Surprise! Monarch Caterpillars

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I’d planned to work in the front flower bed in the early morning – cutting down 1) the milkweed that was being overrun by aphids and something that caused the leaves to curl and 2) the day lily leaves that were beginning to turn yellow. I took a ‘before’ picture.

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Before starting – I checked the milkweed plants for Monarch butterfly caterpillars. Aaargh! They were on almost every plant – even the plants that looked terrible and were full of aphids.

Change of plans. I opted to cut out the worst aphid infestation and move caterpillars to better plants if I couldn’t leave them where they were. It was slow going. After I finished with the milkweed pruning, I started on the day lily leaves and pulling weeds. I found a red maple seedling.

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There were 10 tulip poplar seedlings – and I probably didn’t find all of them since I only worked about a third of the bed. The sheer number of tree seedlings surprised me because I’d already pull quite a few from that flower bed already this year.

There was one black-eyed Susan flower that has been missed by the deer.

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I took an ‘after’ picture that wasn’t as dramatic as originally planned and still a lot of work to do…but I’m hopeful about having a small group of Monarch butterflies this year. I’ll continue monitoring the plants and moving the caterpillars to the healthier looking ones. There are plenty of places for the caterpillars to make their chrysalis; I’ll try to do all the clearing out of the day lily leaves before the caterpillars are big enough to leave the milkweed to find their spot to pupate.

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Unique Activities for Yesterday:

Assessing risk. My daughter told me about the model from Georgia Tech at  https://covid19risk.biosci.gatech.edu/. It has a zoomable map of the US showing counties and placing the cursor on a county provides the current risk level of attending an event (you can select the size of the event) that at least one person present will be positive for COVID-19. This is a good way to assess the risk for being with groups of people – ignoring the reduction in risk that social distancing, masks, environment can provide. With the increasing number of cases, hospitalizations, and deaths in so many areas across the country, this is a way to roll up all that data for where you live in a way that may be more actionable …something to look at before deciding on a particular activity away from home.

Gleanings of the Week Ending July 25, 2020

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

Native Americans Crossed the Pacific Long Before Europeans | The Scientist Magazine® - Using DNA to find more definitive answers.

Forest Surprise: A Wolf Story – West of Flagstaff ---- probably a Mexican grey wolf male…trying to find a new territory and exploring a restored forest appealing.

See Archaeological Treasures Unearthed by U.K. Residents During Lockdown | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – The uptick in gardening and yard work leads to finding things in or on the ground…and then people having plenty of time to find out more about what the objects are. Something positive happening during the pandemic.

You Can Now Explore All 48,000 Panels of the AIDS Memorial Quilt Online | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – I was glad to see this online version of the quilt is available – complete with search and zoom. I found the square for a person that I’d worked with in the 1970s and saw him at IBM sponsored conferences in the 1980s. Our early career crowd was scattered all over the country by the time he died in 1993.

Eleven Awesome Owls from Around the World – Good pictures and a short summary characterizing each bird.

Turmeric could have antiviral properties -- ScienceDaily – It’s already one of the supplements I take…as an anti-inflammatory. This study points to it being anti-viral as well.

Stain Solutions | U of I Extension – A good reference although in recent years the laundry detergents and cold water often get stains out.

Top 25 birds of the week: Wild Birds - Wild Bird Revolution – Enjoy the beautiful birds!

Solar Will Kick Most of Texas's Remaining Coal Fleet Offline – Good news for air quality in Texas. Evidently the growth of utility-scale PV production is rapid changing the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) market.

Infographic: How Breastfeeding Protects Mothers | The Scientist Magazine® - Research about the mechanism behind the observation that women that breastfeed their children have reduced long term risk of developing type 2 diabetes.

Unique Activities for Yesterday:

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Circular voids. I am starting a series of Zentangle tiles that have circular voids in otherwise dense tangles. I got the idea from some Mordecai Ardon paintings (slideshow on Internet Archive here) like Fatal Eclipse shown at the right. My first two tiles are below.

Compost bin. Between rain showers – I put on the boots I have for river field trips and got all my containers of kitchen scraps and spent flower stalks (mostly day lilies) out to the compost bin. It took 4 trips! There have been more things recently that produced more kitchen scraps than usual: fresh corn on the cob, cantaloupe, cabbage cores, and tough onion/leek tops. I’ve learned to save cucumber skins for use in smoothies so those get eaten these days and veggies like beets and carrots just get a thorough scrubbing rather than being peeled. I put all the new scraps on one side of the bin and then turned the other side over on top of it. I should deteriorate very rapidly.

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Fresh flowers in the house. There are now small bouquets from the CSA cutting garden in my office and on the kitchen table. The one below is the one in my office. I like having flowers in my field of view! It’s a way I show kindness to myself.

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Gleanings of the Week Ending July 18, 2020

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

Listening to Silence: Why We Must Protect the World’s Quiet Places - Yale E360 – I realized after 9/11 that most of the modern world sounds at my house are from transportation: planes/helicopters and cars/trucks with occasional yard equipment. While we had a stay-at-home order with this pandemic, it became noticeable as well. There are still times when those noises are subdued or gone. I notice the bird songs in the early morning…when the other sounds don’t intrude. As we skew more toward electric ground transportation….the noise level will notch downward. I enjoy the natural sounds a lot more than our man-made ones.

Declining eyesight improved by looking at deep red light -- ScienceDaily – I wonder if this is something doctors will start prescribing!

Why your organs might reach 100 even if you don't - BBC Future – A summary of some current research areas re aging. There are a lot of different approaches with the primary goal of most being to extend healthy lifespan.  Even if different organs age at different rates…they are interrelated to the body they comprise.

Maryland offshore wind farm could become stop-over for migrating sturgeon, striped bass -- ScienceDaily – I live in Maryland….so this story grabbed my attention. Will the offshore windfarm become a rest stop for fish? And they will offer a convenient infrastructure for researchers to collect data.

Where Will Climate Migrants Go? – THE DIRT – It’s something to think about now. Some coastal cities are already experiencing more flooding even without unusual storm events…and people that can move will probably do so. Will climate trends weigh in decisions about where they move? The article talks about cities and towns in the Midwest that have experienced declining population becoming ‘receiver’ locations. I wondered if people that have discovered that they can work from home during the pandemic – and can continue to do so – will be freer to move to these new locations and still have the same employer! Otherwise there is the challenge of how to sync moving to a new place with a new job.

The chemistry of cats: Allergies, catnip and urine – Compound Interest – Evidently male cats produce higher levels of allergen and have smellier urine…unless they have been neutered.

Ways to keep buildings cool with improved super white paints -- ScienceDaily – White roofs should probably become the norm….it will be hot enough without the added heat island effect caused by a lot of man-made structures with dark roofs.

How humans are altering the tides of the oceans - BBC Future – It’s happening around the world. Dredging river channels and filling in coastal wetlands cause shifts in how tides interact with the land. And then there is sea level rise too. Some places cited in the article that have experienced dramatic change: Cape Fear River in North Carolina (tidal range at Wilmington has doubled since 1880) and the same is true for St. Johns River/Jacksonville Florida. Sacramento’s tides disappeared in the late 1800s because of silt but dredging brought them back and the Thames tidal range was 2 meters during Roman times and 8 meters by the Victorian age.

Meet the Mountain Chickadee – We have mostly Carolina Chickadees where I live in Maryland…this is their relative in the western US (mountains).

Ancient Maya reservoirs contained toxic pollution: Mercury, algae made water undrinkable in heart of city -- ScienceDaily – Mercury from pigments used on Mayan building. Cyanobacteria blooms that made the water smelly and toxic. Not pleasant for a city center!

Unique Activities for Yesterday:

Regenerative Landscaping lecture (via zoom). The lecture was about an hour and my big take away was about the huge environment cost of lawns…and the many dimensions of that cost. The one I hadn’t thought much about before was from the California Air Resources Board fact sheet on Small engines in California (small engines being spark-ignition engines in things like lawn mowers). Their fact sheet says: “In the early 2020s, however, total smog-forming emissions from small engines are projected to exceed those from passenger cars in the South Coast Air Basin because passenger car emissions will continue to decrease. By 2031, small engine emissions will be more than twice those from passenger cars.” For comparison – they show 1 hour of lawn mowing emits as much smog-forming pollution as driving a Toyota Camry 300 miles! This must be an issue in all areas where there is a lot of mowed turf grass – kike most suburbs. There are multiple ways to address the problem and the one discussed in the meeting was transitioning to less lawn or lawn that does not need to be mowed as frequently (or at all). Another way would be to transition to electric mowers and other yard equipment. Right now – the only gasoline powered equipment I have is the mower. I’d been thinking about an electric mower because I don’t like the noise and smell of our current machine. So - this overall air quality issue is just one more reason to do it.

Enjoyed a slideshow of Armand Guillaumin (1841 – 1927) paintings available on Internet Archive here. He was a French impressionist painter and lithographer.

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eBotanical Prints - June 2020

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25 botanical eBooks found in June 2020! The volumes are all freely available on the Internet. The whole list of 1,920 books can be accessed here. Sample images and links for the 26 new ones are provided below. (click on the sample image to see a larger view). Enjoy!

There are several series this month:

  • 7 issues of The English Garden magazine from the mid-2010s

  • 2 issues of Your Garden magazine from the 2010s

  • 2 volumes from Asa Gray published in the mid-1800s

  • 2 volumes from Johann Zorn published in the 1790s

  • 2 volumes of camellias from the mid-1800s

  • 2 volumes from H.A. Weddell from the mid-1800s

  • 3 volumes from Augustine Pyramus de Candolle from the early to mid-1800s

The most surprising to me was the Hesperides, sive, De malorvm avreorvm cvltvra et vsv libri quatuor by Giovanni Battista Ferrari published in 1646….about citrus fruits. The wild forms are quite different than the ones we know today in the grocery store!

Recueil de planches de botanique de l'encyclopédie * Lamarck, Jean Baptiste Pierre Antoine de Monet de * sample image * 1823

English Flower Garden:a monthly magazine of hardy and half-hardy plants * Thompson, William * sample image * 1852

The English Garden - October 2015 * Mahon, Stephanie * sample image * 2015

The English Garden - July 2015 * Mahon, Stephanie * sample image * 2015

The English Garden - December 2015 * Mahon, Stephanie * sample image * 2015

The English Garden - January 2016 * Foggett, Clare * sample image * 2016

The English Garden - April 2016 * Foggett, Clare * sample image * 2016

The English Garden - August 2015 UK * Mahon, Stephanie * sample image * 2015

The English Garden - September 2015 UK * Mahon, Stephanie * sample image * 2015

Your Garden - Autumn 2016 * Colls, Stephanie * sample image * 2016

Your Garden - Autumn 2011 * Lee, Mara * sample image * 2011

Genera florae Americae boreali-orientalis illustrata. The genera of the plants of the United States illustrated by figures and analyses from nature V1 * Gray, Asa; Strague, Isaac * sample image * 1848

Genera florae Americae boreali-orientalis illustrata. The genera of the plants of the United States illustrated by figures and analyses from nature V2 * Gray, Asa; Strague, Isaac * sample image * 1848

Auswahl schöner und seltener Gewächse als eine Fortsetzung der Amerikanischen Gewächse. Erstes [-Drittes] Hundert. V1 * Zorn, Johann * sample image * 1795

Auswahl schöner und seltener Gewächse als eine Fortsetzung der Amerikanischen Gewächse. Erstes [-Drittes] Hundert. V2 * Zorn, Johann * sample image * 1796

Iconographie du genre Camellia V1 * Berlese, Lorenzo * sample image * 1841

Iconographie du genre Camellia V2 * Berlese, Lorenzo * sample image * 1843

Iconographie du genre Camellia V3 * Berlese, Lorenzo * sample image * 1843

Chloris andina essai d'une flore de la region alpine des Cordilleres de l'Amerique du Sud 1855 V1 * Weddell, H.A. * sample image * 1855

Chloris andina essai d'une flore de la region alpine des Cordilleres de l'Amerique du Sud 1857 V2 * Weddell, H.A. * sample image * 1857

Hesperides, sive, De malorvm avreorvm cvltvra et vsv libri quatuor * Ferrari, Giovanni Battista * sample image * 1646

Icones pictae plantarum rariorum descriptionibus et observationibus illustratae * Smith, James Edward * sample image * 1790

Icones selectae plantarum quas in systemate universali ex herbariis parisiensibus, praesertim ex Lessertiano V1 * Candolle, Augustin Pyramus de; Turpin, PJF; Delessert, Benjamin * sample image * 1820

Icones selectae plantarum quas in systemate universali ex herbariis parisiensibus, praesertim ex Lessertiano V2 * Candolle, Augustin Pyramus de; Turpin, PJF; Delessert, Benjamin * sample image * 1823

Icones selectae plantarum quas in systemate universali ex herbariis parisiensibus, praesertim ex Lessertiano V3 * Candolle, Augustin Pyramus de; Turpin, PJF; Delessert, Benjamin * sample image * 1838

Gleanings of the Week Ending July 4, 2020

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

Utah’s arches continue to whisper their secrets - GeoSpace - AGU Blogosphere – A study to measure arches to hone 3-D models from the Geohazards Research Group at Universe of Utah. The 30 second video of the model showing how Moonshine Arch moves is worth viewing.

Will the world be quieter after the pandemic? - BBC Future – I know I appreciate having a quieter environment; it’s an aspect of the pandemic that has been positive. The quiet is one of the things I like about my Prius Prime when it is in EV mode. Maybe some of the new norm will involve choices to maintain, as much as we can, the quiet.

Exposure to air pollution impairs cellular energy metabolism -- ScienceDaily – A study from Finland – exploring how particulates impact the olfactory mucosa (a neural tissue located at the upper part of the nasal cavity…the first line of defense against inhaled agents). As I read the article, I wondered if this is the tissue impacted my COVID-19 in people that lose their sense of smell when infected….and also, does wearing a mask filter enough particles to give the tissue a break from other air pollutants.

Renovations Reveal Rare Maya Murals Hidden in Guatemalan Home | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – From a colonial home in a mountain village.

Bird feeding helps females more than males -- ScienceDaily – The female cardinals are at my bird feeder much more frequently that the males in both winter and summer. This study doesn’t really point to a reason for that. I’ve always thought that other than the males dominance getting food first….the females might need more food at certain times….when they are laying eggs, for example.

London Foxes Show Early Signs of Self-Domestication | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – “Domestication syndrome” – shorter snout and smaller brain.

Painted Vault Revealed at Villa Near Pompeii - Archaeology Magazine – There are new discoveries because they are excavating a part that has not been studied before.

Marine Biologist Braves Cold Water to Photograph Little Known Sea Creatures – Creatures of the ocean….many so delicate they can’t be studied in a lab. Alexander Semenov is a marine biologist and photographer working like a 19th century naturalist, but with 21st century technologies.

Plot Brewing To Blanket US In Solar Panels + Pollinator-Friendly Plants – A beginning…. building hope via steps in the right direction. This article coincided with the MACCEC conference earlier this week. I ended the week more optimistic that the ball is in motion for many ‘drawdown’ actions.

Fish Eggs Can Survive a Journey Through Both Ends of a Duck – The study in this article was done with common carp and Prussian carp…. but what about other invasive species. If most types of fish eggs can survive the duck’s gut - it is bad news for efforts to stop the spread of invasive fish species.

Unique Activities for Yesterday:

Thinking about the first women in my family that could have voted. Women have had the right to vote in the US since 1920 – we’re celebrating 100 years this year. My sister and I have been talking about our great-grandmothers (and maybe the great-great grandmothers too). It’s interesting to think about what it was like in 1920 in our family; they were all citizens by then…although one side of the family were immigrants or children of immigrants.

We wondered if their relationship to immigration and obtaining citizenship would have made it more likely that they would have voted. One of them was divorced with her children teenagers or older; she was educated in Europe before she immigrated. Did her oldest son go with her to vote? The other great-grandmother might have voted as well; she had 3 daughters in 1920 with the youngest being 8 years old (there would be one more after 1920) and they lived on a farm…but went into town often enough. My grandparents from that side of the family always voted, so there’s a reasonable chance that their mothers did to.

One of the things I learned during the recent conversations, is that the grandparents on the other side of the family hosted the local polling place in their garage in the 1940s! That’s an indication that voting was important to them and that could have been passed down from their parents.  One of those great-grandmothers ran a boarding house (around 1920) so she was aware of things going on in town and would have had easier access to the polling place. She insisted that her daughter finish high school a few years later which might indicate that she was attune to the changing role of women more broadly.

I like to think that maybe all 4 of my great-grandmothers voted in 1920…their first opportunity to do so.

Mid-Atlantic Climate Change Education Conference – Day 2

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The biggest take away from day 2 – and really from the conference as a whole – is the shift in the conversation focus re climate change from problem to solutions….it is hopeful rather than doom/gloom.

So much good material referenced in the conference….here are some of the sites I’ve looked at so far.

Project Drawdown. Drawdown is the point in time when the concentration of greenhouse gases in the Earth's atmosphere begins to decline on a year-to-year basis. The focus of this is site is, therefore, about solutions…things we can implement now….with the goal of reaching drawdown by mid-century. There is also a 104-page downloadable The Drawdown Review (free) available from the site.

American Public Health Association page about Climate Change. There are regional factsheets about the health impact of climate change plus some climate-relevant COVID-19 resources.

The UK Health Alliance on Climate Change. Infrographic about “Health and climate: co-benefits.”

Center for Climate Change & Health. Climate Change and Health: A Framework for Action (another infographic)

These links are skewed to the last session of the conference because I’m still overwhelmed and trying to figure out how to organize what I have in my notes. The conference organizers are posting the videos and saved chats to the shared folder by sometime next week (I think). I’ll start with reviewing my notes this week and then add to the summary of what I’ll keep over the next few weeks. I’m envisioning a list of annotated links – at minimum. Some parts of the conference were done as concurrent breakout sessions….so the videos for the sessions I did not attend will be totally new material for me.

Unique Activities for Yesterday:

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Summer squash custard. Before I went to pick up my share for the 3rd week of the CSA, I used up all the summer squash I had in the crisper making a custard with pecan topping. It made an excellent light lunch.

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Lots of day lilies. The deer have eaten more day lily buds…so I am cutting all the ones that are mature enough. Today it was 6 stalks. There will be more ready to cut tomorrow….if the deer don’t get them first

3rd week of CSA. Look at the list of veggies. It was 2 overflowing bags (the fennel, carrot, and beet tops were sticking out)!

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I was glad I cleared out the crispers before I did the pickup. When I got home, I managed to get almost everything into the two crispers. The Caraflex (pointy head) cabbage didn’t fit. Tomorrow I will probably have to process some of it into the freezer.

Mid-Atlantic Climate Change Education Conference – Day 1

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The Mid-Atlantic Climate Change Education Conference (MACCEC) was a conference that went virtual because of the pandemic.  I anticipated that it would be an intense 4 hours in from of my computer. I set up to use both of my screens – one for the WebEx and one for note taking/agenda/etc. Initially, I thought I might use a headset for the audio but quickly decided that 4 hours was too long for that. I also thought that I might get up and move around more during the sessions, but I was too busy interacting with polls and chat…and taking notes. I only got up and moved during the breaks!

Now that it is the ‘morning after,” I’ve had some hours to digest what happened on the first day. It was overwhelming at times while it was happening – and in a different way than an in-person conference is overwhelming. The flow of chat during the presentation is often invigorating but also distracting. It requires multi-tasking. Sometimes I tuned it out to focus on the presenter entirely.

Like most conferences, the speakers were often rushed so that we could stay in the time windows on the agenda. The charts were posted which made up for the rush somewhat…but not completely.

There were breakout sessions that ended up having some similarities with in-person conferences since one time I got lost for about a minute…couldn’t find my session!

The big take aways from the first day were:

  • information is out there for climate change educators…choosing what works best for their situation

  • education on climate change is interlinked with JEDI (Justice, Equity, Diversity, Inclusion)

  • always get to solutions…don’t stop with defining the problems

The ice-breaker activity was to determine the native inhabitant of land where participants were located using the https://native-land.ca/ website. I learned that where I live is Piscataway land. Where my daughter lives in Springfield MO is Kickapoo, Osage, and Sioux land. The land where my parents and sisters live in Texas (Carrollton, Flower Mound, and Sherman) was Kickapoo and Wichita land. Got us all thinking about how the land, water and air have changed since then…what we can and should restore.

Unique activities for yesterday:

Deer found the day lilies. The deer ate many of the day lily buds in the past few days. I am cutting a few every day as they manage to mature enough to bloom indoors.

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I found one already blooming under the milkweed this morning – a different variety than I had cut before. The stalk was shorter which probably helped it escape deer notice. Other buds are hiding in the same way…and I hope they will remain for few more days until they are ready to be cut.

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Oak shedding acorns. Our oak tree dropped quite a few immature acorns on our driveway in the past few days. There are so many…. not many left on the tree to mature over the summer.

Gleanings for Week Ending June 27, 2020

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

What if all viruses disappeared? - BBC Future – We are more aware of pathogenic viruses….but there are a lot more that are not pathogenic to humans….and are often beneficial (directly and indirectly).

Scythian Warrior's Genome Analyzed - Archaeology Magazine – Surprise! Discovered in 1988 and assumed to be a young warrior based on the weapons in the grave. DNA revealed it was a girl and was younger than 14 years old.

90 Percent of U.S. Could Be Powered by Renewables by 2035 - Yale E360 – Technically feasible…but do we have the determination as a country to do what we need to do for future generations?

Repetitive negative thinking linked to dementia risk -- ScienceDaily – But can training/therapy to reduce negative thinking reduce the risk? Whether it does or doesn’t – it seems that people who perceive the positives in their lives are more satisfied/happy….so teaching strategies to enhance that kind of thinking is probably worth it.

How Iceland is undoing carbon emissions for good - BBC Future – Examples of how Iceland is pushing the technical envelope for carbon capture even in heavy industry.

What Makes Some People More Resilient Than Others - The New York Times – Tools most common in resilient people: realistic optimism, a moral compass, religious or spiritual beliefs, cognitive and emotional flexibility, social connectedness.

Memory consolidation during REM sleep: Researchers identify neurons responsible for memory consolidation during REM sleep -- ScienceDaily – I remember the babies I’ve known well having frequent REM sleep….they are doing a lot of memory consolidation!

Top 25 birds of the week: Camouflage – They are easy to spot in these zoomed pictures….in the field, their camouflage is highly effective.

Urine test reveals quality of your diet -- and whether it's the best fit for your body – Interesting work. Maybe in the future we’ll get feedback from the toilet about the ‘health’ of our diet as easily as we get feedback about heart rate and sleep quality from wearable devises now.

The Winnowing of the Wilson’s Snipe – A bird that could fit in the camouflage group…but this bird is special – it makes sound with specialized tail feathers!

Unique activities for yesterday:

Three kinds of day lilies. I have three different kinds of day lilies blooming right now. I love having the flowers in my office and something new opening every day!

Ice maker repair. My husband ordered a replacement part for our ice maker once we started having water overflowing the unit and accumulating in the freezer. He’d done some research online and it seemed likely that the new part would fix the problem. It came and after a few days of the box sitting around to decontaminate, we pulled out the refrigerator to install it (using the opportunity to clean the floor too). This is the type of thing we would have called for repair service pre-pandemic. There are areas where we’ve become a lot more resourceful in recent months and I wonder if we’ll continue that trend post-pandemic.

Grapevine Wreath

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When I was working in the front flower bed, I found a wild grapevine growing up through one of the bushes. It’s native but not growing in a place I could let it continue. I pulled it out but instead of carrying it back to the brush pile with the blackberry vines and grass and weeds….I kept it…thinking I would make a small wreath. I’d learned how in some class I had taken over 30 years ago; simply coil the vine and then twist until it holds the coil.

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I got busy with other things and didn’t remember my plan until the next day. It occurred to me that it would be its most flexible before it dried. When I examined it more closely, I realized that it had some small branches of the bush I had pulled it from; its tendrils were stronger than the twigs’ attachment to the bush. I untangled the twigs and then began the wreath making. I opted to make the wreath with the leaves intact – knowing they would dry up and be easily crumbled off before I would add a red bow or a sprig of holly next December. Of course – I might decide to put a red, white, and blue bow on it for the 4th of July.


Unique activities for yesterday:

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Pretty fly. It seems like every time I take a quick look at the front flower bed there are different bugs to photograph. This one was on the milkweed. I only got one picture before it flew away. The black lattice of the wings and the red of the eyes are quite striking. I used my usual technique: taking the picture with my cell phone as close as I could focus then clipping the part of the image I wanted to show with more magnification.

Fallen day lily. Sometimes the color deepens as the flower ages. The day lilies I brought inside are on the second round of flowers. The flowers start out a robust yellow and then are almost orange when they are ‘spent.’ This dried one is from the first round. It detached itself as the second round started.

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Cardinal nestlings. My sister sent me a picture from her house in Texas. The nest is in a boxwood by her front door! Now that we are all at home more, we have time to savor these natural events.

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Magnolia blooming. I love to photograph the big white magnolia flowers, but we don’t have a tree in our yard. My sister in Texas has one…and took a picture!

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Flowerbeds in the Morning – Part 2

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One of the advantages of cool mornings is that the small critters move a little more slowly – making them easier to photograph. It was in the mid-60s on the morning I went out to work in the front flower beds – and took a few minutes for some photography. The first insect I noticed was a small damselfly flying around and then landing on a day lily leaf. I sat there in the sun long enough for me to get a picture with my phone. I clipped the best part of the image.

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I used the same technique with the bee on the clover. The bee was working its way to all the tiny flowers.

The oak had a lacewing larva several years ago, so I always check the lichen for another; I didn’t fine one this time…. But there was a slug moving over a lichen patch.

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Later – after I finished most of my work, I noticed a fly on a milkweed leaf. It too was a little sluggish because of the temperature.

Overall – I was pleased with the photographic results – concentrating on taking focused pictures without using the digital zoom on the phone – then clipping the portion I wanted for macro viewing.

Unique activities for yesterday:

First Fawn. When I first went into my office about 6 AM – I saw a doe and fawn in our backyard….headed toward the forest. By the time I got the camera turned on and zoomed, they were at the forest edge. This was my first fawn sighting of the year. Last year we had a doe with 2 fawn that came through the yard frequently all through the summer. There don’t seem to be as many deer this year; the path into the forest is growing over with vegetation and my day lilies have not been eaten. It would be good if the deer population were trending lower – although I enjoy seeing them in the forest.

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New low weight for the year. I’m 7 pounds lower than my max weight for the year! I celebrated with dark chocolate for breakfast – of course.

The New Normal – Relationships

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Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

I try to put something new into every day…something that is not just routine…that stretches me in some way. It’s the best way I know to put a positive spin on being at home virtually all the time during the pandemic….and trying to stay resilient to the wave after wave of negative news. I am appalled by the racist behavior exhibited by police (and other parts of our government). All Americans need to take as stand against racism – particularly when it is in institutions that every American should be able to trust.

The New Normal - Relationships

Being at home for months changes relationships to other people.

There are no interactions with people like I had through my volunteer activities – leading hikes for school field trips at Howard County Conservancy, introducing visitors to the Touch Tank animals at Robinson Nature Center, and maintaining containment/assisting people that came to the Brookside Gardens Wings of Fancy exhibit. I enjoyed my conversation with fellow volunteers as well. Similar conversations happened when we attended birding festivals too. There is no replacement for those short duration, stimulating interactions. The partial substitute I’ve nurtured is watching a variety of videos of wide ranging topics (astrobiology, birding, zoo, Coursera lectures to name a few, and a virtual Cape May Spring Festival). The reason videos are only a substitute rather than a replacement is the one-way nature of watching a video; there is no interaction or relationship --- even if you are learning something new from watching the video.

Then there are the synchronous but virtual forms of relationships that allow real-time communications; phone calls and Zoom sessions are two examples. These are OK and they probably allow maintenance of long-standing relationships…but they aren’t the same as being in the same place and face to face. They are often more planned, not as frequent, and can be awkward.

The only face to face relationship maintained through the pandemic is with my husband. It’s a good thing we get along well! We have shared some projects, but we also have activities we enjoy on our own and our house is big enough for us to be ‘alone but not too alone.’

So – what is the new normal when it comes to relationships? It’s a work in progress. I am not keen on Zoom meetings. I do enjoy the more frequent phone conversations with family members. My husband, and I are probably doing more shared projects around the house than we did previously. I’ll be thrilled when we get a vaccine for COVID-19 and I can get back to my volunteer gigs. Travelling is something that we can look forward to as well.

Unique activities for yesterday:

SongSleuth app. Every morning that I sit outside, I realize I am hearing birds that I don’t recognize. When I came indoors today, I looked for an app that might help me identify more of the birds in our forest that don’t come to the feeder where we can easily see them. I opted to try SongSleuth. I’ve done a ‘test’ with a Carolina Wren (in the forest…and I knew what it was) to learn how to record something…select the clip…and then see what the app tells me. The app identified the bird! I’ll take my phone out with me tomorrow morning to see how well it works identifying birds whose songs I don’t know. By the time I go out in the field with the app…I need to be well versed in its use!

Gustave Caillebotte slide show. Internet archive has 258 images by this French painter. He was also a patron of the arts, particularly the Impressionists. The slide show has a brief biography under the panel that displays the paintings. I enjoyed the gardens and botanical images the most but his choice of subjects and perspective (buildings and city scenes, people on balconies…rowing….refinished a wood floor) were interesting too.

A Zentangle Prompt

Three patterns for today’s tile: SAFFLOWER, SQUID, and TRIADZ.

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Here is a tile I made yesterday based on the prompt: Make a two tangle tile today with ROSCOE and SAND SWIRL. SAND SWIRL is one of my favorite patterns. It’s easy and the result varies….emerges as the pattern is completed.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts  here.

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The Zentangle® Method is an easy-to-learn, relaxing, and fun way to create beautiful images by drawing structured patterns. It was created by Rick Roberts and Maria Thomas. "Zentangle" is a registered trademark of Zentangle, Inc. Learn more at zentangle.com.

Gleanings

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Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Gleanings for this week

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

Volunteers Spot New Sites in Aerial Images of England - Archaeology Magazine – Volunteers and lidar scans…a productive combination!

Seven highlights from 70 years of the National Science Foundation - The Bridge: Connecting Science and Policy - AGU Blogosphere – Deepwater Horizon oil spill, public radio and television, ozone hole, strong curricula for introductory science, deep-sea exploration, student opportunities, and COVID-10 response. It seems like the list it too skewed to recent years.

We don’t need nearly as much protein as we consume - BBC Future – Another recommendation of getting nutrients from food rather that highly processed food or supplements….and moderation too. Skewing the diet toward protein at the expense of other nutrients is not healthy!

The Coolest Kingfishers from Six Continents – I’ve seen the first three! All three in south Texas and the Belted Kingfish elsewhere too.  Kingfishers are an easily recognized shape….heavy bill, bigger head relative to body…etc.

How Americans are coping with COVID-19 stress -- ScienceDaily – This report was prior to the additional stressor of George Floyd’s death….the racism of police evident in the videos of the event and the response to protests that seems too militarized. It seems like 2020 will be a pivot point in our nation’s history and how we all respond to the stressors of the year is important in the outcome. I hope that we can show the best of ourselves…our utmost caring for all people and our planet that is our home.

Ice Arch Persists Despite Warm Arctic – It won’t last long…the ice arch which prevents sea ice from drifting south generally breaks up in June or July. Last year it broke up in mid-April.

'New' Footage of Benjamin, the Last Tasmanian Tiger Ever Seen Alive | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – A 21-second video from 1935.

Top 25 birds of the week: Seabirds - Wild Bird Revolution – I’ve seen most the North American birds in these photographs….except for the puffins.

Babies know when you imitate them -- and like it -- ScienceDaily – Most parents probably realize this to some extent…but the research teases out more specifics about how babies respond to knowing they are being imitated.

The remarkable power of the prickly pear - BBC Future – Grown as a crop for food in arid areas and then using the waste left after the food is extracted to generate biofuel. Wish we had more processes like this.

Unique activities for yesterday:

Aftermath of thunderstorm. I did another early morning in the outdoors – noting the aftermath of the thunderstorm the night before. Both birdbaths had been filled by the rain. The one in front is surrounded by day lily leaves…I’m not sure how often it is used by birds, but I like the way it looks from our front door.

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The sycamore tree trunk still looked very wet. I had forgotten the Virginia creeper climbing up. There were a few sycamore leaves that were blown into the yard…but the wind must not have been too bad.

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The wetness of the leaves kept some of the maple leaves flipped over. It’s always surprising that the underside is so light in color.

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Finally, I noticed a dead bee just before I settled into my chair. It must have gotten into the screened part of the deck and not been able to escape.

The rest of my outdoor time I spent making a couple of Zentangle tiles….and listening to the birds.

Mint as a fresh veggie. Mint grows so easily and comes back year after year. My front flower bed has a lot of it…enough to use it for more than a garnish. I cut a handful of stems and strip the leaves – it is the leafy green in a smoothie with chocolate protein powder. Yummy!

A Zentangle Prompt

Make a two tangle tile today with ROSCOE and SAND SWIRL.

Here is a tile I made yesterday based on the prompt: Three patterns to combine in a tile today: FAUX WEAVE, FEATHER FALL, and MEER.

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Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts  here.

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The Zentangle® Method is an easy-to-learn, relaxing, and fun way to create beautiful images by drawing structured patterns. It was created by Rick Roberts and Maria Thomas. "Zentangle" is a registered trademark of Zentangle, Inc. Learn more at zentangle.com.

Zooming Photographs and Tripoli Prompt

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Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Zooming

Last May I took over 2,500 pictures…this May there are just under 1,000. There are still a lot to choose from…and I do use the zoom on my camera a lot. All the pictures this month were taken from around my house. Enjoy the slide show!

A Zentangle Prompt

Make a tile with TRIPOLI as the central tangle. I found this pattern to be challenging the first time I did it a few years ago. So give it a try. Feel free to try some patterns inside the triangles and/or use another pattern (like TIPPLE or CRESCENT MOON) to file some of the tile.

Here are some tiles I made yesterday – savoring the patterns from the last six days. The first was a hodgepodge of almost all the patterns. Then I settled down to 2 patterns (and auras). It was the beginning of a trend because the next one was two patterns with more obvious shading around the edges…and the last was a montotangle tile (gingo)! I enjoyed Tangler’s Choice day and I hope you did too.

Unique activities for yesterday:

Last grocery delivery. I’ve decided to go back to venturing out to the grocery store in June after more than two months of almost weekly deliveries…so this was the last delivery. I’m glad the option was available to us but found it stressful to be online while my shopping was done (to OK or reject substitutions) and then sorting through the bags left on the porch to put away the refrigerator items and leaving the rest to sit a few days (usually in the back of one of our cars) before unpacking. And I didn’t like the quick accumulation of so many plastic bags. All the shoppers seemed keen to do a good job but some were very inexperienced with grocery shopping/the store.

Low weight of the year. I didn’t have any dark chocolate on hand, so I celebrated with sweet potato custard with pecans on top – the making and enjoying warm from oven.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts  here.

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The Zentangle® Method is an easy-to-learn, relaxing, and fun way to create beautiful images by drawing structured patterns. It was created by Rick Roberts and Maria Thomas. "Zentangle" is a registered trademark of Zentangle, Inc. Learn more at zentangle.com.

Venturing Out and Weekly Gleanings

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Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

A Zentangle Prompt

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Inspiration for a pattern can come from our environment. Sometimes creating a pattern is relatively straightforward. The prompt for today is to create your own pattern based on the picture of tiles to the right. Hint: start with a grid of squares. Use your pattern in a tile. Other patterns in the tile are tangler’s choice (i.e. whatever you want).

Here are some tiles I made based on yesterdays prompt: Make a tile using the gingo pattern.

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It is one of my favorite patterns for mono-tangle tiles.

Venturing away from Home

I went to Howard Country Conservancy’s Mt Pleasant to record a Facebook Live Zentangle session. It was the first time I had driven my car in May! It was also my first volunteer gig since early March – and a good experience – but I realized how out of practice I have become with getting out and about. There was a ‘newness’ to my car even though I’ve had it for a few years. Mt Pleasant is a place I know very well but hadn’t been there since January; it felt unfamiliar.

I was glad the flip chart pad and gallery board were wrapped in plastic trash bags because it was raining heavily when I got there. It took two trips to get into the building and I was glad I had worn a windbreaker and waterproof boots.

The mask that I wore during set up did not stay in place as well as I wanted. I need more experience with securing it and being certain that I can breathe well enough through the layers of fabric. It’s a good ‘lesson learned’ before I venture out to try doing my own grocery shopping in June.

The materials I had prepared ahead of time worked well…minimizing the amount I had to create while I was talking.

The Facebook Live session lasted about 20 minutes and made a three-part tile using TIPPLE, CRESCENT MOON, and either MEER or POKEROOT. I missed not being able to create a mosaic of the student tiles at the end. Here are tiles I made with the patterns after the session.

I’m not sure how any of my volunteer gigs will be possible anytime soon but I’ll probably do some hiking at Mt. Pleasant…on a sunny day…another small ‘venturing away from home.’

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts  here.

Gleanings of the Week

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

Soak in the Details of the Moon with this High-Definition Photo – A backyard astrophotographer with a lot patience.

Record conservation study of Tutankhamun's tomb solves mystery and raises new questions – Teasing out more history from a much-studied place.

Top 25 birds of the week: Bright Colours - Wild Bird Revolution – It’s a gray rainy day as I write this….I am appreciating the colors!

New Thoughts on Turkey’s Oldest Temple Complex - Archaeology Magazine – Gobekli Tepe…built by hunter gatherers over 11,000 years ago….requiring hundreds of people to construct. I first learned about it in a Coursera course a few years ago.

NASA's ICESat-2 measures Arctic Ocean's sea ice thickness, snow cover -- ScienceDaily – ICESAT-2 was launched in September 2018; I learned about it during visits to NASA Goddard during my HoLLIE class in spring 2018. It’s good to get an update on it now.

The ingredients for a longer life - BBC Future – Study of populations where many live to 100…focusing on eating habits, social connection, a few cups of tea or coffee, sweet potato and bittersweet melons, landscape…and moderation.

Saving energy and lives: How a solar chimney can boost fire safety -- ScienceDaily – If a building has a solar chimney, it will suck smoke out of a building during a fire…giving people more time to escape!

Risks of Clutter, Tips for Decluttering Your Home | Berkeley Wellness – I had intended to spend some of the ‘stay at home as much as possible’ time de-cluttering. But I moved on to other projects. Now I am returning to the idea just as I am beginning to tentatively venture out. The clutter in my house is not enough to make it unsafe…but I do have a lot of stuff that I no longer need.

Tracing the human genetic history: Every tooth tells a different story – Another data point for forensics when DNA is not available. Teeth often survive for longer than other parts of the body.

New evidence of watery plumes on Jupiter’s moon Europa - GeoSpace - AGU Blogosphere – I’m missing Charles Cockell’s Life in the Universe Pandemic Series. This article is about new analysis of data collected by the Galileo mission flyby of Europa in 2000.  The ESA Juice mission, which is scheduled to launch in 2022, will study the potential habitability and underground oceans of three of Jupiter’s moons: Ganymede, Calisto, and Europa.

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The Zentangle® Method is an easy-to-learn, relaxing, and fun way to create beautiful images by drawing structured patterns. It was created by Rick Roberts and Maria Thomas. "Zentangle" is a registered trademark of Zentangle, Inc. Learn more at zentangle.com.

Filling a Day of Social Distancing - 5/14/2020

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Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Birds nesting in our neighbor’s eaves. A pair of European Starlings found a way under the eaves of our neighbor’s house and they have nestlings. One came out this morning and looked more like a juvenile Brown-headed Cowbird than a juvenile starling. The cowbirds have been around a lot this spring. Now I don’t seem around the feeder as much so maybe they are moving to new territory.

Grocery delivery. First thing in the morning I made the final tweaks to the list. Is it feeling ‘normal’ to have my groceries delivered?  No - I don’t think it ever will. I like to do my own shopping and will get back to it as soon as I can. It took the shopper an hour to find 18 items. It was stressful to stay glued to my phone for that length of time to respond to substitutions; the web page stopped working for a short period of time too. This was the 7th delivery so if it were going to achieve the comfort of ‘new normal’ I think it would have already. It’s been a new shopper every time and maybe that makes it continuously ‘new’ each week.

Mowing the grass. It had been dry for a few days and the temperature was in the 60s…a good day to mow the yard. The south side that had been too wet the last time we mowed so the grass there was getting high. I decided to experiment with making a short video during the first part of the mowing. I used an old larger name tag holder from a conference that was big enough to hold my phone then taped it to myself rather than letting it swing from the lanyard. I started the video, put it in the holder and started mowing. I had put the tape too low on the name tag and the weight of the phone caused it to tilt down a little. The two pictures below are clipped from the video…a part where I was mowing the tallest grass and the lawn mower stalled…I turned off the video. I’ll be refining my technique…but it was a fun experiment.

Two beauties at the bird feeder. As I was starting my day, the bird feeder was active with the woodpeckers and two early birds that seem to be around more often right now: Indigo Bunting and American Goldfinch – both males. Until this spring, seeing an Indigo Buntings were a rare treat but they seem to be enjoying our birdfeeder and we see the males more than the females.

Several years ago, I saw one feeding in the meadow at Howard County Conservancy with a flock of gold finches while I was hiking with a 2nd grade school group in the fall. We all stood and watched the birds until they moved too far away. One little girl commented – “I thought they were butterflies…but they’re birds!” It was a magical moment in nature for me … and the group of children (and chaperone) I had with me.  

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts  here.

Filling a Day of Social Distancing - 5/8/2020 - Gleanings

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Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Coloring a flower picture. I found a wonderful book on Internet Archive – Flower Designs by Marcia Bradford. It is printed one flower per page with light lines. They were originally intended for watercolors. I selected the one that looks like a California Poppy first (saving the morning glory for another day); there are 18 flower pages to pick from!

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I saved the page from the book as a jpeg then printed it on manila cardstock. I used a paper cutter to make ‘tiles’ (so that it would be a mosaic rather than one 8.5x11 inch page). I like the colored result. Tomorrow I’ll fill in some of the blank area with ‘tangles’!

Bringing in more iris stems. We had a freeze watch for overnight, so I cut two more iris stems yesterday. The others are not far enough along to bloom, so I left them outside and hoped they would survive the frost. I took the vase outside so that I could put the new stems into water right away with the stem I’d cut previously.

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Unfortunately, I bumped the flower on the way back into the house so now the flower is in its own small water glass.

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While I was out, I also cut more mint to use in my smoothie with the chocolate protein powder. It tasted so good last time that I’ve added the combination to my smoothie rotation. Hopefully, the temperature will not get down low enough overnight to kill the mint.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts  here.

And now – the Gleanings for this week

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

One little Chipmunk on a Mission! – Pic for Today – Chipmunks are such fun to watch. We have had then periodically around our house but not all the time. They seem to like our front flower beds and porch when they are around. Squirrels are the constant in our neighborhood.

New PMEL Science at Work Video: How tiny particles affect air quality and climate | NOAA Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory (PMEL) – The video as just under 4 minutes…. explaining how we learn about aerosol particles (important because the particles can impact health).

Image of the Day: Ancient Dental Enamel | The Scientist Magazine® - Quite a lot can be derived from protein sequence analysis these days.

Top 25 birds of the week: Endemic Birds - Wild Bird Revolution – Some birds native only to a certain place.

City of Houston Surprises: 100% Renewable Electricity — $65 Million in Savings in 7 Years | CleanTechnica – The city is planning to power all municipal operations with renewable energy! Also included in the program – the provider will help city employees purchase discounted renewable energy.

Organic food growers see surge in demand during pandemic - UPI.com – Glad the organic farmers are thriving. So far- I’ve been able to get organic produce in my grocery deliveries. My local Community Supported Agriculture farm will begin in June.

Understanding deer damage is crucial when planting new forests -- ScienceDaily – UK research on an issue we deal with in the US too.

Frozen, fresh or canned food: What’s more nutritious? - BBC Future – A little update. The article confirmed what I already knew…it’s good to know I don’t need to reset my thinking.

Analysis of Pompeii's Garbage Suggests the Ancient Romans Recycled, too | Smart News | Smithsonian Magazine – Evidently garbage was piled at city walls and sorted for reuse. They lived much closer to their garbage.

Wildflower Watching as a Source of Solace and Diversion – This is the time of year to find wildflowers. I am always surprised at how amazing even the tiny ones look when I can get close enough to photograph them.

Filling a Day of Social Distancing - 5/6/2020 - Routine

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Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Photographing an iris bud. I decided to do some macro photography of the iris bud that had dried up before it put it in the compost. The materials for the project: clip-on macro lens, jeweler’s loupe, a sharp knife and cutting board, and then the iPad to use as a light table. The sections were cut as thinly as possible (not microtome thin, unfortunately).

The loupe provides 22x magnification, so I started with that. These are cross sections of the desiccated bud.

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The cross section of the stem was not desiccated, but obviously not functioning well enough to get water up to the bud.

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The sleeve around the bud was almost completely dry although there was still a little reddish color that I photographed a few days ago.

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I took one picture with the clip-on lens to show the whole bud cross section in one frame.

Making biscuits. Sometimes I get hungry for breads…but not enough to buy a loaf. Making biscuits from scratch fills the craving. This batch was made with a little more milk and spread into a shallow pan to bake. The sheet was about 1/2 inch, so it was somewhat like bread. I slathered a rectangle with peanut butter in the first round…then had ginger preserves for the second serving (yesterday). I still have enough for at least one more serving!

Browsing McCall’s Magazines from the 1920s. Internet Archive has several McCall’s Magazines from the 1920s available. I’ve been browsing through them the past few days …. realizing that one of my grandmothers would have been 20 in 1927…wondering if she saw these magazines. All of them have a segment about clothes …. with patterns available. It was a time of drop waists (or no waist) … shorter hemlines … shoes that were color matched to dresses for formal occasions.

Watching the compiled hatching moments from Cornell Lab of Ornithology. A 3 minutes video of birds emerging from their eggs: Barred Owl, Osprey, Red-tailed Hawk.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts  here.

And now about the beauty for routine….

I’ve been emphasizing some of the things that are different about each day…things that keep the days at home from settling into a sameness. But the routine is important too.

  • I get up about the same time every day…go to sleep about the same time every day too. My internal clock is quite strong. These days the birds are already beginning to make their morning song when I am waking up. I enjoy listening to them for a few minutes before I get up.

  • Breakfast is almost always a smoothie…enough that I consider it the routine. But the ingredients of the smoothie change from day to day…and some days I decide to something completely different. I had left over biscuits and ginger preserves yesterday because my husband was snoozing when I wanted to have breakfast (and I didn’t want to make noise with the Ninja to make the smoothie).

  • Creating at least one Zentangle tile is something that I do sometime during the day. Sometimes I do more than one but not in one sitting.

  • One way or another, I get 12,000 steps (counted by my Fitbit) during the day. I try to spread the activity out during the day and get at least 30 minutes of ‘active minutes’ as calculated by the Fitbit.

  • I browse (occasionally read) 4 eBooks a day. Sometimes I count magazines as books if they are lengthy…or I group several of them together to count as a book. For example, 4-6 of the Life magazines are counted as a book.

  • The blog post is also part of my routine…it was before the pandemic and has continued to be part of my daily rhythm.

  • And then there are the notes I keep for myself on whatever I am doing. I find that a learn better when I take notes while I listen…when I read…even just after I talk to people.

  • Noting at least 4 specific things I am thankful for and ways that I was kind to others and to myself  at the end of the day.

  • 20-30 minutes of yoga and Breathing app round out the daily routine.

Now that I am looking at my list, I am realizing that it hasn’t changed very much from what it was before the pandemic. Maybe I am doing a bit more reading and might not be as rushed to complete the whole routine every day.

Filling a Day of Social Distancing - 5/5/2020 – Dead Pine

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Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Sending off a check to a relative graduating from high school. Some events continue to happen no matter what. The details of how they are celebrated might change. This one was far enough away a card/check was what I would have done even without the pandemic.

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Seeing an ad for GE’s Wonder Kitchen in the June 1955 issue of Life Magazine – A 9.5 foot combo: washer/dryer, sink, dishwasher, stove with a stainless steel counter. Add a refrigerator and have a complete kitchen! It was a product for the new suburbs. Note that the developer Bill Levitt was reviewing the product…known as the father of modern American suburbia – also for his refusal to allow racial minorities to buy houses in his development (see Wikipedia article here). So – this one page reminds us of the relationship of two big themes of the 1950s.

Watching the Juilliard Students grid music video (Ravel’s Bolero). It’s 9.5 minutes of music and performances…students and faculty and alum…from wherever they are ‘at home.’

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts  here.

And now about the cutting down of a dead pine tree….

One of our neighbors had a pine tree that died over the course of last summer and fall. They got a crew out to cut it down a little over a week ago. I watched the action from my office window…through the branches of the sycamore. It was the big excitement of the day. The process involved cutting off the lower branches as far up as the ladder reached, one of the crew climbing up the trunk using the stubs of branches for footholds and cutting off branches as he worked upward then cutting off the top, taking a break (maybe to get a bigger chain saw), and then cutting the tree close to the ground.

I took pictures of the stump a few days later. It’s always sad when a tree is cut down….even when its already dead. In the forest dead snags are great habitat for woodpeckers! But this tree had high potential of causing damage to a house if it fell on its own. It was a good idea to get it taken down in a controlled way.

Filling a Day of Social Distancing - 5/3/2020 - Dogwoods

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Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Browsing Life magazine (on Internet Archive) from around the time I was born (mid-1950s). There were articles about Queen Elizabeth II’s coronation and exploration of the artic. I was surprised at the number of ads for cigarettes and alcohol. The two images I picked to show as samples were both ads: IBM Electric Typewriters (not yet the Selectric models that had the golf ball-like type element which the company made up until shortly after I joined the company in the 1980s) and a passenger train through the Southwest.

Photographing tiny leaves on our red oak with the digiscope (smartphone attached to spotting scope). The branches of the tree are too high to get close enough to do macro photography (I’m not confident enough to use a ladder that high). We put the spotting scope on the front porch, and it was able to focus on the top branches of the tree. We waited until the sun was in the west to provide good light on the leaves…make it possible to ‘freeze’ the motion caused by the breeze.

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A picture of a cat visitor in Missouri. There is a cat that comes to visit at my daughter’s house periodically (started about the same time the pandemic did). It meows loudly at the door to be let in, visits, then goes home. I was talking to her when it appeared on Saturday evening about dusk. She sent us a picture of the cat that appears to be very much ‘at home’ in their house. It probably belongs to a neighbor although she isn’t sure which one.

Experimenting with Procreate App features. When I make Zentangle tiles on the iPad with the Apple Pencil, I use the Procreate App in its simplest form…changing colors occasionally or changing the intensity of the lines. I experimented with the ‘liquify’ feature on some old tiles. The original is on the left and the right is the one I augmented with a few swipes.

And then I did another with a partial ‘recolor’…quite a change from the original! It was fun to experiment although I think I enjoy the creation of Zentangle tiles in digital form that relies on my own drawing rather that the razzle-dazzle features.

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Receiving a new computer for my husband. Fed Ex delivered it on a Sunday! We were not expecting it until Monday and my husband was still doing backups of his old machine when it arrived.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts  here.

And now for the neighborhood dogwoods…

I photographed white and pink dogwoods in our neighborhood during last week’s walk. They were all in front yards and I was able to photograph them standing in the street. The white ones seemed to be a little bruised…might have been out longer than the pink ones. But both were still beautiful. I like the dogwood flowers because they are a springtime feature of our area, the way the trees move in the breeze with their delicate  leafy branches in the summer and then the red of the leaves/seed clusters in the fall. I probably like the white ones that are native to North America the best.

Filling a Day of Social Distancing - 5/2/2020 – 60 years ago

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Continuing the blog post series prompted by COVID-19….

Here are the unique activities for yesterday:

Catching up on a Charles Cockell’s Life in the Universe Pandemic Series:

Making Zentangle tiles while listening to astrobiology videos. I made tiles that start with curvy strings that create spaces to fill with color…the coloring using the ‘pattern’ of connecting spaces via corners. I made two tiles while I listened to the 6 videos.

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Celebrating a new low weight for the year with dark chocolate. Being at a new low weight for the year is s great metric to start the day. I enjoyed the dark chocolate right away - for ‘breakfast.’

Beginning of sycamore seed balls. The light was good in the afternoon to observe the newly forming sycamore balls through the skylight in the master bathroom. I turned the screen on my camera so that I could point the camera straight up and brought in a chair to sit on (help me hold the camera steady). I was surprised at how red the tiny balls looked.

A wary downy. I was looking through pictures I had taken recently and found some of a downy woodpecker on our deck railing. It sat there relatively still for longer than I expected. As I reviewed the pictures, I realized that maybe it was being still to escape a predator from above.

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The Zentangle® Method is an easy-to-learn, relaxing, and fun way to create beautiful images by drawing structured patterns. It was created by Rick Roberts and Maria Thomas. "Zentangle" is a registered trademark of Zentangle, Inc. Learn more at zentangle.com.

Links to my previous “filling a day of social distance” posts  here.

Thinking about 60 years ago this spring…..

I was in kindergarten…walking home with a bean seedling I’d sprouted in a paper cup. It was a warmish spring day in Texas, and I was excited to show the small plant to my mother. She met me when I was about halfway home but didn’t seem interested in my plant which surprised me. She told me that my grandfather had been hurt and was in the hospital.

Those moments became my most vivid memory of my kindergarten year. The details around the moments are missing. Did I usually walk home by myself? Where were my little sisters when my mother came to walk with me? Had the accident just happened, and she was still assimilating the news herself? What happened to the bean plant?

I was at the age where memories start to become more plentiful. By the time my grandfather came home of the hospital – a leg amputated and much thinner - I remember the first time we saw him at his home (my sisters and I were not allowed at the hospital) and thinking how different he looked. He lived another 16 years – helping me and my sisters all along the way…showing us life well lived. Today I am feeling how fortunate we were that he survived 1960.

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