Blue Pieces

Just read the brief blog of Hiroko Tabuchi – a NY Times environmental and pollution reporter – outlining numerous examples of former lobbyists for environmentally destructive industries, or practices within industries, being installed to positions of responsibility for those areas within the EPA.

Former lobbyists at the E.P.A.

This strikes me as counter-productive. Ironically, it is potentially VERY productive – that is, productive in the sense of advancing, within a GOVERNING agency, the causes that these former lobbyists believe in. And additionally very productive in removing guardrails or countering forces within the agency which are central to the mission of the agency in the first place.

This here is one layer of the onion of madness!

While doing some yardwork I came across this nice, fat, juicy cicada sitting calmly on my porch step. He/she did not mind when I sat down beside him/her/it. In fact, it was very complacent and allowed me to snap a few photos – which is more than any of my family members would allow without airing grievances. The cicada sat so still I had to wonder if it was ok. After a few minutes I nudged it and it flew away in a burst of winged fury, rising high in the sky and cruising on past the distant garage. What adventure it was bound for I knew not.

Before I got up to go I noticed the now empty exoskeleton clinging to the rough surface of the brick in the step. Only then did I realize that this Cicada had just transformed itself from a rather ugly big, juicy bug to an equally ugly, big juicy flying creature.

What a process!

Marie trying to work the latch at the outdoor pool

Why do I love Moo?

Last Sunday Marie’s work colleague Greg texted her to celebrate his soccer team’s clinch of second place. During the tennis tournaments Marie gets texts from her work hero Virginia. She routinely got Wednesday night texts during “Modern Family” from her colleague Debbie. She is much loved and sought after by folks at work because she is a friend and brightly shining spirit. Back when I had an office, I would go into it, lodge myself in a cube, and start working. Harumph. In contrast, Marie shines like a star, and wants to know how the people around her are doing… She is not a time waster, not a water-cooler complainer, not a lolly-gagger… But she cares about her team, and finds all kinds of ways to show it.

And that, my friends, is another of the myriad reasons why I love Moo!

And in case you’re wondering about the photo… Once she’s locked inside the latch-gate of the Brighton Rec public pool, Marie cannot extricate herself. She can’t work the latch. Six year olds can work that latch! If no one came to her rescue, she’d have to climb the fence (and she’d do that too before she’d sit around all depressed). But this fundamental inability to make things operate manifests itself all over the place – e.g., on top of Algonquin Peak where she couldn’t work the walkie-talkie, in the hotel where she couldn’t work the mag-stripe room key, and at the outdoor pool…

Why do I love that about her? Because it creates a very small reason for her to need me – and I need all of that I can get!

I heard Frank DeFord recite Casey today… it brought back memories of my Father and Grandfather – both of whom loved the poem and loved me for loving it too.

Part of coming to grips with this whiff tale is understanding that the great power hitters whiffed all the time. Lore of my youth indicated that nobody struck out more than Babe Ruth – except Mickey Mantle. I saw Mickey whiff numerous times. Even as an idealistic hero-worshipping 10 year old baseball fanatic I knew the Mick was all washed up. I was a little too young to catch his glory days.

How do we cope with the unbelievable miracle of our world’s complexity? I sit at my desk and browse the web and cannot stop pinballing from thing to thing…

Climbers killed in volcanic explosion

OK – that is not a “miracle” but it is deeply tragic and provides the literally awesome thought that the earth is alive and breathing and spitting and panting and fuming and on a scale that reduces us to microbes.

Swimming beneath the brinicles

Here’s a better example of a gentle miracle – the idea that at every moment, with every breath, in our world of waste and tumult, there is a scene somewhere else of incredible beauty and peaceful balance. For every place we know, there are a billion places we don’t know.  For every thoughts we ponder, there are a billions thoughts we miss. And the price of the technology that let’s us so easily explore this “room of requirement” that can be anything, anything at all, is the price that may well be our undoing. It is perfect.

Google Earth Time Lapse

Watch the evolution of a shoreline, as brought to us by satellite images and animated compliments of Google. I could sit in front of this widget for hours!

Just got off the phone with Jo and had a great conversation about his new job and the exciting project he’s running. It was like being out of breath then getting oxygen! the idea of facing a challenge got me excited! It’s a little bit too bad I’m just on the sideline in a phone call though. Jo felt that  – and was very sensitive about it – but I was so happy he’d call and fill me in. I was careful to express 95% joy and only 5% wistfulness.

So – the world is a miraculous place. I am thankful. But it is very hard to go downstairs with Moo and watch her walk through the door to go work hard all day and know that I have nothing to do. I have EVERYTHING to do, but have a self-imposed guilt layer associated with lack of gainful employment that says I cannot partake of the forbidden pleasure of indulging myself. I’ve got to back to the work of finding work.

One last (and greatest) miracle… my loving family and their gift of ongoing support!

My Mate Moo – Presented with flowers by her loving daughter, on Mother’s Day 2012.

Jeff and Peter invited us to tag along on their marathon adventure. It was a dismal, 50 degree steady rain for the entire four-plus hours, but it was glorious!

Alfred Anaya got 24 years in prison for building traps. The traffickers who used his traps got sentences half as long. It doesn’t make sense.
WIRED Magazine article by Brendan I. Koerner

This is the way federal prosecutors dispense justice?

Mars Gigapixel Panorama – Curiosity rover: Martian solar days 136-149 in Out of this World