Far away, in a distant galaxy, there lives a kind old man who has a small country cottage, surrounded by flowers, where he raises beautiful kittens. One day, not long ago, the old man fell down, and he knew, as he fell, that he was falling because the world had lost its proper ups and downs. Later, the old man thought long upon it, and realized that his planet had been invaded by aliens who were upsetting the balance of the natural ups and downs.
The old man thought some more about it. Was he being called by the Path to save the world from the evil aliens? The answer came to him as a voice in a dream, “No, old man, you are not the one to save the world, you just have to save the old women who live near you, of whom there are many, and they are being sorely attacked by viruses, worms, adware, spyware, and even the dreaded Trojans.”
The old man went to see a great wizard who lives in a nearby village. “Oh Great Wizard, High Holy Fizzishun, please tell me how I am to save the old women from viruses, worms, adware, spyware, and even the dreaded Trojans,” pleaded the old man.
Holding out a small bottle filled with small, white, perfectly formed pebbles, the High Holy Fizzishun said, “Take one of these after breakfast and another after dinner. They will give you a great power.”
The next morning, after a simple breakfast of porridge, the old man took one of the small pebbles out of the bottle, looked at it with some doubt showing on his wrinkled old face, but then placed it on his tongue and swallowed the pebble. Nothing happened.
About thirty minutes later the old man felt a flea bite his ankle. “Drat,” he said, for the old man did not care for fleas or their bites. But then another bit him on the same ankle. Then, as he reached down to scratch his ankle, something started tickling the inside of his ear. Soon, his eyelids were burning, his lips were burning, his nostrils were burning, and so were all the edges of the rest of his body's orifices. The he noticed his skin was turning red, not just ordinary red but RED red.
And at that moment, the old man became The Scarlet Geezer, protector of old women against the evil attacks of viruses, worms, adware, spyware, and even the dreaded Trojans.
Monday, July 27, 2009
Saturday, June 20, 2009
Raising Kids
About ten feet outside the window in front of the treadmill are two bird feeders: one with sunflower seed and the other with our home-made 'birdyburger', highly prized by woodpeckers. I generally walk at about 3:00 pm and there is seldom much bird activity at that time of the day unless the weather is cold.
As I trudged along on the treadmill, a nice bright male Purple Finch landed on the feeder, followed shortly by two fledglings. The two fledglings began the baby bird begging routine, opening their beaks upward and fluttering their wings. The male pulled a few sunflower seeds out of the feeder and dropped them on the bottom tray. Still, the fledglings begged. After a few minutes the male flew off, quickly followed by the fledglings.
A few minutes later the same routine began again: the male landed, the fledglings followed, and then the fledglings started begging. This time, though, one of the fledglings caught on, and it started eating sunflower seeds on its own, while its sibling continued to beg. After a few minutes the male left again, followed by the begging fledgling. The fledgling that had learned to feed itself, though, stayed at the feeder and continued to eat.
About ten minutes later the male reappeared, followed by a fledgling. The first fledgling, now named Ralph in my internal report of the show, continued to eat, and the second fledgling, now named Carrot, continued to beg. Again, the male left, followed by Carrot, and, later, yet again the two returned. Still, Carrot only begged, and still, Ralph was standing in the same place, eating seed after seed. Finally, Carrot learned to feed herself, while Ralph continued to eat.
This is all pretty interesting, if you are walking on a treadmill and have nothing else to occupy your interest. The male was teaching the fledglings to eat sunflower seeds, which is pretty complex behavior from a brain the size of a BB.
As I trudged along on the treadmill, a nice bright male Purple Finch landed on the feeder, followed shortly by two fledglings. The two fledglings began the baby bird begging routine, opening their beaks upward and fluttering their wings. The male pulled a few sunflower seeds out of the feeder and dropped them on the bottom tray. Still, the fledglings begged. After a few minutes the male flew off, quickly followed by the fledglings.
A few minutes later the same routine began again: the male landed, the fledglings followed, and then the fledglings started begging. This time, though, one of the fledglings caught on, and it started eating sunflower seeds on its own, while its sibling continued to beg. After a few minutes the male left again, followed by the begging fledgling. The fledgling that had learned to feed itself, though, stayed at the feeder and continued to eat.
About ten minutes later the male reappeared, followed by a fledgling. The first fledgling, now named Ralph in my internal report of the show, continued to eat, and the second fledgling, now named Carrot, continued to beg. Again, the male left, followed by Carrot, and, later, yet again the two returned. Still, Carrot only begged, and still, Ralph was standing in the same place, eating seed after seed. Finally, Carrot learned to feed herself, while Ralph continued to eat.
This is all pretty interesting, if you are walking on a treadmill and have nothing else to occupy your interest. The male was teaching the fledglings to eat sunflower seeds, which is pretty complex behavior from a brain the size of a BB.
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Disappearing Ducks
Monday morning I went out to do chores and found Babette's gosling and two young ducks dead in the rabbitry. Another young duck was in the barn, and the remaining ducks had disappeared. They still haven't reappeared, so I assume something hauled off half a dozen half grown ducks, all in one night. My next project is fencing.
Thursday, April 23, 2009
Gosling
What is it with Babette's gosling? He likes ducks. Twice, in one morning, I have taken him out of the rabbitry, where the ten young ducks are making a terrible mess, and put him back with his mother. [The him is generic, I don't know the sex.] He is is all muddy and his mother is distressed. One day old, and already he makes troubles.
Sunday, April 12, 2009
Geese
There was a country song about what's a girl do with a cowboy when he won't go away. Babette Goose has that problem, only her cowboy is a duck. The duck, the only duck remaining after a series of varmint raids, is a drake, and, with none of his own kind around, he has fallen in love with Babette. Babette, like any self-respecting goose, hates him.
Babette is setting on her nest (I checked, setting, not sitting, is correct in this circumstance), faithfully incubating her eggs. Her cowboy stays with her around the clock, staying about five feet away. If he comes any closer she becomes enraged and attacks him. Geese, especially those setting on eggs, have, for the most part, only two emotional states, disdain and rage.
Bebe, who was sharing a nest with Beth, has built a new nest in the barn next to the spot where the dogs sleep. Bebe tolerates Weasel but hates Ruby, so Weasel can sleep in her normal place in the barn, but poor Ruby spends a lot of time shivering on the porch, waiting for an opportunity to sneak past Bebe to a comfortable spot in the barn. I would like to put the duckies in a stall, but the door of the stall I want to put them in is less than three feet from Bebe's nest. Bebe has a history of poor choices in nesting sites.
Beth's nest is in a small stall in the barn, the same place she has used for years. Beth is older than the other geese, and is of a different family line. If you listen carefully to their vocalizations, you will notice that Beth has an accent. Different clans of geese have different dialects.
Beth is also the only one in the flock that was human-imprinted when she hatched. Beth hatched in an incubator, and the first moving thing she saw, other than her siblings, was me. She accepts me as a clan member, sort of. The other three geese hatched under their mothers in a friend's flock. They put up with me, although Beauregard, the gander, is not about to let me come between him and his ladies.
Geese can live for thirty or forty years, so it is possible to get to know them fairly well as individuals. Bebe and Beth have lived here for five or six years and annually have carried out a routine in which Bebe builds a nest next to Beth's, and then steals Beth's eggs, a few each day. One year I put a divider between them and they both hatched broods, but Bebe somehow attracted all the goslings to her nest, where they then spent their nights for the next six weeks or so. During the day, though, they spent most of their time with Beth, who is the flock's self-appointed day care provider.
Day care, in a gaggle, consists of following the goslings and sounding an alarm if they wander into trouble. Goslings are independent, adventurous, and perfectly bite-sized for possums, coons, bobcats, coyotes, and overly enthusiastic Labrador Retrievers. Beth faithfully follows the goslings in their explorations, calling to Beauregard for help when things start to get out of hand, so to speak.
Goslings like to swim; adults don't care about swimming at all, although they like to bathe daily. Goslings, when several weeks old, will start finding their way down through the woods to the pond. Mind, they can't see the pond from the lawn, but they know water is downhill, and they go to the pond. The goslings will spend the entire day playing in the water, exciting the snapping turtles, and the adults will stay on the shore, never entering the water. Once the goslings grow their adult feathers they no longer care about swimming and, like their more sedate parents, bathe in a tub I provide for the purpose and stop visiting the pond.
The gander instructs the goslings in manners. When a gosling crosses in front of the gander they must stop, face the gander, execute a deep bow, and then go on their way. If they fail to do so the gander pinches them, hard. Some ganders are martinets, demanding the goslings stay in line when marching out to graze, and others are easy-going, allowing the goslings to scatter and be noisy. This will be Beauregard's first year as chief, and only, gander in the yard. He seems to be calm enough.
The goose eggs in the incubator started on March 16, the 75th day of the year. Goose eggs take about 32 days (if I remember correctly, I don't have internet service at the moment, so I can't check). Adding 32 and 75 yields 107, and the 107th day of the year is Friday, April 17. Less than two weeks now. Babette's eggs should hatch in the week after the eggs in the incubator hatch.
At least twice each day I open the incubator, roll the eggs around a bit, and then lightly spray the goose eggs with a water. I don't bother to try and turn each egg exactly 180°, I just roll them around some, and talk to them. There is a pan of water in the incubator that helps provide some humidity, but goose eggs like it a bit more damp than do chicken eggs, and there are eighteen chicken eggs in there with the eleven goose eggs.
I'm not planning on keeping any of the goslings over next winter. The only reason I keep geese is that I enjoy watching them cruise across the lawn; our heavy navy. Other than during nesting season, they are fair guardians. They seldom actually attack, but they can be very intimidating. Their eggs are great, I think. I eat them fried and like them, but most people prefer them in egg custards and baked goods.
Roast goose is a treat that everyone should have a chance to try, once. I might be wrong, but based on flavor I would guess that roast goose is a prize-winning cholesterol delivery system, although one should consider that the goose is primarily grass-fed, not corn-fed. I prefer roast goose to duck, certainly, but duck eggs are better eating than are goose eggs.
Eating roast goose is a wonderful experience; preparing a goose for roasting is not. Geese are covered with goose down, and plucking it all out can take an hour or more. Goose down tends to plug up plucking machines, so commercial processors don't like to do them, either.
The easiest way to pluck a goose I have found is to first pluck out all the large feathers, using the normal hot water dip first, except you will need to put some detergent in the water to cut through the oil in the feathers. After you have only down left, coat the entire goose with hot wax, allow the wax to harden, and peel it off. After you do this several times, you finally have a goose that can wear a bikini to the roasting pan.
Babette is setting on her nest (I checked, setting, not sitting, is correct in this circumstance), faithfully incubating her eggs. Her cowboy stays with her around the clock, staying about five feet away. If he comes any closer she becomes enraged and attacks him. Geese, especially those setting on eggs, have, for the most part, only two emotional states, disdain and rage.
Bebe, who was sharing a nest with Beth, has built a new nest in the barn next to the spot where the dogs sleep. Bebe tolerates Weasel but hates Ruby, so Weasel can sleep in her normal place in the barn, but poor Ruby spends a lot of time shivering on the porch, waiting for an opportunity to sneak past Bebe to a comfortable spot in the barn. I would like to put the duckies in a stall, but the door of the stall I want to put them in is less than three feet from Bebe's nest. Bebe has a history of poor choices in nesting sites.
Beth's nest is in a small stall in the barn, the same place she has used for years. Beth is older than the other geese, and is of a different family line. If you listen carefully to their vocalizations, you will notice that Beth has an accent. Different clans of geese have different dialects.
Beth is also the only one in the flock that was human-imprinted when she hatched. Beth hatched in an incubator, and the first moving thing she saw, other than her siblings, was me. She accepts me as a clan member, sort of. The other three geese hatched under their mothers in a friend's flock. They put up with me, although Beauregard, the gander, is not about to let me come between him and his ladies.
Geese can live for thirty or forty years, so it is possible to get to know them fairly well as individuals. Bebe and Beth have lived here for five or six years and annually have carried out a routine in which Bebe builds a nest next to Beth's, and then steals Beth's eggs, a few each day. One year I put a divider between them and they both hatched broods, but Bebe somehow attracted all the goslings to her nest, where they then spent their nights for the next six weeks or so. During the day, though, they spent most of their time with Beth, who is the flock's self-appointed day care provider.
Day care, in a gaggle, consists of following the goslings and sounding an alarm if they wander into trouble. Goslings are independent, adventurous, and perfectly bite-sized for possums, coons, bobcats, coyotes, and overly enthusiastic Labrador Retrievers. Beth faithfully follows the goslings in their explorations, calling to Beauregard for help when things start to get out of hand, so to speak.
Goslings like to swim; adults don't care about swimming at all, although they like to bathe daily. Goslings, when several weeks old, will start finding their way down through the woods to the pond. Mind, they can't see the pond from the lawn, but they know water is downhill, and they go to the pond. The goslings will spend the entire day playing in the water, exciting the snapping turtles, and the adults will stay on the shore, never entering the water. Once the goslings grow their adult feathers they no longer care about swimming and, like their more sedate parents, bathe in a tub I provide for the purpose and stop visiting the pond.
The gander instructs the goslings in manners. When a gosling crosses in front of the gander they must stop, face the gander, execute a deep bow, and then go on their way. If they fail to do so the gander pinches them, hard. Some ganders are martinets, demanding the goslings stay in line when marching out to graze, and others are easy-going, allowing the goslings to scatter and be noisy. This will be Beauregard's first year as chief, and only, gander in the yard. He seems to be calm enough.
The goose eggs in the incubator started on March 16, the 75th day of the year. Goose eggs take about 32 days (if I remember correctly, I don't have internet service at the moment, so I can't check). Adding 32 and 75 yields 107, and the 107th day of the year is Friday, April 17. Less than two weeks now. Babette's eggs should hatch in the week after the eggs in the incubator hatch.
At least twice each day I open the incubator, roll the eggs around a bit, and then lightly spray the goose eggs with a water. I don't bother to try and turn each egg exactly 180°, I just roll them around some, and talk to them. There is a pan of water in the incubator that helps provide some humidity, but goose eggs like it a bit more damp than do chicken eggs, and there are eighteen chicken eggs in there with the eleven goose eggs.
I'm not planning on keeping any of the goslings over next winter. The only reason I keep geese is that I enjoy watching them cruise across the lawn; our heavy navy. Other than during nesting season, they are fair guardians. They seldom actually attack, but they can be very intimidating. Their eggs are great, I think. I eat them fried and like them, but most people prefer them in egg custards and baked goods.
Roast goose is a treat that everyone should have a chance to try, once. I might be wrong, but based on flavor I would guess that roast goose is a prize-winning cholesterol delivery system, although one should consider that the goose is primarily grass-fed, not corn-fed. I prefer roast goose to duck, certainly, but duck eggs are better eating than are goose eggs.
Eating roast goose is a wonderful experience; preparing a goose for roasting is not. Geese are covered with goose down, and plucking it all out can take an hour or more. Goose down tends to plug up plucking machines, so commercial processors don't like to do them, either.
The easiest way to pluck a goose I have found is to first pluck out all the large feathers, using the normal hot water dip first, except you will need to put some detergent in the water to cut through the oil in the feathers. After you have only down left, coat the entire goose with hot wax, allow the wax to harden, and peel it off. After you do this several times, you finally have a goose that can wear a bikini to the roasting pan.
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
TIA
I think it was a Transient Ischemic Attack, known in the doctoring trade as a TIA. Whatever it was, it was one of the damnedest experiences I've ever had, with or without the influences of strange medical, commercial, or recreational drugs. It only lasted about twenty minutes, which was long enough, and I do not care to repeat the experience.
There isn't any residual effect as far as I can tell. I can remember my children's names, my address and phone number, and I can look on my wrist to see what day it is. (Wikipedia has an article about TIA.) The experience, for me, was almost entirely visual. I was working on Rene's computer when I lost the ability to look to the left of center, I would have to turn my head to look to the left. I checked, and it was the same with either eye closed. As it progressed, I became locked in, visually, on the close box in the upper right corner of a window. I couldn't look away at anything else for more than an instant, and then my focus snapped back to that little 'X' in the corner. Again, it was the same with either eye closed, which told me that something was probably occurring in the brain, not the eye or optic nerve.
During all this I was able to clearly describe the sensations I was experiencing to Rene'. About five minutes after it started, I was able to start moving my eyes off the little 'X' and look to the right of me. I realized I was sweating profusely and slipped off my jacket. Then Rene' suggested I go to the living room and sit in a reclining chair. I was light-headed, and there was a very loud but inaudible buzzing going on in my head, but I was able to stand and walk about 20' into the next room and sit down in a chair.
After sitting for a while I finally stopped sweating and my vision cleared up. I wasn't dead, and didn't feel like I was dying, so I got up, went out to my car, and drove home. That was a mistake. I didn't run over any dogs or children, but my wife was not happy with me. She thought I should have called her to pick me up. Hell, I figured out I was invincible when I was a teenager, so there was nothing to worry about.
After much insistence by my spouse, I ended up in the emergency room about ten hours after the attack. Becky, the nurse who took care of me there, looked a lot like Julia Roberts, only younger, so it wasn't a bad experience at all. The doc, though, decided I needed to stay in the hospital for a few days. While there I was poked, prodded, scanned, and screwed around, but nothing particularly painful was done.
The main problem was the food. I would rather eat stewed possum than most hospital food. No salt, no fats, and all vegetables boiled for at least an hour before being well cooled and served. Red beans and brown rice would have been a lot more edible.
The admission process was very interesting, especially the part where they tried to compile a list of my current medications. I keep a spreadsheet with my current meds on www.GeezerNet.com. Anybody should have been able to fire up their web browser, point it at GeezerNet, enter the username and password I give them, and navigate straight to my current medications page.
I run GeezerNet, both .com and .US, on a very old server I own that sits in a laundry room in the back of an old building next to the library in Oskaloosa. It is not an ideal setting for a server, nor is the server reliable. The general unreliability of the whole setup became apparent when I went into the hospital, and discovered that www.GeezerNet.com was not available.
With no written record of my current medications available, it was Friday evening and both my primary physician's office and the cardiologist's officer were closed, nor could the ER at Lawrence memorial search access the data sets except by a telephone request from human to human, so it became their duty to somehow extract from me a complete and accurate list of my current medications. Remember, I'm in there because something went wrong in my brain.
The staff was courteous, pleasant, and professional, and I estimated that the average cost for their time was about $150 per hour (that is cost, not pay rate). If that is a valid assumption, then the approximately 90 minutes spent by three nurses, two pharmacists, and two physicians in determining my current medications, cost all of us $225. That $225 never appears on any bill or report, because it is just ordinary overhead, so it is never noticed as an incredible waste of money.
GeezerNet could be hosted on a commercial hosting site for less than $60 per year, so I could have had it in a secure and reliable environment for three years for less money than it cost the health care system to find my current medications. If I couldn't have given them the password to my health records, the primary care physician I see has it, and so does my wife, who was with me.
There is no reason I can see, other than mass organizational myopia, for the records of the hospital, the physicians' offices, and the pharmacies, to not be available to each other and the ER of every hospital. Our health care system does not have a IT infrastructure. By clinging to the same narrow visions of information technology that characterized the decline of the mainframe computer, the health care system has severely inhibited it's ability to develop an information infrastructure. And that is costing all of us money that doesn't need to be spent.
And that was what I was thinking about most of the time I was in the hospital, being examined because something went wrong in my brain.
There isn't any residual effect as far as I can tell. I can remember my children's names, my address and phone number, and I can look on my wrist to see what day it is. (Wikipedia has an article about TIA.) The experience, for me, was almost entirely visual. I was working on Rene's computer when I lost the ability to look to the left of center, I would have to turn my head to look to the left. I checked, and it was the same with either eye closed. As it progressed, I became locked in, visually, on the close box in the upper right corner of a window. I couldn't look away at anything else for more than an instant, and then my focus snapped back to that little 'X' in the corner. Again, it was the same with either eye closed, which told me that something was probably occurring in the brain, not the eye or optic nerve.
During all this I was able to clearly describe the sensations I was experiencing to Rene'. About five minutes after it started, I was able to start moving my eyes off the little 'X' and look to the right of me. I realized I was sweating profusely and slipped off my jacket. Then Rene' suggested I go to the living room and sit in a reclining chair. I was light-headed, and there was a very loud but inaudible buzzing going on in my head, but I was able to stand and walk about 20' into the next room and sit down in a chair.
After sitting for a while I finally stopped sweating and my vision cleared up. I wasn't dead, and didn't feel like I was dying, so I got up, went out to my car, and drove home. That was a mistake. I didn't run over any dogs or children, but my wife was not happy with me. She thought I should have called her to pick me up. Hell, I figured out I was invincible when I was a teenager, so there was nothing to worry about.
After much insistence by my spouse, I ended up in the emergency room about ten hours after the attack. Becky, the nurse who took care of me there, looked a lot like Julia Roberts, only younger, so it wasn't a bad experience at all. The doc, though, decided I needed to stay in the hospital for a few days. While there I was poked, prodded, scanned, and screwed around, but nothing particularly painful was done.
The main problem was the food. I would rather eat stewed possum than most hospital food. No salt, no fats, and all vegetables boiled for at least an hour before being well cooled and served. Red beans and brown rice would have been a lot more edible.
The admission process was very interesting, especially the part where they tried to compile a list of my current medications. I keep a spreadsheet with my current meds on www.GeezerNet.com. Anybody should have been able to fire up their web browser, point it at GeezerNet, enter the username and password I give them, and navigate straight to my current medications page.
I run GeezerNet, both .com and .US, on a very old server I own that sits in a laundry room in the back of an old building next to the library in Oskaloosa. It is not an ideal setting for a server, nor is the server reliable. The general unreliability of the whole setup became apparent when I went into the hospital, and discovered that www.GeezerNet.com was not available.
With no written record of my current medications available, it was Friday evening and both my primary physician's office and the cardiologist's officer were closed, nor could the ER at Lawrence memorial search access the data sets except by a telephone request from human to human, so it became their duty to somehow extract from me a complete and accurate list of my current medications. Remember, I'm in there because something went wrong in my brain.
The staff was courteous, pleasant, and professional, and I estimated that the average cost for their time was about $150 per hour (that is cost, not pay rate). If that is a valid assumption, then the approximately 90 minutes spent by three nurses, two pharmacists, and two physicians in determining my current medications, cost all of us $225. That $225 never appears on any bill or report, because it is just ordinary overhead, so it is never noticed as an incredible waste of money.
GeezerNet could be hosted on a commercial hosting site for less than $60 per year, so I could have had it in a secure and reliable environment for three years for less money than it cost the health care system to find my current medications. If I couldn't have given them the password to my health records, the primary care physician I see has it, and so does my wife, who was with me.
There is no reason I can see, other than mass organizational myopia, for the records of the hospital, the physicians' offices, and the pharmacies, to not be available to each other and the ER of every hospital. Our health care system does not have a IT infrastructure. By clinging to the same narrow visions of information technology that characterized the decline of the mainframe computer, the health care system has severely inhibited it's ability to develop an information infrastructure. And that is costing all of us money that doesn't need to be spent.
And that was what I was thinking about most of the time I was in the hospital, being examined because something went wrong in my brain.
Saturday, March 7, 2009
Barn News 03-07-09
The first goose egg of the year appeared! Babette had been hanging out in a likely spot, and sure enough, she has started laying. I need to mark the egg with indelible marker and leave it in the nest, but I will take out the next 6 or 7 eggs, probably. Some geese, some years, will lay 30 or 40 eggs. Other years it's 15 or 20. Fifteen eggs is generally a good number for any bird to incubate. The trick is to put eggs in the incubator the same day the goose starts setting so that they all hatch at the same time.
A nice lady in Maryland sent me an email offering to ship 12 bantam White Crested Black Polish hatching eggs for $35, shipping included. She has a nice, clean web site, Brook Valley Farm. The eggs should ship March 23.
It's time to till the garden, in fact it is past time to till the garden. Spring tilling is something you do when the soil is ready for tilling: not too wet, not too dry, and not frozen. If everything is just right on a Wednesday, then do it on Wednesday, because it might rain on Thursday.
Sally had baby bunnies today!
A nice lady in Maryland sent me an email offering to ship 12 bantam White Crested Black Polish hatching eggs for $35, shipping included. She has a nice, clean web site, Brook Valley Farm. The eggs should ship March 23.
It's time to till the garden, in fact it is past time to till the garden. Spring tilling is something you do when the soil is ready for tilling: not too wet, not too dry, and not frozen. If everything is just right on a Wednesday, then do it on Wednesday, because it might rain on Thursday.
Sally had baby bunnies today!
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