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Ann Robinson's avatar

Snow under street lamps is a nice moment to picture - it,s almost Victorian.

My favorite is chili on sweet potato. My husband likes his on rice.

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C C Writer's avatar

I topped the chili with cheese and sour cream.

Not quite a Victorian fixture, but definitely a throwback look. The main thing is I appreciate being able to watch the scene while safe and warm inside. The less I take for granted, the happier I am.

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C C Writer's avatar

Good morning. We got some snow last night. I did indeed have a cozy moment of watching snowflakes swirl and dance under the illumination of the streetlamp, while I sat on the sofa eating a baked potato topped with chili and cheese. Today it is sunny and cold. Tomorrow night into Saturday or even Sunday there will be more snow, followed by even colder cold. But this is February in Chicago, so we'd have more cause to worry if those things were not in the forecast.

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DougAz's avatar

Good morningm. Sun pixies painting the mountains or hills in the back. Love seeing them paint sunlight into ravines, nooks and crannies. These hills are about 7000 ft behind us and rise about 1200 ft above our 3000 ft elevation.

ChinaTalk I find very informative. A very interesting history of East Asia. And how thru administrative stability, China, more powerful of course, left Korea, Japan and Vietnam to develop their own states.

Their strategies and philosophy of foreign relationships was (is?) Totally opposite of European nations.

https://open.substack.com/pub/chinatalk/p/asias-great-power-wars

55F

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Jay Janney's avatar

I don't think you should post this one at the mothership; too many there will assume the "right" is political. 😨 And if they are ever spotted near "Red White, and Blue land", all the worse!

I love whales; beautiful, majestic animals. No puns on that, they are just beautiful. Sea Lice, OTOH, ewwwwwwww! 🤢

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C C Writer's avatar

I always assumed "right" meant it had some kind of structure on its body that is asymmetrical, or some directional orientation (analogous to right- or left-handedness in humans).

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M. Trosino's avatar

I think this whale, although not a right whale, probably did the right thing...

https://apnews.com/article/chile-kayaking-tourism-whale-b0cafde4b640326f20a9da28003d6c26

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IncognitoG's avatar

Gonna be a lot of big-one-that-got-away stories down at the whale pod.

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C C Writer's avatar

Sonofagun--you're right!

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CynthiaW's avatar

That was my first thought on learning about them originally.

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C C Writer's avatar

It would have been helpful if the kind of articles we read originally had addressed such assumptions and got the confirmation or debunking out of the way before proceeding. Failure to do so has always distracted me. Editors should understand that. I only remember one grade-school textbook actually dealing with such a natural assumption for the student, and I don't remember the specifics or even the subject, but it sort of made a little joke with a cartoon to acknowledge it, and I appreciated that.

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CynthiaW's avatar

They do look kind of sideways.

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Seth's avatar

Interesting post, as I'm (still) slowly working my way through Moby Dick.

I did complete this much shorter and easier read recently, though, which was a nice complement to Moby Dick. It provided some really interesting context for the people involved in the US whaling industry during it's peak in the 19th century (Quakers! Abolitionists! Escaped Slaves!).

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CynthiaW's avatar

Thor read Moby-Dick for a college class. He'll bore you about whaling if he's in one of those moods.

"In the Heart of the Sea" was the book about the sperm whale attack on the ship, iirc. I have an article about sperm whales.

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Seth's avatar

Tim Harford did an interesting episode of his podcast on that topic: https://timharford.com/2024/06/cautionary-tales-the-revenge-of-the-whales/

99% Invisible did a good one about the whale oil industry a little while back too: https://99percentinvisible.org/episode/a-whale-oiled-machine/

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IncognitoG's avatar

The Patrick O’Brian novels are a remedy if you catch the tall-ships mental bug.

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Seth's avatar

I think I'm good after this one. I don't have a lot of time to read long books, but am trying to work through some of the classics. I think I'll tackle something shorter next, and have a few on my stack, including "A Canticle for Liebowitz".

I'm also working through age-appropriate classics with our 9-year-old daughter at bedtime. We finished the Chronicles of Narnia series last fall, and will probably finish The Hobbit tonight.

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CynthiaW's avatar

"Johnny Tremain" is good for that age group.

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LucyTrice's avatar

Johnny Tremain!!! I can still recite the first page from memory, used to could do 3 pages.

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Seth's avatar

I had to look it up because I didn’t recognize the name, but I then realized we read that when I was in grade school. I attended a one-room church school (with about 15-20 kids in grades 1-8), so our teacher read it to us as a group.

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IncognitoG's avatar

I’ve done that: trying to work through classics. It’s a work in progress. There are so many I managed to evade in formal schooling!

Canticle was one I read as a teen, when I didn’t read much at all. I loved the story and the narration. I’ve thought about reading it again to see if I had a similar response now, from the perspective of my 50s.

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LucyTrice's avatar

Was that A Canticle for Liebowitz?

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IncognitoG's avatar

Yes.

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LucyTrice's avatar

I picked that up in the school library one cold winter afternoon in high school and it in one sitting. It altered my world view, one giant step forever away from a small, received existance. Profound, disturbing, but not scary.

Maybe I will read it again.

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Seth's avatar

Sounds promising! I read some of the popular classic sci-fi as a teenager (some Heinlein, some Verne), and generally enjoy sci-fi for it's ability to explore ideas and human nature with fewer constraints.

Yeah, I didn't read many of the classics growing up either, and am trying to remedy that now (turning 40 this weekend).

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Ann Robinson's avatar

I continue to be amazed at how much better I like so many of the classics now that I'm grown (haha make that old). It's a killer to understand how much I didn't understand back then.

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IncognitoG's avatar

Rereading Vonnegut’s “Player Piano” just now after 30 years or so. It was recently mentioned as surprisingly apt in today’s context of total automation. It asks what value people will have in such a context. What meaning for their lives. Machines will do everything faster cheaper better…

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DougAz's avatar

Happy Birthday!

Heinlein has a soft not good reputation. I much prefer the Asimov series of books

Foundation, Robot, Empire. Greatest scifi ever!

You might consider Robinson Caruso for reading aloud.

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JohnF's avatar

Most of the Sci-Fi authors of that generation can be problematic if you let them be so. Asimov is criticized today (by some) because his books are heavily skewed toward male characters. Heinlein had a interesting, complex set of values - particularly in his later works, which are representative of the time that they were written. His early books are good for young readers (which is who they were intended for), but I'd save "Stranger in a Strange Land" or "Time Enough for Love" for older teenagers.

The recent TV series that claimed to be Asimov's Foundation was an abomination, partially because the makers of the series tried to correct for the male-dominated viewpoint and partially because it soon became apparent that they hadn't read the books.

Like many other cultural artifacts, it's best to appreciate them in the context within which they were written.

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The original Optimum.net's avatar

Weather here is -6. But the sun is supposed to be strong in the cloudless sky today and it should warm up into the high 20s. Last day of Colorado skiing today before I head back for some Vermont skiing.

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IncognitoG's avatar

> before I head back for some Vermont skiing. <

Sherr you are. Something tells me you’re just trying to get closer to that Canadian border…

Not that I don’t envy the option, fwiw.

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The original Optimum.net's avatar

You betcha. Reading up on the rules of hockey

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BikerChick's avatar

The Northern Atlantic right whale is critically endangered.

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CynthiaW's avatar

Thanks. I chose the southern species because of warm weather.

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IncognitoG's avatar

So is that a “sub-species”? And is “sub-species” still a fuzzy area of academic dispute? I recall that it used to be, sort of akin to linguists and the distinction between a language and a dialect…

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CynthiaW's avatar

Subspecies still exist, but some writers use "race" instead. I don't care for that.

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CynthiaW's avatar

The latest taxonomy identifies three separate species.

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IncognitoG's avatar

Belated correction to the date on the FP. You can fish that calendar back out of the trash.

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Phil H's avatar

Good morning. 33 here, which will probably be our daily high or close to it. Rainy last night, cloudy today.

The mothership is reporting on the warring factions in east Congo, which has broken out into conflict but it linked to the 1994 genocide in neighboring Rwanda.

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C C Writer's avatar

On a KDW thread, people are engaging with pschneider as if setting him straight would have any effect. They'll learn, I guess. Except I did like what one of them said: "You lot are despicable cowards who would sell others into occupation," and "The same old fellow travelers who during the Cold War were dancing on the graves of the captive nations. You live your miserable lives rooting for murderers." Ordinarily I wouldn't approve of that tactic, but schneider really is asking for it with his . . . not sure what to call it. Putinism? And he is very snide.

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Ann Robinson's avatar

I'm glad not to be there anymore.

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C C Writer's avatar

I mostly just ignore the trolls. Don't want to let them spoil my experience or drive me away.

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CynthiaW's avatar

It's reasonable to believe he's a professional propagandist.

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C C Writer's avatar

Can't say that hasn't occurred to me. Wonder who pays them?

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BikerChick's avatar

My daughter’s MIL works for the UN and just returned from that area. I’ll have to get the scoop from her to see what she was doing. She’s brave.

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Kurt's avatar

Whales...I wonder why they "tail sail"?

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Phil H's avatar

Because they can?

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CynthiaW's avatar

So do scientists. They suggest that it is a form of play.

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M. Trosino's avatar

That's a whale of a tail to be playin' around with.

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Kurt's avatar

When I swim, I like to jackknife and stick my legs straight up into the air, then dive straight down.

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BikerChick's avatar

I love to do somersaults in the water.

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Kurt's avatar

Me too. I call it underwater gymnastics.

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CynthiaW's avatar

It's fun to do things when swimming that we can't do on land. Not an issue for whales, of course.

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Phil H's avatar

We can do things on land that whales cannot do -- like walk and run.

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C C Writer's avatar

Then how come land sharks can do those things?

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CynthiaW's avatar

Evolution?

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Ann Robinson's avatar

Low 50s and mostly cloudy here. With the rain yesterday and so much melting snow, looking for downed trees and power outages. Fingers crossed.

Cynthia, I really like your features. A lot of the info goes in one ear and out the other but they are so interesting and great fun to read. I,m starting to live in a eternal present. Maybe I should try the video clips - might help me remember better.

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CynthiaW's avatar

Thank you. Engagement with nature correlates with happiness!

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M. Trosino's avatar

Or panic, if you're engaging with nature farther up the food chain than your own niche.

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CynthiaW's avatar

Good morning. It's still raining, but the interwebs says it's supposed to stop later this morning, and we might see the sun in the afternoon.

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BikerChick's avatar

It’s 6° here with a windchill of -9. We got about 6 inches of new fluffy snow. I have to go shovel and rake the roof. I got the dogs new boots and they don’t come off, yippee! The boy is home sick, hoping the oldsters in the house don’t get whatever he has.

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IncognitoG's avatar

Morning.

Rain here, too, and all night. Remember the drought we were having the second half of last year? The pendulum has sloshed back the other way.

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CynthiaW's avatar

Like it usually does.

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