Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. Radiometric dating and other evidence say the planet was formed some 4.5 billion years ago. The world population is currently 7.53 billion people. give or take a few million.
Some currently accepted facts are:
1) Earth was once believed to be the center of the universe. 2) Earth is the only planet not named after a mythological God or Goddess. 3) Earth is the most dense planet in our solar system. 4) The gravity between the Earth and the Moon causes the tides. 5) The rotation of the Earth is slowing down. 6) The large amount of oxygen on Earth comes from our plant life’s consumption of carbon dioxide. 7) Earth has a very powerful magnetic field. 8) The Earth has an ozone layer which protects us from harmful solar radiation. 9) 70% of the Earth’s surface is covered by water. 10) The first life on Earth started in the oceans. 11) Earth has relatively few visible impact craters. 12) The highest point on Earth is Mount Everest. 13) The lowest point on the planet is called the Challenger Deep. 14) Earth has one of the most circular orbits of all the eight planets. 15) A year on Earth is 365 days.
For 7.53 billion people, Earth is much the same in general, but very different specifically. An Amazon headhunter and a Wall Street stockbroker both have to hunt but their tools and techniques couldn’t be more different.
As far as we know, our planet is not stable and spins in space like a Christmas ornament blown by mysterious winds.
As far as we know, what happens to us might be of our own making.
As far as we know, facts are true until they are proven otherwise.
On Saturday mornings, the New Mexico Jazz Workshop jam is in order.
Open cases are spread on the floor, Real Books rest on stands,metal folding chairs have been unfolded, coffee is okay outside the rehearsal room, guitarists plug in amps, sax players suck on reeds, trumpet players move their fingers over three keys and look to the Gods for good chops.
We sit in a big circle and any person can call a tune out that they want the group to play.
Some tunes we can play well, some we can play, some we just pretend. Some play for fun, others have axes to grind. After playing the head twice, the caller of the tune solos first and then the spotlight moves to the next person around the circle, sometimes clockwise, sometimes counterclockwise. After everyone solos that wants to, the group plays the head twice and we wrap the tune up with a long fermata.
In the kitchen area of the workshop, by the frig and coffee maker, hangs a distinctive framed pencil drawing.
Jazz is about feeling but feeling doesn’t push your keys, blow air across a reed to make sound, provide air support to keep a true tone.
Feeling is huge, but, without chops, it isn’t going far.
This morning, in the rough, I don’t look for my errant drive. One of our foursome’s little dog, Winston, was bit by a rattler and died on another course a few weeks ago. A golf ball,even a new one, is not worth coming face to face with a poisonous viper.
Winston 1 never barked while we were putting though he sometimes ran up to the cup and looked down inside it to see what we were all looking at, then gave us a funny look when he didn’t see anything.
We all miss Winston 1, but Gary has already found Winston 2, a little bigger than his predecessor, looking much the same, but with a different personality..
Winston 2 spends most of his time, on the golf course,sleeping in his carry cage and exploring only when Gary lets him out on a leash.There are plenty of predators on a golf course and some of them have two legs.
None of us want to see a Winston 3.
Seeing a grown man cry is humbling.
After a big rain, these mushrooms appear.
This yard used to be dirt, stones, brush, debris, unused patio bricks, dead leaves and trash. There were overgrown vines, broken trellises and shrubs in need of water. A small tree was removed, litter raked and stuffed into trash cans, earth leveled and turned over. Flower beds were reconstructed. After new desert plants were tucked in, sod was brought from Home Depot. Mr. Porter, my neighbor, loaned me his wheelbarrow and twenty strips of sod were wheeled back and laid down,knitted together by hand.
Closeups reveal these mushrooms to be delicate, white with streaks of purple. Against the green grass, still moist from last night’s rain, they are very much alive.They clump like clouds and the edges of their circles, almost transparent, look like nipples.
After a day, these squatters are turning brown.
Tomorrow I will cut them down with a weed eater.
I don’t want them to take over the yard.
If I wanted them here I would have issued them Passports.
Rainbows aren’t discriminating about where they appear.
This hint of a double rainbow gracefully arches over an Albuquerque Wal-Mart that has its own version of golden arches inside.
Rainbows tell me that there is more than just here and now.
Scotttreks and rainbows have had conversations before, my last rainbow sighting in Belize on the way back from a snorkel trip at Hol Chan with sharks.
This rainbow is almost as good as the one I saw in San Jose, Costa Rica, outside the Hotel Aranjuez.
Rainbows are nature’s brushstrokes, and, as a painter, I’m hooked on color.
If I were a rainbow, though, I would find a better place to do my shopping.
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