Daughters of Norway Christmas Festival

C. & I were invited to attend with other friends the Daughters of Norway Christmas Festival at Our Saviour's Lutheran Church in Burien.  It was a fine afternoon of foods, friends, music, and fun.

Also, _dancing_!  In a church!  (Rather a shock for a pair of Southern Baptists.)

Here are some celephone pictures (not all of which are very good, alas).  You can, of course, download any image(s) you wish to have for your own.

We very much enjoyed the celebration and its fellowship.  God jul!

The pictures: <https://goo.gl/photos/NbgKt3fLxNUoUEff6>
UPDATED 11 December: 3 videos added.


Mark_
10 December 2016

TripPix: Banff 2016 UPDATED 26 NOVEMBER

The service I have been using to host my online pictures has changed its interface: I cannot share all of my albums at once; they must be shared individually.  This is how I solve that (those numbers are YYMMDD dates):

TripPix: Andy & Serenity Cruise to Banff & Jasper, Alberta, Canada

• 160831 Kilby Park & Museum <https://goo.gl/photos/jiXaYDcCkjxCmBRy9> 

• 160904 Overland Falls <https://goo.gl/photos/dhqEU6CZ5HG7Ccjp8> Added 26 November.
• 160904 Rearguard Falls <https://goo.gl/photos/1AfoKMmtp7wQAz4j8> Added 26 November.
• 160906 Edith Cavell Glacier & Icebergs <https://goo.gl/photos/ohdGQFLErACAmWpa9> 

• 160906 Maligne Canyon <https://goo.gl/photos/TrySq6fzubyCJxQu9> 

• 160907 Bears in the Woods <https://goo.gl/photos/ibLtcVaZfhQRb4aK8> 

• 160919 Tunnel Mountain Village 1 camp @ sunset <https://goo.gl/photos/Ns6u69nxMYpm9frLA> 

One hears of these places, and sees their pictures in scenic calendars and coffee-table books, but the real thing--in binocular vision--is considerably better:  more unmistakably real--and much, much, bigger.  This was a wonderful trip.  Thanks, Andy.

Mark_ 

21 November 2016

161126 Day's Outing with Friends

Recent outing to nearby Hylebos Creek park, Federal Way, with Linda & Brad:
<https://goo.gl/photos/dyAGJNTKogPpdTqj6>
A bit overcast & gray, but we saw beauty anyway.

Mark_
161126

TripPix: Other

TripPix: Other trips, hikes, sightings

• 130810 Nisqually Birding <https://goo.gl/photos/gxGBofoTR3hWftZW8>
• 130818 Hiking @ Mt. Rainier <https://goo.gl/photos/2Xh4S91ZmA99hUzH6>
• 130825 Hiking Naches Peak Loop, Mt. Rainier, w/Phil & Ann <https://goo.gl/photos/2d7cuf4VrxWq4rhe9>
• 130904 Cindy @ Ft Stevens Beach <https://goo.gl/photos/4dHvmCAWrtnVoiNY7>
• 140906 Camping Quinault <https://goo.gl/photos/gAM7hs5ixBXQVR8t6>
• 150117 Grilled Cheese & Cookie Party <https://goo.gl/photos/1fCyKWJw1kKqyvYs5>
• 150202 Cape Arago & Sunset Beaches <https://goo.gl/photos/8qUo7o6P1FbeDigR7>
• 160520 Gordon House, Frank Lloyd Wright, Oregon Garden, Silverton, OR <https://goo.gl/photos/X5rj6zV5TQ4A1SNw7>
• 160619 Owls @ Manchester SP <https://goo.gl/photos/X5rj6zV5TQ4A1SNw7>
• 160621 Vista House, Crown Point, Columbia River Gorge, OR <https://goo.gl/photos/EHBj2oRWeGGpoiVk6> 
• 160803 Skyline Trail, Mt Rainier <https://goo.gl/photos/zethyEw3cYUP6QzH9> 

Mark_ 

21 November 2016

The service I have been using to host my online pictures has changed its interface: I cannot share all of my albums at once; they must be shared individually.  This is how I solve that.  (Those numbers are YYMMDD dates.)

TripPix: Rangers in Yellowstone

TripPix: Several "Rigs" of Rangers rendezvoused in Yellowstone in 2013

• 130718 West Thumb Geyser Basin <https://goo.gl/photos/r5nCi5ip36dTKCm5A>

There was much more to the trip than this little sample of pictures indicates.  It was /huge/!  (More later.)

Mark_ 
21 November 2016

The service I have been using to host my online pictures has changed its interface: I cannot share all of my albums at once; they must be shared individually.  This is how I solve that.  (Those numbers are YYMMDD dates.)

TripPix: Missouri 2013

TripPix: We visited family and friends in Missouri in 2013

• 131005 Our multi-legged Missouri friends <https://goo.gl/photos/iz4ZnXbRZAybz1kG6>
• 131011 Jazz @ 18th & Vine, KC, MO <https://goo.gl/photos/rGVxKXjPkoJDVt2d8>
• 131019 Hannibal, MO <https://goo.gl/photos/W2NmcPcQo2hBPoYN6>
• 131020 Southbound along the Mississippi, from Hannibal <https://goo.gl/photos/pxMthmhvD4DHMurv5>
• 131021 Forest Park, St. Louis, MO <https://goo.gl/photos/kW2iuae7xstzjuaP6>
• 131021 Gateway Arch, St. Louis, MO <https://goo.gl/photos/dS9oc1VwevGtZ2L18>
• 131021 Historic Courthouse <https://goo.gl/photos/yfvw4DuC9HZHBHJf8>


Mark_
21 November 2016

The service I have been using to host my online pictures has changed its interface: I cannot share all of my albums at once; they must be shared individually.  This is how I solve that.  (Those numbers are YYMMDD dates.)

TripPix: Utah 2013

TripPix: Andy & Arcadia cruised to Arches and other interesting places in Utah.

• 131025 Church Rock, near Arches <https://goo.gl/photos/CKwmdGhu5c6sEU1t7>

(Church Rock @ Wikipedia <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_Rock_(Utah)>)

There are other pictures of our Utah cruise, but they aren't online yet.  (Not that the trip was unworthy; we have many wonderful pictures of it.)

Mark_
21 November 2016

The service I have been using to host my online pictures has changed its interface: I cannot share all of my albums at once; they must be shared individually.  This is how I solve that.  (Those numbers are YYMMDD dates.)

TripPix: _Serenity_ Cruises the U.S. NE

TripPix: Serenity Cruises the East Coast 2015--NE U.S. and SE Canada

• 150808 Twin Falls, Idaho <https://goo.gl/photos/kPftRgQ7Miu383m19>
• 150818 Fort Niagara <https://goo.gl/photos/MWzYF7ZzCQBNjT3y6>
• 150819 Niagara Falls <https://goo.gl/photos/qbkJNyRLMSN8pv8c7>
• 150822 The Breakers, Newport, RI <https://goo.gl/photos/1beurLVWTLDaAvVx6>
• 150823 Marble House, Newport, RI <https://goo.gl/photos/AAYpn9Df7GjwKmh1A>
• 150825 Martha's Vineyard <https://goo.gl/photos/d9pZtUaBxRBRKRme8>
• 150827 Nantucket <https://goo.gl/photos/forM6q9ATajQ5nUd9>
• 150829 Plymouth (Rock) <https://goo.gl/photos/erxLZchbD1f52BQZ8>
• 150830 Boston <https://goo.gl/photos/o6SVWcW5wEuMTwoR7>
• 150831 Marshlands <https://goo.gl/photos/1aJjwWRw93CRghfA7>
• 150901 Boston, too <https://goo.gl/photos/Rwados2DmjTuJXrJA>
• 150905 Portland Head Light @ Cape Elizabeth <https://goo.gl/photos/8pj4xcc2R68RzBwj9>
• 150907 Bath, ME <https://goo.gl/photos/yzSJhjhWeFmhGziDA>
• 150909 Bar Harbor <https://goo.gl/photos/km95ogtuYHFBiXcE7>
• 150910 Mt. Desert Island (above Bar Harbor) <https://goo.gl/photos/3ug5jE9aMHwNzLuMA>

We had long wished to see this area--northeast U.S. and southeast Canada, with emphasis on the maritime districts--and it had been our intention to remain out longer than we ended up accomplishing.  We blame the giant storm for our decision to abandon our plan in the middle.  (Of course it turned out to be less catastrophic than the worst possible prediction, but we had not wished to be either harmed or in the way; we left for home instead of risking those troubles.

We were there long enough to see many things of historical interest, and of both man-made and natural beauty.

The Canada pictures will be posted separately.

Mark_
21 November 2016

The service I have been using to host my online pictures has changed its interface: I cannot share all of my albums at once; they must be shared individually.  This is how I solve that.  (Those numbers are YYMMDD dates.)

The Rise of H. Sapiens; and Fall?

The Smiths and I have been reading this book:

_Sapiens_, by Yuval Harari:

- <https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/23692271-sapiens>

- <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sapiens:_A_Brief_History_of_Humankind>

- <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yuval_Noah_Harari>

@ TED: <https://www.ted.com/speakers/yuval_noah_harari>

Note that Harari cites _Guns, Germs, and Steel_ <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guns,_Germs,_and_Steel>.  I have begun this, and now I need to finish it, too.  Diamond has a related video @ _National Geographic_ online, or somewhere; I have watched part of it on my Apple TV.

Also by Harari: <http://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/does-trumps-rise-mean-liberalisms-end>

"Interesting times" indeed.  A pox upon it!  (Except that we have mostly cured the poxes--take _that_, anti-vaxxers!)

And:

Some time back I had a look at this book: 

The Triumph of Human Empire:

Verne, Morris, and Stevenson at the End of the World

by Williams, Rosalind H.

<https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17673913-the-triumph-of-human-empire>

I had to return it to the library as we were setting off on a cruise; it had looked like a good thing to read, so I should get it again.

But then there is this on the subject of "progress":

<http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/11/progress-isnt-natural-mokyr/507740/>

I believe I had previously encountered the idea that most of our ancestors had never noticed that there was such a trend (because for most of human existence there was none--or it was so gradual that no [illiterate] generation could notice it; this is an interesting discussion of that novelty.

Recent events in U.S. politics may make us realize that progress is not necessarily permanent; if we are to build the future upon the accomplishments (and the hard lessons) of the past, the next few years are likely to loom large in explaining the decades that may be required for our recuperation.

And this (for fun...and yet oddly to the point):

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CBr6vDCj3Qw>  

This is from a truly great 1936 movie based upon H.G. Wells' 1933 book _The Shape of Things to Come_ <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Shape_of_Things_to_Come> <http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks03/0301391h.html>; I doubt that this speech actually comes from the book, however.

Youtube may have at least one copy of the movie online.  It is well worth a couple of hours for a couple of reasons.

Anyway, I am seriously displeased about the prospect that I may be well over the hill when Trump departs--and that his legacy could persist for decades beyond that.

Mark_

20 November 2016

A Political Tantrum

Hidden Injuries of Class, Race, and Culture- 

<http://prospect.org/article/hidden-injuries-0>

Perhaps:

• People like to be permitted the illusion that they are making it on their own.

• People do not like to be told what to do--even when it is obvious that doing [whatever] would benefit them.

• Some of what Liberalism proposes may seem aligned with values that the poor either cannot afford financially or cannot be expected to care about in the face of more pressing concerns (if those two are not overlapping or identical)--or worse, would directly harm their interests (in the near term or longer).  Concerns about pollution, never mind about pure aesthetics, are possible only when more basic needs have been met.  Working toward the future--long-term goals--makes sense only when today's pressing needs have been met.  Present comfort is superior to purely hypothetical--very doubtful--future improvement in situation.

• People don't like accepting solutions from a group (a _class_) they do not respect (such as educated "elites").

• People don't like accepting solutions (advice, money, or rules) from a group that seems faceless and unaccountable to them, to which they can only with great difficulty speak, query, appeal, negotiate, or resist.

• People will accept false hope--even if its futility is fairly obvious--when it seems to them to be the only option available.  _One-in-a-million_ seems superior to _none_.  Consider the casino or the lottery.

• People don't like being told that they don't--cannot--understand the complexities of their own situations; they will continue against all evidence that they understand their situations better than outsiders could.

• People like to be able to act--to exercise their freedom; voting for the _status quo_ would have seemed like doing nothing at all.

So, this kind of thing happens:

<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_hsi-qvFE4M>

Perhaps I have omitted or overstated some aspect, some explanatory factor in the election outcome.

Perhaps this all seems obvious (and I am the last person to have these ideas).  

Perhaps none of the above is true, but some more complicated or more obscure explanatory system is.

What is demonstrable is that a large number of people are seriously dissatisfied--are actually hurting--enough to wish to embrace the unknown because the known is not quickly enough moving to help them.  It is not clear that this outcome has had anything to do with principle, and perhaps little to do with confidence in the one side; it has everything to do with loss of confidence in the _status quo_ and in its perfectibility.

Ignoring for the moment the fact that the popular vote chose Mrs. Clinton, I believe that the vote for Mr. Trump was a _tantrum_.  

Does anyone ever actually "win" a tantrum?

Mark_ 

20 November 2016

Government _is_ the solution.

Or it ought to be--and not small government, either, because the challenges are large (in two ways).

Continuing about anti-union sentiments and activities (and remembering that it was Ronald Reagan, mentioned in the previous message, who crushed the air-traffic controllers' union), here is more about union troubles in "recent" American history:

<https://thinkprogress.org/the-true-story-of-how-one-man-shut-down-american-commerce-to-avoid-paying-his-workers-a-fair-wage-fe8ff26e236b#.ikovxh9lh>

The events are less recent, but in the sense that the struggles mentioned are perfectly familiar to people who are finding their labor under-valued, they are "modern" events.  The article is from 2014.

It is beyond me how workers who should value union protections could have come to despise them.

Are we _all_ Ayn Rand Objectivists now--even those who absolutely cannot afford to be?  <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Objectivism_(Ayn_Rand)>

Appalling.

Mark_
19 November 2016

Government is not the solution--it is the problem (NOT).

Reasonable people were outraged at the time it occurred, and we still are: Ronald Reagan's pronouncement that Government was causative in (virtually all of) our problems, and that they are addressed by diminution of its size, scope, and power.  Donald Trump, our new <gritted teeth> president, seems to be saying much the same thing; this canard is now one of the assumptions--stipulations--in public discourse about our way of life.

This is outrageous, as is the practice of electing to government service persons who believe that government cannot serve.  Why would people who hold that belief stand for election or appointment to such jobs?  Why would we trust them in those positions?

My usual assumption is that where motivations are not apparent, then there exists something that I am (we are?) are missing or misunderstanding about what we have been told--but equally or more likely may be that we are being lied to.  This time my suspicion is that they hold to no such principle in general; they just don't like constraints on the actions of members of their class.  Constraining the actions of the powerful is a good bit of why we have a civil government--an _elected_ government--in place of a monarch or some other form of tyrant.

Another possibility--one that many others have advanced as fairly adequately covering the facts--is that they take those jobs as part of a campaign to finish it off: to advance (complete?) the destruction of democratic government by further undermining our confidence in its competence.

Michael Moore has seemed to me a bit shrill, a bit outrageous, a bit hyperbolic, rather graceless--but lately I have been listening to him somewhat more attentively.  I have had a look at his Web site <http://michaelmoore.com>, which contains a link to this old-but-not-stale posting from 2012 on the subject of Reagan's damage to American politics and way of life: <http://www.wearethedog.com/2012/07/22/how-reagan-destroyed-america/>.

I find it difficult to reconcile _despising our government_ with patriotism.  I believe that the two do not mesh at all.

Mark_
19 November 2016

161030 Tidal Bore, Moncton, New Brunswick, Canada

During our September 2015 trip to NE U.S. and SE Canada, we visited several sites along the Bay of Fundy--famous for its _world's greatest tidal range_--including Moncton, New Brunswick.  That town, roughly 30 miles up the Petitcodiac River, is famous for its tidal bore.

In general, a tidal bore is a wave that runs UP-river because the rising tide (or other surge) at the mouth has overwhelmed the river's flow, rising past the normal surface level of the river.  It is not so unusual for the lower reaches of rivers to be tidal, but when the difference in level is significant (large and sudden) the wave forms and the river appears to flow backward for a time behind the bore, following the wave upstream for miles.  The event will have ended when the water level has equalized and normal river flow re-established.

There are several of these around the world; the Bay of Fundy's tidal swing is enormous--the world's largest, at 40 feet or so--but the bore on the Petitcodiac River at Moncton is not the biggest.  (That might be an annual high-tide, sun-and-moon alignment, Chinese bore, which kills people every year.  See the Youtube video[s].)

Even so, Moncton's is an impressive and wonderful thing as it hisses and foams along its way upstream, moving past the town at about a swift walking pace.  It's such an important tourist attraction that they built a viewing area complete with bleachers.  I made a pretty good video from there, but the file size is extremely large; it is (for the time being) trapped on my computer.  In place of that, here are links to information, explanations, and videos:

• Tidal Bore
• Bay of Fundy
• Petitcodiac River: "Before the construction of a causeway in 1968, the river had one of the world's largest tidal bores, which ranged from 1 to 2 metres (3.3–6.6 ft) in height and moved at 5 to 13 kilometres per hour (3.1–8.1 mph). With the opening of the causeway gates in April 2010, the river is flushing itself of ocean silts, and the Bore is returning to its former glory." (Wikipedia)
• New Brunswick Tourism
• Moncton vids @ Youtube
• Other (all) Youtube examples

All pretty amazing.


Mark_
30 October 2016

131005 Missouri Trip Pictures 2013

In 2013 we traveled to Missouri, where we took some pictures.  Because Google's online image service does not support "sharing" access to multiple "albums", here is a list.

The 6-digit numbers are the dates of the albums: YYMMDD.

• 131005 Our multi-legged Missouri friends <https://goo.gl/photos/iz4ZnXbRZAybz1kG6>
• 131021 Forest Park, St. Louis, MO <https://goo.gl/photos/kW2iuae7xstzjuaP6>
• 131021 Gateway Arch, St. Louis, MO <https://goo.gl/photos/dS9oc1VwevGtZ2L18>
• 131021 Historic Courthouse <https://goo.gl/photos/yfvw4DuC9HZHBHJf8>
• 131020 Southbound along the Mississippi, from Hannibal <https://goo.gl/photos/pxMthmhvD4DHMurv5>
• 131019 Hannibal, MO <https://goo.gl/photos/W2NmcPcQo2hBPoYN6>
• 131012 Knob Noster, MO, SP camping <https://goo.gl/photos/Gj1WUgn2achFhJ9LA>
• 131011 Jazz @ 18th & Vine, KC, MO <https://goo.gl/photos/rGVxKXjPkoJDVt2d8>
• 131007 Walking along the Little Blue River <https://goo.gl/photos/Tve3ScJrxbv4FjVb6>

Mark_
26 October 2016

Heatproof Glass Risk

In a thrift store a couple of days ago, a pretty large and heavy piece of glass broke a couple of aisles over from where I was browsing.  It was loud, and the resulting fragments were oddly small (in the bin after cleanup).  

Apparently, a patron reported that it had broken (in the aisle where she was standing) for no apparent reason; nothing else was happening at the time--nobody had touched it, nor had it somehow fallen from the shelf.  It had just exploded.

It was a large glass baking pan.

This reminded me of stories I had begun hearing a few years back of problems with heatproof kitchen glassware (cookware) after a switch from borosilicate to [some other glass formulation].  

It has made me wonder about the glassware we have here.  A Snopes article has caused me to worry that I would not be able tell with certainty which of two kinds of glass kind we have, and therefore to consider doing away with it all.  (White Corning stuff is a different material; I may keep that.)

• <http://www.snopes.com/food/warnings/pyrex.asp> 

• <http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/magazine-archive/2011/january/home-garden/glass-cookware/glass-cookware/index.htm>

• <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UyhdMa1ikKM>  Very interesting.

• <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sh6Ww6RreT4>

Apparently there are several (many?) such vids @ YouTube.

Corning cookware @ Wikipedias:

• <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyroceram>

• <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CorningWare>

We have some white Corning cookware: Some is over 40 years old, and is marked "for range and microwave"; one piece is newer and lacks the "range" marking.  We use these pieces in the microwave oven only.

• We have this tableware (in plain white): <https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corelle>.  Apparently its composition is largely unchanged.  (We have broken one piece, but others have been dropped and smacked without damage.)

• We also have one of these Visions glass saucepans: <http://www.discusscooking.com/forums/f89/stovetop-cooking-with-pyrex-visions-cookware-3174.html>.  Although we have used it on the stovetop without incident, it may not be so safe, either.  We use it frequently in the microwave oven.

We have several pieces of clear glass bakeware, which I will examine for clues about whether they are suitable for use: big and small cake pans, loaf pans, etc.

Researching this has been (will be) kind of a lot of work, but if it keeps even one pan of brownies from being wasted (or one eye from being put out)....

And more reading is needed.

Mark_ 

14 October 2016