California bouquet

It's a flower explosion right now in the sage scrub! Here are some of the flowers I picked nearby in the park.

Lunar eclipse...d by clouds

I can't believe that I didn't know about the lunar eclipse tonight! My nerd-by-association hubby actually told me when I got home.

It was visible for a few minutes before the clouds came in. When it popped out again, I was ready with my camera, with no card. When I came back out 1 minute later, it was gone again, and hasn't returned since.

Thus all we could do was participate in the scene simultaneously playing out in various languages all over the western hemisphere: reminding ourselves of the nuts-and-bolts of an eclipse by acting it out, with a motorcycle helmet (as Earth), and two fists, as, of course, sun and moon. "Non, non, regardes... la lune, c'est ici, et la terre, c'est la-bas!"

So here's my picture of what ... ok, scratch that thought. My pictures of the clouds weren't that good.

I'm sure that SpaceWeather has some good photos.

I promise not to take clear skies for granted anymore!

Sunday drive

I decided to test-drive my new eco-friendly truck- I call it the "Environmentor"


Just kidding-- don't even ask!

News from the non-green-thumbed botanist

Spring has sprung on my bathroom counter. Actually, it's late winter, but nonetheless, roots are growing
in happy synchronized harmony.

Why is it spring? I'm really not sure. I'm sure it has to do with dormancy, the protective hesitation of seeds (and bulbs) that requires some sort of cue to grow. This pause makes sure that the seed grows at the most opportune time, say, after the winter, not just in a random spurt of hot weather in October, after a fire, etc.

So back to my bathroom counter. About 3 days after Christmas, along with a wiser party (who should surely know better!), we put some bulbs in a glass jar with polished stones and water, hoping to have a nice little jar of sprouting bulbs and flowers in a few weeks.

Weeks passed, then months, and nothing happened. Of course, we'd chosen a variety that needed a period of cold in order to sprout. However, out-of-the-blue, within the last week, 4 bulbs have simultaneously sprouted roots. How is this possible? First one sprouted roots (and I shouted in joy from the toilet, causing some confusion in the household), then another 3 days later, and then 2 others I noticed today!

Warm weather? Well, they are in a temperature-controlled house, between 68-78 degrees every day. Light? they've been in the near-darkness for about a month in the bathroom (on advice from a friend). PH? I can't imagine the pH has changed- but possibly after the root-breaking of one, there was some sort of signal to the other bulbs.

We'll see what happens! More soon!

Seeing

"To see a world in a grain of sand,
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour."

William Blake

This week, a New York Times editorial, "A Track in the Snow"
brought that poem back to mind.

I was walking in my dog in the park with my iPod on yesterday and
realized that I needed to shut it off. There was so much I was
missing, or rather, it was the silence itself that I needed to
pay attention to.

Normally this walk is a decompression time. Of course, it usually
takes 10 minutes or so for the fresh air to infiltrate my brain.
I walk until my breath starts to normalize, my to-do list stops running over in my
head, and I start to see patterns and processes of nature. If I'm wound up enough,
usually these thoughts run back to my research and classes, but at least I know that
I've been grounded again; the models and experiments and hypotheses have had a chance
to rub up against the truth of what is around me.

On a daily basis, I could only hope to see "eternity in a grain of sand." For now I'm
content if by the time that my earlobes are beginning to feel the burn of the wind,
my eyes are following the line of the hills, noticing the emergence of spring.