A LOT of happy chickens this week

 

 

 

 

https://vitalfarms.com/farm/dry-creek/

 

 

Morning Light

 

 

 

We don’t get out much

 

 

 

But we do a little

 

You are probably wondering

 

 

…why I haven’t sent out any pictures of pelicans gracefully gliding inches above the sea surface lately.

 

I was wondering the same thing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We loved our Mazda RX-7

 

 

So much so, that we had two of them, back-to-back way back when.  The rotary engine was fun to drive but there were production issues with engine wear, fuel economy, and emissions.  Mazda eventually moved on from it.

 

Now there is a new rotary concept.  It’s called the Astron Omega 1.  It’s not from Mazda, it’s from somebody else.  The designers figured out that all four parts of a four-cycle engine don’t have to happen in the same place.  Separate them into intake/compression in one part, move the air to the next section, and perform the combustion/exhaust functions there.  Both parts run at the same time, so it’s intense like a 2 cycle engine, but without the lubrication and emissions issues.

 

Front view.

 

 

Side view.

 

 

Here are some old guys talking about how it works.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LkkjYParp4&t=126s

 

They talk about other stuff too.  The rotary engine part starts at 6:30.

 

It’s small.  The model they’re showing here weighs 35 pounds, turns at 25,000 RPM, and puts out 160 horsepower with 60% efficiency.  (That’s a lot better efficiency than a piston engine.)  And it can run on hydrogen too.  I guess that’s all on computer simulations though.  It’s early in development.  Mazda, are you listening?  RX-9?

 

Did I tell this story?

 

 

Belle Isle.

 

Years ago, I spent an entire summer in Detroit on an accounting assignment.  It was a contract with the federal government and the reimbursement rules only allowed travel home to Colorado every other weekend, so I did a lot of driving around to explore.  I found this wonderful place called Belle Isle.  It’s in the Detroit River which runs between Lake Huron and Lake Erie.

 

https://www.google.com/maps/place/Belle+Isle/@42.3423977,-82.9996621,14z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m6!3m5!1s0x8824d4b2383fbbd3:0x3da444fedb5e0199!8m2!3d42.3432541!4d-82.9743495!16zL20vMDE1c3I0?entry=ttu

 

 

Drive across a lone bridge to get there.  The entire island is an urban park.  A sharp contrast to downtown Detroit.  There are roads to explore, trails to walk, lakes within the island, grassy sports fields, a conservatory, playgrounds, forests, and a giant old crusty multi-tiered fountain on the south end.  I found some photos on the internet.

 

 

 

 

 

Everything about Belle Isle in the 1980s felt a little long in the tooth, run-down, but run-down just added to the character.  It was magical; my favorite place to spend time away from work.  (While I had to be out of town.)

 

Mom was still alive then, so immediately when I got home the first time after my discovery, I shared it with her; my new favorite place.  She sat quietly while I described everything about it, then said, “You know, your dad was from Detroit.  That was his favorite place.”  He took her there to show it off, way back when it was fresh.  Long after Dad was dead, I had unwittingly discovered a favorite place of his that I had never heard of.  We got to share that, not at the same time, but together.

 

Signs

 

 

There are lots of ways to say it.

 

 

 

 

 

This one is the best.

 

Practically even charming.

 

Recalibration

 

 

Hadn’t thought about Duane lately, but I stumbled across this reference to his demise I wrote in 2006:

 

Week before last, we had a nice visit with Duane Dibbens, our longtime renter/friend/neighbor next door in Louisville. He looked as healthy and well as we have seen him in years. A week after that, he died. He went out to dinner with his dancing partner, they sat down together to watch some television after, and he just died. He was older, seventy-four, had heart bypass surgery a couple years back, and health issues since, so it was not a big surprise, but we’re sorry to see him go. He was a good friend/neighbor.

 

Wait.  He died, but after all, he was 74.  That explains it?  It seemed to then in 2006 when I was only 61.

 

 

Big deer

 

 

 

Little deer.

 

 

When I think of something to say

 

 

I have to say it right away.  If I don’t, then when I think of it again a few days later, I can’t remember if I said it out loud, or just thought it in my head.

 

 

Ghostly soldiers in strict formation

 

 

 

Occupying our agricultural fields.

 

It seemed to be a new thing a few years ago, to bag freshly planted citrus trees.  Now it looks to be a feature of every new orchard; and there are a lot of new orchards.  I don’t know if all these new orchards are adding to our citrus capacity here, or if old orchards are ageing out and this is just a natural replacement cycle.

 

Hearing Aids

 

 

JUDY DROPPED OFF HER HEARING AIDS TO GET REFURBISHED.  NOW I HAVE TO TALK TO HER IN ALL CAPS FOR THE NEXT THREE DAYS OR SHE WON’T HEAR WHAT I’M SAYING!

 

 

And still

 

 

The hummingbird infestation persists.

 

The recipe

 

 

Egg cartons.  Soft puffy cardboard.  Maybe add in a paper towel cardboard core.  Shred by hand and place in bowl.  Add hot water from the tap and let stand.

 

Some hours later, smush it a bit with your hands, stir with your fingers, and call it good.

 

The result?  Compostable cardboard mush.  Take it outside and dump it in the compost tumblers with the shredded yard clippings.

 

Along the way

 

 

Roadside flowers.

 

 

 

Yay

 

 

We have real air conditioning again!

 

When we got home from our July trip, the air didn’t work at all.  A repair guy got it running by that evening, but we realized after a couple days it wasn’t running at full output.  As the outside temperature went up from the 90s to the 100s, the inside temperature went up from the 70s to the 80s.  First World problem, right?  It didn’t seem that bad, so we rode it out for a while, waiting for the heat wave to pass.  Well now we’ve had over 80 days this summer of triple digit temperatures with no end in sight.  (The old record was 62 days.)   Once we decided to get the AC fixed, it took some time to get it diagnosed properly and another 10 days for the critical part to arrive.

 

Today.  Full air conditioning.  We set the indoor temperature.  It stays there.  Most excellent!

 

 

Let’s make a rule

 

 

Let’s say excellence should be rewarded.  How do we know how much it should be rewarded?  We have a process for that.  It’s the free-market capitalist system.  Put it out there and see how much people are willing to pay for that excellence.  The price will be what the market will bear.  Makes perfect sense, right?  Until it doesn’t.

 

Should there be a limit?  A professional athlete gets a 100-million-dollar contract.  That’s what the market will bear.  This person is good, but are they really a thousand times, or ten thousand times better at doing what they do than everybody else on the planet is at doing what they do?

 

Okay, I’ll reel it back a little.  How about corporate executives.  In 1965, on average, CEOs made 20 times what the workers at their companies made.  (Source: Economic Policy Institute.)  That seems like a big gap, but there is probably logic to justify it.  CEOs do important things.  But in 2021, the ratio of CEO to employee compensation increased to 399 to 1.  (Source: Economic Policy Institute.)  Any chance that’s excessive?  Were CEOs 20 times more important than each worker in 2021, and now they’re 399 times more important?

 

So, here’s my thought.  Maybe there should be salary caps for corporations.  There could be a rule that CEOs are only 20 times more important than the average worker and that should be their salary cap.  If they want to make more money, then the workers should get more money too.  I don’t care about the exact multiple.  Let it be 10, or 50, or 100.  Whatever’s fair.  Just because our free-market system produces sensible results in some cases doesn’t mean we should unquestioningly accept every result it produces.

 

 

 

The stand up challenge – Follow-up

 

 

The challenge:  Sit on the floor.  Without assistance, stand up.  No touching walls, cabinets, or furniture.  For every time your hand, elbow, or knee touch the floor, count one point.  Stand up with the fewest points possible.

 

 

Best answer:

Yes, I was able to get up without touching the floor or walls with my hands, knees, or elbows.  ZERO points subtracted.  THANK YOU FIRST RESPONDERS.

 

Good one!

 

 

 

And one for-real yes.  “I can do this.”  from our friend who happens to be a yoga instructor.

 

 

Boysenberries

 

 

Does anybody remember boysenberries?

 

Mom always had jams and jellies for us to put on toast and tarts.  Apricot, blackberry, strawberry, raspberry, boysenberry.  I haven’t thought about boysenberry for maybe fifty years.  I don’t know what just triggered it.  Is boysenberry still a thing?  Was it ever a thing outside Southern California?  Did it extend beyond Knott’s Berry Farm?

 

 

 

The stand up challenge

 

 

Sit on the floor.  Without assistance, stand up.  No touching walls, cabinets, or furniture.  For every time your hand, elbow, or knee touch the floor, count one point.  Stand up with the fewest points possible.

 

To be fair though, I think I should get to subtract my age from the total.

 

 

Football’s a stupid game

 

 

The Broncos blew their undefeated season on the Raiders at home.  17 16 Raiders.  Now they’re tied for last place at the bottom of the AFC West.

 

Go Cowboys!

 

 

Happy Chickens

 

 

 

 

https://vitalfarms.com/farm/lizlyn-acres/

 

And happy football fans.  The previously unranked Buffs, now ranked #22, at home taking on the perennial division foe Nebraska.  36 to 14 CU.  Coach says “We’re coming.”  We think they’re here!

 

The #11 Texas Longhorns win against #3 Alabama was great fun too.

 

Yay football season.  Go Broncos tomorrow!

 

A guy being interviewed on TV

 

 

He made the point that he was 74, and the average life expectancy of an American male was 76, so he could only expect a couple more years.  Self-serving B.S.  This year I’ll be 78.  By his measure, by my birthday, I’ll have a life expectancy of -2.  It might be a true statement that the average life expectancy of an American male born today is 76, but given this guy had already attained the age of 74, his expectations from there are something completely different.  Every time we achieve another year, we get a new life expectancy.  Take all the people that have already died by that age out of the equation, and his average life expectancy at 74 is now 86.  Besides, it’s an average expectancy, not a specific prediction.

 

Real data, intentionally misapplied, to mislead.  Grr.

 

 

The palm tree that got hit by lightning

 

 

A few weeks ago.

 

That’s not very many steps from our house.

 

It was really loud.

 

Confirmation Bias

 

 

In the context of news, it’s the tendency to ingest a perspective we already agree with.

 

Even without an outside source telling us, we already know how our chosen news sources lean.  The ones we watch the most tend to lean the same way we do.  Here is an outside source documenting what we already know.

 

 

The chart can be explored in detail with this link:

 

https://adfontesmedia.com/interactive-media-bias-chart/

 

AP and Reuters are pretty close to the middle.  MSNBC is to the left, Fox news to the right.  Clicking on any individual source reveals more about how the rating was determined.

 

The chart not only documents any political leanings of the reporting but does that against an axis of reliability; is each source more likely to be reporting verified facts, or do they tend to just make up stuff to fit their narrative.  That could be useful to know.  Isn’t it interesting that apparently the more a news source skews left or right, the less it relies on reliable evidence to make its case.

 

Of course, to believe this chart might be useful, a person would have to accept that it’s from an unbiased source and its methodology is sound to begin with…

 

This week’s eggs

 

 

LBH Ranch.

 

 

 

There are a lot of happy chickens here!

 

https://vitalfarms.com/farm/lbh-ranch/

 

 

Flagstaff Mountain

 

 

When we first moved to Boulder Colorado in 1968, we were blown away by the forest and trails of Flagstaff Mountain.  Flagstaff was not rugged and inaccessible, but small, round and friendly; right there adjacent to town.  A city street is suddenly switchbacks. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It’s an open Colorado kind of forest with an unobstructed view.  Besides the road, hiking trails lead from town to the top.  Longer challenges snake off into more remote terrain.  In 1968 I wanted to hike every step of every trail.  I think I did.  In 1968 I was blown away.  I still am.