Full Moon and Empty Arms

Posted on 31/10/2020 by Grumpa Joe

Usually every time there is a full moon visible in the night sky I send a text to several friends saying, “full moon and empty arms.” Of course it is because it is true. I see the moon as an opportunity for some romance, but it seems I never have anyone to romance. Last evening while walking home from a jaunt into town I spotted the moon coming up over the tree line. It was amazing. I never took my eyes off of it until I entered the house.

This afternoon and evening, my neighbors were camped out on their driveway waiting for trick or treaters to come by; the volume of tricksters is near nil. I handed out but a dozen pieces of candy since two this afternoon. On most halloweens I have to play Scrooge and ration the candy. Today, I was generous and I’ll still be sampling the left over wares six months down the road. On the way home from my afternoon walk I stopped by the neighbors and told them to watch for the moon tonight. Later, after supper dishes were done I put on my jacket and strolled over to point them at the moon. It looked like it was six feet high above the horizon and huge. They were amazed and appropriately so. One of them whipped out his phone and found his app that identifies planets, and stars in the night sky, all by holding the camera up at the object. He identified three planets, Mars, Venus, and Saturn all visible along with the most gorgeous moon ever. Of course the moon was like looking at a beach ball and the planets were like looking at a grain of sand. I have to get that app on my phone.

Sky Safari

Filed under: Biography, family, Memories, Warm and Fuzzy | Tagged: , , | Leave a comment »

Once Upon a Time

Posted on 01/12/2009 by Grumpa Joe

Once upon a time the planet earth was covered in ice.  About two hundred years ago, people began to notice strange things around the earth. Boulders the size of a house were found in the middle of fields where there was no rock of the same type. Some how these people began to deduce that the ice field on the mountain pushed the boulder down.  Eventually, more people got on the band wagon and a theory developed about the glacial period.  I refer to it as the Ice Age.  In the two hundred years since the glacial period was discovered, scientists have learned that there have been four ice ages.  They  took place over periods of millions of years, but they did take place. Each time, the ice receded and melted. The last ice age was twenty thousand years ago. The arctic and the antarctic ice caps, and mountain glaciers are the remnants.  Let’s face it, there were no cars or power plants twenty thousand years ago to make all that ice melt, so what made it go away?

Today, we have a giant argument about how our CO2 emissions are causing global warming. True, CO2 does cause global warming, it is one of the mechanisms that made the glacial periods recede? Could it be that we are still in the recession period of the last glacial period? Could it be that all the cars and coal-fired power plants in the world running twenty-four hours a day could not have any effect whatsoever on global warming? Could it be that global warming is merely a natural cycle that the planet earth experiences?  Who has been around for a million years to tell us?

I once visited a great place near Tucson Arizona called the Biosphere 2.

Bio-Sphere 2 was originally designed as an experiment to determine if man could survive in a totally closed cell natural environment. They could not. The property was sold to a University that used the Bio-sphere as a closed environment where they ran full size experiments to measure the effects of  CO2 on the planet. The results were too erratic to continue.

While there, I saw a small-scale experiment which was more controlled. The exhibit was a series of twenty-gallon fish tanks. Each growing corn at different levels of CO2. What I recall is that it took a huge amount of CO2 in the atmosphere to cause plants to grow poorly. In fact, the plants did  better with more CO2. The amount of CO2 plants can handle before it becomes deleterious is huge. 

It is clear to me that the current evidence for CO2 emissions causing global warming are irrelevant when compared to the natural dynamics of the solar system, and the cycle of glaciation on planet earth. It is also clear to me that the CO2 content of the atmosphere is still at a level that will help things grow more vigorously. It is also clear to me that the current hysteria about global warming is based on a bunch of questionable data that has now mysteriously disappeared. It is also clear to me that the Cap and Trade system being foisted upon us is still another way for POTUS to grab more control over our lives.

Filed under: Cartoons, Conservative, economy, Election, family, Government, liberals, Manufacturing, politics, Science | Tagged: , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment »