Starship Asterisk*

Today tomorrows and yesterdays I am orientating...

bystander wrote: Have you voted yet?

Click to play embedded YouTube video.

Hey Bystander!

Your YouTube video should be manditory viewing for everyone... so many of us do not appreciate enough what is before us today... I always try to thank the flight attendants and pilots when I get the chance.

orin stepanek wrote: Have a good one Ed

Thanks Orin!

Hadn't heard that classic birthday song from the Beatles that I can recall

neufer wrote:

orin stepanek wrote:
Have a flower filled day to get us by til Spring.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LtnLvrmyh3E

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pansy wrote:

<<The pansy or pansy violets are a large group of hybrid plants cultivated as garden flowers. The modern garden pansy had its origin in the Iver, Buckinghamshire, estate of James, Lord Gambier, whose gardener William Thompson began about 1813 crossing various viola species with Viola tricolor. A yellow viola, V. lutea, and a wide-petalled pale yellow species of Russian origin, V. altaica were among the crosses that began the new hybrids, today classed as Viola x wittROCKiana.

In William Shakespeare's play A Midsummer Night's Dream, the juice of a pansy blossom ("before, milk-white, now purple with love's wound, and maidens call it love-in-idleness") is a love potion: "the juice of it, on sleeping eyelids laid, will make a man or woman madly dote (fall in love) upon the next live creature that it sees." (Act II, Scene I see also: Oberon at II, i). Since the cultivated pansy had not yet been developed, "pansy" here means the wild Heartsease, and the idea of using it as a love potion was no doubt suggested by that name. Ophelia's oft-quoted line, "There's pansies, that's for thoughts", in Hamlet (Act IV, Scene V) comes from this tradition: if a maiden found a honeyflower and a pansy left for her by an admirer, it would mean "I am thinking of our forbidden love" in symbol rather than in writing.>>

Click to play embedded YouTube video.

dangerous and provocative... does your mother read your posts?

BMAONE23 wrote:For tue-day

Ahhh, The Moody Blues. As old as they look in this video, it is extremely dated. Ray Thomas is no longer touring with them and Graeme Edge, while still there, no longer actually plays the drums. Ray Thomas has been replaced by a beautiful young lady (Norda Mullen) with hair down to her knees and there is another drummer on stage (Gordon Marshall) that does the actual drumming. When I last saw them, Norda received a standing ovation from a very knowledgeable audience after an extended flute solo.

John Lodge and Justin Hayward are the sound of the Moody Blues, as I know them anyway, and are still going strong. In the mid-70s, during a brief breakup of the Moodys, John and Justin put out an album Blue Jays. If anybody listening to that album can distinguish it from the Moodys, I would be surprised. Justin (Songwriter) and John (Natural Avenue) both also had solo releases that were good, but not as critically acclaimed as Blue Jays.

Ray Thomas also produced a couple of albums during this time that were excellent (From Mighty Oaks and Hopes, Wishes and Dreams) and while they made it easy to recognize which Moody songs he wrote, they did not sound like the Moodys.

Graeme Edge also had a couple of releases (Kick Off Your Muddy Boots and Paradise Ballroom), as did Mike Pinder (The Promise), but I didn't care for those. Mike Pinder was replaced on keyboards by Patrick Moraz from Yes when the band reformed.

Hope every one is having a good day!

Thanks Bystander for the video and update on the Moodys… I have the Blue Jays album but haven’t listened to it in ages. “I Dreamed Last Night” brings back fond memories and aspirations. Reckon no one has saved the world quite yet and the “hour” still looms… and the dream carries on...

Hi Mr. Orin!

Watching Kaylee play with the stick reminded me of that wheel barrow of yours and how I used to pretend sticks were weapons to fight the hostile aliens… thanks for the peaceful video!

Today I make peace with the aliens…

You know, if I was an advanced faster than light speed alien and I observed earthlings and their habits for very long… I would be extremely frightened about making contact… we have so many hostile alien movies and books and behaviors… who could blame them for keeping their distance!

emc wrote:Hi Mr. Orin!

Watching Kaylee play with the stick reminded me of that wheel barrow of yours and how I used to pretend sticks were weapons to fight the hostile aliens… thanks for the peaceful video!

Today I make peace with the aliens…

You know, if I was an advanced faster than light speed alien and I observed earthlings and their habits for very long… I would be extremely frightened about making contact… we have so many hostile alien movies and books and behaviors… who could blame them for keeping their distance!

Hey ED! Kaylee reminded me of my dog Sassy! Sassy is a Mini Pin. When she was a pup; she would pick up a stick that was about a yard long; (about a meter) and carry it while we walked. It was quite a sight to see this tiny dog carrying this big stick. Sassy got over the stick carrying; but still is very playful. Though she has grown up pretty big (23#) for a small breed; she is great company when I'm home alone. Sassy will be 10 in December; So in dog years she will be as old as I am.

Day of homework, mostly, which I'm still doing. I did get in a very short bike ride (only 9 miles), for which I'm glad I made time. Makes me feel MUCH a little less guilty about eating so much of the Halloween-candy-on-sale-after-Halloween the tall child bought and made readily available to his mother for school-related stress eating.

Milk Duds, anyone?

No?

Yeah, I don't like them, either.

How's your day?

Today I am happy to know that I can make friends over the internet. And smart friends at that! SA* is a healthy place (thanks to the moderators) to learn and have fun practicing communication with folks without the use of voice and body.

Below is my 1977 rendering (ink and acrylic on acetate - like an animation cell) of Ed White's 1965 spacewalk
WHAT'S UP? - Or as my daughter likes to say, "wuzup"... Is this a mental or directional question? Why do we throw this question out so casually to people we see? Perhaps it is because we want to make certain that, like ourselves, no one else knows the answer either. This is possibly the most complicated question perplexing mankind (womankind is far more likely to know).

The MENTAL 'UP' is a constant variable and can easily be any thought available to the human mind at any instant and regarding any circumstance. The 'up' you may be currently processing in your mind would be relative to your life experience and resulting notion regarding the meaning and existence of 'up'. Were it not for your reading this meandering message, your 'up' could be any thought or combination of thoughts within the capacity of your uniquely developed brain. You could be relating to anything from your past, present or future, depending on your state of mind at the moment you realize you are thinking about something.

The DIRECTIONAL 'UP' can be anything in any direction from any given point in the universe. Were it not for your pre-existing notion of where 'up' is, relative to where YOU are, 'up' could very well be in any direction at the initial instant you realize you are conscious, such as, when you wake up... during your wake up... after you fall down... Pointed example> Imagine your self, in a familiar surrounding, leisurely free-floating and slowly spinning and tumbling in a weightless condition, like a spaceman or spacewoman. You will probably have selected the familiar surrounding you are in right now as your reference for 'up'. Now change the reference for 'up' from the surrounding to your relaxed and weightless body... Now your familiar surrounding is spinning and tumbling! Kind of like the planet you live on and this meandering thought.

How's your day?

Ed wuzup reminds me of this!

Orin, I hadn't seen that; thanks for sharing it.

Here's wuzup in my house; I didn't intend for the space to be used this way when I cleaned it out:

Hey Orin!

Wazuuuu uuup! Funny video! I recall seeing something like that on football commercials a while back!

Hi Ms Owlice,

What a beautiful kitten! Cats will make themselves at home in the funniest places. We have a couple of cat tree houses ours enjoy but they're not content with just those. Keeping them off tables and counters is a challenge. We keep a squirt bottle of water handy as a deterrent. Looks like yours found a “just right” spot and would probably appreciate a little bed on that shelf instead of that thingy-ma-bob that’s placed there.

Hiya, Ed! Thanks! The cat in the picture is my three-legged beastie; he's really good about not getting up on things he shouldn't be on. He's a very polite cat (except for the "treating people as prey" thing he does occasionally) and doesn't get up on tables or the counters or anything like that. I was surprised he jumped up into that space; it's unlike him. And no, no cat bed is going in there! I need someplace to put the three-hole punch (which is the thing in the picture with the cat) and a few other things!

Today was a lovely, lovely day out. Clear and sunny, with temperatures in the low 60s. I have a lot of schoolwork to do, but told myself that after finishing a certain project, I was going to get out into the beautiful day for at least a short bike ride. I checked what time the sun set, not realizing that the application was still set to EDT, and headed out at about the last possible minute that would (should) have given me about an hour to ride before dark.

Yeeeeeah... so by the time I got to the trail -- I have to drive there, and had to stop for gas on the way -- it was pretty clear I should turn on the rear blinkie on my bike. By the time I got to the lake, it was obviously time to turn on the headlamp on my helmet. And by the time I was done riding around the lake a couple of times, it was quite apparent that I needed to turn on the bike head light.

It was also apparent that I need new batteries in one or more of these lights!

Still, it was a good ride, though under 12 miles. I heard White-throated Sparrows and mockingbirds (so aptly named polyglottus!), saw juncos (including one I nearly caught in my teeth when he flew in front of me), a Great Blue Heron in the lake, squatting down which I've never seen one do, so it looked as though he was using the surface of the water as a seat, and evidence of beavers at the lake! I'm excited about the beavers; I've never seen any at the lake.

When I got back to the car, the crescent moon and Jupiter were high above me, and there was a deer in the neighborhood park at which I'd left my car. Oh, I'm glad I rode! I always feel better after I ride, no matter how much I hurt or ache when I start out.

How was your day? Did you have good getting-out weather? Are things happy where you are?

Sounds like you had a very good day I reckon thanks to that bike ride adventure… we all need something to lean on that takes the edge off the sometimes sharp days. My wife is after me to take up bike riding, we have some nice bike trails not too far from our house. I don’t get out often enough… part lazy… part incentive to do other things. My days are getting busier with work-for-a-living stuff now... Our weather has been very fine... High pressure in Canada is holding the coldness at bay... Things are happy where I am... stable... in my stable.

I rode a bike today! I didn't even have to go outdoors to ride it. It's in my basement. The only problem with the recumbent bike is that you pedal like mad and never get anywhere. It's kind of nasty out today anyway. A sportscaster at a windy cold Nebraska football game once said; "The wind goes untouched from Laramie to Lincoln!"

Speaking of... The Wind is one of Cat Stevens beautiful songs… about life's journey.
It's a light wind blowing here today... helping move the leaves from the trees. I went hiking yesterday up Kennesaw mountain. The weather was perfect for it. There are still a good many colored leaves still hanging on the trees and the trail is full of colored leaves making for a very enjoyable hike.

Reckon it's a good thing for you to have that recumbent bike of yours for the cold Nebraska winter! Our winter is usually sprinkled with 60 degree days now and then... so it's not that difficult to get outdoors.

There does get to be mild days once in a while when that Gulf air blows North. When the front comes down from Canada though---Brrr! We get a lot of air coming off of the Rockies too

Orin, You have a cool avatar! Are you representing you and your wife with the double star? I think that would be very cool.

emc wrote:Orin, You have a cool avatar! Are you representing you and your wife with the double star? I think that would be very cool.

Actually it is Pluto; Charon; Hydra; and Nix. I'm a big proponent of Pluto is a planet.

Image source http://www.boulder.swri.edu/plutonews/


Pluto and Charon to scale with the United States…

Looks like Pluto pretty well smothers Nebraska

emc wrote:Image source http://www.boulder.swri.edu/plutonews/


Pluto and Charon to scale with the United States…

Looks like Pluto pretty well smothers Nebraska

True; on the map anyway; add Charon covers a lot of Georgia. There not very big; but anything 500 Miles in diameter; and in orbit around a star; ought to be a planet. In my own opinion anyway.

Hi, Ed!

emc wrote:My wife is after me to take up bike riding, we have some nice bike trails not too far from our house.

You should listen to her, especially if you have trails you can ride, and when you get to wanting a $5,000 bike, you can look at her and say, "But honey, you wanted me to take up biking, remember?"

(For the record, I do not own a $5,000 bike, nor even a $500 bike.)

Orin,

You can go far on a 'bent if you want to!

~~~

Sunny and clear here, with some wind. It's supposed to be rainy tomorrow. Too bad I have to work today and have tomorrow off instead of the other way around! I like to take at least a medium-length bike ride on Thanksgiving and hope the weather is not too bad for a 24-mile ride.

~~~

I hope everyone traveling this weekend has an easy time of it!