July 7 2024 - Summer "Time" Flying By

 

This is the start of what I call summer "time".  Everything gets faster - "time flies".  And then it is August - and that for me is the month before "school starts".  Not so much the zenith of summer.   "Tempus fugit (Classical Latin pronunciation: [ˈt̪ɛmpʊs̠ ˈfʊɡit̪]) is a Latin phrase, usually translated into English as "time flies". The expression comes from line 284 of book 3 of Virgil's Georgics, where it appears as fugit irreparabile tempus: "it escapes, irretrievable time". There's a calculation for time movement. This from a cbsnews.com article:  "From the standpoint of a clock or calendar, each standard temporal unit is exactly the same: Every minute contains 60 seconds; every day contains 24 hours. However, standard temporal units vary in what I’ve dubbed “the density of human experience” – the volume of objective and subjective information they carry." Time is perceived to pass slowly (high density) in situations where there is almost nothing happening or a great deal is happening. In other words, the complexity of the situation is either much higher or much lower than normal. The situation seizes our attention - filling each standard temporal unit with the experience of self and situation. Often things appear to move in slow motion. Time seems to pass quickly when the density of experience per standard temporal unit is abnormally low - a compression of time. Here's the CBSnew.com article explanation: "Say you have a busy day at work. You might be doing complex things, but they’re routine because you’ve been doing them for so long. Given that we behave more or less unthinkingly, each standard temporal unit contains very little memorable experience. The “density” of unique experience is low. And at the end of the day, time seems to have passed quickly. We’re pleasantly surprised to discover that it is already time to go home." The author says the routineness leads to forgetting experiences - for example,  from the entire day, month, etc. And doesn't that seem to apply to us as we get older.   Older people say - "how time flies".  I haven't heard a young person say this. Why is that?  An older person can recall something from 10 and 20 years ago (and more at my age) and realize how long ago that was - and with it the perception that time has passed so quickly.     This is the completion day of the Ontario Regional Lily Show.  I took this picture of my picture on the cover of the Let's Grow Lilies Handbook from a previous show.  It came from Brian's Lilycrest Gardens growing field. I started taking pictures of it in 2007.  The field was filled with thousands of plants and hundreds of thousands of blooms.

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Dec 19 2021 - Hansel and Gretel and Gingerbread Houses

 

Is Hansel and Gretel a bedtime story?  Famine in the land. A mother replaced by a stepmother, children not allowed to eat until everyone else finished, hard chores.  Abandoned in the woods to die. They find a candy house with a gingerbread roof. A wicked witch fattening up Hansel to eat him.  Pushing the witch alive into an oven and shutting the door. Escaping with her money.  Returning home, the stepmother has already died. Their father rejoices with their return. Somehow "For many years to come, Hansel and Gretel lived very happily with their father in the hut in the woods." It is said that Gingerbread houses became popular because of this original fairy tale in 1812.  Far earlier in the Middle Ages, Europeans had their own version of gingerbread and it was complicated. Nuremberg was recognized as the "Gingerbread Capital of the World" when in the 1600s the guild started to employ master bakers and skilled workers to create complicated works of art from gingerbread. The first documented instance of figure-shaped gingerbread biscuits is from the court of Elizabeth I of England: she had gingerbread figures made in the likeness of some of her important guests.  There were traditions of gingerbreads being given out at weddings, and so on. Medieval fairs known as Gingerbread Fairs were frequent in Europe throughout the year, not just at Christmas.  Gold leaves were involved in decorating the cookies and the tradition continued with gilding gingerbread houses - which came into their own with the publication of the Brothers Grimm Fairy Tales.   Here is an example of the complex art of shaping and decorating.    Here's a gingerbread-looking fireplace at the Centennial Gardens Christmas mosaic culture display a few years ago.  And then my favourite Christmas card with Lilies from Lilycrest Gardens.

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Sep 8 2021 - September Project ...for Forty Years

 

September is often the month we start projects.  Here's a project I missed out on - a yearly picture of something over my lifetime.  Oh well.  We can look at other people's versions - today we have  a yearly picture of siblings over four decades.  It is a distinct one, done by a professional photographer, so the images are compelling.   From the  NY Times article covering the story:  "Nicholas Nixon was visiting his wife’s family when, “on a whim,” he said, he asked her and her three sisters if he could take their picture. It was summer 1975, and a black-and-white photograph of four young women — elbows casually attenuated, in summer shirts and pants, standing pale and luminous against a velvety background of trees and lawn — was the result. A year later, at the graduation of one of the sisters, while readying a shot of them, he suggested they line up in the same order. After he saw the image, he asked them if they might do it every year. “They seemed O.K. with it,” he said; thus began a project that has spanned almost his whole career. The series, which has been shown around the world over the past four decades, will be on view at the Museum of Modern Art, coinciding with the museum’s publication of the book “The Brown Sisters: Forty Years” in November." An update in 2021 shows Nicholas Nixon being interviewed about the story HERE.  The identify of the four sisters was not revealed for forty years.  Although, it would likely have been easy to figure out.   You can look at the pictures easily - there are many articles with the 40 pictures shown - there's a YouTube video that has the progression in 4 minutes. It is HERE.  It is a bit strange but as the photographer took such a similar picture each year with each person in the same position, it morphs extremely well.  Another version shows the full pictures in progression - it is HERE. At the end, you will find YouTube's endless versions of 25, 20, etc years of family photos.  It makes me realize this is a popular project.  Watching the progression of the passing of a lifetime, that September Song comes to mind, doesn't it? I hear Jimmy Durante's version.   And seeing the pictures, you can understand why Nixon's is so well known - such expressions he has captured. This is a lily in the Lilycrest Gardens field - such pretty colours and a nice progression of the blooms across the picture.

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Aug 27 2021 - Singing A La La La La Long

 

I wonder how we categorize songs to know they are silly songs.  We definitely categorize things as children's songs vs the rest of us adults.  Somehow when we reach adulthood our sensibilities transform so that our sense of humour rises above our childish ways.   I can't be sure of that when I look through various top silly songs and their titles.  Lifehack is so sure that there are funny songs that the internet title says it is always updated -  47 All-Time Funniest Songs To Cheer You Up - what they are is in the nonsense lyric range. Here's the number one pick: I’ve been watching you! A La La La La Long A La La La La Long Long Li Long Long Long. And you'll recognize and sing this in a second: Ah, ha, ha, ha, stayin’ alive, stayin’ alive. Ah, ha, ha, ha, stayin’ alive. Here's an example of Dub-I-Dub Dub-i-dub-i-dub-i-dub-dub-dub Dub-i-dub-i-dub-i-yeah-yeah Dub-i-dub-i-dub-i-dub-dub-dub I don’t need your love You can go through all 47 choices here HERE.  There turns out to be a lot of silly songs of all kinds.  We haven't looked at or ranked the Veggietales silly songs yet.  And our picture? Here's another lovely lily from Lilycrest Gardens.

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Aug 26 2021 - Cat Named Dog

 

Do you remember the 1966 song "Walking my Cat named Dog?" It likely came into my mind with the folk song fund-raiser on PBS. It seems to go with The Rooftop Singers "Walk Right In":  Walk right in, sit right down Daddy, let your mind roll on Walk right in, sit right down Daddy, let your mind roll on Everybody's talkin' 'bout a new way of walkin' Do you want to lose your mind? Walk right in, sit right down Daddy, let your mind roll on The Cat Dog song was written and sung by Norma Tanenga. Norma was a songwriter, singer, and artist.  She was connected to Dusty Springfield musically and romantically. Their romantic relationship was stressful and their professional relationship went poorly for her with a number of her collaborations uncredited.   Dusty Springfield was extremely well known as a top 1960s British pop star.  It turns out that in 1981 she had a romantic relationship with Carole Pope.  Who would guess that?  Gay relationships of any kind were taboo in the 1960s and 1970s.  Britain's press pried into everything and turned it ugly.  So her stardom waned after she revealed she was gay in 1970. Norma's Cat Dog lyrics seemed to be free-spirited and humorous.  Would you call them a bit rebellious or defiant?  Here's the start of the song: "I'm walkin' all around the town Singin' all the people down Talkin' around, talkin' around Me and my cat named Dog Are walkin' high against the fog Singin' the sun, singin' the sun" It concludes with  "That's where I'm at" Such an expression of the social state of things in the 1960s.  Almost "stream of unconscious" lyrics.  The naming of cats and dogs is very complicated today - you can look through and go shopping for any number of most popular dog names.  Would you guess that Lucy is the second most popular female dog name?   Could you name your cat "Dog"? That seems unlikely today - relegated to a novelty song title now. This is the best colour display in the Lilycrest field this summer.

July 13 2021 - Billionaire Branson Blasts into Space

 

I was scrolling past the Branson headlines yesterday to find out about banana slicers.  what did Branson do? He 'soared more than 50 miles above the New Mexico desert.'  He was joined by SPCE.N employees - who unstrapped themselves and floated in and out of cabins with bezerkly goofy grins.     "We’re here to make space more accessible to all," an exuberant Branson, 70, said shortly after embracing his grandchildren following the flight. "Welcome to the dawn of a new space age." The race was on between Branson and Jeff Bezos, according to the Globe and Mail on the weekend. There are lots of headlines on 'the feud' getting petty. This is a highly publicized rivalry with fellow billionaire Jeff Bezos, the Amazon (AMZN.O) online retail mogul who had hoped to fly into space first aboard his own space company's rocket.  There are tweeted comparisons of Bezos' "better" rocket vs Branson's. There was a congratulations on Instagram. Bezos said on Instagram. "Can’t wait to join the club!" The flight was moved up to occur before the Bezos flight scheduled for July 20th. A big party was held afterwards with space industry executives, future customers and other well-wishers  Joining the reception was another billionaire space industry pioneer, Elon Musk, who is also founder of electric carmaker Tesla Inc Branson says 600 wealthy would-be citizen astronauts have also booked reservations, priced at about $250,000 per ticket for the exhilaration of supersonic flight, weightlessness and the spectacle of spaceflight. Branson has said he aims ultimately to lower the price to about $40,000 per seat as the company ramps up service, achieving greater economies of scale. Colglazier said he envisions eventually building a large enough fleet to accommodate roughly 400 flights annually at the spaceport. I wonder what the reviews will look like. I am still thinking about the banana slicer.   At the bottom of one of the articles is a "Litter-Robot" ad for automated cat litter collection.  I don't know if this is a comedic video or an ad. The cost is $660. It is at litter-robot.com and has 8,247 reviews.  Here we are at reviews again.  I scrolled through a few - my estimate is that out of this enormous number of reviews under 10% have correct grammar, spelling or even make sense.  If I pick out the silliest, this could be a rival to the banana slicer. Our picture today - ripe tomatoes. This is a tomato year at Lilycrest Gardens.  There are around 40 - 60 plants in the field.   Each is staked and pruned perfectly.  This picture comes from Cole's Garden Centre where tomato plants this year showed up with a full crop.

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June 9 2021 - Butt Size X

 

Middle name X didn't cause all those photoshopped articles to show up.  I am sure it was the optical illusion t-shirts.  The female bust optical illusion is likely the start of things.  And then the big butts showed up in the image feed.  I can't imagine what makes women want really large butts, so went down the research path.  This is the evolutionary rationale: “The reason narrow waists and broad hips are so prized -- the reason males rate these as being attractive, even though they don’t have any insight into why they do -- is two-fold. It means, if a woman has a narrow waist, she’s not pregnant. And if she has broad hips it means that the underlying skeletal morphology is probably such that she’d be able to have a relatively unencumbered childbirth." This is quite an obsession - articles start pouring in around 2015 onwards.  The Daily Mail UK had an in-depth article on the topic. A marketing assistant has 30 minute treatments that, week by week, is bringing her closer to her dream of a "perkier, peachier behind."  A picture of Kim Karashian's bikini'd bottom shows up in the article and it is a big - really big.  You can scroll down the Daily Mail article to see it HERE.  It is too ugly for me to include in the post.  I found another post in the Guardian.com and Kim's butt is on display HERE.  It is shown in a see-through lace evening gown so not as alarming. There is lots to read about her butt - including her "fake'" photoshopped butt compared to her real butt photographed by paparazzi. And then there are the Butt-focused gym celebrities.  The two that pop up are Tammy Hembrow, in her 20s with 10 million fans.  The other butt celebrity is Katya Elise Henry - with most recent Instagram post of her big butt and baby bulge making an S curve.  The picture has some sort of photoshopping quirk to emphasizes the S, sort of strange given the Kardashian photoshopped images.  These Instagram posts seem to be more soft porn than physical fitness. That seems to be the point. To go along with this, the butt fashion industry is in full swing - 2021 had Amazon's butt-crack leggings with the built-in butt-crack. They are known as tik tok leggings.  Lots of reviews with accompanying pictures. This is all new to me - it is like I woke up today and found out I'd missed 7 years of popular culture.  I blame the Globe and Mail - these stories don't show up in the Globe and Mail headlines. Lilycrest Gardens - the original picture was taken in 2008, on a rainy, misty day in Lilycrest Gardens' hybridizing field. To grow a blue lily will require some significant genetic work.  I relied on Photoshop.

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With the pandemic, I am now engaged in the most popular hobby of all times.  I wanted to find some pink fibrous begonias, but found myself driving by the garden centres.  They had lineups of cars to get into the parking lots, and then snaking lines of people outside.  I wonder what will be the case after the pandemic. Will this interest remain or float away? Something keeps popping into my mind.  A square meal is an odd expression.  Plates are round, so why are meals square?  But aren't I being too literal?  The word square has a meaning that includes proper, honest, and straightforward.  The story that a square meal came out of the British Royal Navy's use of square wooden plates is a false one.  Those plates were knowns as trenchers, but there's no connection.   It is so wonderful a connection that the story continues to be repeated. The square meal phrase is of US origin and the first reference is 1894. Fair and square, all square, and square deal are in the same expression group.  The term honest food is in the same range as square meal - simple food using simple ingredients.  There are lots of restaurants with honest meals, there's an honest restaurant, there's honest food, the honest kitchen - for both people and dogs.  There are even restaurant menus that offer "bluntly honest descriptions".    Do you know those round hay bales you sometimes see in fields? The government is going to outlaw them. Apparently cows aren’t getting a square meal.   The simple dandelion has many stories, and there are millions of them at Lilycrest Gardens, Brian's hybridizing field.  We take them for granted, but looking at them closely is a marvel.

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