1-11-11

Well, I remembered to post at 11:11 on 1-11-11. It doesn't mean anything, it's just a number pattern. But I do like numbers and number patterns and math, so hats off to me plus the person who helped me remember to post something numerical tonight.

Happy New Year

Happy New Year. Time for all those New Year's Resolutions. Most people at least try to make a few. It's a good idea because sometimes you will actually follow through. I gave up chocolate one year. And for nine years I didn't eat any chocolate. Now that is determination and willpower!

Goodbye 2010

It's been a good year.

The Juncos Are Coming, The Juncos Are Coming

I don't necessarily notice when I'm seeing the first Junco of the season, but there are at least a few here. What that means is that they have arrived here for the winter. This is what they consider flying south for the winter. Ooh! It's going to be cold here again, I presume. And they come here for the warmth. I think I would travel to one of the actual southern states for the winter if I was a bird.

That was going to be it for today on the blog, but I found an interesting website all about birds. It's from those good people at Cornell Lab of Ornithology and is called "All About Birds". You should check it out. You can see great photos of birds and hear their typical voice. Really cool.

10/10/10

I've been waiting for this day for a while now and it almost got away before I posted. I was supposed to post at either 10:10 a.m. or 10:10 p.m. or better yet, both morning and night. I'll have to settle for at least getting a post up on the tenth day of the tenth month of the tenth year of the century. sigh

It's been busy around here, always lots to do. Of course that's better than having nothing to do. Weather has been beautiful, record warmth recently. Temperature hit 90 degrees if I remember correctly. Wow.

If only it could be like this on Halloween when all the little ghosts and goblins are out.

Colbert at Congress

This is about Colbert at Congress. This is not about Colbert for Congress. That may happen in the future. It could! He could run for Congress. I think there would be a good chance of him winning.

Moving on.

He was testifying about immigrants who are farm workers in our country. He has done this work for a day and thus is an expert. Here's a link to watch Stephen as he testifies before a Congressional Committee. He brought all the respect and maturity you would expect from him when he talked, as a regular American, to the members of Congress, staff members, press and anyone else who was lucky enough to get in the room before it was full to capacity.

Watch and listen to Stephen Colbert in Congress.

Hurricanes

My gosh but the hurricanes seem to be piling up this summer and fall. It seems every time I turn on the news, we've gone up a letter in the alphabet. I was hearing about Hurricane Danielle and already they are talking about Karl, Igor and Julia. I think I would get kind of tired of all those hurricanes if I lived in or near a coastal region. Yes we have hail and tornadoes and blizzards here, but they don't seem to be as bad.

Now That's a Ring Tone!

As you may know, I'm cleaning.

"But wait a minute!" you all shout at the same time. "Didn't you do that when you were in college?"

Yes, that's right. I did. But, it's time again to clean. Time to add to the recycling center. Time to donate to Salvation Army. Time to let go of some things and pitch them out for good.

It was all sort of a domino effect that's been building. Tired of painting the house so get siding that doesn't need to be painted. As long as that's being done, might as well get new windows. As long as that's being done, might as well get a larger window in basement. That meant moving electrical wiring out of way. It also meant cutting some of the paneling away. And eventually, well, it means the whole room needs to be gutted and started from scratch.

So, all the stuff that has been piling up and stored in the spare room needs to be sorted. Every once in a while there's a surprise to be found. Sometimes a peanut, sometimes a photo, sometimes even something with nice memories.

Wizard of Oz

Google had a nice logo today. It was of Dorothy, Toto, the Scarecrow, the Tin Man and the Cowardly Lion heading to the Emerald City.

It's the 71st Anniversary of the movie "The Wonderful World of Oz". I wonder what it will be like on the 100th Anniversary of the Wizard of Oz movie. Will there be a really big extravaganza? Or will people just not care anymore?

If someone is reading this on the 100th Anniversary, please leave a comment and let me know how it turns out.

8 - 9 - 10 11:12

It's late at night on August 9 and you know what that means. This post was posted on:

8 - 9 - 10 at 11:12 p.m.

You know how much I like numbers and this would qualify for a nifty number sequence.

That's all. Nothing earth-shattering (luckily). Just some fun with numbers.

Oh, Happy Birthday to a certain someone.

Book-It

Tonight, SNL was a repeat with Jon Hamm and Michael Bublé. I enjoyed that one. The commercial was Will Forte as Tarkie Fenzington, the Closet Organizer. They also had a sketch where he was at a bar talking to some guy who recognized Forte as the Closet Organizer Guy. But that's not important. What is important is that Will Forte was wearing a "Book-It" T-shirt in this sketch. Book-It is a program developed by Pizza Hut Restaurant to encourage and reward kids for reading.

Thanks, Will for showing your support for reading. In appreciation, everyone go out and get a book to give to a kid to read.

Baby Blue Jay

There have been so many blue jays around lately. I'm assuming that most of them are babies because they have been so vocal. If I understand bird-talk correctly, they are saying "Feed me. Feed me." This little guy was actually on the bird bath last year, so he is now an expert at all things Blue Jay. I've probably even seen him hanging around the bird bath this year and maybe even eating some peanuts during the winter.

Happy 4th of July

But then why am I posting on July 5th? Well, we were very busy yesterday and besides that, it rained here yesterday and the fireworks were postponed until today.

A few days ago we ate breakfast at Perkins. Typically they have a large American flag flying at their restaurants and the sky was such a nice clear blue that I took a few pictures. Plus it was very windy so I could get good photos of the flag showing all the stripes and nearly all of the stars.

I just spent a little time looking at Wikipedia's entry about the Flag of the United States. It is quite interesting. There is an animated section that shows how to fold the flag. There are pictures of all the different flags through the years. Did you know that at one time there were 15 stripes? I didn't know that.

Happy Canada Day

Today is Canada Day, so Happy Canada Day to everyone up in Canada and Canadians everywhere. Some years back we wanted to escape the crowds of July 4th for our vacation. Plus we wanted to go somewhere where the restaurants wouldn't be closed as they often are on July 4th. We should have done our homework. We were in Canada on July 1.

Canada Day has been called Canada's birthday. Everything was closed. Now we know better and so can you if you read a little bit here at Wikipedia about Canada Day.

I don't know if this photo shows the typical Canadian couple, but it was two people we saw in Montreal back in May of 2006 while we were visiting the Montreal Botanical Garden. The girl's hair was quite red, in fact, I'm willing to wager it wasn't actually her natural hair color. But it really looked nice on her and made for a good photo opportunity. Happy Canada Day to the two of them also.

Take Me Out to the Ball Game

Yesterday we did some walking around the new Twin's Ballpark - Target Field. Games were being played by high school teams, so that was kind of special for them and for their families. It was a beautiful day to be out walking or watching baseball. We saw a few of the Light Rail cars go by while we were there. I actually managed to take a video of this with my camera and not ruin it by sneezing or having someone walk in front of me.

Bad Weather - Ouch

Half of this tree landed across the street in this neighborhood. Hopefully it didn't damage the house across from this one. The road was either blocked or very slow going in the morning. One thing's for sure, they won't have as many leaves to rake in the fall.

I took this photo in early afternoon so this shows you how quickly everyone got out and cleaned up the tree, branches and twigs. Other than the obvious missing branches, tree trunk stumps, and some missing sidewalk squares, you wouldn't realize how many trees were damaged or destroyed. Our neighbor read in the paper that 2000 trees were affected!

Bad Weather, No Parking

This tree did a lot of damage to the fence and yard, and possibly some damage to the house. Or perhaps it is more than one tree, or this tree caused a domino effect and brought down other tree branches. I do wonder what it sounded like when the tree hit the ground, but I don't actually want the chance to ever hear it. Do you notice the No Parking sign? Look further down the street. Typically the signs are about six feet tall. This one was pushed down into the ground by the weight of the tree. Perhaps if it had fallen from a little bit different angle, it would have bent the sign post. But this sign is going to be difficult to take out. Yeah, I know, they probably have the proper equipment to yank this sign right out of the ground and replace it with a new one that is the correct height.

Bad Weather - Something's Gotta Give

The tree split off and most likely blocked the driveways for a while in the morning. As you can see, when the tree got uprooted, it took the sidewalk section with it. The people in the house in the background suffered no visible damage to the actual house. The homeowner said that if the tree had to come down, it came down in the best place. His wife then reminded him to stop talking to all the passersby and keep raking.

Interestingly enough, a few houses down was another tree that made it through the night and through the storm. It had a large red painted dot on it. That means it is destined for cutting down. Too bad it couldn't have toppled instead of this one.

Bad Weather Makes Weakest (Chain) Link (Fence)

This tree tipped over at its base. It may be that the roots girdled the tree and tipping over was inevitable. Tree experts and city foresters will tell you that many trees have been planted wrongly. See next post for more on that.

This tree landed on a chain link fence. It did not do much good for the fence. I think there may be some damage to the house also. You can see different views of the base of the tree trunk. It would be interesting to have the city forester look at these different trees and speculate on why some trees toppled while others held their ground.

At least the two boys found that a tree is much easier to climb when it is close to the ground!

Bad Weather - Tipsy Tree

This tree tipped over at the base. I'm not sure, but it might be a Linden tree. We used to have a Linden tree. It was about this size, maybe a little bit bigger. One night, one windy night, it tipped over. Just like this one. Most likely it was root bound. For future reference, when you buy a new tree and plant it, the roots should not be confined inside a burlap root ball. They need to be stretched out or cut so that they don't eventually girdle the tree at its base.

I only did a quick Google search, but here is some information from the University of Minnesota about the correct way to plant a tree. Pay special attention to the section with Figure 3. Cutting pattern for rootbound container stock.

Later in the day on Friday, this tree had been cut back to the point that it was just a trunk with a few short branches at the top of the trunk.

Read the next post for lots more information about the storm.