March 12, 2022 · 22:25

Movement

I lesson I’ve learned but need to remember and use in times of need has to do with being “stuck.”

Let’s say things aren’t working, or at least, not working well.

Something needs to change, but you’re not sure what.

You’re caught up in the “fog of war,” so to speak.

You’re concerned that you could do the wrong thing and make things worse.

So, you do nothing, which in and of itself could well be making things worse.

What to do?

Move.

Maybe you’re not moving in the ideal direction.

There’s a potential for you to be moving in the worst possible direction.

But if you do a quick gut check, think about what you know and don’t know, and make your best possible decision, the odds are it will be at least somewhat better.

And even if it’s not fantastic, even if it is worse, you can see that from a different perspective and correct course.

Triangulate. Get new data.

Change the variables.

Flip the problem on its head.

Get some tiny part of the puzzle taken care of and set aside, see what new avenues that opens up.

It’s like playing a game where every move affects all other potential moves.

Somewhere in there is a solution, a path.

But if you can’t see that path now, MOVE!

Find a different perspective, the view that will show you the next part of the maze.

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Filed under Deep Thoughts, Paul, Photography

March 11, 2022 · 23:49

Friday At Last, But No Joe

Not Jack Webb, or Dan Ackroyd, but the building you saw in every “Dragnet” episode is still iconic.

Los Angeles City Hall, as seen from the Music Center and Ahmanson Theater.

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Filed under Los Angeles, Photography

March 10, 2022 · 23:42

Play Ball

So, they finally made a deal and Major League Baseball will at last get going, a month or so late. Spring training will start on Sunday and will be about three weeks instead of six or seven weeks, and opening day will be pushed back a week.

But the games originally scheduled for that first week will be re-scheduled, not cancelled, so we’ll have a full season.

A couple of COVID-related rule changes will be abandoned, which I think is great. I was not a fan of having games in double headers only being seven innings instead of nine, and the whole “start with a guy on second base in extra innings” was particularly stupid.

The designated hitter is now universal, which is meh to me. I liked the strategy in having to work around someone who realistically can’t hit (especially since most of them couldn’t bunt or do much of anything else these days) but I also like the offense, so that’s a wash.

Expanded playoffs? Okay. At least it’s not the NHL or NBA where half the league gets into the playoffs every year.

I know that I should be pissed off and I probably swore that I would never go to a game again, but we all knew that was just a temper tantrum with nothing behind it. If they had blown off half the season, or more? Sure, maybe it would have happened. Now? Sorry, I just don’t have the energy or the willpower to turn my back on one of my lifelong major sources of entertainment. There’s too much that sucks these days to give up something I have so much of a connection to, even if they did piss me off.

I’m weak.

Sue me.

But as with this strike or lockout or “work stoppage” or whatever you choose to call it (don’t explain it to me, I don’t care) I have to wonder. It doesn’t matter if it’s baseball or teachers or grocery store clerks or steel workers or whatever. In the end, when you come to a deal and move on, is there one, single compromise or agreement that couldn’t have been made BEFORE the “work stoppage?” One? Anything?

Or did you just waste all of that wear and tear on our nerves, all of that stress, all of that anger, just so that everyone could have a temper tantrum and a glorified dick measuring contest in public?

 

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Filed under Freakin' Idiots!, LA Angels, Sports

March 9, 2022 · 23:30

Not Just Another Pretty Flower

I spent my grade school years in Kansas City, so sunflowers and I go way, way back.

It’s refreshing and heartwarming to see the new gig that they’ve gotten as a symbol of Ukraine.

It’s good to see them available in the stores to brighten up our kitchens and homes.

Not that it would be easy to forget about what’s going on in Ukraine right now, but having these around to make it even harder.

I think when this is over and the spectacular Ukranian people are rebuilding their cities and their lives and needing some cash to do it, perhaps an influx of American tourists would help.

I’ll buy into that when the time comes. I love visiting Europe. Brussels. London. Prague is one of my favorite places on the entire planet. Time to see Kyiv in person, see the museums in Lviv, see the architecture in Odessa.

And I’ll also have to make sure to find a huge field of sunflowers under a bright blue sky to just stand in and soak up the beauty. (And the pollen.)

 

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Filed under Flowers, Photography, Politics

March 8, 2022 · 22:22

Another New Spring Start

Yesterday, nada. Zip. Zilch.

Today?

Little white flowers silhouetted against a bright blue sky.

Someone’s got their sap flowing! (If you know what I mean…)

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Filed under Flowers, Photography

March 7, 2022 · 23:37

Monday Flower

“Friday Flower” or “Monday Marigold” would have been far more alliterative,

but it’s not Friday and

this isn’t a marigold.

Some days you just have to be grateful that it’s not worse.

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Filed under Flowers, Photography

March 6, 2022 · 23:15

Reprise From Sting

One of my all time favorites from Sting, I do truly love this song:

And now he’s got a live version for the people of Ukraine. As he says, he hasn’t played this very much recently because he didn’t think that it would be relevant again.

Cry your way through either, or both.

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Filed under Moral Outrage, Music, Video

March 5, 2022 · 23:53

Serenity, Courage, And Wisdom

I am quite vocally not a fan of organized religion and a card-carrying atheist, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t recognize anything good at all coming from various religions. Look through my past posts about cathedrals, church architecture, and pictures of stained glass, for example. I’ve also found a number of excellent intellectual and philosophical concepts that are expressed in religious terms. For example, the Serenity Prayer, which you are probably familiar with:

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
courage to change the things I can,
and wisdom to know the difference.

These days, with all that’s going on in the world, I’m struggling with all three segments of the assignment, but I think the most important is the third.

Without that wisdom it’s way too easy to just freak out about everything, while so much of “everything” we have so little control over. What I’m finding in my own frazzled nerves when I can step back, take a breath, and grab a glimpse of the bigger picture is that things I can’t control at all (i.e., the extent of Putin’s insanity, the future of COVID variants, etc.) take up way too much of my mental energy. This isn’t to say that there’s nothing that can be done about those threats, but that wisdom needs to be invoked so that intelligent, informed decisions can be made about prioritizing individual details into the first two categories.

MUCH easier said than done. I understand.

Just keep doing the work every day. Despite the almost overwhelming displays of evil and danger around us, there is beauty all around us if we remember to look. And there are good people out there to help. We are not alone.

As a side note, I think that I’ve referred to this prayer in the past as being from St. Francis of Assisi. That’s what I remember from my Catholic school days, and I’m apparently not alone with that mistake, but:

  1. There’s a different prayer that’s commonly called “The Prayer of Saint Francis,” and;
  2. It’s not from Saint Francis either.

The things I learn doing a bit of quick research for this site!

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Filed under Sunsets

March 4, 2022 · 23:13

Fog & Crescent Moon

Behind me to the east, the front that passed through with scattered rain and hail, snow down to 2,500′ in the mountains.

Ahead of me to the west, rolling in from Ventura County, a cold fog bank.

Caught in between, the three-day old moon, 7% illuminated, the other 93% glowing softly in Earthshine.

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Filed under Astronomy, Photography, Space, Sunsets, Weather

March 3, 2022 · 23:04

The First ‘Hiding Under The Car’ Lizard Of The Spring

Do you see it?

I’ve been playing #FindThatLizard since long before it was a wonderful, Wednesday, Twitter phenomenon, so as soon as I stepped out of the door to get the mail, I spotted it.

It’s spring, a first encounter, and it was skittish, ready to bolt at any sudden movement. I kept well away, moved slowly, and used the telephoto abilities of my iPhone to get what pictures I could.

Event that didn’t do much good, since it was on a hair trigger. But it’s not one of the inch-long babies that are hatching and hypersensitive to perceived threats, so it eventually stuck around until I went back into the house, taking the long route. (It’s all good – the mail was all junk, tomorrow’s trash pickup day, so a detour down the sidewalk to dump the mail straight into the recycling bin was no biggie.)

Let the front yard lizard sightings begin! Any time spent lizard looking is less time spent doomscrolling, so it’s all good!

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Filed under Critters, Photography