Marilyn's Photos - Nov 19 2025 - Pig Latin vs Dog Latin

 

My question of the day:  Does Elon Musk’s robot dog Dogimus have some actual Latin in its name.  He is known for Latin phrases and Roman-inspired imagery.  It does relate to the name for his humanoid robot which is Optimus, derived from the Latin word for Best or greatest.  The “imus” could be taken to suggest a greatest dog robot.  I wonder if Elon Musk uses Pig Latin in his communcations.  His company’s Neuralink projects involved a pig named Gertrude.  The project involves implanting a computer chip in the brain to demonstrate a working brain-to-machine interface. This would likely be his twist on Pig Latin.  To speak the real Pig Latin, the instructions go like this:  Move the first consonant or consonant blend to the end of the work and add “ay”.  For words that begin with a vowel, simply add “way”, “yay",” or ay” to the end.  “Pig” becomes “ig” + “p” and then add the “aya” to become “igpay” - this is or was meant to hide conversations from people.  Wikipedia also says that there is Dog Latin. This is translating English words into Latin by conjugating or declining them as if they were Latin words.  We did this with Coca Cola in high school.   It turns out there is such a thing as Dog Latin. It has a long tradition and is mentioned in Love’s Labour’s Lost, Shakespeare’s play written in the 1590s. Skip ahead to the present and Margaret Atwood has a phrase in The Handmaid’s Tale scratched into the wall.  Take one of our favourite TV shows - The Red Green Show. It closed each episode with their Possum Lodge motto:  Quando omni flunkus moritati - whch translated to “When all else fails, play dead”.  Wikipedia says there was an episode in which some of the members break away to form a rival Salamander Lodge ,whose motto is Quando omni flunkus terra retreatum - “When all else fails, climb under a rock”.  Latin seems to be with us every day without us being attentive to it.  What about this latin - Lorem ipsum - it is the nonsense filler text and is based on a Cicero work.  It comes up in Photoshop every time I used the text function. Millie goes to the groomer today, and here’s the explanation for why her haircut costs much more than mine did yesterday.  And below  is Dezi with her seven house rules.

Read more daily posts here: marilyncornwellblogspot.com Purchase works here: Fine Art America- marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca

Mairlyn's Photos - Nov 18 2025 - Robot Vacuums

 

We wonder about self-driving cars and how long it will take for them to be considered safe.  Are there any lessons to learn from robot vacuum cleaners?  They’ve been around for decades now. Remember the Roomba?  That was a great product name.  The designs started in the 1950s but it took quite a while for products to be released.  It was the the 1980s that the Dustbot was released as part of the Omnibot line of toys. It carried a mini broom and dustpan for decoration.  Robot vacuum cleaners can operate autonomously or under human direction. There are now anti-drop and anti-bump sensors, camera-based mapping, wet mopping and so on. A Huffpost article recommended the Shark Matrix as the best of all the products available.  In that article the Roomba starts at  $149 on Amazon and the Shark Matrix is $500 at Amazon.  Switching to a Canadian website on top models the MOVA P10 Pro Ultra Robot Vacuum… is $899 Canadian.  That Shark Matrix that claims it is $300 on Amazon is listed at $1,099 Canadian.  That sizeable difference in pricing is due to a combination of factors -  the result of “country pricing”, smaller market, import duties, transportation, lower competition, exchange rates, and regulatory and compliance costs. I would have thought with the cheap prices in the U.S., there would be a larger portion of Americans using robot vacuum cleaners, but it looks like 14% of Americans own a robot vacuum cleaner. There isn’t any data for Canada, but it is considered to be around 10%.   It seems to me that current robotic products are pretty boring - pool cleaners, vacuum cleaners, lawn mowers…not very exciting products. My guess is robotic pets for children/adults are the fastest growing segment of robotics and AI. No mess, no fuss, no vet visits.  I don’t think Elon Musk’s robotic dog would be very appealing as a pet.  Here’s a marketing shot of it.  I think the Ageless Innovation Joy for All puppy at $250 is more my style.  What would Millie have to say about it - a robot dog that looks like Millie as a puppy - very appealing.

Read more daily posts here: marilyncornwellblogspot.com Purchase works here: Fine Art America- marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca

Mairlyn's Photos - Nov 17 2025 - Accordion Band

 

My sister was in an accordion band/orchestra when we were little.  I have a  memory of my parents dropping her off for a practice at a local hall, and there were a lot of children with accordions arranged like an orchestra. Why the accordion was so popular from the 1940s to the 1960s seems strange.  There were many orchestras during this time.  I assume it was the great European emigration after the war.   Which music school did we take accordion lessons at?  We all took lessons, as accordion was a beloved German instrument, and my grandfather played accordion. Elio Viola was a well-known accordionist and he had a highly successful Accordion School from the late 1940s in St. Catharines.  The Ryson’s Studio in St. Catharines is a candidate school we could have had lessons at.  They are known for having Polka King Walter Ostanek as a student.  The teachers were Ernst and son Boris Bergstrom - those are familiar names  They also opened the Master Conservatory in St. Catharines. I don’t recall that we went there. There are reminisces at a site called accordionists.info - The Accordionists Forum, and one of the contributors is Riccardo who regales with stories of his lifelong love of accordions and experiences in Hamilton and St. Catharines. Here’s the link. In the conversation between these accordionists, one of the participants still plays in an accordion orchestra - in the Netherlands.  To learn more about St. Catharines in the 1960s, 70s and 80s - there is a Facebook page HERE. Lots of pictures. Here’s an accordion keyboard picture.

Read more daily posts here: marilyncornwellblogspot.com Purchase works here: Fine Art America- marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca

Marilyn's Photos - Nov 16 2025 - Christmas is Chocolate Time

 

Is there any time that isn’t chocolate time?  Somehow Christmas is chocolate ad time.   The first edible chocolate bar happened in 1847.  After that conching was invented by Lindt where chocolate was mixed and aerated for hours to create that smooth, creaming, melt-in-your-mouth texture that we consider chocolate. The Europeans took out the chilis and spices and put in the sugars.  There were a lot of inventions, evolutions and developments along the way.  Maybe chocolate is the diamond of the candy world.   Do you know that there are preserved chocolate bars made between 1764 and 1795 for the King of Poland.  They bear the King’s monogram and on display in his Palace on the Water in Warsaw.  Isn’t that curiosity of some sort. And the industrial movement of the 1800s and 1900s meant that wrapping chocolate bars in festive labels became affordable for the middle class, with figurines like chocolate Santas and elves becaming a tradition, along with the Chocolate Advent Calendar.   There seems to me to be a societal evolution where Christmas has become a time of indulgence. The box of chocolates is perfect for the middle class to showcase indulgence.  What could be better than that?  Well, for the rich, there is something.  Le chocolat box includes chocolates, necklaces, earrings, rings and bracelets in diamonds, sapphires and emeralds. I found a picture and it doesn’t look that impressive, does it? That’s because it really is jewellery with some chocolate. At $1.5 million, I was hoping for something more compelling.   More affordable (!) in comparison would be Le Madeline au Truffe - a single chocolate truffle costing $250, To’ak chocolate bar - $360 and the DeLaFee’s gold chocolate box with 8 chocolates and an antique gold coin at $390. And there are more options than these. Don’t worry that you will have to choose which one to get for Christmas.  We have a succession of chocolate festive days - Valentine’s and Easter.  Then you can move into World Chocolate Day, International Chocolate Day, and National Chocolate Day. Or you can expand to other religious celebrations - Day of the Dead, Hanukkah and Diwali. There’s an endless chocolate highway with many stops along the way.

Read more daily posts here: marilyncornwellblogspot.com Purchase works here: Fine Art America- marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca

Marilyn's Photos - Nov 15 2025 - Eating with the Swimming Fish

 

There’s a story that shows a flooded restaurant in Thailand with the water up to people’s knees and below the surface there are fish swimming around - lots of them.  This happened with a damn breach a few days ago.  It is popular news now with murky water filled with fish inside the restaurant.  It turns out the restaurant was first flooded four years ago, and fish showed up.  The novelty attracted many new customers.  Ii don’t know what happened in between time, but this time, the restaurant is packed with people enjoying the nibbling at their toes. How common is this? There are other articles with koi fish swimming about in a cafe.  These look like more decorative fish.  There’s a 2024 facebook post from the Red Dwarf Fan Club showing a different restaurant with fish swimming around the tables.  There are others with fish pools separate from the diners.  The flooded restaurant video shows everyone is in the flood - the kitchen staff cooking, the waiters, the eaters.  The water is murky and the fish aren’t particularly clear in the pictures.   My cynical view says that every news outlet included this story because it means “clicks” and that gives them advertising revenue.   One of those human-interest stories that just gets our attention. Here are the koi at the Marie Selby Botanical Garden in Florida.  They look friendly and fun. We can understand the appeal.

Read more daily posts here: marilyncornwellblogspot.com Purchase works here: Fine Art America- marilyncornwell.com Redbubble - marilyncornwellart.ca