I'm in Foshan, adjacent to Guanzhou, the literal factory for everything in the world. I was in the factory that makes mattresses for all the biggest hotel chains in the world. I didn't know there was this much foam in the world. Lotta Indians, Asians, Pakistanis, and Middle Eastern buyers shopping to fill up luxury hotels in Dubai, Mumbai, Singapore, and every other imaginable place that might have a luxury hotel.
Foshan is the furniture capital of the entire world, and the object lesson in why furniture mfg. will not move back to the US. Furniture showrooms with floor size of 50...I don't know....maybe 100 soccer pitches...it's impossible calculate they're so huge, 12 stories high, and there's at least a dozen of them...maybe dozens...., hundreds of "small" furniture showrooms that are only the size of 10-15 football fields and 5 stories high, multiple hundreds of single entity players selling out of single floor gigantic retail spaces, and probably thousands of single bay shops with some guy sitting there selling a single type of chair...or cigarettes, lots and lots of cigarette vendors,...and about a million noodle shops feeding the masses. You drive for dozens of miles in every direction and its furniture showrooms, nonstop, no gaps, seemingly into infinity. It makes High Point, NC, look like a Stuckeys on a remote stretch of I-75. On the edge of the showroom area (several dozen square miles) there are the factories. Every imaginable iteration of what humans call furniture is here. Trying to describe it in words is like trying to describe infinity.
Thanks for this Whale of a Tale. What magnificent animals.
The other day, with friends visiting from out of town, we started a game of asking each other what we would have like have been in a dream world with no constraints. Answers included pro ice skater, forest ranger, pilot, etc. My answer was that I'd like to have been a marine biologist. The sea creatures have always fascinated me.
CynthiaW; this would have been perfect for Valentine's day.
"A full-grown blue whale’s heart is as big as a compact car." Imagine how romantic it would sound that to say to your wife! 🙄
As for the weather. It's cold. We got 2-4 inches of wet snow on Sunday, but the roads are mostly clear now. The temperature is moody, in the teens, although isn't nearly everything about teens moody?
I love that music, which was my parent's music, so I grew up hearing it.
Too long of a story as to how it came about (mostly just luck), but The Glenn Miller Orchestra - actually it was a multi-piece "band" made up of some of the GMO players, not the full "orchestra" - played at my oldest daughter's wedding back in the late 90s. How cool is that?
Science team trip to UNC Charlotte today. We're early because of my inability to be late. University students will be doing presentations about their research on topics like spider silk, bacterial crop disease, and other science-y magic things.
Then, we get a tour of the labs. I had hoped to be able to bring Fang, who needs motivation, but he has work this morning. Staff training for the Parks Department: it will soon be spring sport season, which means more hours.
This is how I feel about it when, say, a customer service call center makes you wait for ages to talk to a live person when you want one. Some, though, have adopted improvements in offering a call-back option—assuming they follow through in a reasonably timely fashion.
It’s a similar irritation with doctor’s offices that make you wait for a long time on a scheduled appointment. Sometimes there’s an emergency or something. But in other cases, it’s poor scheduling practices and disrespectful of the other person’s time.
You realize, of course, that their time is actually worth about a bajillion dollars an hour while yours and mine and everybody else's is worth less than bupkis.
That used to be called "Lombardi Time." Coach said the most motivated individuals arrive ahead of the scheduled practice time so they will be suited up and ready to begin work at the scheduled practice time.
Neurotically time urgent in my youth, I swear to this day that I was hired in the job that began my career because I was at the office 10 minutes ahead of the scheduled interview time.
Good morning. Back in Vermont, but haven't been able to ski yet. The snow has been followed by winds that have ranged from 50-100mph. Not only is the wind dangerous by itself because of wind chill, not only can they not run the lifts or gondola in wind like this, but it is very likely that the wind has blown the snow off of the slopes into the trees and that what remains on the slopes is ice.
Yeah. That's like me watching the horses and riders in rodeos. Actually, I don't care much about the riders and their performance in different events like calf roping or bull dogging per se, I just really like watching the horses work in those and other events like barrel racing. I never quite "cut the rug" on the back of a horse like they do, but I used to have a pretty good seat (only thrown twice in my adult life) and wasn't shy about laying a spur on a flank on a couple of the rockets-with-a-lit-fuse that I owned over the years.
Nothing quite like giving a horse its head and telling it to git! Especially if it's one that when you do, you'd better have a hold of a handful of mane and be ready to go with it, or risk ending up with your butt in the dirt while watching its butt growing smaller and smaller in the distance. That 0 to 45 in 4 or 5 strides is unlike any thrill any car or motorcycle ever gave me. And leaning into a full gallop, light in the saddle and feeling that animal's power through your legs and seat and in the reins in your hands... nothing quite like it in the way of fun for me.
Had some problems that kept me from riding for the past two summers, but things have improved and I'm really hoping to at least get some saddle time in on my wife's mare this summer. She's a push-button Cadillac, if you know how to push the buttons.
Unlike my gelding, who's a lumber wagon. Hope to get on him at some point, too. We'll see. But my rug cuttin' days are, sadly, pretty much behind me.
Being a mile off shore in Lake Michigan in gale conditions on a teeny little piece of plastic, orienting a teeny sail to catch the wind and being driven along and skipping on the tops of 10' waves like a water bug...there's nothing like it. It's like skiing 10' moguls that are moving and breaking. When I think back that I could even do that...it makes me feel like I got at least one thing right in the world.
The whole thing of sailing craft being able to sail faster than the wind due to the phenomenon of "apparent wind" was really something. I could skip along at 25-30mph.
BIL is an avid skier, and once was an avid windsurfer. He even tried out parasailing on the beach a few years ago. But once was enough for him on that.
It occurs to me that Zelensky/Ukraine seems the party least anxious for peace. Ironically, tragically, this war seems his/its moment in the sun (I feel bad even suggesting that). Anyway, if that is true, it doesn,t surprise me that the others might want to get their ducks in order before bringing him in. Putin is about as reliable as a snake, but you have to start somewhere.
I don't get the sense that Zelensky/Ukraine doesn't want peace. They want a seat at the table about their own country, and they don't want their sacrifices to be wholly in vain.
Zelensky is right not to trust either Putin or Trump to deal with his country fairly IMHO
This administration is full of Kremlin stooges and force multipliers from the top down. Every single thing they’ve done so far has been music to every ear in the Axis of Autocrats.
Last I read was that the Ruzzian bargaining position is that Ukraine isn’t even a nation, and therefore cannot send anyone to negotiate. Meanwhile, this administration is demanding repayment from Ukraine for war aid, as if calling in a loan gone bad. And they want to remove any and all American troops from parts of Europe previously under Ruzzian control. Not as a bargaining chip or deal sweetener for Putin, mind you, but as a starting point “freebie” for Trump’s genocidal maniac pal.
I will not be surprised if they end up committing American troops to help Putin conquer Ukraine and put its people into gulags.
There's little that might surprise me with this administration, but that's a bet I wouldn't take. Anything is possible, but it kinda went out the window with the gulag part.
We're on the front end of what I think will be a long term series of outrageously disgusting activity. It's too early for me to get deep into it, and honestly, I probably won't ever get deep into it.
Suffice it to say I'll agree with any disparagement of our POTUS, the more vicious and damning the better....but I won't be taking part. I'm your silent partner in hating this waddling human turd.
A tad testy, not necessary. I'm not an internet comments maven, but I know to let stuff go when there's nothing at stake. There's nothing at stake here. Let's be friends.
Good morning. It’s about 18º cold here, proving that winter hasn’t been defeated yet, and that global warming still has a lot of work to do.
I was taken aback by the first ‘graph: It never occurred to me that our blue whales were the largest animals that ever lived. I would have thought some other land animal from the dinosaur eras would have taken that prize. Impressive.
I just had a discussion with CoPilot on this. Here's what I got back:
When a blue whale takes in a large gulp of water, it's certainly possible that larger fish could be in that gulp. However, here's why they typically don't end up being filtered and consumed by the whale:
### Key Points:
- **Behavior of Larger Fish**: Larger fish often sense the approaching whale and move away. They have the agility and ability to avoid getting caught up in the whale's massive intake of water.
- **Primary Feeding Grounds**: Blue whales usually feed in areas with dense concentrations of krill. These areas may not have as many larger fish because the ecosystem is more suited to the thriving population of krill.
- **Filtering Mechanism**: While the baleen plates can trap small prey like krill, larger fish that do get caught in the gulp tend to be pushed out along with the water. The whale's tongue and the flow of water help expel anything that isn't trapped by the baleen plates.
### The Filtering Process:
1. **Gulping**: The whale opens its mouth wide and engulfs a large volume of water and krill.
2. **Closing the Mouth**: The whale closes its mouth and uses its tongue to push the water through the baleen plates.
3. **Straining**: As water flows out, the baleen plates trap the krill, and anything too large to fit through the gaps in the plates is expelled.
4. **Swallowing**: The whale then uses its tongue to gather the trapped krill and swallow them.
This highly specialized feeding technique is incredibly efficient for targeting small prey like krill while minimizing the intake of larger, less suitable food items.
### Visual Representation:
Imagine a comb: If you run it through water with grains of sand, the grains will get caught between the teeth of the comb, but any larger debris will be left behind or pushed out. The baleen plates work similarly for the blue whale
I read it as their opening up enough and essentially "inflating" their head to take in the maximum volume of water/food. Filtering through their teeth would mean minimal water volume.
I thought the same thing. Fascinating TSAF today. Blue Whale. I don't know why, but I've had a mystery longing to see one of those guys since I was a little kid.
Engagement with nature correlates with happiness. Engagement with politics correlates with depression.
well said
Depression and anger.
Truth.
On a Mission to Heal Gila Monsters
Fascinating read on a pharmaceutical chemist who left Merck (human) to work on animal specific drugs.
Read (free) how my local Gila Monster cousins, use the basis of a venom chemical, to "eat just a few meals..... a year!!). Ozempic was derived.
Enjoy
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/02/16/science/gila-monsters-cryptosporidium.html?unlocked_article_code=1.x04.f4y7.STiJiRyPUUXJ
I'm in Foshan, adjacent to Guanzhou, the literal factory for everything in the world. I was in the factory that makes mattresses for all the biggest hotel chains in the world. I didn't know there was this much foam in the world. Lotta Indians, Asians, Pakistanis, and Middle Eastern buyers shopping to fill up luxury hotels in Dubai, Mumbai, Singapore, and every other imaginable place that might have a luxury hotel.
Foshan is the furniture capital of the entire world, and the object lesson in why furniture mfg. will not move back to the US. Furniture showrooms with floor size of 50...I don't know....maybe 100 soccer pitches...it's impossible calculate they're so huge, 12 stories high, and there's at least a dozen of them...maybe dozens...., hundreds of "small" furniture showrooms that are only the size of 10-15 football fields and 5 stories high, multiple hundreds of single entity players selling out of single floor gigantic retail spaces, and probably thousands of single bay shops with some guy sitting there selling a single type of chair...or cigarettes, lots and lots of cigarette vendors,...and about a million noodle shops feeding the masses. You drive for dozens of miles in every direction and its furniture showrooms, nonstop, no gaps, seemingly into infinity. It makes High Point, NC, look like a Stuckeys on a remote stretch of I-75. On the edge of the showroom area (several dozen square miles) there are the factories. Every imaginable iteration of what humans call furniture is here. Trying to describe it in words is like trying to describe infinity.
Remind me to write something about it.
Please remember to write something about it.
Noted.
Thanks for this Whale of a Tale. What magnificent animals.
The other day, with friends visiting from out of town, we started a game of asking each other what we would have like have been in a dream world with no constraints. Answers included pro ice skater, forest ranger, pilot, etc. My answer was that I'd like to have been a marine biologist. The sea creatures have always fascinated me.
#MeToo.
CynthiaW; this would have been perfect for Valentine's day.
"A full-grown blue whale’s heart is as big as a compact car." Imagine how romantic it would sound that to say to your wife! 🙄
As for the weather. It's cold. We got 2-4 inches of wet snow on Sunday, but the roads are mostly clear now. The temperature is moody, in the teens, although isn't nearly everything about teens moody?
Son F is moody today. It's a little annoying.
Chill...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h5P-8ZTrGNI
That never gets old.
I love that music, which was my parent's music, so I grew up hearing it.
Too long of a story as to how it came about (mostly just luck), but The Glenn Miller Orchestra - actually it was a multi-piece "band" made up of some of the GMO players, not the full "orchestra" - played at my oldest daughter's wedding back in the late 90s. How cool is that?
Moody. The temperature is moody. I like it.
Science team trip to UNC Charlotte today. We're early because of my inability to be late. University students will be doing presentations about their research on topics like spider silk, bacterial crop disease, and other science-y magic things.
Then, we get a tour of the labs. I had hoped to be able to bring Fang, who needs motivation, but he has work this morning. Staff training for the Parks Department: it will soon be spring sport season, which means more hours.
Punctuality is respect, actualized.
This is how I feel about it when, say, a customer service call center makes you wait for ages to talk to a live person when you want one. Some, though, have adopted improvements in offering a call-back option—assuming they follow through in a reasonably timely fashion.
It’s a similar irritation with doctor’s offices that make you wait for a long time on a scheduled appointment. Sometimes there’s an emergency or something. But in other cases, it’s poor scheduling practices and disrespectful of the other person’s time.
You realize, of course, that their time is actually worth about a bajillion dollars an hour while yours and mine and everybody else's is worth less than bupkis.
Come on now. Show some respect.
That would make a great t-shirt.
Or hat. I'd actually pay good money for a good hat with that on it.
The back could read:
Make America Punctual Again
I can be obnoxious and anti-social, but I always show up at the appointed hour, often a few minutes before.
Well, it would be very impolite to show up late to be obnoxious and anti-social to someone.
When I’m feeling anti-social, I fake a medical emergency or alien abduction. Perfect excuse.
That used to be called "Lombardi Time." Coach said the most motivated individuals arrive ahead of the scheduled practice time so they will be suited up and ready to begin work at the scheduled practice time.
Neurotically time urgent in my youth, I swear to this day that I was hired in the job that began my career because I was at the office 10 minutes ahead of the scheduled interview time.
That’s my MO.
Sooper dooper TSAF today. Blue Whales. I was smiling through the whole piece.
Pleased to hear it.
A humpback whale thought better than to eat this kayaker. https://youtu.be/_yPR_mF0idE?feature=shared
Jonah could not be reached for comment. (No, not Jonah Goldberg).
So, for all your standing as the doorman around here, you just can't help spouting off yourself sometimes, can you?
There was no pun. 🤷
Of course not. He who saves his comment section brooks no puns. 🙄
Would anyone have believed that in the era before ubiquitous cameras?
Will anyone ever believe it again after AI-generated video takes over?
The moral of the story is to be a part of something that doesn't taste like chicken, so they spit it out.
I saw this! Wild.
30 here. Temp dropping all day. Headed to the store soon to buy traditional snow prediction makings for milk sammiches.
Your piece reminded me of this song. Kirk twerks: https://youtu.be/AkjTGCrLvAU?si=DsU13R0fLTIyev3h
Good morning. It's like upper 30s here, might be 50 later.
Hi everyone. Cold here, windy, cloudy. Looks like maybe tomorrow's predicted snowstorm will miss us - i,m afraid to hope too much!
We walk in the morning. Some mornings it's hard. I'm listening to "Red Queen."
There’s no dog walk this am as it’s -12 with a -22 windchill. The forecast predicts a high of 49 next Tuesday though. People will be sunbathing!
49-50 (mostly sunny and breezy) my favorite temp.
Good morning. Back in Vermont, but haven't been able to ski yet. The snow has been followed by winds that have ranged from 50-100mph. Not only is the wind dangerous by itself because of wind chill, not only can they not run the lifts or gondola in wind like this, but it is very likely that the wind has blown the snow off of the slopes into the trees and that what remains on the slopes is ice.
So why limit yourself to a pair of skis?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kIhdQXx4dms
A little practice and you could be mixing it up with these guys...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BXsZKZwLoQ4
Hard pass.
No sense of adventure, eh? Probably because you have at least a bit more than a modicum of common sense, I suppose. But what fun is that?
At my age, watching the video is fun enough.
Yeah. That's like me watching the horses and riders in rodeos. Actually, I don't care much about the riders and their performance in different events like calf roping or bull dogging per se, I just really like watching the horses work in those and other events like barrel racing. I never quite "cut the rug" on the back of a horse like they do, but I used to have a pretty good seat (only thrown twice in my adult life) and wasn't shy about laying a spur on a flank on a couple of the rockets-with-a-lit-fuse that I owned over the years.
Nothing quite like giving a horse its head and telling it to git! Especially if it's one that when you do, you'd better have a hold of a handful of mane and be ready to go with it, or risk ending up with your butt in the dirt while watching its butt growing smaller and smaller in the distance. That 0 to 45 in 4 or 5 strides is unlike any thrill any car or motorcycle ever gave me. And leaning into a full gallop, light in the saddle and feeling that animal's power through your legs and seat and in the reins in your hands... nothing quite like it in the way of fun for me.
Had some problems that kept me from riding for the past two summers, but things have improved and I'm really hoping to at least get some saddle time in on my wife's mare this summer. She's a push-button Cadillac, if you know how to push the buttons.
Unlike my gelding, who's a lumber wagon. Hope to get on him at some point, too. We'll see. But my rug cuttin' days are, sadly, pretty much behind me.
Looks like RCMP border patrol.
Wow
Indeed. I have to go shovel the front stoop because the wind blew all the snow up against the front door.
Maybe try windsurfing.
POI...I was a frantic windsurfer for 40 years. I sailed tiny boards in gale conditions...nothing like it.
And you lived to tell the tale!
Really! That's fascinating.
Being a mile off shore in Lake Michigan in gale conditions on a teeny little piece of plastic, orienting a teeny sail to catch the wind and being driven along and skipping on the tops of 10' waves like a water bug...there's nothing like it. It's like skiing 10' moguls that are moving and breaking. When I think back that I could even do that...it makes me feel like I got at least one thing right in the world.
The whole thing of sailing craft being able to sail faster than the wind due to the phenomenon of "apparent wind" was really something. I could skip along at 25-30mph.
BIL is an avid skier, and once was an avid windsurfer. He even tried out parasailing on the beach a few years ago. But once was enough for him on that.
Good morning. 8 degrees here with a projected high in the teens.
The mothership is covering the tailks to end the Ukraine War — talks that are not including the Ukrainians — and the reaction of European countries.
It occurs to me that Zelensky/Ukraine seems the party least anxious for peace. Ironically, tragically, this war seems his/its moment in the sun (I feel bad even suggesting that). Anyway, if that is true, it doesn,t surprise me that the others might want to get their ducks in order before bringing him in. Putin is about as reliable as a snake, but you have to start somewhere.
I don't get the sense that Zelensky/Ukraine doesn't want peace. They want a seat at the table about their own country, and they don't want their sacrifices to be wholly in vain.
Zelensky is right not to trust either Putin or Trump to deal with his country fairly IMHO
Why are you insulting snakes? 🙂
This administration is full of Kremlin stooges and force multipliers from the top down. Every single thing they’ve done so far has been music to every ear in the Axis of Autocrats.
Last I read was that the Ruzzian bargaining position is that Ukraine isn’t even a nation, and therefore cannot send anyone to negotiate. Meanwhile, this administration is demanding repayment from Ukraine for war aid, as if calling in a loan gone bad. And they want to remove any and all American troops from parts of Europe previously under Ruzzian control. Not as a bargaining chip or deal sweetener for Putin, mind you, but as a starting point “freebie” for Trump’s genocidal maniac pal.
I will not be surprised if they end up committing American troops to help Putin conquer Ukraine and put its people into gulags.
There's little that might surprise me with this administration, but that's a bet I wouldn't take. Anything is possible, but it kinda went out the window with the gulag part.
He always sidles up to a line, then turns around and says: “Ooo, look! Did I cross a line? That’s what I always intended to do—and you can, too!”
We're on the front end of what I think will be a long term series of outrageously disgusting activity. It's too early for me to get deep into it, and honestly, I probably won't ever get deep into it.
Suffice it to say I'll agree with any disparagement of our POTUS, the more vicious and damning the better....but I won't be taking part. I'm your silent partner in hating this waddling human turd.
I hope your last remark wasn't serious.
Trump doesn't want to be there.
Remember: we were sold the war as a temporary (week at most) sop to “freedom."
I'm torn. Always have been.
Donald J Trump is a Kremlin asset, and has been since at least the mid 1980s.
He’s the guy who mused openly that Arlington National Cemetery is full of losers.
Please don’t keep trying to tell me that piece of excrement is a Tootsie Roll.
Not a piece... He's a cesspool of excrement, ripened with age.
And please quit “liking” my comments you don't like. That makes no sense.
A like is analogous to informing someone you read their post. Please don't read stuff into it that might not be there.
If you don’t like this one, go start your own damned blog. I can help you the door, if you’d like.
A tad testy, not necessary. I'm not an internet comments maven, but I know to let stuff go when there's nothing at stake. There's nothing at stake here. Let's be friends.
You are very rude.
I can find my own way out, thanks.
Are you telling me to be quiet???
He may be an asset, but he,s too dumb to know it.
A tootsie roll?
I can agree with that. I also think he's remarkably dumb. I've also read from multiple credible sources that he farts a lot and smells bad.
😂😂😂
Good morning. It’s about 18º cold here, proving that winter hasn’t been defeated yet, and that global warming still has a lot of work to do.
I was taken aback by the first ‘graph: It never occurred to me that our blue whales were the largest animals that ever lived. I would have thought some other land animal from the dinosaur eras would have taken that prize. Impressive.
And the mystery to them…
So if blue whales take a huge mouthful of water and expel it through their baleen, what prevents them from trapping fish, in addition to krill?
I think they can spit out larger fish, their esophagus is the diameter of a tennis ball.
Good question.
Don't they filter the water through their teeth as they draw it in?
They filter the water as they expel it. I think bigger stuff just kind of rolls out.
I just had a discussion with CoPilot on this. Here's what I got back:
When a blue whale takes in a large gulp of water, it's certainly possible that larger fish could be in that gulp. However, here's why they typically don't end up being filtered and consumed by the whale:
### Key Points:
- **Behavior of Larger Fish**: Larger fish often sense the approaching whale and move away. They have the agility and ability to avoid getting caught up in the whale's massive intake of water.
- **Primary Feeding Grounds**: Blue whales usually feed in areas with dense concentrations of krill. These areas may not have as many larger fish because the ecosystem is more suited to the thriving population of krill.
- **Filtering Mechanism**: While the baleen plates can trap small prey like krill, larger fish that do get caught in the gulp tend to be pushed out along with the water. The whale's tongue and the flow of water help expel anything that isn't trapped by the baleen plates.
### The Filtering Process:
1. **Gulping**: The whale opens its mouth wide and engulfs a large volume of water and krill.
2. **Closing the Mouth**: The whale closes its mouth and uses its tongue to push the water through the baleen plates.
3. **Straining**: As water flows out, the baleen plates trap the krill, and anything too large to fit through the gaps in the plates is expelled.
4. **Swallowing**: The whale then uses its tongue to gather the trapped krill and swallow them.
This highly specialized feeding technique is incredibly efficient for targeting small prey like krill while minimizing the intake of larger, less suitable food items.
### Visual Representation:
Imagine a comb: If you run it through water with grains of sand, the grains will get caught between the teeth of the comb, but any larger debris will be left behind or pushed out. The baleen plates work similarly for the blue whale
That's very graphic. I'm informed, not just educated.
Cool, thank you.
I read it as their opening up enough and essentially "inflating" their head to take in the maximum volume of water/food. Filtering through their teeth would mean minimal water volume.
Just posted a long reply to CynthiaW on this (based on what I got out of my AI assistant 🙂)
I am grateful for the opportunity to think about why blue whales don't swallow big fish instead of thinking about US politicians.
Too bad blue whales don't swallow U.S. politicians. If they did, I expect whale feeding cruises would surpass whale watching cruises in no time flat.
Good morning. Rereading it, I wondered whether they might have had more in the way of social structure back when they were much more numerous.
I thought the same thing. Fascinating TSAF today. Blue Whale. I don't know why, but I've had a mystery longing to see one of those guys since I was a little kid.
I had a similar thought. Like maybe there was a learned “culture” that got lost when they were almost driven to extinction.
I could see that. Blowing up a community does that.