My Dad and Baseball (Not What You Think) and More Old Timer Photos

Later in this post I will include more pictures of the Cooperstown Baseball Old Timers Game.

It's funny....I go to a Fathers Day game for Fathers Day and....neither of my parents were baseball fans. As a result, I grew up in the Bronx, and never once visited Yankee Stadium. I don't know exactly how I became interested in baseball, but (this was before it was OK for girls to enjoy spectator sports) I used to get a lot of "you sure know a lot about baseball for a girl" comments.

Actually my technical knowledge wasn't and still isn't all that good. I can't tell you, given a certain scenario, if the batter should bunt, try for the sacrifice fly, if the man on first should try to steal, or what. I just always loved to watch good baseball. I was always the last one picked for softball, so I never even dreamed about playing, back in those pre-Title IX days.

But...my Dad used to take me on Sunday afternoon walks during the summer. It got both of us out of our hot apartment, as we walked and walked. He used to love to go to houses under construction to watch them go up. It fascinated him. I would tag along, with my transistor radio, and listen to the Yankees ballgame. These walks are a very fond memory for me.

That was many years ago, and my Dad passed away in 1986.

Too bad no old Yankees from that 1960's lineup were there in Cooperstown (although I did get to see Whitey Ford once in Binghamton) but here are some pictures of players at the game. And, THANK YOU, BALLPLAYERS, FOR COMING. It was so refreshing to see ballplayers who wanted to be there. And, I know you had a good time too. So much so that Bob Feller has already announced that he plans to return next year.

By the way, I still don't know who the people were who rode in the "Yankees" car, including the gentleman with the Mickey Mantle uniform who looked so much like him. I have a picture, but there are spectator faces in there so I don't want to post the photo.

And, now for the photos:

Here is Hall of Famer Brooks Robinson
and pitcher Jim Hannan: (both from my era)

This picture was taken seconds before a mob of children and adults followed Brooks Robinson. blocking my view, to get his autograph.



Here, from the back, is George Foster: I sure would not have been rooting for him when he was playing for the 1970's Big Red Machine.















This picture was taken after the game: the players in "camouflage" uniforms were Military all stars who played alongside the old timers.

I wish I had a good seat to capture all the clowning around. And, Doubleday Field folks, just a hint-the PA system where we were (all the way in the hinterlands) rivaled the 1970's PA systems in the New York subway for incoherence. Could you at least publish the uniform numbers of the players on the scorecard next year? It was very hard to follow the action with the garbled, echoey narration out there in Section 210.

I also know that there are plans for better crowd control at the autograph tent too, where I understand some adults were pushing youngsters out of the way. I know you will take care of that, and thank you all for giving free autographs out to the youngsters.

Little beefs aside, again a heartfelt thank you for the opportunity. I never got to see the Hall of Fame game but I suspect this was so much better.

Fathers Day with Bob Feller

There are going to be two types of reactions from people reading this title:
a. "Who?"
b. "Wow! He's still alive?"

Bob Feller is a pitcher: he's the second oldest Baseball Hall of Famer and trust me, at age 90, not only was he able to trot out onto the field (and I do mean trot), pitch (AND reach the plate-sort of) but he got a standing ovation and by far the loudest cheers of the game.

I have some pictures of him, but from so far away (we were sitting about as far out as you could get) that it may not be worth trying to put them on the blog.

I was honored to see this game in Cooperstown, NY, at Doubleday Field, on Sunday, along with about 7,000 other people (not quite a sell out, but this is a small, historic, ballpark)

The link above does have a good photo of Bob Feller at the game.

I'd like to talk a little bit more about the game and the parade.

The pre-game parade was small town America at its best - the local merchants, the trolley cars full of local scholars, the Mayor of Cooperstown, some politician running for election, a young man standing on top of two horses (one per leg). There was an older man, maybe in his early 50's, who looked so much like Mickey Mantle, who wore the Yankee #7 (I saw him signing autographs later...who was he?? I can't seem to find out from Internet research.)

Last in the parade came two trolleys, with the old-timers in them. In the first picture, the left most person is Bob Feller, but you can only see that if you enlarge the photo way beyond what I can post here. Guess it would help me to have some photo editing software.

I do have some other photos, including a good one of Brooks Robinson, which I may upload in another post.



I haven't followed baseball in many years. I got fed up back in the 1970's with the greed, and then later the performance-enhancing drug use. I enjoy minor league baseball but I haven't seen a major league game since 1973. This game was a step back to another time (although many of the players didn't retire or didn't play until after I lost interest). The most notable thing was-they wanted to be there. It was so obvious. They clowned with each other. Steve Lyons took a boy out of the stands and let him field alongside of him. That boy had a good arm too, he fielded a ball and started a double play! Some of the players signed autographs as mobs of children followed them along the fences. FOR FREE. (I didn't try to get autographs-I let the children get theirs.)

Would I go again next year? Maybe. But I would sure buy my tickets a lot more in advance. (and maybe even join the Hall of Fame, so I could get the best ones.)

Proof-Death Come in Threes

Shortly after I published the Farrah Fawcett blog entry, I saw the news bulletin about Michael Jackson being taken to the hospital. His death was announced soon after. So now we have our third one in-what, 50 hours?

Just last night, on America's Got Talent, I saw someone perform to the young Michael Jackson (Jackson 5) song "ABC". We all loved the adorable boy then.

But then he grew up.

I won't comment further. As I've said before this is a ramblin' blog not a rantin' blog. Plus, I don't believe in "speaking ill of the dead".

I have long believed in the "deaths come in threes" superstition. This has got to be the most dramatic "proof" of that in a long time.

And now, Farrah Fawcett

I came home from work this evening to find that Farrah Fawcett lost her battle with cancer today.

Suddenly this blog is becoming a chronicle of the death of various Baby Boomer icons. So let's be honest. I never watched Charlie's Angels. But this battle with cancer was so courageous, I rooted for her from the moment I learned of her cancer. At the end we knew it was just a matter of time. In a way it makes me so glad I was never among the rich and famous. Well, maybe anonymous and rich wouldn't have been bad. But not famous.

At the American Cancer Society Relay for Life, we light luminaries each year in memory of those who lost the battle. Another soul lost to this dread disease. May we who live remember this, and remember to cherish every moment of our days on earth.

Your Own Authentic Japanese Golden Poo

I was alerted to this by a blog site associated with Consumer Reports.

Apparently, the Japanese word for "luck" is very similar to their word for...well, poo. So the Japanese, playing on the word, have tiny "golden poo" charms that they attach to their cell phones, etc. to bring them luck. You can buy them here. Except right now, they are out of stock, maybe because of this blog talking about them. These aren't just for luck, at least in the U.S. Hate your cell phone carrier? What about your cable company? Wouldn't a "golden poo" charm be just the thing?

I would have loved to attach one to our glitchy cable box, the one that Time Warner insisted didn't have anything wrong with it....but this is Ramblin' with AM, not Rantin' with AM. Maybe another time.

Goodbye Ed McMahon

Another Baby Boomer icon deceased.

Ed McMahon was part of my life for so many years, Being in my teens and early 20's-30's (especially in the years where I lived in Central Time and could watch the Tonight Show at 10:30 pm) the TV show that entertained us at the end of the day started with "H-e-e-e-e-e-ere’s Johnny!" No matter how outrageous the skits or jokes, Ed McMahon was always there as Johnny's "second banana". (does my son even know who Ed was?)

Ed McMahon was always the perfect gentleman. Even after the Tonight Show ended, I sometimes saw him on "Star Search" and watched him greet lucky winners for Publishers Clearing House. I had lost track of him and didn't even know about his pending foreclosure or his health problems. What a sorrow aging can be.

It is so ironic in a way, I hadn't seen a Publishers Clearing House ad in years, and suddenly, in the last couple of weeks, I am suddenly seeing them several times a day. Maybe they knew something we didn't.

Goodbye, Ed.

Meanwhile...Walter Cronkite is still alive. At least for now.

MacKenzie-Childs: Not for the Timid

Last weekend we went up to Aurora, NY (in the Finger Lakes) to the annual MacKenzie-Childs barn sale.


MacKenzie-Childs is not for everyone. Their pottery, furniture, and other decorative items are...shall we say, quite bold. If you love checkerboard patterns, this is your place.

Here is an example of some of their furniture.
Unfortunately, photography was not permitted inside their "farmhouse" which was decorated in this style: but this will give you some flavor











Outside, there is a "chicken palace" where normally there is a nice collection of rare chickens - to my disappointment the chickens were removed for the occasion. They did leave some geese, who ran up to everyone who came close-I assume waiting for a handout:









Some metal work was featured. Here is a gate showing the detail put into their garden gates plus a little peak into one of their gardens:










Finally, here is a view of one of their gardens.

One day I may afford one of their artisan pieces. Until then, I will feast on the art.

Memories of Arkansas at the Swim...I mean, Relay for Life

Lots of rain part 2 at our Relay for Life this morning. So it is shutting down a little early and I am home early. I didn't win any prizes but if I had known which number Relay this was for our area, I would have won two nice tickets to an area golf tournament next week. Oh well, my bad.

Last night, at our tent (company team), I heard someone being asked "so you lived there when Bill Clinton was governor"? My ears immediately perked up because spouse and I had also lived (in Arkansas, it could only be one state!) when Bill Clinton was governor. So, after that conversation was all done I introduced myself and we ended up walking together for the next 1 1/2 hours. She asked me where I had lived - we lived in three places in Arkansas but I answered the largest one, Fayetteville. The response was, she had gone to college at the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville. (soooo......eeeee!) She was too young to really remember Bill Clinton as governor of Arkansas (I'm not!) but we spent our walk time talking about many things. The memories flowed. She has family in several towns we were familiar with We remembered fairs, state parks, streets....

We lived in Arkansas from 1981 to 1986 and she moved out of Arkansas in 1998, but goes back frequently. So I heard firsthand about what I knew from reading. The area (Northwest Arkansas) has grown tremendously. She worked for Wal-Mart while a college student and later was an assistant store manager for a year. Her mother works for Wal-Mart optical headquarters. (Wal-Mart is headquartered in Bentonville, AR). Small nothing towns near Wal-Mart's headquarters are now anything but because of a Wal-Mart requirement that all vendors have an office in the Bentonville area.

We've never gone back but our discussion has whet my appetite for going back, just to see how it has changed. I know that the rural dirt road I lived on outside of Morrow, AR was paved with city water and street addresses and I was happy to learn that the area is still rural. But as for Fayetteville....my Relay friend told me that every time she goes back, Fayetteville has changed completely.

Even the airport was moved somewhere else.

Will we go back one day? Will we like what we find?

Walter Cronkite Gravely Ill?

A blog reports that Walter Cronkite is gravely ill, and MSNBC seems to have picked up on this.

Say it ain't so (oops, wrong person). An icon of our generation. Meanwhile, I wonder if my son would even know who he is.

Relay Day!

Tonight is our area's Relay for Life. This is an event to benefit the American Cancer Society. Team members, of course, raise money for the American Cancer Society and its various worthwhile programs. The reward is the almost 24 hour event. It's a combination celebration of life and party. Last year the theme was Mardi Gras, so you get the flavor. This year the theme will be "luau".

We know now to bring money because a lot of the teams run Chinese Auctions (hope that one isn't politically incorrect, but that is what they call them here) or other fundraisers so you walk the track, see what you would like to try to win, buy tickets...and of course I have never won. The local Frito Lay team has giveaways of snacks. Most teams have someone who cooks supper. Our cook lost both parents to cancer.

Cancer survivors can attend a Survivor's/Caregivers dinner Friday night and a Survivor's/Caregivers breakfast Saturday. Everyone walks. And, the goal is for each team to have at least one team member on the track at all times. Our team won't but the larger teams full of people in their teens and 20's will. For those who stay overnight, there is music, karaoke, contests, etc. to keep everyone awake.

One event I have never stayed for is the luminary lighting. This is an extremely emotional event. People purchase luminaries in honor or in memory of loved ones, and decorate them. Team members then put them on the track in front of their tents. After sunset, they are lit and everyone walks the track to observe, to honor, and remember. This year there will be a bagpiper too. Quite honestly I have never stayed because it would have been a little too emotional for me but this year I am ready. I think.

The midnight sun it is not but may those luminaries express everyone's prayer that cancer be conquered in our lifetimes.

Just Racin' in the Rain.....

Just got back from the 2009 Corporate Challenge, an annual event in our area (and maybe nationwide). Employees of various businesses compete, in good fun, in various walking and running events. I'm not a runner, so I did the one walking event, the Predicted Mile. In this race, you race the clock, not others. Participants predict the time they will finish the mile in and the person closest to their prediction wins. The key here is that you can't have a watch or any other way of telling time on your person.

This is my third year of participating and it is a blast.

The first year it was held in August and it was in the 90's, with runners collapsing and ambulances responding. Not a pretty sight. Last year the weather was pretty decent. This year, the heavens opened.

It's been raining since last night with a few breaks. At noon, my walking partner and I did 1 1/2 miles, with rain at the end. Tonight the rain started about 5:30 and it didn't let up. The runners loved it. As for the walkers...well, my new walking shoes aren't so new anymore. But it sure beat being in the 90's.

This year's Corporate Challenge had the highest turnout in 10 years, and they had to split the walkers into two groups. 41 companies, large and small. It's a good event and I hope to participate in the coming years, too.

I'll know tomorrow if I (ha ha) won.

Got Twitter? Got a Consumer Problem?

I don't use Twitter but I absolutely loved this article about using Twitter as a consumer tool.

The responses to this article were even more interesting.

Fairbanks has reached Maximum Sunrise-Sunset (Well, not so fast)

The bad news, of course is, that shortly our days will be getting shorter, daylight-wise. Enjoy your 21 hours and 47 minutes of daylight, Fairbanks, in the meantime. In only 6 months you will be down to less than 4 hours.

SUNRISE AND SUNSET
JUNE 17 2009..........SUNRISE  300 AM AKDT   SUNSET  1247 AM AKDT
JUNE 18 2009..........SUNRISE  300 AM AKDT   SUNSET  1247 AM AKDT

(note:  I was off a little - the actual maximum was 21 hrs and 49 minutes...oh well)

Blue Angels and Flood Memories

Over the 4th of July weekend we are being treated to an airshow. This one features the Blue Angels. What a wonderful treat for our area.

It only seems like a few minutes ago, but it has been almost three years, since our Great Flood of June 28, 2006 caused so many disruptions, loss of property (I know two people who lost their homes and one who lost most of her belongings), and cancelled so many events in late June and early July of 2006. One of the events cancelled, if I recall correctly, was an air show.

There are two nice videos on YouTube that show the flood and its aftermath. I didn't see my neighborhood on either of them but parts of our neighborhood were evacuated - we personally were very lucky but if the river (we estimate) had been another foot higher it would have been a different story.

I hope we have much better weather for the Blue Angels.

Dexter Kefir Cheese

Saturday we made a trip up to Aurora, NY for the MacKenzie-Childs Barn Sale. And found something totally different.

You either love or hate MacKenzie-Childs. In our case...well, I would need a lot more money in my bank account. I will write about this sale another time because I need to pull pictures off my camera. We didn't buy anything but as they say-the pictures are "priceless".

On the way back, we stopped at the Long Point Winery. After a wine tasting, we bought a bottle of wine for that night's supper and noticed a sign offering raw milk Kefir cheese for sale. I know what Kefir is but have never drank it. The woman at the counter explained this cheese was made by a local farmer, who lived a short distance away. She gave us some directions, we bought a small piece without even tasting it, and we were on our way to the creamery.

A very friendly farmer greeted us and asked if we would like to see the dairy animals who gave the milk for the cheese.

The breed he uses is the Dexter, and a handsome breed of cattle they are. These are small and, as the farmer explained, very hardy. They would make a fine milk cow for the small farmstead, giving about 2 gallons a day per cow. They are very inquisitive, too. I am more of a poultry person but these animals had a lot of personality.

Too bad, no milk for sale (and I am not going to get into the controversy surrounding sale and consumption of raw milk as I am not completely knowledgeable on the subject) but we were able to sample some cheese. This cheese is quite legal, incidentally, and in fact Cornell helped them develop their recipe.

The Kefir cheese is a good source of probiotics, but also very expensive. This, however, is artisan cheese and is made in small quantities by a farmer treating his cattle in a very humane manner. So, if you live or visit the Finger Lakes region, consider trying to find this cheese. This farmer sells his cheese at the Ithaca farmers market, too.

I Sing the Job Non-Electric

Two jobs, two days in a row.

June 10: son is at his supermarket job, power goes out. Just what happens when a modern supermarket loses power? Think about it. Electric doors, electronic cash registers tied into computers/ scanners, freezers, refrigerators, air conditioners, misters for the produce,electronic customer-service produce scales printing produce price tags.

In the case of this particular supermarket, they have a back up generator, enough to run the cash registers and other necessities. Otherwise, they might have had to turn the customers away. Luckily, the outage lasted only a couple of hours.

This is a far cry from my childhood, where they would have been able to convert an electric cash register to using a crank. With the prices being stamped on each item, it would have been warm and inconvenient but not critical-until the frozen foods started to melt, anyway.

June 11: I am at my office job, we are experiencing a downpour, suddenly the lights blink and go out. The lights go out along with our computers, and our Internet-serviced telephones. Part of the building is out and part isn't, so our IT department tells everyone to turn their computers and surge protectors off. So we sit and wait as the electric company is called. The rumor is that the power failure is confined to our building. That seems to be true, as there is a baseball stadium near our office, and (a game was in progress) their field lights are on.

The call center near where I sit, well, there are no phone calls. And if customers were calling, they would have been out of luck because our reps wouldn't have had computers or scanned electronic records to service them with. Back at my desk, there is my work, which has suddenly turned into non-work. My job, which was mainly paper years ago, is almost totally e-mail and Internet based now. Even my research, which used to be conducted out of books, is now done on online databases. What we are left with is a whole lot of dead time. Luckily, in my department we have other work we can turn to and we do.

Apparently a squirrel caused this outage, and paid for it with his life.

After about an hour the IT people come by, announcing we can power back up. The socializing ends and back to work we all go.

The power failure scenario is so familiar. I am a "survivor" of the Great Northeast Blackout of 1965, which taught me (at age 12) what happens when the power goes out in November, and you live on the 4th floor of an apartment building. (no water. no elevator. no heat.) Luckily that one lasted, for my neighborhood, only 12 1/2 hours.

I escaped the Great Northeast Blackout of 2003 only because we were on vacation at the time and driving into the driveway of an Iowa relative just about the time it happened. We were in Toledo, OH only a couple of days after their power was restored. My boss was in Toronto and was without power for three days in the middle of a heat wave. And so it goes.

But have we learned anything from these and other blackouts? Have we really?

The two incidents bring right back-just how fragile our life style is.

It can, and will, happen again. And not just for an hour or two.

The 10 Dumbest Tech Products

Another masterpiece from PC World.

I'm proud to say that I never used any of these "dogs" (or, cats).

Almost at the Solstice in Fairbanks and Longyearbyen

The lucky folks in Alaska had a beautiful morning in Fairbanks - 61 degrees there at 2am their time,
nice and daylighty (is that a word?) at 2am their time.

By tomorrow they only have another 15 minutes or so to maximum daylight...here in Binghamton
 I think we have another 2 minutes to go.

SUNRISE AND SUNSET
JUNE 11 2009..........SUNRISE  308 AM AKDT   SUNSET  1237 AM AKDT
JUNE 12 2009..........SUNRISE  306 AM AKDT   SUNSET  1239 AM AKDT



AMOUNT OF DAYLIGHT TODAY  (HOUR:MIN)........21:29

Meanwhile in Longyearbyen, Norway, it is actually 39 degrees and the snow is melting!

Thank you, Internet, for allowing me to indulge my Midnight Sun obsessions.

Vintage TV-Goodbye Analog Forever

Now we are finally on the eve of the digital TV switchover. This time it is for real. Your old TV, as of tomorrow night, will not be able to receive the new digital signals unless you have a converter box. Get ready for Channel 12.1!

So now is a good time to reminisce one last time about the analog TVs of yore.

This is a website with lots of old vintage consumer electronics, including TV's.

And, if you need to fix that set, here is the site for you.

There is a site I found this morning that had old experimental sets - I can't seem to find it again-it had pictures of a projector TV from the late 1940's and a TV you could use to watch two TV shows at once. I didn't have time to read it this morning and I forgot to bookmark it. Sigh.

And last, but not least, while searching for the website from this morning I found this....not exactly vintage TV but it is connected with the area where I live.

Goodbye, TV of our youth. Goodbye, VHF! Goodbye, UHF!

MacKenzie-Childs

The items MacKenzie-Childs makes and sells are gorgeous...and way beyond my budget.

Still, you may be interested in their annual Barn Sale.

This place is an Aurora area institution. Their grounds are gorgeous (I hope they have tours this weekend) and the little village of Aurora is a lovely college town. These are artisan items-not your made in China stuff. Their website is a visual treat, too. If you are interested in American-artisan locally made stuff this is the place for you.

Oreo or Hydrox?

If you are Jewish and of a "certain age" you will know exactly what this blog post is talking about. Oreo or Hydrox?

Binghamton-the Land of Dinosaurs?

My spouse had a slightly different take on the "HART of BC" project related to the BC comic strip character Gronk riding a dinosaur, to be created as public art, as a symbol of Binghamton's revival.

My life partner finds it a bit strange for this project to use a dinosaur (symbol of being out of step with the times) for symbolizing our "rebirth" Considering that several years ago a NY Times article referred to Binghamton as a "burnt out industrial town" (I couldn't find an online link to this article), I wonder if people outside of Binghamton will be more bemused than impressed. I hope my spouse is wrong.

This Smithsonian blog entry had still another take on the matter. In fact, it is what Google came up with when I searched for "Dinosaur Binghamton".

Stay tuned.

Sampling the Blue Slate Turkey

I never did post on our experience in eating the young Blue Slate Turkey we purchased over the weekend.

Its only crime was not being attractive enough to be used as breeding stock.

Both my spouse and I have enjoyed true free range chicken, back when we raised our own chickens some 25 years ago. So we know what it is like to eat birds that are full flavored and...let's be honest here....tough, needing special cooking techniques. (there was a reason back in the good old days for chicken soup and chicken stew).

Grilling this turkey was not the best cooking technique. We will know for next time that it needs a gentler cooking technique with moist heat. However, the bird was flavorful. The surprise was...it didn't taste like turkey.

I'm not talking "factory" turkey here but rather the taste of our Bronze turkeys from many years ago, which I could describe at "Turkey +++" Sort of like eating supermarket tomatoes all your life and then biting into one fresh from the garden. You know it's tomato right away. I can't say what this Blue Slate tasted like, however. Which isn't a bad thing. But at $4.00 lb, next time I may stick to this farmer's bronze.

Midnight Sun Festival Time

We are approaching the time when we all (in the Northern Hemisphere) will experience our maximum sunlight.

Today, on the Fairbanks webcams at 2am, it was fully light and 61 degrees. Meanwhile here, at 6am (4 hours ahead of Fairbanks) it was 63 degrees and thundering. In Fairbanks, it even got up to 79 degrees yesterday. Too bad today they are cloudy and it hasn't really gotten any warmer.

So, here is hoping Fairbanks has a wonderful Midnight Sun Festival this year. The Fairbanks News-Miner newspaper has a webcam trained at their parking lot, where some of the festival takes place. I'll be there in spirit. Today, on the News-Miner webcam, looks like they are starting to set up.

The way newspapers are endangered (I have an in-law in the business so know "from the inside"), I hope the News-Miner is around next year to help with this festival.

Those Poor Orphans!

I got such a kick out of this Slate article about people who used Twitter once and quit. What about all those "orphaned tweets?" Do you care? As an anthropology major in college, I found this Slate posting rather....curious.

There's also a blog, according to this article, about orphaned blogs.

Blue Farming-The Blue Slate Turkey and Heritage Breeds

Yesterday we went to the Farmers Market in Otsiningo Park (this is the same park where our community garden plots are) and visited two meat vendors. One was McRey Farm of Glen Aubrey. We wanted some brisket, but they were out. So we splurged on a pound of cruelty free veal cutlet. Cooked it last night. It was thin and was cut the way it should be, and of high quality.

The other vendor we visited was Twin Oaks Farm in Port Crane, where we bought a small, whole Blue Slate turkey. This is a heritage breed of turkey. We are cooking it now, and will report on the results.

I realize some readers of this blog are vegetarian, so ask their patience while I continue with this entry.

What are "heritage breeds"? These are breeds of farm animal that have been "left behind" in our transition to agribusiness to feed our ever growing population. The fact remains that some of the older breeds of animals are better suited to the small farm setting, or may have characteristics that should be preserved. Some of these characteristics include tolerance to heat and cold, leanness of meat, ability to forage. Have you heard the story of turkeys bred so that they don't have enough sense to get out of the rain-and drown? This lack of survival sense is not a trait you will find in heritage breeds.

For birds, this may also include broodiness (the tendency to "get in the mood", so to speak, to sit on and hatch eggs, and rear the resulting young.)

Years ago, before I even knew what "heritage breeds" were, my spouse and I lived out in rural Arkansas and raised various old fashioned breeds of chickens. I won't bore you (in this post, anyway) with the list of chickens we raised at one time or another, but we also raised several other breeds of chickens, ducks and geese that are on a watch list (or even considered critical now) during our 4 year stay in the countryside.

So why should I ask that you care about heritage breeds, and the small producers who are keeping them alive?

Simple. At your local farmers market you will find small farmers who care about their animals, and care about the people who will be eating their animals-because they meet them weekly and talk to them. If you talk to these farmers they welcome your questions They will answer all of your questions patiently and knowledgeably. They know the slaughterhouse their animals go to and can speak knowledgeably about its practices. As a result of these practices, I firmly believe that your chances of getting E. Coli or worse from these animals is greatly reduced. You can also be sure these animals are not being fed anything that would ever result in Mad Cow Disease.

If you must eat meat (and I have been a vegetarian at times of my life, so I am sympathetic to those who do not eat meat) locally grown is ideally the way to go. To put it even more bluntly, if there is no financial incentive to keep these breeds alive, they will become extinct.

I do admit that not all the meat in our house is locally grown. There are reasons-convenience, cost - so I am not always "walking the walk". We will be working on walking this walk more as this year progresses.

Firefly Impatiens and Fittonia

A few weeks ago I bought a pot of Firefly impatiens and decided to move them to my office. These impatiens are a genetic dwarf - I haven't seen mention of them being suitable for house or office plants so this is an experiment.

So far they seem to be doing well, in a brightly lit (but no sun) corner next to my "low light" requiring cardamon plant. The original flowers fell off but now they are reblooming. I am watering them twice a week. This week I will try to remember to bring some plant food in.

Today, on impulse, I bought a fittonia plant ("Red Anne") hoping to bring it to my office too as it said "low light". What it didn't say is that they do best in a terrarium setting, or at least in a very high humidity situation. So I don't think that is going to work in an office situation. I'll have to figure out what to do now. That's what plant growing is all about, after all.

Blue Picasso and River Read

Last night was First Friday in Binghamton, the first Friday of each month event where many downtown Binghamton art galleries and related businesses open from 6-9pm.

One gallery featured items from various private collections, and the collection of Binghamton University.

I got to see a small Picasso painting, from his Blue period. And since I don't know a thing about art, I will just mention it was a harlequin boy, and dated from 1904. I looked on Google images, and there were quite a lot of images from Picasso's "blue" period. (yes, the pictures are mainly done in blue). I didn't find this particular image, which I understand must have been done close to the end of his blue period.

In the same gallery was a Book of Hours from 1497. A "book of hours" is a devotional book popular from the late 15th century to the early 16th century. I am not an antiquarian book expert either, but love to look at old things.

Some of the other things we did (besides going to the web site launch of my last post) included taking my spouse to RiverRead Books. This is an independent bookstore (a dying breed deserving our support) that opened several months ago in a renovated building in downtown Binghamton that (I believe) dates from 1854. The book store is very well set up, cozy, friendly and its web site is well done also. It was crowded, with people awaiting the arrival of local author Liz Rosenberg. Since neither my spouse nor I enjoy crowds, we left just as Ms. Rosenberg arrived.

I must admit I have not been doing my part to support River Read, because if I bring any more books into the house the other occupants will probably rise up with pitchforks and torches. And, with the economy, I admit to frequenting the library more than perhaps necessary.

We also visited the renovated Press Building. I will try to upload some pictures (not of the building itself but something interesting in front of it) and talk about that in my next post. If you go to this article about Binghamton, at least right now, look at the first photo on the right. In that picture, there is a tall red building on the left side of the photo - that is the Press Building. Another web site featuring pictures of this building is here.

The Hart of BC

The late Johnny Hart, cartoonist and creator of the comic strip BC, is one of several nationally known people who grew up in the Triple Cities. Now, his grandson Mason Mastroianni (who took over the strip after Johnny Hart's death) and some other community members have launched an effort called the Hart of BC to help revitalize our community.

The dinosaur "Gronk" from the BC strip has been an icon here for years, decorating everything from our local mass transit buses (BC Transit) to the entrances of our parks. (Since our community is located in Broome County, NY, the association was a natural) Now, the Hart of BC proposes to erect up to 100 fiberglass sculptures of Gronk, as envisioned by area artists, throughout our area, targeted for 2010.

Tonight, I witnessed the launch of the Hart of BC website-complete with free champagne and popcorn. Mason Mastroianni and family were in the audience. After the events of the past few months, our area could use something this creative and light hearted. I wish them the best of luck.

Ads from the Past and Future

A friend forwarded me an email I've seen before, but I still love. It has old ads from the past, including advertising Lysol as an, er, feminine cleansing aid (this is a family blog after all), and another advocating buying sanitized tapeworms to help you keep weight off. The email also contains the usual collection of ads featuring doctors endorsing cigarettes and the ad featuring the happy family that eats lard. (maybe they were happy. No one had ever heard of cholesterol.).

Just think of the ads our grand kids will look at and wonder why those companies are no longer here.

"Enron-Ask Why"
"See the U.S.A. in your Chevrolet" (Oops, not quite yet.)
"Welcome to Circuit City, Where Service Is State of the Art"
"TWA-Up Up and Away" *
"Eastern Airlines-The Wings of Man".

*this was a merger with American Airlines but still, the name no longer exists.

I have told my 19 year old son time and again, that although I may not live to see it, that he may well live to see Wal-Mart or Microsoft file for bankruptcy. Sounds inconceivable now but think of the large corporations of our youth (for those of us in our 50's I mean!) and how many of them are still around. So why shouldn't we be surprised to see what passed as state of the art or common wisdom 50 years ago.

Are Lifeguards Supposed to Guard Lives?

I rarely feel like ranting on my blog but I've had a pet peeve for a while and tonight brought it to a head.

Silly me, I always thought the purpose of a lifeguard at a pool was to watch carefully and make sure no one needed help in the water. That only, no multitasking.

That must not be what they are teaching at lifeguard training nowadays.

I take a water aerobics class at a local non profit agency pool twice a week. There is a lifeguard there. Apparently the lifeguards feel that life guarding is a secondary occupation.
Their primary job duties seem to be (in no particular order):

1. Paperwork
2. Socializing with members of the opposite sex
3. Texting, or otherwise doing "stuff" with their cell phone

Yes, I've complained about it. But after a while the behavior starts over.

I feel like I am the only one complaining. I don't complain often, only when it is really blatant, or when I am in a mood to. And maybe that isn't right. Maybe I should be a pain, but that isn't my nature.

Because I'm not normally facing the lifeguard during the entire class (only when we turn in certain directions) I am not paying attention during the entire class.

I'd love to know if this is against NY law.

This is why this behavior really concerns me:

Back in 1999 my family was enjoying an August trip to a municipal pool in Iowa City, Iowa. Suddenly, all hell broke loose, we were being chased out of the pool, people were shouting and pointing. As I got out of the pool, I looked back, and there was a person lying prone in the pool. Lifeguards (there were more than one; this was a large pool) were speeding their way to the victim and the rescue was made as we watched in horror.

The pool was closed for about 1/2 hour, which my (then) 9 year old son didn't appreciate.

Thankfully, while we were waiting, an announcement was made. This was a drill, there was no victim. Everyone was thanked for their cooperation and for the inconvenience.

As the parent of a teenager, I would not like to see any teen spend the rest of their life in an agony of remorse because someone had a heart attack and died during a water aerobics class, while they were busy chatting or texting.

How do you grow houseplants in Fairbanks?

Fairbanks has a little more than an hour to go before they reach their maximum day length. Now, at 2am, it is definitely morning.

I really don't wonder how people sleep with 24 hour sunlight. That I can imagine. (I imagine they do not sleep well.) What I do wonder about is how they grow houseplants. I know they grow wonderful flowers outside; I've been to southeast Alaska in early September. This is an interesting website that talks about gardening on Kodiak Island, for example.

But I've never been to the true northern part of Alaska. You can't really grow houseplants there without artificial light in the winter, can you?

Or can you?

This article is a bit scientific, but it talks about growing jade plants in Alaska.

How do houseplants cope with the uneven distribution of sunlight in Alaska?

Last Survivor of Titanic Dies

My son, when he was in 4th grade, was fascinated by the Titanic. He read various books and even built a little Titanic model.

Even as a teen, he would occasionally ask me if there were any Titanic survivors left.

As of today, there no longer are. The end of an era and of a piece of my son's childhood.

The saddest part of the story is that she had to auction momentos of the Titanic last year to pay her nursing home fees.

Weather Underground, The Saga of the Florida Owls and Lots of Wonderful Bird Photos

http://www.wunderground.com/ is a lot more than a weather site. They have an extensive collection of weather related, nature related, and other photos. A friend loves to send me links to the best photos and it is almost like I know some of the photographers.

If you love birds, you will love the following link: one of the loveliest photos of owls I have ever seen. The story that goes with it could have had a much sadder ending due to flooding down in Florida, but luckily most of this family survived.

I also like to follow pictures taken in Alaska-here is one

And finally, here is a wonderful baby bird photo.

I am a relative newbie with digital photography (I resisted it for a long time, especially because I have a lot of problems viewing the LCD screens) and I hope one day I can take photos of enough quality to upload here. Perhaps in my, ha ha, retirement.

WABC Rewound 2009 Posted on the Internet

I missed being able to listen to WABC Rewound this Memorial Day but it has now been posted online at Airchexx

Enjoy Cousin Brucie and other favorite DJ's and old commercials and news reports.

And speaking of Airchexx, I don't listen to them very much but I should more often, given my interest in history. They have a pretty good blog on their website, too.

Late May and Flowers are in Bloom!

This was not supposed to be an overly pleasant day. So to our surprise, the clouds cleared and we had a chance to get gardening work done and even put our air conditioners in.

Our Rhododendrons are in full bloom. Our irises are too. If I feel like it, I'll take some pictures and upload them later. (no promises)

We have two main types of tall bearded irises, both fragrant - a light and dark purple kind, and a type that was described to us as a "Kool Aid Iris". It is light purple and smells just like grape Kool-Aid. It was supposed to be a rebloomer but, in the 14 or so years we've had it, it has never rebloomed.

Some bearded irises we had bought at an iris show a couple of years ago are blooming. They are shorter. One is white and is heavily fragrant. A couple are yellow.

My mother in law had overbought for her flower beds and we ended up with some "bonus" dark purple petunias and French marigolds which I may put into a planter.

Our weedwacker isn't operational right now so I took a good old fashioned clipper and clipped grass around our beds. Ouch.

Meanwhile, some volunteer tomatoes have come up in our pansy bed and we will try to transplant them into our community garden. Three backordered pepper plants came in the mail yesterday, so we now have all of our vegetable plants. We ordered several varieties of eggplants and these are in an Earthbox on our back patio.

Meanwhile, the cardamon plant I bought in April up in Ithaca has settled in well at my office. It truly is a low light plant. The miniature impatien I also brought to work had stopped blooming for a while but it is putting out new tiny flowers.

By the way, if you have never heard of the Earthbox, check it out. This is our second year. We have very little room at our house for gardening, and this box enabled us to grow peppers and lettuce last year. This year we are going to see what it can do for heirloom eggplants.

Well, my break is over; time to get out again.

The Midnight Sun has Arrived in Fairbanks!

MAY 29 2009.........SUNRISE 3:42 AM AKDT   SUNSET 12:00 AM AKDT

Bob Feller Still Pitching at Age 90 - and will be pitching Father's Day!

This is a must see, if I can talk spouse into spending the weekend in Cooperstown.

Since I won't be spending June 21 in Fairbanks watching midnight baseball, this is the next best thing: The All Star game in Cooperstown, NY.

Bob Feller, among others, will be pitching.

What a treat for a history buff and someone who used to enjoy baseball - and was too young to see the real "good old days".

The closest I ever got to a baseball all-star was getting to meet Mudcat Grant several years ago. He is quite the southern gentleman, very soft spoken - and was walking with the help of a cane. We all have to grow old, and sometimes it seems like the most unfair thing in the world.

I hope I am lucky enough to get to see this Father's Day game. And I hope Bob Feller is able to pitch.

Midnight Baseball

Back when I was young, and dreamed of seeing the midnight sun (scary but fascinating dreams) I was also a baseball fan.
I never put the two together, but Fairbanks has.

Can you imagine a game that starts at 10:30 pm and is played totally by natural light -and has never once been called for darkness? (I wonder, though, if it has been called for mosquitoes). This is on my all-time travel wish list now.

The amazing part of this annual event is the number of major league/all star baseball players that have played for the Fairbanks team in this midnight classic. Including one pitcher much beloved by NY Mets fans, one Tom Seaver, who won the 1965 game for the Alaska Goldpanners.

I haven't followed baseball for many years, although I do go to several minor league local games each year. Too bad I didn't know about this 30 years ago. I would have been on the first plane.

In my next post, I will give an alternative for those who can't make it to Alaska.

Diabetic Alert - Greek Festival Starts Tomorrow!

If I become diabetic (which may be in my future, family history being what it is) I am going to have to figure out how I can keep scarfing the goodies at this festival. The sweet, heavenly, Greek dessert goodies, that is.

The first weekend of June used to be "Super Festival Weekend" in this area. It isn't any more, but one of the remaining festivals is celebrating its 36th year, with the best sweets in town, a week "early". This is the 36th annual Grecian Festival at the Greek Orthodox Church of the Annunciation in Vestal. There are various Greek meals available, music, crafts, dancing (lots of late night Greek dancing), and more, but I go right for the gusto...the desserts, that is. Honey overload in a box, to go.

Oh yummy heaven. I don't mean just baklava (although yes they have that). These are specialties you won't find commercially. I'm sure they are painstakingly handmade by the members of the congregation. Many of them soaking luxuriously in honey, stuffed with nuts and goodness. If you wait for the weekend, some of the better ones are already sold out.

I don't like crowds, so I don't go later in the evenings, when things really get moving (no pun intended!), but this festival is something many locals wait for.

I've spent so much time praising Ithaca that I have not given enough attention to the festivals in the area. Hopefully I will post more later. Food wise, though, this one is Number One. With apologies to the SpiedieFest, which I promise I will write about soon.

People Search Engines - Who Knew?

Until I read this article in PC World magazine I had no idea that these "people search engines" even existed. These search the "deep web" for traces of your online activity-yours, or anyone you care to spy on, that is. And just think, anyone can use these. To spy on you.

I used several of these to "spy" on myself. I don't do social networking, I don't post videos on You Tube and I certainly don't have anything out there I would be ashamed of, and yet one of these engines dug up an Amazon.com wish list I had posted (for my own use!) several months ago. Granted, I don't care if people know I was shopping for noise cancelling headphones but in my middle aged opinion, it is....creepy.

If you agree, there are ways you can protect your privacy. Read this article and take action! (and see if you can resist the urge to spy on your ex, on your high school classmates, and even (horrors) your children.....)

Ithaca Festival - and Things to do in Ithaca Part 2

And now, back to Ithaca. You must be thinking by now "why isn't this person moving there?" Well because....then I would have nowhere to visit.

Next weekend is the Ithaca Festival, which I haven't been to in many years...pure Ithaca. After all, how many festivals do you know that offer the chance to purchase carbon offsets? If I had a larger lot, I might take them up on buying a red bud tree.

If you are in the area...by all means come. The Sunday (last day of the festival) should be the biggest and best. Lots of music, lots of good food done Ithaca style....various ethnic foods, vegetarians welcome. The website has much more information than I can give. Very child friendly, too, as I recall.

and since I promised More Things to Do in Ithaca, here are some more of my favorites:

1. The Ithaca Art Trail-although for that you will have to wait till the fall. This will be our third year going to this weekend. One allowed us to participate in a traditional tea ceremony. There are about 53 artists that hold open houses during the Columbus Day weekend and the weekend after. All types of art are represented - painting, sculpture, fabric, a most wonderful welder/iron worker, glass, photography, pottery....and to top it off, the Friends of the Library have a fall sale at the same time. (Oh by the way, the spring sale is in its final weekend....May 23 through 26 to be exact. )

2. Cornell Lab of Ornithology, in the Johnson Center for Birds and Biodiversity, in the Sapsucker Woods Sanctuary. No need to be a birder to enjoy this site. Want a wonderful place to walk and enjoy nature? Easy access trails, (very well maintained), plenty of viewing platforms with nice places to watch birds outside. Inside, there are binocular stations and very clean bathrooms. Very educational and very enjoyable. Bring the children! And, like other Cornell attractions....free. Unlike other Cornell attractions...this one you can actually find parking, probably because it is not on campus. There are various bird-oriented events throughout the year.

3. Herbert F. Johnson Museum of Art, on the Cornell Campus. Art museums are not my "thing" but this one is quite decent and...are you detecting a pattern here? "Free". One warning, parking situation could be better. The exhibits vary. I remember a Frank Lloyd Wright art glass exhibit I enjoyed.

4. Speaking some more of museums, I have not been in the new digs (pun intended) for this place -The Museum of the Earth We visited when my science minded son was young, and we all had a great time although their collection was in very cramped, inelegant quarters. I have a feeling that is no longer the case. This one is not free, but I have a feeling it is well worth the admission. Something many people don't know about the Ithaca area - and the Triple Cities area I live in also - is that we have fossiliferous rock right in our back yards. I have found rocks with fossils (brachiopods, I suspect) near the Susquehanna River, just blocks from my house. Ithaca has these sites too, such as the Portland Point quarry.

5. One last museum, the Ithaca Sciencecenter. We haven't been there in around 7 or 8 years but my son loved it when he was younger. What can you say about a museum that the late Carl Sagan was involved with? It's a lot bigger now. I remember a Rube Goldberg-like contraption in the front lobby that we all loved to watch and an imaginative science-minded play area outside. This is located near the Farmers Market (Steamboat Landing) that I wrote about in my "Things to do in Ithaca Part 1" posting. I remember us doing a "planet" walk, with the distance between the sun and the planets in scale. It was fun trying to find the "monument" for each planet, almost like a planetary scavenger hunt. We got lost at some point, maybe between Neptune and Pluto. Of course, since Pluto has been declassified since we walked, I wonder what they did with the Pluto "monument".

I still haven't run out of things to do, and I'll try to continue this another time without using the famous pun "Ithaca is Gorges" once. (If you have to ask....well I should explain next time I talk about Ithaca.)

Security Guards at your Local Library?

I haven't revisited the Binghamton shooting of April 3 recently in my blog (13 dead plus the gunman) although I can assure you that it is far from forgotten.

Here is one of the little ways that concern over personal safety whittles away our personal freedoms. Remember the story about how you can boil someone alive by putting them into ice cold water and then turning up the heat ever sooooooooooooo slowly and they won't notice until it is too late?

Last month, in an incident totally unrelated to the shooting, our county office building ended up unusable for a month due to an accidental discharge of dust and the resulting cleanup.

The offices in that building had to be moved temporarily. One of the temporary locations was the Broome County Library on the edge of downtown Binghamton. As a certified bookworm, I go there at least once a week.

One day I entered, and to my total surprise (there were signs on the door, but I ignored them) there were security guards in the lobby, and a metal detector. What a pain (I thought) as I had to empty my pockets, have my pocketbook searched, etc. and then go through the scanner. All this to get out a couple of books?

The reason the guards were there was because of the relocated offices; they were giving these offices the same security as the county office building enjoyed.

However, over the next month of security at the library, a couple of interesting things happened. First (and I have to mention, this library is not in, shall we say, Binghamton's best neighborhood-sorry, downtown boosters) the guards found an interesting assortment of objects on some people trying to enter the library. And I don't mean library cards.

Second (and this I found out through speaking with one of the librarians), there had been a lot of incidents there-incidents that had many of the staff somewhat concerned about their personal safety. Suddenly, no more incidents. (I have to note here that even before the lobby guards, they did have a guard circulating through the building. But apparently that wasn't a deterrent for those bent on trouble.)

Third and last, to my horror, I found out that a certain person had used the library computers on more than one occasion. Because the computer records are wiped we'll never know what this person was using his local library for. Yes, it was the April 3 mass murderer of innocents, Jiverly Wong. And who knows if he was carrying more than his library card? And what would have happened if he didn't like something there?

Overall, the librarians were feeling a whole lot safer, and I have to admit that I was feeling a whole lot safer, too.

One day I went to the library and there were moving men carrying boxes out-our county offices were leaving. The next day, the lobby security guards and their metal detector left too.

I wrote a customer comment form asking for them back. It's probably not going to happen. I forget the figure given to get them back, I think it was somewhere around $36,000.

Just think. I want them back. I want someone screening everyone before we enter the local public library. Know that pot we live in? Turn up the heat a notch.....

My Childhood and Young Adulthood Considered as a Museum Piece

I thought about a woman who has been my mother in law's neighbor for many years. The neighbor is in her 70's.

We both grew up in the Bronx, 2 miles and some 20 plus years apart.

We can reminisce about a major shopping area in the Bronx off Fordham Road and the Grand Concourse, shopping at the same stores, going to the same movie houses and even eating at the same restaurants. We read the same magazines (including Life and Look). We used pay phones. We drank the same brand of soda (in 7 oz green bottles). We remember the same shows, although it is true that she heard a lot of them on radio and I watched them on T.V. We even remember when TV had steady schedules and seasons that always began the same week each year. We played potsy on the sidewalks. (I'll stop now before I sound like one of those "I love the 50's" emails that circulate.)

There were many differences (popular music, fashions, hair styles, to name three) but we have so much in common that we've had several nice chats about our respective childhoods.

Now think of someone 26 years younger than me. Or, put it this way. My sister in law is 12 years younger than me and there is so much we don't have in common (not that she grew up in my neighborhood, but just in general).

And the 38 years between me and my son? It's sometimes like trying to build a bridge across the Grand Canyon.

Never mind how I accessed the Internet in my childhood or if I played video games during a teacher's strike in 1968.

Let's see some of the things I've had to explain to him: For starters: typewriters. Record players. Rotary phones. Carbon paper. Mimeograph machines. Telegrams. The Space Race. Communism. The Soviet Union. Hollerith cards (OK, I am being technical here, but my son did dream of majoring in computer science at one time in his life.)

I've had some surprises in my career as a parent but having my childhood and young adulthood considered a musty museum piece was a big surprise.

I will, however, have my revenge. Just wait until he has kids.

Flex Spending Accounts-Worth the Hassle?

I don't know exactly why, but my medical Flexible Spending Account administrators have suddenly become audit crazy.

The medical FSA is a great idea on paper. I am no tax expert so I will not attempt to explain them; the link above does a great job. But let's say I want to have $3,000. in the account at the beginning of the year. The administrator gives you (in our plan) a debit card and on January 1 the administrator loads 3,000. on the card. Each paycheck (and I am paid biweekly) they take a deduction out and at the end of the year they have taken out the $3,000. to fund the account. But you have the $3,000. in full to spend on January 1 and it is pre-tax. You can use the money on any qualified medical expense. Need to pay a doctor's co pay? Swipe the card. Need a prescription? Swipe the card.

Downside? Of course. If you don't spend the $3,000 (or whatever you put in) by the end of the year, it is lost. But (unfortunately) we don't have that problem.

This is the third year I've had the card. The administrator can audit anytime and I am OK with that. The first two years there was one audit (one bill) each. But for this year they have audited about 8 different receipts so far, and we are only in May. Who knows what else is to come. Not only that but two of the audited items were hospital bills I paid by mail, giving them my debit card number. So the date of service isn't even the date the hospital charged the card to pay my bill and how am I suppose to prove the date and the expense difference? Especially when one is for a $15 co pay and I have all these different doctors with $15 co-pays?

I had to dig a little to match up the services. This is going to be a major pain. Unfortunately my spouse and I both have several health conditions that require visits to doctors, blood work, etc. so this is not a one time problem. For Pete's sake that is why we got the card and joined up to begin with!

Let me make it clear, I'm very grateful for having health insurance and the FSA. So many people don't have health insurance now. I am truly fortunate. If I didn't have the health insurance the FSA would be even more of a "lifeline" because of you getting all the money to spend up front and "paying it off" in installments.

But still...leave it to the government to mess up a good thing that benefits many people who do have health problems.

Going online in the 1950's - Revisited

I posted previously about my teen aged son wondering how I got online back in the 1950's. Thanks to a comment I received on this, I realize this just isn't my 19 year son, there is some kind of disconnect in experience between the generations that (perhaps) has never quite existed before.

My spouse commented "we can imagine a time without televisions and telephones, why can't they visualize a world without computers and the Internet?"

This isn't a trivia question. It is an entire question of mindset and worldview.

Last night I had dinner with a cousin (who goes to college here) and her parents, come to help her pack and go home for the summer. My cousin admitted to trouble with the concept too.

Meanwhile, when these young adults ask us "when did you first use a computer?" some of us really have to stop and think. The moment wasn't an important part of our lives. It wasn't like we date stamped the moment knowing our children would ask. Few people every dreamed computers would become what they are today. We lived life quite well without these gadgets thank you, even though they have become indispensible to us now. To our children they aren't gadgets, they are part of life itself, like air and water and food.

Has anyone else had this kind of experience with their children or other young adults in their lives?

The Perfect Use for all your old VCR tapes

I couldn't resist this table made out of old VCR tapes. May have my son try to make this.

The Arctic Eternal Day-Continued

Fairbanks gets closer to its 24 hours of sunlight. Today: sunrise 4:21, sunset 11:19. 18hrs and 58 minutes of "day". When I sign on right before 6am (we are 4 hours ahead) NY time, it isn't completely dark any more.

Soon the trees in the little webcam will be leafing out for the short subarctic summer. I wish they had a flower garden in the picture. Hey, folks, could you consider planting one?

I decided go to another Alaskan webcam, in Anchorage. This one shows Mt. McKinley on a clear day, which is pretty amazing, given the 120 air mile distance between the mountain and the city. And guess what? I can see it today!

Meanwhile, in Longyearbyen, Norway, above the arctic circle, it is beautiful, sunny and 27 degrees.

The sunsets may fascinate me, but the little windows on a world I will never know are just as interesting.

Ithaca, NY Stuff Part 1

Here are some of my favorite things to do in Ithaca, NY:

First, eating

1. The Cornell Dairy Bar on the Cornell University campus. Wonderful local ice cream. Parking is a bit "iffy" on weekdays.

2. Greenstar Coop. Clean, high quality food, lots of bulk items, local food, and more.

3. The Saturday and Sunday Farmers Market at Steamboat Landing. Lots of local produce (much of it organic) and craftspeople. Artisan cheese. Locally grown meet: pork, beef, bison. Finger Lakes wines for the sampling and purchase. Live plants - flowers, herbs, veggie starts. Cut flowers. And many prepared food stands, everything from macrobiotic to Laotian.

4. Gimme Coffee!

Second, Gardening:

1. The Plantsmen Nursery -I've mentioned this wonderful nursery before. They are far from your average nursery. Where do I start? OK...#1, it is kids friendly. #2 is the free Gimme Coffee, and biscotti, if you get there early enough. #3, the native landscaping plants...remember think globally, act locally? #4 the unusual annuals, many grown from Seeds of Change seeds. #5 the very knowledgeable, friendly staff. For example, we admired the Marsh Marigolds and they didn't hesitate to ask about our growing conditions and explaining that no, they probably wouldn't work for us.

2. The Farmers Market (see above)

3. Cornell Plantations. If you want to see trees in bloom (150 acres worth), 12-odd demonstration gardens, one of the most beautiful collections of plants in containers and so much more - this is your place - and the best part of it is: it is free. One caution - as is the case with so much of Cornell, parking is a bit dicey during the week.

I'll post some more "great things to do" later.

So How Did The Baby Boomers Get online in 1958?

First, I am not trying to mock my teenage son. But it shows how, in some ways, the mindset of the present generation is so much different from those of us born only 35 or 40 years earlier.

My son knows about what the computers of the 1950's looked like. People of my generation remember the UNIVAC?

Do you remember the famous "hoax" picture of the 1954 RAND prototype of the first home computer? Maybe that was what son was thinking about when he asked his question.

One evening he asked me "how did you get online when you were growing up? Did you have one of those huge computers in your bedroom?" I thought he was pulling my leg.

He wasn't.

Although he intellectually knew there was no "internet" as he knows it back in the 1950's or 1960's, he had to believe that there was something out there, just something very clunky, probably in black and white, and using technology full of vacuum tubes.

Not.

Interestingly, son is also very interested in "old technology". For example, he is looking for a good Betamax player (and has several Betamax tapes). He just couldn't make that intellectual leap. Let's think about this a minute. I bought my first home computer (a bit later than other people, I admit) in 1996 and went online in January of 1997. So my son was 6 at the time.

From his viewpoint, there was a computer in his life "forever".

By the way, when did the Internet start? The answer is complicated. This link has quite the discussion and the answer is..."it depends".

When Life Gets Tough....Turn to the Internet

This is a helpful website from a non profit organization. Their mission is to help you "Understand, Prevent and Resolve Life's Challenges"

We all go through difficult times and need all the help we can get.

Helpguide

www.Helpguide.org empowers you to make educated health and lifestyle choices to prevent illness and improve your health. This non-profit resource provides over 150 articles reviewed by recognized professionals.

ISP Customer Service from the Inside

This is a must read article "Confessions of a ISP Customer Service Rep"

If you ever wanted to know why ISPs do what they do, here's the view from the inside. An educated consumer is a wise consumer.

Back in the.....U.S.S.R

I had to do it. I made my pilgrimage to the Ithaca Friends of the Library Book Sale.

My "find" was not a book, but rather some old magazines. History Lovers heaven!

If you aren't of a "certain age" you will not remember Life magazine (except maybe in the name "Time-Life"). If you are of a certain age this magazine will bring back memories.

In a corner, I followed the musty smell and found a stack of old Life magazines. Many were heavily damaged but some were not. The persons (the mailing labels were still on these, and they weren't the same person) seemed to have a common interest in the space program - and in the Soviet Union.

They were $1.00 each and - to be honest- reeked, so I didn't want to buy too many.

After some digging I found my little treasure - the March 29, 1943 "Special Issue USSR" with a picture of Joseph Stalin on the cover. Now keep in mind that I grew up during the Cold War, did my share of Duck and Cover, and to this day hearing the sirens calling out the volunteer fire department make me cold and scared for a quick second before I reassure myself that they aren't air raid sirens announcing the atomic end of the world as we know it.

Well, my inner historian reminded me that at this point in time the U.S.S.R was our ally (against Hitler). And sure enough I paged through the magazine and saw this article "Red Leaders. They are Tough, Loyal, Capable Administrators". Not exactly the, er, party line I would hear in my growing up. Other articles praised the accomplishments of the Soviet Union, and even the accomplishments of the Russia of the past 1,000. years.

Remember the U.S.S.R? Remember the Reds? Remember Communism? My 19 year old son doesn't. He wasn't even two years old when the Soviet Union fell on Christmas Day, 1991. As for my generation, the Red Menace dominated our childhoods. What a difference a few years makes.

To my Cold War amazement, there is even an article "The Soviets and the Post-War" subtitled "A Former Ambassador to Moscow Answers Some Perplexing Problems". The author is one Joseph E. Davies, who famously supported the Soviet government even back in the 1930's, before we became allies.

One question asked of Mr. Davies was "Is Russian determined to pursue the cause of world revolution?" His answer began "In my opinion, no."

Seven years later, in the Joseph McCarthy era, this article may have been unprintable. The story of Joseph Davies is quite interesting, if this article is accurate.

I don't want to get political here, so just suffice it to say that this magazine, and the other three I bought, will be a source of much pleasure to me.

The Intersection of Cyberspace and History

Last Friday, there was an article in the Wall Street Journal. I found it online today, but I am not sure how long non-subscribers will be able to access it.

The focus of the article was on the use of technology to both save (digitally) old manuscripts, some of which are so damaged that they will be unusable in mere years, and also to use technology such as CT Scans to read such documents as recycled parchment (a common practice). In some instances we can now read the documents that were "wiped out" to make room for the new documents. Scans have even allowed us to read scrolls that were blackened by fire, and scientists hope to read scrolls destroyed by volcanic eruption.

The best part is that the article has links to various online sites where you can view some of these treasures, in addition to other treasures such as Christopher Columbus's diary and one of Leonardo da Vinci notebooks.

Incredible. I know I am far from the only blogger to draw attention to this article. It deserves all the publicity it can get.

This research and preservation work requires a lot of funding, and I hope these historians can find it. Many people do not realize how precious and fragile history is. And what are we without history? Think about it.

Happy Mothers Day to the Five Mothers in My Life

On this Mothers Day I want to pay tribute to five women who helped make me into the person I am today.

The first person was my mother, who died too soon and too young. She was a stay at home mother who, I know, wanted to be in the workplace but the times (the early 1960's) did not support that. Instead, she became the mother that the neighborhood children would call for treats. Yes, call. We lived on the fourth floor of an apartment building in the Bronx. When we would play, and got hungry, we would gather under the window and yell in unison "Mom!" Somehow she always knew "Mom" meant her and not one of the other 130 Moms in the building. Well, OK, sometimes we had to yell for a few minutes. But soon, a bag would be dropped out the window for all of us to share.

Mom was so very proud that her English skills were such that she had gotten a job meant only for college graduates. She graduated from high school and never went further in her education. She had been a contest judge for a famous organization and I used to love to hear her tales about that. She had also studied to be a dental hygienist, and still had one of her textbooks. It was way too hard for me and I was amazed that she could have studied from it.

When I was 10 years old, I broke my leg. As my 6th grade class was on the 4th floor of my elementary school, and there were no elevators, the school sent a home instructor to my apartment for the two months I was out of school. As it happened, the teacher grew up in the the same neighborhood as my mother and they would have coffee and chat as I worked on my studies.

One Friday morning in November my mother left me to go shopping. When she returned, she was crying. She turned the TV on and that is how I found out about the assassination of John Kennedy.

In the last years of her life, rheumatoid arthritis stole much of her mobility and left her so exhausted that she would lie on the couch. She was so very depressed, too but I was too young to understand. I would rub her feet and help her feel better. I would go to the market with her and do the shopping while she sat in the front of the store.

The second mother was the mother of a good friend from school. After she died, "Mrs. Frank" showed me how to use a washing machine, how to open cans (would you believe I didn't know how!!) and so much more, and kept an eye on me. She is still alive today and I hope she had a wonderful mothers day.

The third mother was my Aunt Trudy, who lived in Tampa, FL and in many ways stepped in to fill the huge hole the death of my mother created in my life. I visited her three times in my teen years. She showed me and taught me many of the things that my mother would have shown me if she had been alive. My Aunt also died young, from pancreatic cancer.

The fourth mother was my Aunt Mary. My Aunt Mary lived out in Iowa but after I married and moved out to the Midwest, I became close to her. She was one of the most understanding, most accepting people I was ever to meet. I list her fourth but in many ways the mark she left on me was second only to my own natural mother.

The last mother is my mother in law. She is 81 now and a very strong woman. I hope I have her wits and her determination when I am 81! She is a two-time cancer survivor and the mother of a man with autism. My brother in law was born years before autism was something discussed in the daily news. She was one of the generation of women who did not institutionalize her son and tried to make as normal a life for him as she could while he was growing up. The parents of children with autism today owe a lot of gratitude to women like my mother in law, who "made it up" as they went along, without support, without understanding.

Happy Mothers Day to all mothers. Thank you to the women above, and to their sons and daughters, some of whom are still in my life.

Second Spring-Part 1 - Ft. Myers FL Garden

This is my second spring this year. In March we spent a week down in Florida.
















This set of pictures is from the Edison-Ford Winter Estate in Ft. Myers, Florida. The pictures do not begin to do justice to the gorgeous plant specimens we saw there.

The first two pictures are of a bougainvillea. Definitely not a plant you would ever find outdoors in the Binghamton, NY area. It was so refreshing to see something blooming.



The next picture is of an orchid. I had never seen one growing on a tree trunk. I keep orchids, and one day I will have to write about my adventures...er, misadventures, trying to keep orchids alive.



Many people do not know that Thomas Edison's second wife, Mina Miller Edison was a devoted gardener. Nor do they know that Thomas Edison himself did a lot of experimentation with plants with an eye toward exploiting their commercial use.

This is the link to the Edison-Ford Winter Estates.

Finally, here is a picture of a banyan tree. It's hard to show the size of this tree but what we saw was actually after a pruning done last year. Here is some information about this wonderful tree-which wouldn't grow here, either.

Gas-One Year Later

Funny what a difference a year makes.

Today, noticing that gas has gone up 10 cents a gallon since this morning, we found ourselves looking for a gas station where the prices haven't gone up yet. Local gas station was charging $2.39. Finally found a station selling at $2.25. They were changing their signs to $2.29 but hadn't changed the pumps yet.

Hard to believe that two months ago, in St. Petersburg, FL, we paid $1.84 a gallon.

Last year at this time we would have felt like the luckiest people in the world to pay $2.39 a gallon. In fact, in the first week in July, we paid $1.39 a litre in New Brunswick. To convert to gallons multiply that by 3.785 so that is $5.26 a gallon Canadian-back when the Canadian dollar was about 1.02 U.S. I'm not going to do that conversion.

Our record for gas prices in the U.S. was $4.21 a gallon on the Maine side of the Canada/U.S. border (Calais, ME) on that same trip.

Yes, folks...it's all relative. But, let's see what is going to happen now.

Eternal Sunsets of the Spotting Mind

Back to my favorite website. And my childhood obsession with the 24 hour day.

When I was growing up in the Bronx,I used to have dreams about living in a place where the sun never set. In these dreams, sometimes the sun would set, but it would be very late at night. I would gaze out my window at 11pm (in my dream) and it would still be light. Sometimes, though, it was dark all the time. I would look at the stars, and they were different. This would, for some reason, frighten me.

When I found out that there were, indeed places which had 24 hour light and 24 hour dark, I began to wonder about what it would truly be like to see the sun at midnight, or experience total darkness.

As an adult, I haven't had that opportunity (either way) except through the Internet.

Last year, through Eternal Sunset, I tracked a location in Antarctica and a location in Fairbanks, AK for an entire year. However, neither location has the true 24 hour swing - Fairbanks, for example, has a maximum daylight time of 21 hrs and 45 minutes (approximately.) They do have 24 hour "light"on the day of the summer solstice but the sun does set.

Now, I have, again through Eternal Sunset, found an actual 24 hour web cam location - in Norway. Svalbard & Longyearbyen, to be exact. Right now, as I write this, it is almost midnight. The sun is right on the horizon. The web cam is pointed at it. It is 28 degrees above zero, snow on the ground, and several people on snowmobiles are clearly visible. I wish I could be allowed to post a picture from this website. This is a childhood dream come true. What is it like to live there?

There are photos of this area, and stunning would not begin to describe it. What does the person who runs this website do for a living? Does he sleep at all during the arctic day? Has he ever been to more temporate climes? If so do our days and nights seem weird to him?

One day I will sign his guestbook, although I'd better not tell him about my obsession with the Eternal Sunset. Some things are better left unsaid.

Crack for Book Lovers

Has anyone ever threatened to leave you because books threaten to drown your living space? And you've thought twice about what has to go-your partner or your books?

If so, this is the sale for you.

Twice a year, in Ithaca, comes one of the largest library book sales in the country.
Where? 509 Esty Street, Ithaca, NY
When? May 9-11, May 16-18, May 23-26
October 10-12, 17-19 and 24-27
Here's the website, for more information.

Why do you want to go to this?
Because it's huge.
Because it's there.
Because it is Ithaca, home of Cornell U and Ithaca College.

This isn't junk (well, some of it is. But...). And it isn't just books. It is DVDs, records (all kinds, all ages), video tapes (even Betamax), video discs, old video games, old computer programs, old magazines. If you collect, you may just find a gem here.
And if you don't....well it's a wonderful place to spend hours.

The spring sales tend to be a little less crowded than the fall sales but be prepared to spend a lot of time on line to get in, especially now that the fire marshalls are enforcing the "no more than so many people in this building" rule. Parking is sometimes a bit challenging too. But nothing worth doing is easy.

And, you may just make a good friend while waiting on line.

Need more things to do in Ithaca while you are there? I'll make a post on that soon.

Belly Dancers and a Cherry 57 Nash

Last night spouse and I went to the "First Friday Art Walk" in downtown Binghamton. This is an event that takes place the first Friday of every month where various art galleries and other venues open at night for viewing. Several places that normally charge admission are free. It started out with stores on a particular street and has now spread, including venues outside of downtown. Here's the website: http://www.gorgeouswashington.com/firstfridaysmore.htm.

It's a neat event for a small city. We aren't trained "art observers" we just know what we like and don't like. It's a good way to sample various types of art all in one evening. Two local museums also open free that evening. There is a free shuttle trolley. Although the event officially runs from 6-9 pm, the party really doesn't get started until later-although we aren't there by then.

Three things of note:

First, we saw a belly dancing performance out on one of the sidewalks. I have an in law who is a belly dancer and I wonder what her take on it would have been. It was a lot of fun to watch but I don't know if I would have been brave enough to walked barefoot on that sidewalk.

The second was an exhibition of art work by the late Jerry Garcia of the Grateful Dead. That's where the "Cherry 57 Nash" comes in. If Jerry Garcia hadn't become a famous musician, who knows? His art, to be honest, is not my cup of tea except for, amazingly, some art that he worked on soon after coming out a diabetic coma. He worked on his art as therapy because he had lost a lot of his motor skills. He created visions of what he had seen coming out of his coma. They were absolutely otherworldly. Really made you think.

The third was a coffee shop that featured a young man who was billed as a "culinary artist". He created some very unusual dishes, all of which incorporated coffee. There was a raw shaved asparagus which looked like spinach fettuccine - dressed in oil. It was wonderful. There was shrimp with a coffee based dip. I don't eat shrimp but spouse dug right in. Lastly he had a steamed asparagus spear dish with a coffee dip, again very imaginative. That is exactly what our city needs. The gentleman had been a chef in some big city restaurants, he explained, but his wife was a native of Binghamton and so...here he was. I wish him well.

Finally, a number of galleries were donating contributions that normally went to pay for refreshments to victims of the American Civic Association shooting. Some were also donating a percentage of their sales last night. Very sobering to remember that the last First Friday was the night of the shooting. How quickly time passes. So much has happened here in the last month as our community begins to heal.