"All circuits are busy."

Hi.  Haven't forgotten you.  Delighted so many are still here.

My repeated attempts to blog more frequently have not succeeded, as we all know.  Many, many reasons; one of them possibly being a "natural lifecycle" for bloggers and blogs.  I take some comfort from the fact that both Sharon Astyk, who was a hyper-maxi-turbo blogger for years, and Crunchy Chicken, likewise, both of whom became my good friends as we all blogged- have gone through this exact process- Crunch first, then me, then Sharon.

We're not any of us dead yet- but no question we've slowed down.  Have we run out of things to say?

I don't think so; I think it's more a matter of "iceberg fatigue" with the blogs.  I think the blogs make a difference- and help us all - but eventually it starts to feel like "this isn't enough"... and the energy necessary to keep going flags.

I am, of course, still pushing on icebergs; as are Sharon and Crunch.  That's part of the problem; for me and I know for them- the other icebergs have loomed up on us, and are taking more of our available time and energy.  My "other life" has gotten really busy, in my case.

And, as we accumulate a body of writing here, there's a desire to not repeat ourselves.  And, in my 350 posts here, I did talk about a bunch of different stuff.  Lots of it could use updating, etc.; but the fact is that kind of writing is just not as much fun for us writers; it's careful work; instead just ripping off a good rant.

But!  Still here. Still interested in Life, the Universe, and Everything (which hopefully won't just all vanish on us too soon).  And still cruising the internet sometimes, trying to track down things that interest me.

I found one, recently; which I can share with you.  A blogger much younger in the lifecycle, so hopefully she won't disappear on us soon.  She has two blogs; one is simply her dream journal (she has incredibly lucid and detailed dreams) which you can find at Dreampan (she works in the movie business; pretty sure that's a camera pan reference.)

And the other is her photographic journal of Life- and she has a wonderful eye, a good camera- and a genius for whimsy.  That would be at Thistrinket; and here is the specific post which cracked me up so thoroughly that I wanted to share her with you:

Not everyone who headed out West made it.

Brilliant, Shandra.  :-)  Thanks.

News watchers- get your binoculars NOW...

Oh, my, my, my.  There's a really nice chunk of news going on, right this very second- and there's a free education also being offered to all serious citizens in the "reality" of how "news" reaches us.

The Washington Post, this morning, featured as its Front Page Top Headline- a story - and audio recording- apparently stemming from Bob Woodward (remember Watergate?  yeah; him.)  In the "Style" section.

The recording is of a very, very private conversation - in Afghanistan; in the office of General Petraeus.  You can hear them say "are your ears off?"  They weren't off.  It's a flat offer from Rupert Murdoch to "bankroll" a Presidential candidacy by Petraeus.  Run by the current head of Fox News.

Yep.  Read all about it.  Woodward's story here.  Also in "Style"; but a featured top headline.  For a few hours.

If you go to The Washington Post website right this minute- not one word of all this is in any headline- it's been removed.  At least- they haven't removed the links; but you have to search for them.

Are you hearing about it elsewhere?  Only if you search.  Yes, ABC and CBS have picked it up- but you won't find it on their headlines.

I think- tomorrow - you will.  But at the moment- someone is VERY very ticked off- and pressure has been brought to bear, to bury it.  For a while.  But this one is SO not going to go away.

Oh, so many questions.  Why is Fox News advising our top General?  Why are they asking him to write their headlines?  (They did.)  Why is Rupert Murdoch offering to "bankroll" our politicians?

Why is General Petraeus unaware that someone is making recordings of his conversations, in his office??  The guy who was most recently- the head of the CIA?

Oh, this one is going to be fun.  Take a look!  My guess is- they'll keep it wrapped up a little while; but not forever.  It's just way too much stinky fish.

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Update; Feb. 20, 2013.    Wow.  I guess even week old stinky fish can be wrapped up so tight it won't smell.  This story; as of now, has disappeared completely.  If you didn't pick up on it within that 3 day window- you're out of luck.  Right now; all the links still work.  Send them around so they can't totally disappear.  And learn- yes; your news is controlled.

Something completely different-

This was sent to my by my sister- a little random bit of sharing- and, hallelujah, it's one of those rare bits of pure joy and fun- and totally, utterly brilliant.

Or, just go to YouTube, if the quality here is iffy. My own version of Blogger, for some reason tends to cut off part of the side of the video when it's embedded. You'll want to see it all.

What a bunch of beautiful people. Good to know they're there, and I wish I had them for neighbors. When you think about it- the imagination shown here, in all the variations- and the ability of all these people to plug into the vision- is just plain breathtaking. The basic concept has been done before- but not with this kind of whole community participation, and enthusiasm!

Huge thanks to the Kuinerrarmiut Elitnaurviat 5th Grade - Quinhagak, Alaska.

Halloween ...

I've always loved Halloween, and am enjoying it again now through Smidgen. We grew some huge pumpkins this year, and I think we're going to wind up carving 6 or 7.

Good simple fun. Old traditions; always nice to keep them alive.

My big brother Lurk just sent me this, which is huge fun- these folks actually thought up something new for Halloween enthusiasts -

(Or go to YouTube if this player isn't behaving for you. )

I hadn't run into this thing before; but it strikes me as exactly the kind of prank/video that is likely to go viral, make people famous, and generate a lot of copy-cats.

So........... it yah wanna be reeeally creepy - the next stage in the trick would be to get a very bright kid to pretend to be a dummy- and just as they think they've got it figured out-

LEAP AT 'EM - and give them a good shriek. Now there would be some great video fodder.

I'm quite sure I'm uncertain.

Thanks for the kind comments on the last post; and thanks to Mary Ellen:

mary ellen said...

Miss you Greenpa. Hope all is well with you and the beautiful girl.

I miss you guys, too. I've been struggling with a bad dose of "writer's block" for some time now; not the blog so much, but some professional writing I've promised to do and need to do. I've been trying to break that block, so all my available writing energy has been going there. To no real avail.

Many reasons. And it's not as easy to just whip off a blog post here as it used to be. The world has become even more uncertain. I could fill up the blog with lists of our woes, easily enough. But; really- I figure you guys have woes enough of your own, yes?

My Theory Of The Popularity Of Soap Opera is not so much the commonly cited "misery loves company", but that the great majority of folks can watch a soap and sigh in relief "at least my life isn't as screwed up as they are!" I could probably provide that sort of entertainment.

But it's kind of cheap relief. I would like to be able to offer something more substantive. And right now, between tornadoes, earthquakes, nuclear meltdowns, hurricanes, political chaos... etc.... it just gets hard to find, sometimes.

It's all pretty depressing, in fact. And neither you, nor I , need more depressing.

At my time of life, I've been through multiple episodes of depressing circumstances. When you find yourself becoming petrified by it all, one of the tools that can help pull your socks up is to remember - actively - there is good, and beautiful, stuff in the world, all the time. Then you make yourself notice it. That's the thing- when the burdens get really heavy, and the blows from the careless universe pile up- we stop seeing the good bits.

They're there, though. And in exactly that frame of mind, I looked up and out my window.

And this is what was right, immediately in front of me. Burning-bright in a spot of August sunlight, surrounded by the shadowed forest.

It's just two sprays of goldenrod, lost in the woods. I have fields full of the stuff. So much that I forget to look at it.

But I looked at this. And remembered. There is beauty to be seen. Pleasure to be taken, just for the look. If the "click for bigger" feature is working, you will find a wasp in the upper left corner; collecting nectar I'm pretty sure. Good to see one out doing simple work.

Of course the irony of having this natural gold, mine for the visual collection, occurred to me; with so much intense, fierce, fussing about the metallic kind now going on.

It's there. Free. Easy. Eternal. If you can remember: look for it.

I felt better, after noticing. And - two days later - it's still with me.

Hang in there, folks. We're all in this together.

And some GOOD oddball science...

Coming hard on the heels of Silly Science, here is a totally simple-minded little experiment- which turns out to be brilliant; and I'd have to predict a classic demonstration for all students of physics, mathematics, and music, for eons to come:

This one was built at Harvard; and in the very best scientific tradition, they do not take the credit for it:

"Our apparatus was built from a design published by Richard Berg {Am J Phys 59(2), 186-187 (1991)} at the University of Maryland. He claims their version is copied from one at Moscow State University and they claim to have seen it first in the US, so we don't know who made one first. The apparatus we have was designed and built by Nils Sorensen."

And it came to me via email from my brother, who spends way too much time wandering the ether... :-)