Dec 11 2024 - We're in a great state

 

This from the CBC news:  In an interview with NBC News on Sunday, Trump said that if the U.S. is going to run up lopsided trade deficits with Canada, it might as well become a state. Trump posted that he was happy to have dinner with "Governor Justin Trudeau, governor of the Great State of Canada.  I look forward to seeing the Governor again soon so that we may continue our in depth talks on Tariffs and Trade, the results of which will be truly spectacular for all!"   The CBC named it "a jab" in the article but the headline said Trump again teases Canadian takeover with 'governor' Trudeau post.  Another headline said that Trump's quip about the 51st state was a joke by a Minister that was present.   This shouldn't be a surprise joke or jibe - there's still talk of Trump  "purchasing" Greenland.  Will we get more of this - what do you think?  Seems to go with the package. There's nothing like an Amaryllis at Christmas - this picture from last year.

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Dec 20 2023 - Homes from the Past

 

We drove to Welland yesterday for Gerry's cataract surgery.  The Welland hospital does most of the eye surgery in Niagara.  It has grown so efficient and effective at cataract surgery that what we entered was an assembly line set of activities. Driving into Welland, I was shocked by what I saw.  Little houses.  Just ordinary little houses.  Bungalows. No monster  "Bungalofts" looming over everything around them.  I was transported back to the 1960s.  That was before the "big house" disease took hold.  Well into the 1970s, houses were built to be lived in.  How do I know this"  My test is that back then, two bathrooms were being included and no longer a luxury. After that?  How many bathrooms should be included to show your status?  One for every bedroom started to become vital.  Maybe it was a premonition that houses should be easily converted into Airbnbs.  Welland looked comfortable and homey, not the seeming reputation as the least attractive and most avoided town in Niagara.  Residents are considered lower income than other parts of Niagara.  The livability score has been low - 53/100.  On the other hand, it ranked 15 in the top 25 communities to live and work remotely in 2021 - in the nation.   So maybe these little houses turn out to be not so bad, and Welland starts to shine as a livable place with its parks and rivers.  It is a bit far out - equal distance from Niagara Falls and St. Catharines and Port Colborne - in the middle of the peninsula.   Looking at an article with "recently listed in Welland" houses - they had houses with prices between $300,00 and $500,000.    Welland, capital of eye surgery and inexpensive housing.  A good combination.  I waited for Gerry and watched all the people exiting their cataract surgery with their plastic eye shield over one eye.  It made me think of a science-fiction assembly line movie scene.

Here's a happy holiday card from the past.   Read more daily posts here: marilyncornwellblogspot.com Purchase works here: Fine Art America- marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca

Dec 17 2023 - Christmas Bucket Lists

 

I already don't like bucket lists.  But there might be some crazy, extreme Christmas bucket lists,  Just maybe. No, no.  They are squeamishly embarrassing. Here is a typical writer of the Christmas bucket list: "Hi! My name is Laura. I'm a wife, a mom of 4, a lover of coffee, to-do lists, and all things organizing. I created this blog to help you navigate the chaos of life as a mom in a (somewhat!) organized fashion." Her list is normal Christmas things to do. Just a lot of them in one list - no sense of organized approach at all.   Some of the bucket lists are "fun holiday activities". Other bucket lists are "cheesy" things to do.  Don't forget the "meaningful" bucket list ideas. Are there at least twelve things on the bucket list?  You bet there are 12!   We can have fun with a Christmas bucket list - a "smash-up sort of thing".  I think that the Guinness Book of Records would be in the mix. Whatever the Guinness Book of Records has to say about the best Christmas-themed records works for me.  Crazy, extreme and usually takes a lot of people or practice to achieve. I vote for the easy path - something in a Santa suit.   Would it be bungy-jumping in the most famous places around the world in a Santa suit?  yes - there's a single one in Indonesia in 2011.  What about scuba-diving in a Santa suit and feeding a shark?  Yes - in Australia in 2011.  Having a charity swim in December in Santa suits?  Yes - in Northern Ireland.  Rappelling down a bridge in a Santa Claus suit?  Yes that's been done.  And how are your marital arts skills in a Santa suit?  They are excellent in Seoul shopping malls. Would it be the largest Santa-suited sky-diving jump?  That's a good one - again it's Australia. And that's a partially compiled set of ideas for a Santa-suited bucket list for 2023.  First item:  go get a Santa suit.

Here's an item for a Christmas bucket list  - decorate your tree with 25 Amaryllis plants. Read more daily posts here: marilyncornwellblogspot.com Purchase works here: Fine Art America- marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca

Dec 29 2020 - YamChops the Vegan Butcher

We're coming to New Year's Eve where the traditional fare is beef tenderloin and lobster - a feast of flesh. So my attention was drawn to a headline that had vegan butcher in it.  It hadn't even occurred to me to want to have the word butcher associated with Vegan.  But that seems to be me thinking too literally about the definition.  It urns out there are lots of Vegan Butchers with catchy names: The Herbivorous Butcher The Butcher's Son No Evil Foods Monk's Meats Cena Vegan YamChops This one from B.C. came up:  The Very Good Butchers and this is their home page: THERE'S A NEW BUTCHER ON THE BLOCK And we're doing things differently. Our minimally-processed, vegan meats are handcrafted in British Columbia, Canada with whole-foods you've likely got in your kitchen; beans, grains, vegetables, herbs and spices. We’re on a mission to show that making good choices doesn’t mean sacrificing flavour. We want to make plant-based eating as approachable, nutritious and delicious as possible by creating food that’s Very Good for people, animals and the planet (while having a little fun along the way).  Fed up with the overly-processed meat alternatives available, our founders knew they could raise the plant-based bar. As trained chefs with years of experience, they set out to make the most delicious and nutritious plant-based meats they could, and in our humble opinion, they nailed it!. After selling out the farmers markets on Denman Island, BC, our bean butchers knew they were onto something. They brought their magic beans to Victoria and opened the Canadian West Coasts’ first plant-based butchery. " This got me thinking about another variation we learned about last year and the latest update at the beginning of December.  This is about  "real meat" that isn't butchered: Singapore has given U.S. startup Eat Just the greenlight to sell its lab-grown chicken meat, in what the firm says is the world’s first regulatory approval for so-called clean meat that does not come from slaughtered animals. Demand for alternatives to regular meat is surging due to consumer concerns about health, animal welfare and the environment. Plant-based meat options, popularized by Beyond Meat Inc. and Impossible Foods, increasingly feature on supermarket shelves and restaurant menus. But so-called clean or cultured meat, which is grown from cells outside the animal, is still at a nascent stage. “The first-in-the-world regulatory allowance of real, high-quality meat created directly from animal cells for safe human consumption paves the way for a forthcoming small-scale commercial launch in Singapore,” Eat Just said on Wednesday.   And what will it be?  Chicken Nuggets!     Here is yesterday's Amaryllis reworked with more colour variations and brushstroke additions.  I consider this one a celebration to the year passing, with its moody colours.  Which one do you like best?   Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwellart.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca

Dec 28 2020 - Piece of Cake

 

I hadn't considered how boorish Boris Johnson is. So I went hunting for his words to figure out the extent of this behaviour.  I find some of his statements are whimsical, nonsensical, and absurd, and therefore, very entertaining.  Here are my chosen few:   I have as much chance of becoming Prime Minister as of being decapitated by a frisbee or of finding Elvis. I've got more in common with a three-toed sloth than I have with Winston Churchill. There is no easy comparison with any modern politician. The more you read about him, the more completely amazed you are about what he did - his energy, his literary fecundity, his ability to work - just unbelievable energy My friends, as I have discovered myself, there are no disasters, only opportunities. And, indeed, opportunities for fresh disasters. Never in my life did I think I would be congratulated by Mick Jagger for achieving anything. And who would guess that cake is the subject for words of wisdom and comment.  Boris Johnson has weighed in on to the subject of cake.   My policy on cake is pro having it and pro eating it. Many people - authors, comics, and others - have words about cake: If you're trying to create a company, it's like baking a cake. You have to have all the ingredients in the right proportion. Elon Musk You know you're getting old when you get that one candle on the cake. It's like, 'See if you can blow this out.' Jerry Seinfeld You know you're getting old when the candles cost more than the cake. Bob Hope All the world is birthday cake, so take a piece, but not too much. George Harrison For me, the cinema is not a slice of life, but a piece of cake. Alfred Hitchcock Photographing a cake can be art. Irving Penn  The most dangerous food is wedding cake. James Thurber It makes sense that there are lots of Cake Celebration Days: a National, International and World Cake Day.  There's Ice Cream Cake Day, Chocolate Cake Day, Cheesecake Day, and I would guess a celebration day for most of the kinds of cake.   Think of one and look it up.  Carrot Cake?  February 3rd.  Pound Cake Day?  March 4th.  Tiramisu Cake Day? March 21st.  I rest my case.     I consider the Amaryllis to be a semi-official flower of Christmas in the Northern Hemisphere.  Here's one from the Niagara Falls Showcase Greenhouse last Christmas.   Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwellart.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca

Dec 22 20120 - Christmas Chatter

 

The annual Christmas letter has been a tradition for how long?  The Smithsonian Magazine article in December 2019 says Marie Bussard wrote to her friends on December 25, 1948, beginning the Christmas letter tradition.  The article is HERE.  There's a Christmas letter archivist to keep track of things. Most Christmas letters are literal accounts of the family's happenings that year.  This is similar to project status reports.  I wondered about this.  Why write a letter on status when one can do a chart with the numbers along with a few words.   And that's what I found over on Pinterest.  In fact, here's the link to 6 free templates from the Spruce to structure your personal life's events professionally.   I consider the 2 words to describe our year to be of great significance in this special year.  What are your two words?  I liked 'pivot' and 'Existential threat'.   I don't consider the word of the year to be 'pandemic' as did Merriam-Webster.  But Oxford Dictionary decided it is 'Doomscrolling'.  That seems a representative choice.  The OED decided it was 'unprecedented'. So back to that Christmas letter for 2020. There are lots of Pinterest examples of Family Year in review - for 2020, we recommend you leave out the 'where we travelled' section and the 'big family reunion' description.  Add in your 'sour dough bread recipe'. And a seasonal image of Amaryllis today. Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwellart.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca

How to Put out a Miniature Fire

All things miniature is covered  in a blog named 'THIS IS WHY IM BROKE'.  It has  gifts for people that love tiny and miniature things.  This is perfect for Christmas: 1. Miniature fire extinguisher 2. Mini Jelly Fish Tank 3. Tiny functional cannons 4. Mini spy hidden camera 5. Mini travel iron 6. Mini Watermelon Cucumbers 7. Mini pool table 8. The mini museum 9. Tiny crochet animas - picture of a narwhal 10. Mini Nutella single serve jar 11. Mini Moscow mule shot glasses 12. Personalized miniature of your pet 13. Mini bottle string lights 14. Mini arcade machine 15. Mini karaoke microphone 16. I love you tiny message in a bottle The Guinness Book of records has numerous things that are miniature: largest collection miniature tools largest collection of miniature books the world's top 10 tiny bars world's tiny paintings And returning back to trains - Miniature Wonderland broke a record with the opening of the new route section 'Monaco Provence'.  It will open in 2020. You can see it HERE.  they show numbers like 52 planes, 250 flights a day, 1,040 trains, 10,000 rail cars, 1,320 signals, 50 computers. 390,000 LED lights.  There are 300 employees doing all this little stuff. That's a lot of little!  And it is a lot of fun watching the video - accidents, volcanoes, fires, boats moving through 'water'. This is an amaryllis flower picture taken a few years ago.

Read past POTD's at my Blog: http://blog.marilyncornwell.com Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwellart.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca

Bicycling Under Glass in Niagara

Lucky us in Niagara.  Some of the commercial greenhouses had open houses in support of charity yesterday, so we got to look in on some amazing displays.  They included North America's only cut amaryllis grower, cut statice grower, COSMIC orchids, eggplant production houses, lavender and campanula pot plants, and gerbera growers. The most massive facility was the St. David's Greenhouse.  That's the one along the North side of the QEW at Martin Road in Vineland.  At that facility they grow eggplants.  They use bicycles to get around the greenhouse.  There are 70 acres in production under glass at their two locations. The sophistication of all of these growing facilities is remarkable - each one is organic with biological insects to control pests.  They feed CO2 to the plants to boost growth.  They grow in 'natural materials' raised off the ground.  There is automation to pot plants, and move plants around. The most spectacular sight was the gerbera greenhouse.  That is where 120,000 gerberas are harvested each week.  This would mean we saw millions of gerberas in bloom at the Van Geest Brothers greenhouse on Seventh Avenue in St. Catharines.

Getting the Fake News

The ads that appear all over our internet displays often contain news of some celebrity's death.  This week I saw a news article that Trump's wife was filing for divorce and didn't have plans to be the first lady.  This was a fake news story - with a "fake news notice" on the story.   A site has indicated that Facebook is testing fake news flags.  The warning is  "this website is not a reliable news source.  Reason:  Classification Pending". According to BBC Trending, the problem of fake news has become significant in the U.S. The current circulating fake news story is Pizzagate.   This is a false news story that claims there is a paedophilia ring involving people at the highest levels of the Democratic Party operating out of a Washington pizza restaurant named Comet Ping Pong. Fake news is being covered broadly by the press right now.  The New Yorker, The Guardian, The Onion, BBC, and RollingStone have articles within the last few days. The RollingStone article - How a Fake Newsman Accidentally Helped Trump Win the White House- is compelling.  This is about a Pheonix fake newsman.  He is  the perpetrator of the story on gang-rape parties in India - an internationally famous fake news story. He makes his living from the ad revenue. A site to check out is Fake News Watch with their listing of fake websites, satire websites, and clickbait websites.  The names of clickbait sites are themselves a revelation. Here are a few: HangTheBankers.com GovtSlaves.info CountdownToZeroTime.com Infowars.com HumansAreFree.com TheDailySheeple.com PrisonPlanet.com

Christmas Countdown Headlines

Everyone wants the Christmas Countdown in their headlines.  CNBC's headline today "Wall Street eyes triple-digit gains as Christmas countdown begins".  And doubled that play with this  subheading:  "Oil plays the role of Grinch this year". The countdown of the year's best already started last week in the Globe and Mail.  Today, on the side panel of the Christmas Countdown retrievals is Most expensive celebrity home listings of 2015 and we find out that Michael Jackson's Neverland Ranch was listed at $100 million and the Neverland clock out front remains in place with the return to the name of the ranch before Jackson 'Sycamore Valley Ranch' . It has 2,700 acres. There's the question of how Christmas is celebrated by the Jewish.  The top 5 Christmas songs were written by Jews, so music would be a component.  They were written during the great American Songbook period, when every great Hollywood songwriter was Jewish: "White Christmas" - Written by Irving Berlin, Bing Crosby's version is the best selling single of all time "The Christmas song" ("Chestnuts roasting on an open fire") - Written by Bob Wells and Mel Torme and recorded four times by Nat King Cole "Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow" - Sammy Cahn wrote the song in 1945, during a heatwave in Los Angeles "Santa Baby" - written by Joan Javits and made famous by Eartha Kitt "Winter Wonderland" - written in 1934 and recorded by more than 200 singers Our floral portrait of an amaryllis today celebrates the first song, White Christmas.