Thursday, April 22, 2021

Earth Day 2021

 Greetings Fellow Inhabitants of Biosphere One.  Happy Earth Day to you all.  Things are looking a little dire these days.  I guess some good news is that Bolsonaro said he would put a stop to burning and cutting down the Amazon if the US gave him a billion dollars.  No word on President Biden's response to this most gracious offer.  

NYT did an article about how people are being affected by climate change.  The primary thread among the accounts was rising water, weird storms, fire, and terrible air quality caused by fire.  It's a long read, but very revelatory.  This one really hit home with me, having just left the full time RV life style and moved to a locale that's running out of water.

Five years ago my husband and I divested our real estate holdings for a life on the road. We tow an Airstream with a clean-diesel Ram truck. We meet people who live on the fringe of society, some who are running from disasters like fires, earthquakes, storm surges and hurricanes. An older couple we met lost their first house in the Northridge earthquake, and their second in the Santa Rosa wildfire. They wander from state to state in their truck and trailer with no plans to settle down permanently. A professor at U.C. Santa Barbara tells me his house will soon be off the grid because of rising tides. He and his wife are practicing living in a trailer. At a glance, they appear to be older retired people out having a good time, but they are already on the run.— Carmen Beaubeaux, On the road

The bloom this year has been paltry.  There are not a lot of blossoms, and they're short lived.  Even the steenking Palo Verdes seem to be cutting back on flowering.  If we don't get monsoon this year, we're going to be in a heap of trouble.

The hedge hog next door.

These are the flowers of a Blue Palo Verde.  They have the good blossoms.



I used to know the name of this, but I've forgotten.  I think it was something's ear.  Lamb, maybe?

A fat cholla.


Vaccine rates were down 11% last week.  It wasn't due to a lack of vaccines.  It was the vaccine hesitant and the Covid deniers.  I just saw the following on twitter.  How do you reason with people who think this?


I will close with a picture of the pretty bantam cockerel who lives in Wales.  There used to be two of them, but a fox got one.  He's a feral bird, but he knows where the treats come from.  The photo was screen scraped from Going Gently.


That's it!  That's all I've got.

7 comments:

  1. My eyes are glad , this post has made them so! i would not like to live where water is not- we live in water, as you are aware, suits us really.

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  2. The cacti are beautiful, as always. I'm impressed at how well you can tell them all apart. To me, a cactus is a cactus, with the exception of prickly pears and a few others that really stand out.

    I have to believe whoever wrote that stuff about the kids coming up from the tunnels is deliberately spoofing us all. SURELY no one can be that stupid or misguided.

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    1. Think I might be with you on that one Steve, 1st time I read it my 1st thought was NAH, but then again it was on Parler, which is the land of stupid............


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    2. Remember the Jade Helm conspiracies that made the rounds in 2015? People thought US citizens were going to be rounded up and held prisoner in empty Walmarts. People really bought into it, including Ted Rafael Cruz.

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  3. amazing the crazy shit people will believe. and the cactus blooms and the palo verde are so lovely.

    the republicans who are so opposed to the migrants from south of our border and also opposed to mitigating global warming are going to be in for a shock when the whole planet starts to migrate, when even Americans in the southern regions of the country start moving north.

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  4. Right-o - and once he has his billion $$ all safely tucked away and starts on the rainforests again - what?? "You said you'd quit . . ." I hope y'all get a good monsoon this year.

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  5. Crazy knows no bounds with the far right loonies. There are just no words, assuming they aren't just trolling us. It is hard to tell a troll from a diehard crazy these days. Beautiful cactus flower photos!

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