Hundreds of articles about changes in the way we keep track of dates. One explains why George Washington became a year younger during his life – and lots of others too.
Monday, Feb 29 LEAP YEAR (?) with another day in Feb
For Feb 28 CPAP. Reported figures 6 hrs 11 min with AHI=0.32. Events: 2 H, 1 CSR, 17 RERA. No major mask leaks (max=11 L/min); oximeter on entire time +45 m, AOK, AHI=.29.
The extra February day apparently screwed up my Armitron watch, as it thought there was no 29th day. I have to reset it. I’ve been screwed up all week – numbers being a day ahead of me. I normally only look at it when writing the date on our mileage in the car glove box book, if I don’t remember.
We left several small vases for Lisa R to pick up (at the gate), and when she picked those up she left a large glass vase in the box, another gift from the BNE site. It’s a very heavy vase. My photo ought to have included a batch of flowers, but we are short of flowers this week. Still, the vase is beautiful.
We grew Dahlias 2 years ago. There were 2 color patterns (orange-ish) in the package. John did not dig them up and store them, so they are gone. With the impressive vase to prod him, the next day at Costco, he bought another package (purple-ish). Dahlia starts are “tuberous roots”** .
**What are . . .
Photos from web – our new ones are NOT the color of the pinkish one.
They will look very pretty in it. Actually, I asked him if he would have Dahlias in the garden this year. (Ans. = no) I figured they and colorful Iris would work beautifully in this vase. So we will have both. The Iris do winter but occasionally need dug up, separated and replanted. That did not get done but the dead leaves were replaced with semi-composted horse d’oeuvres, of which we have plenty.
This afternoon, I went to a the presentation by a candidate for a Geography instructor job at CWU, teaching almost the same set of courses I taught. After that I met with a few folks for a practice session for an upcoming music event. I carried a partially eaten can of Cashew Mocha Roca that I bought for John thinking it was chocolate covered (it was), but it had little pieces of coffee grounds in with the cashews. I’m still upset about picking up two cans of that and not realizing it wasn’t what I thought it was. If I still had the cash register receipt from Bi-Mart, I would return the one left, but I think I got all concerned with cleaning receipts not needed for taxes and threw everything away except medical things.
Tuesday, Mar 1
For Feb 29 CPAP. Reported figures 7 hrs 17 min with AHI=0.14. Events: 1 H, 2 CSR, 14 RERA. No major mask leaks (max=8 L/min); oximeter on entire time AOK.
John did not go pruning because of rain. However, he left for Yakima, primarily to have his car serviced and also to visit a hardware store and Costco. Pretty cool what he got at Lowe’s—new broom, a heavy duty rake, a couple of blades for a 7 ¼ inch circular saw, and a circular wire brush for the hand-held drill. He accumulated >$70 of stuff, and used a friend’s gift card of $50 to pay for most of it. He also bought a bunch of stuff from Costco, and got gas there for a good price.
I have been working on adding words and correcting chords on the song, “Who Threw the Overalls in Mrs. Murphy’s Chowder?” I did the best I could with the score without chords that Evelyn had downloaded from the web, and I just sent off the latest with chords to be viewed by her eagle musical eyes to add chords for a measure I couldn’t figure out and two other problem phrases.
I went to Jazzercise and owe $.50 for today — I left my $1 in the car. We only had 3 people there in class, but we had a nice routine mainly involving the torso and abdominals—a much needed exercise. The rest of the month will be 4 sessions of different dance types. Next week is Line Dancing, and I will participate. (That class is free with our annual membership). The next week I will be at the cardiologist’s, the foot doctor, and Costco.
John called just after I got home at 3:35 to tell me he was still at the Subaru dealer from a 2:30 appointment for a scheduled oil change/lube – about 800 miles late. The car is a 2009 and has regular oil with a recommended 3,000 mile interval. They found it needed alignment, so he had to stay and pay an additional $80. I don’t know yet if all 4 were aligned , but I checked with Les Schwab out of curiosity, and they charge $60.75 for the front and $90 for all four. (John had all 4 done and it only cost $80, so that was good and saved him an additional trip.)
I spent 1/2 hour probably on the phone with Joseph in Honduras to get my next 6 months of Sirius XM satellite radio to my Subaru, for a total of $28.08 because I made the effort to request and wait on the phone. I was armed with a code I could get it for $25. Now I have to do the same thing before September 1, 2016, when it expires and automatically reverts to $102.44. Thanks to my friend Bob West in Yakima for telling me this little secret to save money, and still enjoy my satellite radio music in my car. I enjoy listening primarily to 3 stations for all my road travel. It makes me happy, so well worth 15 cents/day.
See: Post-purchase rationalization
Today, a photo from last week at the Fundraiser for Parkinson’s Disease was published on Facebook from the Ellensburg Adult Activity Center (AAC). On my last blog-post I wrote about winning the long-sleeved tee-shirt, I wore it today to Jazzercise class, and stopped by Knudson’s to thank them for their donations to the AAC events. She remembered John wearing in his sweatshirt last year to thank them. This photo was at the very end, and probably only 1/3 of those attending were still there. It was a good turnout. I didn’t hear the final amount of money raised, but at a minimum of $5/head it was a nice piece of change.
Nancy with her prize in a white bag. Also, she wore the “colors” of Parkinson’s research, unless you go with the red tulip logo, or the original yellow ribbon.
Wednesday, Mar 2
For Mar 1 CPAP. Reported figures 7 hrs 29 min with AHI=0.27. Events: 2 H, 3 CSR, 10 RERA. No major mask leaks (max=8 L/min); oximeter on entire time AOK.
Pretty and sunny day for pruning. John left at 7:44 a.m.
I picked up Gloria at 11:15 and went by a BNE person’s house, Heather B-H on our way in to Food Bank to get two medicine bottles to sort some of my extra Vitamin supplements into from smaller containers (see collage below, on Friday).
Our Epson printer claims a thirst issue. John replaced the black ink cartridge and it now seems happy. Me too – I’ll be able to run music pages for my group. I corrected and printed the first page of Who Threw the Overalls in Mrs Murphy’s Chowder and made one page of lyrics only for the audience.
John and I went to the last of the 4 special new lectures this winter by Nick Zentner. This week was Snoqualmie Pass geology. Excellent as usual. I was the only video-taper tonight. John has worked on the trails that start at the Pass – boots on the ground sort of thing – so he enjoys hearing of the recent work Nick manages to find from publications and (geology) colleagues.
Here’s the results from LAST Wednesday’s lecture. Nick Zentner’s recent lecture “Bing Crosby, the Sunset Highway, & the Channeled Scablands” is now available on You Tube. This was done by CWU staff that sets up in the very back of the room. I sit in the front row, almost at Nick’s feet. Mine doesn’t have the professional look, but are a challenge following his antics during his presentations.
Click here to view the CWU version: Sunset Highway and more
In this unusual lecture, Bing Crosby’s first road trip across the state of Washington is used as a vehicle for learning about Glacial Lake Columbia and the Channeled Scablands. Crosby and Al Rinker drove the Sunset Highway on Thursday, October 15, 1925 from Spokane to Seattle – and then on to Hollywood, California.
Some 240 folks attended this lecture at the Hal Holmes Center in downtown Ellensburg, Washington. February 24, 2016. Nick claims that his university students have no idea about Bing Crosby [Harry Lillis “Bing” Crosby, Jr.]. Maybe their grandparents do. Do you remember the “Road to Series” of pictures with Bob Hope and Dorothy Lamour?
On the Road to Blewett Pass:
I have the links to all his downtown lectures over the past several years. We have listed them below at the end of this blog, by name only. If you want them emailed to you, you can request it, or you can copy and paste the ones you want to watch into your browser.
We were late leaving the talk for home, and dropped by Dominoes Pizza for a special $7.99 large pizza with 3 toppings (Philly Steak, Pepperoni, and Canadian bacon). That way we could eat as soon as we got home.
Finally, with John’s help, I got my transmitter for my heart set up tonight, so it will now be in contact with the doctor and technicians in the Yakima Heart Center. The monitoring and sending unit (needs a landline phone), named Latitude™ for a reason that eludes us. Why not, from mythology, Mercury, Zephyrus, or Iris?
Below are all my captures of the evening’s presentation put on You Tube.
Nick Zentner’s #4 Lecture 3-2-16
Snoqualmie Pass Geology
This one above has some interesting topography noted by the geologic timing the Yakima Glacier was retreating and created a bunch of moraines along the I-90 corridor. Dates for the moraines from the Yakima Glacier follow: near Thorp & Rocky Canyon, over 500,000 years ago, Indian John Hill, 130, 000, Suncadia, 80,000, Golf Course Road, 56,000, Keechelus Dam, 18,000, and Hyak, 11,000 years ago. It is expected that there were/are more but evidence of some get wiped out by more recent ice advances.
Thursday, Mar 3
For Mar 2 CPAP. Reported figures 7 hrs 28 min with AHI=0.13. Events: 1 H, 1 CSR, 13 RERA. No major mask leaks (max=6 L/min); oximeter on entire time AOK.
I finally figured out the count for today and called in 8 but they decided to set up 9 chairs. It worked because Haley had a seat next to her mom, when she wasn’t running around visiting.
I set up a few copies of the audience music. Not very many folks at the rehab are capable of following. I was limited by the faulty printer wifi connection and happy I had printed copies last night from my computer, because this morning I was unable to access the printer from my computer. I shall leave a note for John to fix when he gets home (he left for pruning before 8:00), and then I can finish later for next week’s group — who are right with it, and even able to eat and drink their favors presented by the activities director, Mo, who makes an event out of our visits.
I sent in the Boston Scientific Paperwork for my Latitude unit.
We both filled our cars with gas today in Ellensburg, at $1.87 / gallon.
Friday, Mar 4
For Mar 3 CPAP. Reported figures 7 hrs 5 min with AHI=1.27. Events: 9 H, 1 CSR, 13 RERA. No major mask leaks (max=13 L/min); oximeter on entire time AOK.
John stayed home from pruning so that Cameron Fries could go visit a Seattle area farmer’s market to sell his wine and fresh eggs. He has chickens to eat bugs in the vineyard. Another vendor was selling “free range organic eggs” for $9/dz. Cameron doesn’t claim “organic” and sells a few dozen each weekend for $6. Now, he is going to take along a bundle of vine canes because another vendor told him he could sell them to those interested in home crafts. On the web, we found this item list at $60.
John thinks he’ll make a couple with local items (Pine cones and river pebbles) for Cameron to take over. People can add a pretty bow to suit their artistic sense – that’s a selling point, not a flaw.
Minutes ticked away today as I worked on my computer and on chores – while sending up (slow process) the last of the videotaping I had done last Wednesday night of Nick Zentner’s last lecture this year for the community.
Just before 3:00 today, I rushed out the door to pick up my friend Gloria {lives next door to the speaker} to attend a 4:00 p.m. Science Colloquium with Elvin Delgado speaking on the subject of Natural Gas Fracking in the large field in the Patagonia region (Vaca Muerta) of Argentina—with all the associated socio-economic-political-environmental problems. One small town nearby went from 3000 people in 2011 to 15,000 in 2015. There are insufficient services or money to provide such things as sewage and water for all of the inhabitants. The cost of housing is quite high. For a little shack it’s $3,500/ month. Locals cannot afford to stay in the town because of the high prices and degradation of the environment.
For many years, natural gas deposits were tapped by single wells drilled vertically down (sometimes 1500′) to pockets of gas. Subsequent /recent technology came up with “fracking,” a combination method using water and chemicals to extract the natural gas (methane) trapped in shales. This process is toxic to human health and that of the environment. One fracking well uses ~2 to 8 million gallons of water and 10 to 40,000 gallons of chemicals. The water used is contaminated forever.
Vaca Muerta translates to Dead Cow in Spanish, and is a geologic formation of Jurassic and Cretaceous age at the red spot above on the map of Argentina. It holds major reserve deposits of shale oil and shale gas. This discovery occurred in 2010. Total expected reserves are over 920 million barrels. Production is close to 45,000 barrels per day. Issues of getting the reserves out of the ground and into the economy are complicated by many factors. The presentation was an eye opener to many there, I’m sure. Dr. Delgado returns this July to continue his research. There, in July, it is winter time.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
From John: Argentina is a basket case:
More wrong with Argentina than a little fracking
. . . and the real issue is lack of good government. But that’s a different story.
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While in town, I stopped by Dairy Queen to pick up a Peace Symbol necklace from a gal who offered it on the BNE site, and I was chosen to receive it. Her name is Tashia (pronounced, TASIA, Asia with a T). I was on Alder on my way to take Gloria home, so I stopped off to deposit my blue massage tool giveaway to a gal named Nung, using a hand-off at the apartment of her brother-in-law, to save us both a long trip to or from town (she lives in Badger Pocket).
Earlier this week, while searching for clothes to wash and put in the clothing share, I found a Nike biking shirt in our things. I cleaned it, and offered it to my friend, Glenn, and I passed it to his mom this week when we met in a Jazzercise class. He took his photo in it to thank me, and I got his permission to print it here. The collage below shows the items received or given this week, and you already saw the vase at the start. Actually, Gloria was with me when I picked up two medicine bottles Wednesday and gave me another from her stash (described below the photo).
Here’s an explanation of the collage of receives and gives above. On the left you will have to use your imagination. The top two containers I received from the BNE site, and you need to imagine the smaller one is actually larger and orange, and was given to me by Gloria, after she was with me to pick up the top two, and heard my story of wanting to combine my vitamin supplements from smaller bottles to larger ones. The second photo of the Peace Symbol necklace is described in the text above and below. This symbol was originally designed for the British nuclear disarmament movement, and thus carries a lot of protest baggage. A dove and an olive branch is a nicer peace symbol. Yes. No. Maybe.
Doves and Olives
The third photo is of a massage tool for sore muscles from exercise or stress, which I gave to the person also described above the photo, and the fourth is Glenn in his new cycling shirt.
Saturday, Mar 5
For Mar 4 CPAP. Reported figures 7 hrs 59 min with AHI=0.63. Events: 5 H, 7 CSR, 12 RERA. No major mask leaks (max=13 L/min); oximeter on entire time AOK.
A morning funny–As John was leaving late for morning chores, he reminded me he had asked for a haircut a couple weeks ago, and I hadn’t worked it into my schedule. I said, well, I can do it this weekend, because I am free. He laughed out loud, and said, “How many 72-year old women could make that statement?” Well, I am happy I can! However, even with nothing scheduled out of the house, I will stay busy until late trying to catch up on all the organization awaiting me for my social calendar. We were just talking yesterday on his day off from pruning at White Heron, that he no longer had time with his busy schedule of chores here ever to read paperbacks anymore. With that said, he went out to prune our plum trees, as I went off to town late afternoon.
Sunny today, so John is outside now doing chores, after loading the wood stove for my warmth and emptying the clean dishes from the dishwasher so I can add more to be cleaned. I am splitting house chores between working on the blog, sorting receipts, (just located the last of the AMEX cash rebate payments for Costco, which we have to pick up next week when there, for $89.00). It is now in my wallet!! The coupon arrives the end of February with our credit card statement and we must cash it in at the Union Gap (south of Yakima) store.
The last chore took me awhile, but I was finally successful. Packed my Latitude Boston Scientific transmitter that sends data from my defibrillator to my cardiologist’s office. It was replaced because it quit working, and I had to repack the old in the packing box to send via FedEx back to St. Paul, MN. (They sent me the proper address label so it doesn’t cost me). I had to speak to a representative in the Dominican Republic to arrange for the pick up on Monday morning at my front door. In the process of the transaction I got to know him and he invited me to his country where he would give me a tour. Now I’m curious to find a traveling friend to make the trip to an rci.com resort near where he lives. Looks as if the country is about 200 miles east west and ~ 70 miles (in the smallest section from Santa Domingo) north-south. Might be money well spent for a week away, even though it would be a lot of time on an airplane. I’m tempted. He gave me his email and his Facebook name and encourage me to write him. He is 24. He’s already been communicating since he got home from work tonight. We are earlier than they are by 4 hours.
I had the windows open today, and heard geese flying over and honking and also a frog croaking. John was out and says this flock had 7 – heading west. Earlier he saw 12 heading north but they were too far east of here and I did not hear them.
We now have rain and just finished a seafood dinner — coconut shrimp, beer-battered cod, and pears. We will have very berry pie for dessert.
Hope your week was fine.
Nancy and John
Still on the Naneum Fan
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Meanwhile, to end this week’s blog, here are the links to all the excellent Geology lectures put on by Nick Zentner since 2010.
This came in an email today from the source, CWU Geology professor, Nick Zentner. “Many have requested a complete list of the lectures. Please see below.”
Rather than take two hours to put these links in WordPress, just copy paste the links after the title, if you are interested in viewing. Those without links (except 2010) I may well have and put into the blog at the time, as with the first below, in this week’s blog.
Mar 3, 2016 25. Snoqualmie Pass Geology
Feb 24, 2016 24. Bing Crosby, the Sunset Highway, & the Channeled Scablands
Feb 17, 2016 23. Liberty Gold & the Yellowstone Hot Spot: Is there a Connection? https://youtu.be/MXEQeTg0Xww
Feb 10, 2016 22. Great Earthquakes of the Pacific Northwest: Are we really overdue? https://youtu.be/UJ7Qc3bsxjI
Mar 18, 2015 21. Earthquake Research in Washington
Mar 11, 2015 20. Gold Mining in Liberty https://youtu.be/QsBZfRJihdw
Mar 4, 2015 19. Columbia River Gorge Geology
Feb 25, 2015 18. Seattle to North Bend: I-90 Geology
June 12, 2013 17. Palouse Falls & Dry Falls https://youtu.be/F8zLwXfxS7w
June 5, 2013 16. Wenatchee Ice Age Floods https://youtu.be/8Sbxn94vLWM
May 29, 2013 15. Yakima River Canyon https://youtu.be/0o19BMrPmhs
May 22, 2013 14. Ginkgo Petrified Forest https://youtu.be/nfbMxrPnYcc
May 15, 2013 13. Ellensburg Blue Agates https://youtu.be/j8BFvKoabJ0
Nov 17, 2010 12. Geology of Kittitas Valley https://youtu.be/v6LtXsViDNI
Nov 10, 2010 11. Floods of Lava & Water https://youtu.be/ZgVmW_OAB0s
Nov 3, 2010 10. Mount Rainier https://youtu.be/YcSPrk9l22I
Oct 27, 2010 9. Slow Earthquakes https://youtu.be/r9recENBhiU
Oct 20, 2010 8. Tsunami in our Future https://youtu.be/QAtheBYU9Xs
Oct 13, 2010 7. Mount Stuart https://youtu.be/k70sjpHwJnU
June 9, 2010 6. Glaciers in Kittitas County
June 2, 2010 5. Cascade Volcanoes in Washington
May 26, 2010 4. Columbia River Basalts in Washington
May 19, 2010 3. Shallow Earthquakes in Washington
May 12, 2010 2. Magnitude 9.0 Earthquakes in Washington
May 5, 2010 1. Building Washington Piece by Piece