Darkoshi

under a giant tree

2023-09-22T04:10:04Z

A restaurant in Guatemala includes a lovely-looking seating area under a giant tree.

Video title: Así es el RESTAURANTE DEBAJO del ÁRBOL GIGANTE en ANTIGUA GUATEMALA
Posted by: CELINAZ
Date posted: Sep 20, 2023

The video mentions it is an 89-year old ahuehuete tree - a type of cypress.

The next video shows more of the nice scenery and grounds around the restaurant, "El Trapiche de Don Tonito", which includes a coffee plantation

Video title: El Trapiche de Don Tonito
Posted by: Tenamit
Date posted: Apr 16, 2021

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autumn sunshine fluff

2021-09-23T21:53:28Z

I'm sitting outside in the sunshine, working. Every once in a while I see a round white fluffy thing floating by on the breeze. ( Tiny seeds with a ball of white hairs spread out around them - they look like these thistle seeds but are more likely from some nearby tree. Cottonwood, maybe. )

I look up, and up there, many many of these fluffy things are drifting by, glowing even brighter in the sunlight as they pass near the sun.

My camera does not pick them up well against the sky.

I chase a few, and catch one, and take it inside to get some close-up photos of it. Then I release it back outside, and it floats away.

What to call them? "Parachute seed" doesn't seem to do them justice, these delicate light floaty spheres.

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Trees on the move

2021-09-19T17:11:26Z

This reddit shows a cool video of a landslide with trees sliding and tumbling down a mountainside: I see movement ahead

It is from 2004: Massive landslide in Japan, recorded on video!

YouTube has a more complete video of it with sound.

(It reminded me of the video of trees on the march linked to here.)

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Here's the funniest/cutest Cat video I've seen all week (says a person who doesn't regularly watch such videos, as otherwise I'd never get anything done).

And here's a funny/cute dog video: Family Tries To Convince Their Giant Alaskan Malamute To Get In The Bath

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pine cones

2021-08-27T00:22:43Z

Lying back on the porch, looking up at the pine trees. I start counting the pine cones on one tree limb and estimate... probably a hundred on just that one limb.

It's quite possible the tree has more than a thousand pine cones on it! And therefore it's quite possible the other trees have that many too.

Occasionally I pick up pine cones when I'm cleaning up the yard. But I never pick up *that* many.
Do thousands of pine cones fall in the back yard each year, I wonder?

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The pine cones are just shrapnel when they fall.
The trees are missiles.

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my fig tree

2021-07-28T06:33:42Z

... brings all the birds (bees, squirrels, flies) to the yard.

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It has had so many figs this year (the first time it has been so abundant) that I've left many on the tree for them to get.

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pine tree pollen cones

2021-04-24T09:28:20Z

Taken while on a walk last month.

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names. TREES. ALL the TREES and trees and trees.

2020-10-25T19:08:51Z

On another site, I saw a comment by someone with surname "Bumgarner".

I'm familiar with the surname "Baumgartner" which comes from German and means something like "Tree Gardener". So I wondered if that was the person's real name, and he'd shortened it like that as a joke... bum-garner... gatherer of bums... I was thinking of the British definition of "bum", ie. "buttocks", though gatherer of tramps could be amusing too.

But no, according to the 2010 Census there were over 6000 people in the U.S. with the surname Bumgarner.

It truly is however, a "Respelling of German Baumgartner."

Bumgarner History, Family Crest & Coats of Arms - This page seems lip-curling to me. It shows the "Ancient Arms of Bumgarner" image with a tree and a small picket fence around it. It says "They are believed to have been of the order of the Teutonic Knights." Jeez Louize, the site is trying to sell stuff. It says the name means "Orchard" when it must have meant someone who worked in an orchard - the name comes from BaumgartNER, not BaumgarTEN. But anyway, the page also has some good stuff:
"Spelling variations of this family name include: Baumgarner, Baumgarten, Baumgart, Paumgarten, Baumgartel, Paumgartel, Paumgart, Bomgarten, Baumgarden, Pomgarten, Pomgarden, Baumgartner, Paumgartner, Baumgarden, Bamgardner, Bogart, Bogaard, Bogaart and many more."

So the name Bogart (from Dutch) (as in Humphrey Bogart) also comes from, or is related to Baumgartner! And actually, boomgaard is the Dutch word for "orchard", so ok then.

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Kudos to conuly, for letting me know about this online etymology dictionary!

This was another post intended to be quick and short on something that amused me, which while writing it morphed into umpteen more things of curiosity to me. It's now an hour and a half later. This is why I shouldn't...

It also took longer to write due to words being difficult to me this morning.

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Other items of curiosity:

Bummer - is related to the German verb "bummeln - to go slowly, waste time." In my experience, "bummeln" is used in a positive sense, as in "let's go have a good time, strolling around downtown looking at stores and things."

Bumptious - an adjective that means "offensively assertive".

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the making of sticks

2020-09-05T05:18:20Z

The last part of the popsicle, licking it off the stick, doesn't taste so good. I wonder if it is the taste of the wood itself that is unpleasant, or if the wood is coated with any kind of chemical.

It didn't occur to me to be curious about the whole process of making the sticks, but that is what I found:

Ice Cream Sticks whole production line
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RAihwkV8TgE

So many different machines, just to make a popsicle stick (or to make millions of them). No doubt unpleasantly loud thumping thumping thumping machines, though the videos replace the noise with music. Big trees being cut up just for this. Now I feel bad about buying popsicles with these wooden sticks that are made just to be thrown away. Although I use so many other disposable wood products too, and how could you have a popsicle without a stick? And even though I mostly don't throw them away; they accumulate in the drawer waiting for that time when they are just what I need for whatever little task.

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oak snag

2020-08-25T06:16:24Z

New word definition I learned today:
Snag (noun)
as in "A dead tree that remains standing."

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summer time

2020-06-28T08:29:22Z

lalalalalalalala nevermind, don't need to write about that.

Little frogs all over Qiao's back yard. Big ones too; there were two on the back steps last night. Had to shoo them away last night before the dogs saw them. I'm surprised but glad that the dogs haven't been going after the little ones. I worry I might accidentally step on them as they are hard to see when they're not moving. They jump away and then I see them from the motion.

I found a nice plant with grape tomatoes growing in the yard. We didn't plant it. How could it have gotten there? I don't like raw tomatoes; when Qiao sometimes brings me a take-out meal that includes them, I give the tomatoes to the dogs as they like them. The plant is growing in the area where I bury the dog p**p. So that must be where it came from.

Dandelion trees... Weeds that look like dandelions from their leaves, but grow tall with a thick steam. I was watching one such plant grow tall at my house. It finally got even taller than me, and only then did little flowers start blooming at the top. There was one in Qiao's yard too, similar but different; also taller than me.

There's a sassafras sapling growing out back too. I tasted a couple of its leaves; they didn't taste much like root beer, but they were very mucilaginous. From what I read it is actually dangerous to eat, and so they don't use real sassafras as a flavoring any more.

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working from home distractions #384

2020-04-23T22:11:20Z

Are tulip tree flower buds edible?

(Went out to check the mail; picked up some branches that had fallen in today's strong wind; found one with a pretty unopened flower bud...)

With a few of the petals pulled open:

I didn't find any indication that they are edible, but supposedly they have a sweet nectar that is edible. So I nibbled on one petal, and one of the stamens inside. It has a slightly bitter spicy peppery taste, sort of like allspice.

This video talks about the nectar, but I've never noticed nectar dripping from my tree. Nor did I find any nectar in the couple of blossoms I checked today, although it was raining earlier. Most of the open blossoms look sort of decayed/unpleasant inside, or with bugs on them, so I wouldn't want to taste them. Even a recently opened clean-looking one had tiny bugs inside when I looked closer.

Video title: Edible Plants:Tulip Tree
Posted by: Blanche Cybele Derby
URL: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FyCUNBzxLI
Date posted: Dec 15, 2011

The person speaking in that video has a voice and accent very like my step-mom's (who is also from Massachusetts).

My grandmother who was also from Massachusetts had a different accent, maybe because she lived in California for a long time.

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Sandbox Tree

2020-02-07T04:49:41Z

I came across this term while flipping through my dictionary. It is quite an interesting tree.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hura_crepitans
(also known as possumwood, jabillo, or dynamite tree)
...smooth brown bark covered in many dark, pointed spines which have led to its being nicknamed monkey no-climb.
...The sandbox tree's fruiting bodies are large capsules which can explode when ripe, splitting into segments and launching seeds at 70 metres per second (160 mph)... far as 45 metres (148 ft) away...
...The Caribs made arrow poison from its sap.

As for the name, "Before more modern forms of pens were invented, the trees' unripe seed capsules were sawn in half to make decorative pen sandboxes (also called pounce pots), hence the name 'sandbox tree'. "
I'm not sure why it's also called possumwood, but 3 different trees are called that, one of which is a persimmon tree. So I guess in this case "possum" is a variation on "persimmon" rather than "oppossum".

Pictures:
https://duckduckgo.com/?q=%22sandbox+tree%22&iar=images&iax=images&ia=images

Video with a clip of a fruit exploding, although staged in a laboratory(?) setting.
The Incredibly Strange Exploding Fruit Tree

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figs. shelves. locking clips.

2019-07-14T08:25:56Z

Fig tree has so many figs this year. Yesterday I picked 28 ripe ones, the most ever in a single day. I'm surprised the birds and squirrels haven't been taking more; I've only seen a few pecked on or chewed up so far.

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At work, we have Haworth office furniture in the cubes. It must date back to the 1980s. At my last 2 cubes, I had readjusted the shelf over my desk down 4 notches so that it would be a good height for placing the second monitor. I use the lower monitor when sitting, and the top monitor when standing. That way I can stand up when I get tired of sitting.

As we were moved again this month, I wanted to readjust the shelf in my new cube the same way. But when I tried, I couldn't get the shelf to pull free from the rails. It didn't come loose even when I removed the middle part, and tried pulling out each side panel on its own. There was a small metal clip stuck into the top notches, which seemed to be locking the panels in place. I tried pulling and twisting the clips, but wasn't able to get them out. The next day, I had the idea to push up on the bottom of the shelf while pulling on the clip with a pair of pliers. That way I got them out. Then it was fairly easy to readjust the shelf downwards.

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orange turpentine

2019-07-03T21:17:12Z

Whew, is it hot outside. Upper 90s, but with the humidity and in the direct sun it feels like in the 100s.

Qiao hired tree cutters to take care of the fallen tree as well as another dead tree that hadn't fallen. They finished it all, including grinding the stumps and removing the debris, in under 5 hours. It's a good thing they started early when it was still overcast and not as hot.

I will need to do some more fence repair before I can let the dogs loose again. But it's too hot now; maybe this evening. Although the forecast says it will still be 90 degrees, feeling like 96, at 9pm.

My mom is going to a free outdoor concert this evening. Phew. Hot, hot, hot.

Apparently Fort Jackson doesn't do their annual 4th of July Torchlight Tattoo and Fireworks anymore*. I didn't go often... I'm not into patriotic stuff, but the cannon blasts and fireworks, and cheering for the states and territories in the union was fun. Except for the parts where I worried that the fireworks would misfire and hurt someone.

I am still doing my work-work for the day. Learning to write JUnit tests, using Mockito. I feel somewhat ambivalent about their usefulness. In my experience, they only test what you already know works, and when they break it's not usually because the code got broken, but rather because the test code or test data became outdated.

Qiao's back yard now smells like my mom's oil paints used to. Or rather, the turpentine she used to clean the paint off the brushes. I like the scent, knowing that it is only pine.

I had a small set of oil paints when I was younger. And a small bottle of orange-scented turpentine. The orange didn't mask the turpentine smell at all; it just morphed it into a different strong overpowering and astringent scent.

Oil paints didn't appeal to me much. Too long to dry. Too hard to clean. Too messy. Not very suited to my style of abstract art. Me, not talented enough to paint realistic images very well. Although one time I copy-painted a portrait of my mom and brother from two photographs, and it turned out fairly well.

Turpentine smell makes me think of the Mediterranean too.

Whaddya know: orange terpene is made from orange trees and can be used as a substitute for turpentine. But I still think that the one I had back then was orange-scented pine turpentine. One made from orange tree extracts would probably have smelled better, like one of those citrus-based cleaners.

..

*A web search shows that 2017's Torchlight Tattoo event was cancelled due to the year-long centennial celebration that finished up that year. 2018's event was cancelled due to the "Victory Week" celebration in June of that year. But nothing at all is mentioned anywhere about it this year, which seems odd to me, considering that per those pages, "The Torchlight Tattoo is typically one of the most popular July Fourth events in the Midlands. Before last year, Fort Jackson hosted July Fourth celebrations each year in recent memory".
Per a family friend, Fort Jackson is not doing the July event at all anymore, instead having fireworks as part of their annual June celebration, the aforementioned "Victory Week".

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storm damage, fallen tree, bent fence

2019-06-24T07:36:03Z

Friday morning, a storm blew through the area. The strong sound of the wind woke me up. No damage here from that one.

Saturday afternoon, another storm blew through. It came on quickly; I hadn't been expecting it. Loud wind, strong rain. It uprooted a pine tree in the back yard; the tree fell against some other trees and damaged a section of fence. The storm also caused many power outages in the area. Our internet went down before the power did.

Saturday night, another storm blew through.

After I worked on the fence:

Two other sections of the fence were also damaged by falling branches, but only a little along the top poles. The house was not damaged.

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conversation with geese, part 2

2019-03-26T04:20:08Z

A goose is on the nest by the picnic area again. I walk towards my usual table, coming around from the back side rather than walking right by the nest.

As I start to sit down, a Swoosh sound as the other goose comes flying out of nowhere at me. (Whoa, I haven't had one do that before.) It lands a few feet away and hisses.

Me: What? I can't sit here?

Goose: HISS! HISSSSSS!!!!

Me: Really? You're not going to let me sit here?

Goose: HISSSS!!

Me: Oh, okay. ::grumble:: I'll go sit somewhere else then. You scared me away.

I walk to one of the other tables further away.

..

A tree branch hangs over the walkway. Sometimes I have to duck to avoid it smacking into my face. But I always enjoy watching its leaf buds as they develop.

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springasprung

2019-03-22T05:23:02Z

As someone else wrote, Spring sprung! Spring sprung! Spring sprung a rung a rung!

Asteroid!
Small asteroid to sweep closer than moon’s distance. It was at its closest a few hours ago. I tried to find out where in the sky it would be, and if it's visible to the naked eye or not, but couldn't find any mention of that. The sky is rather hazy here tonight; can only see the brightest stars anyway.

I've got a boom boom drum. Got it for my birthday a while back. It goes Boom! Boom! Boom boom boom boom...

Last week on the way to work, while stopped at a stoplight, it was breezy and I saw a cloud of yellow pollen pluming outward from the pine trees up ahead. I'm glad pollen doesn't bother me.

Baby got a cold. I accidentally poured the cold "medicine" down the drain, thinking it was water in the bottle (too thin and clear for cold syrup), already rinsed out. Then I saw that it was labelled as a homeopathic brew, and realized my likely mistake. Ooops. I told the niece about my mistake, and also about how homeopathic items aren't proven to work and are diluted and wacky. I probably could have worded it better, but that's how my spur of the moment verbal skills are.

I checked the cold syrups in my medicine cabinet, but all were labelled as not for infant use. Checking online, I read that it's not recommended to give babies any cold medicines. Maybe that's why the niece had bought something homeopathic; maybe that's the only thing available marked as safe for babies. (Because it's basically water!)

Driving to work, I continued feeling slightly bad, thinking the niece would suspect I poured it down the drain on purpose. I decided to stop by the store on the way home to get some replacement, even if the only thing I could find was another homeopathic one. But I did find some non-homeopathic remedies (though I'm not sure that one is really any more effective); they even had ibuprofen drops labelled for infants.

Spring a ding ding.

Grey's Anatomy had a genderqueer character on tonight's show, using the "they" pronouns. I was watching it with Qiao, and was inwardly pleased (they're like me!), yet didn't feel like saying anything out loud about it to Qiao. I wondered if Qiao even remembers that I don't identify as female. What difference does it make, sigh. I have a boom boom drum.

Boom a doom doom.

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fungi growing on dead tree

2019-02-13T05:33:11Z

Why is it that when I post photos to DW, they always display as larger than actual size? I have to add a parameter like width="80%" to make them look the same size as they do in my image editor, when I'm displaying them actual size there.

Before I had thought it was browser specific, but now it seems to be happening in all browsers. And I can't tell if other people see the images large or actual sized.

It must be due to me having Windows configured to display things at 125%.

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beaver felled tree

2019-02-08T05:20:28Z

I first noticed the tree being chewed on in May 2017:
https://darkoshi.dreamwidth.org/594424.html

March 2018:

December 3, 2018: Chewed all the way through but still upright, leaning against another tree.

December 11, 2018: Fallen into pond.

December 18, 2018: Stump cut (not by the beaver, presumably).

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words trees flowers

2018-04-28T17:56:39Z

Tapeten (German) - wallpaper

Tapetenwechsel (German) - literally, a change of wallpaper. Figuratively, a change of scenery or surroundings.

daffadilly (chiefly British) - daffodil

daffadowndilly (chiefly British) - daffodil (the link is a nice poem)

Annett Louisan - Ich brauch Tapetenwechsel

The above song is originally by someone else, but I like this cover of it. The song is both cute and sad, about a birch tree which wanted a change of scenery, and went looking for it.
German lyrics
English translation of lyrics

Mark Knopfler - Redbud Tree

The vocal notes/key/whatever you call it in part of this song reminds me of kd lang's Ingénue album. I need to check out more of his music. Mark Knopfler's name isn't familiar to me, but he used to be in the Dire Straits.

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squirrel eating blossoms

2018-02-24T07:29:58Z

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they keep trying to grow back

2017-08-28T04:29:34Z

I'll have to try this:

How to stop stumps from growing back, organically! - drill holes in the stump and apply epsom salts, and replenish the salt every week or so.

Another idea - after doing the above, cover the stumps with black plastic / garbage bag and weight it down with bricks, to both block sunlight, and to keep the salts from being washed away by rain.

How To Use Epsom Salt For Stump Removal - this page says to put a little bit of water in the holes with the epsom salt.

How to Mix Epsom Salts to Kill Stumps - this page says to use a one-inch extra long drill bit... Oh, that must be a spade bit.

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korean island walk

2017-06-17T20:58:18Z

This is so cute.

Very good dog crashes every street view shot of this South Korean island

If you explore the map, the island itself is lovely too, beautiful ocean views, fields, a wooded path with interesting things along the way... there's a cool silvery monument in one spot along the path. I haven't found a way to link directly to that location. But (looking at the overview map), it is right near where the path along the east side of the island forks in the middle.

The island is called Jukdo.

(After more wandering along the map-path) This island is like a video game! One page I read said the island has only 3 families; another page said it had 2 inhabitants. And that the island has no running water, that rainwater must be collected, or it must be brought over from the nearby larger island of Ulleung.

But judging by the map-photos, it must be a somewhat popular tourist destination. There is a small building at the southern loop of the path, which appears to have bathrooms. There's a wood fence along the path, with many little rest/overlook areas and picnic tables/benches. There's another building with signs in front, which may be a restaurant. There are signs/markers along the path (in Korean, so I don't know what they say).

Ah, now I feel I must post some screenshots after all.

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never see the same

2017-05-18T13:52:52Z

Now when I see dandelions, I think to myself "Aha! That one has pointy leaves, not round, and they are sticking up, not close to the ground. That is a true dandelion." Or "That's not a true dandelion, it's cat's claw... err, no, cat's ear" (almost every time, "cat's claw" comes to mind first, even though I'm not familiar with it... per a search, it looks similar to yellow jessamine).

The yellow flowers themselves look identical to me on both kinds of dandelions, though this one below didn't have a ball of unopened petals in the middle. Its petals were all open.

It's like when as a kid, I learned the difference between white oak which has the round/curve-edged leaves versus black oak which has the pointy-edged leaves, not to mention, blackjack oak.

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gnawed trunk, catalpa, starfish fungus

2017-05-12T04:49:44Z

I've decided which phone to buy. The Moto G4 Play has pretty good specs (it has 2GB RAM, not 1/2 GB as I originally thought), for a good price.

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This is the most chewed-on tree trunk by the pond.

These are Catalpa tree blossoms. The photo is from 2015, but the tree has blossoms this year too. The blossoms are about the size of big popcorn, and don't have much scent. But a clump of honeysuckle is also growing by the tree, the lovely sweet scent of which has fooled me a few times.

I found this growing in the ground in Qiao's yard. At first glance they look like fallen red blossoms, but what is that black tarry gunk on them? It's one of the strangest looking things. Per the internet, they are called starfish fungus. I saw one by the pond at work too, an odd coincidence, as I don't ever remember seeing these before. But then again, maybe I did and simply thought they were fallen blossoms.

While walking along, do you ever have a sudden amusing thought that makes you break out in a big grin?

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