Showing posts with label nature. Show all posts
Showing posts with label nature. Show all posts

23 September, 2008

Puzzled addiction...

Some goddesses are puzzled by this...like me...
I've become a puzzle addict. Don't get me wrong. I've always liked puzzles. 3D castles being a favorite. But just about any shot of a castle would do. Or those ones with the strange edges.

The only problem with puzzling has been having the room to lay out the pieces. When we lost the house and moved into so much smaller quarters, I lost the puzzle habit. I got it back for a bit at the Beaverton Apartment, but the puzzles were boxed up in the move and now sit languishing in the games closet with all those other things we don't really do anymore. :)

I tried the internet puzzle thing, a LONG while ago and it was pretty lame, so I thought I needed to continue puzzling in the big blue room.

WRONG! I got hooked into setting up on facebook (my kids call it the geriatric myspace! but I've got a myspace too even though Tom is still one of my friends...yes, I'm pathetic.) So anyway, I have been slowly adding an application or two to have fun on facebook and meet new people, etc.

(I got tired of my husband and one of my writing friends beating my @ss at pathwords and word twist all the time!) So puzzlebee came about! Yay! I can even use my own pictures and play with Adobe 8BF filters in Irfanview. (I'm cheap...with my budget I'm all about the FREE stuff!) Xero graphics has some very cool freeware filters.

This is fun! This ap lets you turn the pieces and reorient them. I'm not the fastest puzzler in the world, but I'm having fun doing them.

Here's one of the pictures I've taken in the Gorge that I didn't like...so I messed with it until I did! LOL

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Create your own puzzles at PuzzleBee.com!



so bye for now from a puzzle(d) goddess :)

05 September, 2008

Garden Cities in the historic Amazon

Some goddesses are puzzled by this...like me...

Did you know that scientists are discovering that cities once existed in the Amazon rain forest. And that these cities were as large as their European counterparts. At least up until 1500-500 years ago. Yes, they suspect that the owners were killed off by European disease. But what is amazing is that areas we think of as 'virgin' forest were in fact heavily planted and groomed by the people in these cities. It's also theorized that they used much better urban growth planning than we do. :) [like that's hard!]

Here's the link. To the article in the Telegraph.co.uk

There's another article in the Guardian about the same study.

There is also a feed on the Now Public site that has a small video clip of some indigenous people, interesting music.

I found it interesting that so little real attention has been paid to these sites. Maybe because they weren't European based?

from a puzzled goddess

04 September, 2008

Whale speak...

Some goddesses are puzzled by this...like me...


No it's not Dora...This is an article in the Telegraph.co.uk paper about scientists at Kamogawa Sea World aquarium in Chiba Prefecture, Japan who have taught a Beluga whale to use three identifiable 'words' for a bucket, diving fins and goggles.

It's not that this is a minor accomplishment. Obviously to be reported in the world press it was something unusual and interesting. But I really was hoping that there would be more of a breakthrough in communicating with other species at this point.

This other article talks about whale songs themselves and their complexity.
"Humpback songs are not like human language, but elements of language are seen in their songs," said Ryuji Suzuki, a Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) predoctoral fellow in neuroscience at Massachusetts Institute of Technology and first author of the paper.

There is even a sample of whale song on the site. For some reason, I find whalesong particularly soothing. :) Move over Spock and Capt. Kirk we still have whales here.

from a puzzled goddess

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