llibra's Xanga

gypsy wind

Sat, 26 Dec 2009 18:05:15 GMT

The gypsy woman left her warm hut. The snow, rimed by a day of freezing rain, chimed with a crystalline skitter as she scooted her booted feet. She intersects with deer who are not there, only prints left by their deep hoven feet; and with bounding squirrel shapes of shadows going on in some other time. She sees outlines of round little bellies in the middle of four jumping feet, that tell with their sinuous tail of the same creatures stirring in her house on christmas eve.

Because Maeve loves her trees, she tangles with some choking vines, wondering if they can still inject with a poison this time of year. She thinks they're the ones you call cats-claw, protecting her like briar rose.

Down the pseudo-shine valley of the trees where the sun doesn't reach, she walks into a wind tunnel that stops her very breath, buffeting body and mind, and goes still further to see the offing of the beach. Looking back, she doesn't know how far five minutes was, but as she turns around to face the open waters, Maeve has an idea of how far decades are.

Laughing waves tumbled up a few flat stones, laughing in return she skips them back, and for the ones that skim and hop so fine, Maeve applauds and doesn't notice time. She breathes through her many coloured scarves wound 'round her neck until her eye sockets go numb with frozen tears in the misted sun. And then she leaves like a graceful tree melded with star shine. Christmas was just another day passing by in her quiet life ever falling like snow, or howling like the gypsy wind.

GYPSY WIND painting by jstickmann (a gift 10-29-09)

Christmas Lake

Sat, 26 Dec 2009 01:06:23 GMT

ice on the offing

12-22 studies in blues

Constructal Theory

Tue, 22 Dec 2009 04:36:35 GMT

words by Adrian Bejan

For a finite-size system to persist in time — that is, to live — it must evolve in such a way that it provides easier access to the imposed currents that flow through it.

This statement recognizes the natural tendency of imposed currents to construct paths of optimal access (such as shapes and structures) through constrained open systems. It also accounts for the evolution (improvement) of these paths, which occurs in an identifiable direction that can be aligned with time.

Everything flows one way, from high to low. Water flows through a pipe from high pressure to low pressure. Heat flows from high temperature to low temperature. This principle is known today as the second law of thermodynamics, irreversibility, dissipation, inefficiency, one way, water under the bridge, etc.

One individual sustains the crowd, and vice versa. The big river sustains the many tiny streams of the river basin.

The reverse is equally true: The numerous sustain the singular. The river basin, like the tree of the lung, connects an entire area or volume to one point — flow resistances allocated to areas and volumes, all over the world, so the whole world flows best. This principle is the "constructal law".

Both principles — the second law and the constructal law — are in action. Their footprints persist, like the river beds and the beaten tracks. The river and the caravan that do not follow their beds and beaten tracks do not get far.

The golden-ratio phenomenon and its constructal-law prediction illuminate the oneness of the integrative design of the movement of biological mass on earth. Shapes that resemble the golden ratio facilitate the scanning of images and their transmission through vision organs to the brain. The speeding up of this flow goes hand-in-hand with the dendritic architectures of the nervous system in the eye and the brain. Dendrites maximize the rate of point-volume flow of information inside finite volumes, and the rate at which new point-volume connections can occur naturally in the brain.

The name of this constructal evolution of brain architecture, every minute and every moment, is cognition – the phenomenon of thinking, knowing and thinking again, better. ‘Getting smarter’ is the constructal law in action.

We see pattern and diversity together in every grand design of nature, from the distribution of tree numbers and sizes in the forest to the distribution of cities on a continent. Although much of the observed diversity is due
to randomness, much of it is like a fog that is dissipated by the pattern of evolutionary design predicted with the constructal law (e.g. the Zipf distribution of trees and cities on land, and the speed-mass distribution of animals with locomotion – fliers, runners and swimmers).

http://www.constructal.org/

Happy Winter Solstice

Mon, 21 Dec 2009 16:47:00 GMT

the sun stands still
but water still flows
days will lenghten
while the sky snows
land and air coloured
white grey and brown
dotted with bright berries
as red as a summer rose
so it goes

high n low

Fri, 18 Dec 2009 23:35:02 GMT

view from the road taken Aug. 14
I think that the top of the dune blow-out is the highest point in the state park

today, opposite view from the top Lake Michigan to the west

Muskegon Lake cove to the east

yesterday through the bog on the way to lost lake found these ice crystals in the path
never saw anything like it

sunuva

Thu, 17 Dec 2009 04:22:17 GMT

beach

starting to ice up

the golden minutes

Noam is an anagram of moan

Mon, 14 Dec 2009 06:19:48 GMT

It was a silly thing that began to focus my attention, and brought it around to an excellent article in the Boston Review based on a speech by Noam Chomsky. I was somewhat familiar with him, but now i have a new hero, someone who can put into words the way i think.

http://bostonreview.net/BR34.5/chomsky.php?chom

here are a couple of sections from the article:

- The food crisis erupted first and most dramatically in Haiti in early 2008. Like Bangladesh, Haiti today is a symbol of misery and despair. And, like Bangladesh, when European explorers arrived, the island was remarkably rich in resources, with a large and flourishing population. It later became the source of much of France’s wealth. I will not run through the sordid history, but the current food crisis can be traced directly to 1915, Woodrow Wilson’s invasion: murderous, brutal, and destructive. Among Wilson’s many crimes was dissolving the Haitian Parliament at gunpoint because it refused to pass “progressive legislation” that would have allowed U.S. businesses to take over Haitian lands. Wilson’s Marines then ran a free election, in which the legislation was passed by 99.9 percent of the 5 percent of the public permitted to vote. All of this comes down through history as “Wilsonian idealism.”

- Where neoliberal rules have been observed since the ’70s, economic performance has generally deteriorated and social democratic programs have substantially weakened. In the United States, which partially accepted these rules, real wages for the majority have largely stagnated for 30 years, instead of tracking productivity growth as before, while work hours have increased, now well beyond those of Europe. Benefits, which always lagged, have declined further. Social indicators—general measures of the health of the society—also tracked growth until the mid-’70s, when they began to decline, falling to the 1960 level by the end of the millennium. Economic growth found its way into few pockets, increasingly in the financial industries. Finance constituted a few percentage points of GDP in 1970, and has since risen to well over one-third, while productive industry has declined, and with it, living standards for much of the workforce. The economy has been punctuated by bubbles, financial crises, and public bailouts, currently reaching new highs. A few outstanding international economists explained and predicted these results from the start. But mythology about “efficient markets” and “rational choice” prevailed. This is no surprise: it was highly beneficial to the narrow sectors of privilege and power that provide the “principal architects of policy.”

Back to the silly thing: lighters, cheap lighters, made in China. It has bothered me for quite a while that so few products are made in America anymore, but these lighters at the Dollar Store, 8 in a package for a buck, such a deal. Until the last pkg i bought, the fuel less than one fourth used and they stopped working, or i'd spin the wheel to light it and little parts would go flinging off, on every single one of them. So i bought a pkg of book matches and was pleased to find printed inside every book 'MADE IN U.S.A.' and dang if every one of 'em didn't light!

yes i think this way, look it up

I was actively involved with an independent union when i worked for the municipal government of the second largest city in the state. Wages and benefits were very good, but instead of the rest of the nation being brought up to these standards that Unions had fought for, the culture changed, and wages and benefits and working conditions continue to be eroded.

In this microcosm, Solidarity is a threat to upper management; in the macrocosm of the US, the same holds true, world-wide, true too. Why do you think our jobs are disappearing? Why have our homes lost value? Why doesn't the richest county in the world take care of its own in health matters, education and general welfare, as in all to fare well? Does it really make you feel better to denigrate (i.e.criticize) some one else based on their religion or lack of, their color, race, sexual orientation, political party preference or lack of, or whether one is male or female? Just like upper management, if they could get us fighting amongst ourselves, that gave them more power over us, with 'them' holding out the carrot, yes, we too could be one of them. What is it? Power, the love of money, the root of all evil? Why are some people so unwilling to accept people who are different from themselves or in views, beliefs or lifestyles that differ? Where is, what is, the threat? Don't we all have a difficult enough time keeping our balance on this spinning blue marble?

A special thanks to those who are willing to think and learn and care and love. I can feel you, and the world needs you, definitely, more is better. Peace. 'Tis the season you know.

Wind Water Snow and Trees

Sun, 13 Dec 2009 20:38:17 GMT

I like silence and enjoy following where my thoughts wander. Last week two days swirled with blizzard conditions wrapped in four days of light to moderate gale force winds with wind chills well below zero F. The constant sound of wind and waves could have driven me crazy. Today i drove up Scenic Drive, took twenty pics, seven of which make a tribute to trees, and made me think of this poem, one of the first i ever memorized. (All pics are of the same tree with the exception of the dunes shot.) Although i prefer the off-beat to the la dee la dee la dee dee type of poetry, i sure do like trees. Oh la

I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree.

A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the sweet earth's flowing breast;

A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;

A tree that may in summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;

Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.

Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.

Joyce Kilmer 1886–1918

Oh yeah, Hulu helps to keep total insanity at bay too. Two recent favs, Slacker (1991) written by Richard Linklater, and Master of the World, (1961) written by Richard Matheson, starring Vincent Price and Charles Bronson.

haha, wow

Mon, 07 Dec 2009 23:53:51 GMT

from James Kuhn's blog:
"Lately, when i look in the mirror, i don't know the person looking back at me. Thats not me! Could i really look like that now? My eyes are the only part of me that has'nt changed. In my face transformations series, my face is covered with paint, but i can actually see myself again. My eyes are looking out at me through a psychological mask. I become my dream self, my fantasies come alive in flesh. I get to decide what i see!"

flicker: http://www.flickr.com/photos/hawhawjames/

He describes himself as: Artist, Face paint illusionist, DragQueen, Performance artist, and full time Christian.

winter wonderland

Mon, 07 Dec 2009 22:35:02 GMT

and it's only just begun
winter storm warning from 7p Tues. till 7a Thurs. then a deep freeze Fri. 18° F high | 9° F low

backyard mulberry

front

off to The lake of course

and the harbor

freezing fog
Fog tends to not produce measurable precipitation by itself but it can still wet and moisten objects. In the case of freezing fog, the fog cloud droplets are supercooled - liquid and below freezing. When a droplet contacts an object below freezing it will turn to ice. When only freezing fog occurs, there will be just about as much freezing of the fog droplets onto surfaces as there will be sublimation from the surface, thus there is not much accumulation of ice.

Muskegon Lake