FIVE SECOND STORIES

In the neighborhood:

9/24: A rainy morning: 

All day, big towers of clouds moved around us.

We've had an inch of rain this week and everyone is breathing easier. I feel that stress has gone down but we're not out of the woods yet—we're at least an inch below normal average for this month and no rain in sight for the next 10 days. I mowed the yard for the first time in weeks and deep-watered Ms. Forsythia and Mrs. Krabappel while I was mowing. The month closes with lovely weather: temps around 80° with comfy evenings for good sleeping. Double-bonus: late season tomatoes! Both the mid-size and cherry toms are continuing to ripen. Yay!

Afternoon shadows and light. It's only 5pm!

C cleaned out the department frig again and added old pizza to a failed apple/vegan sausage and mash dish of mine on the buffet. M/M Blue Jay stopped by for the peanuts. I think they are a mating pair who will overwinter together. Jays mate for life and are known to give gifts to each other—peanuts, leaves for nests etal.

MamaC went for the mash!

The next morning, not a scrap remained!

MamaNutkin stopped by and had a drink. Gnomes Cyril and Michal are wearing their new forest gear:

I've been noticing small nuthatches at the feeder and on the Birch. I thought it must be one of this year's brood rather than a female and research seems to verify this. Usually, kids hang out with Mom and Dad until late Autumn when they go off to find their own territory and a place to live. 

~ 

Another afternoon, and the Jays stopped by for some peanuts:

MomNutkin and child at the buffet:

The unwanted tangerine, who joins celery as top unwanted buffet items by our customers at the Diner:
 

One of LG's identifying marks are 2 dark bands on his tail:

 

A fine afternoon for Buddy to chill on a deck chair, while a BigTail noses around by the Callas:

All the Rose of Sharons are fenced in now. I removed the fence around the peonies as I read that their leaves have a bitter taste. Deer dislike them and rabbits and chucks may sample but end up saying "ptooey". We'll see how this works out. Potential for a challenge game where contestants vie for prizes on how much they can stand to eat. "Hot Ones", where celebrities eat increasingly hot chicken wings is the human version. 

The peonies have been struggling since their transplanting. I'm hoping 2/3 will come up next Spring. 

In the East Garden, nearly all the Sharons are reblooming, the butterfly bushes are still producing blooms. I only see the white cabbage butterflies around and occasionally, a small butterfly that is a bit bigger than a half dollar. I think it is a pearl crescent.
 

Long shadows in the Back 40:

While the front is sunny:

Our yard signs:

9/28-30: sunny with crystal blue skies all day long. Recently, we've had a string of nice days but usually by 1 pm, the bright white puffy clouds would begin to form. 

Early evening out front:

A single red leaf:

Tomato harvest with more to come:

 

~

#cutebuddypics: he is well-known for making circles with his tail:

C paused a belly rub session in order to eat and Bud's lingering enjoyment:

~ 

A couple of Five Second Stories: 

A Late Saturday Afternoon in the Fall 

I was walking into the kitchen when I encountered a naked woman, who had just popped the cap off a n/a Heineken and with it in hand along with a paperback (C.S. Lewis's The Voyage of the Dawn Treader), was heading for a lengthy, florally aromatic, hot soak in the tub.

A Twilight Zone tale:

The Magic Fortune Cookies

Early in their marriage, a young couple began eating at a Chinese restaurant owned and run by a husband and wife. The couple quickly discovered that their fortune cookie messages always came true. These were not commercially made—the wife made them by hand. For over 50 years, the couple enjoyed not only good food but uninterrupted good luck in their lives. This came to an end when the wife died and her husband closed the business. From that day forward, the couple's good fortune ceased and their lives spiraled and collapsed.

~ 

A lesson from the Great British Bake Off: the curse of the extract. Use too much and the flavor becomes artificial resulting in a scolding by Prue and Paul. Sure, it's convenient but beware. Of special note: rosewater. Too much turns the flavor into a soapy mess.

~ 

Earlier this year, there was big excitement in Lansing for some folks, caused by rumors of a Buc-ees coming here. That's right, people are ecstatic about a giant gas station and it's expansive retail space featuring convenience store food such as Texas style BBQ, in-house made fudge, beaver nuggets—a sweet, puffed corn snack and a wide selection of branded merch.  Buc-ees, a Texas-based chain is also prized for it's clean restrooms. Currently, the nearest one is over 400 miles away.

~

I was surfing YT the other day and I noticed many ads, presumably featuring some celebrity—either from film or sport—that I did not recognize. This brought to mind the old MAD magazine feature: You Know You're Getting Old When...you don't know or have heard of current celebrities.

~ 

There's a couple of storm systems in the Caribbean, one already a hurricane named Humberto, that potentially demonstrate the Fujiwhara Effect—a term I have never heard of. The Fujiwhara effect, sometimes referred to as the Fujiwhara interaction or binary interaction, is a phenomenon that occurs when two nearby cyclonic vortices move around each other and close the distance between the circulations of their corresponding low-pressure areas. 

9/27: The concern is that they might meld into a giant storm and hit the US with devastating effect. Awful under normal circumstances but now, thanks the DOGE insanity and prevailing attitude by the administration that "you're on your own". Look at what happened to the folks who were hit by Helene a year ago this month. They are struggling just to get food into the mountains no less get damage cleared and begin rebuilding.

9/28: The forecast now is thinking Humberto, well out in the Atlantic as it turns and tracks East away from mainland US, will pull the other tropical system, which may form into a Catagory 1 hurricane named Imelda, to the East as well.

꩜ 

 Fun Vids:

 Catcerto-from 2009 featuring Nora on piano:

Louis, the maine coon-very chill cat who enjoys kayaking with his dad through a German river, canal and wetland system:

Wow! Encounter with a swan turns the voyage into a Inter-species fight club featuring Louis vs Swan vs Dad:

From Jinikal Art: Becoming Thought in the Dream World: 

From Kelly Boesch: Beauty in the Sadness with well-dressed people: 

 

From Adorian Deck, who posts shorts featuring fun facts: 

One that caught my attention concerned the population of Metro Tokyo, Japan: 37 million, making it the most populous in the world. Mind-blowing.
 

 

 ꩜

FUBARland: The strange dichotomy in American Christianity:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2025/09/29/charlie-kirk-christianity-conservatives-trump/?utm_campaign=wp_opinions&utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social  

HAPPY EQUINOX!

 

Song for Autumn by Mary Oliver 

Don't you imagine the leaves dream now

    how comfortable it will be to touch

the earth instead of the

    nothingness of the air and the endless

freshets of wind? And don't you think

    of trees, especially those with

mossy hollows, are beginning to look for

 

the birds that will come—six, a dozen—to sleep

    inside their bodies? And don't you hear

the goldenrod whispering goodbye,

    the everlasting being crowned with the first

tuffets of snow? The pond

    stiffens and the white field over which

the fox runs so quickly brings out

    its long blue shadows. The wind wags

its many tails. And in the evening

    the piled firewood shifts a little,

longing to be on its way. 

꩜ 

It was a typical afternoon with lots of feeder action and Big Blue calling for peanuts. He likes to either go on the big birch limb or on top of the shepherd's crook before jumping off and dropping down on his target. Here, he's joined by a BigTail who is enjoying a drink:

LG is starting to tap on the slider screen when he wants peanuts but sees that I am on the couch. Our Diner patrons do let us know when they'd like to order—another happy customer:

For our feast, I made salads featuring homegrown cherry toms and fougasse to accompany:
 

Fougasse is a leavened flatbread from southern France similar to the Italian Focaccia. This particular recipe was a real bear, being a high hydrated dough which made it difficult to handle. The flavoring is from herb de provence in the dough, rosemary and flaky sea salt on top and olive oil. C's had chopped olives in the dough. They were quite tasty: crispy outside and soft inside. It was served with one of my best finds: plant-based Boursin garlic and herb cheese. I get it at Trader Joe's.

Buddy came in after supper and joined us by the Tube. He greatly enjoyed some blissful belly rubs from his Mum.

 

     

FIVE SECOND STORIES

In the neighborhood:

Getting close to the Equinox (9/22), the shadows are already getting longer earlier in the late afternoon. A recent moon was a horn's up crescent, with Venus and Regulus nearby. Steve Wilson from Kansas took this nice shot on 9/19 and even captured some Earthshine on the moon:

Days and nights are mild and leaves are turning. However, I think much of those leaves we see in the gutter is not a result of an early Fall, but of the continued drought. I've never seen anything like this. When I am out and about, I see small trees filled with their brown leaves on branches and ground. The City of Lansing and Farm Bureau all have new trees planted, sadly without water bags. Grandfather Birch, already suffering from the insect/worm attacks on it's foliage, is turning and dropping already.

Mr. Nuthatch, who has not been around much this Summer is back:

 

A chipper enjoys a new treat: jiffy peanut butter:

Someone took down a tomato, stem and all off the bush, then just left it on the ground! They didn't even bother to taste it! WTF! Dirty, Rotten, Scoundrels!

I tossed it and a ripened, nipped tom on the Buffet. Later, I saw MamaC enjoying the red tom:

9/20: special Saturday night buffet at the Diner! C had cleaned out the leftovers from the Department frig:

MamaC arrived shortly after the buffet opened and immediately went for the chip dip—good for her coat and to enhance her hibernation fat:

We finished up watching the Tube for the evening at 8.30 pm and it was dark out! As our eyes adjusted to the darkened Great Room, we noticed our Stampy was visiting the buffet. The next morning, all that was left was some celery.

9/21: finally, some rain, so far it is just getting stuff wet but it's better than nothing. The West side of the state got some rain last night—there was a large swath of showers and T-storms, probably 150 miles long, moving South to North and slowly drifting East. Hopefully, some folks got a nice, slow drencher.

~ 

9/18-temps got up to 86° today, perhaps the last time this year we will see this kind of warmth. Most afternoons after she gets home from work, C and Bud do deck yoga-he likes the opportunity to get belly rubs: 

Earlier this week, I was shrinkwrapping the pool winter cover and I came across our froggie pal who was sitting on the solar cover post:

What does he do to overwinter?

Cope's gray tree frogs survive winter by entering a state of dormancy call brumation, where they find shelter under leaf litter or logs and produce glucose in their blood to act as a natural antifreeze, allowing much of their body to freeze without damage. During the deep freeze, the frog's heart stops beating, their breathing ceases, and their metabolic processes slow to an almost imperceptible rate. When temperatures warm up, their heart and breathing resume, and they emerge to become active again and look for food.

~ 

We've been watching the Great British bake off series. My first try at a vegan almond danish with puff pastry, flavored with almond paste and orange extract.

Damn tasty with a bit of cashew vanilla ice cream.

~ 

The new adventures of Radioactive Man:

One week down, four to go. With the five days a week and weekends off routine, I have quickly returned to the workingman's lingo despite being retired for 7-8 years : Wednesday is Humpday, Friday is TGIF and one comes back to A Bad Case of the Mondays.

~ 

Fun Facts: 

I was watching Simon Whistler's Side Projects about human oddities and came across something I have never heard of: tetrachromat-an individual with 4 types of color receptor cells (cone cells) in their eyes, allowing them to perceive colors more colors more vividly and differentiate hues beyond what most people can, which is called trichromacy (three types of cones). With most people, they can discern about a million shades of color. This rare genetic condition is typically found in females due to the color vision gene being on the X chromosome and can result in seeing 100 million more colors than an average people. Not all people with this condition end up with tetrachromat vision, often their brains cannot learn to process the additional colors. Simon ends the presentation by noting: "Our perception of reality is not reality itself. It's just what our brains allow us to see."

~ 

Some Indigenous languages completely lack words for left or right, relying entirely on cardinal directions to navigate their world. While we use ourselves as the center reference point, these groups see themselves as part of the larger landscape, always tethered to the Earth's natural orientation. Tests on these folks found that taking them underground or to a place with no windows, causes their entire concept of space to collapse.

~ 

Fetal microchimerism: Baby's stem cells circulate in Mom's bloodstream and organs enhancing her immune system. These cells can linger for years. There was a famous 2015 discovery of male dna in the brain of a woman who had given birth to a son. Some studies indicate that women who have children often do not catch certain diseases. This effect is not limited to humans only—many other mammals experience this as well.

I'm surprised this has not been grabbed by some quaky doctor/ influencer who turns having children into a cult: women having longer, healthier lives and over the generations, produce super humans with fabulous immune systems. Certainly, one sees the beginnings with the pro-natalist movement although they seem to be more geared to a bible-based, patriarchal society than creating a super race. Unless they are a branch that is also neo-Nazi.

One could certainly run with the idea of fetal microchimerism as the basis for dark, psychological tales—the film Sharp Objects comes to mind:

-A Mom's intensely hostile behavior towards her son is linked to his traits that she recognizes in herself and she lashes out.

or 

-A Mom whose son has committed unspeakable crimes, kills herself out of fear that she may do the same. 

or

-She kills the son out of rage that he has polluted her perfect body.

or

-Hates her son's bride and seeing that she is quite insecure and full of self-loathing, tells her of this concept and instills fear of having her child's DNA inside of her thus preventing the bride from ever having children despite prior plans to do so. It ruins the marriage and is Mom's revenge on her son for marrying anyone: Mom wanted him all to herself-forever.

~ 

Callousness by the American government is nothing new-it's just that we don't remember: During Prohibition (1920-1933), the US government in 1926 began poisoning industrial alcohol in an attempt to enforce the law. Unfortunately, many drank in full knowledge that it was poisoned. Often methanol was used and many suffered terribly with an estimated 10,000 deaths. When doctors and public officials begged the government to stop this practice, they were ignored. Treasury officials dismissed the victims as criminals who deserved their fate for breaking the law. Sounding familiar?

~ 

Time in perspective: Cleopatra, the last Egyptian Pharaoh (69 BC-30 BC) lived closer in time to the moon landings in 1969 than to the building of the Giza Pyramids 2600 BC-2500 BC. To her, they were as ancient history as Stonehenge is to us.

~ 

Spectrophobia: the irrational and intense fear of mirrors, which can involve an anxiety about seeing one's own reflection, fears of ghosts or supernatural entities within mirrors, or concerns about bad luck from breaking a mirror. In Victorian times, it was common practice to cover all mirrors in the house after someone died to prevent their souls from becoming trapped in the glass. One wonders if Magritte had this in mind when he painted this commissioned portrait of of Edward James entitled Not To Be Reproduced:

 ~ 

The future of warfare is here: the use of lasers to bring down drones:

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/18/world/europe/drones-laser-weapons.html?searchResultPosition=1 

Mr. Sulu, Fire all phasers!

 

~ 

One of buddy's Diner favorites-the Bullwinkle:

salmon MOUSSE & fresh SQUIRREL 😸

~ 

When I was growing up in the early 60's, my favorite ice cream flavor was maple nut. It vanished in the 70's and I have wondered what happened to it. Well, here's the scoop:

Maple Walnut ice cream flavor hails from the NE United States where maple syrup is produced. It's been popular at least since the early 1900's and was one of the original 28 flavors offered by the restaurant chain Howard Johnson's which began in Quincy, MA. It fell from favor as newer generations wanted more new and exciting flavors. Maple Nut ice cream can still be found mainly in the NE or from specialty shops.

~ 

#cutebuddypics: 

He enjoys a variety of snooze options around the house-recently, he's started to hang out on my bed:  

 

 And of course, hanging out on the couch with me.  

 

 ~

Seen at a hospital elevator: 2 couples from the 1945 gen with one of the old boys wearing this t-shirt:

Certainly a fault line between this gen and those of us who grew up in the 60's. 

I'm coming across articles in the papers talking about people and their relationships with an AI entity. Well, different strokes for different folks: some do this, others have coffee with Jesus. 

꩜ 

Fun Vids: 

Maeshowe, Neolithic tomb in Orkney, Scotland

Curious similarity with Newgrange, a Neolithic monument in Ireland. 

Newgrange was built around 3100 BC, whereas Maeshowe was built around 2800 BC. Newgrange does not have the interior dry masonry and corbelled roof. Both were used as tombs although it seems Maeshowe was closed off after building. Both have a passageway that aligns with the Winter Solstice: Newgrange with the rising sun, Maeshowe with sunset.

Their locations in the British Isles:

Stingless bees in Australia with unusual honeycomb:

Dead sea salt pearls:

 Dead sea salt sculptures:

Mosquito murmuration in Italy:

Tidal trees in the Qiantang River, China:

Kelly Boesch AI-Life in Technicolor:

 Wow! Eastern Indiana: 

CGI but not AI funny parody of Jurassic Park starring a black cat:

 

Wingsuit then paraglide into Burning Man at Black Rock City, NV:

 

 ~

FUBARland: 9/20—this morning, the Pentagon informed European diplomats that the US will partially halt military assistance to Baltic Nations as well as NATO states bordering Russia. Good boy Donnie, hold the door open for Putey so he can realize his grand dream of a new imperial Russian empire. Whatta pal.