Marily n's Photos - Aug 6 2026 - The Library of Alexandria

 

There's an address for the Library of Alexandria in Egypt.  It is located at 6W49+PQ7, Al Azaritah WA Ash Shatebi, Bab Shar', Alexandria Governorate 5423021, Egypt. There's a myth that the library was destroyed in a single fire and that event plunged humanity into the Dark Ages.  Wikipedia tells me a different story: Ceasar's Fire in 48 BC burned thousands of scrolls in a warehouse at the docks.  In the 3rd Century the Romans damaged the royal quarter where the main library stood.  Then Christian leaders destroyed the Seapeum temple in 391 AD. The Islamic Conquest Myth was that the Arab leader burned the books to heat baths - this is considered a false story.   There's a legend that we would be centuries ahead in our technological world if the library had remained.  Now, historians don't think that the library held secret advanced knowledge to prevent the Dark Ages or propel us sooner into space with advanced technologies and scientific knowledge. The prevailing theory is that the library decayed over centuries due to lack of interest, reduced funding and shifting politics: Egypt became a Roman province, moving political power and funding away.  There was a shift from classical pagan scholarship toward Christian theological debates by the 4th century AD, and commercial survival predominated over an expensive, royal research archive. I see a parallel today.  Trump and the MAGA movement in the U.S. today have an anti-education, anti-science, anti-intellectual bias that can dismantle all the education and technology institutions.  This doesn't seem that unlikely many centuries later.  How long does it take to now for something to fall into decay and disappear? The size and scale of the library is so substantial. Somewhere between 400,000 to 700,000 papyrus scrolls is the estimate of the collection - containing famous epic poetry, the ancient Greek plays, science, mathematics, astronomical charts, engineering and medical information, philosophy and history and even foreign translations of Persian, Hebrew and Indian works.  Absolutely nothing remains of the Library.  No architecture, columns, foundations.  It is believed that the library is beneath modern Alexandria or submerged in the harbour.  There are no intact scrolls or documents.   But that doesn't mean that the works were all lost.  Ancient texts were regularly copied and shared with other locations - Constantinople, Rome and others.  That is the most predominant explanation for why historians consider the world would be similar to what it is today with or without this ancient library.   The address above?  It is the Bibliotheca Alexandrina, a commemoration of the Library of Alexandria.  It does seem comforting to know there is a physical place for this legend. I don't have any images tagged with library, and only a few with book.  I did like this picture - a blank slate moment. Read past POTD's at my Blog: http://blog.marilyncornwell.com Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.com

Marilyn's Photos - Aug 5 2026 - More Old People News

 

Clint Eastwood, 96,  made the elderly news recently with an official announcement to retire. That was in June.  It is a remarkable achievement to work and contribute for so many decades.  I wondered if there is more news like this about and for the elderly.  We can go to the UK Independent to see a full news section dedicated to Elderly People.  There are sections on Health, Americas, Home News, Europe, Lifestyle and so on.   I wouldn't call these stories "news-breaking" - very chatty and short.  There are a few crime stories about abuse in care homes and scams.  That's the news in Britain.  Canadian news covers healthcare issues, housing costs, social issues with high rents, and the disproportionate number of old people in Canada.  The National Post has an interesting headline:  "Badly hurt grandfather was reportedly joking after being tossed in the air by a bison."  While it was reported in the Canadian News, the event occurred at Yellowstone National Park.  There was a video of it, so it is travelling around all the news feeds. The distinction of being old and being athletic makes the news. The Guinness Book of Records has athletic records like marathon, yoga, curling, and dead hangs. That last one was achieved by a 99 year-old in 2026.   I expect we will see more news oriented to old people - Canada is expected to join the ranks of "super aged" countries in 2030.  Japan leads this group with 28.2 percent aged 65 plus. Finland, Germany, Italy, Portugal and Bulgaria are in the category as well. There are actually over 40 countries.  In 25 years as many as 2.5 million Canadians will be over 85, more than double the 2021 census number.  Searching for pictures on the topic, I found this one from the past.  I don't remember who the 78-year-old comedian is. In comparison, we enjoy old trees - here's the Comfort Maple - the oldest Sugar Maple tree in Canada.  It doesn't look this good anymore - this is about 10 years ago. Read past POTD's at my Blog: http://blog.marilyncornwell.com Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.com

Marilyn's Photos - Aug 4 2026 - So Old That...

 

In the land of "Old Celebrities" it seems there are a few really old ones.  Who is the oldest? Caren Marsh Doll is the oldest at 107 years - she was in The Wizard of Oz and Gone with the Wind.  Next is Eva Marie Saint at 102.  She's followed by Mel Brooks at 100, Dick Van Dyke at 100, William Daniels at 99, James Hong at 97, and William Shatner at 95.   The list doesn't show Clint Eastwood who is 96, and he turns out to be a celebrity that the MSN News Feed is always covering.  I wonder what that is about.  So I asked the question of what makes some celebrities covered so often.  The answer includes these items:  the mystery factor caused by stars not using active platforms to give fans updates, their versatility for memes with old movie scenes, facial expressions. There's the generational contrast with old celebrities having a toughness and traditional privacy, and finally viral hoaxes with out-of-context quotes, satirical claims, and fake accounts.  That's the case with Clint Eastwood who seems to be present and elusive.  He released a film in 2024 so there are pictures of him on the set to contrast with the pictures of him through the decades.  We are fascinated with time and aging, aren't we?  Who can possibly demonstrate aging better than Clint Eastwood.  Here's the short YouTube video: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/uc55a6k3MKw It is a compelling video with seamless transitions that make it possible to imagine a final transition where Clint Eastwood becomes a mythical being.  This seahorse statue in one of the decorative ponds at Winterthur Museum gives the sense of this as it floats between sea and sky.  Read past POTD's at my Blog: http://blog.marilyncornwell.com Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.com

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Marilyn's Photos - Aug 3 2026 - Graduating Grammar

 

Graduate college or graduate from college.  The New York Times has somehow embraced casual grammar. I noticed this as this looked like a typo to me.  I hadn't heard the expression graduate college.   As Mirriam-Webster puts it, the school grants the degree to the student, so the student graduates from that school.   Another form that is used is "I was graduated from college."  It sounds like a long journey of many small steps, as though one gets a degree by passing through many small increments of degrees. This is the transitive and intransitive debate that occurred during the 1800s.  It is now normal to say "I graduated from college." It is too late at this point to help out those Spring graduates writing their resumes.  Never mind, it probably worked out with CHAT AI  recommending the graduated from version.   Here's a version that gives rise to laughter:  one site says it is incorrect to "pass out of school" and that one should use "finished his schooling" or "completed his school education."   Here's the Laura Secord Public School in Queenston.  This is where the Secord Homestead is located.  This is no longer a public school. It is now a school of restoration arts.  That Laura Secord name, though, is an important one to the War of 1812, so seems to make sense to be maintained.   More of the predominance of the War of 1812 in the Niagara region's naming of schools - here's a little moment from Brock University. Read past POTD's at my Blog: http://blog.marilyncornwell.com Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.com

Marilyn's Photos - Aug 2 2026 - The Blue Hour in Helsinki

 

Today Bing's picture is an aerial view of Helsinki during "the blue hour."  Lots of blue. Blue hour is the twilight period when the sun is between approximately 4 to 6 degrees below the horizon.  The sky takes on deep blue and indigo tones.  Helsinki's blue hour is much longer in the summer.  And the blue hour in Helsinki yesterday?  It went from 9:51 to 10:52. Compare that to Toronto when the blue hour went from 8:40 until 9:13pm.  Our blue hour in Grimsby was 2 minutes earlier and went from 8:38 to 9:15pm - a little longer than Toronto's. There are many entries for photographers on taking blue hour pictures.  And then lots of beautiful pictures. Here's one that came up - it looks like a science fiction picture to me.  It is Daewangam Park in Ulsan, South Korea.  And it has a bridge that looks like it could be in the Guinness Book of Records for something or other.   This is the elevated walkway between the Eaton's Centre and "Simpson's" - whatever Simpson's is now called after Hudson's Bay bought it and then went out of business. This is part of the PATH system that provides underground walkways through the downtown.  This is particularly helpful in winter when we don't want to know about the blue hour in the cold. Read past POTD's at my Blog: http://blog.marilyncornwell.com Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.com

Marilyn's Photos - Aug 1 2026 - The Great Divide

 

The Gordie Howe Bridge opened on Monday - it is a mighty big structure when I look at the pictures.  It has 16 toll lanes and 60 Canada and U.S. inspection lanes for commercial land passenger vehicles.  It makes me wonder how many vehicles will be on the bridge at a given time.  The hourly volume is expected to be around 400 commercial vehicles per hour, plus passenger vehicle traffic.  In its first 12 hours it recorded 7,500 vehicles.  One retrieval says that 12,000 cars and 8,000 trucks travelled on it 2 days ago.  Of course, after its opening, the news will drop off suddenly and move on to other things.   The Bridge has its own website with amenities and features, live camera feeds coming soon, and so on.  The multi-use path opens on August 5th so we can expect some news then. It will be open in the winter - I can't imagine what the wind will be like then.  Maybe some photos of people being pinned to the barrier unable to move forwards or backwards.  They might get "iced in." Not so far away is the Pickering Bridge.  It is the longest enclosed people crossing in the world.  It is the GO Station bridge is 250 metres long and spans 14 lanes of Highway 401, six rail tracks and a two-lane municipal roadway.  Doesn't that sound like a traffic jam by itself.   I wonder if Windsor might join the ten incredible bridge walks in the world - things like Sydney Harbour Bridge, the Golden Gate Bridge, Yokohama Bay Bridge, N.Y.'s Brooklyn Bridge, the Tower Bridge in London.  These all have incredible views compared to Windsor-Detroit.   I found a cartoon for this one.  It is by Graeme MacKay - mackaycartoons. Here's a winter view of the Toronto Botanical Gardens bridge over Wilket Creek.  Doesn't winter look so scenic and pretty when it is a picture and not the view out the window. Read past POTD's at my Blog: http://blog.marilyncornwell.com Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.com

Marilyn's Photos - July 31st 2026 - The Weather Report is Late

 

What an interesting Globe and Mail story today on the problems being experienced with the U.S. National Weather Service no longer launching their noon and midnight weather balloons on time. The is an activity done simultaneously worldwide at noon and midnight GMT.  Doing this provides supercomputers with a uniform, three-dimensional snapshot of the atmosphere.   There are 900 - 1,300 meteorological stations across the globe and they are supposed to launch weather balloons twice each day at exactly the same time.  There are even ships at sea who participate in the maritime observation networks. One of the questions that AI wants to answer is How high do the balloons fly before the pop? They fly to altitudes between 20,000 and 30,000 metres before they pop.  As the balloon rises it starts to expand and reaches the size of a two-storey house.  Eventually the latex stretches to its limit and bursts. A small orange parachute opens automatically to bring the instrument package safely back to earth.   There are 30 to 31 upper-air monitoring stations across Canada and that means 60 - 62 balloons a day are released.  The U.S. has around 92 weather stations. However, the U.S. has cut staffing and budget so severely that many of their balloons can't be launched on schedule so the synchronization isn't happening.  The National weather service has suspended or delayed launches at over 25 stations - either stopping them or delaying their launches to later in the day.  So if you want to complain about the weather forecast, you now have the answer as to why it isn't as accurate as it might have been or should be or could be.   What would be the risks?  Predicting sudden thunderstorms, heavy rainfall, and tornadoes in real time, receiving less advanced notice of dangerous weather events, and degrading forecast accuracy for neighbouring regions and downwind areas. I found the first cartoon on a cartoon stock website - isn't is excellent for us old-timers. The second comes from a previous post about the "worst" beginning sentences of famous novels.   Here's a "storm coming" sort of sky!  Wouldn't that make a weather balloon pop. Read past POTD's at my Blog: http://blog.marilyncornwell.com Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.com

Marilyn's Photos - July 30 2026 - Out of office replies

 

Do you remember the "out-of-office" phone and email messages?  I say "remember" as we don't leave the phone on its own anymore.  It has no down time, no vacation moments of its own.   But there are still very funny automated reply messages to enjoy.  Maybe because people are natural humourists. "I am driving right now, or at least staring blankly at the road while listening to a true crime podcast that makes me trust no one." "Auto-reply activated because reality became too overwhelming and I chose to ignore it." "I can't answer right now because my emotional support snacks required immediate attention." "Your message has been received and is currently being ignored with care." "I'm busy right now, but I still like you." "My social battery just entered low-power mode. Please try again next year." "I will get back to you as soon as I figure out whose unsaved number this is." "I'm not ignoring you, I'm just giving your text time to marinate."   And here's a cartoon from FunnyTimes.com Here's a colourful version of a watercolour of dandelion seed heads.  The seed heads are made by putting salt on wet watercolours.   Read past POTD's at my Blog: http://blog.marilyncornwell.com Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.com