Inside the Magic Kingdom?

Tonight we attended a nice dinner, given by our church, for all volunteers. I'm not doing much these days, but hubby is, so we were invited. Let me first say, that this is not our church building. The dinner was hosted at an assisted living home in our town. I'm not sure why, but it was a nice building.



We had live music to eat by!

Pastor Jeff said a few words based on the book "Inside the Magic Kingdom," which explores the seven keys to the phenomenal success of the Disney enterprises. One of those keys is in the way it treats employees. Basically the idea is positive reinforcement, with no feedback being just as bad as negative feedback. Thus, they decided to say a very nice "thank you" to volunteers. After dinner the program was some improv comedy by a group from Grand Rapids called River City Improv. Two of their skits were very funny.



This skit called on two volunteers from the audience. The audience supplied a work place idea (in this case, an office). The girl in green and the guy were from the improv team. They could talk, and they made up a discussion on the fly. This one had the girl as the guy's manager and she was calling him to account for losing a ream of paper. Well, that was all immaterial, and pretty much lost to view, as the part that made it hilarious was that the team members could talk, but not move. The two from the audience (ladies in the red and pink shirts), had to move the team members as if they were jointed dolls. So they had to follow the fast conversation and try to move the improv's bodies into positions that made sense with the dialogue. It was hard to get a picture that really captured it, but this was the best one I shot.



Another funny skit was set up by asking the pastor to pick some ordinary thing he had done in the course of the day. He said "I went home to feed the dog." So the skit proceeded with the team doing a breaking news broadcast of the scandal just reported about the pastor feeding the dog. It went on and on about dogs all over the city being fed, and paparazzi gathered on his lawn to try to catch pictures of the dog being fed. Then they did an interview with the "pastor's parents" as to how they felt about the dog being fed. So that is what is happening in the picture above. Well, Jeff's parents were there, and I managed to catch them during the "interview." Jeff is on the left, then his oldest son, and his parents are on the right.



Just a fun evening.

Monthly Winners!

There were 3 entries this time, and I guess participation doesn't have much to do with hard or easy, because all 3 people got them ALL right. I think next month we'll have a puzzle of some sort. So, since I forgot to say something like, "in case of a tie, the earliest entry wins," all three winners will get a free, 125 x 125 banner.

Here are the answers:
1. I was writing an article about traveling and suddenly found myself confused about Baltic vs. Balkan. Give me the names of 3 Baltic countries, and then 3 Balkans. (6 pts total)
The Balkan Peninsula includes Greece, and a bunch of countries to the north and east on the Adriatic Sea: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Greece, Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, Croatia, and maybe Serbia and Romania. The Baltics are on the North Sea, across from the Scandinavian countries, and are Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania.

2. I just started reading a book about the Underground Railroad in Ohio. What was the technical difference between those who sought abolition of slavery and those who favored emancipation of slaves? (2 pts)
Abolitionists wanted slavery eliminated immediately. Those who favored emancipation thought that immediate change would lead to social and political upheaval, and they wanted a gradual change which would culminate at the same goal- the end of slavery.

3. I managed to pull a muscle this week. Darn and ouch! Did I pull my sartorius or my sartorial? (1 pt)
The sartorius. It's the longest muscle in the body, going from the outside of the hip to the inside of the knee. It's the one that is pulled in groin injuries, although mine hurts on the hip, not the inner thigh where it's usually sore when this muscle is pulled. The word sartorial refers to tailoring and clothing. "Sartorial splendor" could describe a man who is all dressed up. The word actually comes from the name of the muscle, because tailors used to sit cross-legged to sew, and so that muscle would get stretched.

4. It's December. Wow! Name three other words that come from the same Latin root word. (3 pts)
December was named for the 10th month of the Roman year, and "dec" should ring bells with anyone. Words given as answers were decimal, decigram, decistere, decathlon, decagram, decade, decathlon, and decimeter.

5. The sun appears to move from north to south and back between the two yearly Solstices. In the northern hemisphere, at the winter solstice, is the sun at the most northern point of its track, or most southern? (1 pt)
South

6. For me, it's always about learning new things. Just tell me any two new things that you have learned from a blog recently. (2 pts)
Everyone had no trouble telling me two things.

So, who is it? The first entry in was from Carmen at Carmen's Chronicles
Second entry came from Ivy at Spinning Lovely Days
Just under the wire, snuck the Rat of The Everyday Adventurer

Look for their full size ads on the left. I didn't show him any favors, but Ratty did some nice "brown-nosing." He gave me a word that I had to look up: "decistere," which is a tenth of a stere or cubic meter, equal to 3.531 cubic feet. Who knew!? AND, and... he cited my posts about bluebirds as helping him to learn how to recognize them. So... maybe future contests will we weighted in favor of those who stroke my ego? Evil laugh. (probably not).

The Top Commenters
I like to give the top commenters of the past month a free link with a small icon in the sidebar. There were 63 total commenters- the most different people for a month yet! I really appreciate every one, and try to respond. There were 10 clear winners. Here they are:
Everyday Adventurer (Ratty- 37 comments)
My Journey (rainfield61- 17 comments)
Ann's Snap & Edit (Ann- 17 comments)
Carmen's Chronicles (Carmen- 17 comments)
Our Simple Life (Julia- 16 comments)
Secondary Roads (Chuck - 13 comments)
WillOaks Studio (Karen - 12 comments)
Dances of Dreams (IcyBC - 12 comments)
Duck and Wheel with String (Lin- 8 comments)
Vanilla Seven (VanillaSeven- 6 comments)



One final word from Maggie:
Ruff! Several people asked about my vests. I have a really bright thin one that Mom made for me. I wore it Nov 15- December 1, because of gun-deer season. But I have a neoprene one that my mom's friend Irene gave us (because it was too small for Sandy Fe or Pearl). It's orange too, but faded. But it helps me stay warm in winter. I get cold! You can see the difference in these pictures.

See Contest Day- Win an Ad for a Month

Walking and Writing

Ellen came, and we did go for a short walk. My stupid leg was too sore to go any farther, and I didn't do it any good. Now I'll have to be really careful for a few days. We ended up just doing the loop along the Pere Marquette River that you've seen before. Above is the small creek one must cross to reach the trail section that is right along the riverbank. Some times of the year the bridge is underwater! But today we were able to hike the whole loop.


This picture shows another potential adventure. The river is running across the picture from right to left. The waterway coming toward you in the center of the picture is a small creek. It would be interesting to explore that gully some time. I looked at the local topo map, and it's just a short creek, no name, and probably all on private property. But I wonder if I could get permission to follow it?


These pictures are of a very pretty, but problem plant. It is Japanese Barberry, Berberis thunbergii. The shrubs have very sharp thorns and it is often planted to create hedges for security, or under windows. However, in most of the northeastern US, it has escaped and is now listed by the US Department of Agriculture as invasive. It displaces native plants and reduces wildlife habitat and forage. Whitetail deer avoid eating it, which gives it a big advantage. It will grow almost everywhere, and makes the soil more basic, which can change the plants which will grow in an area.


Here's a closeup of the berries. They look so pretty for Christmas! But it's a really bad plant in our part of the world.

Writing? I did take a third place in the Accentuate Writer's fiction contest for October! I'm quite happy with that! It was a theme that I had to stretch a bit to come up with an idea for. The November theme was even "worse!" So I wrote a spoof. I'm not sure how well I pulled it off. That one is still in judging. I'm not sure I'll be able to get one done in December, but I have found another contest I may enter if I can find time, since that is due Dec 7. Anyway, here's "proof" of my win. First Love Contest Winners. Sorry, I can't share it; the contestants agree to allow the contest anthology to have first-time publication rights. But the title was "Invisible," and the theme was First Love.

See A Walk By the River See National Park Service info on Japanese Barberry

First Snow Winter 2009 - 2010

Yup, we finally got snow today. It probably won't last, but it's supposed to continue through tomorrow. The picture on the left is the apple tree outside my kitchen door at 3:30 this afternoon. All the pictures below were taken next, and the picture on the right is the same apple tree at 5:50 pm, just as it was getting dark.



So Maggie and I went for our walk despite the snow and my pulled muscle. It's better if I exercise it every so often. It's not too bad as long as I don't twist my hip. The picture looks out of focus, but look at Maggie. She's not blurry! It's just that the snow was coming down fast by then!



This is how the snow was beginning to gather on the small plant called Herb Robert. It's a rather ubiquitous little member of the geranium family.



Since this is the first snow, all of the fragile foliage is still upright, and I just like the way the wet snow catches on each leaf. All this grass will soon be beaten down and hidden under the heavy weight. Maybe even tomorrow!

Ellen and I are going out for our first monthly adventure tomorrow. I'll be sure to take the camera.

See Kayaking on Nov 21 for the last adventure with Ellen See First Snow and Last Hike for last year's first snow

Nature's Alphabet: P - T

See Nature's Alphabet K-O See Nature's Alphabet A-E

Contest Day - Win an Ad for a Month!

Entries received to date - 3

Here's your chance to win an ad for a month on My Quality Day. If you can read the numbers in the poll results graphic, you will see that there is a great disagreement in how people feel about the contests. Let me first thank all the people who voted! But then you can see that 4 people like them just the way they are, and 4 people thought that I should just drop them altogether! Well, I guess I get to cast the deciding vote, and I say they stay!

The next most chosen answer is that people for get about them. I've tried to give you some warning that this was coming up, so perhaps a few more people will recall that it was "that time" again.

OK, here we go. You know that I love words, just for their own sake. I haven't done many blog posts about them, because I keep finding cool nature things to show you. But these questions are almost all based on words that are very similar. You can look up the answers, or guess, or whatever... but the winner will have a 125x125 banner and link for a month. There are 15 possible points. Send me your answers at jhy@t-one.net before midnight EST on Friday, Dec 4.

1. I was writing an article about traveling and suddenly found myself confused about Baltic vs. Balkan. Give me the names of 3 Baltic countries, and then 3 Balkans. (6 pts total)

2. I just started reading a book about the Underground Railroad in Ohio. What was the technical difference between those who sought abolition of slavery and those who favored emancipation of slaves? (2 pts)

3. I managed to pull a muscle this week. Darn and ouch! Did I pull my sartorius or my sartorial? (1 pt)

4. It's December. Wow! Name three other words that come from the same Latin root word. (3 pts)

5. The sun appears to move from north to south and back between the two yearly Solstices. In the northern hemisphere, at the winter solstice, is the sun at the most northern point of its track, or most southern? (1 pt)

6. For me, it's always about learning new things. Just tell me any two new things that you have learned from a blog recently. (2 pts)

There you go! Again, email your answers to jhy@t-one.net before midnight EST, December 4.

Finally... I leave you with today's sunset.

Geometer

OK, the quiz is going to start tomorrow. I just didn't get it ready today. What I did manage to do is finish an entry for a writing contest that was due tonight. They haven't announced the winners from last month yet, but are supposed to really soon. It's probably good that I didn't know how well or poorly I did before I finished the current entry. If I didn't even place I'd probably have been too disappointed to continue. I'm trying to think that one of the 3rd tier prizes would be nice. That's $25.

Instead I'm showing you a little moth that I found dead on my dining room table in September. I've been saving it to show you. Its colors are so drab, but the pattern is lacy and intricate. It's slightly less than an inch across, in real life. And the most interesting thing is that it is just a little bit shiny, like the sheen on silk when you move it through the light.

I tried to identify it, but the best I can do is that it's a Geometer. That means "earth measurer." Ha! I should have saved that for the quiz! Well, that's the official name for... inchworms. The Order is Lepidoptera (butterflies and moths), Family Geometridae. They are also called loopers or spanners. The moths all look a lot alike! I found one that has a very similar pattern to the wings on this little guy, but it's European, and I doubt that he wandered that far before kicking the bucket in my house.

I'm open to guidance from any entomologists out there. Location, western Michigan.

P.S. I hate not being able to ID things.

See Moth Memories