Barefoot Days of Summer

Placing yesterday in a jar filled with flowers
Breathing in the scent; not counting the hours
I remember the gardens of long ago

Fields where the blue ragged robins grew
I flew my small kite; gazing into the blue
Yearning to climb on the wind to the sky.

Everywhere the wild, pink poppies thrived
The sun and the rain keeping them alive
Sharing the field with tall grasses and vines.

Years later,the wild field was replaced
A fenced boxwood garden has taken its place
Trespassing forbidden for child with a kite

KEEP OUT
CHILDHOOD OVER


by Chancy...

South Pacific

Just saw on PBS the "South Pacific’ in Concert from Carnegie Hall,” featuring Reba McEntire as Nellie Forbush. and Emile (Brian Stokes Mitchell). It was done in an entirely unique format. Like an opera rehearsal with the singers holding the sheet muxic and reading their lines.

Rather than detract from the story, this technique puts the emphasis on the show’s wonderful songs, including such melodies as “Some Enchanted Evening,” and “Younger than Springtime"

I remember seeing "South Pacific" for the first time about 1950 when a road company came to Atlanta. I have been enchanted by the music ever since. Tonight's performance was a reminder of the Broadway musicals of yesterday.

If PBS rebroadcasts this version of "South Pacific" tune in. If you love music you wont be disappointed.

And Reba was outstanding as "the little girl from Little Rock"

For more information click on title of post for PBS

They've got to be kidding..songbirds and grammar

I can't believe it. Another study . But this is one we really, really needed.
Notice that the researcher made 15,000 attempts before success.
Now the birds no longer tweet "I ain't singing" but they use proper grammar and sing " I am not singing"


Songbirds May Be Able to Learn Grammar
By SETH BORENSTEIN, AP Science Writer


The simplest grammar, long thought to be one of the skills that separate man from beast, can be taught to a common songbird, new research suggests.

Starlings learned to differentiate between a regular birdsong "sentence" and one containing a clause or another sentence of warbling, according to a study in Thursday's journal Nature.
It took University of California at San Diego psychology researcher Tim Gentner a month and about 15,000 training attempts, with food as a reward, to get the birds to recognize the most basic of grammar in their own bird language.
Yet what they learned may shake up the field of linguistics.But after training, nine out of Gentner's 11 songbirds picked out the bird song with inserted warbling or rattling bird phrases about 90 percent of the time.

Two continued to flunk grammar.

"We were dumbfounded that they could do as well as they did," Gentner said. "It's clear that they can do it."

Ref Desk

I have posted once before some time back about this incredible resource, "Ref Desk" A smorgasbord of information, quotes, newspaper links, magazines, games, you name it and it is there. Take a peek and bookmark it.
And don't hold it against RefDesk's owner that he is Matt Drudge's father. ;)


"On the Internet since 1995, refdesk indexes and reviews quality, credible, and timely reference resources that are free and family-friendly."

">Link http://www.refdesk.com/

Spring is here

Most of our small front yard at the townhouse is planted already with shrubs, liriope, dwarf mondo grass and ferns. The azaleas have just finished blooming, and are on the wane. They are a lovely deep pink color and were real showy for about two weeks. We also are blessed with 2 full grown red japanese maples and a large birch tree.

The guy who does our two seasons flower planting brought a combo of impatiens, blue pearl, white and a lavender pink color. In a few weeks they should be showing many blooms that will last throughout the summer. .This one small flower bed is by the front walk where we can see it from inside and enjoy it on our way outside.

Spring is really here.

Pulitzer Prize

Mike Luckovich, the editorial cartoonist for the Atlanta Journal Constitution, our local newspaper, won his second Pulitzer prize today for his editorial cartoons. Several of Mike's editorial cartoons were submitted but I suspect this one tipped the scales in his favor with the committee.

"including his Oct. 26 cartoon in which the letters in the word "Why?" are formed by the names of 2,000 American soldiers who have died in Iraq. Luckovich won his first Pultizer in 1995"

I noticed on the enlarged version of the WHY cartoon; third column over about 6th name from top is Casey Sheehan, Cindy Sheehan's son.

Luckovich's cartoons :


http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5346807
">Link http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5346807

Ordinary days

"Annie Dillard wrote, “How we spend our days is, of course, how we spend our lives.” The tragedy is that we ignore so much of it in the interest of getting to the real stuff. Never confuse the ordinary with the simple, the static, or the boring. Living an ordinary life well can be a very complicated thing to do. It takes great talent to make a great life out of a routine one. "**


Joan Chittister, OSB **

Christ Church St Simons Island,Georgia

This is Christ Church, St Simons Island Georgia. church. It is tiny, with lovely little stained glass wondows. The stained wooden beams and ceiling are stunning in their simplicity. The church is surrounded by massive old live oak trees, draped with Spanish Moss. A cemetary with graves dating back to the late 1700's add to the sense of history .

Eugenia Price who lived and wrote on St Simons Island is buried here. She wrote many novels and one that featured this church and it's first minister.

No matter what your religion, to sit awhile in Christ Church in silence is an enchanted time of beauty and serenity

Christ Church's beauty and romantic history have lured the attendance of four American presidents -- Woodrow Wilson, Calvin Coolidge, Jimmy Carter and George Bush. The building, cruciform in design, features stained glass windows given as memorials to the church, including a Tiffany. They depict the life of Christ and the early history of the church.

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To see the Earth as it truly is:

Let me describe part of my "computer habitat." I sit at a pecan wood desk with a black leather top. To my left on my desk is a framed black and white photo that I cut out of a National Geographic about 1969 during one of the early moon /space flights. It shows the earth from deep space. In the picture the earth appears to be no more than a large black and white round marble. A black background and below the earth is a poem by Archibald MacLeish .

"To see the earth as it truly is, small and blue
and beautiful in that eternal silence where it
floats, is to see ourselves as riders on the earth
together, brothers on that bright loveliness
in the eternal cold--brothers who know now----
they are truly brothers."


Archibald MacLeish.

Useless and expensive studies

Saturday,April 8, 2006
The Daily Canard
By I.B. Afulu

Researchers charged with wasting federal funds studying the boring habits of carpenter bees and the television watching habits of elderly women.

Could researchers be experiencing brain shrinkage by focusing on the boring habits of carpenter bees and the TV watching habits of elderly women.

A new study sponsored by the "Friends of Carpenter Bees of America" and financed by the federal government to the tune of $500,000 has reached a startling conclusion about the effects of insecticides on the wood boring abilities of carpenter bees in Marlin County California.

Instead of diminished depth of drilling into wooden decks, porches, shingle roofs and other wooden structures, a new insecticide "Deeper" has enhanced the carpenter bees ability to bore.

Measurements have been painstakingly taken by teams of 50 etomology investigators and their findings prove that "Deeper" is having the opposite effect from what was anticipated.

The wooden holes bored and tunneled by the bees have consistently measured 3 inches deeper than in years before "Deeper" was introduced into the California market.

In the new study, conducted over a period of 2 years, etomology researchers studied data from a 1996 study of healthy carpenter bees in California.

The researchers also took tests that measured their own memory, decision-making abilities and other cognitive skills before and after participating in these two studies.

49 out of the 50 researchers scored 20 points lower than the norm for a 6 year old child; suggesting the truth of this old joke:

Q: Why do bees hum?
A: Because they've forgotten the words!

Chancy :)

Of course I fabricated this "news article and study but it is no less ludicrous that the following article and the study it cites.


And now for a REAL NEWS ARTICLE that made my blood boil and wasted a bunch of our tax dollars.



Soaps, Talk Shows May Dull Aging Brains
By Randy DotingaHealthDay ReporterMon Mar 20, 5:07 PM ET
MONDAY, March 20 (HealthDay News) --

Could Oprah and General Hospital be bad for your brain?

New research suggests that elderly women who watch daytime soap operas and talk shows are more likely to suffer from cognitive impairment than women who abstain from such fare.
Researchers stress that it's not clear if watching these TV shows leads to weaker brainpower, or vice-versa. And they say it's possible that another explanation might be at work.
But there's definitely "something going on with those two types of television programming," said study co-author Joshua Fogel, an assistant professor of behavioral sciences at Brooklyn College of the City University of New York.
Fogel launched the federally funded study after wondering how television affects the brains of older women, many of whom are avid watchers of the tube. Previous studies had already looked at possible connections between TV watching and senility, but came up with differing results, Fogel said.
In the new study, Fogel and a colleague looked at data from a 1996 study of healthy women in Baltimore aged 70-79.
The researchers asked the women about their favorite types of TV shows, offering a list of 14 options including news, soap operas, comedies and game shows, among others.
The women also took tests that measured their memory, decision-making abilities and other cognitive skills.
Fogel and his colleague looked for patterns linking cognition abilities and the women's favorite TV shows. Their findings appear in the March issue of the Southern Medical Journal.
Women who watched talk shows were 7.3 times more likely to have long-term memory problems, the researchers said, while those who watched soap operas were 13.5 times more likely to have problems with attention.
The researchers didn't find any evidence that TV shows helped improve cognitive abilities in the women studied, either.
What's going on? The study can't and doesn't answer that question, Fogel said, leaving it unclear if a preference for soaps and talk shows is a cause of cognitive difficulties or a symptom. "One possibility is that people are unable to watch the other shows because they're too cognitively stimulating," Fogel said.
One researcher who has studied the effects of television watching on children said the study suggests that, "viewing television in a way that reduces active mental engagement may lead to poorer cognitive outcomes in older people."
Frederick Zimmerman, director of the University of Washington's Child Health Institute, added that the findings are significant because the apparent effects of television watching are quite striking. He said he's also found evidence that excessive television watching hurts kids' academic and cognitive development.
But Zimmerman cautioned that "it would be premature to tell Granny to turn off the soaps on the basis of this study."
And in his editorial, Albert Einstein College of Medicine neurologist Dr. Joe Verghese said that, "depending on the program, television viewing might even have cognitive benefits. Generations of children have grown up learning their alphabets, and presumably increasing their cognitive reserve, from programs such as Sesame Street. Television viewing may also help reduce chronic stress levels."
Fogel believes the study findings are more than just a curiosity, however. In fact, he thinks doctors should take them into account when they evaluate patients.
If an elderly woman says she enjoys watching talk shows or soap operas, Fogel said, that might be a sign that she's having cognitive problems and should undergo special screening.


More information
For advice on healthy aging, head to the U.S. National Institute on Aging.

">Link

Happy Birthday Ronni

Serendipity ...( The faculty of making fortunate discoveries by accident. )


One fine day I packed a picnic lunch and set out on a ramble to search for blogs and articles on "Aging" . I wandered over to Google and quickly came across "Time Goes By", the blog on positive aging by Ronni Bennett. As I lingered there I came across a group of people, friends, comrades in arms gathered around a wise elder blogger. I pulled up a tree stump and sat down around the camp fire and felt the warmth of good fellowship as I read the diary entries and comments.

I lingered in the forest, absorbing the camaraderie, advice, issues, concerns, and just plain old fashioned horse sense. Soon I could no longer allow myself to simply lurk behind a tree on the periphery and read; I jumped in and commented occasionally.

From the central point in the woods of "Time Goes By" I followed the path that Ronni had pointed out in her links. This path has taken me to Japan, Scotland, France, England, the North, South, East and West of the US. I became acquainted with bloggers from all over the world. Still, I always come back to the incandescence of Ronni's "Time Goes By"
,.
Thank you Ronni for sharing your many talents with us all and leading us into the realm of positive aging.

Happy Birthday from
Chancy





















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Exercise for elders.

I came across this exercise suggested for seniors, to build muscle strength in the arms and shoulders. It seems so easy, so I thought I'd pass it on. The article suggested doing it three days a week.


Begin by standing on a comfortable surface, where you have plenty of room at each side.

With a 5-lb. potato sack in each hand, extend your arms straight out from your sides, and hold them there as long as you can. Try to reach a full minute, then relax. Each day, you'll find that you can hold this position for just a bit longer.

After a couple of weeks, move up to 10-lb. potato sacks. Then go to 50-lb. potato sacks and eventually try to get to where you can lift a 100-lb. potato sack in each hand and hold your arms straight for more than a full minute.

Once you feel confident at that level, put a potato in each of the sacks
………………………………………………………………


Chancy >:0]--<
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Medicare Part D My rant

My husband and I have been on Medicare for about 10 years now and the program has worked well for us and was easy to sign up for and understand. Most doctors accept Medicare assignment and file the paper work.

And then "along came Medicare Part D" prescription drug benefits. I consider myself more computer savvy than the average 76 year old but navigating the Medicare.gov web site trying to make an informed decision about signing up for Part D. was extremely difficult. We would have chosen to remain on the Blue Cross Medicare supplement policy (plan J) that covered,to some extent, prescription drugs but after reading and talking with Blue Cross we decided that (1) The already expensive premiums would increase soon and (2) The penalty phase of Medicare part D would kick in if we did not go ahead and sign up.

So we held our noses and joined (AARP) United Health Care's plan. Time will tell if we mde the right choice.

Some polititians are claiming that those in Medicare Plan D will save money. Initially that is true but after one reaches about $2200 dollars in prescription drug costs, then there is a donut hole (nothing is paid on drugs) until drug expenses reach over $5000. For the average elder the "donut hole will come in about 6 months or less. Many elders who signed up and started using the Plan D should reach the "Donut Hole" just about election time this November. Won't that be interesting.

I am incensed that our government made no attempt to negotiate with drug companies as is done in Canada for instance to reign in the cost of prescriptions drugs. As usual Congress and the POTUS were catering to big business interests and to heck with the average citizen.

My rant is over. Move along. Nothing to see here. ;)















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