Cap'n Bob & the Damsel

Culture

Spring Begins in the Northern Hemisphere

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Grand Octal Image via archaeoastronomy.com

Today marks the first day of spring North of the Equator. The graphical “Grand Octal” image above shows our planet as of today, passing through the Vernal Equinox portal in its orbit around the Sun. The other portals depicted have special meanings as well, dating back to primitive people whose cultures would depend on knowledge of the position of Earth during the year.

Here in our little patch of Arizona, we have been enjoying occasional spring-like days since February, as well as some not-so-warmish days and nights. Checking with our weather history on this day (courtesy NWS), we find that our forecast high of 65°F will be below the average 78°F temperature for this first spring day while we will be slightly above the record cool for this date (61°F) and well below the record high (92°F). I guess Global Warming has yet to catch up with us.

During these times of the overblown fake news media and democrat demagoguery (but I repeat myself), forecasting doom and gloom, we’re doing fine. We have things in stock, as we always do, that keep our household up and running with all our needs covered. Since we maintain two households on the premises (house and motorhome) there is plenty of everything available until all the bull$#!t blows over.

We hope everyone who reads this has planned accordingly and wish you comfort, safety and good health. We pray for these things.

20 Mar 2020 by Arizona Culture Environment Notions

All Hallows’ Eve

halloween.pngOur little Arizona house is located on an unpaved access (can’t really call it a road although it’s passable for most vehicles) which is about five hundred feet from the nearest paved road. In addition to there being no real road, there are no street lights, either. That means that not many kids (zero so far in eight Halloweens here) venture into the dark desert to go trick or treating. After all, there are all kinds of potentially unfriendly nocturnal critters that habit these parts including javelina, cougar, coyote and others.

So we’re expecting to get NO visitors on this night, which is fine with us. There are a few children that live in our area, but their folks take them to lighted, less rural areas for the evening.

When we lived in Torrance, we would get a steady stream of kids, most of whose parents brought them to our nice neighborhood from their crappy ones. We got tired of that and cut them off for several years before moving here.

In late October and early November in the year 2000, Damsel and I were in Rome; I was there for conferences with our business partner on a satellite project and Damsel came with me. While I was in meetings, she toured with one of the other wives who spoke Italian and was familiar with the environment.

One of the things that was interesting was the Romans were into Halloween just like in America which was surprising to us. The difference is that many of them also celebrated “Tutti Santi” – All Saints Day on November 1st. We watched Pope John Paul II celebrate the mass in St Peter’s on TV from our hotel room. We headed back to America the following day.

We had many other good Halloweens in the old days, often hosting costume parties for family and friends. Good memories, but we don’t miss all the late night activity and possible morning after blues.

We hope that those of you who will be celebrating have a safe and sane time. Enjoy!

31 Oct 2019 by Culture Holidays Notions

Vernal Equinox

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Archaeoastronomy‘s Earth Clock Graphic shows Earth’s current position relative to the cusps of equinoxes, solstices and cross-quarters. As you can see, Earth is crossing through the Vernal Equinox cusp along its orbit around the sun. As of 14:58 Arizona Time, we are now officially in the spring has sprung mode.

Our early signs of spring have started. Damsel’s Flowering Plum is full of blossoms and her Daffodils are opening, no thanks to the colder late winter weather here. Wickenburg actually had three or four days of snow this winter which is highly unusual. The high temperatures were seldom above 60 degrees F. for much of February to mid March.

The rest of the xeriscape garden is also showing signs of spring, albeit later than normal. We have several beavertail cacti which all are sprouting flower and paddle buds. The Argentine Giant out front is showing flower buds and a new arm sprouting, maybe two. The other prickly pear cacti will be getting flowers later in spring. The giant saguaro out front should also be getting flowers in late spring.

I’m sure that with the cactus flowers opening and other springtime events, Damsel’s (and my) camera will capture some of it for posting here. Stay tuned . . .

20 Mar 2019 by Astronomy Culture Environment Technobabble

Celebrating Our Irish Heritage

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Damsel’s sister is an Ancestry addict, having traced not only her roots, but also those of mine, and many of her other in-laws. Thanks to her, we were able to look back in our family tree to establish that, indeed, there were Irish ancestors in both Damsel’s and my lineage. In both cases, we have to go back quite a few generations to actually find someone who lived on the Emerald Isles.

Damsel’s birth surname is quite Irish-sounding, while mine is more of English derivation. In both cases, we each trace to that region of Europe with some Dutch showing up in my ancestry (e.g. Van Patten, Van Slyck). Damsel has some Native American in the Oklahoma region up her tree.

Regardless of our actual heritage, we’re both Irish today as we settle in to enjoy a traditional (to Irish Americans) Corned Beef and Cabbage boiled dinner this afternoon. We hope that you are enjoying the day as well, Irish or not.

17 Mar 2019 by Culture Family Food & Dining Holidays Notions

Cowboy Classic Ford Pickup

Cowboy Classic

Earlier today, Damsel and I were at the clinic where I had a follow up appointment for a blood test I took earlier this month. On the way out of the parking lot, Damsel took this photo of a classic mid-50’s Ford stepside pickup truck all decked out cowboy style with saddle and rope. Wickenburg is big into rodeo, especially the team roping event and this cowboy’s rigs suggest he is one of ’em.

The appointment at the clinic was with my nephrologist (kidney doc). We actually saw the doctor’s Nurse Practitioner who analyzed my lab results which show that the kidney functions are currently “good enough.” That’s good to know that I won’t be needing dialysis or a Kidney transplant anytime soon. She forecast that with my numbers the probability is that I wouldn’t be needing any of that until I’m 120 years old.

26 Oct 2018 by Arizona Classics Culture Medix Notions

Happy Easter 2018

Happy Easter

We wish everyone a happy and blessed Easter.

We bought a potted Easter Lily which opened just in time for the holiday. Photo courtesy of the Damsel. Click on the image to enlarge.

Let us keep in mind the true meaning of the Easter and Passover seasons as we pray for peace and unity among the nations. Even as we do so, let us resolve to using whatever means might be necessary to keep the peace and to keep our nation free. Amen.

John 3:16

Exodus 12:12-14

31 Mar 2018 by Culture Flowers Holidays Religion

Weekend Activities

A Humorous Quilt At the Craft Fair

In a rare departure from our tendency to remain home during winter weekends, we broke with that and went to the Town Library and Civic Center to attend two functions happening simultaneously. It was a very nice spring-like day, so we opted to venture out among ’em.

In the town auditorium, there was a showing of quilts from a local quilting society where there were hundreds of beautiful items on display. All of them looked that they had a lot of labor hours going into them, some taking the quilter years to complete. Damsel took the photo upper left of me being amused at a quilt commemorating the “Christmas Story” with Ralphie and the Leg Lamp.

The other activity was a craft fair presented by “Friends of the Wickenburg Library.” It was the usual display of art, jewelry, woodwork, soap, pottery and you name it. The displays were on the grounds of the library and it seemed to be well attended, now that the town population is over 20K with our winter visitors here for the beautiful weather.

While we were out, we decided to stop at the supermarket in that part of town and pick up a couple of sale items and some things we missed from shopping on Thursday. We noted that shopping on the weekends seemed to be a competition in that the parking lot and aisles were crowded. We resolved to avoid weekend shopping in the future during the winter season.

27 Jan 2018 by Arizona Culture

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