"Mark this well..."

tiny tiny eight-legged creature which was on most flowers...maybe a spider maybe a mite

a very odd (to me) occurrence while i was watching these ant manipulate this bug

                                       saw a lot of these munch on the plants

                                             these tiny ants seemed to avoid the sun and stayed mainly in the shade

                                i thought these winged ant were headed out but they all went back into the ant-hole

 this tiny spider like creature was running along the sand and suddenly stopped and climbed up a hidden silk thread to disappear...

 this spider was on a flower and barely visible...due to "edge diffusion (thanks to lindsay nikole)

the oddest thing i saw was when these ants seemed to be struggling in vain with this bug at the entrance of their ant-hole and they slowing managed to get it out and an inch or so from the entrance when suddenly they maneuvered it slightly and rapidly dragged it back into the hole out of sight...i was stunned by what appeared to me to be a "thoughtful" appraisal of the geometry and logistics of this task and acted accordingly...

i watched some very good youtube recently..."The forgotten voyage" alfred russell wallace  and his discovery of evolution by natural selection (1hour:12 minutes) excellent 

i would like to say something about mr milo rossi and ms nikole and their use of "profanity" in their presentations...i personally view this more as "exclamation" points than any attempt to curse...sometimes rossi does actually specifically curse someone or something...but both of these presenters have so much erudition and factual material in their well though out work that the curse words are hardly a detriment...BUT...if you want presentation with erudition and no profanity i highly recommend that you watch "firing line" interviews with germaine greer PhD (1973) or "the limits of journalistic investigation" with woodward and bernstein...outstanding examples of thought discourse.

"Mark this well, ye proud men of action! ye are after all, nothing but unconscious instruments of men of thought." Heinrich Heine (1797-1856)

 

"So many people..."

this is the type of habitat this plant seems to prefer...mud or silt washed out of the rocks

this is what this plant looks like when looked at from a few feet...they are attached to small vines

this is what the seeds look like when observed up close...quite pretty and with a nice aroma

 this is a rare sight in the dry desert...a juicy caterpillar....

the window of opportunity is quite short to see the flowering plants in this desert...i figure less than a month...and the situation changes daily as the maturation and flowering depend on certain conditions which may not occur every year...

read a good article on my news feed which is well worth finding...is is called "The courts were never going to save America from Donald Trump"...which was on Vox.com..the author has done a lot of research about what the courts have done in the past...all the way back to the Dread/Scott decision which ruled that black slaves are not people but property...a notoriously bad ruling...i watched most of the state of the union address and was pleasantly surprised at how well the commander in chief related his case to the american people and the world...not enough about minimum wage being dismal

i watched an interesting movie last week called "Rope of Sand" 1949...104 minutes...

 with burt lancaster claude rains, paul henreid, and introducing corrinne calvert...it is about diamonds in africa and those people who want them and those people who dont want them to have them...i expected bogart to appear before the movie was over,,,but he did not even make a cameo...the cover of the DVD has an illustration of ms calvert which looks exactly like jane russell...she does not even get a mention on the cover of the DVD and you have to look at the fine print on the back...there are a couple of odd things in this movie...one is that twice for no reason that i can figure out lancasters character exhales a huge puff of smoke (there is so much cigarette smoking in movies from this era it is no wonder so many people in films died from cancer...Bogart being just one) the other odd thing is that ms, caverts character is subjected to a lot of action...bombs in the restaurant, fights qnd time in jail...but her hair is always perfect...you assume that there is a hair dresser within arms reach at all times...but all in all not a back flick...

"So many people, so little purpose."  Sherlock Holmes "The Three Gables"

"The weather is not benign..."

 when no one is looking the antelope squirrels like to do a little break-dancing 

i looked up the lizard in the last blog and it appears to be a "Colorado fringe-toed lizard"...i was told about this lizard by a scientist i met in san diego county a couple of years ago and he said they only live in the algodones dunes...which i can see to the west of me as they are only a few miles away...these lizards are adapted to living in the sand...which is plentiful where this lizard was photographed but no dunes...maybe is is a sub-species...

the temperature here is about 81 degrees today and only a mild wind...in northern california several feet of snow is predicted...i am always looking to see what the weather is doing as my life depends on it...

i heard where the krewe of Freret in New Orleans will no longer throw plastic beads...hooray...

the north korean wig market has begun to grow as they use malasian and Chinese hair to make high quality wigs which are in much demand...and there is a loop-hole for them to engage in trade

i would like to recommend "Barney Miller" as a wonderful old television show to watch...when the writers and actors strike was happening it occurred to me that this show was made in two rooms...the jail/office and Barneys office....all of the characters were rich in quirks and the "criminals" were also...great stuff...

I pick up 25 cent magazines at the library and picked up "Outside" and "RollingStone" recently...i think they are way way way too pretentious to be serious...fashion fashion fashion...remember 'THRIFT STORE, YARD SALES, FLEA MARKETS AND PAWN SHOPS....recycle or die...

i have a neighbor now...thousands of acres and this person has to park less that 100 yards away...very secretive...i am a person of interest...i think maybe the scary military has decided that i do not give adequate reverence to their service...maybe i should adjust my position...professional suspect...

"The weather is not benign; but how low is he sunk whose strength depends upon the weather." S. Johnson