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Wed, 23 Apr 2008 22:23:02 GMT

Zantedeschia 'Mango'

Elizabeth asked in the comments yesterday if we had a snow shower weekend locally. Yes, a little bit on Friday and Saturday, but I didn''t really notice. I had purchased a bouquet on Friday afternoon, partly for the reason that the forecast suggested a return to wintery conditions (which didn''t really come to pass) so I would instead spend time inside learning how to use my off-camera flash unit. These are a couple of the results of that exercise. I''ve primarily categorized these photographs as "botanical art", as I''ve used much more digital manipulation than I normally would and don''t consider these images documentarian. As to what sort of manipulation, for those interested, I greatly increased the midtones using curves on both images. In the second image, I also burned a small portion of the flower to locally decrease the exposure.

I think these calla lilies are the cultivar ''Mango''. I called the florist yesterday, and the person answering the phone thought the name was ''Margo'' (a non-existent cultivar, from what I can tell), so I concluded ''Mango'' instead (and somewhat confirmed by the Zantedeschia photographs on the Pacific Bulb Society Wiki). Another point of evidence is the many commercial recommendations for its use as a cut flower in a search for "Zantedeschia ''Mango'' cut flower".

Certainly, one of the elements that attracted me to this particular bouquet were the orange tones (the bouquet contains orange lilies and orange gerberas, as well). The Production and Landscape Horticulture program at Massey University in New Zealand has done some research into Zantedeschia pigmentation. As you might expect from a cultivar that is mainly orange with patches of red, it is concluded that ''Mango'' contains a discontinuous layer of anthocyanins on a base of carotenoids. Posted by: Daniel Mosquin      Read more     Source

Wed, 09 Apr 2008 19:52:47 GMT

Erythrina crista-galli

Connor put together today''s write-up:

Thank you to Quimbaya@Flickr for today''s Botany Photo of the Day (original via UBCBG BPotD Flickr Pool). I also recommend taking a look at his orchid photographs , truly amazing!

Erythrina crista-galli is a member of the Fabaceae and is native to central South America. It is cultivated elsewhere, and has even been declared a noxious weed in parts of Australia. Its flower is the national flower of both Argentina and Uruguay (via Wikipedia). The epithet crista-galli means "crested comb" (from the Royal Horticultural Society who happened to feature this plant as Plant of the Month back in October), referring to the resemblance of the inflorescence to the comb of a rooster. This combined with erythros, meaning red, gives rise to one of the common names, the cockspur coral tree. Other names incude the cry baby tree and ceiba.

Like other plants in the Fabaceae Erythrina crista-galli associates with bacteria in a symbiotic relationship. The bacteria fix nitrogen for the plant in nodules found on the roots, and, in return for doing so, receive carbohydrates. This topic is a hot area of research because of the prospect of transferring this nodulation ability to other plants. In What Makes the Rhizobia-Legume Symbiosis So Special? (PDF), Hirsch et al. discuss the mechanisms by which this relationship takes place. It is thought that compounds produced by the Fabaceae called lectins play a crucial role in this process. Lectins are proteins produced by plant cells that bind to carbohydrates found on the surfaces of other cells (and are often very carbohydrate-specific). Their function is unknown but many speculate that they help plants defend themselves by recognizing invading cells. This cell-to-cell recognition also facilitates the establishment of an endosymbiotic relationship between a plant in the Fabaceae and a Rhizobium bacteria. Posted by: Daniel Mosquin      Read more     Source

Wed, 09 Apr 2008 06:30:08 GMT

The Flight of the Red Balloon

"Like his 2004 film Cafe Lumière, Hou Hsiao-hsien''s sublime new movie The Flight of the Red Balloon finds the director in a foreign country paying homage to another filmmaker," writes Chris Wisniewski at indieWIRE. "With Lumiere, Yasujiro Ozu was Hou''s reference point and Tokyo his canvas; here, Hou reimagines Albert Lamorisse''s classic 1956 short The Red Balloon as a Parisian family melodrama."

"A remarkably rich, rewarding, and restful experience, Hou''s latest is a film like no other - in the simplicity of its lines, colors, and framing, and in the complexity of how those elements compound and contextualize its emotional subject matter, The Flight of the Red Balloon can, in my mind, be compared to the works of Matisse," writes Michael Koresky in Reverse Shot. "Despite this elevation, the film, miraculously, doesn''t feel like an artist''s grand summation, but rather just another in a long line of purely wrought canvases; it never calls attention to its own technique or turns its endless flow of lovely, complicated compositions into recognizable set pieces, and instead allows its three principal characters to navigate its spaces with ease."

Updated through 4/5. Posted by: dwhudson      Read more     Source

Mon, 31 Mar 2008 00:19:26 GMT

Insecurity and Dating

Are you afraid to really get out and date? Do you think you'll make an oaf out of yourself and not get another chance?

I talked to a woman the other day that had recently been in a 20-year marriage. She met her husband while in high school, and now was telling me how she didn't want to "date" because she was looking for a "life partner."

To me, it was an insecure and uneducated response to dating. After all, the majority of singles looking to meet people want to find a committed relationship. In my friend's mind, however, she seemed to think everyone was out there for fun and sex, without commitment.

The ironic part is, her attitude tells me she very much NEEDS to get out and date if she's ever to find the right guy for her. Because she met her husband so young, she doesn't know how to act on a date. She doesn't know how to get out and meet the right guy. And because she's had so little life experience in this area, she doesn't know herself very well, either. All she knows is that she was in a long relationship with someone that wasn't right, and now she wants to meet the right one.

Well.... that's all anyone wants. But sometimes our insecurities get the better of us. For example, will she be nervous the next time she goes out on a date? Will she not be able to make small talk? Will she be sizing up the guy for marriage right out of the gate?

For her, and anyone like her, I came across a great article about dating insecurities. The very first item on the list described her perfectly: Dating Insecurity #1: "I'm not my date's type." Since she assumes that "guys only want one thing" she also thinks she's not the one for them. She's looking for her "soul mate" but thinks she doesn't have to date him in order to find him.

What do you think? Posted by: Cherie Burbach      Read more     Source

Wed, 19 Mar 2008 01:42:51 GMT

Austin Chronicle

Last night, at the end of the odyssey that brought me from Berlin to Austin, I stepped off the plane to find a stack of fresh Austin Chronicles, and there on the cover, as you can see, is the lovely and talented Greta Gerwig. "Love it or hate it, mumblecore is here to stay, as evidenced by this year''s Festival program book," writes Kimberley Jones, introducing the Chronicle''s SXSW Film package. Spencer Parsons conducts the interview.

A quick run-through of the rest, before I head off to catch Goliath (site); first, Josh Rosenblatt talks with its makers, David and Nathan Zellner. Also: an overview of the 24 Beats a Second program of music docs. Posted by: dwhudson      Read more     Source

Thu, 13 Mar 2008 02:52:49 GMT

Weekend shorts

"In almost every movie you go to these days you''ll see another screen - a television, a computer, even another movie screen - within the screen you''re watching," writes Peter Keough in the Boston Phoenix. "In 1964, when Marshall McLuhan submitted, in Understanding Media: The Extensions of Man, that ''We have extended our central nervous system itself in a global embrace, abolishing both space and time..... We approach the final phase of the extensions of man - the technological simulation of consciousness,'' it might have sounded a little over the top. Not so much now."

"What is this fascinating new film theory known as cognitivism?" David Bordwell offers a primer with linkage.

FilmInFocus interviews the SpoutBlog''s Karina Longworth. Posted by: dwhudson      Read more     Source

Tue, 11 Mar 2008 10:57:33 GMT

Face In Hole

Wouldn''t it be great if you could be a different person everyday? Many of us have tried to manipulate pictures in order to try something different or just to have fun. But not only it takes loads of hard work but also the results aren''t usually all that great.

With Face In Hole you can easily create a totally ''new look'' for you and your friends. You just have to select a scenario, upload and adjust a photo (or use your webcam) and there you have it, a great picture that you can send to your friends, post in your blog or make available to the world.

That''s me in the picture above as Austin Powers. Posted by: Gerard      Read more     Source

Sun, 02 Mar 2008 13:55:34 GMT

What didn't happen

When we didn’t go out to Roundrock on Sunday (because of the challenging weather conditions), we didn’t do all of the following things:

We didn’t stop at the game camera we had left on the tree across from the suet feeder, and we didn’t download all of the pictures of the many woodpeckers (including, probably, an ivory bill) that had visited. As a result, we also didn’t put in fresh batteries and move it to a new location, salted with lots of corn and peanuts that we didn’t take down there with us. And because we never went down there, we didn’t manage to set up the other game camera (the one that is still giving me fits) to give it one last chance to perform.

We didn’t check on the pine trees to see how their fences were holding up either. We would probably have found that they were holding up well, and we might have even seen some vandalizing attempts by the deer captured by the nearby game camera when it wasn’t shooting the ivory billed woodpeckers.

We didn’t go down to the lake to listen to the ice booming, and because we didn’t do that, I won’t be giving you the audio on a video clip of it this coming Saturday. Too bad about that.

Another thing we didn’t do when we weren’t down there was hike up to the unfenced part of our southern boundary line and sink a couple of fence posts in the spots where we had found two old survey stakes on recent trips. And after we didn’t do that, we didn’t try using line-of-sight to plot the direction the property line goes based on those two points that are established. Thus we didn’t try hanging temporary bits of survey tape in the trees and to see if we came out close to the southwest corner where another stake rises.

Because we didn’t go to Roundrock, we didn’t sit in the comfy chairs, shivering a bit in the weak sunlight to eat our sandwiches. We didn’t find that all of our firewood was too wet to build a fire, so we didn’t decide not to make a fire.

We also didn’t get the truck bogged down in the sloppy mud of the road across my neighbor’s meadow, in the soft area where our road turns into the trees down to the lake, or in the pecan plantation where I would have imprudently driven my truck despite admonitions from Libby that that would have been a really stupid idea.

Here are some things that might have happened today though:

Missouri calendar:

• Opossum young are born and climb into the female’s pouch.
• River otter litters are born now through late March.

Today in Missouri history:

• Abraham Williams, Missouri''s third governor, born with only one leg who served a scant six months in the office, was born on this date in 1781.

Posted by: Roundrockjournal      Read more     Source

Thu, 24 Jan 2008 01:29:28 GMT

Important Numbers

Keep important numbers close at hand.

Now this seems like an easy thing, keep all your important numbers that you call on a frequent basis where you can find them very easily.

There is a many ways to do this. Rolodexes are still popular items and can be found at you local office supply store. I have put all my important numbers in on the computer in outlook so they can be easily found. Some other people like to keep their important numbers on their Blackberry's or Palms.

What every way you decide make sure that you are able to access your important numbers quickly and easily. As a busy small business person, the last thing you want to do is waste time trying to find an important number. My Organized Biz blog has some more ideas to help you out. Posted by: John Dornoff      Read more     Source

Fri, 04 Jan 2008 04:59:45 GMT

Happy New Year!!!

Hey everyone I wanted to wish everyone a Happy and Fabulous New Year!!! Go out there and put your best (beautifully decorated with amazing heels) foot forward and start the new (fashion) year right!! Make sure you are safe though and on top of no drinking and driving I also mean stay away from spandex!!

Can't be here? Times Square Webcam Posted by: Ryan      Read more     Source