A Roll in the Universe

Wordless Wednesday

Sailing out from Copenhagen, on the ferry bound for Oslo, we pass by a long line of wind turbines standing tall out in the water. As "green" as I am, I have never liked the looks of the modern three-bladed wind turbine. There is something about them that bothers me. When I watch them turn, I find that there is no evenness to their rotation; visually, it looks to me like three Barbie doll legs, one "falling" down after another. (I have rarely seen these things moving so fast you can't make out the individual blades.) Apparently, these turbines are not as environmentally friendly as we are led to believe. In the county of Rogaland in Norway, one array is noise polluting a nearby neighborhood. I have read that the maximum three blades on modern turbines is chosen because it makes a minimum of noise. Still, anything that big, rotating in the wind, will make some sound. Another array was put in a white-tailed eagle breeding area two counties north of where I l...

These last 18 months have led me down paths I wasn't expecting to travel. I'm basically challenging my own paradigms. Here are my thoughts about food: I have come to realize that no one can live well and healthy without animals, not even vegans. According to everything I've been reading and hearing about nutrition since I went low-carb in August of 2010, we need agriculture to continue to feed ourselves, but what we don't need is industrialized or petroleum-based agriculture. That type of farming is destroying our soil (which adds to global warming) and our health (lack of omega-3 in meat, for example, and lack of nutrients in vegetables). Organic agriculture preserves soil, plant and animal health, and in turn, our health. Humans are not in competition with animals for food. The logic that vegetarians (I used to be one) buy into is that it's better to give the grain directly to people, rather than feed it to cattle because it takes 6 (or 10 or 18 or even just 2...

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday (Sorry about the streaks. Nothing like sunshine to reveal dirty glass.)

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday Forest slug

Tom could hear a humpback mother and calf from his house. The humpbacks migrate from Alaska down to Hawaii for the winter. I always thought they were chasing food, but no. They don't eat while on winter vacation. They merely give birth and then head back up to colder waters come spring. Tom had no photo of mother and child but I do. The above photo of a humpback mother and her calf, blowing its air hole, is from my summer vacation in Alaska in 2007. We were so lucky not only to follow this mother and calf and the calf's antics (constantly slapping the surface of the water), but we also got the rare treat of seeing humpbacks bubble net feed. You can see more whale photos from my Alaska trip here . I find it a bit amusing and rather fitting that today of all days, I post about a mother and child. I'm not Christian, and can hardly be called sentimental when it comes to babies, but even I am moved by the beauty and tenderness of the story of the baby Jesus. The beauty a...

I grew up in an era where there was a call of "back to nature" (the influence of the flower children of the 60's), where more and more humans stopped defining all the members of nature (from bacteria to whales) as having the quality of good or bad. We had embraced ecology and the awareness that our own value system has nothing to do with the natural order, and that the natural order is perfectly set up and not to be meddled with. So I ended up not hating the lion for killing the cute antelope, nor thinking the antelope was all that cute. Rather, they just are, and one can admire the grace and ability of each species to make the best of rather tricky and life-threatening situations without labeling. Ah, evolution... Also, when I was growing up, organic farming was getting (back) into fashion, and I never lost faith in it. Happily, I keep coming across all kinds of reasons for why working with nature as it is - rather than inventing and using chemicals and genetic modific...

The US is facing a possible agricultural disaster. Honey bees are vital to fruit crops because they pollinate the flowers of fruits and vegetables. But in 2006, hives were suddenly being abandoned. The bees themselves disappeared without a trace, leaving no clues behind, and no other bees came to take over the hives. The phenomenon is called colony collapse disorder . The mystery repeated itself in 2007, and now almond growers in California are very worried about their 2008 crop, since almond trees rely solely on honey bees for pollination. Other countries are reporting similar colony collapses. The theories about why honey bees are suddenly disappearing are several: New pesticides, a more virulent virus and even disorientation from wireless networks and cell phones. This last is illustrated by the comic "Mythtickle" : The cell phone explanation seems to be based on a misunderstanding . I am relieved about that because I just got a wireless connection for my computer ...

Today the rain came - with somewhat cooler temps but increased humidity (sheesh) - and I got the get-up-and-go to swap a couple of shelf units so I could get my microwave oven off my kitchen table. That project took me about 3 hours, including a couple of coffee breaks, during which I registered with I Can Has Cheezburger , and committed, among other things… …starring my former calico cat and current IKEA sofa. My goal in life is to be as funny as the other ICHC contributors. And finish reorganizing the shelf units.

There are a few photos that make me wish I could trade places with the people in them: (Photo from Tom Dempsey's Antarctica ) Isn't that the coolest thing? (No pun intended.) Curious Gentoo chicks will approach humans and even lie on them for warmth. Can you imagine being the human? I think that would be such a wonderful experience! (Photo from Cute Overload ) This brings back memories of childhood. I would love to be that girl, both because of the cow and because of her age. I am reminded of my first summer in Norway and with it, my first encounter with cows. I was 8 and so a young human female and my grandpa's brother's cows were young bovine females. My first introduction to them, separated by a fence, taught me my first lesson about cows: They have very long and very strong tongues. I found that out because when a heifer decided my flower-print mini-dress (ah, the crazy fashions of the late 60's) was edible and tried to get the whole thing in her mout...

Victoria is a fellow expatriate who has just gotten a new puppy and is about to experience her first Easter in Norway. She posted about that and since I know something about the matter(s), chose to reply here, rather than fill up her comments. I am fairly familiar with the weirdness that is the Norwegian attitude to spaying and neutering. Up until 1995 or thereabouts, the rule was not to neuter a pet because that would infringe on its right to choose. I kid you not. They made birth control pills for the cats (bitches don't go into heat just because it's a Tuesday and a tom is yowling) and I remember giving those weekly to a cat we had when I was a young teen. But those things caused cancers so the powers that be finally decided to encourage spaying cats. The aforementioned cat probably died of something like that because she didn't make it past her third year due to "tummy trouble". Because cats are more likely to stray/become strays, neutering and spaying of c...

Today is the start of the Chinese new year , and the start of the year of the Rat. I was born in the year of the Rat , so I'm wondering if this can be seen as some sort of "return" like in western astrology, where a new cycle starts when a planet returns to the same position it has in your birth chart. The sun does this every year, which is why English speaking folks say "many happy returns" to someone on their birthday. The Wikipedia description of the Rat more or less fits, with one huge exception: "Will not think twice about exacting revenge" is accurate only if it means I won't think about revenge at all. Even if it would be nice to see people who hurt me get their come-uppance, I can't be bothered to bring it about myself. Too much work. And too much karma.

My post yesterday may make it look like I'm saying, "Oh, no! Everything's wrong because the world's all heating up and stuff!!!" I'm not. I have noticed that our winters have been getting progressively milder - since the 1970's, with a bit more escalation after we entered the 21st century - but flies in January outdoors , well, that's a new one. But I don't actually know why that fly is alive and well and on my window in January. Maybe houseflies have always done that, and I just never noticed because they chose the office on the other side of the quad, or the office two windows down or maybe they preferred the south windows of the third floor. Or, maybe the flies have a union that managed to lobby for some really cool, er, warm changes. Yes, that's it. I look around me, and everything is set up to support a frigid fly. Modern affluence and heating has gotten to the point that a regular housefly, should it find itself out of doors in the midd...

There was a time when, when fall came, everything died off or went into hibernation, and for about a half year, nothing grew or bloomed or buzzed or flitted. However, as those older and wiser like to remind us, nothing ever stays the same. I'm sure they aren't referring to global warming, but how else do you explain a live housefly sitting on the outside of my office window, cozy underneath the outside blind - at 60 degrees north latitude on January F-ing twenty-first ?!?

I'm watching a show about Mexico on Discovery Channel and they describe how the migratory monarch butterfly seems to sit in lifeless clumps for three months, until the February sun penetrates the trees and strikes the butterflies. Because of buildings in front of my 2nd story apartment, I don't get any sunshine in my apartment from about mid-November to the very end of January. And the day I see (should I be so lucky weather-wise) a ray of sun briefly lighting up my wallpaper is a true solar return for me. And I stop being a lifeless clump just like the butterflies do.

The first time I saw the finale to this, I actually started to panic, wondering about how the cat would get back out. It became a little too much for my latent claustrophobia. But it was a pretty darn good kitty trick! (Via Cute Overload , who were more taken with the cheesy laughtrack.)