Geococcyx Californianus Hunting Along the Wall

My friendly neighborhood Road Runner (Geococcyx californianus) showed up this afternoon on the northern border wall of my back yard while I was doing yoga, poolside.  I remained VERY still, and watched as she ran along the top of the wall to the north west corner.  A male vireo who was in a neighbor's tree, singing loudly that my back yard and pool were his territory, got the road runner's attention.  She was roughly 100X his size, as the large, sleek, Lamborghini-esque raptor chicken peering up at him, the walnut sized warbler about 10 feet above her changed his song to that of "danger! danger! danger!" and flew to a perch another 5 feet higher and deeper into the leave-less mulberry tree, to put some distance between them.

But she was still hungry, so she turned South,and ran along the top of the wall, cross 1/3 of the length of my back yard in a blink of an eye... then she spotted a striped whip tail lizard, and began to stalk it.  There's a plethora of lizards in my back yard, and she's just wandered into a lizard smorgasbord.  I froze in my yoga pose, mesmerized.  She POUNCED, and crested one of the "posts", Grabbed a 4 or 5 inch long lizard whose body was the size of one of my fingers, and Gulped it down, 2 feet above the large aloe patch beside my pool.

This impromptu meal aggravated the male black chinned hummingbird who has claimed all of my aloe as his personal nectar cafe.  10 or so feet above the Road Runner, the hummingbird chirped, clicked, hovered, and whirled.  At about 150X the humming bird's size, the Road Runner paid him no attention whatsoever, and stalked down towards the South West corner behind the lemon tree.  Looked all around, and then headed West down the neighbor's wall, in the same route that she took on Tuesday.

It was truly amazing to see this efficient, beautiful, streamlined, evolved avian predator patrolling in my own back yard, eating a lizard that's been eating the beetles and crickets from my back yard. When the hawk took the squirrel from the bird feeder in South Carolina, it was in a FLASH, a flurry of red wings and a wriggling furry tail being taken off into the sky through the trees, with no time to appreciate it or have it sink in.  The Road Runner encounter today, by contrast, seemed to be almost in slow motion, less than 15 feet away at one point, a full 180 degree panoramic view.  I am going to take my camera out with me from now on each time I do yoga in the afternoon (90% of the 2012 afternoons so far, I've spent an hour poolside, increasing flexibility, lowering blood pressure, and increasing muscle tone) in case she comes by again to hunt more lizards. 

Fuel, the #1 US EXPORT

Today, President Obama is at a Boeing plant, talking about jobs.  Aircraft used to be the largest US Export, back in 2008 and 2009, but not anymore.  Now, America's biggest export, is fuel.  Yep, The USA, who has 5% of the world's population, but who consumes 20% of the world's natural resources, is exporting more fuel - at record prices I might add - to the rest of the world than any other export, according to US Census data. (read about it here in the Boston Globe, here in the Pittsburgh Gazette, or here in USA Today). 

Why do we need the Keystone XL pipeline? For Exxon Mobile, Chevron and ConocoPhillips to make larger profits of course!  As Americans, we need to 'drill baby drill!' and get all that nasty, hard to extract Canadian oil sand contaminated crude pumped down to Texas, before our Canadian friends try to build a pipeline over the Rockies (and through Indian lands!) to sell it to China!

The US market is not so thirsty anymore, with all those pesky wind mills popping up, and all those efficient hybrid cars, and the rise in CAFE standards, as well as most Americans sinking lower in the 99% with less buying power to purchase ever more expensive gasoline & plane tickets.  It's in the USA's national interests to have XOM, CVX, and COP to rise as much as possible, and build share holder wealth.  Don't listen to all the malarkey about "Energy Independence" - yes, the US is still a net importer of crude oil, but we're refining more than we need and exporting it.  Exporting it to other countries who pay heavily for it, raising the share prices of the largest US refiners.  Who is making all this refined fuel?  Well, I'll show the top 25 here... so everyone can see my point.
RANK     CORPORATION                 Barrels per Calendar Day
1     EXXON MOBIL CORP     Texas     BAYTOWN         560,640    
2     EXXON MOBIL CORP     EBATON ROUGE             502,000    
3     HOVENSA LLC         KINGSHILL             500,000    
4     MARATHON OIL CORP     Louisiana     GARYVILLE     464,000    
5     CITGO PETROLEUM CORP     Louisiana     LAKE CHARLES     427,800    
6     BP PLC             Texas     TEXAS CITY         406,570    
7     BP PLC             Indiana     WHITING     405,000    
8     WRB REFINING LLC     Illinois     WOOD RIVER     362,000    
9     EXXON MOBIL CORP     Texas     BEAUMONT         344,500    
10     SUNOCO INC         Pennsylvania     PHILADELPHIA     335,000    
11     CHEVRON CORP         Mississippi     PASCAGOULA     330,000    
12     DEER PARK REFINING LTD     Texas     DEER PARK         327,000    
13     VALERO ENERGY CORP     Texas     PORT ARTHUR         292,000    
14     KOCH INDUSTRIES INC     Texas     CORPUS CHRISTI         290,078    
15     MOTIVA ENTERPRISES LLC     Texas     PORT ARTHUR         285,000    
16     ACCESS INDUSTRIES     Texas     HOUSTON         280,390    
17     CHEVRON CORP         California     EL SEGUNDO     273,000    
18     KOCH INDUSTRIES INC     Minnesota     SAINT PAUL     262,000    
19     BP PLC     BP West Coast     California     LOS ANGELES     253,000    
20     CONOCOPHILLIPS         Louisiana     BELLE CHASSE     247,000    
21     CONOCOPHILLIPS         Texas     SWEENY             247,000    
22     CHEVRON CORP         California     RICHMOND     245,271    
23     CONOCOPHILLIPS         Louisiana     WESTLAKE     239,400    
24     EXXON MOBIL CORP     Illinois     JOLIET         238,600    
25     CONOCOPHILLIPS         New Jersey     LINDEN         238,000

Romney Gekko 2012

Greed is good!  And "This money tastes delicious!" Investment Capital Firms...  we make money whether your company grows, or if we shut it down, sell it off, and ship the machinery off to China and Brazil!  Either way, we walk away with the remnants of what used to be your former company's pension fund, your dignity, and the hope you might have had to build a better life for your children.

Too bad your daddy wasn't the head of American Motors, who paid for you to go to Harvard and get both an MBA and a law degree like Mitt did.  Born into such wealth, you might be as rich as Mitt is too!

Buttery Primitivo Di Manduria from Epicuro

Epicuro makes good quality, drinkable, affordable wines in Italy.  Trader Joes carries many of their wines, and recently, Trader Joes began selling a Primitivo De Manduria, Denomazione di Origine Controllata (2008).  I purchased a bottle for $6 last month, and put it in the wine rack.  Tuesday, I opened it with some meat dish I made - I can't remember exactly what it was, but Thursday I grilled up some pollo asada and the Primitivo di Manduria paired wonderfully with it.  While the Primitivo started off with plum and subtle black berry notes that did not over-whelm on Tuesday, by Thursday it had transformed into a smooth, buttery (not caramely, but a buttery feeling on the tongue) delicious 2 glasses. 

I highly recommend it. 

Spin̈al Tap - Hell Hole

Spin̈al Tap's Hell Hole kept running through my head this morning, after I heard Dr Desert Flower's blaringly loud alarm go off across the house from my office.  Appropriate morning music before heading to work.

When Trimming Lavender...

When trimming lavender around your pool, make sure you:
- trim them early in the morning, before the honey bees wake up.  Trimming them in the late morning or afternoon will really anger the bees who are harvesting pollen from them by the dozens, and those girls' stings are painful and fatal to the bees too.

- use really sharp shears.  Dull shears will not make clean cuts and damage the plants.

- retaining an old, long, cardboard box (from a LCD HD TV box, for example) makes a handy way to easily collect the trimmings

- trim an inch or two more beyond the edge of the pool deck, so that you don't need to trim again for a few more weeks.

- don't bother trying to retain & display in a vase all the blossom trimmings, as they will wilt within just a few hours.  The hydrostatic pressure the plant produces keeps the blossoms nearly vertical.  Lop off the plant, and there's no easy way to retain that pressure.

This weekend will be a massive planting effort for the Valentines Day French Lavender.  Hopefully, it will all go well (digging of holes in Arizona top soil the consistency of concrete, using a contractor grade pick, uprooting a severely frost damaged bougainvillea, engineering adequate drip irrigation and elevation sloping in an effort to not drown the plants, and then re-surrounding the new plantings with ubiquitous Arizona yard gravel, all without getting stung, punctured, or pulling any back muscles).

What'd I Say

I LOVE the ride cymbal beat in this classic Ray Charles tune, What'd I Say.  What'd I say. Lyrics here. Video here.

Road Runner Digesting a Lizard Lunch

As I was walking back from the mailbox this afternoon, I spotted our neighborhood road runner.  Dr Desert Flower and I had spotted him previously in other peoples' yards, but this was the first time I saw the raptor heading into our yard!    I raced into the house to grab my camera, ran back out front and found the road runner gone!   I raced BACK inside, and found the raptor in the wall, above my grill, in the process of swallowing a whip tailed lizard, head first.  I tried to ZOOM IN to capture this unexpected lunch treat.

If you've never seen a road runner up-close, or a real one that is not in a cartoon,  picture what you'd get if you took a Lamborghini, a chicken, and a velociraptor, and made it about the size of a grown man's arm.  This road runner (I think it was a "she" and not a "he") ran along my border wall, hunting lizards who were sunning themselves.  She got one near my grill.  Then sat and completely swallowed it, before moving on to hunt for more.

After a minute or so (and about 6 pictures), she stalked off down the wall, and between the neighbor's homes behind me.  Truly a great treat, and the biggest bird I've had in my yard since a hawk came down to catch a squirrel at the bird feeder in South Carolina.  Awesome.

Valentines French Lavender

The French Lavender I pre-ordered from Elgin Nursery last month arrived yesterday.  I drove over this afternoon as soon as my work day was done, and picked them up - coincidentally with Valentine's Day.  $19.99 a piece, X6, but they charged me $98 with tax.. so it was like a 25% discount.  Guaranteed for a year.  4 of these will go in the back yard, and 2 in the front yard.   I hope they thrive, and are enjoyed by the honey bees, humming birds, and Dr Desert Flower year-round.

If you plant lavender, make sure the soil is well drained (to avoid root rot) and partially shady (per the Elgin Nursery guy) .. though our earlier French Lavender thrived in the full sunshine, from dawn to about 5pm.  Il faut voir..  we shall see how these go.  They're guaranteed! =)

Carnahan's The Grey

Dr Desert Flower and I saw Joe Carnahan's  "The Grey" last night, in a teeny, tiny, little theater that was part of the multiplex in the Scottsdale Fashion Square. The theater might have held 50 people (about 8 rows of 6 seats each, with a few handicapped ADA seating areas in the 'crank your neck WAY BACK' front).  The small "Theater 7" was bout 50% full, mostly couples and families with one or two teenage children.  I'd wanted to see this film from the deluge of previews that Open Road Films blanketed Comedy Central throughout the month of January, as well as Liam Neeson's excellent interview on The Daily Show..  So after a fantastic happy hour at Sophie's Bistro, we headed first to the Biltmore AMC Esplande theaters on Camelback in Eastern Phoenix. 

The AMC Esplande movie complex is silly fiasco we will not attempt gain.  Parking options are Valet, across the street, where you have to then walk through a tunnel under an 8 lane street (Camelback), being accosted by aggressive street musicians and beggars, or parking in a pay garage under the theater ($1 for the first 20 minutes, and another dollar per 20 minutes thereafter), for the privilege of paying $15 a ticket in a theater setting where you can order food and drinks which are served at fatly inflated prices.  Lucky for us, the 6:15pm show for "The Grey" was already sold out when we arrived at 6:19pm, and it cost us a dollar to park, and 20 minutes (and a $1 to park, ugh!) of an otherwise perfect evening, once we navigated down the convoluted scheme of escalators and elevators to get back to the parking garage.

Dr Desert Flower's efficient Job's Device promptly found a 6:45 show at the Scottsdale Mall, about 5 miles away, so we headed directly there with Celeste's top down, got rock star parking, bought Kiosk tickets for $9 each, (instead of waiting in a 50 person line with the rest of Idiocracy at the mall who didn't know how to use Kiosks) and sat down one minute prior to the start of the trailers in the tiny theater.

Now, from the many, many, commercials, you know that this is a movie about a group of people who experience a plane crash in the middle of no-where Alaska, and how they band together to try and survive the frozen arctic environment and the threats posed there.  Carnahan's writing and directing created a powerful story.  Neeson's acting, again superb.  The scenery (filmed around Smither's British Columbia) was breath-taking, and best seen on a LARGE Screen.  Very well done.  Dramatic.  Tense.  Gripping.  Intense.  Driven. Raw.  Desperate.  The ending, at first, left me initially disappointed, but the more I thought about it today, the more I liked it.

This film is not for small children, who will not be able to separate the fictional depiction of wolves from the dramatic story (Prudhoe Bay has no wolves, nor do real North American wolves typically behave in the ways they've been depicted in this film (factual link here), though some Russian Wolves have been documented with similar behaviours).  There were several scenes where I was on the edge of my seat, which rarely happens in movies anymore for me.  An audible SIGH & Groan could be heard around throughout the theater when the details of Ottway's wife's fate are so poignantly yet subtly revealed. 

If you get a chance to see it in the theater, on a large screen, seize the opportunity.  Live or die on this day.

Terrenal Tempranillo

Last Spring, I write about a very strong, quite aggressive, heavy tannin laden Spanish Cabernet from Terrenal (link here). Recently, from Trader Joe's, I picked up a Tempranillo from Terrenal.  It was more mellow, and drinkable, than its cabernet cousin.  For $4.99, it's well worth the price.

If you're looking for an inexpensive Spanish red wine to go along with spicy dishes, or flavorful foods that saturate the palette, and my April 2011 posting frightened, try the tempranillo instead of the cabernet.  If you don't like it, you can always turn it into a marinade or braising sauce. 

Jesus's iPhone Mirror Pic

This cracked me up the first, second, and third times I saw it.  Amen.

Château Haut Guillebot

The Bordeaux Château Haut Guillebot have been a staple in our wine rack for a long time.  When we lived in South Carolina, Total Wine carried it there, and now in Arizona, they carry it here.  There's a white, Entre deux Mers varietal, a Bordeaux Rosé that is great to have on warm days on the patio, and a Bordeaux Rouge, which used to be a  Bordeaux Supérieur, but apparently now has dropped the "Supérieur" to the slightly lesser quality rating of just "Appellation Bordeaux Controlee".  At $9.99 a bottle, it's a good "go to wine" to have when company comes over, or with a steak, or hearty foods.  Other reviewers like this Chateau as well, linked here, here, and here.  I just hope Total Wine doesn't raise the price on this one too...  but... il faut voir.

Vins de Bordeaux

As I've been enjoying a fair amount of Bordeaux wines this year, and blogging about them here, I have been (and will be) referring to many of the regions within Bordeaux.  Here's a copy of the map from Rhone-Poulenc that I have in my office, for future reference.  Vins de Bordeaux:

Eric Cartman Spotted

Contrary to popular belief, Eric Theodore Cartman is not a fictional character.       Though Cartman would never be caught reading anything....  unless it was one of Hitler's speeches, so there are some differences.

Château la Valade, Premières Côtes de Blaye

Last month, we enjoyed a nice bottle of Château la Valade Premières Côtes de Blaye.  It was a Total Wine purchase for $10 that I picked up before Christmas.  When I went back to Total Wine last weekend, they'd hiked the price to $12 (typical Total Wine sales ploy, hook'em, and then reel in the fish).  It was a good Bordeaux.  85% Merlot, 15% Cabernet Sauvignon.  Alfio Moriconi, total Wine's European buyer / negotiant has consistently good selections.   I disagree with the very negative drync review here (link).  I thought it was well rounded and didn't find any 'metallic' tastes. 

It went well with steaks, grilled vegetables, and spicy Mexican dishes.  It was worth the $10 I paid for it, but I always hesitate on wines over $10, so I can't say as I'll buy it again - at least not from Total Wine for $12.  You can find it here and here et ici.

Agent Smith On Humans

Vinho Verde Espiral

Last weekend, Dr Desert Flower and I enjoyed a nice bottle of Portuguese Espiral.  The Vinho Verde region is in Northern Portugal, and this is the first wine we tried from there so we did not know what to expect, but at less than $4 a bottle at Trader Joe's, we thought we'd give it a try.  It was light, crisp, refreshing, paired very well with the brie, feta, stilton, and hummus we were enjoying.  The Espiral has a light carbonation that enhanced the lemony, peachy, spritzy textures.  For $3.99 it was fine.  Other wine reviewers liked it as well here (winewitch), here (sfweekly), and here (cheapwinefinder), while Dr Desert Flower and I disagree with Jon & Ted here (2guysuncorked).

Pro-Life Conservatives

I do miss having George Carlin around.  His observations were remarkable in their clarity and acerbic poignancy. 

Erosion Can Be Beautiful

Tangerine Dream

I got an email yesterday from my buddy Tom, who I have not heard from in 20 years, since going to his wedding near Rochester New York.  He was my roommate Sophomore year and the beginning of Junior year in college, and rooming with him greatly expanded my appreciation for a wide range of music, much of which I'd never heard before.  He had a vast Tangerine Dream record collection, along with Alan Parson Project, Steely Dan, Jean Michel Jarre, and 100s of others.  He also had an awesome stereo where we made pirate cassette tape - all of which I still have - of each others' albums, using TDK, BASF, and Memorex cassettes, bought in massive bulk quantities.  His email said "was listening to Tangerine Dream this morning, and thought I'd look you up".  It's really nice to hear from old friends.

Normal Shanghai Air Quality

In my business travels, I've been to Shanghai a dozen or so times.  In the photo to the right, I've been in both of these structures.  In the fore ground is the tallest building in Shanghai, in which a Hyatt hotel is located.  I've been to the top of it.  In the back ground, is the "space needle" radio & observation tower, where tourists are JAMMED in, body-to-body, odor-to-odor, a crush of crowds that would upset even the most laissez-faire fire marshal on the ground, disregarding that these people are crammed in 100s of meters in the filthy, lead laden air. 

The dingy, smog-filled atmosphere in Shanghai, the "New York of China", and this is Pudong, the "Manhattan" of Shanghai, is normal.  In each of my visits, this was the typical air quality I saw not only in Shanghai, but also in Beijing, Chengdu, Shenzhen, Chongqing, and Xian.  In fact, the photo here shows relatively GOOD air quality because you can see both structures, which are less than 1 kilometer away from each other.  This is not rain or fog, this is typical smog in China.

Just beyond the space needle is the Huangpijiang river, that can barely be seen through the snog from the observation level of the space needle. To the left, just out of the picture's frame, is the Pudong Shangri-la hotel, also on the river ("on the Bund") where I usually stayed, all of these structures are within walking distance of each other - a walk through a gray, dusty, heavily-under-construction, trash strewn urban landscape.  Or short cab rides, to zip from door to door, and avoid the trash and spittle and fence-blocked sidewalks.

Contrast the photo above to the photo of Manhattan's Central Park to the left.  Yes, there's a gray and less-than-pleasant Hudson River there, but you can see green trees, building outlines, shadows, detail.  This photo was taken roughly around 30,000 feet, or an altitude about 30 times higher than the Shanghai photo.  One might say "you're comparing apples and oranges!".  Well, not really.   I am comparing a dirty crab apple to a sweet, succulent, polished honey crisp.  Or maybe it's a comparison between industrial grade citrus concentrate to hand picked, organically grown, fresh squeezed orange juice.

So for a better example of what firm, effective, enforced government environmental regulations can do take a look at the two photos of Los Angeles, taken roughly 18 years apart (circa 1994, vs 2012).  While I have visited the LAX airport on an Australian flight stop-over I've never spent any time in LA.  I have heard Bill Maher state over the last 15 years, how the air quality in LA valley has improved to the point where now, in 2011 and 2012, you can "see the mountains again".  Mountains that were previously occluded by the pervasive smog from the 70s, 80s, and 90s.  Take a wild guess which photo below is the 1994 image, and which one is 2012.

Every time I hear Republican primary candidates talk about "job killing environmental regulations", I think about this contrast that I have personally experienced.  I don't want the United States to turn into China with indentured servitude, shortened life spans, a poisoned environment & rampant corruption (though we're already well on the way to the corruption part). LA has been cleaning up their terrible air quality for the last 50 years.  As a nation, do we want to begin a corporately driven march from the clean milestones reached now, towards a smog-filled, Shanghai-like future?  I hope not.  Il faut voir.

Portlandia Hilarity

When I first saw ads for Portlandia on IFC that showed Fred Armisen riding a bike, I thought "this looks lame" and I did not bother to watch.    Fred Armisen's recurring characters on SNL are often less than hilarious and just annoying, so I was hesitant to start watching a show where he is the creator, main actor, and writer.  A lackluster Obama, Billy Smith, Fericito, Garth, Gaddafi's best friend, and worst of all Nicholas Fehn... no thanks, bleh.  Then, in January, I heard a interview on Fresh Air that sounded too funny to be true.  So I set the DVR to record, and luckily IFC ran a Portlandia marathon one Friday night that included the whole first season.  Now, we are hooked.

The recurring characters are mostly funny - the funniest being the "chin bearded" bike delivery guy with ear expanding rings & neck tattoos, whose attitude and appearance make me laugh enthusiastically.  They mock politically correct, 1990s-time-capsule-ish, extremely eclectic nature of Portland, and use loads of local actors, shooting on locale.  There was a episode where they focused entirely on locally sourced food that had me rolling.  It's over-the-top, but each little vignette lasts just long enough to not over-do it, and leave the audience looking forward to more.  Highly recommended. 

Historical Artifacts Destroy IDiots

I saw a fascinating show that I'd DVR'ed on Nat Geo last month, that was a necropsy of a giraffe (Inside Nature's Giants).  While dissecting the neck, they came across the vagus and laryngeal nerves, and showed how they start off in the brain, about 2 inches from the voice box, run 2 meters down the neck, around the arteries of the heart, and Back Up the neck to the giraffe's voice box.  The following video illustrates this:

Richard Dawkins Demonstrates Laryngeal Nerve of... by blindwatcher
[Tip of the hat to grrlscientist for this very handy link]

Now, Richard Dawkins is a very smart man, but like many smart people who think they are the smartest person in the room (or in the world) he can sometimes be more than a little abrasive, so I try to keep my exposure to him at a minimum.  I don't see him as a "science rock star" as much as I do a "angry, smug, bully" who would draw more bees with honey than he would with vinegar, but everyone has their own way of handling things.  I see no reason that those who are not atheists can be good scientists, just as Francis Collins has said repeatedly (and Collins and Dawkins are often at odds), whether that's a belief in Jesus Christ, or Vishnu, or the Big Electron (warning, this video link to George Carlin is not child safe) in the sky.

But the illustration of the laryngeal nerve inefficiency, routing DOWN a giraffe's neck and BACK UP, after millions of years of evolutionary change shows that it is NOT an intelligent design.  It's not even a mediocre design.  It's back-ass-wards.  It's illogical.  IDiots (those who cling to Intelligent Design Because their so-called Christian[TM] faith has such a weak foundation they can't handle thinking on their own as they hypocritically eat their pork products) subscribe to such a notion, but I don't, and I can't. 

Organic Spanish Bubbly

Last week, Dr Desert Flower and I enjoyed a light, crisp, organic Cava from Albero for the first time.  We'd had other organic Albero varietals (sans bubbles) in the past, but had not yet tried the Cava.  It did not disappoint.  And at $5 a bottle from Trader Joe's, it was darn delightful.

Dr Desert Flower does love her champagnes, but a true French champagne runs at least $20 a bottle for the cheapest ones, and 3X or 4X for the better quality ones.  The Spanish Cava from Albero was enjoyable, and the bottle didn't last more than 2 days.  Paired well with olives, cheeses, salads, chicken dishes, hummus.  At just $5 a bottle you should try it too - I don't think you'll be disappointed.

Champagne, Cavas, Proseccos, their not just for New Years Eve or Celebratory Victories (say of a Super Bowl win or that kind of thing), but are wonderful libations to have on hand for life's little celebrations, each day or each week.

Social Distortion February 4th

Dr Desert Flower and I went to see Social Distortion last night at the Tempe Marquee, with our friends Alan & Tory.  While the tickers were not expensive - just $38 a piece - it was lame that they charged $5 to park 2 blocks away and across the street since their parking lot was inadequately too tiny to handle the sold out crowd for Social D.  While $5 is not much, it's the principle of the thing, to make me walk, and then charge me anyways... but I digress.

The crowd was mostly younger than us, but there were a few "older folks" there as well. the opening band (the Flaming Tones) were OK. We stood on the general admissions floor to stage left, about 60 feet from Mike Ness, and a massive mosh pit broke out about 15 feet away from us, where shirtless testosterone males pushed and shoved each other for most of the concert.  I had on my steel toed black leather engineering boots, which have very little grip on a beer slickened concert floor, so I declined to join in the fray.

The music was good, the sound quality at the Marquee was slightly garbled and sub-par, and the lighting was nothing to brag about.  Occasional wafts of cannabis smoke drifted through the crowd, and most of the fellow concert-goers were well behaved and courteous.  The only disappointing thing was that the concert lasted less than an hour.  9 songs until the first set was done, less than 45 minutes into the concert.  4 song encore later, and Social Distortion left the stage, the house turned on the lights, and they channeled everyone through the two tiny front doors - instead of the rear fire exists that lead directly to the over-flow parking garage 2 blocks away. 

Family Poolside Yoga

Since it was 18 or 19C today here, with a light breeze, Dr Desert Flower and I did yoga together for the first time poolside this afternoon.  It was wonderful, except for the 1/2 dozen honey bees who seemed inexorably drawn to the yellow sheet I'd laid down to keep dust & dirt off the yoga mats.  We figured out it was the yellow sheet when we finished yoga, and moved to the patio to enjoy a lunch of Stilton, Brie, Hummus, dried apricots, organic feta, organic baby carrots, and a bubbly Vinho Verde Espiral, I laid the yellow sheet over the dusty patio chair on which I sat, and I instantly became a popular bee magnet.  We moved inside, abandoning the patio, and watched through the screen as a dozen or more honey bees thoroughly investigated the sheet. 

As you can see in the photo, the aloes to the left are flourishing, as the transplanted patch to the right of the torch  is now rivaling its parent patch on the left.  The massive lavender "hedge" under to pool tools started from two 2 gallon pots.  The solar heater across the pool is still putting out 100F water, but it is not enough volume or BTUs to over-come the nightly lows of 45 or 50F.  The lavender to the far right also started off as a two 2 gallon pots that have taken off aggressively. 

Where's a good bee eater when you need one?

Found Object Carmenere, Not Objectionable

Trader Joes last month was selling Found Object Carmenere for less than $6 a bottle.  A young (2010) red from Chile's Colchagua Valley, it was pretty good.  Two years ago (was it really 2 years? wow...) I mentioned the Panilonco Merlot Malbec from the Colchagua Valley.  Like it's merlot cousin, this carmenere did not disappoint.  Carmenere is an under-appreciated varietal that I try to seek out as often as possible.  it goes good with spicy meat (asadas, salsas, pepper dishes) and flavorful dishes. 

If you like Chilean reds, try a Colchagua Carmenere and you just might like it.  Other wine bloggers have also found it to be "drinkable (here, here, here, and here).

Wookie Dog

Dino Xing

I heard that some of JustJoeP's visitors / followers have friends and relatives visiting Arizona this week.  If you speak with your visiting loved ones, tell them to be sure to watch out for the random raptor crossings they may encounter in the Sonoran desert.   Next to running into a moose in a cold climate like Maine, hitting one of these in Arizona would be pretty damaging to everyone involved.

Arctic Snowball Camouflage

Hiding in plain site.  A windswept, sub-zero plain.  Arctic Hares.  Awesome snowball camouflage. 

Dear Fork

Social Distortion, Phoenix

Social Distortion is coming to Phoenix this weekend playing two shows.  It should be a good concert.  I'll have my Italian leather coat & steel toed black leather boots on, and several glasses of whiskey in me.  They wand everyone at the door of the Marquee, and quite a 'mosh' pit forms in front of the stage. 

If you want to listen to more Social D, check out the links below.
Ball and Chain
Ring of Fire
Story of My Life
Machine Gun Blues
Angel's Wings
Don't take Me for Granted
I Was Wrong
When She Begins
Cold Feelings
Bad Luck
(I'll be listening to them whenever I am not on a conf call tomorrow)

Kanye East

This brought a grin to my stressful work day.

The fact that my desktop's monitor faces South (and I face north as I sit before it), made this even funnier.

Rest Room Book Rack, Stuckup!

I so much want to get a copy of this, and leave it in the magazine rack in the hall bathroom for guests to see and browse while seated there.

Heritage of Southern Family Values

I lived & worked in South Carolina for 16 years, after living in Indiana for 21 years and working there for another 4, so I am speaking from many years and 1000s of conversations and relationships worth of experience.  I've seen both the modern, advanced, cosmopolitan aspects of both states & their inhabitants, and the red neck, racist, xenophobic, backwards aspects of both states.  When I stumbled across this photo yesterday, I thought "oh, how wonderful! a whole family together on an outing!".  "It's about heritage" my fellow South Carolina citizens used to say.   Yep, a 'heritage of hatred'.  You want to understand why so many Americans HATE President Obama SO MUCH, but they don't articulate a valid, factual reason why?  See below.  Amen, brother.

PS:  it ain't Halloween.

Movie Quote Venn Diagram

This Movie Quote Venn Diagram brought a smile to my face.  "Finish this part for me" ... lol!

A Good Reason Not To Surf

Growing up in the Midwest, I spent very little time by the ocean as a child.  One vacation to Florida when I was in my tween years is all I can recall.  Lake Michigan has no sharks.   Yes, it has gar, pike, and other fresh-water barracuda-like varieties in very very limited quantities, but they leave humans alone. 

Images of sharks, jelly fish, the deep-deep-ocean, giant squid, the Pacific gyre, barracuda & sea urchins  (while snorkeling), violent storms and hurricanes give me pause... and make me think... "being on land is good".

Our son, who has spent nearly the last 20 years of his life in South Carolina, and nearly 1/2 of that in Charleston, has no such fear of the ocean, and in fact, is drawn to it, at home in it, one with it.