The Fountain at Jörmungandr Pond

The pond is really named “Rose’s Pond”after the people who donated the land, but I call it Jörmungandr Pond after the sculpture of the Midgard Serpent in the middle. Lenexa lights up the fountain at night, so I decided to get a picture of it while walking Kasey early yesterday morning. It’s a bit fuzzy, I wasn’t able to grab a sharp focus with my aging eyes at night. Next time I will take the android pad so I can see the image larger and sharper than on the camera back. IMG_1906

President’s Day Apple Rant

Today is President’s day and I’m off work, so I got my walk in early and now I’m listening to James Supercave and wondering what to do the rest of this fine day. I think a visit to the hardware store is in order – there’s a lot of non-GFI outlets next to sinks in this house. I’m reading some David Brin (Uplift again…)and Richard Kadrey(Sandman Slim) in the interstices between events and plans, and all seems to be going well.

So here comes my Apple rant — keep the above in mind so you don’t consider the following representative of how I am or where I’m going, but yeah – I am angry at Apple. Years ago I got an IPOD as a gift, and promptly converted my music library to Itunes, and later lossless with Apple’s version of FLAC, ALAC. All was well, I listened to just the tunes I like in an endless rotation – no crap, no pap.

Much much later that original IPOD started dying in the cold after about 15 minutes so Santa brought me an IPOD 5 or 6 (I care about the version: nyet.) I use this thing for one purpose Apple nabobs and fanboys: I use it to play just the music I like — nothing less, nothing more.

So I toggle off the Apple snoopcode and data prying bits and pieces where I see ’em and I try to keep it slimmed down to the minimum set of code bits needed to play music. I have it syncing to the ITUNES cloud but otherwise I don’t want FUCKING APPLE in my shit, and I don’t want APPLE and their cheap ass stream service that rapes all music creators.

I pay for my songs, and I want to play just my songs. I’m sick and tired of having to go through five minutes of poking around a nearly bricked IPOD clicking off adds for streaming service and and crap from FUCKING APPLE anytime I want to just play my music. When this IPOD dies, it won’t be Apple gear replacing it, so suck it Apple nabobs and fanboys, I’m through with you.

El Nino Still Growing

Be on the watch for more unusual weather:

Winter-Sunrise-Bare-Trees-e

The current strong El Niño brewing in the Pacific Ocean shows no signs of waning, as seen in the latest satellite image from the U.S./European Ocean Surface Topography Mission (OSTM)/Jason-2 mission.

El Niño 2015 has already created weather chaos around the world. Over the next few months, forecasters expect the United States to feel its impacts as well.

The latest Jason-2 image bears a striking resemblance to one from December 1997, by Jason-2’s predecessor, the NASA/Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales (CNES) Topex/Poseidon mission, during the last large El Niño event. Both reflect the classic pattern of a fully developed El Niño. The images can be viewed at:

http://sealevel.jpl.nasa.gov/elnino2015/index.html

The images show nearly identical, unusually high sea surface heights along the equator in the central and eastern Pacific: the signature of a big and powerful El Niño. Higher-than-normal sea surface heights are an indication that a thick layer of warm water is present.

more at JPL

The Zombies | NPR MUSIC FRONT ROW

Imagine creating the best work of your life, some of the best music of its day, and no one cares. Now imagine playing those songs 47 years later to a screaming and loving bunch of fans and getting what seems like a hero’s welcome. That’s part of the story of The Zombies, who played the classic 1968 album Odessey and Oracle, along with a set of other hits and brand new songs, live in Washington, D.C. last month. Now we have their nearly note-for-note live reproduction of Odessey and Oracle for you here.Ode