Gleanings of the Week Ending January 26, 2013

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles I read this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

How Much Unsubsidized Solar Power is Possible? - interactive map showing increase incost competitiveness of solar power in the US

World's Largest Natural Sound Library Now Available On-line ... And It's Free - the Macaulay Library archive…a 12 year project to digitize the entire collection has been completeed!

Woodpecker inspires cardboard bike helmet - it absorbs 3 times as much force as polystyrene helmets and is 15% lighter

Hello Robots, Goodbye Fry Cooks - what about the impact of the robotics revolution on human employment/

Vouching again Creationism - a rant about the relationship between school vouchers and the teaching of creationism...how religious teaching is becoming publically funded

Top 25 Wild Bird Photographs of the Week #34 - The last one surprised me….the Indian Robin does not have a red breast like our North American robins

Exploring The Parks: Grand Canyon National Park, A Winter Wonderland - Some year I’ll get to the Grand Canyon in the winter

To Surf a Hundred Million Stars - intro to a zoomable photo of the Milky Way center….spend some time zooming the image (and the others available from the GigaGalaxy Zoom project also linked from this article).

Interior Department Nominates Poverty Point National Monument For World Heritage Site Designation - specifics about Poverty Point but also general information about the World Heritage Site designation

Museum Collections (National Park Service) - the site has been revamped. Take a browse through the collection highlights (click on one that looks interesting and a whole series of items from that same location will appear0. Or use the pull down to select your favorite park!

The rise and fall of artificial gravity - Why has no one built a space station with artificial gravity?

Opinion: The Successes of Women in STEM - there are still roadblocks. Karen Purcell articulates some of them.

Warmer with a Scarf

This last cold snap has raised my awareness about scarves: they can indeed help you feel more comfortably warm. This is not about scarf paired with coats for outdoor wear (although that is a good idea too); it’s about a scarf worn inside over normal indoor clothing - as shown at left over a sweater.

I’m not sure why it took me so long to make the discovery. I wore scarves for years to compliment the ‘business casual’ attire I wore every day. But those were tied loosely. The scarf needs to be snuggled up to the neck for warmth.

When I hiked the Grand Canyon over 30 years ago - I discovered that having a wet bandana around my neck helped me feel cooler - but missed the opportunity to make the correlation that the neck temperature leads in perception of comfortable temperature (for me, the feet are first….and then the neck).

But - it is a welcome discovery while we are in the 20s outdoors in Maryland and trying to conserve energy by not keeping our house overly warm!

Details Seen in Photographs

In my last walk around Brookside Gardens, I took my usual large number of pictures - and then enjoyed the detail of what I captured after I got home and could look at the images on a large screen.

I didn’t notice the imperfections in the succulent pictured below when I took the picture; the colors and the frame filling shape of it was what caused me to take it. Now - it is the imperfections that cause it to be one of my favorite images from this visit to the gardens.

I held my camera upside down and took the picture below blindly - pointed upward into the angel trumpet flower. The light from the conservatory roof was bright enough to give the flower a central glow. The delicate fibers within the flower show through. The green core of the flower looks like an asterisk pinned to the stem by the flower parts and framed by the fused petals.

Did I say that it was a sunny day? The photo below is the only image in this post that was taken outdoors. The shadow and burn out areas are what makes this image a favorite for me.

Last but not least, the coiled fronds in the center of a fern. I always like to catch the spirals of nature since they are never that way for long; they’ll unfurl into the outer ring of green while new fiddleheads form in the center.

3 Free eBooks - January 2013

The Internet has a growing number of online books….and many of them are free. This is the monthly post highlighting 3 that I have enjoyed most this past month.

Shin-bijutsukai (2 volumes from early 1900s). Kyoto: Yamada Geikido. Available here. Art from Japan of the early 1900s. The red leaves at the left is a portion of one of my favorite images from the books.

White, John and Michael Dennin. Science Appreciation: Introduction to Science Literacy. ComPADRE. 2010 Available here. This is the text for Coursera’s Science from Superheroes to Global Warming offering. Even if you already consider yourself ‘science literate’ it is worth perusing for an update on how the issue of illiteracy in this particular topic area is being approached in our colleges.

Leonard, Anna B. and Adelaide Alsop Robineau. Keramic Studio periodical (volumes 2, 10, 13, 16 and 20 from 1900 to 1919). Syracuse, NY: Keramic Studio Publishing Co. Available here. Keramic Studio was pioneering periodical for ceramic artists and potters in the early 1900s. It was full of wonderful images that were emerging in that heady time when so much was changing just before World War I and immediately thereafter. The variety of work depicted - from drawings to finished works - is quite broad. Some of my favorites are the images of peacock feathers in volume 10 show in the clips to the right.

The previous eBook posts can be found here.

Low Sodium Diet Journey - Part 5

How hard is it to consume 2 grams or less of sodium per day? I started out thinking it would be difficult when a low sodium diet was recommended for one of my family members but it has been easier than I anticipated. This is the fifth post in a series that documents our family’s ‘learning experience.’ 

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Mixes and packaged foods are generally high in sodium so ‘homemade’ becomes the best choice for some things. This post walks through how to calculate the sodium in something as ordinary as homemade cornbread muffins with the idea in mind that a few modifications might make a lot of difference. Start with ingredients listed for the recipe and look up how much sodium is in each using your favorite nutritional information site (mine favorite is http://nutritiondata.self.com/) or checking the package of the ingredient.

Ingredient	mg of sodium
1 1/4 cups flour	3
3/4 yellow corn meal	11
3 tablespoons sugar	0
4 1/2 teaspoon baking powder	1980
1 teaspoon salt	2325
1 egg	400
2/3 cup milk	97
1/3 cup olive oil	1
	4817

This recipe makes 9 servings so the total per serving would be 536 mg of sodium which is a bit high.

Substituting a no-salt seasoning blend for the salt would subtract 2325 mg from the total and result in a 277 mg serving.

It might be worthwhile to look at a no sodium baking powder as well (one available via Amazon has gotten good reviews). With the sodium from the baking powder and salt gone - the serving would be down to 57 mg which would easily fit into a low sodium meal.

So - it is possible to do some quick calculations to determine how much sodium will result in a homemade muffin. Another possibility it to find a cookbook or web site that already has low sodium recipes. http://www.lowsodiumcooking.com/free/Cornbread.htm is one I found.

Previous Low Sodium Diet Journey posts are here.

Brookside Gardens Conservatory Flowers - January 2013

The conservatories at Brookside Gardens are lush with greenery and flowers - a welcome contrast to outdoor vegetation this time of year. Begonias and bird of paradise…crown of thorns and petunias. Today is a celebration of the flowers!

The Sun Coming Down from the Trees

Years ago - on an annual fall foliage camping trip - we got up at dawn because it was too cold to stay in the tents any longer. As we built the fire to cook breakfast - someone noticed the sunlight in the tops of the trees. It looked so warm compared to where we were at the forest floor - still in deep shade. And the description of what was happening became “the sun coming down from the trees.” We all watched as the light made its way down the trees and anticipating the day warming up.

I caught the same time of morning behind my house this week. The tree tops were glowing with the reflected light of dawn - much more colorful that the washed out light later in the morning that reached all the way to the forest floor.

On that cold morning almost 40 years ago - we bundled up, had a hot breakfast and took a hike. We still have some of the prints of sumac seed pods from that morning!

Gleanings of the Week Ending January 19, 2013

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles I read this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Where US R&D dollars go

Geometric Sculpture by George W. Hart - the ‘skinks’ is my favorite

Tap into the 2013 Natchez Trace Parkway Visitors Guide - available in PDF

What You Don’t Know About Home Burglaries - infographic. 65% of burglaries happen during the day and other factoids

Top 25 Wild Bird Photographs of the Week #33 - my favorite is the Indian peafowl

Australian Heat Wave Is Literally Off the Color Scale

Marc Goodman: A vision of crimes in the future - TED talk

These Days, Darwin Would Need To Know More About Jupiter - What Can Astronomers Teach Biologists? - 4 perspectives

Americans Have Worse Health Than People in Other High-Income Countries; Health Disadvantage Is Pervasive Across Age and Socio-Economic Groups - from the National research Council and Institute for Medicine. Full report can be found here.

 Human Numbers Through Time - the graphics show population growth over the past 2 millennia. It was created in 2004 but I just found it this past week

Spectacular Macro shots of Underwater Corals

Waiting for Snow

The forecast was for snow - but instead we continued under heavy clouds and mists in the same pattern as the past few days.

There is too much brown in the outdoor scenes - bare tree branches and dried hydrangea flowers.

The tuffs of green grass are a bit of relief and the colors of the shelf fungus on the oak stump provide some relief.

And then - I check the pots left on the deck from the summer and discover that both pots of parsley are surviving!

Still - I would enjoy a big snow….one that would keep me at home for a few days, give me a physical task (shoveling the driveway), and change the scenery through the window to a white wonderland.

Flower Parts

Flowers are often the most studied part of plants. They are usually colorful and intricate - forged to propagate their kind. I decided to photography the part of an Alstroemeria flower on a recent rainy day. I cut a flower from the bouquet I posted about last Friday and then used several light sources to rearrange the petals. The shape and curvature of the petals are still appealing even when the flower it taken apart. No wonder the botanical prints that were so painstakingly made in the 1800s have such an appeal even today.

I used two different light sources. One gave the flower petals and warm glowing color while the other turned them cool. Which did I prefer? I'm including both in the slide show below because I can't quite decide.

And finally the inner parts of the flower - looking fragile away from their surrounding petals. It is easy to see these as the models for delicate spirals in even our earliest art.

The Joy of Free Courses

Years after college, I am still in the mood to start classes in September and January. The rhythm of the school year is evidently one that will last all my life.

It is easier now than ever before to study at your own pace and without traveling to a university. Courses are offered using all kinds media - videos, forums, simulations, readings. And many are free. In some cases, formal credit for the course is offered upon completion.

Coursera is my favorite for free online courses with 212 courses that are freely available. I have enrolled in 3 courses that will start up this month; it’s such a thrill to have a richness of topics from which to choose. I found it challenging to choose just three! I’m signed up for:

The Modern World: Global History since 1760

Science from Superheroes to Global Warming

Critical Thinking in Global Challenges

I’ve already selected another that will start in February (Aboriginal Worldviews and Education) and one in April (Nutrition, Health, and Lifestyles: Issues and Insights).

Clearing ‘Stuff’ - January

Over time - we fill the available space in our homes with ‘stuff.’ Moving to a new house or apartment is a forcing function to clear out what is not needed. But what happens if you live in the same place for a very long time. Having lived in the same house for almost 20 years, I’ve had the luxury of putting off the task of getting rid of things. There is plenty of room to just let it accumulate.

One of my goals in 2013 is to develop more discipline when it comes to stuff. I am planning to do a monthly post to document my progress on this year long project. It is not quite the forcing function that moving would provide but (hopefully) will be enough of a reminder to keep focused.

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What have I accomplished so far? 

• To start off - I’ve selected an unused corner of the dining room and started a pile to donate or freecycle when I accumulate enough.
• There are some old pictures that were bought to match a particular color scheme that no longer exists. The glass is broken in one. They all go into the pile.
• The pile grew as I put away some Christmas decorations. There are some that are just not worth keeping for next year.
• There are some books I’ve finished reading and won’t reference again. I’m switching more and more to ebooks, but I’ll be drawing down on my pile of physical books over the next year and most will go in the pile after.
• We have an incredible number of address labels from charitable solicitations…and we create relatively little snail mail these days. I reduced the pile rather dramatically into the paper recycle. 

Of course - the really hard things are still to come: boxes of keepsakes mixed with flyers and brochures and wilted flowers. It takes time and thinking to go through them. I am more conscious now that most reminders of travels and events are in digital form.  

Low Sodium Diet Journey - Part 4

Canned soups are notoriously high in sodium. With a little planning, soups can remain a quick and low sodium meal. Here are a few tips: 

• Start with a low sodium broth. I’ve found some cartooned broths (vegetable, chicken, beef) that are low sodium - but there are alternatives to consider like
  • ‘No Salt Added’ diced tomatoes
  • A watery smoothy of veggies previously frozen just before they went bad (i.e. never throw away wilted lettuce or carrots that have gotten too dry - freeze them until you make soup!)
  • A strong tea
  • Keep in mind that spices other than salt are welcome. There are a variety of ‘no salt’ blends too try. Some not traditional seasonings - like orange zest (make it yourself if you eat oranges!). Always keep garlic cloves on hand for soups.
  • Total up the sodium of your ingredients to make sure the finished soup will still be low sodium. Meat, dairy, and some vegetables (like mushrooms and celery) will all add sodium.
  • Sauté vegetables like onions, carrots, and celery prior to adding the broth and softer ingredients.
  • Putting whole grains in soups avoids the sodium of eating them as breads. My favorites are buckwheat groats and quinoa.
  • Always have homecooked beans (i.e. cooked without salt) beans in the freezer. They are a quick addition to just about any soup.
  • Sometimes leftovers can be turned into soup. For example - if you make low sodium spaghetti sauce, then make a tomato soup (add water and seasoning to taste, heat, sprinkle with parsley and stir in a dollop of sour cream). Or for leftover stir fry chicken with onion and peppers, add a veggie broth with seasons and buckwheat groats or quinoa. 

Previous Low Sodium Diet Journey posts are here.

Celebrating 40 Years

My husband and I are celebrating our 40th wedding anniversary this month. The actual day is not that important. It is not the anniversary of the wedding we value…it is the 40 years we’ve had so far and the prospect of the years to come. I am savoring the little celebrations all month long. 

• The being home again after being away for almost 6 weeks
• The cut flowers on the table
• The savoring of Christmas decorations as they are put away
• The seasonably cold and unseasonably warm days - particularly the sunny ones
• The sunrises
• My husband finally recovering from a bad cold (or maybe it was the flu)
• Planning a ‘spring break’ trip 

The best of it all is realizing that we both made a very good decision 40 years ago!

Gleanings of the Week Ending January 12, 2013

The items below were ‘the cream’ of the articles I read this past week. Click on the light green text to look at the article.

Mexican Hot Chocolate - yum. My variation of this uses hot tea to replace half the milk and stevia instead of the agave. I make it by the (large) cup…and haven’t quite got up the courage to add the cayenne.

Beautiful and Dramatic Thunderhead Clouds - my favorite is the Jason Clark one with the orange of sunset…lightning…and barbed wire in the foreground

12 tips to clean up, de-clutter and revamp your home - from Marlo Thomas. I’m going to try the grapefruit and salt idea for cleaning my bathtub and shower

Interlocking Origami Stars and Prisms by Byriah Loper

Moving through waters of human attention - Apollo Robbins…pickpocket and illusionist

Modern Parenting May Hinder Brain Development - new is not always better

Top Four Reasons Why Diets Fail - Inadequate sleep is one of the 4!

A Very, Very, Very Delicate Balance - rocks balanced by Michael Grab (watch the video)

Slices of Life, circa 1872 - some of the work referred to in the article that was published by Christian Wilhelm Braune in the 1870s is available on the Internet Archive here

Medallion Snowflakes - you don’t have to be a child to enjoy this little project

Alstroemeria

There is so little color outdoors in the Maryland winter that I sometimes give in and buy a bouquet of flowers along with my groceries. My favorite is probably alstroemeria. They have a relatively long vase-life (longer than roses).

I put them in a vase on the table and inevitably try macro shorts. The petal markings and venation are easy to capture.

And now I am thinking about whether I want to try planting some in garden in the spring. It may be a bit too cold to leave them in the ground over the winter here in Maryland so I may plant them in pots that I can easily bring indoors.

January 2013 Sunrise

It is easy to capture the sunrise in January because I am already up and about at sunrise. The one in this post was taken at 7:15 AM yesterday from my front porch. The only negative was the temperature; it was in the low 20s so I got the picture I wanted and retreated to the warmth indoors.

Dawn is an every day celebration….the overcoming of night….another day full of potential…the return of color to the world.

Around our (Maryland) Yard in January 2013

The temperature was in the 20s on the morning I walked around our yard this month. There was still frost on the ground - coating the hardest of weeds that are green (lower left). The cairn of rock and shells (upper right) has been knocked over by foraging deer; I left the toppled pieces for another day. Most of the seeds from the onion have scattered (upper left) and the seed casings are tattered. Surprisingly the tulip poplar (middle left) seems full of the dried remnants of flowers and seeds from last spring. The trunk of our oak tree (bottom right) has smooth areas from its younger self.

Winter is the starkest of seasons. Every color that breaks the monotony of browns is appreciated: the blue of the sky, the green of a weed, the white of an old shell. Now, as I write this post, I am looking at the maple from my window and noticing a little movement of the branches from a breeze and am glad I am in the warmth of the indoors.

Low Sodium Diet Journey - Part 3

How hard is it to consume 2 grams or less of sodium per day? I started out thinking it would be difficult when a low sodium diet was recommended for one of my family members but it has been easier than I anticipated. This is the third post in a series that documents our family’s ‘learning experience.’

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Probably the more redeeming find about the low sodium diet is that most candy is low in sodium….so the indulgences into the world of sweets are not reduced at all by the need to control sodium intake.

Dark chocolate is a great first choice. My favorite treat is two squares of Lindt Intense Mint chocolate - which totals up to 0 milligrams of sodium (note that some others have a small amount of sodium - read the labeling).

Peppermints were our second - in the seasonal form of candy canes. They generally have no sodium at all. What would Christmas have been without the candy canes?

Previous Low Sodium Diet Journey posts are here.

Dallas Airport Mosaics

I photographed the mosaics near my gate in Terminal D of the Dallas-Fort Worth airport. It was a last interlude after being in the Dallas area for a month…finally on my way home to Maryland.

I had seen some of the medallions before. The one I saw first several years ago is still my favorite: Cypress Trees by Arthello Beck. The slideshow below shows different parts of it.

I didn’t walk the whole terminal but there were other mosaic medallions nearby.

A bird

Concentric circles

Golden shapes and geometrics

There were a few other people that paused to look at the mosaics. They too made the circuit around each one to take in the images created from the small pieces of color. Most people hurried along their way - focused on their destination rather than the art under their feet.