"I Won't Grow Up," Peter Pan, DMTC, Big Day of Giving, May 4, 2017

"Welcome Home," James and the Giant Peach, DMTC, Big Day of Giving, May 4, 2017

Good Versus Evil Over at DMTC Today on the Big Day of Giving, May 4th

Run, Black Widows, Run!

Moving rocks; digging dirt. Watching the black widows run. Run, black widows, run!

A Five-Dollar Check

I was going through boxes of old paper: specifically, Christmas and birthday cards from the past. There was a Christmas card sent by my Uncle Marcus and Aunt Millie in 1976, and to my surprise, inside, there was an overlooked, uncashed, five-dollar check. Made me misty-eyed.

Donald Trump's Civil War, by Ken Burns

A tale told by an idiot.

Trouble in Tapeats

Whoa! I remember Tapeats Creek! When I was 18, I spent nearly a week in the area. Thunder River is the bigger danger, but things are so steep, you can get into trouble anywhere:

GRAND CANYON NATIONAL PARK - A body found last week has been identified as that of a 14-year-old hiker who went missing nearly two weeks ago while hiking a remote part of the Grand Canyon during a family trip, authorities said Monday.

Jackson Standefer, of Chattanooga, Tennessee, was crossing a creek on April 15 when he and his stepgrandmother, LouAnn Merrell, lost their footing and were swept away.

Easter's Over. What Gives?

Penitente hobbyists?:

Police in Albuquerque say a man has been found alive with his hands nailed to a tree in a forest.

They say officers received a call around 8:30 a.m. Monday about an injured man on the east bank of the Rio Grande.

Looks like the Campbell Rd. access. They're just superstitious peasants over there on the east bank of the Rio Grande. Not like the scholastics on the west side:

“Officers found a man who seemed confused, standing in front of a tree with his hands next to his shoulders,” Espinoza said. “Each hand had one nail through it.”

...“He was initially not cooperative or compliant with officers,” Espinoza said. “They are continuing to try to interview him and determine exactly what happened and how he ended up in the bosque.”

The 2016-2017 Sacramento Rainy Season (October-April) is Over

At Sacramento Executive Airport, it was the second-wettest rainy season (190% of normal, in contrast to 2015-16's 91% of normal) since measurements started in 1941.

Inches End Year
30.43 1982-83
28.21 2016-17
27.41 1981-82
27.34 1997-98
25.71 1957-58

For Sacramento in general (whose station has moved around several times over the years), it was the fifth-wettest rainy season since measurements started in 1877.

Inches End Year
32.75 1981-83
32.10 1885-86
29.78 1994-95
29.57 1981-82
29.25 2016-17

So, the 2016-17 rainy season wasn't an all-time record, but very strong, and I probably won't live long enough to see a rival.

Escaped Pet Birds are Teaching Wild Birds to Speak English

Smart birds!:

Across parts of Australia, reports have been pouring in of strange voices chattering high in the treetops -- mysterious, nonsensical conversations in English. But while this phenomenon is certainly quite odd, its explanation isn't paranormal. It turns out that escaped pet birds, namely parrots and cockatoos, have begun teaching their wild bird counterparts a bit of the language they picked up from their time in captivity....

Long-Time Iowa Farm Cartoonist Fired After Creating This Cartoon

Our overlords at work:

"Again, I fall hard in the best interest of large corporations. I am no longer the Editorial Cartoonist for Farm News due to the attached cartoon which was published yesterday. Apparently a large company affiliated with one of the corporations mentioned in the cartoon was insulted and cancelled their advertisement with the paper, thus, resulting in the reprimand of my editor and cancellation of its Friday cartoons after 21 years of service and over 1,090 published cartoons to over 24,000 households per week in 33 counties of Iowa.
"I did my research and only submitted the facts in my cartoon.
"That's okay, hopefully my children and my grandchildren will see that this last cartoon published by Farm News out of Fort Dodge, Iowa, will shine light on how fragile our rights to free speech and free press really are in the county."

Fyre Fest is the Best New Idea in Years!

I would have loved to have been there! Stories for a lifetime!

7. Do whatever you need to do to survive.
According to what one attendee told Fader, “we found out there was apparently not enough water there for everyone. You’d see people walking around with full cases of water that they stole from the dining area.”

Trump is Scum

Fuckers, all of them:

Argentine President Mauricio Macri planned to award President Jimmy Carter the Order of the Liberator General San Martín, the highest distinction Argentina awards a foreign person, during his visit to Washington this week. However, the award ceremony was cancelled after an explicit request by the Trump administration, according to several reports.

A Half-Meter Long Dragonfly

Would have loved to see that thing!:

From these two finds, and calculations of other griffinflies, it was estimated that Meganeuropsis had a body roughly 47 centimeters long, with a wingspan of 75 centimeters across. This is much wider than the South American damselfly Megaloprepus, the largest odonatan living today. Meganeuropsis was able to get this large possibly due to a far higher oxygen content in the atmosphere. During the Carboniferous, there was a massive influx in global oxygen levels and this allowed many land-living invertebrates to get to huge sizes.

My Ceiling's Sending Messages

Another Night at the Club

Avoiding male attention:

Female dragonflies use an extreme tactic to get rid of unwanted suitors: they drop out the sky and then pretend to be dead.

Rassim Khelifa from the University of Zurich, Switzerland, witnessed the behaviour for the first time in the moorland hawker dragonfly (Aeshna juncea). While collecting their larvae in the Swiss Alps, he watched a female crash-dive to the ground while being pursued by a male.

The female then lay motionless on her back. Her suitor soon flew away, and the female took off once the coast was clear.

“I was surprised,” says Khelifa, who had never previously seen this in 10 years of studying dragonflies.

The Democrats Kicked Ass with the Budget Negotiations!

The Democrats kicked ass with the budget negotiations with the Trump Administration! So much winning! I presume it went down like this:

Pinball Prison Blues

The best video of the week! This guy needs to be on "Better Call Saul" ASAP! (From "Buckshot: The Movie").