Butterfly

I noticed a small pod-looking thing hanging form the roof of our porch a few days ago. I didn't look closely to see what it was, but I no longer have to wonder. It was a chrysalis for a Monarch butterfly, which emerged just an hour or so ago.



I added a few additional photos to my Flickr account. Rabbits, birds, butterflies...our back yard has seen a lot of action this year.

The Classic Fake

Bringing lunch to work just got a little more interesting...

moldy sandwich bags

Where were these when I was in 4th grade? Just think of the possibilities...

Safety First

So a good portion of the city was still without power on friday. At least the weather was nice this week, but that’s small comfort to people going on day 6 with no lights.

Columbus city schools opened friday for the first time of the week. The news mentioned that on thursday evening about every 3 minutes, and kept reminding all of us idiots to watch out for them, especially at the intersections where the lights are out. The implication being that we know you're all shiatty drivers but we need you to straighten up just this once because the kids will be out there, and this is SERIOUS because it’s dangerous with all the non working traffic signals. It’s so serious that the police will have officers at every single intersection with no working lights to help the little snowflakes get across.

So friday morning, I pulled up to the one light that was still out on my commute. It's a busy intersection downtown (Broad & Washington). All the traffic is treating it like a 4 way stop intersection - with the exception of one vehicle driving down Broad St. in the opposite direction from me. It gets closer, and I realize it’s not stopping. It blows right on through the other stopped traffic and the intersection, not even flinching – luckily the car on Washington was paying attention. Now, that’s bad enough, when people are so self absorbed that they don’t even notice or question why everyone around them is stopping.

The best part? The miscreant was driving a large, yellow vehicle, with ‘Columbus City Schools’ painted on the side, and I’m sure a few rows’ worth of children on board. Yep. And no police anywhere to be seen. Well, at least the children are safe. Except maybe the ones on that driver’s route.

Windy McBlowsalot Comes To Town

Well, we officially don’t like Ike.

While we didn’t get any rain, we got substantial wind for several hours yesterday. The winds were sustained between 60-75 mph for several hours in the area, according to the local news. Yowza. When I left work tonight, AEP was still reporting a little over 300,000 people without power in Columbus. That's about 55% of their customers. It's a similar story in the Cincinnati and Cleveland areas.

At home, our power went out about 6 times, but they were all momentary interruptions, where the circuit resets itself (if it can) after something contacts the line. On our property, damage was pretty minimal. The only casualties were an ugly trellis, and the top of the car shelter frayed a bit from the winds. I think a little clear tape should take care of that. And I have replacement trellises that I bought earlier this year, so this gives me a reason to finally get rid of the tacky old ones.

We were lucky, there’s large trees down and property damage all over the state. Nala said he and Giga were out yesterday, they witnessed roofs and siding being pulled off buildings, transformers blowing (that was not a Michael Bay critique), just wild crazy stuff.

I don’t know how the shelter made it through…when the wind was getting strong, I decided to take off the end panel, so wind could pass through it rather than turn it into a kite. I also moved the car out of it, and had a utility knife on standby in case I had to slash the fabric to relieve the wind pressure. Amazingly, it held up under the ass kicking that Mother Nature threw down yesterday.

For a more colorful story, check out Naladahc's blog, who has even less love for Ike. Er, he will, once their power is restored!

Palin around

Vet Voice

The Commander of the Alaska National Guard was causing some problems for Palins' claims of experience. He had explained that as Governor, she has no direct oversight in their operations.
That is until he had a talking to last week. Suddenly he began praising her oversight and direction. I guess she found time for that in between firing her safety director and asking people to pray for her pipeline project.
Well, surprise surprise, the Commander has been promoted for his sudden change of heart. The link takes you to the rundown of events.

Waterworld postponed

Well, the basement seems to be rated for at least 3 inches of rain without leaking. But lately with the several recent hurricanes and tropical storms wandering all over the eastern us, we could have been socked with a motherload of water. So far, so good, nothing of note has hit the Cowlands.
Ike was turning out to be the latest potential headache. Yesterday they were planning on it marching right thru the center of Ohio, and one forecast said we'd see 5-10 inches of rain here. Ouch.
But, it looks like it's fizzling fast and has changed course slightly. Now, we're forecast to have maybe a tenth of an inch of rain.
Whew!

Unfortunately, my relatives in Chicago have a different story to tell about that.

The race

Forget the hockey mom and Skeletor, or the other guy who has the nerve to pronounce 'nuclear' like a grown up. How uppity.

Silence. Here is the candidate who will save us all. All we have to do is kneel.

Zod for President

The view from the Buggalo ranch

Martian Sky

A short video clip of clouds moving across the Martian sky, taken by the Phoenix Polar Lander. Would be even cooler if NASA had upgraded to a color camera for an additional $29.

Garden Plans

When I decided to cultivate a garden this year, I made a decision to only buy perennials. That was mainly because I figured the plants would come back fuller and better every year. While that is true, the one aspect I didn’t know about was that most perennials only bloom for short periods of time, a few weeks or so. And for a new garden, until the plants are established and there’s a selection of things that bloom at different times, you’ve got a garden full of non blooming plants. While that can be nice, and green trumps brown for garden color, I’d like some more variety. Besides, I can’t tell if half of the plants in there now are just invasive weeds. So next year. I’ll be stocking up on annuals to fill in the areas that were let down by plants that only bloomed for a few weeks.

In addition, my veggie plot will be started this fall to get a jump on spring planting. I’m pretty sure where it will be, now it’s down to devoting the time to the project. Those trains will have to run themselves for a while.

I might even go whole hog and start some indoor seedlings late in the winter, to make sure we're not waiting until August for something to eat!