Forensic Pathology - new tests

A new Patricia Cornwall's Kay Scarpetta novel "Autopsy" has been released and it will be interesting to see what this forensic pathologist is up to this time.
In the real world, here in Australia, the Australian Federal Police have begun testing of unidentified human remains with new technology that will allow them to estimate an individual's year of birth and death, ancestral origin, hair and eye colour and even their facial appearance.
There are 2,600 long-term missing persons in Australia; there are just 850 sets of human remains in mortuary and other facilities throughout the country. Some of these remains will go through the new forensic testing in the hope they can be identified and that answers of what happened to their loved ones can finally be provided to their families.
The report I read on the ABC site can be found here.

Windows 11

I was very excited to get the notification that I could download the Windows 11 Update onto the laptop (Lennie the Lenovo that is ... I'm still waiting  for word for the Surface Pro).  It took a couple of goes but in the end it finally downloaded properly and I was stunned to see that it has instituted a taskbar along the bottom of the screen, not unlike that on a Mac computer.  Some of the features and settings are definitely different but not so much so that it's unusable without a deep dive into the new system.  I know there's heaps more there which I will find as we progress past Day 1.  Then, hopefully, when the Surface Pro is able to be upgraded, it will be an easy decision to make ... it isn't always. That's why I'm glad Lennie's upgrade came through first ... I use Lennie mainly for TAFE study so it is stripped right back and not running any extraneous software - it has only ever had the Edge browser on it ... which is good since they appear to have made it a much better browser ... although I'm not sure I agree with Edge apparently now warning users about the dangers of downloading Google Chrome.  Apparently it will give a pop-up when you try to download Chrome and so it does... but for some reason I couldn't do a screenshot on the computer ... but there is always a way ... or maybe not !

With the Omicron CoVid variant that has hit the news comes a bit of an understanding about the Greek alphabet. The strains so far have been called after Greek letters - the biggest up until now being the Delta variant. A new strain coming out of South Africa was originally called NU... until it was decided that was confusing ... so they went to the next letter in the Greek alphabet - XI... and decided that wouldn't do because it was such a common surname in China. They went to the next letter ... Omicron. But this presents a bit of a puzzle for those who have gone to have a look at the Greek alphabet because Xu does not follow immediately after Delta... that would be Epsilon. So why didn't the folk who decide such things choose Epsilon or any of the other letters between that and Nu. It would have been clearer ... Zeta, Eta, Theta, Iota, Kappa, Lambda or Mu would have done ... maybe.

Oops, just as well there is this thing called the internet.  Another look at the Greek alphabet naming convention shows that there are indeed CoVid variants named after the letters between (and including) Epsilon and Mu - but nothing much seems to have come of those (mentioned an article I read).

 It was reassuring that others were also noting the link between CoVid and the Greek alphabet ...

Test subjects

If you were starting human trials on a new drug ... how would you choose your subjects? There are sure to be ethical guidelines around this type of thing and probably whole areas of study but where do you tap into these fields if you aren't in them? The question came up while I was watching Venom - when "off the book" experiments are being conducted on folk who have either not come along voluntarily or have been promised a way out of their current (not so good) life predicament. So, if you were trying to get a positive result, would you pick the very best subjects you could or just who you could find?

Thoughts on a theme

Oops. I have been watching a new series Invasion, and in it a couple have a Tesla vehicle ... which the male partner cannot get going - admittedly he is a bit flustered as they are under attack and, necessarily, in a hurry - the female partner takes his mobile phone from him and then uses an app on the phone to start the car. He seems to have forgotten that step. Hmmm. So what happens if there is a problem with the app. Lots of Tesla drivers found out recently when they were locked out of their cars after an outage struck the Tesla app. Some of them posted about the outage on social media - and none other than the Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk personally responded to one saying, on Twitter, "Checking". He later tweeted "Apologies, we will take measures to ensure this doesn't happen again."

This is not the first time Tesla has been in the news lately. One has been about a staff member who sued the company and was awarded over $137 million. According to his attorneys, the case was only able to move forward because Diaz had not signed one of Tesla’s mandatory arbitration agreements which the company uses to force employees to resolve disputes without a public trial. The claims of racial abuse apparently date back to 2016 - since which time Tesla has made numerous HR changes to improve the workplace. Tesla has countered suggesting $600,000 would be a fairer compensation.

And two more instances of Tesla in the news, both emails:

• A response to a colleague who queried about using headphones on the plant floor - with one in one out - no problem;
• An email telling managerial colleagues that there were three courses of action if they received an email from Elon about doing something: provide information about why they thought it was wrong; seek further clarification; do it. If they didn't do any of these, the suggestion was that they could be asked to resign.

Yes, there is little doubt that Elon Musk is the boss.

Have you had enough?

If you are fortunate enough to score an invitation to Christmas at Queen Elizabeth II's estate chances are you will need to take part in a 120-year-old tradition. According to an article by Melanie A. Davis (on suggest.com) a habit now tradition of weighing guests when they arrive dates back to Queen Elizabeth's great-grandfather Edward VII; he wanted to "ensure his guests ate well". Attendees were "expected" to gain at least three pounds during their stay. If you want to see the practice portrayed on film, watch the new Pablo Larrain film Spencer. During the 1990's, the weighing of guests included family members including Princess Diana who was asked to weigh herself on the antique scales; she was struggling with an eating disorder at the time - something which was not unknown to the Royals. Some traditions are perhaps best not followed religiously. Also, as noted by Melanie A. Davis in the last sentence of her article: Apparently being a princess isn't all that it's cracked up to be.

Not 100 per cent

It's a hard thing to know ... when is 100 per cent not 100 per cent.  I saw on the news this morning that a dam is currently at 104%.  Does that mean its' overflowing?  It didn't sound like it was ... and if it isn't full (to overflowing) then why is it over 100% capacity?  

(Pause for research.)

The full supply level of a dam, when it is at 100 per cent capacity, is the approved water storage level of the dam for drinking or irrigation purposes.  But a dam can hold much more or much less than that.  According to a report in the ABC News in 2019, the Ross River Dam reached a capacity of 244.8 per cent. 

Who knew that dams could be gated or ungated.  The report went on to say that if a dam has a gated spillway, it can be opened to release water; for un-gated dams, operators have no control over the water that flows over the spillway once the dam's water level surpasses the full supply level.

A big find

 We were going for a drive this afternoon before meeting back at Monty's (microbrewery) and ended up at the Highfields Pioneer Village. In all the years we have been going to Toowoomba, we had no idea it was there. And certainly none of the others really had any idea about the rather large cow that has moved in. We will go there another day to "visit" but today it was just about finding out about the site and what they had (besides the ginormous cow). The volunteers on duty referred us to their website (www.highfieldspioneervillage.com.au) and told us that it would have details of upcoming events and special days - and if/what additional activites would be available eg blacksmith demonstrations, music, tea and damper and Model T bus rides around the village. The rest of the time, there is loads to see with each of the buildings on site housing a museum to "something" ranging from an old school building to the fire service and Southern Cross windmills. There is also a Heritage Chapel on site which is available for weddings and christenings. It's just a shame that lack of patronage during CoVid-19 last year has meant the folk who ran the cafe on site had to take up other jobs, so the on-site cafe is no longer running.

But at least we know where to look for it now - the signage to the site is not good and the volunteers were telling us that it is difficult and expensive to have the signage upgraded or moved - I think they mentioned the not-insignificant figure of $15,000 per sign. It's just a shame the Big Cow (one of Australia's many "big things") is not visible from the road.

Freedom ... ?

The suspense is palpable for those of us who have been wearing face masks as required throughout SE Queensland. We have been told that as soon as Queensland reaches 80% first-dose vaccinations the masks can come off. We had just 0.2% to go at 10:30 on Wednesday (or so I was assured by the wait-person where I picked up a coffee). Of course, you can still wear them if you wish, and I think we may still in some situations. There are heaps of people who seem to have given up wearing masks some time ago ... part of that at least I think is the unclear messages about masks, and mask-wearing, and restrictions.
An example: when we go to Trivia on a Monday night. We don't have to wear a mask until we are at the front door and signing in... and once we have signed in, we take the masks off... and don't wear them again for the two or so hours we are there, until we put them back on to walk the three steps through the foyer and out the front door. I can see why people think there is no reason to wear masks.
What puzzles me is how businesses are supposed to police this. Lots have a sign saying no face mask: no entry, but that doesn't stop people from entering bare-faced. What legal right or responsibility does a business have to prevent non-masked folk from entering - and how would they stop them? Similarly, come the point where 80 per cent of Queensland's (eligible) population is double-dosed and only those who are fully-vaccinated will be able to attend cafes, restaurants, clubs, sporting venues etc, who will be monitoring that? If it's so important, surely there needs to be a system in place to encourage compliance.

Hard sell ...

What the ...? I rang to cancel my subscription to the Gold Coast Bulletin and the Australian's Mind Games this morning and when I finally made it through to the operator, he asked me for a reason for the cancellation. I said I'd rather not say, but I just wanted to cancel. Then started a rather intensive session of him trying to extract a reason: he needed to put something down, he'd get in trouble if he didn't, it would affect him, you had a reason for joining - you must have a reason for cancelling. I suggested he just tick the box that said the customer declined to say: you're assuming there is something like that he replied, and again "it will affect me if you don't give me a reason". Well, I said, you read out the reasons you have and I'll see which of them I like. I don't want you to make up a fake reason he said, well, I told him, just put down that the customer declined to say. And I think there was one more round "You're a person, I'm a person and it will affect me if you don't say" before he would start processing my request.
Now, I don't know if it was just me, but the rest of the call did seem to take a while as he located my subscriptions and then cancelled them. Hmmm .. and why was it that the short survey at the end of the call I had been promised as I was on hold waiting to speak with an operator wasn't offered? I really wanted to help them improve their service! I must say though, that I'm used to getting a hard sell when folk are looking to sell me something ... not when I'm cancelling something ... although, to be fair, I know it's that he was looking for a way to have me continue the subscription/s so I guess he was on for the "sell".

Pandemics ...

Where did they find the resources to deal with the casualties? The Covid-19 pandemic this week reached a global death toll of 5 million ... although there are some suggestions that this figure is grossly under-reported. Given the media reports over the last (almost) two years since CoVid-19 first hit the global media, that is entirely possible. The question is whether the vaccination programs and measures being put in place will be able to counter the spread and contain it. But even at the conservative figure of 5 million deaths, CoVid-19 seems to not be the worst pandemic the world has seen. The actual figures may not be exact - because how would they keep an accurate track of the casualties over a number of years and locales. The reported totals - highest death toll first:
1347 - 1351   The Black Death         75-200 million
1520 - 1980   Small Pox                    56 million
1918 - 1919   Spanish Flu                 50 million
1981 -             Aids                              35 million
  541 - 750     Plague of Justinian    25-30 million.

So how did these people over the ages have the resources to deal with the casualties? And to record the numbers?

All a bit trivial ...

All the Trivia we do has to pay off sometime. In today's quiz in the Sydney Morning Herald, we came across two questions we definitely knew - which came first, the fruit or the colour orange ... and what was Colonel Sanders given name.*

I was also happy at Trivia on Thursday night when the question was "how many points is the Green worth in snooker?". The mnemonic I had endeavoured to remember had stuck - in part at least. 3 is/was the answer! Really, you go (red, yellow, green: 1,2,3) ... and there is more but I can't remember it now. It was just as well the question was about the green ball because I have no idea about any of the others with scores above three! I may have to have another look at that.  We have been listening to an Audible book "3,666 Facts" and some of the facts are interesting and I think it's those that we comment on and talk about that have a chance of making it into memory. One of those facts was that a "tower" is the collective noun for a group of giraffes. It was good we remembered it because that was one of the questions at tonight's Trivia.

I think we are starting to play much better as a team - we were seven tonight and it certainly didn't feel like the incredibly hard work it has been. We tried a new seating arrangement and I think that helped a little ... but it could just be that we knew more answers this time. We managed equal 2nd, together with about three other teams. The winning team had one more point, so we were fairly encouraged by that.

* Fruit; Harland

VIPs ...

Big Brother VIP - who are these people? I think I am definitely out of the loop as far as VIPs go. The VIP being interviewed on a morning show (not sure if it was The Morning Show) was someone called Jessika Power - and I am probably the only one in the world not to have heard of her. She was beaming in from Manchester England (England, across the Atlantic Sea) and she was obviously a very happy person because she seemed to be smiling all the time, although that may have had something to do with what may have been previous substance injections into her lips. What is it about people helping nature give them fuller lips ... and eyelash extensions?

Mistaken identity ...

Following the recent abduction and return of Cleo Smith in WA, one of the media outlets published the name and photograph of the suspect before he was formally charged. I'm not sure what the legal ramifications are in these instances especially as the person identified was someone else completely and not the person who was charged.  The wrongly-identified person will reportedly sue.  As well as civil proceedings, does this warrant investigation and/or action by the judicial system not because of the false accusation but because of possible interference with the abduction case? 

Trolls

Are some people just argumentative by nature?  Down at the Broadwater on Sunday morning, the Ian Dipple Lagoon had been closed off to the public - as folk from SeaWorld and the Council looked to see if the sea snake sighted the previous day was still in the Lagoon.  As it turned out they weren't looking to see if it was there, they were looking to make sure it wasn't there.  Fun fact:  sea snakes are usually underwater but come up for air every half hour to an hour to breathe ... and then they look like a rope floating on top of the water.  Another not so fun fact - sea snakes are incredibly venomous but - and this is more fun - they have an incredibly small bite so they can really only get purchase on smaller areas, like the webbing area between people's fingers. 

I put a photograph of the lagoon, without any swimmers or children playing in it, onto Facebook and mentioned the search for the sea snakes.  There were then some comments about sea snakes - and then one from someone suggesting that there were NO SEA SNAKES.  It was obviously someone who hadn't been there or hadn't talked to one of the folk around the lagoon. In the great scheme of things it wasn't that much ... but still I was pleased when a couple of the other members of the group pointed out his "error". 

I can't imagine what it must be like to have serious trolls following you online.  They can be quite nasty. ... and persistent... like those badgering Cleo Smith's family after her abduction last month.  It would be interesting to see if the trolling has stopped since Cleo has been found and returned to her family. 

Who's listening?

We sometimes joke - and certainly it is the stuff of memes - that our electronic devices are listening to us - or watching us.  Sooz was telling me the other day that she had been watching videos on families with Tourettes Syndrome.  I'm not sure where she found them but she doesn't have any trouble finding them now because they keep coming up on her Facebook page.  I'm still getting videos and ads about MDC Caravans - I had looked at some of the videos from their site and now they're just not going away.  Most folk have a story about how Siri or Alexa or Cortana "eavesdrop" on their Google searches and they start getting related content soon after.  I can understand that ... what I don't understand is how they can pick up cues from conversations you've had with someone when you're not actually searching on the internet. 

Tribute (?) tattoos

A married couple from Niagra Falls ("fans") were recently tattooed with red and black ink infused with Charles Manson's ashes. They are calling them "tribute tattoos" and the husband is reported in a TMZ report as saying he followed the example of his wife Deanne who wanted to become the first woman to sport a tattoo featuring Manson's ashes. This seems odd, as the husband reportedly already had a "Helter Skelter" tattoo on his forehead using Manson's ashes.
I can't help wondering how much murderabilia can physically be extracted from one person's ashes. After his death in 2017, and following a court case involving several interested parties, Manson's remains were awarded to his grandson. Since then, the ashes have seemingly been used in at least one painting, two masks and now at least three tattoos.

The Last Supper

There was a recent story in the Washington Post abut Julie Green, renowned painter and art professor with Oregon State University, who died earlier this month. They (Julie preferred the gender-neutral pronoun) were "a wide ranging artist whose paintings ... examined gender roles, wrongful conviction, animal abuse and their own colourful life". They were particularly known for The Last Supper project - nearly 1,000 white plates with cobalt blue artwork that depicted the last meal of prisoners destined to the death chamber and which spurred debate over capital punishment and, some suggested, allowed a window into the life of a prisoner. Many of the works are currently on display at the Bellevue Arts Museum.
Julie had also been working on a series called First Meal depicting the first meal of those who were released after a wrongful conviction.

Photo of some of the "Last Supper" works from the media.npr.org website

Gender bias

I would like to say that sexism is so subtle that it isn't always noticed but that's not always the case. The Star Casino has an app where you can play table games or slot machines and it's good for relaxation - especially since you don't have to outlay any money but you can earn vouchers you can use at The Star's food and other outlets.
A new slot game dropped for Halloween and I had been playing it for a short while before I realised a glaring inconsistency ... the paylines with male characters paid far more than the paylines with female characters. Others could see this as inconsequential but it really does seem to reinforce that gender inequality is alive and well ... even in gambling.

Perfect timing

It's good when there are kids at the table next to you when you're out having breakfast. We have been known to "engage" with them, usually making them laugh or smile - waving, pretending to play "hide and seek" that type of thing especially if they seem to want to "engage". There was one lad this morning who kept looking at us and try as we might, we couldn't get a smile out of him ... he was just watching us ... and just as my partner said "he scares me" he turned around in his chair and then looked back over his other shoulder ... and it looked as though he was going to do an Exorcist 360° head rotation. The timing was impeccable ... and we laughed so much I'm sure everyone thought we had lost it.

Mascara ... in space?

I have a question. If you were a female astronaut lifting off to the International Space Station (ISS) - would you wear your usual makeup - including mascara? Or would you think that, for the duration of the flight, stay and return, you might just give it a miss? How do you take off makeup in space? I was pondering this as I watched the first episode of Apple TV's new series "Invasion" where the female astronaut does appear to be have thick long lashes, perhaps false, perhaps extensions (a very profitable business I hear) but at the very least, mascara! If you were off to the ISS for a year, would you bother? And why do most boys not have this issue?

Halloween colours ...

We drove past the local park today where folk were setting up for a party ... we were fairly sure it was a Halloween event (even though it is a bit early) because they were putting up orange and black balloons and crepe paper. How did orange and black come to be seen as Halloween colours? Black we get because of the "sinister" component but what about the orange ... the colour of pumpkins we decided. Because Halloween comes so quickly after the Americans' Thanksgiving, we figured there would be lots of pumpkins left over to use as decorations ... and then slowly rot away to nothing.
Well, we were close but not close enough. Black is "sad" rather than sinister - at that time of year the veil between the living and dead is said to be thinner and folk would offer tributes to the departed and wear black to honour them. Orange is not to do so much with pumpkins as the change of seasons with the trees turning orange ... that and the fires that would be lit to sustain folk during winter. Hmmmm ... practical.
Next time: why red and green are the colours of Christmas. (Just joking.)

Dolphin

What is it about dolphins? They always fill us with such pleasure - especially if we see them in the "wild" - and up close and personal. There was one this morning down at the Ian Dipple Lagoon - actually in the lagoon. They have been doing dredging there and deepening and widening the lagoon mouth which is how the dolphin could swim in. Everyone was delighted to see it - especially the folk who were swimming there at the time, and the people (like me) who were busy filming with their mobile phones.
We were so pleased we had gone down to the Broadwater this morning ... we were later than usual and had thought about not going ... but being later had its benefits - because if we hadn't been later we wouldn't have seen the dolphin. It was in the lagoon for no more than a few minutes before it found its way out again.

Science fiction ... science fact

Which came first ... the one on the left - the stylised robot killer "dog" from Howard Overman's War of the Worlds - definitely something you would not want to run in to OR the stylised robot killer "dog" on the right - the Vision 60 Quadruped equipped with SPUR (Special Purpose Unmanned Rifle) which is designed to help armed forces get (safely) closer to enemy targets and can shoot a target from three-quarters of a mile away ... and its thermal camera with 30x optical zoom means it can spot living, breathing targets at night - making it also something you definitely would not want to run into.
So is it life imitating art or art imitating life?

Kindness of strangers ...

Trivia was a bit difficult last night ... we were not at our usual table; we thought we would be on the couches down the front but there was a cancellation so we ended up sitting at one of the "high tables" - the one right under one of the speakers.  So, as well as being on high stools (there is something quite comforting in not having to remember you are at height and are stepping down when you are standing up) we were six on a round table where we couldn't really confer properly even if we had been able to hear each other.  There was a bumper crowd last night as well - 90 folk were expected, with 19 teams - although one of the teams were a "no show".  It was painfully loud and I don't know about the others but it was so loud I could hardly concentrate on the game or the game play.  Pe seemed to be having a hard time hearing the team's input and working the buzzer ... especially in the "Fastest Finger" round.  Ah well, it's not as though we were last at the end of the game ... we were 12th ... so imagine our surprise when Adam told us not to go anywhere.  The winners, Ramsay Street, had decided to gift their first place voucher ($50) to us ... what the?  They said they had won the last three weeks and decided to share it ... we thanked them profusely ... and would have offered them our leftover scones had we not already promised them to Adam.  Yes, Wa is staying with us at the moment, had come along to Trivia, and made scones for the occasion.  I watched him this time and feeling that it wouldn't be wasted (now) he texted me his recipe.  I'll have to do a test run before I take a batch ... but I will.  The only difference will be that I won't be whipping up the cream in the car park with a whisk attachment on the Ryobi drill ... yes, he really did that ... and the scones were wonderful for it.

And if one episode of passing it forward for the week wasn't enough, when we were down at the Broadwater this morning, when we went to pay for our coffees, Ruth told us one of them was free because someone had paid for an extra one and said to "pass it forward".  

And did I mention our Trivia team managed a second at Monday night's game?  Yes, I know I could mention that the two top-performing teams had given the game a miss this week because of the storms that swept through the Coast that afternoon, dumping loads of rain and some hail on its way through ... but I won't.  :) 

Places not to live ...

... might have to include places like Midsomer.  So far there have been 95 episodes of this crime drama set in and around the fictional Midsomer - and at a minimum of two murders per episode of Midsomer Murders (there are often more) that makes a body count of about 200 since the show was launched in 1997.   It may not be a safe place to live (a bit like Murder She Wrote featuring novelist Jessica Fletcher and her hometown Cabot Cove) but filming location Buckinghamshire hopes it makes for a good place to visit - post-CoVid lockdowns there will be three Midsomer tours in the area:  The Midsomer Marlow Trail, Midsomer on the Misbourne, and Step into Midsomer - featuring various locations where the show has been filmed. 

Too early?

I am calling it as way too early on 20 October to have seen Christmas banners on light poles.  Seasons Greetings!  What?  We haven't even had Halloween yet - not that we're in America but there will be children going around the neighbourhood in their costumes in 11 days who do not even want to start thinking about Christmas yet ... or will they?   All this would be moot if we were all like pigs ... who are physically unable to lift their heads high enough to be able to look into the sky.  How sad would that be ... no Christmas banners, no clouds that look like anything, no moonrises ... no International Space Station - which is now the most expensive thing ever built at US$150 billion ... mind you, that was the 2010 total cost and they have kept spending on it since then!

Windfall

Windfall.  That's what was waiting for me when I went out to the backyard the other day and three of the neighbour's lemons had fallen off their tree and on to our lawn.  I'd just thought "free lemons" while I scooped them up and took then inside. But they were a "windfall" - because the wind had made them fall off the neighbour's tree and on to the ground on our side of the fence ... which, as well as picking them, had also made them (legally?) ours.  I'm not sure when the term went from windfall (an apple or other fruit blown down from a tree or bush by the wind) to windfall (a large amount of money that is won or received unexpectedly) but you can see how they are essentially the same - a reward for.little or no effort.

Popularity contest ...

What makes an establishment - I am thinking cafe in this particular instance - popular? When we stopped in to get a hot beverage at one of the local cafes on (Public Holiday) Monday morning it was busier than I have ever seen it. The joint was positively jumping with almost every table taken and a serious line-up for takeaways. Why so busy ? And was the only other cafe open in the area doing a similar-sized trade?

We have a system for rating cafes based on (in no particular order): how close to home are they, is there adequate parking, are the amenities close by and well-maintained, is the coffee good, is the food good, is the service good? You would think it would be easy to find (most of) these in more than a couple of nearby establishments but it is harder than you'd think. Still this helps us go further afield in search of a good breakfast ... unless we are keen on having fruit salad which so far we've found at only one cafe. It's not easy to find boiled eggs on a menu either!

Look up!

At any point it seems that the world is surrounded by space junk … those bits of hardware that have boosted rockets and people into space that have not fallen back towards the earth and burned up in re-entry. They have to be small enough to burn up in re-entry though and there is apparently a piece of Chinese rocket is spiralling out of control towards earth – all 30-metres and 22.5 tonnes of it. Under international (should that be interplanetary) guidelines, rockets are supposed to return to earth in a controlled way. The Chinese rocket will not. A report on the ABC News site says no-one really knows where the Long March 5B will come down just that it will probably come down at lunchtime this coming Sunday – give or take a day. The last time this happened - yes, another rocket – the prototype of the one in question – fell to Earth in the Atlantic Ocean and dumped a 12-metre long piece of debris near an African village – luckily no-one was injured. You have to wonder if there’s a dollar or two to be made if you happen to be lucky enough to be near it when the Long March 5B falls to earth and lucky enough not to be damaged by it. The U.S. Skylab which had a “controlled” return to Earth in 1979 left a substantial debris field, including pelting Stan Thornton’s home in Esperance WA with bits of space station. He grabbed some and hopped the first plane from there to the offices of The San Francisco Examiner – it had offered a $10,000 prize to the first person to deliver a piece of debris to them within 72 hours of the crash. They paid up even though they may not have expected to get any takers on their offer especially from Australia!

Body parts ... with caps

The crossword clue had me stumped at first ... five letters ... body parts with caps ... who would have thought there were at least three possible answers ... heads, teeth, knees.  It was knees.  

Ice cream

We have been watching the new season of MasterChef and the other night two contestants used nitrogen to make ice cream for their dishes. It looked amazing with "mist" rolling out of the mixing bowl. Stunning stuff. We were lucky enough to see it done in real life today. We have a local shop - Nitrogen Ice Cream - which does just that. They have ten flavours or so - all starting from an Anglais base and then they add the different flavours to make the ice cream - and then the different components eg crumb on the Cheesecake for the different "flavours" as they "plate up".  The ones we had were delicious: dinner and a show. It was interesting speaking to the owner as well; she was saying that if you have ice cream at a fine dining restaurant, this is how it would be prepared - except they would mix it by hand rather than use a beater/mixer. 

Too many colours?

We all perceive the world differently but we'll never know quite how other folk see the world - particularly in relation to actual colours. Most folk have three receptors in their eyes for colour recognition but if you're born with just one extra cone cell in your eye you can see 100 million more colours. How amazing would that be - how many colours would you be able to see in a rainbow; more than the standard seven? And how would it be if your job was to look through the spectral whats-it to determine the chemical composition of planets. Who knew that's how it was done? Yes, those colours on the Periodic Table are there for a reason ... each element has a different colour and if there are numerous elements "together" then viewing then with the help of a spectral whats-it will allow the colours to be seen separately.

Dognostics

New research suggests that dogs are able to detect the presence of CoVid-19. At the moment the results are encouraging ... and at a hospital in Florida, Buffy (a two-year-old yellow Labrador) is trained to sniff out CoVid-19; she sniffs visitors to the hospital and if they are Covid-19 positive, she sits down. They are claiming a 95% accuracy rate for her. As well as the lab test, or dognostic test as some are calling it, visitors also have their temperatures checked but if Buffy gets a positive result, the person has to have a CoVid-19 test. In research elsewhere, nine previously untrained dogs have been first taught in general scent detection and then moved on to learning to distinguish between urine samples from Covid-positive and Covid-negative patients. The samples had first been "inactivated" so it was safe for the dogs (who can apparently catch Covid-19) to smell. Success rate:  96%.  The information I read suggested that the use of dognostics may not be implemented quickly for day-to-day screening ... this was supposed to be something to do with the costs involved in large-scale training/testing, but I'm wondering if it has more to do with the dogs being trained to detect the virus in urine ... it's going to take longer to screen people if they need to give that sample first!

Comparison shopping

Internet shopping ... where would we be without it? Actually I think it would be better characterised as internet window shopping and/or price comparison. I had to buy a new camera battery the other day and I checked online to see what was available in the area and how much I would be paying. Consistently the price on the internet was around $100 (it sounds so much cheaper if it's only $99.95) so imagine my surprise when I went into the camera shop and they were selling it for $149. What the? So I asked if they would price-match (as I pulled out my phone) and they said yes - but not Amazon. Fair enough. So I pulled up the price for one of their local competitors - $99.95 - and to their credit (pun intended), they matched it. Mind you, had they not, there was no way I would have bought the battery from them. It is a huge price difference. So thank goodness for the internet because had I not done the research beforehand, I may well have spent the $50 (or so) extra.

Powers of observation - not

I would hate to have to pick someone out of a police line-up. Not because it would mean I had been in close proximity to a crime (although there would be a bit of that) but because I don't really recognise faces* and am sometimes not that observant. Take today: I was at one of the local coffee shops getting a takeaway coffee and I noticed they seem to have replaced one of their tables: where there was now an art deco black and white table and chairs set there had been an old school table and chairs. I must have been distracted then because I noticed the bottle on the counter - filled with water, some greenery and one of the tiniest coloured fish I've ever seen. As I watched it, the owner came over to ask if I could see it - yes - and then took me over to the art deco table to show me the other two fish "bottles" there. Truly I had not even seen them although I was looking straight at the table! What else do we miss seeing in everyday life?  I'm thinking there might be more than we could imagine.  

*This has a name - Prosopagnosia - it is also known as face blindness or facial agnosia.  

Meerkats under wraps

Meerkats in the wild would apparently breed like rabbits which is why any zoo in Australia only has single-sex populations just in case they stage a mass break-out. I had thought the person who told me this was pulling my leg but this is what the keeper explained during the talk at the meerkat enclosure at the Darling Downs Zoo when I was there the other week. So, where do the new/replacement meerkats come from? Are there special "breeding pairs" safely tucked (read: locked) away somewhere to boost the numbers when a replacement is needed (I was going to call it "natural attrition" but that would suggest they were leaving of their own volition - nope, we don't want that!)? Or do they come in from overseas? Or do they use AI for the job ... which would work in female populations, but not so much the male populations.

That's bananas ...

Where do we pull Trivia knowledge from? I was just thinking about East Egg and West Egg - from The

Great Gatsby. Who knew we knew this? Certainly not me -it's all I can do to remember the plot points let alone where the action takes place. But we all continue to "learn" (or is that "amass"?)

Trivia - like the fact that Cavendish bananas do not self-propagate. Or that the first monkey-human embryo has just been developed and while it survived only 20 days, it makes you wonder why they would even think to do it- haven't these folks seen Planet of The Apes? But if these chimeras did survive and gain world dominance they'd soon run out of Cavendish bananas as a ready food source if they didn't learn how to fertilise and farm them!

What's in a name?

Would it have been as successful a game if MOUSETRAP had been called RATTRAP? Would that group have been as big a hit if they were called Coleoptera instead of The Beatles?

Cosplay

As we were driving back from breakfast this morning we noticed there were folk in costumes around the Gold Coast Convention and Exhibition Centre - and it didn't take long to work out Supernova is in town.

It's a while since I've been to Supernova - and the last time was with our neice, nephew and two of their friends.  The bathroom was off-limits to us that morning as they primped and preened and applied buckets of pancake make-up and put the finishing touches on their quite elaborate costumes.

I was chatting with one of the Supernova crew members (SCM) later today about how the event has changed last year and this year - because of CoVid. One of the big changes is that there are no international stars - and they used to be a huge draw card. There are Australian stars of course but the SCM seemed to think that the cosplay, merchandise and panels were the reasons for folk coming along. The SCM said it was "packed" inside and I thought about buying a ticket ($37 - cheaper than I remember) and having a look for myself but I was very concerned I would be amongst many of those emerging from the Centre - laden down with merchandise! I just knew there would be something that wanted to come home with me - Star Trek, StarGate, Dr Who, Torchwood, Star Trek (did I say that already? There are so many different shows!).

I spent some time outside the entrance/ exit taking photographs of the cosplayers. Isn't it good that folk still play dress- up!

That's entertainment ...?

Married at First Sight is almost over for another year ... thank goodness because I am still not sure what the program sets out to do. There is a lot of titillation and you can see that the scenes are heavily edited to be as sensational as they can be - and then some.
On the whole, it isn't as issue I guess, but one"marriage" in particular has been worrying: it's been referred to as toxic in the media and it certainly does seem to be a relationship you wouldn't want anyone you cared about to be in. But that one appears to have thrived and continues "outside the experiment". Gaslighting, coercive behaviour - all warning signs of a relationship that could easily tip into domestic violence territory; all in full view on National television and not in any way, mitigated, explained or commented on by the "experts" who are said to take such care matching the participants and making sure they receive 'intensive counselling throughout the experiment. 

So, is it entertainment? I don't think so but chances are l'm not the target demographic! 

Orange ...

Which came first - the colour orange on the word orange? You would think it would be fairly easy to find out - given we have the internet and other excellent research tools at our disposal. I now know that the only fruit named after a colour is the blueberry. But if that's the case, what about the blackberry?   So, the colour ... orange, in English anyway, is named after the ripe orange fruit - from the French pomme d'orenge.  According to Wikipedia, the earliest known use of the word "orange" as a colour was in 1502 to describe clothing purchased for Margaret Tudor.  Prior to this orange was commonly known as geoluhread - "yellow-red".

In 1512, "orange" (actually "orenge") appeared in a will (filed with the Public Records Office*) to describe the colour between red and yellow.  The report I read did not specify what item was thus described.   

*Still looking ... but it's hard to believe - or maybe not - that the will was consigned to the Records Office because of the use of the word orange. Were all wills sent to the Records Office way back when? Perhaps the only people who would have had wills then were the wealthy and it could make sense that their wills would be filed for legal and/or historical reasons.

By the letter ...

It's not always easy to know the origin of words but sometimes it's fairly self-explanatory even if not immediately obvious.  I don't think I had even really thought about the word alphabet* until we were driving in Central Queensland and we saw the signs for the next town along the road - Alpha.  This led to discussion about the Greek Alphabet ... and at some point shortly thereafter the penny dropped - the word Alphabet is from the first two letters of the Greek Alphabet - Alpha and Beta.  The Phoenician Alphabet was the basis of the Greek Alphabet ... so did they call it an Alphabet or was that term coined later?  Later it seems ... the world Alphabet has it's origins in the Middle Ages but does derive from the Greek word alphábētos.  
* Oxford Dictionary:  a system of writing, developed in the ancient Near East and transmitted from the northwest Semites to the Greeks, in which each symbol ideally represents one sound unit in the spoken language, and from which most alphabetical scripts are derived.

Riding high

How do they build roller coasters* and what do they build them of/from? We have been watching the new roller coaster being constructed at SeaWorld on the Gold Coast and it seems to be being made of wood ... but it could just be that that is the framework for holding up the real roller coaster as it is being built.  I know there are renowned wooden roller coasters around the world but I would have thought that metal roller coaster would be more cost efficient to erect these days.  We will just have to keep an eye on it to see what happens as it gets nearer to completion.  

*Oxford Dictionary: a fairground attraction that consists of a light railway track which has many tight turns and steep slopes on which people ride in small, fast open carriages.

Holding a torch ...

A question at Trivia a while ago was about whether you can ascend to the top of the Statue of Liberty's torch.  The answer is yes you can but you actually can't ... access to the top of the torch has been restricted since 1916 when an explosion caused by German spies during World War I permanently closed the area.  I read this today, together with some facts about the symbolism of different aspects of the Statue of Liberty and its history.  You can read more here.

Like no other can

We were at a service station on the way home today and I bought a can of Coca-Cola. Two cans actually because they were on special - two for $6. I was planning to buy a can of drink, I just hadn't planned on a 500ml can - who ever knew there were cans larger than 375ml. So why did I buy the larger can? It looked so good - I think they must have used the Golden Ratio or something like it in the design of the cans, because they certainly hit the right visual note. Examples of the Golden Rule in nature - snailshells and sunflower seeds; in art - the Mona Lisa. The Golden Ratio is 1.618 (or thereabouts). Powerful figures indeed ... that could be why it's used so widely in the advertising industry.

Changing the formula

It doesn't seem like 24 years ago - but it is - that Coca-Cola replaced its traditional secret receipt with "New Coke" - which fell flat and had the company revert to the original recipe after sales declined. To paraphrase another logo ... when you're on a good thing (business-wise) ... stick to it.

Curiosity

I read something the other day about the Mars Curiosity Rover ... that, all alone on the Red Planet (as far as anyone would be aware), it had been programmed to sign "Happy Birthday" to itself once a year.  How sad!  But then it became just a little sadder.  Last week marked the Rover's fifth anniversary on Mars ... but there was no "Happy Birthday" this time ... in fact, there was only one "Happy Birthday" sung and that was back in 2013.  Why?  The report I saw quoted Florence Tan, the deputy chief technologist at NASA's Science Mission Directorate as saying (after she had said that "the answer to your [Marina Soren - the author of the article] questions will sound rather cold and unfeeling" ):  in a nutshell, there is no scientific gain from the Rover playing music or singing 'Happy Birthday' on Mars.  Marina Soren's comment in response:  In the battle betwen song and science, science always wins.   Why did it do that one time?  Well, in that case, it was to see if it could be done:  so ... Curiosity (Rover) won!

Memory

Is memory fickle, fragile or something else entirely?  At lunch yesterday, one of the guests was a retired teacher - who had taught at Rangeville State School back in the '60's.  That sounded a bit familiar ... and, sure enough, I had also been at Rangeville State School in the '60's  - as a student.  Our times there had not overlapped - we had missed each other by a couple of years ... but she asked an interesting question ... who was head of the school when I was there.  I told her I couldn't remember ... I can't remember any of those years with any clarity. The first teacher I can remember clearly was Mrs Tremble, who taught me during my first year at High School in Charters Towers.  Mrs Tremble used to send chalk home with me for my (by four years) younger brother.  The next teachers I can remember were at my next High School - a couple of years later - on the Gold Coast.  I can't remember lots of their names - and the memories of some of them are much clearer.  And it seems that might not be everyone's experience ... others at the table talked about how well they remembered their school years - even their primary school years - and their teachers.  How amazing would that be!

Imagination

Imagination is alive and well!  While the kids were playing on their tricycles this morning, one was making a call on his mobile phone (a toy one) to the other - who answered on his tennis ball.  The reason for the call:  When you will be home?  I guess that bit may not have been that imaginative at all and probably shows what today's 4-year-old boy thinks a mobile phone is for.  Gone are the old Star Trek days when a mobile phone could have been a space-age communicator!

Names of things

I wonder if this was intentional?  The Brand name for the toaster is VERO but you could be forgiven for thinking it is NERO ... does anyone else smell something burning?

Cutting the Mustard

"Cut the Mustard" - what does it mean? What are its origins? I have been pondering these questions since I saw the plastic squeezable bottle of mild American mustard on the morning tea table when I came in. How do you cut a liquid - but I think you do - cut whisky for example -which essentially means adding just the right amount of water (maybe ice). But where does "cut the mustard" come few? There is some suggestion that it might be about soldiers being mustered - and only the ones who passed muster were called on to fight - or about not being able to harvest (cut) mustard (plants). Or not being able to cut very tiny round mustard seeds. The general consensus is that if you can't cut the mustard, you can't make the grade, are somehow sub-par etc etc ... but what a funny way to say it.

Handwriting

Handwriting is on my mind at the moment ... I'm reading a novel (Last Writes) about a forensic handwriting analyst - and I have started following a blog where one of the key focus areas is handwriting and how to improve yours. It's quite interesting (both of them) - especially for someone who loves handwriting. One of the recommended exercises is filling out crossword puzzles neatly, or writing out your favourite quotes, and, of course, practice ... and lots of it. But it has to  be good practice - mindful of the implements you use, taking care to form each letter, and aiming for consistency. Also recommended - keeping (and dating) your practice sheets so you can come back to them later. The thing that strikes me about this advice is that it seems that the handwriting is an end product, more important than what is being communicated ... when "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog." is one of the suggested practice exercises.
I wonder how Claudia Rose, handwriting expert, would cope with line after line of handwriting practice and what she would be able to tell about the writer ... their motivation ... state of mind. She's currently holed up in a sect hideaway looking for evidence of less-than-pure-of-heart converts as she seeks out an-about-to-be-three-year-old girl who is about to be given over to be "sacrificed" (not literally - or so we're being led to believe at this stage) into a subsect of the sect.
Meanwhile, closer to home, I'm wondering about the difference in writing - and if there is one - depending on whether writing is done digitally by typing, or through transcription Software, or by handwriting. Probably different input methods work best for different uses.  I prefer handwriting unless I'm in a hurry - or in a typing mood!

Quizzes

One of the "quizzes" doing the rounds on FaceBook at the moment is "Your Life Quote" - which is fairly easily arrived at.  You select the provided link, then "sign in with FaceBook" and it gives you a quote ... and, the good news is that if you don't like the quote you get .. you can go again (and possibly even  again and again and again) to see if you like that quote better!  I know I did!  But why would people believe that something as generic as FaceBook is (as it must be) could provide something of personal significance?  Who's your soulmate? Who makes you laugh the most? You get the idea.  And you know they can only take names from your FB friends, possibly even friends of friends, or from your contacts (if you've allowed access).  The whole idea intrigues me because I know (from my cyber-security friend) that you should never click on those links (they can be as dangerous as opening that email attachment) but I know I keep doing it!

Motivation?

We used to play Trivia regularly on a Monday night and while we often had some good scores, there was another team who often had great scores, only missing one or two answers some nights - other nights not doing so well at all.  In the end, after a change in format, and because the night dragged on for too long and various other reasons, we stopped going ... and have been trying to find the same trivia game at another venue.  I've sent emails to the company that supplies the trivia questions but they have not responded, and when I did ring their number, I was told person who managed the Trivia was out of the country.  But yesterday, quite by accident, we stumbled across a game - at the Nerang RSL.  We were having a late lunch and at some point I noticed what I thought were fairly familiar Trivia sheets ... and they were ... and Trev's Trivia Show.   And even though I recognised the sheets, Sooz did a better job ... recognising someone we knew from our old Trivia - none other than one member of the "performing incredibly well most of the time" team. Hmmm ... we thought ... hmmmm.  Could this be the secret of their success?  I suggested that it might be that they had stopped going to the Monday night Trivia and be coming here instead - and Sooz was inclined to agree until she made eye contact with the man in  question ... and he looked away (guiltily?).  What a turn-up that would be ... attending Trivia a day before so they could win the half-time game ($15 voucher), the full-time game ($50 meal voucher) and the Baffler (drink vouchers for the table)!  And here we were thinking they were just good at Trivia ... except for those nights when they weren't.  The question for me is why anyone would want to cheat at Trivia at all?  Surely the reason for playing is to see how well you do using your own resources? 

A mix of words and pictures

Once upon a time we had "mixtapes"  - a hand-made compilation of music (typically copyrighted songs taken from other sources - thank you Wikipedia) recorded in a specific order ... although with shuffle on an MP3 player these days, that's not always necessary.  Before we did it though, they were typically compiled by DJs in the 70s and 80s who "mixed" and recorded them onto cassette tapes - hence the name.  I'm going to go out on a limb here and say they had a less eclectic batch of songs - and possibly shorter - than on the mixtapes I currently have on my phone - which are running at 40, 41 and 55 tracks long.  I don't play the songs right through - sometimes just listening to the first few seconds of a song reminds me of where it's from and why I like it ... most of them are "favourites" because they remind me of people or places or ... sometimes something else which I can't quite describe, just evokes a particular feeling ... a bit like visual art.  There was one piece ... a painting ... I heard about recently where people would look at it - and start crying. It sounded to me like it had "E Flat" in it - and while that sounds a little out there, when you think that vision and hearing both relate to "waves", anything is possible!  And who knew there was at least one book about such things - James Elkins' "Pictures and Tears: A History of People Who Have Cried in Front of Paintings".  Of course, art, in its many forms, has been making people cry for about as long as it's been around - and the "why" is the subject of much speculation and discussion ... and seriously worth a bit more consideration.  I remember someone saying once that an artist spends their life trying to create that perfect piece and then, if/when they do, trying to do it again.  You have to think that part of that drive must be left in the piece ... perhaps it's that which strikes a chord in the rest of us.

To remake or not to remake?

Why do they have to remake movies? I watched the remake of Poltergist today - possibly because of the clown news out of the U.S. (nothing to do with their Presidential race). Over the last few months there have been random (?) sightings of clowns - not nice ones - around various areas of the States. One with a machete apparently even tried to lure a woman into the forest - although I'm not sure that even something as fun (to some folk) as a clown would be able to lure anyone anywhere if it was carrying a machete! I'm not one that;s afraid of clowns - there's even a name for it - but I do know some folk who are! It could be they have seen IT (the Stephen Kong miniseries) with Pennywise the clown or Poltergeist - old or new - with its horrific clowns. Come to think if it even the Simpsons with their Krusty the Clown also has the less than nice clown bed that Bart sleeps in in a Tree house of Horror. For such figures of mirth you have to wonder how clowns ended up with such a bad reputation and why they're always called so-and-so The Clown - as if we can't actually tell that they're clowns by how they look!  But back to the remake of Poltereist - which I'm not giving a rating but which was vastly different and oh so much less subtle than the original.  I understand that technology changes when it comes to movie-making but there was nothing wrong with the old one and so much right with it that it makes me wonder if there isn't any way they can come up with new ideas for movies rather than doing remakes. 

Lost my way

Nooooooo .... is it really months since I last made an entry here?  Alas, I think so ... I fear somewhere over the last couple of years, I have lost my way - doing shares on FaceBook rather than taking the time to write.  Not that I haven't been doing some jottings in that time ... there was Jannie Jaunts and This is what's happening ... but it's time to turn my attention back this way for a while.  Hopefully I haven't forgotten how.

Brain training?

I'm currently doing a daily dose of Brain Training via Lumiosity.  Whether it can actually be called "brain training" is under discussion after the US Federal Trade Commission earlier this month announced a settlement with Lumosity over charges that advertising its games as "brain training" and that they were designed to improve cognitive skills such as attention and memory and that they were capable of improving an individual's performance on everyday tasks may not be supportable.  Either way, I'm prepared to give it a go after my brother said it was helping him ... and I think there are some games there that do stretch me ... especially with visual memory tasks.  One of the hardest things though is remembering what the rules of the games are ... and yes, mostly I do the traing "daily" but sometimes I don't get to it.  I wonder how much science the FTC would need to see to be convinced that it did support Lumosity's claims.  Maybe it's a matter that the games are "designed" to help with brain training ... and they don't always work. 
Some people don't need to do the training of course ... they just have it.  Like the time my sister and I were peeling potatoes and popping them into a saucepan of water ... and then a potato went in and the water was close to overflowing.  We angsted over how to carry the saucepan to the sink so we could pour some water out until my partner suggest we "take a potato out".  Oh my goodness ... what brilliance!  One of my work colleagues came very close to that level of brilliance yesterday ... we were trying to print out a file which had too long a name - once the directory information was added. We couldn't change the file name, nor copy it, nor get it to do anything really ... every time we tried the name "too long" rewarded our efforts.  Finally, Del solved the problem ... she renamed the folder the file was in!  Bravo! 

No. 1 in shoplifting?

Why are razor blades the most shoplifted item in the world?  What do people do with them ... besides shaving, cutting drugs, eating them?  What else can you do with them.  Artists use them, people use them for cutting things ... but you would have to think there are safer ways where you're not going to risk losing a finger.  And how on earth did they decide blades were the most desirable target for our light-fingered friends?  When we discussed the possibilities at Trivia we considered chocolate and other confectionery, pens, and other things but we didn't give razor blades a single thought.  And how would you best test their answer?  A quick interweb search shows that razor blades (Gillette Quartro or something like that) is on the list, but around 4 or 5.  Gourmet meat and expensive perfume are right up there as well.

Starry starry night

Normal bulbs around the world are being replaced with LED (light emitting diodes) which, while they are energy efficient and much cheaper to run, do generate much more light pollution.  This means that even though astronauts can see Earth, Earth may not be able to see them.  I wonder if it would be different if they gave them a red hue - like the red lighting they use in some centres in the US (and possibly elsewhere) where all the exterior illumination is red, which throws very little light pollution and makes the environment great for star-gazing. 

Heavenly bodies

$4 million ... that was what NASA had originally budgetted for Earth defence a few years ago - and while that could be defence against anything (or anyone), I think they meant asteroids and other space bodies.  Well, the good news is that the budget has just been increased to $50 million and there is now a Department at NASA with the responsibility of keeping us all safe from "potential doomsday asteroids".
As the report said: The Planetary Defense Coordination Office will oversee all of the space agency's efforts to detect and track near-earth objects, and coordinate with other federal agencies as well as other nations if and when it becomes necessary. 
It doesn't say more than that ... so people can use their imagination to work out what that might mean.  The Head of the Department, with the title Planetary Defense Officer, would probably know though.
"The formal establishment of the Planetary Defense Coordination Office makes it evident that the agency is committed to perform a leadership role in national and international efforts for detection of these natural impact hazards, and to be engaged in planning if there is a need for planetary defense," Lindley Johnson said in NASA news release.
Word is that, closer to home, there's also a US plan to deal with the Zombie Apocalypse. 

Sounds rough

There was something in one of the media outlets the other day asking why it was that animals make different sounds in different languages.   I've not had the much experience with animals overseas but it does seem like they would make more or less the same sounds the world over ... but apparently you wouldn't think so if you heard "Old McDonald Had a Farm" sung in different languages.  It just makes me want to travel overseas and listen to some animals ... like the cats throughout Rome, some bears in Yosemite, dogs in San Ramon, and some otters in Scotland.  

Changing times

The only thing constant is change ... isn't that what they say?  One of the cleverest things I think a barista can do is coffee art ... drawing something in the foam on the top of your drink.  I've seen people draw some amazing pictures ... and somewhere deep in my photo archives I have some wonderful shots of those pictures.  But it looks as though this might be a dying art ... according to recent reports coming from the CES in the US, a company has invented a device which will be able to print images on the top of your coffee.  The "stencil" will come in hundreds of designs and will be customisable for company logo, football team emblems, almost anything.  It means the days of the leaf design on the flat white are well and truly numbered.  And while this may be "progress", it does feel as though the world has somehow become a sadder place.

Word/s of the year

Even though it says on social media that any quiz you do on Facebook can lead to your data become less than private, it seems very difficult to resist them.  It was interesting that both a friend of mine and I had obviously both done the same quiz ... what is your word for the year.  I tried my name and came up with "Joy" - which was fair enough; but I wondered if it might be rigged in some way ... so I put in my nickname and the quiz came back with "Innovation" - much better ... but all in all not a bad combination.  When I was telling my friend this, she told me her words of the year were "Beauty" and "Simplicity".  Not bad ... not bad at all ... but then I wondered how she was able to get two words ... had she put in two names as well?  Well, as it turns out she hadn't put in any names.  She had just decided that she would have two areas to focus on this year and there were ... Beauty and Simplicity.  She didn't even know there was a quiz on Facebook!

It can't be true!

Who knew that something on the internet could be false, untrue, even a fib!  I refer of course to the story I read some time ago .. and why would I doubt it ... even question it ... that Winston Churchill's level of anger in the WarRoom could be judged by if his teeth flew out of his mouth while he was shouting - and then smashed against the wall.  The false teeth were of unconventional construction ... they were made of wood.  And I believed that until last night at Trivia when we were trying to work out the baffler - one of the questions was "I used to be made of wood" - and, of course, I trotted out the Winston Churchill story.  St questioned it ... and based on that, I went for another look on the internet ... and what do you know, there was a different story this time ... about the sale of Winston's Churchill dentures ... and they weren't made of wood!  I felt cheated!   

Missing Herman's Head

I miss Herman's Head - which was very much like Inside Out except years before and with human actors!  The main character was Herman and the other characters - and I wish I can remember who they all were - were inside his head - like muses but also with some input into the action.  Why is it that they have to do remakes?  Yes, I know, most of the folk who see Inside Out will have no idea how good Herman's Head was ... or that it even existed!  That's a shame.

Make-up your future

There has been talk about the changing nature of employment lately and how automation and digitisation will change the face of jobs as we know it. Seems to me though that if the whole fascination with Zombie movies and series continues, if you do make-up for the living dead, your future is secure. And, if the zombie apocalypse is real - but like iZombie rather than The Walking Dead, you've probably still covered!

Smile

We all have different skills - and we all try to get more from time to time.  I was reading today that one of the ways to help you learn - especially when you are feeling slack and can't concentrate - is to force yourself to smile as you learn.  If you can't fake a smile, you can force yourself to by holding a pencil between your teeth.  Of course, for some of us this is not an option ... in fact, once that pencil goes in my mouth it's all I can do to not be squeamish.  Maybe that's a new skill I could try to learn :)