April 16 2024 - Clone Me to Do my Job

 

That's the headline - "People making digital clones of themselves to do their work."   That's what they report about Deepak Chopra.  The clone can mimic thoughts and speech.  “The clone will learn how they think about the world,” Delphi co-founder and CEO Dara Ladjevardian told the Daily Mail this week. “We have a readiness score to show how ‘ready’ a clone is in representing that person. They can also upload their voice, so the clone learns how they speak as well.” There's a monthly fee between $29 to $399 a month.  This is already at work in Japan.  It is promoted for coaches and experts.  What about what it says for bosses - who can share his personality, thoughts, management, philosophy and other topics that are normally difficult for employees to ask questions about or communicate with ordinary workers".   I guess so, if you insist. Here's the promotional sell: 'If you ask a relationship coach to describe a happy relationship, they will tell you their strong opinions. These opinions are why their audience follows them."  I was hoping I can clone me to listen to people who bhave like bosses and other "experts" so that I don't have to be there in person and be polite. Ha ha on me. This garden statue seems to be on theme.

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Feb 12 21021 - There's One Chinese New Year's Joke

 

It is Chinese New Year.  How is  the date determined? First new moon that appears between 21 January and 20 February  I know so little about how it works.  Here's an impact - figuring out your Chinese birth-year: "Many people inaccurately calculate their Chinese birth-year by converting it from their Gregorian birth-year. As the Chinese New Year starts in late January to mid-February, the previous Chinese year dates through 1 January until that day in the new Gregorian year, remaining unchanged from the previous Gregorian year. For example, the 2018 year of the Dog began on 16 February 2018. The year 2018 is generally aligned with the year of the Dog. However, the 2017 year of the Rooster officially ended on 15 February 2018. This means that anyone born from 28 January 2017 to 15 February 2018 was actually born in the year of the Rooster rather than the year of the Dog. Many online Chinese Sign calculators do not account for the non-alignment of the two calendars, using Gregorian-calendar years rather than official Chinese New Year dates." There are lots of charts in the Wikipedia entry as the Chinese calendar is not continuous but cyclical.  That just seems so strange to me now that we've become an arithmetic-based, linear society.  The headline promises easy but funny Chinese New Year Jokes 2021 For Everyone.  But there aren't many jokes.  Here's one: If you celebrated Chinese New Year in America do you celebrated American Years in China? Summer images are so full of colour compared to our current landscape. The statue is in the Powell Garden in Kansas City. Purchase at: FAA - marilyncornwellart.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca

Nov 6 2020 - And the Countdown Continues

 

How different Christmas would be if we had to reach a specific number of prayers, monetary donations and gifts to the presenting organization. That would typically be a religious organization in the past.  In the present, it might be retail organizations.   Probably Amazon - it would be able to keep track of this.  And it makes me think of this Scrooge crossed with performance target scenario:  No Christmas for the poor - you haven't made your quotas. On our Christmas march, we are slowing inching our way towards the U.S. election results.  That's how I think of this:  we're waiting for political Christmas Day.  If we don't get to Christmas Day, we will be experiencing purgatory for another 4 years. Because there is only one scenario that results in Christmas Day.  I know this from the news this morning. This morning's New York Times inbox news tells me that "Trump lies in the White House briefing room, and the networks pull the plug"  “We have to cut away here because the president has made a number of false allegations,” Lester Holt said on “NBC Nightly News.” On ABC, the anchor David Muir broke in and told viewers, “There’s a lot to unpack here and fact-check.” MSNBC declined to air his remarks live at all. On Fox News, the White House correspondent John Roberts told viewers that “we haven’t seen any evidence” to back up Mr. Trump’s claims of electoral fraud. This is the angel in our cemetery.  She's praying with us on this one.

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The Barge Story .... continues

The Niagara Falls barge is a world-wide news story.  The Guardian, USA Today, and CNN have video.  Which officials are monitoring the barge?  Some articles say U.S. officials.  I guess they are all monitoring it.  It is located on the Canadian side so that's the official 'guardian of the barge'. However, the barge did not come from the Canadian side.  It started more than a mile upstream on the American side. Here's an excerpt of the story found at niagarafrontier.com - it covers the event extensively. At about 3:10 p.m. on the afternoon of Tuesday August 6th 1918, a steel copper bottomed sand scow (barge) was engaged in dredging operation in the fast currents on the American side of the Niagara River opposite Port Day at the entrance of the Niagara Falls Power Company hydraulic canal.  The scow was being towed by the tug boat - "Hassayampa" being operated by Captain John Wallace along with the assistance of tug Mayer, with Captain Enos White and the tug Kinch, with Captain Charles Smith. The scow had two deck hands aboard. They were Gustave Ferdinand Lofberg, age 51 of 275 Mackinaw Street, Buffalo NY and James Henry Harris, age 40, a father of five children of 860 Niagara Street, Buffalo NY. Harris had no seafaring experience. He was a rigger by trade and had worked for the company for only one month. The Swedish born Lofberg was a weathered and seasoned saltwater sailor. He had worked on the Great Lakes for years.   During the operation, the tug Hassayampa suddenly struck and grounded on a rock shoal/sandbar approximately a ½ mile upriver from the Falls. The taut steel towline that held the barge to the tug snapped "like a thin string". The 80 feet long and 30 feet wide scow was set adrift.  The whistles of the five tugs on the river were blowing continuously. The four tugs went to the aid of the Hassayampa and the alarm was spread that the scow had broken free. Rome Coddington, superintendant of the Hydraulic Power Company arrived only moments after the barge was adrift. He notified the Niagara Falls Fire Department in Niagara Falls, Ontario and the Coast Guard stations at Buffalo and Fort Niagara. The powerless barge containing approximately 2,000 tonnes of sand and rock quickly drifted out of control downriver into the Canadian channel and towards the Horseshoe Falls. Lofberg and Harris were helpless and could do nothing to stop the scow. According to some reports, they were seen trying to slow the swift progress of the scow with the use of makeshift oars but with no success. The river descends 15 meters (50 feet) through a series of rapids and cascades. The Cascade area is divided into two channels by Goat Island. These channels carry the flow of the water to both the Horseshoe Falls and the American Falls. The rock strata located upstream of the Horseshoe Falls tilts 20 feet (6m) towards the Canadian shoreline in 1 mile (1.6 km).  From a distance, citizens witnessed the two men working desperately on the barge. Harris and Lofberg made ready in hope that the scow would go aground, and it did about 2,500 feet above the brink of the Horseshoe Fall, over which only two persons had previously gone over in barrels and survived.  Lofberg and Harris could only hope and pray for a miracle as they faced to see rising mist of the great Horseshoe Falls growing closer by the second. The roar of the Falls echoed in their ears.  In a twist of fate, the scow swung sideways in the turbulent water, grounded and became lodged on a rock shoal 2,500 feet (767m) upriver from the Horseshoe Falls in the shallow but fast moving cascades. The barge had travelled about 1.25 miles. There is much more to the story...the rescue itself.  We have a lovely garden statue today.

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Origami in the Garden

Origami in the garden was the theme of the artwork at the Minneapolis Arboretum Garden.  This was the most beautiful of the sculptures.  Set in a pond, it was isolatable so can be admired with the hint of the garden that surrounds it.  Buddhist monks carried paper to Japan during the 6th century.  Japanese origami dates from this period and was used for religious ceremonial purposes. Origami butterflies were used during Shinto weddings to represent the bride and groom in the 1600's. Our picture today shows cranes in flight.  Cranes are the best known design.  The crane is auspicious in Japanese culture.  Legend says that anyone who folds one thousand paper cranes will have their heart's desire come true. The thousand cranes is a poignant story of the 20th century.  A young Japanese girl, Sadako Sasaki was exposed to radiation of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima.  By the time she was twelve in 1955, she was dying of leukemia.  She decided to fold one thousand origami cranes so that she could live.  She saw that other children in her ward were dying, and she realized that would not survive. She wished instead for world peace and an end to suffering.  Her thousand cranes are said to have been completed after her death. There is a statue of Sadako in the Hiroshima Peace Park:  a girl standing with her hands outstretched, a paper crane flying from her fingertips.  Every year the statue is adorned with thousands of wreaths of a thousand origami cranes.