Category Archives: photography

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pigeon guillemots

These are called sea pigeons locally.

We were trying to figure out who lives in the sand cliff holes on Marrowstone Island.

We see something fly out but weren’t quite sure who it is.

And then, aha! We see an owner.

https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Pigeon_Guillemot/id

They look like ducks except the beak is not duck like. From the Cornell All About Birds Site: “Ornithologists recognize five subspecies that differ mostly in size: eureka in Oregon and California; adianta from Washington to the central Aleutians; kaiurka in the west-central Aleutians and the Commander Islands; columba from the Bering Strait to the Kamchatka Peninsula of Russia. The subspecies of Pigeon Guillemot that inhabits the Kuril Islands of Japan, snowi, has little to no white in the upperwing, unlike other subspecies.” They are in the family with auks and murres and puffins, rather than ducks. How aukward, heh, heh. I am informed that they “are not good eating”. Too fishy.

For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: float. They are very good at floating and diving, and make a whirring sound as they fly. They have a high piping song.

The range map is cool: https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Pigeon_Guillemot/maps-range.

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teen toys today

Um, you say, these don’t really look like toys.

I had friends visit last week. These are the thirteen year old’s toys: he enjoys fixing cell phones and computers and asked if we had any old game platforms. I talked to my son and the thirteen year old is taking the ones he wants. And what was he working on in the picture? Replacing the broken glass in my cell phone.

Now many of you are jealous and would like this teen to visit you. My cell phone has a lot of parts and many tiny screws. There was only one left over and the phone is working fine and the glass is unbroken! Wow! Toys of mine that were used in explorations and repairs included my vacuum and I provided the super glue.

I thanked him with a comic book subscription, since we share an enjoyment and appreciation of comic books.

One of the most useful toys I had growing up was a china doll. Useful you say? Yes. We sewed doll quilts and doll clothes and made our own furniture and hoped for the tiny books in the Cracker Jack boxes. How is this so helpful? Surgeons asked where I had learned my stitching techniques. It was quite delightful to reply, “Doll clothes.” It really did help. I made one old fashioned dress with miles of ruffle, all hemmed by hand. In the 1970s I was embroidering my jeans and adding studs and we dyed t-shirts with melted paraffin and crayons. My sister and I nearly burned down the kitchen once, but we did learn which techniques to use to stop wax fires.

I am not sure who made this dress for the doll. My grandmother Katy Burling sewed doll clothes for us and helped us make patterns and nine patch doll quilts. My other grandmother Evelyn Ottaway could knit the tiniest doll clothes on knitting needles: I still have some of those as well. A tiny stole knit out of a furry yarn and lined with brown satin. My mother was an artist and loved crafts as well but NOT sewing. Pottery yes, sewing no.

My daughter promptly illustrated her lack of the packrat gene by putting half the furniture and stuff away and having a spare and elegant doll house. She learned to sew but does not like it much to date.

What childhood toys and ideas contributed to your adult skills?

For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: toy.

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Parasympathy

In 2013, Catherine Hodes, director of the Safe Homes Project (a domestic-violence program), started a workshop called “Is it Conflict or Abuse?” An abusive dynamic, she argues, requires one person to have power over the other, whereas conflict involves two people struggling for power. The distinction can be confusing, and in some cases “both people feel like they’re being abused, because they’re not getting their needs met or they’re not getting their way.”

From the Atlantic Monthly article: That’s it, you’re dead to me. September 2022 p. 14.

I think this is a fascinating idea, in the article that questions the internet wisdom of getting rid of “toxic people” in one’s life. When we cut off someone we consider “toxic”, we aren’t peaceing them, are we? Peace me, peace you, how do we actively peace people instead of being afraid, on guard, at war. I think everyone is more afraid after the two years of Covid 19 pandemic and all of the deaths and the Long Haul Covid and war. Everyone has a shorter fuse, everyone is stressed.

Remember that stress activates the sympathetic nervous system, the fight or flight system. The body makes less thyroid and less sex hormones and makes more adrenaline and cortisol. Cortisol is a steroid and great for short term, but bad for long term. If we are continually stressed, cortisol messes up the immune system and we get auto-immune disorders, the body attacking its’ own cells. The adrenaline raises our heart rate and blood pressure, neither of which are good for the heart long term. When the thyroid hormone is on the low side, we feel tired. The adrenaline makes us feel wired and we have trouble sleeping. The cortisol makes us more likely to get sick and raises blood sugar too. The low sex hormones, well, women can stop menses and men start asking for viagra.

So we as a world, need to learn to downregulate the sympathetic nervous system and go back to parasympathetic. The relaxed one. The one where we have less adrenaline and less high cortisol and more thyroid and our gut works and sex works again. How do we get there?

Breathing is one way. Slow breathing: 5 seconds in and 5 seconds out. Work up to 20 minutes. One of my veterans said he was not used to feeling relaxed, it felt weird. Ok, it may feel weird, but maybe we need to practice it. He did. There is circular breathing too, 5 seconds in, 5 hold, 5 out, 5 hold. Zen meditation, facing a wall for 40 minutes, works too. We try not to follow the thoughts. The thoughts pop up anyhow, but not following them down the rabbit hole is interesting and challenging. Mindful mediation and Jon Kabat Zinn’s books and tapes work as well. It takes practice. Practice peace, practice relaxing. Doesn’t that sound like a lovely practice?

Stupid cat videos work for me too. Laughter works. What makes you laugh? I like the silly animal videos, the moose playing with the wind chimes, three baby bears rescued (with care) from a dumpster, with the truck driving off to avoid momma bear. Rocking, knitting, sewing, fishing, walking the beach, cuddling a baby, dancing, listening to music, playing music. Which works for you? Silly movies. I don’t like horror movies, and I love cartoons and animation. Engage the child at heart for the parasympathetic nervous system.

In high school my daughter said that most fights were stupid. “One person says something without thinking. The other person goes off and gets upset. She stops talking to person one, who has no idea what is going on, and they often talk to their friends. So there is this big fight over some dumb comment.”

I don’t think it ends with high school, sadly enough. And before we label someone “toxic”, maybe we need to wander off and breathe, or watch a silly cat video. Whatever works for you that doesn’t hurt others.

We need more parasympathy in the world. Yep, I just made that word up. Relax and if you can’t or won’t, consider practicing.

Peace you and please peace me.

https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/body/23266-parasympathetic-nervous-system-psns

https://healthnews.com/family-health/healthy-living/how-to-activate-the-parasympathetic-nervous-system/

August 19, 2022

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lung pizazz

The tent in the center is mine. I took this two days ago as soon as I had it set up. The big deal is that pulmonary rehabilitation is WORKING.

My friend B from the east coast invited me to hike with him and two other friends. They were going up the Hoh River trail. The initial hike was five miles and then camp. They will go up to Glacier Meadows.

I looked the hike over. The first five miles starts at around 500 feet and stays near the river and fairly level. I bought a pass for the campsite and loaded my pack. I took the pack to pulmonary rehab on Monday and carried it on the treadmill. I went for 25 minutes at 3mph, loaded. My heart rate went to 110 (normal at rest is 60 to 100, though mostly cardiologists don’t care if it’s below 60 unless bad symptoms or heart block) and above, but I held my oxygen sats. I decided I could GO! We met in Port Angeles and then drove up. We didn’t start hiking until 3:30pm but got to the campsite, ate and set up tents.

The next day I hiked back alone. A couple coming in stopped me and said, “There is a bear. It went up a tree when we saw it.” The next trio said that the bear was on the ground and seemed undisturbed. I had my whistle out and kept hiking, a little cautious. I did not see a bear.

As I reached the parking lot, I reread the signs. “Cougar area, hiking alone not recommended.” Oh. Well, but I really was rarely alone. I counted the people hiking up and there were 147 in that 5 mile stretch. Some out for day hikes, some with packs headed to Glacier Meadows or beyond, some with almost no equipment.

Anyhow, I am so delighted that my lungs have recovered enough to hike! I don’t think they are ready for altitude and the climb to Glacier Meadows. Maybe by next summer. Hooray for lung pizazz!

https://www.nps.gov/olym/planyourvisit/hoh-river-trail.htm

For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: pizazz!

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mermaid vacation

Do mermaids go on vacation? I think they would come up rivers and explore. Lie around on the banks and talk about the ocean and whales and fish and annoying tourist boats.

I took this yesterday on the Hoh River.

For the Ragtag Daily Prompt: mermaid.