We have a nature theme today, folks.
If you’d like to read about the kinder aspects of nature, like geese and turtles, you can read a nice little post here.
Filed under Letters.
If you’re interested in learning about more violent out-bursts in nature, discover a vulcanic eruption more deadily than Pompeii by reading here.
File under The Odd […]
Wild geese reproduce at a prolific rate. I have read about how wild Canadian geese populations have become a problem in some areas, their numbers have grown so large.
We don’t have that problem in this neighborhood.
Yet.
But, watching the wild geese that live in this area, I see how it does happen in other areas.
Geese Grazing
Directly […]
Most of my regular readers probably already know this, but for those who missed it— Clause Vistesen posted an edited version of my post Does an aging demographic structure lead to an export-oriented economy over at Demography Matters.
Edward Hugh (A British born Spanish based economist who specializes in economic effects of demographic change) has posted Click Here to continue reading.
The cynic gives with eyes averted, and doubts when he hopes, because most of all he fears dissappointment–that is loss of control.
I think I made it clear, when I presented to you the sprouting change, that danger threatened the sprout from every side. I intimated the militant ranks of people who would not take a Click Here to continue reading.
All this focus on death in the rant and essay of this week made me think of this passage from Job.
Since this week’s Essay of the Week is about death and society it is only right that this weeks rant should be about society and death. And so we present a British Inspector’s rant on the indignities that modern regulations force on the dead and the grieving.
This week’s essay of the week aggravates me and inspires me at the same time. It aggravates me because it takes a promising idea and does not do it justice. But it inspires me because it has gotten me thinking about why I don’t think this essay handles the subject properly and how I would do it differently.
And what is the subject of this aggregating and inspiring essay? Properly speaking it is death and the foundation of society. But in one the first ways in which the essay goes wrong the author of the essay (Joseph Bottum) elects to call the essay Death & Politics. He thus gives a rather mundane gloss to a serious issue.
Flaws aside, the inspiring aspects of this essay make it worth putting up with the aggravation that it contains.
So often grade school science books paint the life of a predator as being so easy. You sit around in a tree all day, and grab yourself a snack when you need one. This is especially true with lions, which are portayed as being so fast an powerfull nothing can keep them from dinner. I Click Here to continue reading.
Much of the US is operating under drought conditions as this story from USA Today demonstrates. This drought is afflicting parts of the country that are not use to prolonged dry spells. From the USA Today article…
This drought has been particularly harsh in three regions: the Southwest, the Southeast and northern Minnesota.
Severe dryness across California and Arizona has spread into 11 other Western states. On the Colorado River, the water supply for 30 million people in seven states and Mexico, the Lake Powell and Lake Mead reservoirs are only half full and unlikely to recover for years. In Los Angeles County, on track for a record dry year with 21% of normal rain downtown since last summer, fire officials are threatening to cancel Fourth of July fireworks if conditions worsen. On Wednesday, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa urged residents to voluntarily cut water use 10%, the city’s first such call since the 1990s.
In Minnesota, which is in its worst drought since 1976, the situation is improving slowly, although a wildfire last month burned dozens of houses and 115 square miles in the northeastern part of the state.
The Southeast, unaccustomed to prolonged dry spells, may be suffering the most. In eight states from Mississippi to the Carolinas and down through Florida, lakes are shrinking, crops are withering, well levels are falling and there are new limits on water use. “We need 40-50 inches of rainfall to get out of the drought,” says Carol Ann Wehle of the South Florida Water Management District.
Despite a recent storm, water hasn’t flowed in Florida’s Kissimmee River, which feeds Lake Okeechobee, in 212 days. The district has imposed its strictest water-use limits ever in 13 counties, cutting home watering to once a week and commercial use by 45%.
Of course, this is adding fuel to people’s global warming concerns. But to my mind, the really scary thing is how much worse this could get using only the historical record as a guide. As The Weather Guys point out in their blog….
But as bad as this drought is, it can’t hold a candle to the disastrous Dust Bowl of the 1930s. For example, in July 1934, an incredible 63 percent of the USA was considered to be severely to extremely dry, compared to just 18 percent this April, according to the National Climatic Data Center.
Just because we live in a traditionally wet area, does not mean we should assume that we are safe from really bad droughts. And I count the dry summers that we have suffered from in the past as being really bad droughts.
I have tried hard to like Chanel’s work, but I just have never quite managed it. People would say her work was the epitome of luxury, the definition of chic elegance, that she had the perfect taste. I tried to see it, but I couldn’t. The “classic” Chanel jackets simple looked like an old couch Click Here to continue reading.