Spatter

Wordless Wednesday

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"Egret In Reeds"
From the "Wings" gallery at by damanti

 

Just Words

Blunders...especially made by Bill...are making it hard for the Clinton campaign to stay afloat.  He needed to cool it long ago.  I thought he'd stay in the background more after South Carolina, but he didn't.  It's been suggested that he just can't help it. Well then, Hillary should have seen to it. I think he's detracted from her candidacy...a lot. 

And now, even Hillary's come out with something that got my head to shaking: her "just words" comment about Obama's rhetoric. Hillary certainly understands the importance of words, so when she came out with that one, it seemed like...to use a football analogy...she was throwing a fourth quarter "hail-Mary" pass...and a failed one at that. She failed with her words in trying to dismiss his.    

You see, we're a people who've been feeling disgusted, saddened, helpless, and hopeless. Until now. Now, someone has awakened the hope in us...with words. And as  already noted by Obama, words do matter:

"These are the times that try men's souls..."  Thomas Paine used these words to give the Continental Army hope and inspire them to keep on fighting for a cause larger them themselves.

"We hold these truths to be self evident..."  Our founding fathers used these words to define who we are.

"The only thing we have to fear is fear itself..." Franklin D. Roosevelt used these words to console us when we thought our world was caving in on us.

"Ask not what your country can do for you..." John F. Kennedy used these words to stir us to action.

"I have a dream"... Martin Luther King used these words to give us hope.

There's a reason these words are immortal:  they move us and they remind us of who we are...who we can be.  Obama's words are conveying the same message. And we're listening. We're listening because we want desperately to be more than we've been these last twenty years.  We're listening because we want desperately to believe things can be different. And we're listening because we want desperately to have hope, for without hope, there's nothing. 

Hillary Clinton would be a competent, hard working President. Of that, I'm sure.  And if she wins the nomination, I'd have no qualms voting for her over McCain.  Her positions are in sync with mine and she knows the issues inside-out. But is that enough?  We need a new direction from Bush/Cheney policies, that's for sure...but I think we also need a change in our internal compass, and it may just take words to do it.   

 

The Graduate

 

I'm very happy and proud to report that Shaynee's been certified as a therapy dog by the Humane Society!

Shaynee was one of three dogs certified on the spot...she didn't even have to sit for a final test because she performed so well on assessment night. That was the night where the trainer made her assessment as to which dogs were ready to sit (pun intended) for the exam.  She did everything she was called on to do, including staying put even as big dogs brushed by her and a very loud train passed nearby.   

Her vest and Judy's t-shirt will be ready for pick-up on the 28th...pictures to follow! Then...off they'll go to give a few needed smiles.

Silent Sunday - Feathered

I'm having a quiet day...a Silent Sunday, if you will...content to take in the world around me without speaking. In keeping with my mood, I've decided to just post some photos today: some of the feathered beings I saw on last week's trip. 

McCain Mutiny

I used to think John McCain had some integrity.  But he's not the man he used to be.  He's been going through this metamorphosis for a few years...now it's complete.  This week he did something I would never, ever have thought possible: he voted against the torture ban.  Yes, the former POW who was tortured is now unable to stand against it. Yes, the man who in 2006 sponsored a bill (The 2006 Detainee Treatment Act) that prohibits the use of any cruel, inhumane, or degrading treatment by the military, has now voted against a bill that would extend that same ban to the CIA and other intelligence agencies.

This mutiny comes less than four months after he rebuked Rudy Giulani on the topic.  When Giulani could not be certain if water-boarding was torture, McCain said: "All I can say is that it was used in the Spanish Inquisition, it was used in Pol Pot's genocide in Cambodia, and there are reports that it's being used against Buddhist monks today". He went on to say that he believed torture is ineffective because its victims will say anything to make it stop.  McCain had stood alone among all other Republican candidates with this stance. But alas, not any more.

Is he that desperate to win the favor of his party's conservative wing that he would turn his back on what had been unequivocal and eloquent condemnation of torture?  Evidently so.  This is about as repugnant an example of political pandering as I've ever seen. 

 

Friday Fact - Mermaids

Considering that I just saw manatees, I guess it's no surprise that this week's Friday Fact is about mermaids.

The Irish say that mermaids are old pagan women who had been banished from the earth by St. Patrick and a Livonian folktale says they are the drowned children of an unknown Pharaoh...having met their doom in the depths of the Red Sea.  But it's in Hellenic literature that you find the first literary description of them.

The Greeks thought the sea a mysterious thing. Living near and working on it gave them lots of cause to do so. Unexplained things happened, and not surprisingly, they attributed some of them to the strange creatures they thought were lurking below its surface. These beliefs became part of their stories...their mythology. 

One story told about beautiful girls that lived in the sea, called "sirens"...so named after the setting of the story: three small and rocky islands off the coast of Greece called Sirenum scopuli.  The sirens were described by Horaz and Ovid as "bare girls with a tempting body which ended up in a fish tail."

As the story goes, these girls sang very beautiful songs that would put sailors in a trance.  In fact, the sailors would be so hypnotized by these songs that they would crash their ships into the rocks...just to find the girls who sang the songs.

First you will come to the Sirens
who enchant all who come near them.
If any one unwarily draws in too close
and hears the singing of the Sirens,
his wife and children
will never welcome him home again,
for they sit in a green field
and warble him to death
with the sweetness of their song.
There is a great heap
of dead men's bones lying all around,
with the flesh still rotting off them.

from The Odyssey translated by Samuel Butler

Their belief in sirens...also referred to as mermaids...was reinforced by actual sightings of them. Combined with the pressures of travel, toil, isolation, and the will to believe, the legend of the mermaid distorted the perceptions of humans for hundreds of years.

Even Christopher Columbus mentioned seeing them.  During one of his voyages to the New World, he wrote in his log:  "In a bight at the coast of Hispanola I saw three Sirens, but they were far less beautiful than Horaz described them."

Of course what they were actually seeing were manatees...ancestors of those I saw this week.

It's easy to see how tired and lonely sailors could mistake these critters for mermaids.  In addition to the fact that for most of history, men thought robust women beautiful, there are other attributes that contribute to the confusion:

• a manatees' front half resembles a head and arms (flippers) and their back half resembles a tail like a fish
• female manatees have their teats at the front of their chest
• when excited, manatees shed tears
• manatee mothers cuddle their suckling baby in their arms

The mermaid myth endured long after the time of long sea voyages and it's remained a part of our culture to this day.    

And that's a Friday Fact!

 

Twice Honored

I arrived back home the other day to find myself the recipient of two blog awards from Bonnie:

The "E for Excellence" Award

and

The "Toad-ally Awesome" Award

That sure helped make the sciatica fade away!  As I noted recently, Bonnie was one of the first bloggers I "met" and I've long admired her full embrace of the blogosphere. She's exposed to a myriad of bloggers, so to be included in her list...twice...is quite a high for me.

I've added these to the others on my sidebar, not to boast, but because I'm truly proud and honored to have received them.  I couldn't have imagined when I began to write Spatter last August that I'd have any readers, let alone awards given by people who I count among my friends. 

In keeping with the spirit of these awards, I've listed below the blogs I think get an "E for Excellence". I enjoy many blogs, but I especially look forward to my visits with these "Toad-ally Awesome" people:

Susan:  Patchwork Reflections
Colleen: Loose Leaf Notes
Kerri: A Little Piece Of Me
Alice: 10,000 Monkeys
Leanne: Leanne Wildermuth: Artist by Nature
Jen:  Blog In A Cyber Bottle 
Becca: Becca's Byline
Sandy: I Beati
Blue: Ruminations Of A Country Girl
Shannon: Going Crunchy
Country Dew: Blue Country Magic
Janeywan: Life In Westcliffe
Rhea: The Boomer Chronicles
Beth: Blue Ridge Blue Collar Girl

And of course, Bonnie!

Consider yourselves hugged on this Valentine's Day    

 

 

Wordless Wednesday

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"Head On"
From the Critters gallery at bydamanti

Good To Be Home

I returned home last night, happy to crawl into my own bed.  I had fun and am glad I went, but it's good to be home.  Here's a synopsis of the trip:

Our first stop was the Ringling Museum. I don't know if it's from the drought or from hard times or a bit of both, but I was struck by how run down looking the grounds were. I had expected a cared-for look with flower beds, etc., but there was nary a one save for a formal rose garden...and the roses weren't in bloom. Not having much to see outside, we went into the circus museum.

It was interesting but for those of you who might be thinking of going, I'd have to say it wasn't particularly memorable.  Again, it felt a bit neglected.  I was excited though at the performance of my new camera.  It was taking sharp pictures in low light without a tripod.  The photo below was a grab shot taken with the following settings: 1/30, f4, and 1250 ISO. I've not done any processing. You can click on it to see full sized.

We then went on to the mansion...that still magnificent. It was easy to imagine F. Scott Fitzgerald style parties going on in and around it...guests  arriving at the marbled dock.

There's an additional charge to the compound's $19 entry fee if you want to have a docent's tour and see the second floor.  Finally, we toured the art museum...the star attraction...where we found wonderful works, including Grandma Moses. 

The following day was spent at Myakka River State Park.  We took a hike, a boat tour, and a tram tour...all nice and all educational. I learned a lot of interesting things about the environment, both flora and fauna.  For instance, I never knew that you can measure the length of an alligator by measuring the inches between its eyes and its nostrils.  Each inch equals one foot.  If there's an 8 inch span, it's 8 feet long, etc. 

Unfortunately, there were hardly any birds to be seen this day.  It was windy (they were taking cover someplace) and the drought has dried up the water where they linger in the more accessible areas.  All in all though, we had a good time and we checked this outing as a "winner".

It was then on to Homosassa Springs...where old Florida can still be found.  It was shocking to see the development I saw going on along the way...I barely recognized some areas...but as you head north and west of Tampa, there's still an amazing amount of undeveloped land to be found.  As I passed, I wondered how much longer it would be there. 

By the next morning a cold front had come through and nixed our desire to swim with the manatees.  We did get to see them (wild and captives) as well as a myriad of birds while in the park. Here's a manatee...too bad no polarizing filter.

Later in the day we were supposed to hook-up with a couple who I used to work with, but I never got hold of them.  So instead, we decided to drive to Tarpon Springs.  For those who don't know, Tarpon Springs is known for sponge fishing and its Greek heritage. We had lunch there and then, it was over the Sunshine Skyway Bridge and on to home.

   

 

Help Save The Mountains

My blogger friend Blue continues her tireless work to bring awareness to the issue of mountain-top removal - which, for those of you who don't know, is just what it sounds like: coal companies stripping the landscape to access the coal within. The photos of what used to be beautiful mountains are horribly shocking.  But it's more than an aesthetic problem.  This mining is directly affecting people's lives, and too, this raping of the earth is depleting forests...one more contributor to global warming.

Please take a minute to learn about this here .  On this site you'll find several links worth clicking on, including: a Bill Moyers video, photos of the problem taken from a airplane, and a slew of other interesting and/or disturbing links. Ways you can help are listed in its sidebar.

Thank-you for caring.