Showing posts with label textures. Show all posts
Showing posts with label textures. Show all posts

Saturday, April 8, 2023

Apr 8 2023 - Sliding In

 

Did changing the baseball rules get the results they wanted?  There were dozens of articles on what the rule changes are so I became very familiar with what was about to transpire.  

I thought I'd find out what the results are and found one article - from Sports Illustrated on the results.  Given they are the sports source, it was a great article.

And they say the new rules make the game more exciting. 

Which is what they wanted. The first benefit was that the Dodgers and Angels game took just over two hours instead of three hours.

The pitch timer cut 25 minutes of dead time out of minor league games. 

And another big question?  Would they sell less in concession sales with those big dollar beers?  They had no significant decline. 

Fans had already been leaving the game early before the end.  Now the game is ending on time. There were more good results from the changes, too.

The article says that the game has returned to its aesthetic best - that was in the 198os.

The article is HERE

I have to think there might be hope in America - if baseball can make changes, think what might be possible next!
 



This is a bit of scuffed and scraped street curb and I have it a spring colour makeover.
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Wednesday, January 18, 2023

Jan 18 2023 - Pink for boys..no girls

 

I wondered how we got to pink for girls and blue for boys.  And what made us gender-rigid in this respect.  Here's a picture of Franklin Roosevelt in a white dress, party shoes and long hair.  This was the norm in 1884 - gender-neutral.   It was in the 19th century, though, that colours became gender signifiers.  

This is different than what has been published as the U.S. history.  But then I think that is because the research in the 1980s by Paolettis and a book published in 2011 get referenced over and over, turning into an urban legend. 

"The march toward gender-specific clothes was neither linear nor rapid. Pink and blue arrived, along with other pastels, as colours for babies in the mid-19th century."

"For example, a June 1918 article from the trade publication Earnshaw's Infants' Department said, “The generally accepted rule is pink for the boys, and blue for the girls. The reason is that pink, being a more decided and stronger color, is more suitable for the boy, while blue, which is more delicate and dainty, is prettier for the girl.” Other sources said blue was flattering for blonds, pink for brunettes; or blue was for blue-eyed babies, pink for brown-eyed babies, according to Paoletti."

Wikipedia has a long survey of countries showing that pink has been generally used for girls and blue for boys.  Then it chronicles pink for boys and blue for girls. The earliest references are pink for girls and blue for boys - starting in the early 1800s to 1941.  

For the blue for girls and pink for boys, scroll to the end and see the US is where the reversal is revealed in the ads. 
 


Another close-up in the Niagara Falls conservatory.  

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Thursday, December 29, 2022

Dec 29 2022 - goodgoodgood

 

There are a few good news websites, and I guess there are quite a few.  I found this one -goodgoodgood.co - it must have had trouble find a "good" website name. What was the good news of 2022?  I found it hard to figure out so abandoned that when I saw these children's t-shirts for the nth time in the last few days.   They are creepy optical illusions, I suppose.
There are good news websites, and I guess there are quite a few.  I found this one -goodgoodgood.co - it must have had trouble find a "good" website name. What was the good news of 2022?  I found it hard to figure out from the website.  I abandoned that when I saw these children's t-shirts for the nth time in the last few days.   They are creepy optical illusions or perhaps the latest in aliens arising. 
 
This may be the new t-shirt trend.  Will it become on the the top seller in 2023?  What are the most imports T-shirts historically.  Here they are:
  • Kiss Me, I'm Irish‍.
  • I “Heart” NY.
  • I'm With Stupid.
  • Keep Calm and Carry On.
  • The Rolling Stones.
  • Vote For Pedro.
  • Jurassic Park / Ghostbusters‍
  • Charlie Brown‍
What about those Kevin t-shirts I see around?  Which Kevin is this?  Is it one of the 25 famous people named Kevin - e.g. Kevin Hart, Kevin Durant, Kevin Gates, Kevin Alvarez, or Kevin Joans.  Lots named Kevins.  

Could it be Kevin's Famous Chili?  This is a popular scene from The Office.   But I suspect this Kevin falls a distant third to the most famous fictional Kevins.  

I  think the contest for the top Kevin is between Kevin in Home Alone vs Kevin the Minion in Despicable Me.  

Kevin in Home Alone has a fashion designer for a mom and a securities company executive for a dad (or maybe a day trader).  There's a Home Alone family tree.  That's how important Kevin is.  He's like Royalty.

Kevin the Minion has the occupation of "henchman".   His family tree is listed as the Gru Family.   That's the father and children - I guess the Despicable One Family.  What about the Minion Family - they are a males species of fictional yellow creatures.  Can they have a family tree?  How important is Kevin, the Minion?  While we know they left their home country of Switzerland in favour of a new life in America during the late 1960s,  they have in fact existed since the beginning of life on Earth.

Which t-shirt to get - the creepy puppy t-shirt or a Kevin  t-shirt?

This is a carved  stone pathway at Bellevue Botanic Garden, outside Seattle.  I colourized the sections to bring out the surface textures.

 
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Tuesday, September 27, 2022

Sep 27 2022 - Troipcal Storms

 

Storms are all around us - and all around the world.  They demand our attention and action. 

Based on a 30-year climate period from 1991 to 2020, an average eastern Pacific hurricane season has 15 named storms, 8 hurricanes, and 4 major hurricanes.  
An average of ten tropical storms develop over the Atlantic Ocean, Carribean Sea, and Gulf of Mexico each year. Many of these remain over the ocean. Six of these storms become hurricanes each year.

 "Since the year 957, there have been at least 12,791 recorded tropical or subtropical cyclones in the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian Oceans, which are known as basins."  I haven't found any information about that typhoon in 957 which is listed to have killed 10,000 people.  I have found that the early recorders of typhoons were the Chinese:

As early as the fifth century AD, the typhoon had been recognized by the people of southern China as a distinct meteorological phenomenon. A specific term, ju or jufeng, was accordingly coined, with rather accurate specifications given to it. A typhoon that struck the coastal city of Mizhou in Shandong Province of northern China in AD 816 is the earliest recorded tropical cyclone landfall in China, and perhaps also in the world. The typhoon as a weather phenomenon was frequently mentioned, described, and discussed in many works, including history books, poems and government documents, in the ninth century AD.

What's the biggest storm that we know of?  It is the Great Red Spot on Jupiter.  It is a persistent high-pressure region in the atmosphere of Jupiter, producing an anticyclonic storm that is the largest in the Solar System. Located 22 degrees south of Jupiter’s equator, it produces wind-speeds up to 432 km/h (268 mph). Observations from 1665 to 1713 are believed to be of the same storm; if this is correct, it has existed for at least 356 years.

Here's a montage landscape image turned into an interpretation of a tropical storm. 

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Tuesday, August 24, 2021

Aug 24 2021 - Soda Jerk

 Would you want to be a soda jerk or a soda clerk?  The term soda jerk was a pun on soda clerk, the formal job title of the young male drugstore assistants who operated soda fountains. It was inspired by the "jerking" action the server would implement to drive the fountain handle back and forth when adding soda.  That was in the 1030s and 1940s. Here's the article on the "lost lingo of New York City's Soda Jerks HERE.  


It got me thinking about how anyone would want to be called a jerk rather than clerk.  That's because, in contrast, a jerk is defined as a "contemptibly obnoxious person. " That was American slang that started showing up in the 1930s.  It is thought it developed via  "jerkwater' which dates from the 1860s and came to mean an insignificant or hick town.  It evolved to "small-time, second-rate, mediocre" and was abbreviated to jerk, so was the start of "jerk" the obnoxious person.


But what about "jerk chicken"?  Jerk is a style of cooking native to Jamaica, and meat is dry-rubbed or wet marinated with hot spice. That word jerk comes from charqui, a Spanish term for jerked or dried meat.  That's another world altogether and not to be considered with the clerks and jerks above. 

The original word "jerk" means a quick movement, and then the verb "jerk" meant to strike or lash, so that the noun became a stroke or lash.  Both verb and noun are considered echoic - sounding like what it meant.  

But what about the sexual slang aspects of the word? The grammarphobia.com article chronicles the word's sexual slang aspects through a lengthy history. It repeats the American reference to Alexander Portnoy in Philip Roth's novel Portnoy's Complaint, 1968, as the sexual verb was "so beloved of Alexander Portnoy".   So when I looked through a lot of the "lost lingo" terms for types of sundaes, it seemed to me this might have been a part of the underground world of sexual slang.  Being called a soda jerk might have been considered smirky and rebellious.  When I look at the pictures of those teenage boys, this makes perfect sense.

What do you think?



This wonderful painterly background makes this a pleasing floral portrait.
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Thursday, April 9, 2020

April 9 2020 - Volcanoes Erupting

The Japanese Sakurajima volcano erupted on April 6th sending plumes of ashes into the sky.  I didn't even see it in the news.  There were 15 explosions between the 2nd and the 6th of April.

It was in a report of weekly volcanic activity on the website Volcano Discovery.  What a website - packed full of stuff.  It does not have the look and feel of other websites, so I checked it out.  This is what it has to say about itself:


"www.VolcanoDiscovery.com is a complex website with many facets: 
- First of all, it represents the (very) small private tour operator company, founded by Dr. Tom Pfeiffer back in 2004, which offers geologic-interest walking and study tours and expeditions to active volcanoes world-wide. 
- In addition, this website has grown a lot with a large section about volcanoes, volcano news, volcano photos and recently, earthquakes all over the world."

I find out that there are 20 volcanoes actively erupting on any particular day in the world.  So far there have been 49 confirmed eruption during 2020 from 49 different volcanoes.  They are in France, Costa Rica, Ecuador, the Philippines, Japan, United States, Russia, and so on. While it seems a lot, volcanic activity hasn't not been increasing over time.

The authority on the subject is the Smithsonian Institution's Global Volcanism Program - which is HERE.  They maintain a database of volcanoes along with activity.  While the Sakurajima eruption isn't listed on the activity page, the site message is that due to COVID-19 they are working from home.  

I wonder about volcano jokes.  I can't imagine a topic without its own jokes.  Here are three for volcanoes.
A man phoned to find out whether he could get insurance if the nearby volcano erupted.
They assured him he would be covered.

Scientists say that the Yellowstone super-volcano is overdue for an eruption.
Apparently the volcano has eruptile dysfunction.

What kind of dessert comes out of a musical volcano?
Bach Lava

I went looking through my database for any volcano abstracts.  There is quite a selection -  rust, peeling paint and scratches on all kinds of surfaces.
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Wednesday, November 20, 2019

Wherefrom that Surname of Lightfoot

I wondered what the origin of Gordon Lightfoot's surname is.  We watched the documentary about him last night.

The surname is derived from Old English and means light foot and likely an occupation as a messenger.


The Lightfoot migration to Canada can be traced to Henry Lightfoot landing in Nova Scotia in 1749.  A subsequent record indicates Richard Lightfoot came to St. John NB in 1784. A Lightfoot family was aboard the ship "billow" in 1833. 

Gordon Lightfoot has a busy tour schedule that shows dates into October 2020.  He was born in November 1938, so over 80 years old now. That makes another folk-rock/country music musician/composer who is still active. 

Here we are at Christmas with the Poinsettias about to arrive at the Fantasy of Trees display.  What a comparison with the American  experience where Thanksgiving has yet to arrive. I found a few abstracts from past years to remind us of the textures and shapes of their 'leaves/petals'.  
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Monday, September 30, 2019

Eugene and Delilah

The name Eugene and the the field of eugenics trace from the same origin - Greek - to be 'well-born'.  This seems like a vintage name to me.

Baby-naming trends remain somewhat stable: Liam and Emma continue to be the most popular names.  Noah, William, James and Oliver and then Olivia, Ava, Isabella and Sophia.

But "vintage" names are moving up. Arthur has jumped back into popular names after almost 100 years since it was last listed.  There's Calvin,  Emerson, Amos, Edgar, Chester, Tucker for boys.

What about Ada?  It started a comeback in 2018. Then there's 
Delilah, Ayla, Zoe, Margot and Felicity.

Supposedly researchers had found that names influence the choice of profession, where we live, whom we marry, grades achieved, and so on.  The original study took place in 1948 and was widely repeated, always finding that unusual names were more likely to have 'flunked' out of Harvard or to have exhibited signs of psychological neurosis, and so on.  

But the link between names and longevity, career choice and success, geographic and marriage preferences, and academic achievement has been questioned and disproven.  What has been proven is that names 'signal' things - like ethnicity, wealth, and country of origin and give a sense of economic status.  And then the receiver treats the person as such.  


So the likely question parents should ask is:  What signals does this name send and what does it imply?    That would be useful for parents who name their daughter Delilah.

Today's images are of driftwood on the beach in Salt Spring Island.
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Wednesday, July 24, 2019

Summer Pie Time!

It is time for summer pie.  First it is strawberry-rhubarb, then strawberry, then raspberry, now cherry, and soon the Queen of Pies - peach pie.  Did you learn to make pie crust?  I was lucky that my friend Janet had a mother who constantly made pies. My mother constantly made German streusel cakes - sweet raised yeast bread with fruit and sugar butter crumb toppings.  And those breakfast rolls with butter, brown sugar and cinnamon all gooey together. Consider these two desserts together and you can see how we lived a sugary sweet existence, blissfully ignorant of the health problems to make the news in later decades.

Why are pies round and cakes square? Because they are.  There is an explanation on Quora that comes up first.  It is based on the pie plate being easier to make round.  That would be the same for cakes.  Quora is great to read, but don't consider it information.

What makes a pie a pie?  A crust - even though there are crustless pies.  Think of the expression 'crustless pie' and you understand that a pie and crust go together.

Wikipedia's entry on pies is rich with information with delightful pictures of mouth-watering savoury and dessert variations.  I looked through the list of pies and the stargazy pie got my attention.  Not a happy result, though, as it is a Cornish dish made with baked sardines, eggs and potatoes. There are fish heads protruding through the crust, apparently so that they appear to be gazing skyward.   I couldn't make this up - take a look HERE.

Should we make square pies instead of round?  The Atlantic has a remarkably entertaining article on this topic. The Case for Squared Pie is HERE.  Dan Pashman is the author of the book Eat more Better:  How to Make Every Bite More Delicious and says that the square pie has more deliciousness - where the crust turns the corner in the pan is where the flavour from the filling is absorbed into the crust while maintaining toothsinkability.  He's done the arithmetic on this.   Sounds heavenly to me.
Out of the thousands of pie jokes, here are just two:

Q: Why did the pumpkin pie go to a dentist?
A: Because it needed a filling. 
Q: What do you get if you cross a train engine with an blueberry pie?
A: Puff pastry


Here's today's Prayer Plant image.  I am fascinated by the textures within these abstract shapes.






 
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