Campus Chatter – February 5, 2012
Today in history, greetings, and social banter here. (More)
Henry of Navarre abjured Catholicism at Tours today (1576). Also, Roger Williams emigrated to Boston (1631), Saint Petersburg, Russia’s Hermitage Museum opened (1852), Wallachia and Moldavia became the United Principalities (1859), the United States and United Kingdom signed a treaty for the Panama Canal (1900), Leo Baekeland announced the creation of Bakelite (1909), Mexico adopted her current constitution (1917), the Royal Greenwich Observatory began broadcasting hourly time signals (1924), the European Court of Justice established the principle of direct effect in Van Gend en Loos v. Nederlandse Administratie der Belastingen (1963), and Bob Douglas was the first black elected to the Basketball Hall of Fame (1972). And Byron De La Beckwith was convicted of the 1963 murder of Medgar Evers (1994).
Good morning! ::hugggggs::
Yesterday on Campus
Morning Feature – Listening to Latinos, Part III: Culture and Convergence (Non-Cynical Saturday)
Campus Question – Is “phony economics” the new “phony birth certificate?”
Today on Campus
Morning Feature – Two Tribes? (Ask Ms. Crissie)
Furthermore – Winning Progressive with Weekend Reading
Noontime News at noon
Campus Question at 6pm ET
Evening Focus at 7pm ET – Silly Sunday: Super Silly!
Our Earth at 8pm ET – Eco News Roundup
Good morning, everyone. Half the much-dreaded long wall got painted yesterday and I feel like I almost have a new house. Everything still needs to be put back in place, and then we move on to the even-more-dreaded kitchen next weekend. There are some things I can move in advance (and clean), so I figure I’ll tackle that stuff during the week.
Now after that extremely exciting update (I’m sure you were all waiting with bated breath to hear how this job is going) I’ll try to find something else to talk about.
Sometimes tasks become so consuming they’re all you think about. I have reached that state of affairs, in part because my house has been entirely up-ended for weeks.
Hugggs!
I’m glad you got that first half of the wall done. I really was wondering how the painting was going.
Just think how great you are going to feel when this is all done and you can enjoy everything getting put back in place after being cleaned and redone.
The hard parts of any painting project are the moving-stuff-out-of-the-way and moving-stuff-back-where-it-belongs. The painting itself is easy and fun, for me at least. On the plus side, the moving-stuff parts are an opportunity to ask one of life’s Great Questions: “Do we really need all this stuff???”
Good morning! ::hugggggs::
A very good question.
I have been asking the same question. I am wondering why I wasn’t asking the question at the buying end of things.
I thought about thinking about that, then gave up and decided it’s one of those Schrödinger’s Pootie Problems. Turns out it’s awfully hard to predict whether This New Thing will become a Use It Every Day delight or a Why Did I Buy That disappointment.
Good morning! ::hugggggs::
Good for you on being half done! While you have your painting project I am marching through the cleaning out phase. I have to be in a certain frame of mind to discard stuff and I have found that state of mind. Strike while the iron’s hot or something like that.
You definitely have to be in the right frame of mind to do the cleaning out part. I have not yet reached that, although I suspect it might begin with all the back-and-forth moving.
The catz were waiting with baited breath…….
Glad you are making progress, keep it up!
What bait were they using?
Good morning! ::hugggggs::
Thanks, Gardener. I plan to.
Good morning. I’m back for a little while. It’s currently 5 degrees here in the mountains, with a high predicted of 28 degrees. It’ll be warmer (again) starting next week. It was rather strange being outside in long sleeves, no jacket on Groundhog Day. That is not the sort of weather one expects on Feb 2, but except for the ski areas and snowmobilers, no one is complaining.
This past week has been very busy, and disturbing. I managed to get my aunt through some of the basic things, but found out a lot more things that my uncle had … seriously screwed up … with their finances. We have a meeting next week with a lawyer, in addition to a set of other things. Short version: She’s going to lose the house at some point this year. Although that’s another stress she didn’t need, speaking as someone who has been trying to get her to move out for a while, it’s for the best. It’s just that it changes our timetable around.
I am sorry for your aunt but it’s good that she has lots of nieces and nephews to help her through all this.
I too am sorry for you’re aunt’s loss and for the financial stresses it has unearthed. I’m glad she has good relatives like you to help her sort through her options and make better decisions going forward.
Good morning! ::hugggggs::
Yes, what she said……..!
I feel for your aunt, Norbrook, and for you for having to deal with this. The move will be hard on her, of course. I’m sorry she’s losing her house, even though the move will be for the best. Those changes are never easy.
It’s not going to be immediately (we hope), but the mortgage he had on the house is so screwed up – by him – that there’s no way that it can be fixed. That’s besides the house being in terrible condition. I said to a sister who was considering options for bailing out the mortgage, that the best thing to do would be to tear the place down and start over. Given that it’s in the middle of nowhere, and not near any services or public transportation, it’s not a place she could have stayed in long-term anyways.
One of the most fascinating things I learned over the last few months was that time wasn’t synchronized around the world, or even city to city, until railroads became widespread enough that synchronizing time became essential to safety.
Acurate time pieces were already available, but each city or town set its own time according to the sun. Trains changed that, and what a boon it must have been with Greenwich became able to broadcast an acurate standard time.
It’s hard to imagine how irrelevant standardized time was in a pre-industrial, pre-electronic society. Work hours and meeting times were local concerns. Newspapers came out in the “morning” or “evening.” There was little need for clocks in Heretown to match clocks in Theretown. I understand the reasons … but it’s still hard to imagine.
Good morning! ::hugggggs::
It’s very hard to imagine.
Church bells chimed the hour, but what hour? Across the mountain they were probably chiming at a different time. But what did it matter until people started making long trips so much faster?
Up until the past few centuries, most people spent their lives within a fairly short distance of where they were born. One of the amusing things when I look at some of the longer-settled areas in this country is that if you look at the distances between villages, they tend to be “single day” trips apart. That is, what you could get to, do your business, and return in one day on foot or by wagon.
I’m glad that time was standardized before this current crop of Republicans came in. I can imagine them arguing state’s rights and city’s rights and how we could each be in our own timezone.
Back in the day, RR employees who worked on the trains would have to let the carrier test their watches for accuracy. This involved keeping them overnight, and comparing them to a master clock.
Even today, the carrier I worked for required a time comparrison by operating department employees at the start of each trip. Was vastly more important in steam engine days, when trains ran by schedule, and if you were supposed to be in the siding at Fishtown at 10:06, you’d dang well better be there!
I love hearing about this stuff, Gardener. Thanks so much!
Things I learned today: The Observatory at Greenwich is a museum.
That was fascinting, Jim. Thanks for the link and info.
Interesting! I assumed the Royal Observatory at Greenwich was still … well … an observatory. But it makes sense that light pollution would have forced relocation. Thanks for sharing that, Jim!
Good morning! ::hugggggs::
Good morning! Hope everyone is running ontime!
Downton Abbey tonight on PBS!
Overcast and gray again, wind from the north….. Hope y’all have a decent day!
I’ll have to set the DVR for Downton Abbey, as the Official BPI Telereceptifier will be tuned to the Awesome Semi-Spherical Crockery … at least as long as the Patriots stay in the game.
Good morning! ::hugggggs::
Oops, it’s “Downton.”
My bad! 
Not your oops. You had it right to start with. I thought it was misspelled and ‘fixed’ it. My oops.
Fixed again.
Good afternoon! ::hugggggs::
We has some snow here, G. I’m predicting it will be a low-key day here. If we watch any sporting event it is likely to be the Puppy Bowl!
Good morning, folks. 33 and snowing here – it started raining right after we buried Smokey yesterday and turned to snow a couple hours later. Not much, only about an inch and a half, but it’s snow.
Moving slow and late, but so far, I’m the only one up (except for Gaffer – he’s lying on top of the sofa right above my head). Just wanted to thank everyone for their support the last couple days. My focus has been helping Kidlet through everything. With the life she’s led, she has issues with loss (rightfully so), and I’m trying to help her with that. She’s doing OK now that she knows where Smokey is and can visit him occasionally. She plans on making a cement marker for his grave, and I’ll help her with that. We’ll probably bury the other pooties in the same area when their time comes.
Have a good day, everybody, and thanks!!
I’m glad to hear that Kidlet is handling this reasonably well. It will take time, but I’m sure you and iriti will help her (and each other) through the loss.
Good morning! ::hugggggs::
You are a prince of a guy, t……. I took a big ol’ piece of limestone rip-rap and lettered, “MOTOR” on it for my buddy…….