooted Heel.

And don't forget the sarcasticons!

I'm not much for sarcasm. You got any ironicons? You might have noticed that Piero is into irony.

The pretended intended sort.

Hey, Peter. I saw how you helped ChocolateMuse out on her Shakespeare on the b'day thread. How about helping me here? I refer to the MacBeth soliloquy beginning:

If 'twere done when 'twere done,
Then 'twere well it be done quickly ...

Get the fooking thing overwithalready. There is still some milk in the confused Scot's nature though it is curdling fast.

A fool's bolt is soon shot - I doubt that Overpluss Will meant this.

Meanwhile a very tiny wit is not the answer.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OJZ_WAPZ23A

Yeah, that's what I shoulda done. (I have all these regrets, going back at least to the seventh grade.) Stood up and said:

"I dint memorize it, Mr. Littmann, but I kin paraphrase it: 'Get it done with awready! Kill the bastard!'"

The bastid?

Write. I was out of character there for an instint.

The redoubtable Littman (just the right name, no) might have shat his knickers if you delivered thus:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gcfut8QI2-k

Tho mine own favorite McBeth is Jeremy Brett.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wmIrImnfuQA

Ah, yes, I remember that bank and shoal of time when I wowed them in the seventh grade, building to a crescendo in order to shout: " ... trumpet-tongued against the deep damnation of his taking off ... "

Those were the days.

You were a regleh Albit Phinnie.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R-yblNKfQyk&feature=related

Maybe we should call the next iteration of this thread: Abbott and Costello Meet Gracie Allen, with Enrique playing the part of Harry Bonzell.

And why not. I should think EF could manage the part.

No, no, I got it wrong. First, it's Harry Von Zell, not Bonzell. And second, if you're reading this Henri, you are nothing like Harry Von Zell, except for the fact that you're always popping in here and there, which is not enough of a character trait to build an LT sitcom on.

Um... who gets to be Gracie?

Do I get the impression tc LIKES to be sufficiently spanked? Or am I missing something?

Who gets to be Gracie? OMG, Tani, excuse me for a few minutes while I LMAO and ROTF (that's roll on the floor).

Harry von Zell, eh? You think I'm Hoobert Heever?

Again, I apologize for casting you as Harry von Zell. You're nothing like him. Except for the popping in and out.

Ouch!

Hmmph¡

Who the hell is harry von zell?

Who the hell is harry von zell?

The Black Eye Fraternity

Harry on Burns & Allen

>47 Porius: thanks Por, I'll definitely look out for some Meredith.

Another huge Brubeck fan here. That cat could swing!

Brubeck was a jazz god. No, he was THE jazz god.

And for the rest of you goof balls..

MALOFRO YAII¡¿¡¿¡¿

One more time for old Shacksbard:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S69vCzMRAi0
Enjoy the great Nigel Hawthorne as Malvolio and the equally great Ben Kingsley as Feste.

Lotta celebration of Shakespeare today; deservedly so. And Dave Brubeck. I wonder when Harry von Zell was born?

Who cares about that sort of thing?

Certainly not us¡¿¡¿

A dissenting voice amidst the day's silliness. A slap in the face, so to speak. Among the things I heard back in the day and didn't include in my book (sometimes you can't fit in things you might want to, for one reason or another) was something Patrick said one day at the Eighth Street commune when everyone was getting on his case. He stood there and took it from all sides, then finally announced, in all honesty, without self-pity: "I accept your rejection."

The blackbyronyofirony.

SILLY? I suppose it is a bit, meeting adjourned forever.

He lives!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bCdT0RlYf90&feature=related

Who's dissenting? Are you referring to me, Piero? Twas just more silliness...

No, I wasn't referring to you. Though dissent is okay, non? If that's what you choose. And thanks for the Burns and Allen clip, btw. I haven't seen the TV show in a while, and still find the crew funny.

As old 'Honest Abe' said many times and oft: "the nays have it."

steady on steady on, TC. Brubeck is hot, but he is not god. The God of piano Jazz is definitely Kieth Jarrett, and the God of Jazz in general is still Miles Davis, from whose loins all jazz still springs. Amen. Praze jazzus.

Sheesh... you can just call me tc, Murr. TC is so formal.

And I acquiesce...

Gadzooks, I believe Thelonius Monk is piano's King. Then there's Teddy Wilson, Tommy Flanagan, Earl Hines, Bill Evans, Dave Frishberg, Fats Waller, Mose Allison, John Williams, the list is endless.

On the other hand... if you were from MY generation, you should be talking Herbie Hancock.

My acquiescence is revoked.

EVERYONE, HEAR ME! Watch this mini-doc:

http://www.vbs.tv/watch/toxic/toxic-garbage-island-full-length

Oh, that is one nasty scene, Todd. It hurt, but thanks for sharing.

Way back to #58,
Pete, I had an image of doing something stranger to a tree. I've read too much Ovid, I guess.

>100 Porius:, 101
yes, and Oscar Peterson, George Shearing, Michel Petrucciano, Brad Mehldau etc etc and excellent they all are

BUT

Keith Jarrett is GOD, GOD I'm telling you.

Thelonius Monk and McCoy Tyner on keyboards, but I realize that my opinion is worthless because it is not Bill Evans.

Robert

>104 Sandydog1:. So what's growing and chirping in your neighborhood, Sandy? I ask with an appreciation of your ability to actually name flowers and birds. Not all of us have that gift.

Jane, on the last thread you wrote: "I saw Treme over the weekend - very good though it will be a tough one to get through every week." I meant to ask, then forgot: Is that because of the ravaged state of the city, and the situations depicted?

2:35 pm & overcast. Rain threatens . Enjoying very much after 4 1/2 months in sunny So. Cal. Not much in the way of breezes. Temperature about 58 degrees F. The greenery-yallery loves the overcast skies. The pink colors of the dogwoods are stunningly beautiful. Not much an array of colors but any colors look their best and truest minus the blinding sunshine. The white dogwood blooms are especially beautiful. Showing off their whiteness against the pewter skies. Some of the white blossoms are beginning to go the way of all blossoms though.

Maybe it's the contrarian in me, or the je ne sais quoi in my makeup that leads me to root for the underdog, or that nostalgie de la boue that some of us bandied about a few months ago, trying to nail down its meaning and derivation, but (you knew a but was coming, right?) I get particular pleasure in spring breaking out in places like Detroit, that woefully depressed and uber-concrete city; ginkgo trees emerging from pavement and managing to survive if not flourish in New York City; children playing on narrow beaches of brown sand or pebbles across a bay from downtown office buildings; Los Angelenos seeing mountains on a miraculously clear morning when the smog lifts its curtain ... like the candlelight that illuminates a room during a hurricane or blizzard, after the electricity goes goes out. What light could be finer?

HURRICANE

A calm within the storm
Our house tonight.
Outside, the trees tremble and sway,
The winds howl, ghostly.
Our house is still.
It stands, solid, safe,
While the natural world rages outside.
I wonder why we are not lifted, battered
Flung into the whirling world around us.
I wonder, too, at the solidity, the calm
Of this house,
That rocks so
From the turbulence inside,
But keeps us safe
Tonight.

whose poem Clarabel?

Mine, Porius. I saw "hurricane" in Peter's post and couldn't help myself.

Detroit? Peter old fellow, you could do better for your buck. Nostalgedellaboo is not enough excuse to waste any precious moments in dear dirty Detroit. Is it?

Very good poem, I think, Clarabel.

I like your poem too, Clarabel.

Thank you both. It's nice to have an appreciative audience.

It's the contrast that brings out my sentiment, Porius, not the place itself. I mean, Clarabel's poem is not an ode to the hurricane, but how solid would the house appear without it?

Tani: barbecued turkey burgers for dinner; my own special recipe. Yum.

Mmmm... Slow Roasted Pork Roast sprinkled with Sage and fresh cracked pepper and sea salt, rice and veggies for the parentals.

Do share your turkey burger recipe, Piero!

ETA Unless it's a family secret, of course!

The truth is, it's not a great secret. I don't eat red meat, but cooking ground turkey as is, you get this hard result, so the trick is to soften it up, let it breathe, in two words: bread it. I do this with both Italian meat balls and turkey burgers: for two pounds of ground turkey, five pieces of bread, aired out to become a bit stale first, then ground into powder with a mixer, for the meat balls; ditto for the burgers, except only four pieces mixed in with the ground meat.

The beautiful part is that whatever else you then add gets sopped up, because of the bread you've added. I add (this is a BIG secret) pesto to the Italian meat balls (and a few spoonfuls of ground-up Romano cheese). And to the burgers, barbecue sauce and a little Worcestershire sauce.

mmmm mmmm. Yummy! Gotta try that. I am always looking for inspiration when it comes to cooking. My style is to just use what is available in the cupboards or fridge. The only time I follow a recipe to a "t" is when I bake.

They don't make burgers out of birds. No matter how hard they try.

Who is "they"? I am obviously not a member of their group. Not that they'd want me.

Speaking of burgers, I had lunch today at one of the couple sites that claim they invented the hamburger:

http://www.louislunch.com/

You wanna talk burgers? THE best burger I have ever eaten was "The Special" @ Stanich's in NE PDX. OMG! don't set it down once you pick it up or it will be a disaster.

That looks like a very excellent sandwich. If I knew someplace nearby to get one I would go right now. But it is not a burger. You can add a few things to a burger, but it's all about the meat which should taste like cooked beef.

Robert

>123 Sandydog1:. I saw that place on a TV special, Road Trip, maybe, about the best burgers in America. As if it were a science. Do I remember correctly that Louis had some sort of fetish: That you couldn't put ketchup on it? Or maybe you had to put mustard on it? Or mayo? Or maybe nothing? Or else they'd throw you out?

It most certainly IS a burger! You just cannot see it because it is so piled high with extra goodies. Mmmm like bacon (I think) ham and egg and cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, and more I cannot think of right now. BUT, to each is own... We have a burger joint in Bend called the Pilot Butte Inn and they have an 18oz burger, but I would never go THAT far. ;-)

Pilot Butte Inn

You can see the hamburger patty. The point I was making was when you add all that other stuff you end up with a sandwich, good though it may be, that is not a burger. The Counter, a nose in the air chain, sells a 16 ounce burger; it is nearly impossible to eat. When I go there (rarely, it is across town and not as good as a joint with a branch in my neighborhood) I get two one third pound burgers and sweet potato fries.

Robert

jesus, just thinking about it makes me belch.

I've eaten already and in not so very long it will be time to go to bed to read. Still I'm tempted to go out to the local place for a couple of burgers. Belching would be a bonus.

Robert

Sorry, Robert, just being sarcastic, again..

Me, too.

Robert

Y'know, I had a hamburger once.

Rain today. Very nice. It puts you in a certain mood.

In Seattle it kinda rained and kinda didn't. Often it was hard to tell what was what. Here, it rains or it doesn't. No pussyfootin' around.

Yay burgers! We are doing a little bbq hamburger today even in the rain.

107 - Treme is a bit difficult mostly because of the situations. It hits pretty close to home a lot of the time. And then there are the things I miss - I lost it pretty good when the big chief came walking out the pitch black.

It is times such as this that I hate not having "premium" channels. Pray tell, what is "Treme" about?

On the weather front; there is NO front!!! We are experiencing gorgeous blue skies and highs will be in the low to mid 60s today and tomorrow. The gates at Wickiup have been opened and the Deschutes flows as it should. I love Spring on the high desert.

I was thinking the other day about the upcoming garden and how nearly everyone is advising me to put up a fence around my garden to keep the deer and other critters away. Others tell me I should get a .22 rifle and use it to shoot turtles in my pond. I can't tho, it's against the city ordinance to shoot firearms in the city limits. I was talking with my wife about shooting deer that came into my garden and we got to discussing Bambi and Bambi's mother and all the sentimentality built up around "nature" over the last sixty or seventy years (and more, depending on your circumstances) and it dawned on me that sentiment is an emotional luxury that signifies the triumph of humans over their environment in some way. We can afford to be sentimental toward Bambi and Bambi's Mom because we are no longer in direct competition for survival with them. The closer one is to competing with nature for survival, the less one can afford to be sentimental with regard to it.

Does anyone else see sentimentality this way?

THE QUANGLE WANGLE'S HAT

On the top the Crumpetty Tree
The Quangle Wangle sat,
But his face you could not see,
On account of his Beaver Hat,
For his Hat was a 102 feet wide,
With ribbons and bibbons on every side
And bells, and buttons on every side
And bells, and buttons, and loops, and lace,
So that nobody ever could see the face
Of the Quangle Wangle Quee.

The Quangle Wangle said
To himself on the Crumpetty Tree, -
'Jam; and jelly; and bread;
Are the best food for me!
'But the longer I live on this Crumpetty Tree
'The plainer than ever it seems to me
'That very few people come this way
'And that life on the whole seems far from gay!'
Said the Quangle Wangle Quee.
But there came to the Crumpetty Tree,
Mr and Mrs Canary;
And they said, - 'Did you ever see
'Any spot so charmingly airy?
'May we build a nest on your lovely Hat?
'Mr Quangle Wangle grant us that!
'O please let us come and build a nest
'Of whatever material suits you best,
Mr Quangle Wangle Quee.

And besides, to the Crumpetty Tree
Came the Stork, the Duck, and the Owl;
The Snail, and the Bumble-Bee,
The Frog, and the Fimble Fowl;
(The Fimble Fowl, with a Corkscrew leg;)
And all of them said, - 'We humbly beg,
'We may build our homes on your lovely Hat, -
'Mr Quangle Wangle grant us that!
'Mr Quangle Wangle Quee.

And the Golden Grouse came there,
And the Pobble who has no toes, -
And the small Olympian bear, -
And the Dong with the luminous nose.
And the Blue Baboon who played the flute, -
And the Orient Calf from the Land of Tute, -
And the Attery Squash, and the Bisky Bat, -
All came and built on the lovely Hat
Of the Quangle Wangle Quee.

And the Quangle Wangle Quee said
To himself on the Crumpetty Tree, -
'When all these creatures move
'What a wonderful noise there'll be!
And at night by the light of the Mulberry Moon
They danced to the flute of the Blue Baboon,
On the broad green leaves of the Crumpetty Tree,
And all were as happy as happy could be,
With the Quangle Wangle Quee.

Edward Lear 1812 - 1888
Lear was born in Lancashire and died in San Remo. Sketching one day at the London Zoo he caught the attention of the Earl of Derby who invited him to Knowley to draw the birds there. In 1846 he published A BOOK OF NONSENSE complete with the limericks he had written to amuse the earls grandchildren. Later in life he travelled through most of Europe and the Far East painting landscapes which sold well. Lear's poetry was always popular. Ruskin placed him among his 100 authors. Lear was considered a Romantic poet: his world is more of the Imagination than the intelligence. He was a deft parodist and did much to revive the limerick.

Bravo, Porius. Very nice.

>136 highdesertlady:. Tani, Treme is an HOB show situated in N'Awlins three months after Katrina, focusing on characters who remained and are coming back, or not. A good mix of culture, politics, and music. But I can imagine how it might be unsettling for someone who knows the city well.

>137 geneg:. I never gave that survival angle a single thought, Gene. I mean, ghetto and tenement survival, yes, but I felt like Bambi then, in a different survival scene. I guess you must've been closer to the points you raise than someone who's always lived in urban areas; until I moved up here, that is.

I don't think that that's all there is to sentimentality, but certainly we can be sentimental about Bambi because our groceries come from a supermarket. My question is whether that is an advance. I happen to like feeling sentimental about Bambi but wonder whether that is, say ethically, good for me.

Robert

Talk you of Lance Alworth?

That is an interesting assessment and I do believe I agree. Our family has for the last 50 odd years spent "opening day" in a camp in eastern Oregon. Fall was the season for venison jerky and thuringer sausage in our house. Yet, for the last 12 years that I have lived in Bambi's neighborhood and watched the lives of some dozen or so Doe (how does one pluralize doe?) and their families my sentimentality has increased toward them. One in particular at our place near Mt Hood. She was very small and had patches of white on her belly and of course I named her 'Patches' and for 5 seasons followed her closely as she gave birth to 5 adorable offspring. The last two were twins and during her pregnancy I fed her apples nearly every day. At first I would throw them down over the deck to her and then when the twins arrived she brought them back and would even come when I called her. Near the end of our time on Mt Hood she would come to within 4-5 feet of me to eat her apples. So, yes, I agree that we can afford to be sentimental when our grocery stores are stocked full of just about every sort of protein imaginable without the slightest regard to their origins.

A dreary day to to others dark and dank though to my 'northern' soul one of great beauty. The threat of rain hangs in the air with the persistence of a head cold, but I don't mind the littlest of bits. April is marching on. So far it has been of an even temperament. Nothing too much as those sensible Greeks of old might say.

Not Chris Collinsworth, neither.

A 6.9-magnitude earthquake hit at 10:59 a.m. local time, and was centered 170 miles east-southeast of the coast of Taitung, located in southern Taiwan.

Did you feel that, tomcat? Did it do damage in your vicinity?

It's midnight there right now... I hope he's okay. have not seen any posts from him since 6:19am your time, Piero.

I'm not worried that he's hurt, Tani. I was hoping for an eyewitness report.

Very chilly today.

It was calm and mild this am, but now is very windy and coolish. Quite distressing considering the USFS decided to do a controlled burn a couple of miles away...

Chilly here too. I like it. Got a lotta work done today, and I'm not done yet.

A brilliant afternoon. Windy. The trees are leafing at an alarming rate. Spring in my youth moved very slowly. These days it slips by so fast I must make a concerted effort to keep an eye, a gimlet eye, on the mercurial season.

HUMPTY DUMPTY'S RESOLUTION

In winter when the fields are white,
I sing this song for your delight -

In Spring when woods are getting green,
I try and tell you what I mean.

In summer, when the days are long,
Perhaps you'll understand the song:

In autumn, when the leaves are brown,
Take pen and ink, and write it down.

I sent a message to the fish:
I told them 'This is what I wish.'

The little fishes of the sea,
They sent an answer back to me.

The little fishes answer was
'We cannot do it, sir, because -'

I sent again again to say
'It will be better to obey.'

The fishes answered with a grin,
'Why, what a temper you are in!'

I told them once, I told them twice:
They would not listen to advice.

I took a kettle large and new,
Fit for the deed I had to do.

My heart went hop, my heart went thump;
I filled the kettle at the pump.

Then someone came to me and said
'The little fishes are in bed.'

I said to him, I said it plain,
'Then you must wake them up again.'

I said it very loud and clear;
I went and shouted in his ear.

But he was very stiff and proud;
He said, 'You needn't shout so loud!'

And he was very proud and stiff;
He said 'I'd go and wake them, if -'

I took a corkscrew from the shelf:
I went to wake them up myself.

And when I found the door was locked,
I pulled and pushed and kicked and knocked.

And when I found the door was shut,
I tried to turn the handle, but -

Lewis Carroll
1871

I didn't feel anything at all. Taitung is in the middle of the island, and I live in the north, and it seems like the epicentre was some way out to sea, so probably didn't effect the island much.

Tremblors and quakes are pretty much regular here, sometimes I notice them, sometimes I don't. Next time there's a big one, I'll give you an eyewitness report (assuming I survive...)

Thank you all for your concern.

Raining again, more of a drizzle today; everything's very green around here.

I gotta make another limousine trip down to JFK to pick up the missus. She went on to visit a friend in Berkeley last week when I flew home from Seattle. I should buy one of those chauffeur caps.

I bought a Leon Russell CD after listening to Ganeshaka and Porius duel with his songs on the underappreciated author thread months ago. That, and the Stones, and some reggae, and a cigar for the trip home tonight, will keep me going as I speed along.

Musick to mine ears PW:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tV6u97beANs&feature=fvw
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fXs29SpLGpU&feature=related
That Loseeanna Man is gonna gityouyet
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yB-aVj83KAs

Grayling (Michigan) - As many as 1,000 people gathered under a huge, rain-drenched tent within a long cast of the Au Sable River on Sunday to celebrate the life of Calvin (Rusty) Gates, who for nearly 30 years had been the voice and chief guardian of one of America's most storied trout streams.
Gates owned the Au Sable Lodge with his wife, Julie, died last December of lung cancer. He was 54.
Gates founded the anglers of the Au Sable in 1987 and led numerous battles, many successful, against oil and gas drillers and other potential polluters, including the military, that he believed would have despoiled the river and its banks.
People came from as far as Montana and Minnesota.
During the eulogy the 'Gator' as he was called by his friends was celebrated for his Qualities: Stubborn, uncompromising, smart, relentless, pigheaded - it was certain he would need to be all these as he faced such tricky foes as the military.

mostly from Eric Sharp, Free Press Outdoors Writer, THE DETROIT FREE PRESS.

A cold, windy and oft snowy day on the high desert. BUT! The flickers are back and I do love their songs.

Weather report (somewhat revised)

According to reliable sources, tomorrow will be less chilly than today, and the next day even less so. It might even reach the high seventies on Saturday.

The Northwest to be windy and with a nasty chill today and for who knows how much longer. Tani might well be getting snow, if she hasn't already.

The middle of the country will be okay, warm in some places, warmer in others, but with storms here and there tomorrow. The Southeast and Texas will actually be quite livable the next few days.

Southern California will continue to be whatever it usually is, give or take.

Elsewhere: given the time zone differences to the east and west, people who live there either already know what the weather was or are anticipating an entirely different day altogether. It's too confusing for me.

It snowed several times yesterday but did not amount to anything. It looked like powdered sugar this morning. Now it is just very very cold and groppling here and there.

Oh! My chocolate mint is starting to sprout, the sedum is filling out, the allium's are huge and if mother nature would cooperate I could get out there and move the rest of my mints and the junipers and sage into the sun.

Nothing like the sun.

OF MODERN POETRY

The poem of the mind in the act of finding
What will suffice. It has not always had
To find: the scene was set; it repeated what
Was in the script.
Then the theatre was changed
To something else. Its past was a souvenir.

It has to be living, to learn the speech of the place.
It has to face the men of the time and to meet
The women of the time. It has to think about war
And it has to find that what will suffice. It has
To construct a new stage. It has to be on that stage
And, like an insatiable actor, slowly and
With meditation, speak words that in the ear,
In the delicatest ear of the mind, repeat,
Exactly, that which it wants to hear, at the sound
Of which, an invisible audience listens,
Not to the play, but to itself, expressed
In an emotion as of two people, as two
Emotions becoming one. The actor is
A metaphysician in the dark, twanging
An instrument, twanging a wiry string that gives
Sounds passing through sudden rightnesses, wholly
containing the mind, below which it cannot descend,
Beyond which it has no will to rise.
It must
Be the finding of a satisfaction, and may
Be of a man skating, a woman dancing, a woman
Combing. The poem of the act of the mind.

Wallace Stevens

Am watching RSC's 2009 HAMLET with Patrick Stewart and David Tennant as the moody Dane. Very good, as you can imagine.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xYZHb2xo0OI

Re: sentimentality and nature. I suspect that I am as fond of creatures different from myself as anyone. However, if Mr. Bunny and Mr. Crow eat the garden there will be none for me and mine. Therefore a certain amount of bird-shot is expended this time of year.

I've never been in that situation. If I were, I think I'd find another line of work so I weren't. Which is not a criticism. I do go after flies and their kin all the time, with a rolled up magazine.

I've neglected the local natural conditions for a while, so here's a Northeast report that most likely applies to Teresa (New Joizey), Sandy (Connecticut), Jane (New York City), and maybe Mr. Durick, who is still incognito but is probably around here somewhere:

My non-pine-tree leaves are still a springlike bright green, but the lone forsythia is now entirely dark green. The grass continues to grow, the St. Francis on the edge of the forest is still atilt (I must get out there soon and straighten him out), and with a few blips here and there, I can more or less count on fifty degree mornings. I haven't seen a deer in a while. Could be they're busy copulating, wherever they go to do that.

My newspaper tells me that a late season blizzard hit parts of upstate New York, Vermont, and New Hampshire with 20" in places. Were you affected by it?

Yeah, I saw that report, because it was so chilly and windy here yesterday; still windy today, but not as cold.

"Upstate" is a term lightly used by many, including people in New York City, whose sense of geography beyond their world within a world is severely myopic. You might have seen the famous Saul Steinberg New Yorker cover showing the city large in the foreground and everything else a blip. My mother would hear a weather report about snow in Buffalo and assume I got it too; someone else asked me if I'd bring them some childhood kielbasa from Rochester, as if it were just up the road: Buffalo is 350 miles away, Rochester about 250 miles. Woodstock is a mere 100 miles north of the city.

My guess is the blizzard hit the Adirondacks, which you know about, and from central Vermont and New Hampshire north, including Rutland, Hanover, etc., and not Bennington (which isn't far from Albany), or even Brattleboro (one of my favorite places) or the southern, now bedroom suburbs of Boston like Nashua, New Hampshire: where the state motto, btw, according to the locals, is not "Live Free or Die," but: "Live, Freeze, and Die."

So don't feel too bad about your early spring snow, Tani. You've got company.

Wow! You can see Russia from New York!

Good show, Jane! I love it when we occasionally achieve synchronicity on these threads.

LMAO!!!! I adore you people!!!

Yes, we are occasionally groppling again today with expected highs by early next week of 70... go figure. Our temp right now at noonish is a whopping 32.

Earthbound.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7A1bHsrUDOc&feature=channel
Acres Wilde
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AjzZm-m2BM4
Some hippies that made a lot of money.
or Detroit
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4z2DtNW79sQ

Yes, and seem to be insanely happy. Hummmmph!

I lived in Colorado Springs for a year, once. I didn't particularly care for it, but the thing that put me off Colorado was the day in June we got six inches of snow, followed immediately by temps in the 70's and 80's that turned it all to slush, then to mud. Loots of mud. Everywhere.

It was in an interesting location though. I can see why Zebulon Pike could see his peak more than a month before he arrived. If you went just a little way up the side of the mountain and looked to the south or the east you could see a thousand miles in either direction. Of course to the west were mountains. And I'm not talking about them thar hills, neither. Theseuz real mountains. Plateaus that start at 8,000 feet type mountains. High Plains Drifter type mountains. The kind that make the Applechains ashamed to be called mountains. Real Mountains.

But with looney weather, and now, loonies in general, it just did not appeal to me.

I was trying to explain to Zenomax, an excellent fellow, on another thread that there are just those times that nothing but a 'groove' will do. A boiling rhythm section and lots of repetition. I saw James Brown at Cobo Hall as a 9th grader. That was it. From that point I needed periodically if not oftener to hear that swampy sound. I would search out that musick at any venue, any part of town, any time of night. Jr. Walker and the All Stars, the Temptations, Gladys Knight and the Pips. An integral part of my Detroit edgeimacayshun.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v1YWtQ5n7Es
When I was a callow teen I wanted to dance like James Brown and walk (and do everything else) like the actor Laurence Harvey. My heroes. What a zany combination. I think this explains my weltschmerz (spelling?) as much as anything else. Not to worry, I'll return to my usual offerings tomorrow.
http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_iE3uB6YBQdY/SbxMC0VxZ0I/AAAAAAAAKmA/jIB9Emb2-8s/s400/L...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t9DxfhzFyRI

I was fortunate in my formative years, when I also, incidentally, happened to be going to college, to see James Brown at the Apollo in Harlem. What a spectacle that was! In his emerald green suit and with his gaudy backup singers. And on another night, at the same fabled theater, an all-star night with Bo Diddley, Muddy Waters, Bobby Blue Bland, Jimmy Reed (!), sitting in a chair, with his wife standing behind him, cueing him to the words ... and others, since all these legends-to-be weren't making any money to speak of.

As a matter of fact, before they went on stage, there was a movie, to bring more people into the theater. Damnedest thing I'd ever seen, black teenagers booing and hissing whenever the cavalry arrived on the scene, cheering the Indians on.

Cheering?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LJRs2TnP9H8

Porius, did your Detroit edgamacation include these guys? This was the best of the Detroit bands of the sixties. IMHO.

John Sinclair and the MC5. I was just thinking about them the other day, while getting this latest manuscript of mine in shape, Gene, because of my former brother-in-law, a drummer with Question Mark and the Mysterians, who swore he was a demo tape away from landing with the band.

Sure enough Gene. The Lincoln Park boys played a lot in Ann Arbor. Fred "Sonic" Smith was a Local Hero. Saw them many times, or it seems like many times at this remove. Maybe confabulation? Patti Smith would haunt the local watering holes and attend a play or an art exhibit. Saw her a few times at these recreations.

Peter, you bring 96 Tears to mine eyes!

Yes. One-hit wonders. But I see from the video, if that is indeed the original group, that the drummer is not my former brother-in-law. He lied to me.

96 Tears and this were my fav songs back then, guys!

Those two songs were on the radio all the time back then.

On Music

When through life unblest we rove,
Losing all that made life dear,
Should some notes we used to love,
In days of boyhood, meet our ear,
Oh! how welcome breathes the strain!
Wakening thoughts that long have slept,
Kindling former smiles again
In faded eyes that long have wept.

Like the gale, that sighs along
Beds of oriental flowers,
Is the grateful breath of song,
That once was heard in happier hours.
Fill'd with balm the gale sighs on,
Though the flowers have sunk in death;
So, when pleasure's dream is gone,
Its memory lives in Music's breath.

Music, oh, how faint, how weak,
Language fades before thy spell!
Why should Feeling ever speak,
When thou canst breathe her soul so well?
Friendship's balmy words may feign,
Love's are even more false than they;
Oh! 'tis only music's strain
Can sweetly soothe, and not betray.

Thomas Moore

Oh excellent Moore.

YELLOW TULIPS

Looking into the vase, into the calyx, into the water drop,
Looking into the throat of the flower, at the pollen stain,
I can see the ambush love sprung once in the summery wood.
I can see the casualties where they lay, till they set forth again.

I can see the lips, parted first in surprise, parted in desire,
Smile now as a silence falls on the yellow-dappled ride
For each thinks the other can hear each receding thought
On each receding tide.

They have come out of the wood now. They are skirting the fields
Between the tall wheat and the hedge, on the unploughed strips,
And they believe anyone who saw them would know
Every secret of their limbs and of their lips,

As if, like creatures of legend, they had come down out of the mist
Back to their native city, and stood in the square.
And they were seen to be marked at the throat with a certain sign
Whose meaning all could share.

* * * * * * * *

These flowers came from a shop. Really they looked nothing much
Till they opened as if in surprise at the heat of this hotel.
Then the surprise turned to a shout , and the girl said, "Shall I
chuck them now
Or give them one more day? They've not lasted so well."

"Oh give them one more day. They've lasted well enough.
They've lasted as love lasts, which is longer than most maintain.
Look at the sign it has left here at the throat of the flower
And on your tablecloth - look at the pollen stain."

James Fenton

Crazy weather this week. Cold and rainy and insanely windy at the beginning, now warm and sunny and beautiful.

Crazy, yes. It gives me a headache, for real: my body and head don't know what's going on and are rebelling.

Google gadget says it's 35° @ 11:45am! Oy ve... And of course the bozos on the local weather can't decide when it will warm up... For crying out loud it will be Cinco de Mayo in 5 days!!! Phew... thanks for letting me rant. Glad that's over.

Carry on.

Just got back from walking the dogs on this sunny, lovely 80 degree day. Just had to share.

Closer to 90 than 80 tomorrow, Teresa. You ready for that?

I will love it. The heat agrees with me.

My poor poor plnats! Bambi really likes tulips... they got every last one. Guess I won't be plnating any more of them!

Here's a weather phenomenon I've never seen, except on the Weather Channel and in The Wizard of Oz:

Several tornadoes that ripped through central Arkansas killed at least one person and injured two dozen others, officials said as they braced for another round of severe weather Saturday.

We're out in the woods and the Spring flowers are still in full bloom: Cowslip (Marsh Marigold), Stinking Benjamin (Red Trillium), Jack in the Pulpit, Dwarf Ginsing, Wild Sasparilla, Windflower (anenome), Dogtooth Violet (Trout Lilly). Sandy don't give a dog's ass; she's chasing squirrels and sniffing for deer...

Dogtooth violets, whoopiteeyow there boy. It's Nature's wey.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YsTK2LHZKPQ&feature=related

All that glisters is not gold
and wishing you many good lucks
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ocvLICvoTt0&feature=related

I took the dog and son up out for another walk to do some botanizing, you know, to observe the plnats and the like. What a beautiful day!

The boy almost stepped on a real good-size Northern Watersnake. It whipped through the grass, jumped in a small stream/culvert, swam a bit, turned around and faced me down! Now I know watersnakes are known to be bitey, but this guy really stood his ground! Beautiful looks.

Here's a more intimate encounter:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xc5xLtj2fhc

"Our" birds (the neotrpical migrants) are coming back and starting to fill the prematurely-leafing New England trees.

Nice entry, Sandy. You make it sound like summer there ... and why not, it being 85 degrees or so? I also like "the boy." Intriguingly literate, you are, and can recognize a (grumpy) watersnake when you see one too. Very impressive.

I have been compelled by circumstance to get into this subject:

Lumpia are pastries of Chinese origin similar to spring rolls popular in the Philippines and Indonesia. The term lumpia derives from lunpia (traditional Chinese: 潤餅; pinyin: rùnbǐng; POJ: jūn-piáⁿ, lūn-piáⁿ) in the Hokkien language. The recipe, both fried and fresh versions, was brought by the Chinese immigrants from the Fujian province of China to Southeast Asia and became popular where they settled in the Philippines and Indonesia. In the Netherlands and Flanders, it is spelled loempia which is the old Indonesian spelling for lumpia and has also become the generic name for "spring roll" in Dutch. A variant is the Vietnamese lumpia, wrapped in a thinner piece of pastry, in a size close to a spring roll though the wrapping closes the ends off completely, which is typical for lumpia.

About 30 years ago, a navy buddy of my brother brought his Filipino wife to stay with us for about a month and man could that woman cook! I still have her hand written recipes for Shanghai Lumpia, Siopao, Chicken Adobo, Pancit Canton and Chopsuey. Oh, I miss my friend... Good eats!

ETA* I will happily pass on her recipes to whomever is interested. I think she would be okay with that. Last time I saw her was 15 almost 16 years ago at my brother's 3rd wedding and she made them then... Okay, that's it... I have GOT to get some wrappers! k, am going to search for an Asian market in Bend right now!

Today's nature news:

Crews have had little success stemming the flow from the ruptured well on the sea floor off Louisiana or removing oil from the surface by skimming it, burning it or dispersing it with chemicals. The massive and growing oil slick is creeping toward the shoreline from Louisiana to Florida. Adding to the gloomy outlook were warnings that an uncontrolled gusher could create a nightmare scenario if the Gulf Stream current carries it toward the Atlantic.

All I can say is, Drill, Baby Drill.

I have no words...

Our government will bail out the company, and the masses will suffer.

If I weren't convinced that socialism is just as unworkable as the current neo-conservatism, I'd be a revolutionary.

Robert

12:07 P.M. EDT 29 April 2010 White House Briefing:

Q Is there a point, though, where the federal government shifts from oversight of BP to saying, we’re taking control and we’ll send you the bill, and are we at that point?

REAR ADMIRAL BRICE-O’HARA: We are certainly not at that point now. And I don’t imagine, given the professionalism of our partner, BP, and -(a VERY pregnant pause)- maybe partner was -- let me back up. (Laughter.)

SECRETARY NAPOLITANO: They are not our partner -- they are not our partner.

REAR ADMIRAL BRICE-O’HARA: In terms of -- bad choice of words. Our responsible party has shown willingness, they’ve shown resolve, they’ve shown accommodation for what the government has asked of them. They, too, have been forward leaning. I can’t emphasize enough in terms of what’s happening underwater -- the state of the art of that technology. There are not easy answers. "

Need I say more?

Bastards.

Bastids.

89 degrees today and I'm waiting, hoping, for rain. Lightning and thunder would be nice. I don't know how you hot weather people can stand it. You must have molasses for blood.

I just laid in four 20' rows of corn (will plant three more in a week or ten days), seven ten foot rows of okra (we like our okry here in the south), and seven tomato plants. It's supposed to thunderstorm tomorrow. Here's to hoping for good rain, but not enough to wash me out. Once I get my beans in, planting will be done.

Wow, and here I thought I was warm at 55°! lol! Can't wait for those temps here. Nice thing is that it is dry. Can't stand humidity.

209--Heat? Lovin' it.

>210 geneg:. Back in the day, when I gardened, I got into planting seeds in accordance with the cycles of the moon, based upon observations made by Rudolph Steiner. I'm a skeptic at heart, but also gullible, so I was at war with myself while following this regimen. But I did it, and who knows? It might just've been coincidence, but my tomatoes (four or five different kinds), bush peas and pole peas, eggplant, squash, three different kinds of lettuce, etc., were amazingly large. It occurred at a low point of my life, so it was reassuring to know I could at least produce something worthwhile.

All that stuff works whether you believe or no.
Have you read that book by Paul Hawken?

No, I haven't read Hawken. And I was trying to tread lightly on making absolute claims; the skeptic in me. Who knows why I had humongous tomatoes that year? I did put a lot of work into the soil, resisted my CEO father-in-law's entreaties to use his chemical company's toxic fertilizer, and there was a certain amount of rain, sun, etc., maybe the perfect amount for that particular year. I don't want to give the moon, or Steiner, all the credit.

Raining cats and dawgs. Turning chilly after a stuffy day. With you on the heat PW, can't take it no more. I likes it about 55 and cloudy. All that sun out in So. Cal. gets on my nerves. I can even hear a little thunder in the background. Just finished watching a movie with Gene Tierney and Vincent Price. The sound was turned off. Watched the puppet show as I contemplated my nave-el.

It cooled off a trifle here, but it would be swell if I got some rain too. I'm about to watch Treme now. Ciao.

I don't recall where, but I heard once years ago something about plnating during the new moon. Is that what you did? It totally makes sense to me, but then I am a tad bit off.

On the weather front, we are expecting sustained winds of 30-40 and gusts to 55mph from 7am to 11pm tomorrow on the high desert. Here's what it looked like about 45 minutes ago.

Yup, that's what I did: the new moon. And as a result ran afoul of the old adage: never eat anything bigger than your head.

hahahaha! You funny, Piero!

Rain has stopped. Cool air out there. Noh wind.

It's 4:30pm here. Sky's still light, but the sun's down. Where did summer gohohoho?

It's pleasantly chilly - people walking around under red trees wearing black and red, and at certain times of day the sunshine slants at an angle that makes one feel like it's a movie set, only, y'know, in real life.

Sorry, Rena... we are taking your sun away. But you can have it back in oh, say about 6 months? ;-)

Edited for stupid spelling mistake

>222 ChocolateMuse:. You do have an eye for things, ChocolateMuse.

>223 highdesertlady:. And Rena is ... ?

I am here--if just for a minute! A non-sequitur here, but, Peter, the Dan Ryan Expressway is at least six lanes wide in some places. But for number of continuous lanes of traffic and insane traffic, I think Atlanta is right up close to the top.

Now for nature: Yesterday we took our oldest grandchildren (12 and 13) to the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum located just north of the Lincoln Park Zoo in Chicago. I had never been there before, and was quite impressed. It focuses on nature, animals and conservation in the midwest, has hands-on exhibits to entertain even the 12 and 13 year old, and had a group from the Chicago Herpetological Society there with snakes, iquanas, frogs, toads and turtles that could be held, touched and learned about. NO, I was not holding or touching, but the kids loved it. There is also a butterfly habitat with butterflies from around the world. When we went in I thought we might be through in an hour, but about two and a half hours later, we were dragging the kids out!

Maybe not as cool as the nature most of you live with, but my nature is pretty much confined to parks and the lake. Really enjoyed this museum.

Back to the grindstone . . . .

Glad you dropped in, Grandma. That might be the same museum I took my daughter to years ago: off the lake, a classic looking structure, not far from Hyde Park. But no, that was the Natural History Museum, I think. Hey, I live here now but I'm still a city boy. I love museums; city parks; bridges (!) over canals, inlets, tributaries; elevated train lines overlooking whatever landscape ...

From I Think, Therefore Who Am I?:

The quilt of tenements filled the foreground at uneven heights, stretching to the red brick border of Stuyvesant Town at Fourteenth Street. To the west, in the distance, the Empire State and a jumble of skyscrapers marked the business district. To the east, thin streams of white smoke rose from the Con Ed smokestacks next to the sluggish East River between Manhattan island and the squat warehouses and factories lining the Brooklyn shoreline. Farther north, the span of the Queensboro Bridge seemed an erector set construction. And around everything, the entire panorama, the ochre smudge of pollution . . .

It took my breath away.

I even get off on overgrown lots. Which is to say, don't you be putting down your nature, Lisa. It is as natural in its way as anyone else's.

On the Dan Ryan: if an expressway that wide appeared in front of me as if by magic instead of the narrow three lanes typical in New York City (one of which is usually closed at any given moment), I'd be thoroughly discombobulated by whatever the opposite of claustrophobia is.

#224 - That would be Muse...

#226 - I really loved that passage in your book, Piero. Made me feel like I was there in your chair in front of the window. How the heck did you manage to snag an apartment with that kind of view?

Now how did you find that out, Tani? The Muse's name isn't on her profile. You continue to astonish me.

Yes, it was a great pad. But back in those days, things came cheap and easy. You can make an argument that otherwise, what we call the sixties would never have occurred.

She took a new path, down to the road, the one the taxi should have taken, and then continued along it until she came to a track up into the fells to the north-east. The afternoon sun, as it began to go down, was making the lake rose-colored. After about a mile, she sat down on a stone in the bracken and looked around her. All was gray and white and pink and gold. The crags looked soft, almost fluid. They shone like the bodies of soft pink seals. She felt the smallness of the Lake District, its constriction. Such a few miles holding all this grandeur. Wordsworth had been one of the Lake District crags. Man and mountain. A pinprick, an insect on the water, sometimes, but he had ended up a crag. A crag that looked out over eternity.

from THE FLIGHT OF THE MAIDENS
by Jane Gardam

Not bad, Peter. Not bad at all.

#229 Love it, Por-man!

#228 I have my ways, Piero... I have my ways.

Since we're passing around compliments today--nothing wrong with that--I liked your entry way back at message #142, Tani. And your reportage at #206 weren't bad neither.

The novel is pretty good too tc.

Nothing personal, fuzzy, but no phantoms are allowed on this thread. Sorry, them's the rules.

#231 - Oh, I had forgotten all about my Patches post. I miss her. She was very cool. She used to come up to about 6-10 from my front door and look in the french doors as if to say "Um, excuse me! Where are my apples?" She got apples from a lot of us within about a mile radius of my house. when I find the photos, I will post one. I had never seen a dwarfed deer before her, nor one with so much white.

Yeah, that was an absolutely ridiculous press conference, She was quite dumbfounded as to how to get herself out of that one. If I find a video I will post the link. The head of the EPA was standing behind her and was disgusted and you can here Napolitano in the background "They are not our partner... they are not our partner" What a freeque'n joke.

Found the youtube video mentioned above... it is about an hour long, but if you are interested, it is quite an interesting snafu on the rear admiral's part.

Oil Spill Press Conference

Fuzzybutthead? As Hank Kingsley would say: wow, wow, wow, wow.
You are one c-r-a-z-y kat.

It was his library that clued me to his incorporeality.

And his misspelled buthead?

I know that I posted this before but I can't help myself.

Cold is the ogre which drives all beautiful things into hiding. Below the surface of a frost-bound garden there lurk hidden bulbs which are only biding their time to burst forth in a riot of laughing color (unless the gardener has planted them upside down) but shivering Nature dare not put forth her flowers till the ogre has gone. Not otherwise does cold suppress love. A man in an open cart on an English Spring may continue to be in love, but love is not the emotion uppermost in his bosom. It shrinks within him and waits for a better time

from SOMETHING NEW
by Pelham Grenville Wodehouse

I am contributing to the Dostoyevsky thread elsewhere. While it is most informative the laughs are at a premium.

I don't remember this entry, Porius. But then, I am old.

I like Dusty as much as anyone, but no, not a lotta laughs there.

If you ask nicely, like Tani did, you may be granted the inestimable privilige of addressing me as 'Rena'.

Nah seriously, as friends, you may call me anything you like. (that might be interesting)... One of these days I will put that spicy bit of info onto my profile. My real real name is Lorena, but I somehow prefer Rena online. Also, all variations on ChocolateMuse seem nice and friendly.

I remember your Something New entry from before, Porius. I love it.

Happy to hear it. I love PGW. My goal is to read everything he wrote if I can get my hands on it.

Yes, Rena, Tani spilled the beans. So now we know. Americans, of course, like nicknames; the shorter the better. Rena doesn't lend itself to anything snappy that I can think of. Some call you Muse, but that's too serious, I think, and Choco's too unserious. Maybe we should have a contest.

Oh, I love that, Porius! It is so apropos to my spring or lack thereof. Thank you!

hmmm... contest?

Yay, a contest! We haven't had one of those since the fridge lists, back when I was too scared to post anything in Le Salon for fear of seeming Not Intellectual Enough.

Aussies use nicknames a lot too, preferably if they end in 'o'. So, I'd be Muso I guess. Which has a double meaning I rather like... (Appropriately enough, I will be doing the piano accompaniment in a Muse song on Monday night http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8gjxpDxugno )

But hey, whatever, you can call me Rena, or Ms Muse like Murrushka does, or Hepzaiah Figginbottom if you like. I'm just happy to be considered one of the crowd :)

ETA: Not actually FOR Muse, just in a backyardish kinda way in a performance at work.

OT - I just want to interject here that I just finished watching a piece on PBS called "A Ripple of Hope" about the speech that Robert F Kennedy made in Indianapolis the night that Martin Luther King Jr was assassinated. What a powerful, let me repeat, powerful piece of journalism. My Mom and I have been sitting here crying as though it was yesterday.

We saw Bobby Kennedy, on a warm night in May 1968 two weeks before he was assassinated, at the high school near my home. I was 7 going on 8 (the same year I got that bike that I posted on the sixties thread) and it was so exciting to see him up close and in person. Mom & I kind of hung back because the crowd was just incredible but my brothers ran along side of his car. And you know, he was riding in a convertible. Damn it, why do they always have to take the good ones? For those of you in the US if you get a chance to view this show I would encourage you to do so. Set any preconceptions aside and just watch and listen to his words. It's being repeated in our area and I imagine in most other areas as well.

Okay, thanks for putting up with me... Carry on.

#248 Oh My Gawd, I LOVE THAT BAND!!!!! Thank you Ms Rena, Ms Muse, Ms Muso, Ms Hepzaiah Figginbottom... you darlin' girl, you... You have great taste in musica!

My great uncle used to call my cousin and me Hepzabob and Spindleshanks... don't ask me why because I can't for the life of me remember. (I was Spindleshanks) Huh... have not thought of that in decades.

So, Salonistas I have not been around long enough to know about these past contests. How does it play out?

A contest, hmm? I didn't expect to be taken seriously; I often don't, except when I'm serious. Let's see ... First we need a prize. Something worth the effort to compete for. Let's say ... a hundred thousand dollars. No. that's too crass, and too much, and Porius doesn't have that much to spare. So ... maybe a book. But not my bloomin' bouk, since I already offered that and still have one copy floating around here someplace.

So before we can go on, we need to come up with a book prize, to be given to the winner of our Name the Sheila contest. I'm open to suggestions ... unless people want to have a contest to determine what book should be the prize in our contest.

Rena from Gehenna? Too hot? Too trashy?

We have an entry, fellow naturalists! From Gene, who apparently doesn't care about prizes. (Good for you, Gene.) Rena from Gehenna. (Anyone may submit as many entries as they like, so you're not necessarily through yet, Gene.)

Of course, we should have a deadline. Contests can't go on forever (for then they would be the same as life, where, as they say, the person who dies with the most money wins).

Let's say Name the Sheila ends Saturday, May 8th, at midnight (our time, not Sheila's). The decision of the judge--that's you, ChocoMuse--is final.

I am not sure it could be an entry because it has been used. However, I like Rena the Muse. It works on several levels and has a flavor of Tolkien to me.

How about 'Goodnite-I-Rena'
A little ponderous or maybe even cumbersome - whaddyathink?
A great way to sign off though.

Is her name not Bruce then?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_f_p0CgPeyA

I wonder if the person who came up with the slogan "He who dies with the most toys wins" ever understood the extent of the irony such a phrase contains. Or, if as most usual with narcissistic bumpus's, they were too stupid to see it.

Entries in Name the Sheila so far:

geneg: Rena from Gehenna
hippypaul: Rena the Muse
Porius: Goodnite-I-Rena

Meanwhile, on the nature front:

http://www.slate.com/id/2252748/

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/04/business/energy-environment/04weed.html?th&amp....

MERLIN'S OBSERVATORY
The 12 Houses of the Stars shall lament the irregular excursions of their inmates. (The Prophecies of Merlin)

Ganieda seeks to restrain Merlin from returning to the woods, and he agrees that his mode of life should change. He requests her to build an Observatory, with a house for Winter shelter, where he can watch the stars and have detailed notes taken by scribes. He spends the Summer close to Nature, but the Winter in the Observatory.

After these things had happened the prophet was making haste to go to the woods he was accustomed to , hating the people in the city. The Queen advised him to stay with her and put off his trip to the woods until the cold of White Winter, which was then at hand, should be over, and Summer should return again with its tender fruits on which he could live while the weather grew warm from the Sun. He refused, and desirous of departing and scorning the Winter he said to her, "O dear sister, why do you labor to hold me back? Winter with his tempests cannot frighten me, nor icy Boreas when he rages with his cruel blasts and suddenly injures the flocks of sheep with hail; neither does Auster disturb me when its rain clouds shed their waters. Why should not I seek the deserted groves and green woodlands? Content with a little I can endure the frost. There under the leaves of the trees among the odorous blossoms I shall take pleasure in lying through the summer; but lest I lack food in Winter you might build me a house in the woods and have servants in it to wait on me and prepare me food when the ground refuses to produce grain or the trees fruit. Before the other buildings build me a remote one with 70 doors and as many windows through which I may watch fire-breathing Phoebus and Venus and the stars gliding from the heavens by night, and all of whom shall show me what is going to happen to the people of the Kingdom. And let the same number of scribes be at hand, trained to take my dictation, and let them be attentive to record my prophecy on their tablets. You too are to come often, dear sister, and then you can relieve my hunger with food and drink.' After he had finished speaking he departed hastily for the woods.
His sister obeyed him and built the place he had asked for, and the other houses and whatever else he had bid her. But he, while the apples remained and Phoebus was ascending higher through the stars, rejoiced to remain beneath the leaves and to wander through the groves with their smoothing breezes. Then Winter came, harsh with icy winds, and despoiled the ground and the trees of all their fruit, and Merlin lacked food because the rains were at hand, and he came, sad and hungry, to the aforesaid place. Thither the Queen often came and rejoiced to bring her brother both food and drink. He, after he had refreshed himself with various kinds of edibles, would arise and express his approval of his sister. Then wandering about the house he would look at the stars while he prophesied things like these which he knew were going to come to pass.

from the MYSTIC LIFE OF MERLIN
by R.J. Stewart

#260 Thanks, Porius! I like that one!

#259 Ugh... as though I didn't have enough to do without the time saver of roundup. Sheesh.

Now, on to Rena and her nick name. I vote for MochaRena... it kinda rolls off the tongue.

lol, name the sheila. Too funny.

Gene, does it change matters if I say 'Rena' is generally pronounced with a long 'e'?

I love MochaRena, only it's almost as hard to type as ChocolateMuse.

I like them all! Keep em coming! :)

Shades of winter here today. Cold rain, petulant wind. But the trees are still red - nature's equivalent of a wood fire glowing in the corner.

Well this ol' bloke had a real late start for the evening dog walk. As a result we got to listen to the twilight serenade of a "timberdoodle". The lek it selected was a golf driving range.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qk5I402LW8o

Okay... hmmm... let's see... hows about... MoRena (short for MochaRena) or simply Mo. (personally, I really like Muse)

Ah, there is also Renya (I am leaning towards the Russians these days) or Renshka?

LOL ;-)

Okay, let's see if I've got this straight. The exuberant Tani's entries are: MochaRena, MoRena, Mo, Muse, Renya, and Renshka.

And, since Rena from Gehenna actually sounds like Reena from Gehenna, does Gene want to reconsider his entry?

>264 Sandydog1:. That doesn't sound like a serenade to me, Sandy. More like a buzzer that either delivers a nasty shock or that tells you your time is up on a quiz show.

#264 LOL! I think Piero is correct! My shoulder started twitching with that too!

I have no idea why our man Porius placed this on the sports thread. In case he had one of those episodes the elderly sometimes have and meant it for our amusement here, here it is:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T70-HTlKRXo

Okay, forget Rena from Gehenna. I misunderstood Loreena. In
English we need that extra e for the long: sound e followed by consonant followed by a. I guess in Australian it has a different effect.

Anyway, I'll go with Lovely Rena Meter Maid. How's that?

Hahahaha! I love Monty Python!

Rainclouds hung in the air all day as bloated and as hideous as Rush Limbah himself but precious little rain. As precious little mercy droppeth from the corpulent man's lips. I don't usually bother with these types but I can't help believing we would be better off if the great fat man would take all his pelf and retire to the country.
The Prince William Sound is pristine says the benighted mouth-piece!?

271: Don't listen to talk radio - it will do wonders for your blood pressure!

Lovely Rena Meter Maid. I notice that these nicknames are getting longer, and no easier to spit out than ChocolateMuse. I'll go shorter, with the simple and not particularly earth-shattering ChocoMuse. But I intend to call her Sheila anyway.

#271 Porius!!!!! Listen to me! The man is EVIL INCARNATE!!!!! JUST SAY NO to the FAT MAN! See my blood pressure is up just thinking of him. okay... shhhh, just turn it off. Don't be like my brother and say that you need to listen because you have to know what the other side is saying....blah, blah, blah... Ugh! I detest that man intensely.

#273 I almost put that out there, too Piero! hahaha. I am leaning toward Miss Muse or the Russian alternative, Mushka too.

ETA... or the feminine Mushkaya.

I don't listen to him. The information came to me on the ED SHOW. On his segment called Psycho Talk. I listen to these shows while I do other things. Though my best news source is Jon Stewart - gofigure.

Yesterday, I was in Queens, a borough of New York, cleaning up my mother's apartment so it can be sold. She died in September, at ninety. If you've ever done this, you know it's a sobering one might say existential encounter with the meaning of possessions; a few things worth a bit of money, most not, and of course a rare item of sentimental value.

I came across that rare item, a letter from my father's aunt Rae (he died ten years ago) to my parents after the death of her husband, Yale Okun--a big, lumpy faced, sweet man--my father's favorite uncle, a light heavyweight prizefighter who fought in the twenties and thirties. He was a contender, as they say, took place in a box-off after the undefeated champ Tommy Loughren retired in 1931, was beaten in the semifinals at Madison Square Garden by the eventual champ, "Slapsie" Maxie Rosenbloom. Afterward, he beat the soon-to-be heavyweight champ, Jim Braddock, when Braddock was still a light heavyweight.

At the height of his success, Yale went on a European tour and married a chorus girl. It didn't last long, but she had a child by him, and by then he was back in the U.S. He never had any children and this was the first, and as it turned out, the only one: a boy. But Yale never saw him, spent the rest of his life trying to find him, and when he died, Rae wrote in the letter I came across, it was of a broken heart.

You know what? I am NEVER going to be able to choose just one of these lovely names. I'm inclined to list them all on my profile page and invite you to use any, depending on your mood, the time of day, and/or the seriousness of tone of your post. Here's a comprehensive list so far:

Rena the Muse
ChocoMuse
Lovely Rena Meter Maid
Goodnite-I-Rena
MochaRena
MoRena
Mo
Muse
Renya
Renshka
Mushkaya
Mushka
Miss or Ms Muse
Sheila

Have I missed any?

People also tend to abbreviate to CM a lot, which is easy, though not terribly inventive.

Oh and Gene, don't worry, lots of people call me Lorenna. It's just not how my parents decreed its pronounciation.

Oh, goody! I can use them as you described... How fun! So, MochaRena, tell me more about your beautiful fall down under. I love the way you describe your surroundings.

We, on the high desert of Oregon are having very strange weather. Wind and white powder sunshine just to name a few of the strange patterns today.

'White powder sunshine"... is this a technical or poetic term? I like the picture it gives me, but don't know if it's very accurate.

The Sheila Weather Report Down Under has very little to add today, except that the wind has developed a bite and is munching hard, even in the sunshine.

And Oregono-tani (I can't take all the nickname prerogative) - we Do Not have 'fall' here. We have that more gracious season called 'Autumn'. Though in the north we don't have either, just 'The Wet' and 'The Dry'. But that's a lot further up than I am.

For the record, I have moved that list of Rena-names to my profile. Any more contributions will be added as they arise. Prizes all round :) I always like a bit of cheesy democracy.

LOL Miss MochaMuse! (;-) another for your list!) I stand corrected. There is no 'fall', just Autumn down under and only wet and dry seasons up north. Filing away for future reference.

Usually in Oregon (renowned for its rain) we have 'Liquid Sunshine'. However, Mother Nature has seen fit to grace us with a "White Powder Sunshine" which is my own term, btw. It consists of a blue sky, gray on the horizon, loads of crisp air, and snow!

Oy! It is Cinco de Mayo, for heaven sake! It's supposed to be in the 80s by now! Okay, 'snuff whining.

Having now suggested several names for Sheila (aka ChocolateMuse) that she's taken to heart and placed on her profile page, we approach the end of Australia Appreciation Week. But not yet. We still have a few days to go, so here's a poem written by another Aussie sheila:

The unquiet city

we are succulents
our cool jade arms open
over clean tables our fine bone
china minds pull the strings
of our tongues together we plait
our thoughts with the television
back through the aerials and
transmission towers prodding
through the literal fog
the mechanics of which distance
does not startle us or the ears
pretend to hear the telephone
the page also wearies
us we have taken the meaning
out of things by laying them face to
face in our dictionary of emotions
we are so entirely alone that we
are unaware of it
and we enjoy the religion of solitude
because religions are at base
meaningless and we can turn
from them to a new hobby
to clean ashtrays or emptier
whiskey glasses we the women
of our building Margaret Gladys
Cecily Ida Eileen and I have
the cleanest washing on our block
we are proud and air our sheets
although it's a long time since
any serious stain or passionate figment
seeped through that censorious cloth
we have plants one of us has a budgie
and I have three fish the details
are unimportant God does not come here often
we would be suspicious if he
did without an identity card
we collect each others' mail
remind each other of garbage
days and are frightened
of the louts from the skating rink
but in the night I leave
my curtains open and air
my pendant tremulous breasts

Chris Mansell

bbbbrrrrrrrrrrhhhhhhhh! mmmmmy gooogggle ggadget sssays itttt's 17°!

It is, however, abso-frequen-lutley GORgeous out. The crispest blue sky ever! They say it will reach 55° but I won't hold my breath.

And now I must venture out and travel into the big city... wish me luck.

Okay. Good luck. I ventured into the big city the other day and returned with a headache.

I definitely won't have a headache, but I will, however, be out of it when I get home... Am going to get an injection in my SI joint at the pain clinic. Ugh! Thank Gawd for Versed. Have done them both ways... with/without and will never do it again without. Am a little concerned about the trip back with Papa driving. I am not a good passenger anyway, but he is getting a little scary. Would have Mama drive, but she is ill. Hence, the good luck is necessary. ;-)

Any of you have to take the keys away? I think this is looming closer than I care to think about. Would love anecdotes if anyone has them.

Ciao!

I can commiserate. I had to take away my mother's credit cards because of her Alzheimer's. You do have to anticipate problems when it comes to people who don't know what they're doing, whether young or old.

I was wrong when I said it was the second best day ever a couple of weeks ago. (Lisa's term.) This is the second best day ever. A light breeze, neither warm nor cold, out of the south. The leaves fulsome. Tiny, harmless insects, perhaps mayflies, flitting around over stalks of grass that stand with distinction, each one separate; almost with pride, seemingly. If I could bottle this ... well, that would ruin it, wouldn't it?

A cool breeze out of the NNW. Sunshine. The trees are green. Even the late showing maple outside my window is doing some kind of Spring shake to show its fellow trees it's with the program.

And whot'd you get in San Diego? A friggin palm tree, that's whot.

What about the magnificent Eucalyptis, the glorious Jacaranda (the tree Nabokov used to like to write under), the Cottonwood, just to name a few there, PW, there. Pale-in loves to follow most everything with a there there. But of course as old Gertrude Stein said: "There's no there there. So there.

The Jacaranda was the name of one of the clubs in Liverpool for which the Beatles were the house band. At that time they may have been the Quarrymen or someone else, but they played a lot of gigs there in the late fifties and very early sixties. I believe they were playing there before they went to Hamburg. They became a real band in Hamburg.

>289 Porius:. Yes. Eucalyptus. The smell of it, so distinct. Not much to watch bloom, though, which was my pernt.

>290 geneg:. There was a movie, Gene, about ten years ago, maybe more, focusing on the Beatles in Hamburg. I didn't think I'd like it, since I couldn't imagine watching a buncha blokes pretending to be the iconic four, and yet it was pretty good. Took them from Liverpool to Germany, including a Pete Best character. Do you know it? What it was called? I wouldn't mind seeing it again.

Re eucalyptus, there's a street of lemon scented gums not far from my place - you walk down it and it smells like... well I'll paraphrase John Fowles - air as sharp as lemon juice, and just as cleansing.

And I have jacaranda seedlings popping up all over my backyard. They turn out to be everywhere in spring, though one forgets they're there the rest of the year.

xoxo, Lovely Rena Meter Maid

So, today, which for Sheila is still yesterday--or is it tomorrow?--is ChocoMuse's birthday. She and her many aliases. Pretty prescient of me, I'd say, scheduling Australia Appreciation Week when I did.

Well, we've actually managed to overlap, Peter - it's today. Thank you for the Australia appreciation week, I enjoyed it muchly.

Here's an Australian appreciation ad for an Australian airline: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hbGuqmaDgLA

Cheesy? Impressive? Make what you will of it.

here's some more Aussie appreciation: an Aussie band being critical of Australians!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ejorQVy3m8E

Damn them! And damn me for linking this during Australia appreciation week! Would I like it if somebody linked "Bullet the Blue Sky" of "The Last Resort" during Proud to be an American week? I don't think so.

Love it Muse-ical Rena! What I would have given to be in that choir as a child! ;-)

Some people celebrate Proud to Be an American Week every week, week after week, until you want to scream. At least these Aussies have the good sense not to go on and on forever about it. Btw, Sheila, what is the name of your prime minister? It was in Sunday's New York Times crossword puzzle, which I've finished about half of--and after only 30 hours! Four letters. Starts with an H, I think, and might end with a D.

Birthday? Happy, Happy Birthday Miss MochaRena! And how did you find that out, Piero? Now you are astounding me!

Mushkaya aka MoRena more or less announced it ... somewhere. You're usually on top of these things, Tani. Don't you be operating no moving vehicles now! Or stationary ones either.

uh uh... no way, Piero! Not til noonish tomorrow. Slept all afternoon then made dinner for the parental units and now am veggin'.

Peter, that crossword is totally at least three years out of date. John Howard (liberal) was our last prime minister, and a shoddy job he made of it too. We've had Kevin Rudd (labor) for the last 2 and a half years, election coming up at the end of the year.

That's hilarious, that the NY Times has no idea, when we follow US politics more closely than our own it seems sometimes.

Oh, okay, I just realised that you've filled something else in wrong, and should have been 'R' instead of 'H'. Four letters does after all make Rudd. But I'm not going to delete what I just wrote anyway, so there.

Riiique, I can't see things on Vevo :(

Thanks for the birthday wishes!

I know, Vevo is kinda sketchy for me too, Rique!

So now you must change your profile, yet again, Mushka. You are no longer 26. and is it today the 6th or tomorrow the 7th. My niece just turned 26 today! Whichever it is, was, or will be (?) Happy Happy again! I love bdays.

It's today the 7th, Tani, and I already changed my profile, because 26 is what I'm turning at about 4:30pm.

While driving last night, I thought your name sounds kinda herbal, Tani. Hows about OregonoTansy?

;-) I like it! But, now how are you pronouncing it? (I am a student of phonetics as my name has been misspelled, mispronounced my entire life. Twice today, in fact, at the surgi-center)

OT for short... that ought to confuse the masses! Well, maybe not... I do tend to be a little off! Also, if you did not see my pronunciation previously, I just want to make sure you are hearing it correctly... it is pronounced Tah-nee. So loving Oregano, (my best personal recipe is for spaghetti) and playing off Oregon my home state and Tansy being a weed (and having smoked weed) It all fits together rather nicely and fits me to a tee. Yes, I really like it.

(can you tell I have been on drugs today?)

I took Gene's advice--and everyone else's--as well as the fat and the skinny guy on TV, went out and bought an iMac, to replace the Hewlett-Packard I bought six months ago, which I might donate to a charity I hate. So now I'm waiting for the so-called geek squad to arrive, plug it in (I'm not good at that), and deal with my special issues, which have to do with templates and other uninteresting things, so I won't go into them.

I'm back, and still waiting for the nerds to show up. I posted this on the wrong thread, and just now found it (you can imagine why I might need the geek squad):

Not so many pix on this fourth iteration of the nature thread, so I'm still okay with it, but others might not be. So let me know how your computers are loading and whether you want to move on and leave the plnats behind ... perhaps for even more spectacular mistakes.

Speaking of which, I was much too glib yesterday while dissing the vegetation of the West Coast and elsewhere. (I forgot our unwritten basic rule: that we do not pass judgment on each other's natural habitat.) I have since googled jacaranda and seen that it is indeed a lovely tree, as Porius asserts, and Jane too I believe, and Sheila of the Many Names, which no doubt blooms in the spring as notably as the elms and hickories in my backyard.

All I know about Australia, and I've said this before, is that it is filled with things that spit poison and kill. I'm amazed anyone lives there. From the Discovery Channel it looks like the whole place writhes and crawls underfoot. Then there are the child eating dingoes. And the billabongs filled with giant mega-crocodiles. Not to mention the murderous Great Whites with Box Jellies hanging from their maws. How do you live there?

Actually, I spent a week in Sydney and environs, on R&R from Vietnam back in 1968. Had a great time. The only negative was the aboriginal fellow who did not want me to take his picture. But that was my problem, not his. The flight from Sydney to Darwin in the daytime was one of the most astounding flights of my life. The view from the air is only rivaled in my opinion by the Grand Canyon. But where one flies over the Grand Canyon in five minutes, this awesome beauty lasted several hours. It was just like living in an edition of the National Geographic. But I swear there were places that writhed and seethed with the ten deadliest creatures on earth.

Oh, btw, I'm fine with continuing this thread a while longer.

Oh, again, congratulations, LRMM, on surviving to another birthday in such a beastly place, you take care, ya heah? We want you back next year for the next one!

"That's not a knife. THIS is a knife!" - Crocodile Dundee

Noyff.

Rain. And more rain. Distant rumblings, thunder of course. Just like old Ingamar Johannsson. Da tunder in da rite and da tunder in da leff.
Should be on the sports thread. But here it is.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6vU8Os4CN4

301,302> oh. bummer. it was just Midnight Oil doing their classic, pro-aboriginal, give-them-back-their-land ditty, "Beds are Burning," off their Diesels and Dust lp.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GAaH_HlUD68

It's so sad. D:

#311 Oh my... that is heartbreaking!

#308 Noyff??

#306 Am happy to stay put a while longer as well.

Thanks for ruining my day, Todd.

Suck it! You dick!

Ahahahahahaha!!!! Too funny Rique! Who are those pedants anyway? It is amazing that people like that are able to socialize at all. If that is what they call it. Oh, wait! They're the social police or maybe that's too kind. No, they must be the thingamabrarian police. Omnipresent keeper of the rules and regs of LT.

311: If I watch all 4 minutes is it going to get happier? I watched about 30 seconds before giving up. How sad...

Snapshot

I do not remember
the house where I lived first.
I know
the small-town name,
Downer's Grove, outside Chicago,
The Windy City.
There were wood-slat photographs
of me in white dresses,
with a tin pail and shovel,
playing with a little girl.

I have on a too-big Indian suit
in one, and am laughing,
with my eyes shut,
at my mother sitting
on a little stool on the sidewalk
drying her hair
in the sunlight and laughing
at me, with a war bonnet
down around my ears.

And we had a touring car.
Then we moved
to Washington, D.C.

James Schuyler
reprinted in NYRB, May 27, 2010

Sweet picture...

Wow, majorly olde poem.

Oops!

>290 geneg:. That Beatles movie, Gene: Backbeat (1994). How time does fly; I thought I saw it ten years ago. Captures the band's early manic days. Here's a brief description:

The Beatles' early days as a struggling bar band are depicted in this fact-based drama, which tells the little-known story of original member Stuart Sutcliffe (Stephen Dorff). A close friend of John Lennon, Sutcliffe acts as the band's original bassist, accompanying them on their early gigs in Liverpool and Hamburg, Germany.

It's raining quite seriously here, pouring out of the drains onto the lawn, pattering down. And everything is so green! Oh, yes, this is the second greatest day ever.

And in my house, a magnificent machine called the iMac. (Only would someone please tell me how to delete forward instead of just backward? I spent about an hour yesterday trying to figure that out, with no success.)

According to my Sheilian calendar, Australia Appreciation Week is now over, but given the usual grace period for such things, we should add an extra day, no? So, any last minute thoughts on that former penal colony?

Here's an existential poem by Les Murray of New South Wales:

The Meaning of Existence

Everything except language
knows the meaning of existence.
Trees, planets, rivers, time
know nothing else. They express it
moment by moment as the universe.

Even this fool of a body
lives it in part, and would
have full dignity within it
but for the ignorant freedom
of my talking mind.

321--Peter, to delete forward, press hold the fn key (it's on the far lower left) down as you delete.

Great, thanks. In my benighted state yesterday I looked at that key and thought: a key for footnotes; that's interesting. And then ignored it.

Hey! I have one of those footnote keys on my HP Laptop! ;-)

Yay, Les Murray! Australia Appreciation Week continues!

>307 geneg: Gene, funnily enough, everyone who doesn't live in Australia has that impression of it, even when they actually go, like you did, and discover that the writhing creeping things are nowhere to be found. Still the impression seems to remain.

Seriously, I've seen maybe 6 or 7 brown snakes in my life, and maybe 2 tiger snakes (don't wanna see one of those again). I live in Sydney yet have never seen a funnel web spider. Been to the Top End, saw freshwater crocodiles lying around, but the only saltie I saw was behind bars. And that's about it, in all those hair-raising 26 years of mine. Nary a scorpian or box jellyfish. Apart from banging my garden shoes together to shake em out before putting them on, I don't even think about biting creatures in my daily existence.

Truthfully, the most dangerous Australian animal I've faced was an oversized kangaroo. I should tell you that story some time, though it's best told verbally, with actions.

Would that be the kangaroo you banged into with your car that hopped away?

Oh dear, have I told that one already? No, this is another one. It involves a bucket.

Austraila Appreciation Week will be over any minute now, Sheila, so you better tell it or else have to wait till next year.

okay, since you press me... ;-)

It was when I was living on 13 acres (tiny hobby farm) with my parents. There were roos everywhere, and in a drought they'd get very possessive with any patch of green on the property. We began to notice one MASSIVE grandaddy kangaroo around the place - he was taller and wider than my dad. We named him Big Max.

Over time one summer, Big Max began to be seen more and more in the vegie garden, until eventually he decided it belonged to him. It was pretty hard to argue with him. I don't know if you non-aussies are aware, but a roo can kill a person in a few different ways. They can stand on their tails and kick with both powerful back legs, or they can rip you apart with their front claws if you let them. So we were pretty wary around Big Max, and we'd usually check first to see if he was in the garden before we'd go in there. If we did venture in, he'd stand up straight and stare down at us from his great height. Sometimes he'd make aggressive grunting noises. We never tried playing chicken with him to see who'd run (or hop) away first.

One day, Mum got sick of being bossed by a kangaroo, and it happened that this rebellion came upon her while she was carrying a bucket. There was Big Max in the garden, standing up tall and looking down at Mum. There was Mum, walking towards him (rather hesitantly if truth be known) carrying her bucket.

She stops, and they have a brief staring contest.

Mum says, "Shoo!"

Big Max does not budge.

Mum waves the bucket at him. "Go on, shoo!" she says

He stands up straighter and looks at her down his nose.

So then Mum throws the bucket at him.

(and this is the climax:) So Big Max catches the bucket in his front paws, and, retaining eye contact with Mum, he slowly crushes the bucket and drops the pieces at his feet.

Mum backs slowly away, and does not try anything with Big Max again.

We found him dead in a dramatic position a few months later, as if he'd suddenly fallen backwards in death. We couldn't see a bullet hole, so I don't think the neighbours shot him (we didn't, its's illegal in that part of Aust) or if he just got too big and died of a stroke. But anyone who thinks of kangaroos as cute fluffy bouncy little teddy bears need to have this story told to them.

All anybody can say is:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aPu-C5vvzU4

Thank you, Rena, and you too, Peter, for that fitting reprise, to close out Down Under Appreciation week. I wish we had more stories on this thread. I've done my part, and Gene and Tani have told a few. Surely there are more out there.

Step up to the plate, why don't you, Chicago, L.A., Arkansas, Connecticut, Texas, New Joizey, Ohio, New York City, Portland, and elsewhere. More poetry too.

I only wish I could have seen the physical form of Renshka's Roo story. What a memory to have!

More poems:
http://www.shakespeare-online.com/sonnets/110.html

Country life:

Windy or breezy the last few days, today too, with leaves, twigs, and branches in the backyard and on road surfaces. The electricity went off for about three seconds yesterday morning, which it does about a dozen times a year, setting digital clocks askew and turning off computers. No big limbs came down, however, and with temps in the fifties and low sixties, merely an inconvenience instead of a genuine problem.

54 degrees. Brilliant sunshine. Not much breeze, if any. Green is the word with all the rain over the weekend.

Peter, a poem by another Michigander (sounds a bit like meshugginer, don't it?):

The Sloth

In moving-slow he has no Peer.
You ask him something in his Ear,
He thinks about it for a Year;

And, then, before he says a Word
There, upside down (unlike a Bird),
He will assume that you have Heard--

A most Ex-as-per-at-ing Lug.
But should you call his manner Smug,
He'll sigh and give his Branch a Hug;

Then off again to Sleep he goes,
Still swaying gently by his Toes,
And you just know he knows he knows.

Theodore Roethke

Having something of the sloth about myself. I like it.

Porius, recently photographed in the wild

Holding on for dear life.

Is that indeed a sloth? As in slothful? Doesn't look so sinful to me.

Looked more like a real stormy spring day until about 5 minutes ago when it started snowing big fat flakes... We have been under our average temperature for 40 out of the 52 days of spring. Unbelievable! There is the promise of one more wet cold day tomorrow and then on to high 60s and low 70s.

Aww, Por-man you be cute! You even have a smile on your slothful little face! ;-)

Is that a three-toed tree sloth? I am vaguely remembering some tongue-twister including that phrase . . . . .

I am trying hard to come up with stories, but I am just plain boring. We are forecast to have gale force winds tonight which will kick the lake up to 9-12 feet. One does not want to be on the lake in 9-12 footers! That is not boring.

See, Lisa! You're not boring at all! ;-)

Chicago Poet

I saluted a nobody.
I saw him in a looking-glass.
He smiled—so did I.
He crumpled the skin on his forehead,
frowning—so did I.
Everything I did he did.
I said, “Hello, I know you.”
And I was a liar to say so.

Ah, this looking-glass man!
Liar, fool, dreamer, play-actor,
Soldier, dusty drinker of dust—
Ah! he will go with me
Down the dark stairway
When nobody else is looking,
When everybody else is gone.

He locks his elbow in mine,
I lose all—but not him.

Carl Sandburg

Made me think of an old Carl Perkins-inspired Beatle song sung by Richard Starkey (he of the magnificent "cavo" nose) WHAT GOES ON.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N5yvezZTPMM

Ringo had a great love of Carl Perkins' songs. He was a rock-a-billy lover. As I've said before, and doubtless will say again, For whatever the Beatles were, and they may have been many things, they were one hell of a rock-and-roll band.

My paranoid thoughts about the Italian publisher were somewhat put to rest when I got the contract yesterday. The lawyer l contacted, who deals in international type things and speaks Italian (though the contract was in English) will speak with me, perhaps tomorrow, since he apparently does have some things to say about it. Which is fine: what do I know about it? A certain amount of my doubts had to do with information they asked me to supply, which he already told me is typical for Italian contracts, written to flush out mafiosi using false identities: where I was born, for instance. You don't see that in typical contracts.

Well, congrats, Piero! Hope all goes well.

Me too. The officialness of the experience unnerves me. Maybe if I'd had a nine-to-five job the past thirty years it would seem normal.

Did anyone know that if you pick a JAP pumpkin fresh from the garden, take it inside while the juices are still flowing and cut a paper-thin slice off and eat it raw, that it tastes like watermelon? Fact.

Also, it's mandarin and red tartan scarf season. There's too much smoke in the air - something's burning that shouldn't be, or else someone's burning off, which is more likely at this time of year.

ETA: Congratulations Pete. Can I call you Pete?

Is it appropriate to refer to a pumpkin as a JAP?

probably more appropriate than calling a Jap a Pumpkin, I should think.

JAP = acronym for Just A Pumpkin (Cucurbita moschata)

http://www2b.abc.net.au/science/scribblygum/newposts/376/post376532.shtm

Sometimes a JAP pumpkin is just a pumpkin. Though we can't help our pumpkinifications, can we?

>352 ChocolateMuse:. No, Sheil. Pete is not on the list of approved names.

Another reason I like spring--aside from warmth (though it's chilly today)--is that the leaves hide my neighbor's house. I would like this even if he weren't an annoyance, with his chain saw and snow blower and generator. Some people just have to make noise to feel worthwhile. Until the town passed an ordinance a year or two ago, he also used to make a bonfire of the branches and twigs from the trees on his property that he cut down, which he had to do of course because he has a chain saw. And he did this on windy days, which was why the ordinance was passed: to keep idiots like him from burning down the Catskill Preserve.

Living in the dry climate that I do the thought of debris burning is anathema to me. Especially on windy days and those days that the forest service decide to do a controlled burn. And those days are the next three for me. I understand the need, just can't understand the timing. We have been cold and damp for weeks, and now that we have our first day that should approach the mid 60s they decide to burn. On a day when I would love to be out working in my yard clearing my debris and making my yard fire safe I can't because of the smoke. hmmph!

358: Guess they have not had a lot of good days either... yeah when it's windy you'd think the risks would be greater than the benefits. As I think I told you before my Dad lives up in the Siskiyous right against a lot of federal land and this (the controlled burn thing) happens around him all the time throughout the late spring and summer. But the alternative is probably more of this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biscuit_Fire

(They had to evacuate during that one, but it stopped at the Illinois Valley and they are on the other side.)

Oh, I remember that one well, Anna. In fact, I met some New Mexico Native American firefighters at the top of Independence Pass in Colorado on their way home from helping us fight that one. I have a great respect for them. My brother was a volunteer firefighter in the Gorge for 15 years.

Sorry, was just whining about the smoke. Kind of a catch 22.

But fire (says this Sagittarius) can be good too:

Candle Hat

In most self-portraits it is the face that dominates:
Cezanne is a pair of eyes swimming in brushstrokes,
Van Gogh stares out of a halo of swirling darkness,
Rembrant looks relieved as if he were taking a breather
from painting The Blinding of Sampson.

But in this one Goya stands well back from the mirror
and is seen posed in the clutter of his studio
addressing a canvas tilted back on a tall easel.

He appears to be smiling out at us as if he knew
we would be amused by the extraordinary hat on his head
which is fitted around the brim with candle holders,
a device that allowed him to work into the night.

You can only wonder what it would be like
to be wearing such a chandelier on your head
as if you were a walking dining room or concert hall.

But once you see this hat there is no need to read
any biography of Goya or to memorize his dates.

To understand Goya you only have to imagine him
lighting the candles one by one, then placing
the hat on his head, ready for a night of work.

Imagine him surprising his wife with his new invention,
the laughing like a birthday cake when she saw the glow.

Imagine him flickering through the rooms of his house
with all the shadows flying across the walls.

Imagine a lost traveler knocking on his door
one dark night in the hill country of Spain.
"Come in, " he would say, "I was just painting myself,"
as he stood in the doorway holding up the wand of a brush,
illuminated in the blaze of his famous candle hat.

Billy Collins

;-) Love that one, Piero!

Goya
http://www.backtoclassics.com/gallery/franciscogoya/selfportrait2/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Autorretrato_en_el_taller.jpg

Can we strt a new Nature thread? This one's getting pretty long in the tooth...

does Peter want to do the honors? (But only if he keeps our "plnats" spelling because it is great!)

Let's have another Goya poem first:

from A Goya (To Goya)
Ruben Dario

Rare and daring man of genius
with your visions of the endless,
for you I light fragrant incense.

To the greatness of your palette
that’s capricious, brash, incited,
and beloved by every poet;

to the darkness in your visions,
to your whitened emanations,
to your black and your vermilions.

From you all Dante’s colors flow.
From you, lovely human forms glow.
From you, glorious frescoes.

Thread switch (and all the fun and games that go with it) coming up shortly ...

Presenting Nature, etc.

http://www.librarything.com/topic/90900

I always screw these things up, in one way or another: this time by announcing a new thread by appending the link to an old message, which no doubt rendered it invisible to those who earmark these things. Hence this message, and this link, again:

http://www.librarything.com/topic/90900