There is a new boy band in town!

Last night when I got home from work, I found a little white box stuffed in my mailbox. I pulled it out and looked at the mailing label and a big smile lit up my face. It was a package from Lynn, the Ramblin' Southern Woman. She has sent me an e-mail saying, "Keep an eye open for a package" but steadfastly refused to say what she was sending. Such a tease. :)

I've known Lynn for a quite awhile - she and I used to talk from time to time - and I've always loved her paintings. Then, I lost touch with her but during that time, that last several years, her "Bemused Clown" (the one on the right) was the wallpaper on my laptop. I had only to fire up the laptop to feel reconnected with her and that bemused, smirky smile always made me smile back at it.

So, I tossed the junk mail into the trash can next to my mailbox and sat on the curb and eagerly opened the white box. It contained a nice wad bubble wrap - so I knew I was going to be in for a good time popping the bubbles. I'm sorry, I just can't help myself. There is nothing like the snap-pop-rattling bangs of a good bubble wrap popping session.

Unnoticed by me, a couple of friendly neighbors were making their way up the street on the sidewalk, being pulled along by their two dogs, Hermann and Peewee. I still can't believe they named them what they did.

I still hear them yelling, "Come here Peewee! Hermann!!" the one night they charged up to me when I had the audacity to walk on the sidewalk in front of their house. Afterall, it's their sidewalk!

I read the enclosed note and smiled - and pulled the contents from the bubble wrap.


They are just too stinking cute! Handkitted Orange ConeHead Aliens! Such perky, smiles too! I sat there on the curb laughing. If you had heard it, you might of been reminded of Arnold Horshack's wheezing Haaaaa-haaaaaaa-ha from 'Welcome Back Kotter'. Oh well, at least I no long sound like Steve Urkel.

It was just that moment I suddenly got the back of my neck washed by Hermann accompanied by some hot, slobbering, panting while Peewee wormed his way under my arm to give the white box and its contents a thorough investigatory sniffing.


Move over Jonas Brothers, there is a new boy band in town! Ladies and gentlemen, put your hands together for the Conas Brothers! Ready for some music! Listen up to their hit song, "Burnin' Up"!
I'm hot
You're cold
You go around
Like you know
Who I am
But you don't
You've got me flat-sided

I'm slipping into fresh asphalt
And I'm tryin' to keep from going under
Baby, who turned the temperature hotter?
'Cause I'm burning up, burning up
For you baby...

I fell (I fell)
So fast (so fast)
Can't hold myself
Back
Flat Base (Flat Base)
White Stripe (White Stripe)
So bright orange, gotta catch my breath...

Stand by the road
All I can see is you
You're staring me down
I know you feel it too...


I think I'll name them Nick and Joe Conas. If you want one or more of these cute lil' guys, the knitting pattern is available (here).

Thank you Lynn! I think they are wonderful!!

I've Been Slacking...

...with both the orange cone pictures and the walking reports.

Since I've started recording my daily pedometer readings on July 1, 2005, I have walked 24,831,171 steps and 10,628.96 miles. While I have been tracking my virtual walk progress around the island of Great Britain and have gone 2532.61 of the 2705 miles, leaving only 172.39 miles to go, I've not written about any virtual tour stops. I need to get back to doing that.

I hit a rough spot last autumn/winter and for various and sundry reasons didn't walk my targeted distances and fell well short of my goals. I'd like to blame it all on the early darkness and the snow, but that never stopped me in previous years. It was just a hard winter in many ways.

This month, April, I lowered my targeted distance but was determined not to fall short on my goal. So last night I was walking, and walking, and walking, striving (and striding) to catch up.

One thing I wanted to do was walk down a little ravine from the Schuylkill River Trail and see the culvert that must of been down there. The trail crosses the ravine on a flat and level "fill" since it was a railroad track at one time.

When I figured out how to get there, off I went.


The Pennsylvania Railroad built this railroad in 1884. It ran from downtown Philadelphia to the coal mining regions around Reading, Pottsville, and Wilke-Barre, Pennsylvania.

The railroad was known for sparing no expense and desiring to be the finest in the world. This culvert is well over a hundred and twenty years old and still looks nearly brand new. I think the last train over this culvert ran in 1980.


I continued down the narrow path looking for (the largely missing) Deer, enjoying the cool breeze in my face and the yielding dirt underfoot when I came to this - a small creek with stepping stones in it. Having all the balance and grace of a tazered water buffalo, I decided that discretion was the better part of valor and turned around and backtracked a bit.

The gnats were out in force. The deer were few and far between. But then, I saw something that made the long walk all worthwhile...


I'm sure once I perk up a bit, and/or find some more NyQuil, I'll get back to writing about my orange conehead friends once more.

On August 11th, 3114 B.C. ...

... the Mayan of Central America started counting.

On December 21st, 2012 A.D., the remnants of the Maya in the highlands of Guatemala, will reach the end of their Great Cycle Long Count, 1,872,000 days after starting.

They didn't count in groups of ten like we do, they preferred to count in groups of 20's. Perhaps they used their toes or the both the front and backs of their fingers?


The Maya Calendar - Note the appearance of cycles within cycles with position-like pointers.

The Maya Calendar isn't really that complicated but the names given to the various "days, weeks, months and years" seem so random they are a daunting hurdle to understanding it.

Much like we do, the Mayan had useful intervals of time laid out in cycles.

Their basic cycle was the Count of Days, called the "Tzolkin" which lasted 260-days and consisted of a repeating 20-day "week".

The days of the week were, loosely translated, Alligator, Wind, House, Lizard, Serpent, Death, Deer, Rabbit, Water, Dog, Monkey, Grass, Reed, Jaguar, Eagle, Owl, Quake, Knife, Rain, and Flower. You will see their glyphs on the outer ring in the next picture.

I guess the Mayan went around saying TGIF! just like we do, except theirs stood for "Thank God It's Flower!"

Mayanists (people that study the Mayan) speculate that the 260-day cycle was based on the human gestation period which aligned with phases of planet Venus as well as interval between the planting and harvesting of the corn crop.

The 20-days made up one of their 18 months (or 19, if you include the extra month having the 5 extra days needed to get a 365-day year.) The months had names like Kayab, Zec, Sac, Cumhu, Xul, Ceh, and Pop.


The first large cycle "counts" is called the Calendar Round. This is when the 260-day count, the Tzolkin, and the 365-day Solar count (called the "Haab") come back to their begining points together. The Calendar Round is 18,980 days (or 52 years).

Here is where it starts getting a little tricky.

Venus has a 584-day cycle. In other words, it will rise as the morning star every 584 days and was no doubt tracked closely by the early Maya. There is some reason to suspect that the 260-day count arose, in part, to structure the related cycles of the Sun and Venus. The relationship between the solar and Venus cycles is this: 5 Venus cycles equals 8 solar years.

The nature of the Tzolkin, Solar, and Venus cycles are such that they all synchronize every 104 years, which happens to be exactly equal to two Calendar Rounds. The Venus Round is 37,960 days (or 104 years).

Now, remember that Mayans counted in groups of 20. So in addition to keeping track of where they were within each of the cycles mentioned above, they simply counted out time in groups of twenty.

1 day = 1 day
20 days = 1 uinal (month)
18 uinal = 1 tun (year) = 360 days
20 tuns = 1 katun = 7200 days
20 katuns = 1 baktun = 144,000 days
13 baktuns = 1 Great Cycle = 1,872,000 days
This is called the "Long Count" system.

The Long Count and tzolkin/year/Venus systems are theoretically unrelated, yet 37 Venus cycles = 3 katuns. So there is reason to think there is some yet to be re-discovered interweaving between these two systems. It has been noticed that both the Long Count and tzolkin/year/venus counts are used together in many of the archeological inscriptions throughout Central America.

Today's date is 11 Eb 5 Uo or Day 1,728,000:

Source

There is even an iPhone app to show you the Mayan date available (here).


So what happens when the Long Count reaches 1,872,000 days on December 21, 2012? I suspect the Mayans planned to simply turn the calendar over and use the other side.

Informational Source and More Details

An Old Seashore Memory

Back when I was a little boy of about eight years old, I remember taking a ride in a rather beat-up, old white station wagon with my dad and Grandfather to Cape May, New Jersey.

I do not recall why we went there - there are some fishing boats in which we might have gone fishing that day, perhaps from the nearby town of Bivalve, NJ.

Bivalve, located in the wide Delaware Bay at the end of the road through a salt marsh having towering sea grasses, is known for its oyster and clamming fleet and is named after the mollusks having two shells.

At the end of the low, rutted road through the tall grass, were mountainous piles of clam and oyster shells. I can still hear the raucous noise made by the sea gulls as they fought each other of any scraps of food they found.


Source

But I digress. My Grandfather spent his summers as a young boy in Cape May. Back then, the trek from Philadelphia to Cape May consisted of a ferry boat ride over the river to Camden, and a lengthy, sandy, single-track road through the pine barrens.


A road so narrow that when another car came along, the drivers would pull over, running half off the road, and at places where the rut was deep enough, they would watch that the roof of the car didn't strike the other one as it went past. I remember my grandfather saying a good trip meant only changing one flat tire along the way. Sometimes, he said, it was much easier and faster to take the five hour train ride. The train no longer goes to Cape May anymore.

Down among the fancy Victorian houses along the beach, my grandfather's mother had a small house a couple blocks from the bustle of the Roaring 20's beach.

My grandfather often went fishing, for Flounder, Sea Trout, and Striped Bass. Going by his stories, the fish must have been born weighing about 10 or 20 pounds or so, because he never seemed to catch anything smaller than that.

So, on that long ago day, while my Dad drove us to Cape May, my Grandfather told me the story about a concrete ship.

Even though I was a young boy, I was dubious. "A concrete ship? No way!" My Grandfather then related the strange tale of the S. S. Atlantus, built entirely from concrete.


The S. S. Atlantus was built by the Liberty Ship Building Company in Brunswick, Georgia and launched on December 5, 1918 and was the second concrete ship constructed in the World War I Emergency Fleet. It was built from concrete because of a war-time shortage of steel.

The war had ended a month earlier, but the Atlantus was used to transport American troops back home from Europe and later to transport coal in New England. In 1920, after a very brief career, the ship was consigned to a salvage yard in Virginia.

In 1926, the Atlantus was purchased by a Colonel Jesse Rosenfeld to be used as part of a ferry dock in Cape May, New Jersey for a proposed ferry between Cape May and Cape Henlopen, Delware. Concrete ships were thought to be ideal breakwaters.


So the Atlantus was repaired and towed to Cape May. On June 8th, a storm hit and the ship broke free of her moorings and ran aground 150 feet off the coast of Sunset Beach. Several attempts were made to free the ship, but none were successful.

The ferry idea was then put on hold for about 40 years and it wasn't until 1964 that the first ferry crossed the 17 mile expanse of the Delaware Bay.


A sign on the beach read:

S. S. Atlantus

Remains of experimental
concrete ship. One of twelve
built during World War 1.
Proven impractical after
several trans-Atlantic trips
because of weight.

Broke loose during storm
(June 1926) went aground.
Attempt to free her were futile.
You can see how the wreck slowly weathered (here.) I remember standing on the beach looking at the remains of the S. S. Atlantus in incredulity and wide-eyed wonder. I also remember a huge crowd of horseshoe crabs crawling up the beach to lay their eggs that evening.

I would give almost anything to be able to go back to that day and enjoy it once more.

On April 24, 1990...

...the Space Shuttle Discovery blasted off from Cape Canaveral, Florida, carrying the 1.5 billion dollar Hubble Space Telescope.


Every 97 minutes, the Hubble Space Telescope completes a spin around Earth, moving at the speed of about five miles per second (8 km per second) — fast enough to travel across the United States in about 10 minutes. As it travels, the telescope's mirror captures light and directs it into its several science instruments.

People often mistakenly believe that a telescope's power lies in its ability to magnify objects. Telescopes actually work by collecting more light than the human eye can capture on its own. The larger a telescope's mirror, the more light it can collect, and the better its vision.


The Hubble's primary mirror is 94.5 inches (2.4 m) in diameter. This mirror is small compared with those of current ground-based telescopes, which can be 400 inches (1,000 cm) and up, but Hubble's location beyond the atmosphere gives it remarkable clarity.

Hubble's discoveries have transformed the way scientists look at the universe. Its ability to show the universe in unprecedented detail has turned astronomical conjectures into (more) concrete certainties. It has winnowed down the collection of theories about the universe even as it sparked new ones, clarifying the path for future astronomers.


Among its many discoveries, the Hubble space telescope has revealed the age of the universe to be about 13 to 14 billion years, much more accurate than the old range of anywhere from 10 to 20 billion years. The telescope played a key role in the discovery of dark energy, a mysterious force that is causing the expansion of the universe to accelerate.

It is named, most fittingly, after the American astronomer Edwin Hubble.

Edwin Powell Hubble (November 20, 1889 – September 28, 1953) was an American astronomer who profoundly changed our understanding of the universe by demonstrating the existence of galaxies other than our own, the Milky Way.

He also discovered that the degree of "Doppler shift" (specifically "redshift") observed in the light spectra from other galaxies increased in proportion to a particular galaxy's distance from Earth and helped establish that the known universe is expanding which in turn led to refinements in the "Big Bang" theory.

In 1919, Hubble was offered a staff position in California by George Ellery Hale, the founder and director of the Carnegie Institution's Mount Wilson Observatory, near Pasadena, California, where he remained on the staff until his death. Shortly before his death, Mount Palomar's giant 200-inch (5.1 m) reflector Hale Telescope was completed, and Hubble was the first astronomer to use it.

Happy Birthday Hubble! And thanks for all the glorious pictures of the cosmos.

The Customer is Always Right

I've been a bit busy lately working at a client site about an hours drive from the office. When I first started working on the many tasks they needed done, I found their server in a vanity in the woman's bathroom. The server has the complete inventory for their warehouse (approximately 30,000 parts), the company's accounting system, as well as e-mail and other databases for about 18 employees.

The first day there, I worked for several hours and was mid-way through a rather critical and complicated upgrade sitting on the ladies room toilet, when the lights when out. A transformer on a pole had caught fire down the street and it took them 3 days to get it the power back. In the mean time, in one of the warehouse buildings, the electric was still working as it was on a different meter and served from poles on a different street.

I quickly bought a computer rack on wheels, loaded the server on to it, and wheeled it down the block and across the street to the other building and after a bit of frantic work, got enough computing power back on-line for them to work while the rest of the company's buildings sat in the darkness.

When the power was restored, the server was wheeled back to the ladies room along with 5 other computers on the rack. I spent a couple hours re-wiring the network and provisioning some uninterrupted power supplies, as well as rewiring a circuit so that a portable generator could be used - I had some fun trying to ground this circuit in what is essentially a ceramic tile over cinder block powder room.

Through clenched teeth, I recited what became my mantra. "The customer is always right, even if they are crazy."

They are limited on clean, quiet, air conditioned, floor space and this is about the only place these computers can be put.

Most days, I think I'd rather test drive a boat. :)

St. Johns River Flashback

In late November of 2005, I was invited to test out a then newly designed boat on the St. Johns River in Florida. The boat, a economical trawler design of 37 feet in length was manufactured by Mirage Manufacturing, in near by Gainsville, Florida.


After just a few short hours of getting my sea legs on it, the bright red "N37 Semper Fi" was a true delight to live aboard and sail as we explored the beautiful river for a couple weeks.

A few miles below Jacksonville, Florida, on the river, are the towns of Orange Park and Green Cove Springs. Green Cove Springs has a wonderful warm mineral spring that flows through a public swimming pool, and then down through a beautiful public park before emptying into the St. Johns River. It was here that I boarded the Semper Fi.

At the same dock, were two large cruise ships, bobbing up and down in the gentle river currents. Asking around, I learned that they had been laid up since 2002 (three years) when their buyer couldn't pay for them. They were identical twins, the Cape May Light and the Cape Cod Light.


The Cape May Light, was built at a cost of $37.95 million and its sister, the $38.5 million Cape Cod Light (pictured from the dock of the Semper Fi) were basically repossessed after American Classic Voyages defaulted on its loans without ever making a payment on the principal.

The Cape Cod Light was designed to cruise the U.S. East Coast, Maritime Canada and into the St. Lawrence River and Seaway. In the winter, the ships were to sail south to Belize, Costa Rica, Honduras, Mexico and Panama, and in the of summer 2002, cruises were expected to range deep into the Great Lakes.

Built at Atlantic Marine, Jacksonville, Florida, the 1,580-ton diesel-powered ships have a service speed of 13 knots.

The ships were finally sold, for $9 million apiece, in 2008 to two Florida companies.

So, ancient history, huh?

Well, I was pleasantly surprised to see one of them on the television about two weeks ago in a news item titled, "Coastal cruise ship gets Haiti mission." After being laid up since 2002, one of two 224 passenger coastal cruise ships was chartered to provide accommodations for World Food Program (WFP) staff engaged in relief efforts in Haiti.

The lucky ship, the Sea Voyager, was previously named the Cape May Light. It has the following dimensions:

Length overall: 286.3 ft
Width: 50 ft
Height: 96.5 ft
Draft (maximum): 13.5 ft
Gross tonnage: 4,954 tons

Whoever Would Have Thought?

Today was my Step-Grandmother's funeral and while I am emotionally tired and the funeral had grieving people, most of the service was an informal, get up and talk about what remember best... and I know I exasperated my Step-Grandmother - I enjoyed teasing her just to watch her facial expressions and to hear her laugh.

You may remember the time I wrote about how she wanted a "nice picture of me" and I gave her this - Where's Iggy?

One autumn, I found an old hand-drawn property map (plat) of Quakertown, PA, the town my step-grandmother lived in that was drawn in the early 1800's. The town had very few streets then, and the three dozen or so properties on the map included her log cabin home. I spent every dollar I had and bought immediately. I remember eagerly taking the map to her and her being quite excited and delighted by it.

She sighed and said, "This would be tremendous if it was framed! I'd hang in here in my dining room" next to the framed original deed for the property that she had handing near the doorway.

I was just out of school, and the map was rather large and I couldn't afford a frame that size, so I left the map with her and thought about things.

One thing I've learned in my time on this planet is that, some times 'things just happen' and it wasn't long afterwards I stumbled into the perfect frame at a garage sale - It was just the right size and had ho-hum country fox hunt type of print in it. I remember that I bought it for about $5. I took the country fox hunt painting out and ... the little guy with the pointy ears and red suit whispered to me - and I smiled and then chuckled to myself. I went to the store to complete my arrangements and then wrapped the "revised painting" up in Christmas paper.

That Christmas, we gathered around the tree and the youngest started unwrapping their presents. I spoke to my step-grandmother, who was eyeing the large rectangular package I had for her (and my grandfather) saying, "You can probably guess what your present is."

She replied something to the effect, "well, I've been waiting a long time for a 'nice picture of you' but I don't think we have a place for one that large!"

She looked rather concerned actually. I then told her, "You know, the absolute finest art in the world, more than any other, is painted on black velvet." She smirked at me and looked doubly alarmed. "Furthermore," I continued, "You know the most desired art, worth millions of dollars, are paintings of Elvis on black velvet."

She gasped quite audibly, and said, "You didn't! Did... you?"

I then said, "Elvis is still alive you know, in that mall in Minnesota, probably working at a record store. I understand he is quite envious of Micheal Jackson." She looked quite baffled at that, so I continued, "Elvis is doing the reverse of MJ, for every shade lighter MJ gets, Elvis gets a shade darker. So for your present this year, I decided I, personally, would paint an original painting, just for you. Please, unwrap it."

With trembling fingers, unsure of just what to expect, she pulled the wrapping paper off .... my 'masterpiece'. I titled it, "A Black Elvis on Black Velvet".


She laughed and laughed and then laughed some more. In the back of the "painting" I had put a card saying this frame was for the map of Quakertown and I would see that the map was properly mounted in the frame.

To this day, the map hangs in the dining room of the log cabin house where it was seen by the fifty or so people that went there for a bit to eat and some small comforting talk after the funeral.

After a bit of munching and reminiscing, my step-grandmother's daughter, crooked her finger indicating to me to "come here". She opened the drawer of the china cabinet and inside, carefully folded into quarters, was the black construction paper that I had mounted in the frame... all those Christmases ago.

Norristown Farm Park Moods

As many of you already know, not far from my house is the Norristown Farm Park.

The Norristown Farm Park was once part of the Norristown State Hospital, originally known as the State Lunatic Hospital at Norristown, was and is a psychiatric hospital.

Opened in July 12, 1880 - Dr. Alice Bennett, a graduate of the Women’s Medical College of Pennsylvania, the first woman in the nation to direct a mental institution, admitted the first patient.


With the grey overcast skies threatening rain, I decide to walk through the Farm Park and into the State Mental Hospital. I also decided to play with my camera's panoramic shot feature. I didn't quite "do it right" but the picture shows the view from the upper farm park looking northeast toward the Germantown Pike. Philadelphia is about 18 miles to the far right. The Stony Creek runs unseen in the valley below the road bridge seen in the middle of the picture.


The Stony Creek reflects the green splendor of a tree with fresh, spring leaves. I leave the Farm Park at this juncture and head into the hospital grounds.


I walk slowly past the front of The Administration Building as the sky grows gloomier and gloomier. Unbidden, the tune of the Addams Family enters my head...

They're creepy and they're kooky,
Mysterious and spooky,
They're all together ooky,
The Addams Family.

Their house is a museum
Where people come to see 'em
They really are a scream
The Addams Family.

Or perhaps it is the home of Mr. and Mrs Herman Munster on 1313 Mockingbird Lane never before seen in color?


This building is located near the Administration Building. I looked for some sort of unifying architectural theme ... and decided perhaps one of the patients had a hand in designing it.

Only later I learned that a prominent Victorian-era architecture and engineering firm, Wilson Brothers & Company designed and built the original hospital buildings.

The Wilson Brothers designed or contributed engineering work to hundreds of bridges, railroad stations and industrial buildings. Among their surviving major works are the Pennsylvania Railroad Connecting Bridge over the Schuylkill River (1866-67), the main building of Drexel University (1888-91), and the train shed of Reading Terminal (1891-93), all in Philadelphia. So I should show some respect but jeepers, these old buildings gives me the willies.


The building that houses the one hundred and thirty-six patient forensic unit for criminally committed patients is often near capacity. My mind gathers in the bent barb-wired fence, the bus stop, and the speed bump and spins out as if it had hit an oil slick.

I think to myself, "I hope my life never encounters a speed bump where I find myself getting off a bus at a locked-down mental hospital..."


I resolutely decide to avoid ever taking SEPTA's bus route 90 which starts its voyage at the Plymouth Meeting Mall, near the now abandoned IKEA store.

That decided and mentally filed away for future reference, I start my walk back to my car and as I do, my scalp crawls and my arms get goosebumps. I hear in my head the voice of the evil Dr. Drakken from Kim Possible, laughing manically over and over again.

I shake my head and the voice changes to Rico in the Penguins of Madagascar but it is the same voice? Upset and alarmed, I look around to see what is causing my distress and see ... nothing ... unusual... when the voice returns... Duck Dodgers? What could be happening? A cold sweat pours from my forehead and I panic and start to run.

Suddenly, it dawns on me. That voice! It belongs to John DiMaggio, who is the cartoon voice of all those I was hearing in my head and one other...


Bender Bending Rodríguez of Futurama! I didn't know he had a couple of identical brothers, but being a mass produced robot, it shouldn't have come as a surprise to me...even if seeing him and his brother's half buried standing up in the lawn of the mental hospital both surprised and scared the heck out of me.

Hmmm... Maybe I do need to take that bus ride.

Rudy - Then and Now

Along the Perkiomen Trail lies the 19th century Victorian country village originally known as Rudy.

It prospered as a railroad town when railroad service began in 1868. The Perkiomen Railroad followed the Perkiomen and Hosensack Creeks to reach the suburbs of Allentown, PA.

The Hosensack Creek takes it name from the Pennsylvania Dutch dialect, "Hussa-sock" translates to "pants pocket" in English. Those crazy "Dutchmen"!

When the railroad reached Rudy, the town was renamed Salford Station. When I saw this old black and white picture of the station (taken around 1932) in a recent newspaper article, I decided to see where it stood along the trail. Note the (presumably) black car next to the general store in the left distance.



The train stopped going past Salford Station in the 1970's.


I walked back and forth, trying to find the exact same spot the old picture was taken from.



Today, the rails and the station are long gone, but the red-painted general store (to the far left) and the mansard-roofed Salford Station Hotel (to the far right) still stand -


This 1932 view of the Perkiomen Creek was taken from the summer vacation spot there. The area was known as Camp Rest-A-While and people from Philadelphia would come on the train to stay there.


Some of the families owned summer houses there and some rented them. There was a refreshment stand and a dock where you could get a canoe.


There is a property with cabins on it not far from the station. I don't know if these were a part of Camp Rest-A-While. People still swim in the creek there - usually during the hot summer days during the annual weeklong Philadelphia Folk Festival.

In a new place...

While we expected the very recent news of your passing, we did not expect it quite so soon - and we are truly thankful that we had the opportunity to gather together while you were still alive and to say our "see you laters" - for none of us think this is a final good-bye.


My step-grandmother passed away last night in her much loved log cabin home, April 12, 2010 after a brief battle with lung cancer. She leaves a large (and complicated) family to go to a new place.


Rest peacefully Grandma, I know you are delighted to be with all the hunting dogs that were your beloved companions once more. Until we meet again...

Deer Hunt Walk

I wrote this entry as an email to someone - someone I think very highly of and often wish they could see the sights as well as experience the scents in the air around me when I take a particular pleasant walk. So I feebly try to describe the sights to them herein...

------------------------------
A couple days ago, I left the office early as I wanted to cut the grass at home and needed some extra time to start the lawn mower for the first time this year. It's always a little cranky after sitting in the garage unused all winter.

It was really bright and sunny outside, and very warm actually, as it was just shy of 90 F. I figured riding on the mower would get a breeze going on my face. I got the lawn mower started quickly and the lawn mowed in next to no time - the grass wasn't very tall, it was just really high in spots where the onion-like grass sticks up like sore thumbs.


As it was still early afternoon, I drove over to Valley Forge National Historic Park and decided since I was in no rush to actually get anywhere, I would take a slow loop walk. My legs were pretty tired before I started - I've been ramping back up on my walking this month, and am averaging 5 miles a day now.

As it was so sunny and warm, I took the Deer Hunt trail, as I call it, since it goes into the shady woods. I expected to see some deer, but mostly I was just curious to see what damage the hard winter had done to the trees and also to see if the bluebell flowers have bloomed in profusion yet.


The fields were just covered with little yellow buttercups, an endless sea of them. I didn't notice a lot of bugs, creeping or flying, but there were some - the first I've seen this year. The Gnats will soon be out in force and they make dense clouds on the trail - so I think to myself, enjoy the lack of the pest while it lasts!


The winter was brutally hard on the trees, bushes and tall grasses, everywhere there are fallen, broken branches, flattened grass, and bushes split into parts by the weight of the heavy snow we had, compounded by the heavy rains into the drifts of snow causing heavy masses of soggy ice and snow to crush everything beneath it. We had a couple very windy (60 mile per hour plus) days that furthered the destruction.


But nature goes that way, a cycle of growth, retreats, and regrowth. It is now a time for regrowth. The trees, which had mostly budded last week, have exploded seemingly overnight with light green leaves... the grass is starting to straighten up and shoot upwards, and the bushes and flowering trees are positively brilliant - the bright yellow forsythia, the lime green weeping willows, and the bluebells are all at peak vivid splendor poking up through the shattered branches littering the ground.

It is still too early for many of the birds, the Robins are here, and the Canadian Geese are starting their migration, and some of the smaller hawks are patrolling the skies, along with the always present buzzards who I secretly think believe that, since I walk so slowly, I'm nearly ready for their dinner.

I saw no deer and no squirrels... I think they were taking naps in the dark shady spaces since this is the first very hot day and no one, man or beast, is used to the heat yet.


As I walk along I get more limber as the heat coupled with the exertion of walking up and down the hilly trail make me begin to sweat. I soon soak my shirt and feel the pleasant state of fatigue... and follow the trail along the river where the evening breeze starts to pick up and the quacking of the Mallard Ducks impinges on my (now mostly idle) thoughts.

Almost too soon, although it is a couple hours and six miles later, I am back to my car where I head home for a shower and a light dinner.

The Things People Do...

On the third flight of the U.S. Air Force's "Project Excelsior", USAF Colonel Joe Kittinger (ret.) jumped into the record books.


On August 16, 1960, a helium ballon, The Excelsior III climbed to 102,800 feet (19.5 miles or 31,333 meters) over New Mexico, and Joe Kittinger leaped out.

On his descent, Kittinger freefell at speeds up to 614 miles per hour, approaching the speed of sound without the protection of an aircraft or space vehicle and experiencing temperatures as low as minus 94 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 70 degrees Celsius). He was in freefall for 4.5 minutes before he opened his parachute at 18,000 feet.

Those handy with a calculator will note he travelled an average of 214.13 mph as he fell through the (lack of) Earth's atmosphere.


Sometime this year (2010), Felix Baumgartner, an Austrian skydiver and stuntman, with help from Joe Kittinger, will attempt a freefall from 120,000 feet (more than 22.7 miles) as part of Red Bull's Stratos program.

He aims to break four world records:

1) Speed record as the first human to break the speed of sound in free fall.

2) Attitude record for free fall (120,000 feet)

3) Time record for the longest free fall (approximately five to six minutes, landing about 13 minutes after pulling the rip cord)

4) Attitude record for highest manned ballon flight (120,000 feet)

Joe Kittinger's records have lasted nearly 50 years so far. His record is very safe as far as me breaking it. :)

Monday Morning Perk Me Ups

I'd be the first to admit that I hate Monday mornings. The relaxing tempo of the weekend screeches to a halt when I get to my office desk and see the pile of accumulated boring run-of-the-mill paperwork in my in-box.

It takes a little extra effort to get myself rolling on Mondays and one thing that always brightens my day are a few bloggers that make a special effort to combat the "Monday Blahs".

Joy De Vivre has her kind and gentle "Happy Mondays".

Jeannie's Happy World has her "Monday's Monet Moments", showcasing Monet's most soothing impressionist works.

After an hour or two, I grudgingly come to accept that it's Monday and crank up things up and always get a belly laugh at Yellow Dog Granny's "Monday Stumbles", an eclectic mix of political satire, cats and dogs saying zany things from zany poses, occasionally ribald and always some rather R-rated and very off-color items I find hilarious (but wouldn't want my Mom to know I read).

I take it down a notch and visit Circling the Square Table's often off-beat first day of the week observations called, "Monday's Mumbles".

This past Monday, in addition to the having just had a nice Easter holiday, and being thankful for the moderate spring weather, I had some surprises greet me.


My brother was in the office briefly during the weekend, and he must of brought his daughter along. I found a smiling SpongeBob SquarePants with protective eye-wear and jellyfish hunting net - standing proudly on the fireplace mantle were my black lump of Lehigh Valley coal normally sits (collecting more dust than interest, admittedly.)

This cute little fellow came in a Christmas box of goodies from Alice Kay.


Alice Kay's grandson Ryan (with help from his very nice Mom) recently sent me this Orange ConeHeaad Alien (OCHA) drinking cup complete with straw and Winnie The Pooh stickers.

Recently, Dorkys Ramos commented saying I was a "kid at heart"... :) Little did she know just how true that might be!


I immediately had to see if my bigger SpongeBob Squarepants, a Christmas gift from LadyStyx was the right size for the drinking cup. I placed an Easter Card next to him.


Here is a closer look at that wonderful Easter Card from Queenie Jeannie! The rabbit sure looks like chocolate (but it isn't, I umm.. errr. SpongeBob says so!)


And then on Monday afternoon, the mail slot popped open and in came this beautifully crafted card sent by Alice Kay. The picture doesn't do it justice, the colors are so bright and cheery.

Thank you Alice Kay!


And in the same stack of "good mail" was this hilarious card. Inside it reads, "Hap-bl-bl-bl-py Blr-blr-blr-birthday!" (and the note inside says, in part, "I know its not your birthday but I couldn't resist!") ... the card made an ordinary Monday morning seem like my birthday!

Thank you Punkn!


Next Monday I just have to wear the SpongeBob T-shirt I got from Tori to work and drop on the deck and flop like a fish!