July 24 2021 - The 2020 Olympics that occurred in 2021

 

Do you find it strange to see 2020 as the year of the Olympics? How will it be referenced in the future?  Something like: The 2020 Olympics which occurred in 2021? Here's something that is interesting and unusual about the Olympics: "The wood used to make the logo is special. Turns out, during 1964 Olympics, athletes from across the world brought seeds from their countries and the wood is taken from the trees that grew from them. The wood came from 160 pines and spruces grown from seeds that came from Northern Europe, Canada and Ireland. They were constructed in the traditional Japanese woodworking style of Yosegi-Zaiku — a marquetry technique that dates back to Japan’s Edo period and uses different grains, colors and textures of wood to make mosaic designs." Here's a Foxglove today.

Nov 9 2020 - The Exception

 

Our weather in November has been the exception this year.  Yesterday was a summer's day.  Today it will again  be summer in November.  And the forecast is the same for Tuesday.  That is 20 degrees compared to the daily average of 9 degrees.   In the world of averages, November turns out to be an indistinct month in Grimsby's weather.  The coldest month is January, the driest month is January, the snowiest month is January.  We've passed the rainiest month - that's September.  November does have the distinction of lake effects snow possibilities.  That's how Snowvember came about in 2014.  There's a Youtube video of the snow engulfing Buffalo.   In the water temperature information, it says that March has the coldest water temperature at 2.7 degrees Celsius and August the highest at 21.7 degrees.   In the information for travel to Grimsby, it lists all the cities that can reach Grimsby by plane.  What an interesting array of cities - London, Athens, Glasgow, Copenhagen, Istanbul, Lahore, Paris, Ottawa, and so on.  Maybe the ads for travel are the reason for this unusual 'mix'.  I can't imagine taking them up on the offer to work from home at an exotic location or retire to an exotic location.  We're looking at the bark of a Scotch Pine at Gage Park.  So many colours and textures.

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Twitter Presents Mutiny on the Bounty

There was a cruise ship Mutiny on the Bounty via Twitter reported on the Weather Network on the weekend.  The ship had missed its fifth scheduled port of call in a two-week vacation to Iceland, Amsterdam, Norway and Ireland due to bad weather. This would be a scenario from hell.  Passengers board the cruise ship with the expectation of luxury and pampering that they consider they've paid for, and end up roughing it with the toilets out of order and confined to a floating hotel with few or no stops.  The staged protests with signs that said "Refund! Refund! Refund!" There have been far worse cruise ship experiences.  Perhaps the passenger twitter reports made this one distinct, along with the organized protests and angry confrontations sent out via twitter regularly. Guinness Book of Records doesn't have records for the worst vacations or cruise ship incidents.  It has the worst roads, longest journey by car, barefoot, wheelchair, all the continents, skateboard journeys, and so on. The usual strange variations on travel. To find out the worst cruise ship experiences/incidents, we go to one of the sensationalist articles - a good example is HERE. Today's picture is a close-up of a carved wooden sculpture in the RBG gardens.

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Luxury Yacht in Grimsby

The Ocean Dreamwalker III docked in Grimsby last week.  It is a luxury super yacht valued at 30 million pounds. It docked at the old fishing docks. That means it docked in Grimsby UK.   The owner is Chinese technology pioneer John Deng Zhonghan whose wife is a celebrated singer in China. A helicopter can land on the boat.  It was reported that they are looking for something larger with better helicopter capabilities. Its helicopter was visible on the deck in the pictures. Over here in Grimsby Ontario, there used to be a pier/wharf.  It was significant.  In 1884, fifty thousand people came to Grimsby Park - that was a high point of the Chautauqua era.  Many arrived via steamboats from Toronto.  There are some impressive steamers in the pictures - for example 'Turbina'.  You can see them HERE. The marine traffic today is focused on the Welland Canal.  Last week a luxury cruise ship - the Hamburg - went through the Welland Canal.  That's how I found the Ocean Dreamwalker - it came up in the search for the Welland Canal story.                           The nature abstracts today are from Sacramento.

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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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On Being Cheap

I was in Harvest Barn yesterday - it is a local produce and bakery store in St. Catharines (like the old days of grocery stores in yesterday's daily post).  The cashier asked the lady ahead of me if she wanted to buy a carry bag ($.05) or use one of the small meat/freezer bags as they were free.  The lady had only 2 pounds of butter, and she wanted a bag because the butter was cold.  She accepted the little bag over the bag that cost the five cents.  Then the cashier told me how she uses these little freezer bag for all kinds of things.  And concluded with:  "I'm cheap". So I wondered what "cheap" is and how do we recognize it.  Here are 5 major differences between cheap and frugal from money.usnews.com 1. Cheap and frugal people both love to save money, but frugal people will not do so at the expense of others. 2. Frugality is about assessing the bigger picture and having the patience to cash in on the simple savings strategies. 3. Cheapness uses price as a bottom line; frugality uses value as a bottom line. 4. Cheap people are driven by saving money regardless of the cost; frugal people are driven by maximizing total value, including the value of their time. 5. Being cheap is about spending less; being frugal is about prioritizing your spending so that you can have more of the things you really care about. When I read the full article, I was a bit discouraged.  It points to a lot of rationalization by the 'frugal' author for choosing where and how to spend money:  a lot of one's internal conversations are taken up with mundane decisions.  It is a start, though, and helps to understand this significant topic. And a search for the country with the reputation for being cheap?  Two countries show up: Holland and Scotland!

And What about Crīstesmæsse?

In first year university, our English course included works written in Old English.  It was a double duty activity - translating the text of basically another language, and then learning to interpret the intended text.  You may ask in a skeptical way:  How difficult was it to read, reallyt?  I saw the Old English version of the word Christmas and here it is: Crīstesmæsse, meaning "Christ's Mass". So in case you didn't have the first year English course experience, here are 10 Old English words to learn during the Cristesmaesse season. These are from Mark Forsyth's The Horologicon: A Day’s Jaunt Through the Lost Words of the English Language. 1. UHTCEARE “There is a single Old English word meaning ‘lying awake before dawn and worrying.’ Uhtceare is not a well-known word even by Old English standards, which were pretty damn low. In fact, there is only one recorded instance of it actually being used." 2. EXPERGEFACTOR "An expergefactor is anything that wakes you up. This may simply be your alarm clock, in which case it is time to hit the snooze button. But it may be a dustman or a milkman or a delivery van, in which case it is time to lean out of your window and shriek: 'Damn you all, you expergefactors!' This ought to keep them quiet until one of them has at least found a good dictionary."   3. AND 4. PANTOFLE AND STADDLE “Once your toes are snugly pantofled, you can stagger off to the bathroom, pausing only to look at the little depression that you have left in your bed, the dip where you have been lying all night. This is known as a staddle.” 5. GRUBBLING "It’s time to check whether you’ve got your keys and your phone and your purse or wallet. This is done by grubbling in your pockets. Grubbling is like groping, except less organised. It is a verb that usually refers to pockets, but can also be used for feeling around in desk drawers that are filled with nicknacks and whatnot." 6. MUGWUMP “Mugwump is a derogatory word for somebody in charge who affects to be above petty squabbles and factions. So when your boss tries to make peace at the meeting table like an impartial angel, he is being a mugwump.” 7. RAWGABBIT "A rawgabbit, just in case you were wondering, is somebody who speaks in strictest confidence about a subject of which they know nothing. A rawgabbit is the person who pulls you aside and reveals in a careful whisper that the head of Compliance is having an affair with the new recruit in IT, which you know to be utterly untrue because the head of Compliance is having an affair with you, and the new recruit in IT hasn’t started yet." 8. VINOMADEFIED “Once you are properly vinomadefied all sorts of intriguing things start to happen. Vinomadefied, by the way, does not mean ‘made mad by wine,’ but merely ‘dampened by it.’” 9. LANSPRESADO "A lanspresado is (according to a 1736 dictionary of thieves’ slang): 'He that comes into Company with but Two-pence in his Pocket.' Lanspresados are everywhere. They have usually forgotten their wallets or can’t find a cashpoint or some intensely complicated thing has happened with their rent, which means that they’re skint till Thursday." 10. VOMITORIUM “A vomitorium is not a room in which ancient Romans would throw up halfway through a banquet in order to make room for the next course. That’s a myth. A vomitorium is simply a passage by which you can exit a building, usually a theatre.” A version of this story originally appeared in mental_floss magazine.

Abstracts in the City - the AGO Staircase

I climbed the staircase in the AGO for the first time.  I can imagine that this is the first of many times.  There is a lot to see in the curves, lines, textures and details.  There will be interesting differences with the change in light and time of day.  

It is great to have a city like Toronto to be able to explore in.