Yesterday evening as darkness fell, I went to close the blinds and discovered the planet Venus beaming in my face. Then there was tiny red Mars above and to the left. This time of year it’s rare to see anything in the sky except clouds and occasionally the obscured light of the moon.
So behind am I on my astronomy that I had to doublecheck that it was Venus, not Jupiter, that bright and that high above the horizon. The website I consulted even said Mercury should have been somewhere in view, but there were hills in the way. I felt lucky enough to see two planets.
I used to love sky watching and even once built my own eight-inch reflector telescope. Ground the mirror and everything. But the NorthWET, it goes without saying, isn’t friendly to such a hobby. Anyhow, the telescope got left behind years ago when I ran from a relationship that had turned dangerously crazy.
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This morning we’re awaiting an ice storm. Probably not a catastrophic one. Minor. But following a brisk (read: damn freaking cold and windy, but boy was that aerobic) morning walk in the woods, Ava and I are huddling in front of a faux fire and not going anywhere.
Despite the wind, the day feels very still, as if it’s waiting for something.
This house has a heat pump that keeps the main rooms tolerable on 50-degree days, but when it gets as cold as this, that otherwise blessed device just doesn’t do it. So I thank friends and fortune for several alternate sources of heat for days like this (or in case the ice pulls power lines down this afternoon).
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Speaking of not wanting to venture outside — and speaking of relationships getting dangerously crazy — MJR sends this report of a new app developed in Russia that … well, check it for yourself, then kiss privacy goodbye if you’ve ever posted photos of yourself anywhere.
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And speaking of storms … I’m sure you’ve heard numerous times about Waffle House restaurants being open when all around was complete weather chaos and closures. But did you know that FEMA even keeps a semi-official Waffle House Index to help gage the severity of bad weather?
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Here’s one of those found-on-line things I planned to write my own riff on, but since I might not get to that soon, enjoy the ZMan’s thoughts on “CalExit!” His take is more conservative than yours or mine, but still pretty interesting.
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Finally, today at Amazon it’s “Five Golden Things.” Sometimes they really are stretching to keep their “12 Days of Deals” theme, because other than 55% off on select jewelry, none of today’s deals have anything to do with gold. They’ve got 60% off on cold-weather accessories, a home karaoke system for 50 bux, and a bunch of other deals of the day. But gold? Gold? Not hardly.
That said, even though it’s not a “deal,” here’s something a lot of us wouldn’t mind having: Firefly: The Gorramn Shiniest Dictionary and Phrasebook in the ‘Verse. No kidding.
That’s it for today. Good luck with life, the universe, and the weather wherever you are.
FindFace: It isn’t exactly as bad as Bloomberg would have you believe. The app only searches registered users of Vkontakte. Which, of course, is the only way they can get “70% reliability.”
Honestly, you can search more people with a combination of Google and TinEye.
Yes, but I think the real point is in the potential of that app, not its current reality.
Fortunately, facial recognition is still not as flawless and scary as “they” want us to believe it is. But we’re not far from serious, serious creepitude.
I’ve been following the CalExit rumblings as well. I was stationed on the Central Coast when in the USAF, at Vandenberg AFB near Lompoc circa 1975-76. It’s a beautiful place and I spent a lot of time exploring it, including its crown jewel, Big Sur, one of the most beautiful places I’ve ever been. Cali was the land of the fruit and nut when I was there, but it has since gone off the deep end and that, along with the housing costs, have put the kibosh on me ever going back there to live.
I do favor secession though, in the particular case of New York State. NYC and Downstate Progressives are now dominant in NYS by sheer numbers, giving us a Governor such as the gun grabber and tyrant, Andrew Cuomo, who flat out told conservatives, 2nd Amendment supporters and pro-lifers that we were not welcome in NYS! This dominance why there’s been calls for Upstate NY to secede from Downstate and NYC. A good friend of mine wrote about it back in 2008 and he made a good case for Upstate New York to secede from Downstate NY and NYC.
Upstate Ultimatum
Good piece, r_v.
While New York is probably the worst, given New York City’s prejudices and power, other states also increasingly abuse their powerless rural areas. Unsurprisingly (because this has been a longtime complaint), a couple of lawmakers from eastern Washington state have just filed a bill to divorce from the urban Puget Sound area: http://www.seattlepi.com/news/article/Eastern-Washington-lawmakers-file-bill-to-split-10783423.php
They want to call the new state Liberty.
Thanks, Claire! It’s unfortunate that we lost Charlie in 2009, due to heart failure. We lost a true patriot!
I like that name, Liberty! Don’t blame the folks in eastern Washington state for trying! There’s actually an effort for Upstate NY to become autonomous from Downstate and NYC, without actually seceding. Upstate NY would become the New Amsterdam region:
http://www.newamsterdamny.org/
Current reality is actual cyberbullying. Here’s another article from Meduza on Findface that goes into more depth than the Bloomberg article. The tech was invented by Artem Kuharenko and funded by Maxim Perlin. The Tsargrad TV interview with Maxim Perlin opens with some very interesting visual footage (worth watching!), even if the rest is unintelligible. Apologies for the Google links, but the “translate” option is very useful to escape the filter bubble. Anyway, it’s quite the rabbit hole!
Illinois and Louisiana are other examples. In fact, there are several states that would love to jettison a big city.
I live in MI. The U.P. has always wanted to divorce from the lower peninsula. If they ever do, I am moving up north. It won’t happen, but we can always dream. On a sad note, I had to lose my best friend, my dog Louee, last Friday, to a probable tumor on the pancreas, which caused uncontrollable diabetes. We had to make the always heartbreaking decision to have him put to sleep. Life is sometimes hard. Those of you that have pets, understand.
It’s very hard, pigpen. It’s even hard to read about it even with knowing it’s the kind of thing that happens every day. James Thurber, I believe, would wake up in his old age and talk to his wife about how much he missed his childhood dog. One I lost almost 19 years ago will always be with me. Kipling understood this perfectly, in his poem “Power of the Dog.” It’s something that I believe would be worth reading after some time has passed. A breeder once told me that when I could think of my former dog without being overcome with grief, then I would be ready for another one. It was a lot longer than that before I did it again.
Condolences to you, pigpen51, on the loss of your beloved dog. It’s a tough one…
Shel wrote: ” A breeder once told me that when I could think of my former dog without being overcome with grief, then I would be ready for another one.”
We lost our Beagle/Dachshund mix, K-ci, back in 2013 and my wife and I still sometimes catch a glimpse of him out of the corner of our eyes. We’re not ready…
“Illinois and Louisiana are other examples. In fact, there are several states that would love to jettison a big city.”
Madison, Wisconsin is sometimes referred to as “80 square miles, surrounded by reality”. Most of WI would like to eject it and Milwaukee both.
Milwaukee is pretty much considered to be part of Chicago anyway.
” A breeder once told me that when I could think of my former dog without being overcome with grief, then I would be ready for another one. ”
Sometimes life makes that choice for you. I was out scouting deer hunting spots once when a cat found me and climbed in my coat. A week later my older cat died. I wasn’t going to get another cat, but this one changed my mind. Now that she’s sick, I keep half expecting another cat to find me.
Oh, pigpen, that’s so awful. I lost one of my best (human) friends to pancreatic cancer three years ago and I know how cruel a disease it is. And yeah, our canine and feline buddies always end up breaking our hearts. Farewell to Louee. I love Shel’s recommendation to read Kipling’s “Power of the Dog” — later, much later. And that’s quite a story from Ellendra, too.
http://www.petloss.com/poems/maingrp/powerdog.htm