Open Thread – Fun with Frost!
I went for a walk this morning to enjoy the unexpected photographic gift of a hard frost. It’s definitely a timing issue when you want to get these shots. As soon as the sun hits your target, the clock starts ticking. So, I had fun finding places that were still frosty and hadn’t succumbed to the still warm sun of October. It really was quite spectacular. The whole world looked like it was coated in sugar. Every leaf, every blade of grass, every twig, seed pod, and berry was glistening. I was almost going to tell you that the frost…
Dispatches from the Congo – A Journey of Love (Part 8)
Bonjour from Kinshasa! Kinshasa used to be known as Kinshasa La Belle — Kinshasa the Beautiful. Now, it’s known as Kinshasa La Poubelle — Kinshasa the Garbage Can. It’s a very apt description. This city is wearing on me a bit. What was new and exciting for the first 5 days or so begins to get old after the first week. The power outages aren’t helping — the internet is my lifeline to the outside world! I think the hardest thing about this city is that I always feel dirty — like no matter how much I scrub, I’ll never…
Open Thread – That’s Just Wrong
I want to know who came up with this one – child-resistant lighters shaped like puppy dogs. They’re just begging for vigorous product testing. What could go wrong?
Open Thread – Occupy Anchorage on Saturday!
This Saturday from 3-7:30 pm, join the Occupy Anchorage rally in Town Square Park next to the Anchorage Center for the Performing Arts. Step out in solidarity with the protesters of Occupy Wall Street! Come early to join in the organization of action committees. Stay to enjoy a peaceful protest to make the voices of the other 99% of Americans heard for equality, financial justice, and democracy. Please bring your signs, food to share, musical instruments, ideas, costumes, puppets, friends and purpose to join us for an afternoon of street theatre and consciousness raising. Stay tuned, as it may also…
Open Thread – Rest in Peace, Steve Jobs
Rest in peace, Steve Jobs. 56 is too young, and cancer is too mean. But we wonder, as we do with all those who changed their world and left us too soon, what you might have done with another five years, or ten, or forty. The world has lost a bright light, an innovator, an out-of-the box thinker, a technical artist, and a changer of society. He did more in his 56 years, and left a larger legacy than most humans do. Thanks for a job well done, and for furthering our imagination, our communication, and our sense of wonder…
Dispatches from the Congo – A Journey of Love (Part 7)
By Erin Pohland Good evening from Kinshasa! As I write, there is a dance party happening on the street in front of my hotel. Luckily, Andrew is a good sleeper — too bad his mama is not. Today was relatively uneventful, as far as things go. We had no appointments and nowhere to be. Instead, we spent the day with our new American friend “J”, that works at the UN. After getting up for breakfast, a bath and then a nap, J picked us up at the hotel. It was SO nice to be in the car with a non-native…
Open Thread – The Advance of the Termination Dust
It’s here. I’ve been watching it. First, it showed up on the high peaks two rows back. Then Wolverine Peak and the taller peaks of the Chugach Mountains got it. Then Flattop got it. And now, it’s reached the lower peaks… the last line of defense between Old Man Winter and Anchorage. Right now, it’s just called “termination dust” – the smattering of the white stuff that marks the termination of summer. The torrential rain currently pounding on my roof will soon be silent and white. We are on beautiful borrowed time…
Open Thread – Hi There!
Hey, Facebook friends! There you are! I thought this was a cool app, and had no idea that my FB friends were flung so far and wide. Although I have to admit, I’m now on a quest to get a friend in Greenland, and maybe Mongolia. If you aren’t represented on the map, do feel free to click the little “like” button next to all of those handsome faces in the sidebar.