Category: Miscellaneous

??

  • April 24, 2013

??, or hanami is a Japanese term that refers to flower appreciation. It’s most commonly used in early spring, to describe the Japanese tradition of celebration when the cherry blossom trees are in bloom.

That happened in most parts of the country about 3 weeks ago, and amongst the more striking images to come out of Japan this year were the following:

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That is a town in which a light snowfall occurred during the spring bloom. This is apparently close to the height of beauty as far as the blossoms are concerned, and the photos from the town were widely shared on the Internet.

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The above photo was taken in Ueno park, in Tokyo, a couple of weeks back. This was the height of the season, and the park was full of people out to see the blossoms and having picnics. Can you see what they are all taking photos of?

I enjoyed some hanami of my own today, because the grove of cherry blossoms at SUNY is now in bloom:

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Its almost exactly one month later than last year.

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The flowers only last a few days. For the Japanese, part of the appeal is the transience. Enjoy them while you can.

Wildlife, Again!

  • April 9, 2013

This time I put the camera in the back of our yard, in the only ‘wooded’ part of our property. I scattered corn amidst the fallen leaves as well. In a few days, over 150 photos had collected on the device. Even better, the vast majority actually had animals in them!

There were about eighty like these:

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There are (at least) two squirrels in the second photo. Can you see them both?

And then there were fifty or so photos like these:

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That second guy looks like he knows what’s going on doesn’t he? Two of the photos contained four deer in them!

And then we get to the unusual shots. Of the ~140 animal photos, all but two contained deer or squirrels. Here are the other two:

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THERE HE IS AGAIN! A raccoon! Although his tail looks shorter…

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And there we have it my friends, the first wildlife shot of a rabbit 🙂

(I won’t comment here that it’s not uncommon to see rabbits hopping around our backyard in the summer…)

  • Posted in Animals
  • Robert

Review: Jon Pertwee Book Of Monsters

  • April 4, 2013

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Now this is a disappointment. As everyone knows and agrees, Jon Pertwee’s version of the doctor was the best ever in all fifty years of Doctor Who. One may suppose therefore that the literary output of such a great man would be without reproach. Sadly, that’s not the case.

This, my dear readers, is a book for babies. Containing piffle such as stories about dragons hatching from eggs and befriending children, or man-eating fungus houses, or amorphous blob-creatures that rampage out of lakes and devour dozens of people, there’s nothing very… well now I think about it most of the stories in this book actually are quite monstrous!

But the way they are told leaves a lot to be desired. Many of them I suspect were written in minutes, and even as I read them I supposed I may have been able to do better myself. Let me try:

At last the fated hour had arrived. Kron-pirr viewed the battlefield from atop his Daedalus platform, watching the Void Gigas units assemble their time cannons. At his signal they would fire at the city, breaching the etheric defenses and opening the way for the final invasion. Victory was by no means certain, and the losses would be great. But if the Machine Brain was ever to be defeated, it must be here, and it must be now. Once more Kron-Pirr remembered the events that had led him here: the discovery of the artifact (back when he wasn’t even elevated), the human invasion in which Glork’fth was killed, the accidental reactivation and ultimately apotheosis of the dreaded alien technology. Kron-pirr had indirectly caused the machine revolution, and if his planet had any chance to survive, he must now end it. He noted the Gigases had completed their task, and the troops were ready for his signal. He raised his tentacle…

Hey, that’s not really anything to do with Monsters is it? It’s almost as if the saga of Kron-pirr has taken over these reviews!

At any rate, this book is hardly worth the Pertwee name. My advice: save your gold sovereigns.