Lilac Lore

The Lilac buds are swelling. Even at this early stage, you can already tell whether you're gonna have a good bloom year or not.

The buds (above) are just going to be leaves, while...
...

THESE show the first signs of tiny purple blossoms! Don't know if it would be as easy to tell on yellow or white Lilacs - i'm sure the dark purple type are easier to see. Anyway, i'm happy to say that i saw very few non flower buds this year!

RANT : Lost Life Data

Being a middle aged (the latter end of "middle"!) person, i don't take all this new technology for granted. Yes, i'm thrilled silly with my iPod, and love my netbook, and i think it's great that the Smartphones can do all the things they do - but i am also old enough to remember when cassette tapes were hi tech! So i see the other side of it. i own a pay as you go cell phone and still have a land line - i can't bring myself to trust a phone that can run out of battery power! That's just too unreliable - we have elderly parents - i don't want one of them to get sick and not be able to call me because my battery died or i ran out of minutes!

And while i couldn't live without my computer now, it still bothers me that the information i'm now putting on CDs, SD cards, flash drives, and peripheral hard drives may not be able to be accessed in a couple of years because there will be NEW ways to store data! i have my resume on a floppy disk, had it safely on there for years and could update it at anytime - now it's just a piece of plastic! i still have my old PC - it does have USB ports, so hopefully (if i ever think about doing it) i could transfer the resume to a flash drive. i know there are solutions,but, as a self described computer illiterate and old person, it's a lot

of work and confusing - more trouble than it's worth!

i had a scanner - just utilized it on occasion - and now, after i acquired my last PC, it's too old, not compatible, and also junk! i paid a lot for that thing at the time - now i have to invest in another one when the one i have is like brand new! Then i have to explain to my "Don't get any of those newfangled gadgets near me!" hubby WHY i'm throwing away an expensive, perfectly good piece of computer equipment!

Some of my NEVER USED floppy discs sitting on my useless scanner...
Hey, they're for sale....... cheap!

So are all these photos i painstakingly transferred to a CD for posterity going to be unavailable to me in a few years, or will i have to transfer all of them to something else? i know there are companies that can store all of my data for a monthly fee. Great - what if they disappear 3 years from now? What if i lose my job and can't AFFORD the monthly fee anymore?

i guess i'm looking for certainty in an uncertain world, and may never get what i want, but i wonder if i'm the ONLY person who has noticed any of this stuff!?

Fish Favorites

Pet shop people don't like me. At least if they've seen me before. i'm the one who goes into the fish department, stops at the "10 cent Feeder Fish" tank (the 30 gallon tank filled with 500 1/2 inch goldfish), and wants to pick out ten "pretty" ones! Yes, they always warn you that those fish may be inbred and/or diseased, and there's a chance they could affect the health of your current fish population - which is very true! - if you just toss them in immediately. So i definitely recommend putting the new purchases (even if they were NOT feeders) in a quarantine tank for a week or two first. i don't always do that, but that's my risk to take! Most of the time, the store employees are very polite about it and actually chase down and net the fish i pick out. NOTE: don't come in on a Saturday or at a busy time and expect them to take that time - be considerate :o)

Some of the cheapie fish in the pond - the little ones in the photo above are Rosy Red minnows

Seriously, though, my feeders have done very well. Oh a few do die right away, but that's why they cost practically nothing! But i try to pick out color mixes, longer fins/tails (Comets), things like that, and they breed with the others and really create a colorful bunch of fish. In fact, around here, that's the only way i can find Comets anymore.

These two (the bigger ones) are Koi - they cost a little more than the feeders! This is the first time this year that they made an appearance. i had a third, but haven't seen him yet - he may have not made it thru the winter...

Me, Interrupted

Today i'm in the throes of a cancer scare. Normally, i don't like to be serious on my blogs, i'm making an exception today. This IS also a journal, more or less, and, while i also know that i have a pretty low following on this year old blog, hopefully someone will read this and can understand.

First of all, i'm a hypochondriac and have learned to recognize that. i have so far had brain tumors, heart disease, skin cancer, Lou Gehrig's (ALS), plus a few more i can't think of right now - all were in my head, but i even had symptoms - it's amazing what your mind can do to you physically! The Web is a godsend- most of the time i look up some symptoms and realize that i don't really have the disease (then the symptoms magically disappear!)

Then last year, a co worker of mine had been having stomach problems for awhile. She had only been there a year, was not a friendly person, so i did not yet know her very well and really never knew any details. But she was taking over the counter meds for it, eating Activia (the yogurt that's supposed to regulate your digestive system), stuff like that. Then she started to call in sick here and there, called me one day in early December and said her doctor was putting her in hospital to see what was wrong (she was in quite a bit of pain by then).

That was a Monday. The following Saturday she was dead.

Apparently it was cancer, and she had hardly any intestine left by the time they found out. She was about my age, too.

...Needed to stick something lighthearted in here - made ME laugh, anyway!

Keeping this background in mind, I had just mentioned to DH that i was glad I didn't need Activia, i have never had many problems like that (OK, years ago i had Irritable Bowel Syndrome- went on a low carbohydrate diet and stopped eating sugar, and it disappeared. Completely). Then, about a month ago, i became constipated - and it hasn't gone away! Yes, i could take laxatives and it would be better, but it doesn't change the fact that something is still not right. After about 3 weeks, i saw my doctor and am now setting up an appointment for a colonoscopy, because now, i'm scared silly that i have colon cancer. Now, the procedure itself does not concern me - if they would find cancer and would have to go through treatments (which i certainly don't want, but at least i would have a chance), that would be tolerable as well. No, i'm afraid of a situation like my co worker had - that it's found too late, or it would not be treatable and the doctors could not help me! My hubby has had Non Hodgkin's Lymphoma - twice since 1996 - but he has done very well and after going thru a LOT of various treatments, is currently fine. After all that, my greatest fear is that now I would end up with something that will "get" ME in a month! i'm really NOT constantly fretting about it - it's the times i wake up at 3 A.M. and start to think about it....

So if you could cross your fingers and send some good luck wishes my way, i'd be happy! And i'll pass along whatever the diagnosis ends up to be (hopefully just hypochondria!).

First Art/Craft Event 2010

Well, the Home & Garden show, for all intents and purposes, sucked (businesswise)! Looking at it from another perspective, though, i had time to walk around and talk to the people who had plant nursery setups, one being Bench's Nursery, which is my favorite one in the area!

Why? First, because you can tell they actually love plants, and because they really go out of their way to find very unusual flora and little treasures! Only purchased one thing there - i'll be taking my annual "plant quest" journey next month, and will stop at their place then and

load up! What one thing did i purchase? It's another addition to the "wish I had thought of this first!" list (along with Velcro and Post It notes).

Called "Pinky Trees", these are tiny cacti or succulents planted into a tiny capsule about 1 1/2" long that you can wear as a pendant! It has holes in the bottom so you can set it in water 1-2 times a month,and of course can live in the capsule until it gets too big, then it can be potted up and you have a houseplant! How cute! Brought it to work today so i can string a nice neckchain for it. And, of course, when it

does outgrow its capsule, you can bet i will find a plant i have grown myself to replace it!

Some amazing landscaping setups, too...

Also enjoyed talking to the other artisians there about different

events, their experiences with the local art shows, and an artist's life in general (for the ones who actually do this for a living). i did have some offers to consign or wholesale to a couple of local businesses, one of which is very close to where i live, so i may take them up on it.

Networking is always good!

Nature ~ Again Resurrected

It has been less than a week since the snow faded away - it had effectively kept any flower growth dormant. But now- the Winter Aconite is suddenly in full bloom!

One small group of Crocus have appeared...

 The fish can finally see the sky...

And the Pitcher Plant that resides in a pot in the pond looks incredible, considering it has been frozen in solid ice for the past 2 months!

i haven't seen my young Palm  since the cones went over him in November - time to peek....

 Oh, and he looks very healthy!

  

One last small miracle - my Foxtail Lily is emerging! It was very iffy as to whether it was hardy enough for my area - apparently THIS year it was!

Wow! Where Do The Hours Go?!

This was definitely news to me!

The massive 8.8 earthquake that struck Chile may have changed the entire Earth's rotation and shortened the length of days on our planet, a NASA scientist said Monday.

The quake, the seventh strongest earthquake

 in recorded history, hit Chile Saturday and should have shortened the length of an Earth day by 1.26 microseconds (millionths of a second), according to research scientist Richard Gross at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.

"Perhaps more impressive is how much the quake shifted Earth's axis," NASA officials said in a Monday update.

The computer model used by Gross and his colleagues to determine the effects of the Chile earthquake

 effect also found that it should have moved Earth's figure axis by about 3 inches (8 centimeters or 2.7 milliarcseconds). Earth's figure axis is not the same as its north-south axis, which it spins around once every day at a speed of about 1,000 mph (1,604 kilometers per hour).

Image: NASA Glenn Research Center

The figure axis is the axis around which Earth's mass is balanced. It is offset from the Earth's north-south axis by about 33 feet (10 meters). Strong earthquakes have altered Earth's days and its axis in the past. The magnitude-9.1 Sumatran earthquake in 2004, which set off a deadly

tsunami, should have shortened Earth's days by 6.8 microseconds and shifted its axis by about 2.76 inches (7 centimeters, or 2.32 milliarcseconds).

It did not shift the Earth's axis as far because the earthquake was located nearer the equator.

- msnbc.com

 

 

My question is this: are these axis shifts new, or is our technology just becoming sensitive enough to measure such things...? i think i could research this a little and find out fairly easily, but it's more fun to speculate!