Marilyn's Photos - July 18 2026 - Mermaids are Among Us

 

Isn't that such a cute fence on one of the Grimsby Beach Painted Ladies?  This was from a few years ago and a watercolour treatment removed the background.  When I opened the Globe and Mail this morning, I saw an article on Mermaids.  Ho to become a licensed Mermaid.   You will master breath-holding, underwater movement with a monofin, and essential water safety.  You will have to hold your breath underwater, of course.  The mermaid swimming technique is distinctive.  Without those paddling feet, one moves with the hips.   And then what?  You can work professionally - at children's birthday parties or public aquariums.  I guess at children's parties would mean you would live in some very large city with many swimming pools.  If you are in the U.S. it would be Phoenix, Miami, Orlando, then Las Vegas and finally Los Angeles. Globally, it is Sydney, Australia.  But that doesn't come near China's exploding mermaid population. In comparison, China has a large population of certified mermaid instructors - over 1,000.  They have tens of thousands of people that are mermaid-certified.  They have the Guinness World Record for an underwater show featuring over 100 trained mermaids.   So that means there are at least hundreds of thousands of certified mermaids world-wide.  That seems like a lot of recreational hobbyists vs professionals.  Maybe it is owners of swimming pools who take mermaid training! There are mermaid conventions galore in the U.S.  We've missed them - MerMagic in Silver Spring, MD was April 10-12th, the California Mermaid Convention was May 15-17 in Sacramento, Vero Beach, Florida had the Mermaid Freedive in April. And you can visit a mermaid museum, too!  There must be a mermaid joke for every one of the mermaids in the Guinness Record underwater show.  Here are a few: Q: Where do mermaids see movies?     A: At the dive-in! Q: Where does a mermaid keep her money? A: In the riverbank! Q: Where did the fisherman and mermaid meet? A: On line! Read past POTD's at my Blog: http://blog.marilyncornwell.com Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.com

Marilyn's Photos - JHuly 17 2026 - Word Salad

 

Before we called it word salad, what did we say it was? It was schizophasia, or a formal thought disorder.  In that context it is a symptom of severe mental health or neurological conditions such as schizophrenia, dementia, acute psychosis, or brain injuries.  This meaning has been with us since 1904. Word salad became a common name for the condition. In terms of recent meanings, it now has a social meaning and has been accepted into dictionaries as of 2017.  Now it means something closer to nonsense.  It refers to the logic or intelligence of a person's language rather than the person's mental state.  It is a confused or unintelligible mixture of random words and phrases that lack coherent meaning or logical structure.  The words together might be grammatically correct, but the sentence as a whole does not make sense.  This use started in the 1970s and 1980s, it has come to its zenith in the last few years in the Trump era. Today's papers covered the most recent version in the news: "Reflecting on how Karoline Leavitt said that what Trump reveals tonight "will shock you if you have an honest eye listening to the president,” Miles Taylor quipped that “yes, and if your ears watch closely, you'll be doubly stunned.” Here is a list from AI of the top speakers of word salad today: Donald Trump Kamala Harris Gavin Newsom Shunyamurti Kanye West  Marjorie Taylor Greene Andrew Tate Dean Phillips Jim Cramer Sarah Palin Is this an American phenomenon?  Perhaps.  Or perhaps we in Canada live next to the largest nation in the world, so are witness to this more than other nations. And that makes it more likely we will see more U.S. figures and their word salad quotes given how funny some of them are. This is a picture of the "egg salad" salad at Good Earth quite a few years ago.  We remind Andrew the chef of this frequently, hoping he will make it specially for us one day.  It seems to take on new meaning now. Read past POTD's at my Blog: http://blog.marilyncornwell.com Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.com

Mairlyn's Photos - July 16 2026 - Double Yellow Alert

It doesn't seem as yellow today, compared to yesterday.  What a strange light - and when the sun shone through the smoke it was an orange ball in the sky.  It makes me think of Rod Serling episodes on Twilight Zone.  Somewhere between the smell of smoke and the yellow light, it is Rod Serling who comes to mind, and here are the two episodes that seem to fit: "The Midnight Sun" (Season 3, Episode 10) This iconic episode, written by Rod Serling, follows an artist named Norma and her landlady, Mrs. Bronson, trapped in a melting New York City. The Earth's orbit has been altered, and the planet is falling into the sun. The Atmosphere: The sun never sets, the heat is unbearable, water is scarce, and the sky is a blinding beacon of doom. The Twist: Norma eventually collapses from the heat, but wakes up in a snowstorm. It is revealed her heatstroke was just a fever dream, and the Earth is actually hurtling away from the sun into a permanent freeze.  "The Burning Man" (1985 Revival) In this episode from the revived 1980s series, a couple driving on a desert road experiences an oppressive and unnatural heat wave.  The Atmosphere: The sky fills with thick smoke and an unrelenting, blistering sun. The Twist: They pick up an eccentric older man who eventually vanishes, leaving behind a bizarre mystery and the chilling truth that he was a victim of a historical forest fire.  So I expect this is it.  I remember Norma waking up to the permanent deep freeze.     This seems to have the Rod Serling sort of ambience.  It is a Floyd Elzinga metal wall piece that has been "flexified" Read past POTD's at my Blog: http://blog.marilyncornwell.com Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.com

Marilyn's photos - July 15 2026 - The Royals

 

We have a notion called upper class. I think it stays newsworthy because of Britain 's Royal Family.  Doesn't the Royal Family seem both small and large.  So much press and focus on William and his family.  They are at the top of the pyramid - the Monarch and immediate Family.  Then there are the Working Royals.  There are 10 members with official public engagements.  That includes Queen Camilla, Prince William and Princess Kate.  The Official Royal Household has 48 to 50 members - they include all blood royals, spouses and extended family members with royal titles.  The Line of Succession incudes more than 60 of the King's descendants and extended relatives.  And then the Extended Dynasty - the wider family who are all direct descendants of King George V - the great-great-grandfather of the current heirs - and that has 50 to 70 individuals.   And that's the Royal Family - then there are Dukes, Earls and Barons - the second tier of nobility.  What might be the total number of upper class members?  It says 700 to 1,000 titled families.  But this seems a low number for something so dominant.  There likely are more than that and sufficient number for those not in the upper class to notice things.   But then it only takes a few members of Britain's Royal Household to be in the news every day.  So maybe it is only 1,000 people dominating our sense of privilege and priority.   We've got the Royal Botanical Gardens nearby.  This name was granted by Britain's King when the garden was established.  Read past POTD's at my Blog: http://blog.marilyncornwell.com Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.com

Marilyn's Photos - July 14 2026 - There's Sugar and then there's Sugar

 

There's headline news that sugar has been detected in the galactic centre region of the Milky Way.  It is erythrulose that was found.  This is one of the chemical building blocks necessary for the origins of life and this means that it is widespread across the galaxy.  One possible conclusion is that it improves the odds that we are not alone.   Chemically there are thousands of types of sugars.  I am familiar with the sugars that make food sweet. Even there, there are many types of sugars.  I found  Robert Lusting 's book on sugar and he has a list of the 156 names for sugar - the list is HERE. Here are some I don't know about - Muscovado and Panocha.  The first is an unrefined moist cane sugar where the molasses is never separated from the sugar crystals.  Panocha is a traditional unrefined cane sugar block found in Mexican and Filipino cuisines.  Muscovado adds a rich chewiness to chocolate chip cookies, gingerbread, and brownies.  Panocha sweetens beverages like chocolate, makes savoury-sweet dishes, and melted with butter makes a spread.  The pictures of these sugars show cones and blocks.  I can remember wanting to do a photo series of ants (they were plastic) on sugar cones.  I went to all the specialty food stores looking to buy a sugar cone, but never found one.  I didn't realize I needed to go to a Mexican or Filipino store.   This is an October 2016 scene of Sugar Beach on Toronto's waterfront.  The Redpath Sugar Refinery there has a raw sugar shed that holds between 16,000 and 37,000 tonnes of unrefined raw cane sugar.  Can you imagine what it smells like near the Refinery?  I would expect it would be very sweet.  Here's what they say:  toasted cotton candy, caramel, burnt sugar, or molasses. Read past POTD's at my Blog: http://blog.marilyncornwell.com Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.com