May 10 2025 - Build Me a Blobbery

 

Do you remember the Monty Python movie with the "you must find me a shrubbery" scene?  It is "Scene 17:  How to Find that Perfect Shrubbery"  and you can read it HERE.   And I recommend you read it as it is hilarious. My favourite moment is Roger the Shrubber's short but excellent "soliloquy": "Oh, what sad times are these when passing ruffians can say 'ni' at will to old ladies. There is a pestilence upon this land. Nothing is sacred. Even those who arrange and design shrubberies are under considerable economic stress at this period in history." Scene 18 follows with an escalation of the shrubbery demands: "First you must find... another shrubbery! Then, when you have found the shrubbery, you must place it here, beside this shrubbery, only slightly higher so you get a two layer effect with a little path running down the middle." I have found a third scene that could be inserted.  A decades later sequel to the movie.  This comes from the middle-sized garden weekly blog, and this week is showcasing blobberies.   Here's the possible scene: "And now build us a blobbery. One with balls, clouds and lollipops.  They give a garden structure and interest all year round.  And they are easy to clip and maintain." "And mix them together – different types of plants as blobs – and sometimes they’ll merge together over time." Wouldn't that be a perfect sequel to the shrubbery scene? I think of this tree as being a haze of blossoms.

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Apr 4 2025 - Roll Over Rover

 

I wonder what makes dogs do things so well. Things like catch, roll over, shake a paw, and sit.  Do dogs learn faster than humans?   AI compares a dog to a 2-year-old child in terms of intelligence.  Then skip to Quora. Quora can be counted on for hilarious responses to questions.   How do dogs think so quickly compared to humans?  Short answer:  Dogs appear to think faster than humans because they have less to think about.  Back do dogs learning so fast.  There is a puppy socialization guideline called the rule of sevens.  By the time a puppy is 7 weeks old, it should have: Been in at least 7 different locations (backyard, garage, kitchen, neighbor’s yard, etc.) Eaten from at least 7 different containers Been held and petted by at least 7 different people Taken at least 7 one-mile car rides Been in a crate at least 7 times Played with at least 7 different kinds of toys Walked on at least 7 different substrates (grass, gravel, concrete, etc.) Been taken somewhere alone, without mom or littermates, at least 7 times Been exposed to at least 7 challenges (climbed on a box, gone through a tunnel, climbed up steps, etc.) And then what?  You will socialize them and they will learn more about the world around them.   I assume they will learn faster, too. It is proposed that this rule of sevens approach is as crucial as kindergarten is for a human child. I wonder if we have a rule of 7 for 2-year-old children.  Is there a 7-7-7 rule?  Yes, there is.  It goes like this:  Play with them for the first seven years, teach them for the next seven, and then advise them for the next seven and beyond.  I vote for the dog rule of 7 - more fun in a shorter time.

Tulip time is starting in a few weeks - towards the end of April and then finishes the middle of May.  We have Tulip Festival Fields now in Niagara.  Little did I guess that the display last year would be so pertinent this year.  This is at Seventh and Fourth Avenue in St. Catharines.  Read more daily posts here: marilyncornwellblogspot.com Purchase works here: Fine Art America- marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca

Mar 23 2025 - That Turning Point Day

 

That 1963 turning point - the killing of Kennedy in Dallas, Texas.  The vast batch of documents released was poured over last week.  Can you imagine, as a JFK authority, getting access to more extensive information? And the turning point?  Three things stick out for me: The end of an era of optimism.  The cynicism towards government that gave rise to conspiracies, especially Kennedy's death.  And the switch to consuming   news via television..  So the release of these thousands of documents may or may not quell the conspiracy theorists.  There are so many things now that are "conspiracized" over.  (Yes, I just checked that there is this verb in the urban dictionary).   I wonder how many conspiracies were present in 1963?  Let's retrieve them: the "Paul is Dead" hoax. There's the landing on the Moon was staged.  There was a black helicopter theory that the United Nations would arrive in black helicopters to bring the US under UN control. Of course, UFO theories abounded - claims of government cover-ups and alien involvement.  And what are our prevalent conspiracy theories in 2025? What a question! This is a difficult area to research as it is now jam-packed with disinformation, misinformation, "spamouflage", deepfake videos, and more.  There's a new story every day that would fall into the decades-ago idea of a conspiracy theory.   It is a very busy area now - too many conspiracies to list.  Not like the "gold old days" when we could list 10 top conspiracy theories.

If we could vote for simpler times, I would be canvassing all over for that.  Here is a picture of Ranunculus - a spring pot plant for the porch. Read more daily posts here: marilyncornwellblogspot.com Purchase works here: Fine Art America- marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca

Mar 14 - 2025 - Pussy Willows are here

 

Pussy Willows are ready.  The farm where Brian has his lily hybridizing field produces pussy willows as one of the flower crops.  There's a lot of work in pussy willows.  There are standards for length of stem and buds. That means a lot of sawing in the shed during February and March.  This year, Mark, the owner, has mostly retired so the bulk of the pussy willow crop is someone else's work this year. That's the case with the peonies as well.  Little do we know how much work goes into making a single-stem flower for the florist store. The garden centres are starting to open.  Sunshine Express, one of the largest in Niagara,  opened this week.  It is full of little pot plants still sprouting.  It has a large wholesale pot flower trade, especially in the fall with the Chrysanthemums.  You never see them blooming.  Lines of green pots full off flower buds as far as you can see, and then they are gone.  We don't get to see the colour display.     Here's a spring picture - ice on the pussy willows. This is from a few years ago.

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March 11 2025 - High Heels Dangerous

 

This is the anniversary of the start of COVID lockdowns.  There are a few articles on the lessons learned.  Of course, my attention goes to this fascinating report in the New York Times - COVID proved that high heels are dangerous for women.   Did we know this before COVID?  What was COVID's part in this that changed things?   Psychology Today has the answer: "During the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic, hospital visits caused by high heel-related injuries substantially decreased." "For the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic (beginning in mid-March of 2020), U.S. residents experienced substantially reduced geographic mobility, either due to policy restrictions, job loss, or the choice to limit contact with others in order to reduce the risk of infection. Additionally, nearly 25% of the adult population reported regularly working from home. Researchers wondered whether this notable change in mobility combined with fewer opportunities for social contact would lead to fewer high heel-related injuries." "...The researchers estimated that from 2016 to 2020, there were over 70,000 heel-related injuries treated in emergency departments — about 14,000 per year. For 2020, this number dropped to approximately 6,300. The shoe-injury drop occurred after March 15; for January through March 15 of 2020, the rate of heel-related injury visits looked similar to previous years." The article is HERE.    Here's a happy Spring poster.

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Feb 27 2025 - Meet Meteorological Spring

 

We're coming up to the start of Spring - that's for those of us who follow the weather over the stars.  There's more rain than snow in the coming week's forecast, a good sign that snow will recede.   Maybe Millie's tidy-up today will stay neater a bit longer than it did in the winter.  While snow is very cleansing when it first falls, it turns to mud in the street and somehow mud clings on longer than wet snow.  In addition, my dog's hair cut will cost more than my hair cut.  And it will take longer to cut, as well.   So this would be a perfect occasion to acquaint ourselves with the differences that cause the difference.

Here's a Monarch Butterfly in the summer garden. Read more daily posts here: marilyncornwellblogspot.com Purchase works here: Fine Art America- marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca

May 15 2024 - How Many Choirs

 

One of the songs we sing in the choir I am in is "Isle of Skye".  You can youtube search any song and a choir will have sung it - all kinds of choirs.  School choirs, church choirs, professional choirs, You've Got Talent auditions of choirs.  I wonder where choir music ranks in the top watched videos on Youtube.  This is too hard - there are a lot of choirs and a lot of music.  There is even a list of the 1,000 most viewed songs on Youtube.  That would take a little while to listen to.   There are about 28,000 choirs in Canada with 1.8 million adults (7% of all adults) in a choir.  More people sing in choirs than play hockey.  Another census found that there are 3.5 million Canadians singing in a choir/singing group.  Maybe that includes children.   That sounds like a lot of local music to be able to enjoy.   With that many people in choirs, there should be some jokes. Here are two for the choir members.   Here are a few traditional choir jokes: What did the choir director send his wife for Valentine’s Day? A choral arrangement What do choruses get paid in?   har-money Why do the singers rock left and right while performing on stage? Because it is more difficult to hit a moving target.   These are the Niagara Falls Dogwood trees turned to Spring Cherry blossoms.

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May 3 2024 - The Bottom Line

 

The Bottom Line I see this expression a lot.  I guess it is overused as it makes me wonder what it really means and was intended for. Originally, this is the final result or the final line of a financial audit.  It  refers to the actual last line - where profit or loss are stated.  Audits are not much about written words, but numbers so there can be a final number.  That means there is also a top line.  That's the gross revenues or total sales.   From there, bottom line evolved into a figure of speech for the most important part of anything. If someone is talking a long time explaining something, you might ask "What's the bottom line?" That's asking them to get to the point to the main argument or central idea. So when I read an article that finishes with the heading of The Bottom Line - it makes me wonder if they realize they are self-critizing that the article didn't really have a point to start with.  But it does get your attention, so I guess that's why iit is overused. There aren't bottom line jokes.  Alternatively, you can think of the bottom line as your butt and you can read about getting a butt facial that is called the bottom line.  That article was written 20 years ago and the "facial" cost $200 then.  Bikini season coming soon, so bottom lines will be very visible.   This is one of those images that has been manipulated in Flexify.  It is Dogwood trees in bloom.

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Apr 223 2024 - Autocorrect Funnies

 

There have to be the top funniest autocomplete suggestions.  Because I get them often, and then I don't write them down.  Here are some results in this article I found HERE.   These are from 2010.  There were a lot of inappropriate autocompletes in 2010.  Even if they came from actual search results.  How strange that in 2010, "I hate it when j" had autocompletes with Jesus in them.  But then, skip ahead to today's retrieval on this query and it is equally strange and incoherent with Jesus references.   Here's the article's search autocomplete for "Is it wr": This is what I got:   Here's the 2010 article's search autocomplete for "when I jump": It looks like a lot happened in the decade that passed. This is from a similar 2023 article:   Not much has changed in a year or so since the last retrieval.  This is what I got:   This activity would either lead to a research study or be turned into a word game. If you figure out the word game, let me know.   I seem to think we are well into Spring.  The early daffodils are finished and we're on to the mid-season bloomers.

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Mar 19 2024 - Spring Time Today

 

Spring starts today.  Later today towards noon, but earlier than usual because it is a leap year.  I seem to be finding do-it-yourself rituals for spring.  Things that seem mundane to me -  Plant seeds or garden; Wake at sunrise; Have a bonfire; Spring cleaning and so on.    Let's get to something more novel - amongst these same sorts of ideas in the British Vogue article, we find "Candle Magic":   "Do some candle magic" "Traditional practices such as candle magic help us focus our energies on what we want. They plant messages in the unconscious, so we notice opportunities and have the confidence to take them. Choose a candle colour that appeals to you and distil what you want into a simple phrase such as, “May a new job come my way.” Light the candle for eight consecutive evenings. Each time you do, say your phrase, then imagine you have found a new job and are feeling delighted and grateful. Spend a few minutes sitting with this feeling and leave the candle safely burning for a while. Each time you blow the candle out, say, “So be it.” Now create channels for opportunities to flow your way. Contact people who might help you, attend events where you can network, look at job ads, and see what the universe sends." Candle magic and spring rituals?  This one doesn't seem to need spring, and the Vogue article unconsciously tells us the same - it says to celebrate the 2024 spring equinox on March 20th.  Here's an abstract I did from a few years ago with the title Spring Equinox.

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Jan 6 2024 - Ice Heaves Near You

 

There's a headline about a kilometre long ice heave in Saskatchewan.  That's a heave of ice from an ocean or large lake onto the shore.   When we consider shoreline erosion, I guess one of the causes can be ice heaving.  It is also known as ice jacking and then what it does to the shoreline is known as ice ridges, ice pushes and ramparts.    Cracks form in the ice when there are different temperatures at the top and bottom of the ice, making for different expansions ages.   There's a fact sheet from the Kawarthas so this must be a common issue in Eastern Ontario.  I guess the big damage would be to docks on cottage lakes.  In Alberta there are also ice quakes: these are also known as cryoseisms. It is a seismic event that occurs naturally by the rapid movement of the ice occur when there is a sudden release of energy from ice under stress.  The shock waves are not significant, so maybe the name sounds more ominous than the actual event. Beyond this there are ice tsunamis - that was on Lake Erie a few years ago. And remember two years ago when there was a Lake Erie storm that whipped up snow and water onto the shore-front homes encasing them in ice a foot thick.  They did not give a name for this occurrence. The places where the conditions come together to make ice heaves near us are on the east end of Lake Erie around Buffalo.  But we are quite close to Buffalo, so there have been cases where the ice heave was a shove that made its way to the Canadian side. Here's the story: "Back in February 2019, a major ice shove on Lake Erie produced spectacular video as the ice encroached on the Canadian shoreline across from Buffalo. Using an ice thickness of 6 inches, it was calculated that there could have been in the neighborhood of 13.5 billion tons of ice covering the 225-mile-long lake, being pushed downwind by wind gusts up to 70 mph. That gives you some idea of the forces involved when Nature flexes its muscles."  There are videos at this site HERE.  Here's a look ahead to spring blossoms.

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May 2 2023 - Poodles in Everything

 

There are so many cross-breeds of dogs with poodles.     Aussiedoodle - offspring of an Australian Shepherd and a Poodle Cockapoo - offspring of a Cocker Spaniel and a Poodle Labradoodle - offspring of a Labrador and a Poodle Maltipoo - offspring of a Maltese and a Poodle and these: Cockapoo. A firm family favourite, the Cockapoo is a cross breed between a Cocker Spaniel and a Poodle Labradoodle Cavapoo Maltipoo Pomapoo Yorkie Poo Shih-Poo Bernedoodle There are over l40 different types of Poodle mixes or doodles.  Check them out here at the Martha Stewart article - they shed less so are popular with people who have allergies. And the inventor of this crossing?  It was Wally Conron and here's his conclusion:  "I opened a Pandora Box and released a Frankenstein monster. " Here are two of the blossom blur pictures. Read more daily posts here: marilyncornwellblogspot.com Purchase works here: Fine Art America- marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca