"All these things I should keep to myself
But I feel somehow strangely compelled...."

- Neil Finn, Sinner

We found out this week that Gareth's mission model had been entered by the school in the county Youth Expo at the Orange County Fairgrounds. That's his, closest to the hay bale on the lowest level. The one just behind him is a classmate's; she decided to make hers out of gingerbread, with red licorice for the roof tiles - pretty creative, but it was looking a bit tired and crumbly after all the travel. I brought along the Big Camera, but unfortunately forgot the spare battery; after a few rabbit and chicken pics in the 4-H section, it died, so had to rely on my phone.

OC Youth Expo
Costa Mesa CA
Kyocera Switchbach phone camera
18 April 2009

By the way - the Fairgrounds really needs to label their entrances for events a little better. There was a Pet Expo going on at the same time, which took up most of the grounds and for which there was a $12 admission. There were signs on the main street for the Youth Expo (which was free), but no other direction. We parked at OCC, the community college across the street, and walked to what we thought would be the entrance, but both the main fairground entrances were to the Pet Expo. By the time we figured out the entrance was in the back, near the Equestrian Center, we had had to walk all the way around the Swap Meet (also going on, and charging admission so we couldn't take a short cut through it), and up Newport Blvd., nearly a complete circuit of the entire Fairgrounds. Which I wouldn't have minded so much, but it was HOT!!! and I hadn't brought any water with me. Plus three kids who weren't necessarily wearing walking shoes. Also, when we finally found the correct entrance, there was no sidewalk and very little allowance for pedestrians; I did not feel real comfortable with three kids, dodging cars to walk in the driveway.

( other youth crafts, animals and balloons! )

Heading up to Monterey for a staff meeting. Driving because of the budget, and about 44 miles from Salinas. A few minutes ago, south of King City, we passed half a dozen deer in a dormant walnut orchard; it seemed strange to see them in such an open space, right next to the highway, dark gray-brown antlers among white walnut branches. For that matter, I could've sworn I saw a doe between the bushes below the Getty Center while we were still in LA. And coworker B has been making a game of counting redtailed hawks along the highway. It'll be dark soon. Glad to not be driving. He was just remarking how the last 50 miles seem to be the longest. (sent while heading up the 101...)

On the door of the public entrance to my work building. Yes, you see strange things around my office sometimes.

Office Sign
Los Alamitos CA
Sharp VE-CG30
19 November 2008

My SF/Fantasy book group decided to have a video night instead of meeting at the bookstore like we usually do. Our hostess lives in Leisure World, and her small home is nearly overtaken by her lion collection.

We watched a bootleg of Tales of Earthsea; I didn't realize Miyazaki had done a version of Ursula LeGuin's books.

Leisure World
Seal Beach CA
Kyocera Switchback phone camera
11 September 2008

( ...and her carousel horse collection... )

The Aquarium of the Pacifc is having a photo contest; any photo taken there over the last 10 years can be entered. I was thinking of these two:

Weedy Scorpionfish

Weedy Scorpionfish by *senoritafish on deviantART

or

Anemones



I've got a squillion of 'em, but I think I like those the best. Which one do you like better?

Squeeee!

Lampwork Nudibranchs.

I think they're even pendants...

A sea cucumber puckers up. Well, I did it again. It was a special kid's morning in early February at the AOP, and as per usual I took 119 photos that I have trouble deciding on. Ooh, 7 am is way too early to be at the Aquarium!

( more critters )

The church a block from my house puts on a Drive-Thru Nativity every year; they have since I was a kid. They set up all these little scenes in the parking lot and you drive your car from one to the next. Kind of corny, but I like how they use the parking lot plantings as part of the scenery. We're pretty agnostic, but I figure the kids should at least know the stories.

( Angels, asses, and sheep. And sheep's asses... )

My boss turned me on to this - Divebums.com is a website dedicated to the San Diego area, but most of what you see there is representative of my area, too. They have a Photos of the Week page featuring local underwater photography, although quite often people submit photos of where they went on vacation. You can sign up for an email reminder and they'll send you a link to the week's page. This week I received:

http://week.divebums.com/2007/Apr09-2007/

It's that nudibranch time of year...

Enjoy,

John
Divebums

A few of my favorites, Spanish shawl nudibranchs, in this one...

You may even see me there occasionally (waves fins).

Hmm, just got notice a few minutes ago that a story about CA Department of Fish and Game wardens making a bust on illegally caught spiny lobster will be featured on "All Things Considered" this afternoon (Listening to it now). Don't know if it was recreational or commercially caught.

That took place in my office yesterday. My friend IT asked us to borrow a uniform shirt, because we have a drawer full of them, and his was at home. He was volunteered in case anyone had questions on lobster biology and said today he thought he was going to get out of it without saying anything, then at the last minute they wanted an entire formal presentation on the lobster fishery and lobster biology. The office was full of wardens and as I walked by the conference room, I could see one entire table covered with spiny lobsters - many still alive, I could see their antennae moving. The local NBC and ABC news affilliates were here as well, although I guess it wasn't a slow enough news day for it to appear last night.

The sad thing is, all those lobsters will have to be killed (probably frozen), because they are evidence for a court case, although later they will probably be donated to a shelter.

(Ah, here it is - they were fishing in protected areas, caught in a sting operation using marked lobsters. Interesting how enforcement refers to perpetrators as "gentlemen.")

Has Neil Finn ever used any kind of nature sounds in his work? I seem to remember weird bird-like noises (gulls maybe? possibly backwards?) at the end of "Kill Eye"...any others?

This occurred to me after I recently purchased One All from iTunes after becoming a reluctant iPod owner (yes, I'm a bad Finn fan - but I did manage to get 7 Worlds and Everyone is Here first). After listening to Into the Sunset several times, I realized something sounded familiar - the bell-like noise in the chorus. I used to have quite a few Paul Winter albums (mostly on tape, never repurchased as CDs, so I haven't heard them in a long time), and a couple of Bernie Krause CDs - both artists use animal sounds in their work, and one of those albums is where I heard a very similar sound.

It's a male walrus, declaring his territory. You can hear it here:

http://whyfiles.org/114music/3.html -
(click the walrus button)

They make the sounds underwater, by vibrating air sacs in their necks.

Now I'm sure the bell in Neil's is just that - it sounds a bit muffled and off-kilter, but the sound is consistent. The walrus's vary in tone and pitch. However, I'm sure I must be the only person who hears "Into the Sunset" and is reminded of Arctic pinnipeds. Well, there is some marine imagery in this song, so perhaps it's not too out of place.

( Lyrics... )

(crossposted to urban_nature)

We saw tons of mourningcloak (Nymphalis antiopa) caterpillars this summer. I haven't seen this many for years. When I was a kid, they used to colonize the few elm trees on my street, but the city began spraying the trees for pests, and they became a lot rarer. Lots of people don't like the caterpillars because they are spiky and scary looking, and leave lots of droppings beneath whatever tree they are feeding on. This website has some nice background infomation on them, and it's even from my county! :)

http://www.dbc.uci.edu/~pjbryant/biodiv/lepidopt/nymph/mcloak.htm

We noticed this small tree in June. I'm not sure; I think its a type of Australian willow. I walk past it from the bus stop to my house. There were so many caterpillars, they completely stripped it of leaves three times over the summer. I never noticed so many on any other tree on my street, even though there are others of the same type only a few houses away. The third time caterpillars appeared on the tree, they got about half grown and then one day I came home from work to find that the property owners had ripped the entire tree out of the ground.



( more stages... )

Apparently the crab in the Honda Element commercials is out of a job...

http://www.savethecrab.com/

When I was five, I told my dad I wanted an alligator for a pet. He told me I could have one when I was fifteen.

When I was in fourth or fifth grade (can't remember exactly what year now), there used to be a alligator/crocodile park close to one of the theme parks near my home. Remembering back on it now, it was probably small and overcrowded, although the animals seemed well taken care of; at the time I thought it was a fascinating place. That was where I dragged all of my girlfriends for my birthday, when I was in fourth or fifth grade. Most of them put on the typical girl-afraid-of reptile act, but I think at least a few of them found themselves reluctantly interested. I think I got one or two of them to actually touch a snake, including my best friend Anne, who was terrified of them; she was shocked that it wasn't slimy.

In Girl Scouts, I was always the girl in my troop who got woken up in the middle of the night to get a spider out of somebody's tent. One time, it was a chicken; not really all that scary an animal, but I suppose at three o'clock in the morning when you aren't expecting it, it could be a bit nerve-wracking to wake up and find an Indian Jungle Fowl on top of your sleeping bag. And when we had emergency-preparedness challenge where someone pretended to sprain her ankle and the rest of us had to carry her back to camp, I tried to calm everyone down when the cows in the field started coming through the busted fence onto the road behind us; I don't know what they thought they were going to do, just suddenly charge and trample us for no reason?

On my fifteenth birthday, after opening my gifts, I turned to Dad and said, "OK, where's my alligator?" He blanched and replied "Dammit, you were supposed to have forgotten by now!" I laughed and put him at ease; by that time I had realized that large reptilian predators do not make good household pets, and sharing the bathroom with two brothers was crowded enough without putting a creature with a lot of teeth into the mix.

So maybe we had a few things in common, but I can't say I was a big fan of Steve Irwin - my main reaction to his show was rolling my eyes, and it seemed that he often put getting a good camera shot above safety. There's such a thing as a healthy respect for the business end of an animal that's either venomous or could do you a serious injury, that he just didn't seem to have. However, I watched one of his interviews the next day, and to his credit, he emphasized (as he pointed out all of his numerous scars) that any injury he'd ever gotten from an animal was his own fault (although aren't you supposed to learn before you get that many?). I've worked with pelagic stingrays ( Pteroplatytrygon violacea, formerly Dasyatis violacea, same genus); they are not gentle or harmless if they think they're threatened. They can arch their tails clear over their backs, they can aim, and there's a lot of muscle behind it, too - that spine is just like a serrated knife. Maybe he just didn't take that into account.

But if his enthusiasm got anyone interested in animals, conservation, zoology, or even changed anyone's mind that "ugly" or dangerous critters serve a purpose in the environment and shouldn't be killed just because you're afraid of them, then that was a good thing. I know I had two little boys here who took the news pretty hard and needed a lot of comforting and drying of tears before going to bed the other night. Gareth sobbed and cried, and Angus was just as affected although he reacts to grief with a stiff body, clenched fists, and angry tears, refusing to be soothed - he immediately wanted to go and punish the stingray, and we had to explain that it was only trying to defend itself, and that's exactly what the Crocodile Hunter always tried to prevent. We've always taught them that animals are allowed to protect themselves, and the cats will scratch them if they're bothered.

We finally got out a candle, took it out on the patio, lit it and said good-bye to Steve as we watched the flame. Rituals seem to help, and they were finally able to calm down enough to go to sleep. I know it won't be as easy for Terri and her kids.

He was only a little older than me - we were born in the same year.

*sigh*

If I ever catch my kids picking up a snake by the tail, though, they're going to wish it had bitten them.

Afterward: John was angry with me for letting it slip. He thought they didn't need to know about it, and it could've waited. Maybe so, but he'd rather they found out from turning the show on the next day? At school, when a friend told them? When is a convenient time for a child's grief?

Garethism for yesterday: "Everyone has a guardian pigeon!"

Inspired, I think, by our visit to the San Diego Zoo with their uncle Dave on Saturday and a crowned pigeon in one of the aviaries. He didn't seem to be too afraid of us, perching on a limb only a few feet away, and then down to the walkway, where he walked right past Avalon. Unfortunately, this was not a time my camera wanted to cooperate and most of the pictures I took of him are either blurry or overexposed from the flash.



He's about the size of a chicken.

The Venture Brothers season premiere was totally hysterical and somehow managed to tie up most of the loose ends, fulfilling not just one, but at least three fan theories of what happened (that people came up with right after the season ending almost two years ago). I know the writers are fairly in touch with their fanbase, so maybe they somehow worked them in.

Those two items were welcome laughs on an otherwise pretty depressing day.

Ok, angelsmum, your next assignment, should you choose to accept it, is to teach Gemma to do this:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=6742988194956129075&q=dalmation

Hmmm, maybe not - no one'll ever be able to keep up with her then...

I heard about this on the radio yesterday, and of course trusty people at invertebrates found a link.

http://www.int.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=14&click_id=143&art_id=qw1141765922171B216

A new species (actually a whole new family) of crustacean; it sort of resembles the deep-water squat lobsters we've found in spot prawn traps.

I kept hearing a little bell in various parts of the office. Then, all of sudden, my cube is being investigated by this:

( attached to a jingle bell... )