I'm going to start today to record on a daily basis whatever happens to strike my fancy. So, it is a very cool breezy day. I just posted 5 short book reviews to The Monthly Reading Challenge. I'm suppose to put away some winter wood today from the woodpile outside but I'm playing hookey from work to write so starting this blog will get done.
I'm having a daily fight with a flock of English Sparrows that are trying to take over my barn. They are making a terrible mess so they have to go. I have destroyed several nests so far they don't leave but they get out of the barn when I am around. I'm just starting the fight so I guess I don't know how far I have to go to discourage them.
I'm trying not to spread myself to thin on WDC because I find so many things that are interesting here and I am trying to work on a new story. I really enjoy sitting at my desk with a cup of tea and reading blogs on WDC.
Vermont Country Store sells pure Vermont maple syrup still. I get Maine maple syrup from my son every year, he would never mix anything in. But would I trust other sources, not so much.
“I love writing. I love the swirl and swing of words as they tangle with human emotions,” says James Michener.
Hi!
Swirl is a good word for today. Seven A.M. 48 degrees. Balmy weather. I filled the bird feeders as the wind blew in a new blizzard. By 9 A.M. the temperature had dropped by 20 degrees. There is a lot of snow in the air. It eventually drops onto the ground. The wind is from the south and cold, cold, cold.
I just write because I don't talk much. One thing I've noticed this year with all the snow and blow of air and grounded clouds. There is a red squirrel out in the midst of the worst stormy weather. He climbs up and down the tree outside my window. I know they only hibernate in the worst part of weather. This is a small red flash. I have not figured out where its hidey hole is? The blizzard has been blowing fast across the ice-covered yard for about 4 hours. I think the red-tailed critter should call it a day and tuck into his or her nest for the evening.
Something to ponder. There is only one out during the worst storms. Errand runner for the family?
People are guilty of saying-- I don’t have enough time. We have exactly the same number of hours per day that were given to Helen Keller, Pasteur, Michelangelo, Mother Teresea, Leonardo da Vinci, Thomas Jefferson, Albert Einstein, etc…
So, if time isn't the culprit, what is??
HI.
I'm not sure about the science end of time as it relates to the above important people. Maybe we do have the same amount of time they had or maybe not.
Sometimes it is money instead of time. Other problems could be the types of education or the type of interests we have gravitated to in our youth. What pricked our interests?
The biggest thing is mental drive. What causes us to stick with something until the end. To just go back to it if you are not finished with the result the first time.
I took my first guitar lessons in Texas on a second-hand guitar in the 60's. The lessons were on PBS. Then, when I moved back to Pa. I did not do guitar at all until the 80's. I bought a new classical guitar because the old one was junk. I found a teacher for classical guitar and in spite of being told females did not usually play classical guitar, which I later found out was not true. I made some progress was able to play up to the 7th position and learned a lot of music. Next, I put the guitar away until 2023 when I picked it up one day and said, "Why don't I play this anymore?"
No children to feed or raise, no one who dared to tell me I should not need any more lessons. And lots of online encouragement to play classical guitar. There is a special openness to classical playing now. YouTube is full of both male and female players with lots of knowledge and music to share.
I am revisiting some other knowledge I gained in the 1980's. Upgrading, renewing, and expanding knowledge. We have the internet now. We have access. Those people mentioned in the prompt may have had a better start toward learning. I heard someone say once if you don't educate females, you are wasting a percentage of the brain power you have in a nation. Our schools are more concerned with how knowledge is distributed.
Also, you have to have the guts to go for it. Is there something you want to know more about or something you need to practice. Put aside 10 minutes a day and do it. You may be surprised how well that works. Add a walk or try a new recipe or restore a talent. Will we cure a disease or find a new species? Actually, it is possible. Just try.
There's another Maple Syrup heist happening and it's up to you solve it in your entry. Have fun!
Hi!
MAPLE SYRUP HEIST?
There is gold and then, there is liquid gold. More than 70% of maple syrup is from Canada. Maple syrup is a large export for the country of Canada. When countries begin to feel economic stress, rising food prices open avenues of fraud for merciless money theft.
Presently, there is a 10% tariff increase for imports of products, that are not compliant with Mexico, Canada, and United States agreements.
Food fraud is one of the easiest and most targeted frauds. It is also a dangerous one, because it targets the health of consumers as well as their pocketbooks.
In the case of Canada's liquid gold maple syrup, or other maple syrup imports, fraud is most likely on the rise. Although labeling a product as, 100% pure, is common it may not be as pure as it should be.
Several years ago, Olive Oil containing a mixture of oils, other than olive oil, was found on some store shelves in the USA.
Now, consumers should beware of Pure Maple Syrup being mixed with other ingredients. An alternative ingredient mixed with maple syrup could be corn syrup or some other type of syrup, that would be able to be concealed within the flavor of maple syrup. This kind of change in the bottled liquid increases the dollars in the pockets of the fraudulent perpetrators. Sometimes, it is possible, the label pure doesn't mean every drop of syrup in the bottle is Maple Syrup.
I have to ask? Will reading the label help the consumer?
The library I get eBook's from recommended, "Not a Creature was Stirring" by Jane Haddam.
The book is a mystery featuring a retired FBI agent, who needs to combat the ho-hum of retirement. Gregor Demarkian, is a captivating character. He moves back to Philadelphia to a place he lived when he was young and becomes involved with the local church.
After reading the first book in this series I took up the next in the series, "Precious Blood." I was looking for some entertainment since TV is not very entertaining. The descriptive actions of the Catholic and Armenian social church add to the color of the action.
I'm not presently involved in any heavy reading. Just enough entertainment to forget the weather and snow outside.
“And (I) wondered how anyone could ever imagine unquiet slumbers, for the sleepers in that quiet earth,” says Emily Brontë in Wuthering Heights,
Hi. I'm still around even though have not stopped in for a long few days.
It's been a long, long time since I read wuthering heights. Probably sometime in my late teens. It sounds like she was referring to death. I read something this year about a theory, that dying is not anything to worry about because you just fall asleep and don't wake up. It is interesting to find so many ideas about what happens when you die.
Do you ever wonder about how many people have died in the last 2000 years? So many interred into the earth. Some graveyards have been lost to time as well.
I guess humans visit this subject now and then because we think and wonder, about almost any subject from time to time. This brings on the need for mindfulness. I should revisit Wuthering Heights.
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