21.10.10

Space Travelers
 In general, lichens are considered extremophiles. Many can survive extreme environments - even conditions of excessive radiation and temperatures that would kill most other organisms in moments. In order to test the possibility of a lichen surviving an interplanetary journey, in June 2005 the European Space Agency took a specimen of Elegant Sunburst Lichen (Xanthoria elegans) into space. After being exposed directly to all the perils of space for 14.6 days, it was returned to earth for testing. There was a full rate of survival and an unchanged ability to photosynthesize.


- Joe Walewski

18.10.10

A system, which is too perfect, is also too rigid because it does not need to evolve... One moves from rigid and brittle rocks, within the upper layer to ductile rocks below that can deform in a continuous fashion under the action of tectonic forces. Contrary to what is often assumed, the weak and imperfect parts are often those that allow the evolution to occur without any revolution... We tend to dissociate the individuals who are well adapted to our social life from those that have difficulties to follow the pace that is imposed on them by our life style. Yet a society that separates the producers from the others considered dead weight, even as marginal or excluded individuals, is a hard society, characterized by conflicts and often by complete rejection of minorities.

- Xavier Le Pichon

15.10.10

Muddy clouds cream the sky.
Worry. Sun glows bloody orange.
Relief - Prescribed burn. 

13.10.10

Puffballs and Pennies

I've been thinking about seeing. There are lots of things to see, unwrapped gifts and free surprises. The world is fairly studded and strewn with pennies cast broadside from a generous hand. But - and this is the point - who gets excited by a mere penny? ... It is dire poverty indeed when a man is so malnourished and fatigued that he won't stoop to pick up a penny. But if you cultivate a healthy poverty and simplicity, so that finding a penny will literally make your day, then, since the world is in fact planted in pennies, you have with your poverty bought a lifetime of days.
- Annie Dillard

12.10.10



"In the vaunted works of art, the master-stroke is nature's part."

- Ralph Waldo Emerson

11.10.10

'All men are created equal; but no place more than in a sauna'
- Unknown

7.10.10


It really upsets me for people to fall in love with beautiful areas and use them as places to play. It's very sad if our culture only sees wilderness as a place to play. What wilderness should be doing is speaking to our souls and teaching us about being quiet, and learning and thinking and respecting the world we live in. It should remind us that there's where everything we have comes from.

- Bill Mason

6.10.10


October 6 Morning Walk:

It's a beautiful day in this neighborhood, 
A beautiful day for a neighbor, 
Would you be mine? 
Could you be mine? 



It's a neighborly day in this beautywood, 

A neighborly day for a beauty, 
Would you be mine? 
Could you be mine? 



I have always wanted to have a neighbor just like you,
I've always wanted to live in a neighborhood with you.
 



So let's make the most of this beautiful day, 

Since we're together, we might as well say, 
Would you be mine? 
Could you be mine? 
Won't you be my neighbor?

- Mister Rogers

5.10.10

3.10.10


In this way, while I am charmed without by the sweet influence of the beauty of the country, I have not less delight within reflecting on the mysteries which are hidden beneath it.
- Bernard of Clairvaux