I must confess that there are quite a few things that escaped my education, probably stuff that you all know; mostly everyone knows this stuff.
Deep breath…
🔳 I didn’t know that whales are mammals, I really didn’t, despite the fact that I love animals and took enough classes in college that should have made this a solid part of my knowledge base.
🔳 I also didn’t know that earth revolves around the moon.
🔳 I don’t know why we sometimes see the moon during the day. Like yesterday.
I know I’ve LEARNED these things, but apparently the facts didn’t stick in my gray matter.
The moon orbits around the earth, not the other way around, as I thought. The reason why we can see the moon at night because of the reflection of the sun’s rays and energy that bounce back to earth. This is what gives the moon the brilliant white glow. It’s important to also remember that the earth has a rotation and an orbit around the sun. The relationship between the earth and the moon is kind of like a slow dance.
The earth is tilted on an axis, all the while going around the sun and meanwhile, the moon is going around the earth. The light from the moon is bright enough to overpower the usual light that we see at particular times of the day. Most of the light that is visible to the human eye is in the blue color range and the moon’s reflected light, combined with its location gives us the chance to see it during certain daylight hours. Due to the rotation of the moon around the earth, it is actually above our horizon for about twelve hours out of our twenty four hour day.
We can only usually see the moon for about six hours during that time period, and then the bright light energy of the sun overpowers the reflection.
The moon orbits the Earth once every 27.322 days. It also takes approximately 27 days for the moon to rotate once on its axis. As a result, the moon does not seem to be spinning but appears to observers from Earth to be keeping almost perfectly still. Scientists call this synchronous rotation.
Earth spins on its axis once in every 24-hour day. You and me and everything else – including Earth’s oceans and atmosphere – are spinning along with the Earth at the same constant speed.
If the Earth suddenly stopped spinning, the atmosphere would still be in motion with the Earth’s original 1100 mile per hour rotation speed at the equator… This means rocks, topsoil, trees, buildings, literally everything–would be swept away into the atmosphere. (Info curated from Google, NASA, and Wiki)
Now I’ve entered a rabbit hole that’s really too much for me to comprehend. My head is spinning. Like Earth? The moon? The sun?
Too much. Now I wonder…are we really the only living beings? Is Earth the only inhabited planet? Shaking my head, it’s too much for me to absorb.
I’m not sure if ignorance is bliss, but my head’s going to explode if I continue to follow the pathways of deep existential thought.
Our existence on this planet is incredibly fragile. I feel an urgent need to step outside and place my bare feet on the grass and the rocks, to touch skin of the earth; to feel and be grounded.
Still no whales/mammals, but a pic of the beach tree all dressed up for the holidays.
Warning: This is a longer-than-normal read. There’s no way I could edit out more or the story wouldn’t make sense.
Sometimes I love the internet SO much.
I live a sort of quiet, uneventful life; mostly concerned with animals and my son and now his babies; not really any major excitement unless you count meeting the Dalai Lama as excitement, or being in a few films and doing a little modeling back in the day…seeing a coyote or a wolf counts as excitement in my world; as does experiencing a mountain etched against the sky or finding a special rock or seashell on a hike.
But there’s one certain time that I broke out of the mold. I guess I’m unpredictable. An enigma, you might say.
I suppose it all started when I was a young teenager and crushed SO HARD on Jim Morrison that I would use the old computer paper that my brother brought home –reams of it–to hand write story after story about how Jim and I would meet, fall in love, and marry. There was no reality to my desires; I was immersed in total limerence and fantasy.
Moving from the east to the west coast was a total culture shock I don’t think I ever recovered from.
On this particular day, I don’t have a memory about how I managed to get out of the house to attend this concert, but I did.
Here’s the backstory–two of them; intertwined:
On of my Twitter friends attempted to divert all of our stressed out political chatter to something more benign and queried,
“What was your favorite concert that you attended?”
My response was concerts with the Doors and Guns N’ Roses; one I saw in high school and GnR more recently.
I couldn’t remember exactly what year it was, so I Googled Doors concert San Diego and discovered it was August 22, 1970, which means I had just turned sixteen and when school started in September, I would be a senior. (I used to be very smart. That was a long time ago and I’m not so very smart anymore.)
The articles that popped up about the concert totally blew my mind. I wonder why I have no recollection of the concert, what happened, or later reading about it! (I was not into drugs, so that’s not the reason why I don’t remember.)
But not yet. This is a twisty windy story.
Before I share the info, the other piece of this story is that I hadn’t even remembered anything about that Doors concert until I attended the 2017 Womens’ March.
I was there with friends, caught up in the passion of the movement, and then, right in front of me, in the middle of the street on Harbor Drive, was a very familiar face that I hadn’t seen in thirty-plus years. In actual fact, we hadn’t seen each other since my son’s first birthday party in 1982. A LONG TIME AGO.
I yelled her name, she turned around, and we screamed and hugged each other. Apparently, I looked familiar, too. Always with the curly hair, lol.
Right then and there in the middle of the street with 25,00+ people milling around us, we caught each other up on the highlights of those lost decades.
That’s when she reminded me of something she could never forget; the day we went to the Doors concert together, and in total conflict to my normal personality, I jumped on the stage to try and touch/kiss/marry Jim Morrison.
I had totally forgotten.
There were no cell phones back then and hardly anybody brought a camera, so there was no documentation. Until now!
PROOF:
Crabby Appleton opened the show. (I kinda remember that.) The Doors setlist:
Roadhouse Blues
Back Door Man
Break On Through
When The Music’s Over
Soul Kitchen
Money
Little Red Rooster
Unknown Track (Poem)
Carol
Louie, Louie
The Celebration Of The Lizard
Heartbreak Hotel
Light My Fire
Post-concert article by unknown author:
“…The venue was the San Diego Sports Arena, used mainly for basketball and hockey games. ‘Festival Seating’ was in effect: no reserved seats, and no seats at all on the floor. Acoustics were poor.
Prior to the Doors coming out, a local DJ appeared on stage, and told the crowd how glad the Doors were to be back with ‘their people’. This was a reference to the fact that Morrison’s obscenity trial (stemming from a charge of indecent exposure at a Miami concert) had required them to spend a lot of time in Florida.
The DJ also read something that was getting quoted a lot around that time, due to demands from George Wallace and other conservatives for ‘law and order’ to suppress student protest and social unrest:
“The streets of our cities are in turmoil. The universities are filled with students rebelling and rioting. Communists are seeking to destroy our country. Russia is threatening us with her might and the Republic is in danger. Yes, danger from within and without. We need law and order! Yes, without law and order our nation cannot survive.”
This was attributed to Adolf Hitler, though in fact he probably never said it. Whatever its source, it served well as a statement of the sort of counter-cultural, anti-establishment militancy that seemed obligatory at every rock concert around that time.
Soon after that, The Doors came out. As Robbie Krieger launched into the opening riff of Roadhouse Blues, the spotlight fell on Morrison, who stood on the right side of the stage (the audience’s left) a bit apart from the rest of the band. He was dressed only in a white t-shirt and blue jeans. He had a full beard. As the song intro continued, Morrison remained stock still, eyes closed, his only movement being to wind the microphone cord, looping it over his left shoulder. This seemed to go on for quite some time; he must have wound at least 30 feet of cord.
******As he did so a girl from the crowd leapt onstage and wrapped her arms around him, only to be quickly taken off by a roadie. (This would happen several times more).
In the middle of Back Door Man or Soul Kitchen, Morrison ad-libbed something like “San Diego baby, gonna catch ya, gonna clean ya, gonna cook ya, gonna eat cha!”.
He drank frequently on stage, and I doubt it was water. At one point Morrison wandered to the side of the stage where amps were stacked, and placed his mike into the speaker cones, producing squeals of feedback. Also he came downstage and pointed the mike at several members of the audience, each of whom merely gave out inarticulate yells. When Morrison asked the crowd “What do you guys want to hear?”, the response came back: ‘Light My Fire!’
The San Diego gig was the Door’s fourth from last before Morrison died.”
And YES, in case you haven’t figured it out, I was one of those girls!!!! I don’t think I actually got close enough to touch him, but there it is; proof in black and white.
If my attorney dad had read those articles and put two and two together, I would have had a barrage of a trial-worthy interrogatory and would need to think fast. Thank goodness there were no pics of me! (No cell phones/a blessing??)
I can’t figure out how or where I conjured up the chutzpah to jump on the stage-but it happened. Was it a premeditated decision or one I made just prior to the actual act? I don’t have any answers.
It was a moment in time memorialized in a few old newspaper articles.
Memories.
Here’s a couple videos; not great quality, but there’s more on YouTube.
That’s the question (with apologies to William Shakespeare).
Quick post:
There’s a lively discussion on NextDoor about a woman who was walking on a local trail with her nine-year-old son when he needed to relieve himself and did so a few feet off the trail in the bushes.
This is not a remote trail, it’s pretty much in the city, paved and well-traveled.
Apparently a woman stopped to stare and made the boy feel uncomfortable. There were quite a few negative comments directed toward the woman who (allegedly) was looking, comments like “mind your own business”…
Mine seems to be the ONLY comment that talked about the possibility that it might be inappropriate for a boy that age to urinate in public.
In my opinion, I think this would be a different story if it was a toddler in the middle of toilet training, but a nine-year-old is too old for that behavior.
Normally I don’t respond to NextDoor because it’s a dark hole like Facebook, but I felt compelled to share my thoughts.
What if it was a nine-year-old girl? Does that change anything?
Obviously, they were in plain sight. I wouldn’t want my son or my grandkids to see someone else’s body parts or something that should be private.
What if there was a predator around?
I’ve hiked a lot in many different wild places and had to find a secret spot myself, but this location isn’t a forest or a remote mountain trail. It’s a mile-long walkway paralleling the railroad tracks with houses and windows all around.
I don’t care how you pronounce it, but I need to share my secret love for potatoes and there’s a recipe at the end.
Specifically, the much maligned WHITE potato: simple, sturdy, earthy.
On the last day of my most recent visit to the Angels, sadly, a very long time ago, DIL thoughtfully made a special going home dinner for me, all from scratch by the way, which made it even more wonderful.
There was vegan lasagna with a side of roasted potatoes and apple crumble. The lasagna was made with chard and kale from the garden and was SO VERY YUMMY and healthy.
Apparently (and rightly so) she thought I didn’t eat white potatoes because for the longest time, I would scowl at anything white: white rice, white flour, white sugar, white potatoes–as the source of empty calories, zero nutrition, and a great friend of diabetes. Not too healthy.
From the oven there emanated a most delicious perfume. I asked DIL what I was smelling and she said, “It’s roasted potatoes but you don’t have to eat them. I know you don’t like white potatoes.”
Not so fast, DIL.
I want to not like them, but I’m addicted to French fries (has anyone ever seen me hoard them? It’s not a pretty sight.) I actually dearly love white potatoes, but I try NOT to eat them and have some semblance of self control, like I say I don’t eat chocolate, only because I have no off switch. Once I start eating chocolate, I can’t stop. I don’t ever have any around because of my lack of restraint, which is also the reason why I buy Halloween candy like Skittles and other stuff I don’t like so I won’t be tempted.
OK, enough of the sidebar; back to the story of the roast potatoes.
Dinner was ready and we were setting the table. I was actually STARVING and had most likely once again forgotten to eat for the entire day.
DIL handed me a bowl of roasted potatoes and before they even reached the dining room table, I had eaten EVERY SINGLE ONE.
I brought the empty bowl into the kitchen and asked DIL where I could get seconds. She took one look at me and the empty bowl and started laughing.
“That was a sharing bowl! Did you eat all of them?”
“Well, yes, oops, sorry! I didn’t know they were for sharing!”
“T, Grandma ate ALL the potatoes!”
“YOU DID? HEY DAD, GRANDMA ATE ALL THE POTATOES IN THE SHARING BOWL! SHE REALLY DID!”
I hadn’t tasted anything so delicious in FOREVER; OMG they were so good, I’ve been thinking about them ever since I came home.
And by the way, I had never heard of the term “sharing bowl” before that day. It must be a British thing, as DIL is from the UK.
I finally broke down and bought two WHITE IDAHO potatoes and since it’s a bit rainy today and not devil hot, I’ll attempt a recreation of DILs heavenly dish. I’m even going to add salt and that’s also something I rarely do.
They tasted pretty yummy, but to be honest, not quite as good as DILs, but maybe that’s because it’s such a treat for me to have someone else cook, ‘cos I usually have that job.
Did you think I was referring to love? I could have been, but nope, not this time.
While this isn’t my photo, it’s worth sharing. In a cool social media twistyturny kind of way, I was chatting with a fractal artist on Twitter and shared my previous fractal post with him, Fractals Freak Me Out.
His book of fractal art is soon to be published and he kindly shared a photo with me, so here it is for a very wordy #WordlessWednesday. I am sooo jelly of creative people.
I wish you every success in your awesome endeavors!
Join me on yet another Odysseus-like journey through my town. I’m not sure what I’m searching for, but maybe like Odysseus, I’m trying to find my way home, facing challenges along the way.
This was an interesting morning.
When I began my pilgrimage, there was so much fog! It was coming down from the heavens like rain. Super cool for walking, not so good for curly hair, but I like to look on the bright side so I braided my curls and wore a hat.
Check out the Halloweeny spider webs on this pine tree, brought to life by the heavy fog.
For a while, I was a few houses behind a woman who was walking her Rottweiler. I was actually across the street, but couldn’t help but notice that she was roughly pulling on the poor creature’s leash/collar. The collar was one of those mean ones that have little barbs in them. I was already upset that the dog had a cropped tail. I believe that sort of mutilation is outlawed in other–more humane–countries, as is that nasty hurtful collar.
OK, I said to myself. Don’t say it, I said to myself. You know what to do, girl, I said to myself, keep walking and don’t speak. Don’t say a word this time, I said to myself. Just DON’T, I said to myself. Look away, I said to myself. Take a deep breath, I said to myself. You can’t protect every animal in the world, I said to myself. This might not go well, I said to myself. Take another deep breath, I said to myself. Mind your own business, I said to myself. Slow down your pace so you’re out of hearing distance, I said to myself. I mean it, have some impulse control; this time just don’t say it, I said to myself.
And then the woman and her dog slowed down, so they were within the range of my voice.
What do you think I did?
Yup. I really did. I couldn’t help myself. I TRIED really hard to get my Zen on, but my one little inner voice was joined by yet another little inner voice and the words spilled out…
“Umm, excuse me, but I couldn’t help but notice how you’re jerking your poor animal’s neck that way with that awful chain around its neck. It looks really painful from my point of view.”
“She needs to learn to listen. It’s just a little pinch.”
I said…”Well, you might want to learn another more positive method of training that poor girl because as I’ve observed during the last two blocks, your way isn’t working out very well.”
I concluded by saying, “I’ve trained a lot of animals, and actually think those types of chains with the hooks on them are banned in other countries. It’s abusive. You might want to research using a harness which doesn’t choke your beautiful dog.”
Well, she didn’t say anything else to me because at that point she walked up a side street, in all likelihood to get as far away from me as she could.
To her credit, we didn’t get into a screaming match. Walking away was her best choice, as she would have lost.
I took a deep breath and felt good that I had spoken truth and possibly opened her brain to a nicer way of training. Or not. Maybe I just ruined her day. Either way, job well done, in my opinion.
I looked down and was rewarded by a treasure! This is the most beautiful hawk feather. I carefully picked it up and placed it in my backpack. I think this might be a tail feather, don’t you?
At the beach, there was the usual non-compliant non-mask wearers, but I wore mine, took my ocean photos, and turned back to walk home.
No wave too small if you’re on a SUP.Still foggy, but beautiful.
The lights were out at the intersection of Carlsbad Blvd. and Tamarack. There was utter chaos with cars and pedestrians, near misses, and impatient drivers. I crossed the street, defying a white SUV who was inching slowly toward running us all down, and saw a few police cars show up to direct the shitshow, so I thanked them for saving our lives and continued on my way.
This was a new sign at the railroad tracks. I swear there’s a deeper, more profound meaning here, but I can’t figure it out. I don’t have a clue. What do you think?
I stopped at RiteAid and bought a couple of cute Halloween decorations to add to my display ‘cos they were on sale.
Six miles or so again. Except for a still sore left arm where I had the injections, I think I’ve fully recovered from the horrible side effects of these vaccinations. I’m no closer to answering life’s existential questions, but the song that came on as I was almost home was Sting’s If I Ever Lose My Faith in You, and I’m even more confused.
The Yiddish word mandelbrot literally means almond bread, a reference to its common ingredient of almonds. It is typically formed by baking a loaf which is then cut into small slabs and twice-baked in order to form a crunchy exterior. sort of like biscotti.
This has absolutely nothing to do with fractals; I just thought I’d toss it in for randomness, like croutons on a Caesar salad.
Fractals freak me out but they’re also super cool and I decided to learn a little bit about them since I’m immobile for a couple of days, recovering from a bad reaction to a pneumonia vaccination. I felt as I imagined it would feel to be run over by a big rig that broke every single bone in my body.
The more I learn, the more fascinated I am by fractals. I even met a real fractalist on Twitter and he gave me permission to use his beautiful art. Check him out! Daniel Travers/ Multimedia Producer & Artist www.redideostudio.com
According to Wiki, Benoit B. Mandelbrot (20 November 1924 – 14 October 2010) was a Polish-born French and American mathematician and polymath with broad interests in the practical sciences, especially regarding what he labeled as “the art of roughness” of physical phenomena and “the uncontrolled element in life”.
He referred to himself as a “fractalist” and is recognized for his contribution to the field of fractal geometry, also coining the word “fractal”, as well as developing a theory of “roughness and self-similarity” in nature.
Toward the end of his career, he was Sterling Professor of Mathematical Sciences at Yale University, where he was the oldest professor in Yale’s history to receive tenure.
Fractals are also found in human pursuits, such as music, painting, architecture, and stock market prices. Mandelbrot believed that fractals, far from being unnatural, were in many ways more intuitive and natural than the artificially smooth objects of traditional Euclidean geometry:
Clouds are not spheres, mountains are not cones, coastlines are not circles, and bark is not smooth, nor does lightning travel in a straight line. (Mandelbrot, in his introduction to The Fractal Geometry of Nature)
A fractal is a never-ending pattern. Fractals are infinitely complex patterns that are self-similar across different scales. They are created by repeating a simple process over and over in an ongoing feedback loop. Driven by recursion, fractals are images of dynamic systems – the pictures of Chaos. Or in my opinion, of heart-centered LOVE, an infinite woven pattern of infinity. Not finite. Not at all.
A curve or geometric figure, each part of which has the same statistical character as the whole. Fractals are useful in modeling structures (such as eroded coastlines or snowflakes) in which similar patterns recur at progressively smaller scales, and in describing partly random or chaotic phenomena such as crystal growth, fluid turbulence, and galaxy formation.
The most famous fractal equation is the 2D Mandelbrot set, named after Mandelbrot in 1975.
What is Mandelbrot set zoom?
It’s an image made purely of mathematics. It is formed by converting the coordinates of each pixel into a complex number and then iterating it with a simple equation. We can actually zoom into the picture by narrowing the range of the axes and get a better look at the detail along the edge of the set.
The spirals of florets on a Romanesco broccoli form natural fractals.
As it turns out, a lot of plant life grows in patterns that mimic the Fibonacci sequence with petals, leaves, or (in the case of Romanesco broccoli) tiny buds called “meristems” that have 1,2,3,5,8,21 and more spirals coming from the center.
A special type of fractal is a Koch Snowflake.This fractal starts as an equilateral triangle. With each iteration of the pattern, the object becomes more and more like a snowflake. You could say a snowflake is a natural example of the Koch Snowflake fractal. Other examples of fractals patterns in nature include trees, mountain ranges, lightning, and coastal lines. http://www.enf.org/outdoor-academy-blog/snowflakes/
This year, October 10 is known as Columbus Day. Some states have proposed legislation to legally replace the holiday, but as of today, none have passed.
I don’t acknowledge Columbus Day because it’s more of the same; entitled males making unilateral decisions without regard for anything but their own selfishness.
They continually attempt to push candidates and legislation that will eventually completely strip women of any right to autonomy over our own body.
Even the grandkids know what this day really is all about: good for my son/DIL talking TRUTH.
No one can pinpoint the etymology of this phrase with regard to our extremely precocious almost 4.5 year-old, but yesterday was the first time I heard it.
We were FaceTiming so he could tell me about their week-long camping trip. He was regaling me with how much fun he had and how he went surfing and how his baby sister enjoyed her first time living on the feral, as we say.
As an aside, he started referring to his almost one-year-old sister as “Missy” and when I asked him who he was talking about, Mom took the phone and said he started calling her that after I sent an Amelia Bedelia book where the child she babysits for is called “Missy.” T has a very active imagination.
As, we’re chatting and he shows me some new crystals he got at a yard sale–green and purple, his two favorite colors–I heard Dad in the background say, “Tell Grandma about the lake we went to this morning.”
“Oh yeah, hey man, I jumped all the way in from really high, you would have been too scared, little Grandma!”
I said, “What lake?” and “What did you just say?”
And he replied, “Let me ask Daddy.”
He walks over to where Dad is sitting on the sofa (I’m dragged along on FaceTIme) and says, “Hey, man, what was the name of the lake we went to?”
My son started snickering and said. “It was Kachess Lake”.
T said, “Hey man, it was Kachess Lake”.
I replied, “Oh, I saw the pictures and thought it was Green Lake.”
He corrected me, “No, man, it was Kachess Lake. Hey man, did you see me jump?”
“I did. You are a brave boy. Hand the phone to Dad for a minute, please.”
“Hey J-boy. What’s up, man? Where did he get that?”
*snickering again*
“We have no idea; he must have heard it somewhere or maybe on Sesame Street, that’s all we can think of, but literally EVERY other word out of his mouth is ‘man this or man that’.”
“Hey man, I’m gonna hit the red button now. Is that OK, Grandma?”
“Yeah, man, that’s cool. Catch you later. Bye, Angel Boy.”
Have you ever heard a little one use that term in the proper context? He sounds so grown up, so sophisticated. SOOOO precocious. Heaven help us when he’s an actual teenager.
A young couple purchased their first home since they got married. It sounded like this was going to be a welcome addition to the ‘hood, but things took a 180 degree turn when they made a decision to host party after party after party Friday through Sunday from about noon to whenever. With loud music, drunk friends, and a pool, what could go wrong? Think Animal House.
After a few weeks of enduring this disrespect, I mobilized my other neighbors to see if they were as annoyed as I am, and I discovered that they were, especially the couple on the OTHER side of the frat house with a new baby.
This is a family community; we live close to an elementary school. Whether it’s a fam with kids or people like me who have lived here for 35+ years, one thing I know for sure. It is NOT party house friendly. If that’s what they were looking for, their realtor dropped the ball.
Once in a while, a loud party is not a problem. Multiple days every week? NOPE.
It was so unpleasant that I felt held hostage in my home; I couldn’t even go outside in the garden because of the noise. Apparently other nabes felt the same way. It’s been so hot that it’s not possible to close doors and windows. Last night they partied until after midnight.
I was on my LAST NERVE.
Similarly frustrated neighbors and I met (with masks). We strategized and decided to first have a friendly chat and if necessary, follow up with other actions.
We had the chat; there were a few dumb excuses and a bit of denial, but that didn’t last long, then a begrudging apology. Fingers crossed, peace is once again established throughout the land –at least my little world.
This is the first Saturday afternoon I’ve been able to go outside and not listen to their LOUD music and intermittent bouts of increasingly more raucous laughter. The more they drank, the louder they were. PEACE and SERENITY.
“Serenity NOW” as George’s dad said on Seinfeld. “Serenity NOW!”
In honor of the sounds of pure silence, I gave my Peace Lily a sunbath on the deck.
Enchanted Seashells | Princess Rosebud 