Almost Gone

You are only there to help.  Cricket and Gary are up from Texas and Gary is a woodworker -- makes furniture and such from mesquite and cedar wood.  You get the chainsaw to cut a tree in the north woods which has a burl about six feet from the ground , found by ginny previously, growing off of a black oak. Tree is near the size of that shown here but the burl is maybe three-quarters as big. Woodworkers go nuts over these since the woodgrain inside is beautifully swirled and colored.  And any type of tree can grow these  burls since they are the product of some sort of injury or assault to the trees' exterior.
You make a cut to the tree high so as to lessen the cutting necessary to release the burl.  Tree is going to fall to the East I predict, Gary says to the West.  You make the first cut on the West side, then go over to the other side where, after a cut into the tree, the saw is pinched in the cut..  You are too distracted trying to free the saw or turn it off to consider the next move; not realizing that the saw is pinched because the tree is falling the way you predicted!
You feel a strong push from the left (gary), reel to the right but remain standing.  A soundless mass of dark tree lightly brushes by your left shoulder on its way down as if a shadowy hand has brushed a fly from your arm.
You are one  arms-length away from being gone.
You later  try not to think of the bad outcome; or let it flow through once then forget it -- best not to dwell on a messy situation.  As it occurs during meditation, let it pass -- let it flow then let it go.
Just another thought to watch without reaction or tensity.

All you can say later  is:  I had better get a bowl out of this deal . . .

The burl can be cut into a thin veneer and made into a wood-surface upon any type of furniture.
This is called a "bachelors chest" and has the thin burl layer attached to the desktop and drawer fronts.

The First Google

 

Prior to the advent of internet searches, information and tools could be hard to find.  Local library, local stores, telephone book, word of mouth , were all means of obtaining information and tools but could be limited in scope.  This catalog, started by  Stuart Brand in 1968 attempted to include sources for books and pamphlets which may have been at the edges of what was obtainable locally.  Here you may find information on communes, building your own sauna, ordering a parachute, carving a pipe, building a tipi or log home, desert farming, and a book which I may look to see if it is still available called  "The practical cogitator".   There is a running drama on the pages of the catalog called "Divine Right's Trip" which is interesting to read as you peruse the pages, and tends to draw you into the rest of the page which contains summaries and comments on the books presented for sale.  Readers could submit writeups of books or catalogs and would be paid $10 if their presentation was printed in the next supplement.  Between fall of '68 and spring of '71 there were 14 updates/supplements sold to stay current with what was available and add new sources.

I used to collect catalogs and still have a pile of useless ones since they are mostly way out of date (I still get a few sent to me which is odd because the companies now have an on-line presence and need not print them.)

On the cover of the first Whole Earth Catalog was a photo of the whole earth taken from an ATS satellite in November 1967.  It is said to be the first full-earth picture published.  (Eat your words flat-earthers.)

But  we can now search on any topic or item  and get many sources and possibilities for products and reading.  What need for libraries or stores when anything can come in the mail?

I marvel at the possibilities; but  do wonder what exists out there and may not be available by punching keys.

 The first

Crystal

Deep in the heart of cold
I exist Unique among many
As you
A hopeful bright spark of existence
Here but for an instant in the flow of time
We shine brightly



I have sometimes wanted to try to photograph a snowflake with some sort of microscope/camera rig which could be set up winter-outside to keep the little guy from melting first. Seems that it has already been done by this fellow.
From CalTech in California he travels the cold snowy parts of the world to capture the images of snowflakes and even grows some flakes in the lab to further investigate crystalline-structure formation.
There is wonder everywhere if we only seek to find it. Small almost unseen places exist and we need only to look for them ,and see.

Finito

The finished Burj Dubai, on the Persian Gulf ; the tallest earthly building now, at almost 1/2 mile high (I think they cheated and used the towers on top in the calculation). Its probably good that earthquakes are not common in that part of the world since I doubt it was built to seismic standards. It has a third lobe, on the backside of the photo, to create a triangular cross-sectional setup for stability.
This may be the last of construction firsts for Dubai since the Emirate is in serious debt to all of the bond holders around the world who invested in nonstop construction since the early part of this decade --- not much oil there as it turns out!
But a wondrous place to roam around inside of as depicted by this website on the matter.
I am not a fan of "bigger is better" but something/one has to claim the prize I guess . . . and will.


Bigger is better they always say
but why not best in a beautiful way?
Sport and games teach conformity and structure I fear
with nary a thought to art or a song for the ear

from a push by Rhiannon