Error message

Deprecated function: Array and string offset access syntax with curly braces is deprecated in include_once() (line 20 of /home/caucusni/public_html/includes/file.phar.inc).

OT ~ Welcome to Saturday!

Submitted by smiley7 on Sat, 03/30/2019 - 5:50am

Sit-a-while
on swinging porch
where tin-dippers and
sweet water
in cool touches
meet lips
from hand dug wells.

Love is a friendship set to music. ~ Joseph Campbell

Good morning good people,

"Baby T. Rex Was an Adorable Ball of Fluff"

"It may be hard to imagine towering Tyrannosaurus rex as tiny, but the toothy Cretaceous giant didn't spring from an egg fully grown. In fact, T. rex hatchlings were about the size of very skinny turkeys, with "arms" that were longer in proportion to their tiny bodies than in adults. And each baby T. rex was covered in a coat of downy feathers."
[...]
"These and many more T. rex surprises abound in T. rex: The Ultimate Predator, a new exhibit opening March 11 at the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) in New York City. While T. rex is one of the most iconic dinosaurs, the exhibition presents new discoveries that are transforming scientists' understanding of this colossal carnivore and its tyrannosaur cousins, all of which likely had feathers, too." https://www.livescience.com/64936-t-rex-new-look-exhibit.html?utm_source...

A Russian fairy tale.

Little Red Riding Hood and the Wolf in the Forest ~ Carl Larsson, 1881.

This 1960 documentary recreates the universe as it would appear to a voyager barreling through space. This film was among the sources used by Kubrick in 2001: A Space Odyssey. ~ National Film Board of Canada.

Mini mum, Mini scule and Mini ature are not new automobiles. They are newly discovered frogs.

"Mini mum, Mini ature, and Mini scule “are astronomically small,” says Mark Scherz, an evolutionary biologist at Ludwig-Maximilians Universität in Munich, Germany, who described these and two other new tiny frog species in a new study published March 27 in the journal PLoS ONE. Mini is an all-new genus of frog.

“You could sit the brain on the top of a pin. It’s amazing that they have all the same organs you or I have in our bodies, but in a package that can fit four times on your own thumbnail.” https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/2019/03/smallest-frog-species...

Shout out to West Coast meet-up; have a great one.

Tags:

Open Thread

Vote

Comments

Submitted by smiley7 on Sat, 03/30/2019 - 6:00am

Wherever you are,

hoping you've a wonderful day.

Submitted by randtntx on Sat, 03/30/2019 - 7:21am

Good morning

smiley. I like the phrase "astronomically small" to describe the pinhead-sized frog. The microscopic world is huge.
The little dinosaur is very cute, almost cuddly, except for the teeth. Thanks for the heads-up on the exhibit, it sounds fun. I'll have to tell my crew in NY.
That Carl Larsson painting makes me want to stick it on my wall and look at it.

Hurling through space with all the rest of you. Thanks for the OT smiley...best Saturday to you.

Submitted by smiley7 on Sat, 03/30/2019 - 9:13am

Fun mood this morning, randtntx.

@randtntx
Would enjoy the exhibit as well; especially if accompanied with son; he knows dinosaurs.

Wanted to escape the silly season and 'latestgate' and folktales came to mind.

Wonder if the tiny fogs give one warts? Cute little creatures, they are.

Hey, thanks for reading and have a great weekend.

Submitted by apenultimate on Sat, 03/30/2019 - 9:08am

Nice Morning Surprise

Tulsi's Los Angeles appearance today had to be moved to a larger venue--a unitarian church.

That's a good sign. Her Facebook page shows 1,726 guests, which is always way overblown. But she might be bringing in half that, which is still a lot of people!

Yesterday, on one of her 4 interviews on left-ish online media (not sure how to rate TYT), she mentioned she was over 50,000 unique donors. So, less than 15,000 to go and we're still in March.

Submitted by smiley7 on Sat, 03/30/2019 - 9:16am

Thanks for the heads-up, apenultimate; go Tulsi.

@apenultimate

Submitted by Raggedy Ann on Sat, 03/30/2019 - 9:49am

Good morning, smiley ~~

Sitting at the laundromat
watching the folks
loading washers and dryers
with their soiled threads.
The air smells of soap,
softener, and dryer sheets;
the aroma lingers
on ones skin.
Good day - have a good one -
she waved good bye at last.
The work is done
now it’s time to play
on this beautiful start
to a nondescript Saturday.

Have a lovely day, everyone!

—

"The “jumpers” reminded us that one day we will all face only one choice and that is how we will die, not how we will live." Chris Hedges on 9/11

Submitted by smiley7 on Sat, 03/30/2019 - 9:59am

Good day, RA; i know the woman

@Raggedy Ann
at the laundromat.

Thanks for this treat. Brings smiles to the day.

Until we meet again at that coin-drop place, may peace, cheer and love be with you.

Submitted by Lookout on Sat, 03/30/2019 - 11:01am

A beautiful spring day here

Calling for mid 70's. Supposedly a rain comes through tonight. We've been almost 2 weeks without rain...longest dry spell in months and a nice break from the gray.

Trade day was very social, lots of visiting and chit chat.

Dinosaurs provide lots of lessons...extinction among them. However dinosaurs still live among us...from turtles to caimans to crocodiles.

Here's one we do...Don't you remember the time?
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cR_hYxbvyUo]

—

“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

Submitted by smiley7 on Sat, 03/30/2019 - 11:19am

Beautiful music, Lookout; many thanks for sharing.

Making the rounds is news of dinosaurs: 66 million-year-old deathbed linked to dinosaur-killing meteor https://news.berkeley.edu/2019/03/29/66-million-year-old-deathbed-linked...

"The beginning of the end started with violent shaking that raised giant waves in the waters of an inland sea in what is now North Dakota.

Then, tiny glass beads began to fall like birdshot from the heavens. The rain of glass was so heavy it may have set fire to much of the vegetation on land. In the water, fish struggled to breathe as the beads clogged their gills.

The heaving sea turned into a 30-foot wall of water when it reached the mouth of a river, tossing hundreds, if not thousands, of fresh-water fish — sturgeon and paddlefish — onto a sand bar and temporarily reversing the flow of the river. Stranded by the receding water, the fish were pelted by glass beads up to 5 millimeters in diameter, some burying themselves inches deep in the mud. The torrent of rocks, like fine sand, and small glass beads continued for another 10 to 20 minutes before a second large wave inundated the shore and covered the fish with gravel, sand and fine sediment, sealing them from the world for 66 million years.

"This unique, fossilized graveyard — fish stacked one atop another and mixed in with burned tree trunks, conifer branches, dead mammals, mosasaur bones, insects, the partial carcass of a Triceratops, marine microorganisms called dinoflagellates and snail-like marine cephalopods called ammonites — was unearthed by paleontologist Robert DePalma over the past six years in the Hell Creek Formation, not far from Bowman, North Dakota. The evidence confirms a suspicion that nagged at DePalma in his first digging season during the summer of 2013 — that this was a killing field laid down soon after the asteroid impact that eventually led to the extinction of all ground-dwelling dinosaurs. The impact at the end of the Cretaceous Period, the so-called K-T boundary, exterminated 75 percent of life on Earth."

Fossilized fish piled one atop another, suggesting that they were flung ashore and died stranded together on a sand bar after the seiche withdrew.

May snow tomorrow night and Monday, but pleasant today, overcast but warm for here.

Our Farmer's market doen't begin until around June; it's also a good place to see old acquaintances.

Thanks again for the music and have a great weekend.

Submitted by Anja Geitz on Sat, 03/30/2019 - 11:38am

Hello from a Baby T-Rex

Wow. There's a visual. Wish I still lived in the city. I loved going to the Hayden Planatarium at AMNH. Their exhibits were always fascinating. The T-Rex exhibit sounds like good one too!

This afternoon I'm going to my first Art class here in sunny Southern California. Looking forward to it. It's a wine and art class for people like me who aren't artists and just wanna dabble a little in colors and shapes, er, and drink a little wine. Lol.

Have a marvelous day everyone! Thanks smiley for an entertaining OT!

—

There is always Music amongst the trees in the Garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it. ~ Minnie Aumonier

Submitted by smiley7 on Sat, 03/30/2019 - 11:50am

Good going, zoebear; art class, wine and conversation should

@Anja Geitz
make for a splendid afternoon.

Enjoy!

Submitted by Anja Geitz on Sat, 03/30/2019 - 11:54am

Is that picture from the palette of that wonderful guy

@smiley7

Whose name I can't remember who used to paint on PBS?

—

There is always Music amongst the trees in the Garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it. ~ Minnie Aumonier

Submitted by smiley7 on Sat, 03/30/2019 - 12:01pm

It's a random choice from wiki.

@Anja Geitz
However, can't beat a good palette for success.

Submitted by Anja Geitz on Sat, 03/30/2019 - 1:17pm

No you can't!

@smiley7

And a good metaphor for life too

—

There is always Music amongst the trees in the Garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it. ~ Minnie Aumonier

Submitted by Dawn's Meta on Sat, 03/30/2019 - 4:01pm

Ads for Weherhauser Corp. done by a Japanese

@Anja Geitz @Anja Geitz @Anja Geitz @Anja Geitz @Anja Geitz @Anja Geitz traditional brush water colorist. We stopped by the hq just as WH was being sold to a holding corp. They were emptying closets, the basement and all.

We asked about those ads, and they went and brought us a DVD, a book, and information on the artist. Lucky shot for us. Those ads were super. All NW forest scenes.
From a 1998 Annual Report (PDF)

Weyerhauser Watercolor

WH also had/has a Rhododendron garden with plants from every continent, and environment. Plus a Bonzai collection that is stupendous.
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4aoG5RWFe8]
We were worried that it would all fall by the wayside. Luckily somehow after a couple of years it was funded, and one can get off of I-5 north near Sea-Tac and see something wondrous.

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDbFgvCOSA0]

Another local company is sold. Lost jobs, lost local support of the arts, horticulture, sports and many other enterprises. The holding company was a shell.

The HQ was also a work of art. A Google link to images for the headquarters. I almost broke my neck the first time I saw it in the rear view mirror.
Weyerhauser Headquarters Building

Rhododendrons are near and dear: our dad and his WWll GI crew of budding horticulturists, developed the Anah Kruschke Rhoddie as a parting gift to the couple who trained them on the GI bill.
https://www.naturehills.com/rhododendron-anah-kruschke

'Anah Kruschke' was bred by Franz Kruschke of Clackamas County, Oregon and named for his wife Anah. Introduced in 1973 by Wright's Nursery of Canby, Oregon, it was derived from a seed-grown specimen of Rhododendron ponticum. It has widely funnel-shaped, 3 in. wide flowers that are reddish-purple with a deep purplish-red blotch. 'Anah Kruschke' is a rounded, well-branched shrub that grows 3 to 5 ft. tall and 3 to 4 ft. wide.

https://www.google.com/search?q=anah+kruschke+rhododendron&tbm=isch&sour...

—

A society grows great when old men plant trees in whose shade they know they shall never sit. Allegedly Greek, but more possibly fairly modern quote.

Consider helping by donating using the button in the upper left hand corner. Thank you.

Submitted by Anja Geitz on Sun, 03/31/2019 - 3:53pm

Simply exquisite

@Dawn's Meta

Those bonsai trees are art themselves. I've always had an affinity for Asian Art. There is something so tranquil about the "open" space on the canvas that just draws me in. As for the Rhododendrons, I did think if you've seen one, you've seen them all! Not with this garden. The curator obviously has a true passion for this flower and his garden. Just love that. We all need a passion about something to help us live our lives well.

One of my passions are gardens. Not only do I enjoy puttering around in mine but I love visiting public and private gardens. Very close to where I live we have the Huntington and the Descanso Gardens. Tomorrow I'm going on a picnic lunch with a dear friend to the Huntington where the cherry trees are in bloom. As is typical for California right now, the weather is gorgeous so it should be quite breathtaking!

[video:https://youtu.be/eb8WJ4J6VUA]

Thanks for sharing the art and the flowers

—

There is always Music amongst the trees in the Garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it. ~ Minnie Aumonier

Submitted by Granma on Sat, 03/30/2019 - 12:02pm

Sunshine and clear blue sky here in PDX

It is a nice change for us, for however long it lasts.
I've been down for 6 weeks now. Am looking for a house cleaner. It's too bad you all are too far away to know someone local who does that.

Enjoy your day people. Sounds like a lot of us have great spring weather today.

Submitted by smiley7 on Sat, 03/30/2019 - 12:19pm

Great to see you, Granma; and hope

@Granma
you are on the mend. Wish i could help with a referral for house cleaning; maybe some of our Portland folks will chime in if they see this.

Again, sorry you've been down; but, very happy to have you here today.

Sending healing vibes and best wishes.

Submitted by magiamma on Sat, 03/30/2019 - 6:02pm

Late afternoon check in...

Took the morning off to go to a met opera at the cinema. Wagner. Die Walküre. Have always avoided wagner bc hitler. But enjoyed the music. The plot not so much. Food for thought.

Sunny here for a bit. More rain on the way. Have a good one, all...

—

Stop Climate Change Silence - Start the Conversation

Hot Air Website, Twitter, Facebook