A Curious Statistical Anomaly

Since we’d marked the calendar and set an alarm, we were ready this year for Earth Hour 2009.  We turned off all the lights outside the house.  We shut down the laptops, router, printer, UPS, and electronics and then turned off the lights, fan, and everything else.  All we left on were the appliances (furnace, fridge, water heater).

Throughout the year we try to do what we can to conserve and reduce our footprint on the Earth.  We only own one car.  My husband drives it to work and back during the week.  He makes a loop on the way home to the post office or store so there’s no additional travel since their on the way home.  We shop once a week or every other week depending on our needs.  That weekly shopping trip is on a loop so we drive to the recycle center to drop off all our recycling (we’re not on a pick up route), then we hit the stores in order  and come home.  Many times we do the shopping on Saturday and thus don’t drive or go anywhere on Sunday.

We have a small vegetable garden during the year and eat out of that for fresh veggies when we can.  Of course, most years we’re struggling to get the fruits of our labor before the critters get them.  (We live on five acres in the midst of farm country and often have deer, rabbits, and other critters in our yard.)

We also have a small fruit orchard but even though we do get peaches and plums and apples by they time they ripen the deer or other critters get them.  We have managed to get our strawberries and raspberries (and we put the blueberries in planters on the deck so we could get them.)

What angers me sometimes is the questions on surveys: Will you drive less because of gas prices?  No, we won’t. We’ve reduced our driving years ago and they only way we could further reduce it is not to go to work.  Many of us have been cutting down and doing what we can for the Earth for years and have very little we could still cut back on so the questions don’t truly get at the current status of some of us.  For other, who have never considered cutting back, they probably could find ways to reduce driving or use of resources but others of us have already done the hard stuff and we’re working on refining where we can.

So, this year we did our bit for Earth hour and now we need to consider what more we could do.

Last year we turned off all our lights and the computers and everything we could find in the house except some appliances. We cranked up our wind-up radio and our wind-up LED Camp light and some candles and listened to music and read.

It wasn’t as quiet as the time when a hurricane blew through and we lost power for a week. One thing that power outage and Earth Hour taught me is just how much noise there is in our lives from our electronics. If you’re reading this on your laptop or PC, just listen for a moment. Do you hear the computer’s fan? Do you hear the hum of electronics? We’re so used to the background noises that we don’t even hear them anymore. But they’re there — subliminal and slightly annoying.

When the power went out, everything was off — not just the non-necessary lights and gadgets. The silence was unbelievable. In our bit of the world, our home, was only the sounds of wind rustling in the trees, birds chittering and tweeting, and that was it. Just our talking or turning a page — just the noise of life.

This year, I’ve marked the calendar and we plan to turn off all non-essential electronics again. I hope you join with all of us throughout the world to give the Earth an hour. Vote for the Earth by turning off your lights and non-essential electronics for one hour on March 28th from 8:30 PM (your local time). You’ll be amaze at what the world around you sounds like.

Today, I forget how, I ran across an article in the New York Times “Whoopie! Cookie, Pie or Cake, It’s Having Its Moment” that stopped me in my tracks. Just last weekend when we stopped at a local Amish Market I saw whoopie pies in their bakery section, and now here was an article in the Times.

A bit of Googling found a Wikipedia entry, a recipe at epicurious, a slew of recipes at Cooks.com, and a bit of history and another recipe at What’s Cooking America.

I grew up in Maine, born in Mexico, ME (yes, the place on the sign) and went to college and graduate school at the University of Maine in Orono. Whoopie pies are big in Maine. Most stores, bakeries, and Mom and Pops have (or had) them available. But mostly, I remember my grandmother made them. She didn’t make them often so they were a special treat. When I was an adult she gave me her recipe for them. I’ve made them myself a time or two but mostly when I’m missing home and family.

For me Whoopie Pies are a comfort dessert. There not something you actually see anywhere here in Maryland. At least they didn’t used to be. Last weekend I spotted them at the Amish Market and later at the bakery in Giant. I’ve been thinking about them ever since with a longing I can’t really express.

Mostly the longing is for my grandmother, who died several years ago. I still miss her more than I can ever really express. To sit and have a cup of tea or coffee and a whoopie pie and talk with her again would fill my heart to bursting with joy. So, I guess for me a whoopie pie is a tangible link with my past and the people who I now communicate with only in my heart.

I guess maybe I’ll go look up my grandmother’s recipe and think about tradition, family, and continuity on this the second day for Spring where we look forward to the new.

Today it was in the mid-30’s and it snowed a bit. It melted as soon as it touched the ground and later turned to rain.  But, cold and rain means it felt even colder. What makes it weird is that just two days ago on Wednesday the temp was near 80 and I was outside without a sweater or a jacket.

I noticed then that our forsythia bushes are all budded up and a there’s some bright yellow showing. These are the harbingers of spring that I really love — they just flash their brilliant yellow flowers — shouting to all who listen that it is spring.

The azaleas have got some leaves and buds too. The tulips and irises have shot up their leaves. No sign of flowers yet, but the promise is there.

I’m starting to think of gardening and ran about pulling all the gardening catalogs out along with the one or two seed catalogs that I got. I’ve got the pots and the soil to get the seeds started in the house. Once they get growing they’ll be transferred to the garden area.

I love spring; it’s such a time of promise and hope. What about you? What do you look forward to when you recognize the signs of the coming spring and summer months?

March came in like a lion. There’s an old saying I knew as a child:

March comes in like a lion,
and goes out like a lamb.

Hopefully, that means that the end of March will quietly meld into April. But, I guess we’ll have to wait and see.

Meanwhile, I got a new coffee cup. This one was a Christmas gift from friends. It’s got those simple lines that I love. Again, it’s reminiscent of a type of diner coffee cup and has a nice blue line. It also says “Vote for Women” celebrating women’s right to vote. That’s a right that’s very dear to my heart making this an especially great cup.

Well, while March was coming in like that lion it roared with wind and dumped about five inches of snow on us here in Brandywine, Maryland. Not at lot of snow by the standards of some northern parts of the country but here people don’t do well with snow so five inches is a lot. In our part of the state, we usually don’t get much snow for some reason, most of the snowfall is north and northwest of DC and we’re southeast — we usually get rain when other parts of the state get snow. But not this time.

We got a bird feeder a while back because of our concern about a demented cardinal that was continually attacking our sliding glass door on the deck. The birds have been spreading the word and we’ve got quite a lot of birds eating from our feeder and we’re learning to recognize some of them. However, evidently birds go a bit wacky with snow. Maybe they think they’d better fill up on all the food they can because the feeder might go away because today we were inundated with birds.

While it’s not that unusual to see more than one bird at the feeder, today saw a lot more birds than usual. We usually fill the feeder once a day and very occasionally twice. Today, we filled it three times.

We haven’t seen much of our looney cardinal or any cardinals for that matter since we got the bird feeder. Today in the snow we saw several of them. Some down stairs on the lower patio and some on the feeder, waiting their turn or just looking like they just drifted in to make a splash of color on an otherwise  grey day. I got this fellow sitting on the railing on the upper deck.

I was trying to get a better shot of a cardinal sitting on the railing. When I clicked the shutter, I saw that another bird had come into the shot and was just off the cardinal and it looks like it’s attacking the sitting cardinal. But in truth, it just appears that way. But it was a neat shot and the wings are in motion so I thought I’d post it.

I’ve got two more picture I took today, the first is of the birds in and about our hydrangea bush down on the patio deck on the ground level of the house. I suppose I should explain that all the pictures were taken from within the house. While the glass on the doors is fairly clean it does effect the light and the clarity of the photos. In this one I also got a cardinal and a mourning dove.

To give you an idea of how patient the birds were here’s a shot of several birds waiting for their turn at the feeder.

So, even though it snowed and was cold and completely blew away my belief that the worst of winter was over. It was an absolutely wonderful, beautiful day.

I’m happy dancing all over the house. I got my Kindle 2 in the mail today — late, very late afternoon.

Then it was Google time to figure out how to get the PDF review copies of books from my PC to my Kindle so I could read them. Many minutes/hours later, I ended up using Stanza (free download).

The resulting files aren’t the greatest but they are readable and they’re on the Kindle so I’m not tied to the PC and desk — so that’s a good thing.

Next will be to actually spend a day using it but now I’m behind schedule — again and the next two days are going to be really, really busy getting ready for the zines to go live on Sunday, March 1st.

Haven’t had much time to think, let alone posts.  But, my hubby found that absolutely wonderful knitting cartoon. You’ll find it Wondermark #491.

I mean really, some men just don’t understand the need for knitting.

My hubby thought I’d get a kick out of it because every trip we take, I spend more time trying to decide how much or which knitting projects to take. Then there’s the decision about what to take carry on and what to check through. If the yarn is really, really nice I hate checking it through … what if they loose my bag — it’s happened so it could happen when there’s yarn.

Meanwhile, working on getting the zines up and ready to go live on Sunday, March 1st. Desperately trying to finish up my reviews and overview of the zines in time. Also, proofing, editing, and tracking down missing content. But they’re going to be great issues.

I even had a review of my new ASUS Eee PC 1000 in TechRevu this week. Got some more things lined up to review over the coming months.

Finished one sock and I’m nearly done with the other one. Will do a photo of the pair soon. Also, got to finish my bears this weekend so will hopefully have a series of photos on making the faces and putting the arms and legs on. So, things are coming along in my universe.

I still keep missing time though. I’ve looked and looked and I can’t find the time leaks but the seconds, minutes, and hours just seem to be slipping past. So, far this month I’ve managed to keep it down to seconds and minutes rather than days and this is even a short month. I’m hoping the lost time is in a corner somewhere and with spring cleaning I’ll find it and can keep it in a bottle and pull out extra time when I need it. It’s a thought anyway.

I have good days and so-so days and bad days. Today started as a good day so I rushed about doing everything I’d let slide over the past week. I got caught up on a lot of work tasks, did some housework, and then…ran out of steam.

I should of known it was too good to be true when the headache didn’t go away when I got up until after the coffee. (I’m limiting myself to only one cup a day.)

I moved slower and slower as the day wore on and when Hyperion got home… I’d been sitting and reading and I could barely move when I went to stand up.

Poor me. Whine and cheese. (long list of whines here). But I’m still so much better than I was that I’m sure this is just a minor set back (fingers crossed and quick wish).

The problem with fibromyalgia is that it changes. Some days I’m normal and some I feel like I’m a billion years old. Other days, I’m just a bit off. I’ve had a lot of off days lately but managed to plow through and today is just one of those muddle days where the whole range shows up in one day.

Better tomorrow. The sun will come out and it will be a glorious day even if it rains, storms, four-letter-words, or is perfect. Every day is a joy.