hot flash

yeah, it's time for TMI!

i recently heard hot flashes described as a "personal tropical vacation".

i'm currently taking a break from my busy morning because suddenly it is ninety-eight bazillion degrees in here even though my thermostat is set to 60 and it's cold outside and i am nearly naked.

i am really looking forward to thanksgiving, when i will be able to call myself done with the whole business of having an active reproductive system, and it is a thing i have been looking forward to ever since i heard that periods were a thing and i was going to start getting them.

i'm not into it.

sing along if you know the words.

boomwhackers!

this week i saw a post in laughing squid about boomwhackers. more specifically, it was a post about the students of THUD performing don't stop believin' on boomwhackers.

go ahead. i'll wait.





a lot of people are amazed because they did not know boomwhackers were even a thing.

i am amazed because i bought a couple of sets of boomwhackers for my classroom when they were a NEW thing and although i understood that they had this potential, performing with them like this takes a LOT of skill. have you ever seen a really good handbell choir? yeah, that's the basic principle.

and if you can't figure out what the black things are they keep putting on and off, those are endcaps.

a boomwhaker is an open pipe, and the endcap makes it a closed pipe, which drops the pitch an octave because effectively the vibrating air column is now twice the length. physics is fun.

word garden

out behind the waterbury public library they have a word garden.

it's sort of like magnetic refrigerator poetry, only with very satisfying stone pieces on gravel. i was there with my friend rsr (ingress, boys and girls! we're the BLUE team!) and we wrote this poem:

i was out camping.

um, yeah, so...

neither of you are going to be surprised that i took off and went camping, because of course i did.

i don't know if i told you or not, but i made a goal for myself of camping in every month this year.

and now october is complete.

later on, (yes, i always promise later ons) there are going to be some pictures and stories. right now i'm concerned with unpacking and airing out gear so it will be nice for the next camping, doing the laundry, and maybe cleaning the house.

oh, and studying for the VMN class upcoming. and preparing girl scout things.

adulting, both basic and advanced levels.

wayward children

some months ago somebody posted something in one of my slack chats from seanan mcguire's tumblr feed. i liked what she had to say on her tumblr feed, so i started following it.

and then i realized that seanan mcguire is not just an awesome human being, but also a bestselling author.

only her books are in some genres that are usually too scary for me. but i love her so much from things she says i want to read her books. but i don't want to have nightmares. but i want to read her books. but afraid.

well, one awesome thing about her is that she actually talks to random people who write in to her tumblr. many people write in to say "whoa! i only just heard of you! where should i start?" and she points them to this page.

the wayward children series. it appeared to be gentle enough even for me, but i was still on the fence.

and then i decided to pull on my big girl pants and went down to my local library to get every heart a doorway and while i loved it, i felt it was ... incomplete. i wanted to learn more about these worlds and these characters.

but wait! there are more!

so now until the fourth book comes out, i'm having to start one of her other series, and i am hoping they are not too scary.

i now have a bona fide author crush.

returning property

have you guys seen this story?

https://boingboing.net/2018/10/04/why-you-should-never-return-lo.html

are you seeing the major flaw with the police position?

they're saying the guys should have turned it in immediately to a nearby BUSINESS.

as if businesses are institutions of safekeeping. as if a subway is not full of people being paid minimum wage who might steal something.

i'm not saying they're inherently dishonest, but seriously? a business is not better guarantee of getting lost property back to a person than any honest citizen.


in the last year i have returned hundreds of dollars worth of things to people who had lost them or even just left them behind in remote parking lots.

that stuff goes in my car until somebody calls to identify it. i am more confident that i will get it back to the proper owner than some random person working in a nearby store.

this story is one where the police have an overconfidence in businesses as entities that are somehow better than citizens. that officer didn't say the man should have turned it in to a police department or government agency. he's saying the man is being charged because he did not turn it in AT A SUBWAY RESTAURANT.

CHARGED.

this is part of an increasing trend to criminalize people for just being people.

2018 venture vermont: identify two kinds of drgaonflies

this is hard, because they don't love to be caught.

and it's hard to photograph them clearly enough if they're not caught.

i'm going to hope for the purposes of this challenge that we're including damselflies in this category, because  a lot of people don't rally distinguish the two.

plus they're easier to catch.

anyway, here's a variable dancer:


















and this is a stream bluet:

two of them, actually. i do not know how they fly like that.

2018 venture vermont: practice skipping stones

it's hard for me to get the spin on the throw, but the challenge isn't to be awesome at skipping stones.

it's to practice.

and practice i did, on and off, all summer. i am not often in a place where the stones are built for it (rounded,  flat,  light) which would help a lot, but a skilled stone skipper can skip nearly any stone, even on choppy water.

last week i managed to skip one stone nine times, in a long, curving arc.

2018 venture vermont: create your own state park song or poem

274 raymond road

you might miss the turn 

even if you were looking for it, 

and end up somewhere better-known

but less desired.

you might miss the opportunity, slotted into your day

between this and that, packing a lunch,

making an appointment,

unable to escape.

but let's say you find your way 

and find yourself slotted in 

between the ledge and the sandbank;

you have to choose early.

but once you do choose

(and maybe you do go up on the bank or over the rock ledges,

but this isn't about that, not today, not this path)

once you do choose to go down the center slot

every other way becomes less likely

every other choice is uphill

i won't tell you there's no escape

but why would you make the bushwhack?

why would you try to get out of this slot,

this wide road down

that when it opens

it opens

on wide lake and sky

2018 venture vermont: identify three habitat types by your house

i guess i could just call them forest, field, and grassland, but i just got a copy of wetland, woodland, wildland so i think i can do a little better.

this here is the verge of a section of northern hardwood forest.

it may be a mesic red oak variant,but it is an area that has undergone considerable disturbance and being sure requires more study than i have time for this week.

soon, though.

here's a beaver meadow,  most likely a shallow emergent marsh.

this grassland used to be mowed, but isn't anymore.

2018 venture vermont: donate to your local food bank

it's really easy.

you tear off the coupon at the store and pay a little extra on your bill.

they have these at the richmond market.