Just Another Day

Today's story starts at the Oaks card club but this is not a poker story. The card room is just the setting for part one of my tale. The Oaks has an elevated rail like many card rooms. For the non-players that simply means the area around the poker tables is separated from the common area by some kind of rail or railing. In this case there is a very large wooden ballister about four feet high with heavy thick wood posts appropriately made of oak. And the common area is two steps above the playing area, so those waiting to play can watch the games quite easily from above the action but behind the rail.

Yesterday I happened to be seated at one of the outer tables facing the rail, so I could see the six or seven spectators up there. At some point I looked up and an elderly oriental gentleman was at the rail. He was old, not ancient; dressed in a hooded sweat shirt with a well worn but not frayed leather jacket as an outer garment. He was wearing a wool knit hat, you know the one size fits all winter hat, he also had on big black glasses with the side bows worn on the outside of the wool cap. So he looked just a bit odd. When I looked up a second time he was vigorously wiping down the top of the wooden rail with a paper towel. He was very diligent about his cleaning chore, once done he discarded the towel in a nearby trash bin and then began a slow inspection of the now sparkling clean two foot wide section of the top rail. He then stepped up to the rail without touching it, watched one hand of play at our table and walked away.

An hour later, I happened to look across the room to see the same gentleman cleaning a section of the rail on the far side of the card room. I kept an eye on him, when he finished his task, he again watched one hand at the nearest table and departed. I have nothing more to say about this.

On the way home, I stopped into Berkeley Bowl, a local favorite, for some groceries. Near the checkout stand  was a large five shelf display of package nuts, candies and assorted treats. While I waited in the queue, two offerings caught my attention: Organic Gummy Bears, which seems like an oxymoron. The second item was candied fennel seeds. I have nothing more to say about this either.
--
that is actually not a lime on the cat's head but a carved pomelo; some kind of chinese tradition; attribution for the picture is lost in the shadows of the internet

Favorite Bands/Favorite Songs

While listening to a rock&talk radio show on one of my drives around northern california, I heard a question that seemed too simple to have an easy answer:

"What is your favorite song by your favorite band?"

My thought, of course, was - can you actually have one favorite band? or one favorite song by that band? But lists can be fun, entertaining or revealing so I pose this question to you:

"Name your favorite song by your three favorite bands."

The comment section is open below, let's hear your choices. Here are mine in no particular order.

Yes, that's the Uncle John's Band up there at the top. My favorite Grateful Dead song is China Doll. Links are all to youtube versions of the songs.

I think it's fair in all musical comparison lists to put the Beatles into some sort of emeritus category and make other selections. But I left them in as one of my three and the song: A Day in the Life

My third band is Talking Heads and the song is Heaven.

Heaven, 

heaven is a place, 

a place where nothing, 

nothing ever happens

Your picks?

Something Peculiar Day

Something familiar, 
Something peculiar, 
Something for everyone:

A comedy tonight!

Nothing with kings, nothing with crowns;

Bring on the lovers, liars and clowns!

Old situations,

New complications,

Nothing portentous or polite;

Tragedy tomorrow,

Comedy tonight!

-from A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum

Some things just defy comment.

I have wanted to use this picture for so long; it just never seemed appropriate, it still isn't I suppose.

There exists a fine line between social commentary and outright ridicule.

I imagine some will think this crosses that fine line.

Now wasn't that better than some tired, long-winded joke about me getting engaged, moving to Mississippi or supporting Sarah Palin? The date Emily, look at the date.

Potassium

Since deciding to exercise more I have been experiencing some minor leg cramps; charley horses usually at night. Now we all know that a healthy potassium level often prevents those nasty knots in the calf. So I thought I should make a quick surf to find some high potassium edibles.

The banana is the most obvious. Ripeness being the primary component of a good banana.

Papaya is another good source, I often combine them with other yummy fruits in a mid-morning Jamba Juice breakfast.

Don't you really enjoy finding out something you like is also good for you. Once again ripeness is a key with the avocado.

Next on the potassium hit parade, my favorite legume -- lentils, in all hues.

Spinach - just don't cook it, give it to me tender and raw.

But for me, it's really hard to get past the banana for a perfectly delectable source of K. Besides there are so many great banana pictures.

That's a laser engraved banana.

This is actually an eraser but nice colors!

In case you missed my words of wisdom the first few times - it really is all about the ripeness. 

Yes that is a statue, a life-size piece of art, 

well life-size for the woman not the banana.

A Cat of a Different Color

Let's call this a topical picture dump for this month. I offer these without comment either from the Humane Society or the proprietors of the NYC salon that charges $400 for a feline dye job.

He doesn't seem to be sharing the obvious vibes of peace and love.

Envy is not often associated with cats.

No cats were harmed during the making of these photos; no hallucinogens were used either by the photographers or the fur stylists.

You have to go to sleep sometime.

Apparently they breed.

Care to try out your skills in a claw-free environment?

--

Why? Because sometimes I like to know my blog content drives Michael crazy with the sheer level of the mundane I can achieve.

A Bit of History

I came across a piece of history recently, a certificate from the U.S. War Department dated 6 August 1945 and signed by the Secretary of War Henry Stimson. Here is the text:

United States of America

War Department

~

Army Services Forces 

Corps of Engineers

~

Manhattan District

This is to Certify that

[name redacted]

has participated in work essential to the production

of the Atomic Bomb, thereby contributing to the successful conclusion of World War II. This certificate is awarded in appreciation of the effective service.

Hiroshima 11 August 1945

That's all I got today.

Morning Routine

I was up just after dawn this morning, not my usual rising time but when a large black critter decides he wants breakfast and you are the only one with an open bedroom door. Well let's just say I pulled on a few pieces of cotton clothing and fed the cat. Then I was standing at the porch door still blurry eyed when I noticed the hummingbird feeder was a block of ice, so I put on a few more layers of garments and switched out the frozen feeder for the warm one from the kitchen counter.

That's when I noticed.

We have been having some deep fog layers the last few nights. In the frozen morning that translates to every branch, leaf, needle and stalk being hoarfrosted in the early morning. Lovely, beautiful, enchanting - pick your adjective. But something else happens if the morning dawns with direct sunlight as it did this morning. The ice crystals get dislodged and fall towards the earth catching the sunlight in all their facets as they do.

First one or two small motes of sparkle drift down. Then as the sun hits the trees more and more twinkles, flashes and sparks fly. Finally I walked out among a nestle of scrub pines and stood in a tinkerbelle fall of fairy dust.

I would tell you fair readers that I then rushed to my keyboard to share with you this bit of magical winter wonder but I did instead go back to my warm bed for another hour or so of blissfully cozy sleep.

---

photo credit: Cyndy's shot of last evenings alpine glow on Mt. Shasta

Year of the Tiger

We are in the waning months of the Chinese Year of the Tiger, which ends February 2, 2011. The tiger is the largest of the earth's felines, the biggest of the big cats can top 600 pounds. Of course, like any wonderous species they are endangered largely due to pouching in their natural habitats throughout Asia.

According to the World Wildlife Fund there are more tigers in captivity in the U.S. (5,000) than there are alive in the wild. Regulation of captive big cats is so lax that there is no official count of their numbers worldwide nor are they protected from the trade in animal parts that has devastated the wild population. 

But I don't want to sound like the last two minutes of every nature show. Tigers are gorgeous creatures, if you want to help them thrive -- Save the Tiger fund is a well respected organization.

By the way February 3, 2011 marks the beginning of the Chinese Year of the Rabbit.

Going Quantitative

I'm going to go by the numbers for the next week or so. Back in the 90s, when I wrote my Ph.D. dissertation, I was working with qualitative research. To be very simplistic, qualitative methods do not include counting or measuring. No math as I like to joke. But over the past couple of months I have collected some interesting numbers, so it is time for a quantitative dump that I hope will entertain or enlighten you.

#1: Recently I heard a NPR show about the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill. Apparently a spokesperson for Exxon gave an early estimate at a news briefing of 10.8 million gallons of oil, which was the low end prediction for the spill. Media picked up that number and somehow never verified, updated or corrected it. Later, checks of the tanks on the Valdez, which held 55 million gallons showed that the true number was closer to 35 million gallons not 11 million, but that original low estimate is the number still connected with the Exxon Valdez disaster. 

#2: Be careful when you do comparisons between the Valdez spill and the current Deepwater Horizon numbers from the Gulf of Mexico. At times BP was making estimates in barrels per day not gallons, a barrel of oil equals 42 gallons. As of August 1st, here are the numbers for the Gulf of Mexico:

Department of Energy estimate:    92 million gallons

BP Worst Case estimate:              183 million

Experts' Worst Case estimate:     318 million

(Exxon Valdez)                          11 to 35 million

8/2 New Federal Scientists est.    210 million

#3: Between 1510 and 1888 slavers took 11 million Africans to the Western Hemisphere. During that same period 2.6 million Europeans came to colonies of the New World.

#4: OK, I didn't watch it all, but the disaster movie 2012 was on the other day. I heard the Mayans mentioned once, so I asked the kids who did watch the whole movie about the connection to the Mayan "End of Days" calendar and the year 2012. They told me about the cool special effects, particularly airplanes taking off, but none of them could remember anything about a references to Mayan historical predictions.

#5: Finally for today on the number front, I understand sitting cross-legged on the floor but I never quite got 25 or 6 to 4.

Physics of a Sunset

About six weeks ago I slept for the first time in the Berkeley apartment, I noticed that first night the sun was setting just a degree or two north of the Marin side of the Golden Gate Bridge. Since that was mid-March the sun was progressing north and I wondered when I would see a sunset directly over the bridge. After reaching its furthest point north on June 21st, a rough estimate would have the sunset back to the bridge around the fourth week of August. So the second part of the question was: just how far does the sun move each day?


I wondered if my distance from the Marin Headlands was a factor (that's the land on the other side of the Bay those of you who don't live around these parts) but I quickly realized that the horizon (where the sun sets) is nearly equidistance from me at all times and the intervening land masses had nothing to do with my calculations. I did, however, correctly intuit that latitude had to make a mathematical difference. Since I was dealing with a tilting planet around a semi-constant axis. I made the only rational decision I could with my decades old calculus.


I went to google.


Between the solstices (approx. June 21st & Dec. 21st), the sunset point changes by about 62.6 degrees in half a year (about 183 days), for an average of 0.34 degrees per day. Near the equinoxes (March 21st, Sept. 21st), the sunset point changes about 0.51 degrees per day; near the solstices, it hardly changes at all. Which means the sunset appears to shift faster around the equinoxes and almost not all all near a solstice.

If you live south of 40 degrees, the change from solstice to solstice is less; if you live north of 40 degrees, the change is greater. Berkeley is at 37 degrees 87 minutes.

The earth's axis is inclined to its orbit by 23.5 degrees. The shift in the sunset point between solstices is roughly given (in degrees) by the formula [2 * 23.5 / cos (latitude)] but this is only an approximation. For a precise calculation, we need to use spherical trigonometry, which I will hold for another time. Nerds may proceed on their own.


What I clearly did notice was that the point of sunset did move quickly right around the time I moved in, near the equinox, in fact by the second week just a line of sight projection seemed to suggest that by the summer solstice the sun would be out of sight to the north. This, of course, assumed a constant movement, which google has help me discover is not the case. Already the daily progression to the north has slowed from the near breakneck half a degree a day when I moved in.


Come summer solstice, I will still have a sunset and somewhere in late August, I will post a week or so of pictures when the sunset beams through the Golden Gate.

Sleeping Through Insomnia

It has been a very, very long time since I have had a bout with insomnia. If fact, one of the true pleasures of my life is the adoring relationship I enjoy with sleep. Which is why last night was so strange. Around midnight I decided that the novel I am reading was not to lure me for a third straight night, its a bit too dark. So I just tucked myself under the blue flannel comforters and assumed the position. Instead of my ever faithful fall into the realm of Morpheus, I lingered in a hypnogogic limbo for over an hour. There were no entertaining fantasies or story boards dancing like sugar plums, just tedious processing of the old mundane business of life.

There really are no pressing issues emotionally or and other -ally for me right now. I just had a long night of struggle with what for me is generally pleasurable and easy. I woke perhaps half a dozen times during the night and finally fell into a deep sleep less than an hour before I needed to be up and at the world again.

I felt post-downer dull when I heard the early stirring of my friend and knew we had to be off to Berkeley to meet with the remodeling contractor. A solid half day of errands and consultations awaited us. Fortunately for me, unfortunately for her, she had had a similar night to mine, so we shared a scone and grumped our way to the other side of San Francisco Bay to put in our time in the real world.

This evening, I am going to bundle up in some heavy cotton, curl up with a good, if mindless book and grab the very first train to the land of Nod. Got no needs to do, no promises to keep.

p.s. late today I noticed an item I was reading on the web last night, a NYTimes book review on, of all things, insomnia.

A Caffeinated Thought for the Day

Observation: Machinery to be operated first thing in the morning, by people of foul temper, jonesing for their first fix; these appariti need to be less complex and have no sharp edges.

"Cheerfulness removes the rust from the mind, lubricates our inward machinery, and enables us to do our work with fewer creaks and groans. If people were universally cheerful, there wouldn't be half the quarreling or a tenth of the wickedness." -- said by a non-coffee drinker right before being ground into the floor by those in the early morning queue at Starbucks.

"A person with so-called character is often a simple piece of mechanism with a single point of view for the extremely complicated relationships of life." -- August Strindberg

"Enough with the philosophical talk, can I get a friggin' cup of coffee!" -- inspiration for today's post from an old friend, early in the morning

Condoms & Condom Devices

The picture above is of a 'device', which is apparently used to assist in the application of a condom. Also apparently this task has become more difficult in recent times or perhaps this is just another indication that indeed men's brains do function poorly when blood is diverted for other purposes. In either case, anyone with a Y chromosome will take one look at that 'device' and offer a less than polite no thank you. But first looks can be deceiving.

Earlier this year I was at a medical equipment, paraphernalia, gimmick convention in Las Vegas where these items were being demonstrated. No, it was not a live demo but they did use anatomically correct and variously sized dildoes. Since then I have had this information in my "future posts" file. Today is the day.

The device is marketed under the brand name Pronto and was named The Most Beautiful Object in a 2007 South African Design competition. This from the product literature:

The applicator allows a condom to be put on easily and rapidly. The user holds the device with the thumb and forefinger of both hands, pulling the condom down over the penis in a single rapid movement.

Yes, there is a video demonstration, which might actually change the mind of any quick draws out there.

And for the purposes of keeping this blog within the bounds of public service educational content as opposed to prurient interest.

Condom - a thin sheath, usually of rubber, worn over the penis during sexual intercourse to prevent conception or sexually transmitted disease.

Synonyms: French letter, contraceptive, johnny, prophylactic, protection, raincoat, rubber, safe, sheath.

The additional picture is just an additional picture I had in my photo folder and bears no connection to the Pronto condom device, but its a cool picture.

[Update: Pronto condoms are now marketed at 4 sec condoms but remain unavailable in the U.S. because of a high level of demand and several nasty plastic pinching incidents.]

---

Photo credits: archives

Gay Penguin Couple Adopts Egg

[Content Disclosure: 0% Poker, 89% Social Commentary, 54.8% Penguins]

Just in the form of personal disclosure, earlier in my life I had a great interest in penguins. I went to Antarctica in 1981 and for years I was an easy mark on birthdays and holidays for penguin gifts. A few old mugs and towels still have penguin images but I am much better now. But I do get forwarded penguin news from long-time friends and that is the source of this post. Back in '81 a scientist at one of the research stations took me on a tour of a penguin rookery and pointed out a number of homosexually bonded pairs, so this information was not new to me. What caught my eye was the final paragraph in this story.

It seems keepers at Germany's Bremerhaven zoo couldn't get two penguin parents to take care of their egg, so they're trying an experiment — they gave the egg to a gay male penguin couple.

The biological parents "always rolled the egg out of their nest, they kicked it out again and again," zoo veterinarian Joachim Schoene said.

Then they made the decision not to give it up on the egg and the potential penguin chick and instead try to give it two fathers. The experiment was a success. The two foster dads incubated the egg for 30 days until it hatched and continue to care for the newborn chick.

The male penguins, named Z and Vielpunkt, are one of three same-sex pairs of Humboldt penguins at the zoo. That means almost a third of the zoo's 20 penguins who have attempted to mate exhibit homosexual behaviour. Same-sex penguin pairs have also been observed at zoos in Japan and New York.

The behaviour is not considered unusual because homosexuality has been well documented in the animal kingdom. Scientific observation has shown that most sexual encounters between giraffes are homosexual. Male bottlenose dolphin calves often form homosexual bonds and exhibit bisexual behaviour when they're older. And female Japanese macaques, or snow monkeys, form monogamous relationships with each other that last from days to weeks. All of these behaviours have been observed in the wild and do not appear to have been influenced by a scarcity of available mates of the opposite sex.

A similar experiment was performed at New York City's Central Park Zoo in 2004. Two male chinstrap penguins named Roy and Silo incubated an egg together and raised the chick, called Tango.

A children's book written about the New York penguins called And Tango Makes Three has been the book with the most requests for removal from libraries in the United States over the past three years, according the American Library Association.