Saturday, 17 July 2010
Nothing heavy on this Satt-ah-dee night, but here’s a castle I found while perusing the landscape in Google Earth. I love that you can see the terracing below the lower castle wall. Note the defensive shape of the main wall. As always, where are the storage rooms for food, water, ammunition? That’s the problem with holing up; you need supplies….
Friday, 9 July 2010
Today’s main event: American Museum of Natural History.
The entry hall is named after Teddy Rooooosevelt, and is dominated by a dinosaur skeleton and the sound emanating from the congregating hoardes—ooh, let me rest my feet—yesterday in the park about did me in!
I had two sections I wanted to hit. My mistake was checking anything out along the way.
I had heard the revised human origins hall was very well done. My takeaway: excellent.
The posted hominid “family tree” even includes two species of Ardipithecus!
And I was eyeball to eye socket with a Neanderthal skeleton (or replica thereof) for a while. Thinking. Contemplating humanity, I suppose.
This diorama, however, is of Eurasian Ice Age Homo sapiens, those folks of the Far North who used mammoth bones as building material.
Thursday, 8 July 2010
Daylight through a gun port, high in the wall of a fortification in the northern part of Central Park, NYC.
Wouldn’t you know that if I spent the day wandering in Central Park, I would find a ruin? Well, it’s not a crumbly ruin, but, still, it’s an abandoned building. Locked away and secured. And so: essentially a ruin.
Of what?—you ask (if I’m lucky)….
A fort once stood in what is now the park. I had no idea.
This ruin dates to the War of 1812, and was remodeled later.
Extra credit: what were the “sides” in the War of 1812? What was the dispute?
Monday, 28 June 2010
I spent most of today thinking about and researching the Bronze Age on this island*. I know this reads like I’m loopy, but mostly I’m wiped out.
* And yes, north on this Google Earth screen-grab is “up.”
Monday, 7 June 2010
We took a hike this aft from the Log Slide westish to Au Sable Point Lighthouse (that white dot on the other side of the point in this view). We descended (then ascended on the return trip) down, by my count, three lake stages, but I don’t know the geology beyond that. All that is in a National Lakeshore—your tax dollars at work!
GGumee: thank you HWL.
Thursday, 25 February 2010
On this bright, sunny, yet windy-chilly day, we headed to Athens to return a too-long borrowed book (oops!).
I had forgotten that way back in June 2009, the Georgia Theatre suffered the ravages of fahr (deliberate misspelling**). Too, too bad.
And now the façade stands, a bright face to building-less architecture.*
As I recall, the last event I attended here was Lucinda Williams—fine music that night!
* Click here if you want to donate to the rebuilding fund.
** Channeling Kayak Woman….
Sunday, 7 February 2010
We spent the day out on the western side of Sapelo Island. A big part of the story is the catamaran* ferry that we took out and back. The only other time I visited Sapelo, over a decade ago, we took a much slower boat, which meant we spent a long time crouching behind the pilot area out of the wind as much as possible, but still with a view. After all, it’s not every day you get to ride through the salt marshes behind a barrier island.
This is the ferry coming in to pick us up in the morning, when it was overcast. By the time we began our island tour (thank you, Ray!), almost an hour later, the sun was out, and by mid-afternoon, all the clouds departed.
Some of this will be detailed elsewhere over the next few months.
* I had no idea “catamaran” is from the Tamil word kaṭṭumaram. The Tamil are native to Sri Lanka and southeast India. That’s a long ways away!
Saturday, 6 February 2010
This round window is high on the center section of the back side of the Ashantilly plantation house. The back side looks inland. The main entrance faces the marsh to the east.
Although I sat in a meeting all day, our hosts treated us like royalty and our setting was stunning—both of which took some of the pain away (plus, we had a productive meeting). We met in the library at Ashantilly, a plantation house north of Darien. It’s now operated by a enthusiastic team of volunteers, who have their work cut out for them—take their next big project: fixing the roof. Follow this link to get some of idea of how much roof there is, and of how many sections it has….
BTW, below the framing here is what is called tabby, which is made from a mixture of oyster shell, lime (made from roasting oyster shell), sand, and water, which is poured into forms and cured, much like concrete.
I cannot let this day pass into history without mentioning that the fine people who operate Ashantilly fed us three meals this day—all super-yummy!—including an evening oyster roast and shrimp boil. Convivial. Tasty. The best!
Friday, 29 January 2010
Usually, the Dusty Past I think about is not my own, unless we’re talking deep ancestry, many, many generations ago.
Today, I overheard JCB & Mom discussing this artifact, and had to fess up that I had made it aeons ago…. If you can’t tell, it’s a pincushion, but mostly it’s festooned instead with needles, including sewing-machine needles….
Friday, 18 December 2009
Rainy rainy rainy all day until now when it’s just plain wet, drippy, and grey outside.
Inside feels almost as gloomy (“quiet, too quiet”), if drier. We need Xmas lights!
And, me? I’ve been reading about wear patterns on antlers (currently free to download—how exciting!), among other things. You see, antlers are one substance used to make stone tools, an activity which, of course, generates distinct patterns, at least theoretically, as a result of the use. Conclusion: marks on antlers from tool use can be difficult to separate from natural deer rub marks.
Meanwhile, the picture is from yesterday’s walk, of some surviving colorful leaves. Apple maybe?
BTW, anyone else tired of hearing about the blue “people” movie & from its director?