Waves of grass

Across the street from where I work is agricultural land.

Last year it was planted in safflower.  Before that cattle sometimes grazed there. 

This year it is coming up grass.  I can't tell yet whether it was actually planted in wheat or barley.  It has been a mild, slow spring, and the grass is now at the 12 to 18 inch length where it bends gracefully in the wind. 

The underside of a blade of grass is less green, more silver than the top.  As the wind moves across the hillside across the street, delicate curving waves of dark and light march slowly along.  Ever changing.  I could watch for hours. 

Earth Hour Music!

In my mind Dancing in the Dark will always be associated with the immortal Cyd Charisse in The Band Wagon. 

Here's something to brighten up you day and night!

Deforestation

Speaking of Earth Hour, one of the proponents' consciousness-raising issues is deforestation. 

The claim is that about 29 square miles of forest are lost in South America each year, but it sounds a lot bigger if you say it in hectares. 

No comparison on the environmentalists' sites about the relative benefits at the local level, of forest land versus farm land.  But then, farm land might produce food, and food might be for people, and people = not nice.  If you're an environmentalist joiner. 

Also no comparison given between "deforestation" and, oh, let's say wildfires.  An average wildfire season in the United States alone consumes over 300 times more forest than the annual deforestation claim made by the World Wildlife Wrestling Federation or whatever they are.  Just sayin'. 

Saturday 23 March 2013 is "Earth Hour"

Environmentalists will be humming John Lennon's "Imagine" in the dark this Saturday 23 March 2013, in the joiner ritual started in 2007 by the World Wildlife Wrestling Federation or something. 

Starting at 8:30 PM wherever you happen to be, joiners are advised to turn off all their electric lights and appliances for one hour. 

"Awareness" is the goal, apparently. 

I really must remember to turn on all the lights and blare the stereo while running a chainsaw.  Or maybe just watch a video.  How about "Army of Darkness"?

People who know nothing about statistics can also lie

Newtown school shooter Adam Lanza played video games.  (Well doesn't everybody?)

But now it's a big deal.  Conservative talk show host Hugh Hewitt on 19 March 2013 maintained at length that it is now known that "violent video games" produce violent school shooters, and that in fact the makers of the video games could / should be sued for damages by survivors of Sandy Hook Elementary victims -- because a reasonable person would conclude that playing a game leads to sociopathic behavior and homicide. 

"He didn’t snap that day, he wasn’t one of those guys who was mad as hell and wasn’t going to take it anymore,” the man said. “He had been planning this thing forever. In the end, it was just a perfect storm: These guns, one of them an AR-15, in the hands of a violent, insane gamer. It was like porn to a rapist. They feed on it until they go out and say, enough of the video screen. Now I’m actually going to be a hunter."  The person who said this is identified as "[t]he man to whom I spoke, a tough career cop who did not wish to see his name in the newspaper" by writer Mike Lupica in the New York Daily News.

Well there you go.  

See, reporters and anonymous cops know how the mind works. Little boys who stare at curvy pictures become rapists; players of video games become mass murderers.  Except they don't.  What's the p-value on that "porn to rapist" factotum?  Probably nearly null.  But I bet it's greater than the p-value for gamer to murderer. 

The idea that artists -- authors (even blog authors), movie makers, and video game producers included -- are to be held liable for the insane acts of art consumers, is itself insane.  When legislators or regulators get an idea like that, it is dangerously insane.  Think of the chilling of creative activity.  Think of the Taliban-style enforcement. Thought Police.  They know better.  Like that anonymous cop quoted in the New York Daily News.  He knows better, just ask him. 

I don't for a moment believe the gamer-to-murderer hypothesis.  I'll tell you one thing I do believe.  History.  There is  a strong p-value for the transformation of Big Government to Genocidal Regime.  

Three And Ones

Sometimes I mix some walking into my run.  There is benefit to spending a certain amount of time on the legs, or covering a certain amount of distance, regardless of the effort level or aerobic zone in which it occurs.  Bones,  tendons, ligaments, muscles -- all strengthen in response to the stress of being used.

Yet at my age ( cough - mid-50s - cough ) I am extremely wary lest injury cause a setback.  The idea of doing like Prefontaine and going all out all the time is a recipe for injury.

So yesterday, for example, I did my 5 mile Sunday "long run" by setting the interval timer on my watch to repeat and alternate between a three minute interval and a one minute interval.  Run three, walk one.  That worked for where I happened to be condition-wise that day.  My overall time ended up being  right where the McMillan Running training pace thing advised me to be.

Another successful training week!

Plus, I get out and see the pretty poppies!

A little St. Patrick's Day Celtic Thunder

Too much fun!