Atmosphere, climate, environment, sky, industrial forcing global temperature rise...

I read an article today on Grist that said the global temperature is at a 4,000 year high. The increase has been precipitous since the mid 19th century, from about 1850-1870 when industrial consumption of fossil fuels markedly increased. Here's a link: Global temperatures are at a 4,000-year high

Global temperatures at a 4,000 year high, after being at a 10,000 year low only 200 years ago?! That is scary!

Societal/Industrial activities have already had severe impacts the planet, and by many accounts, impacts are set to increase. Just that knowledge is enough to be psychologically disruptive, and damaging.

After all, what is the point of destroying the planet? Extreme riches for relatively few people? Can anyone's riches be justified when they depend upon harm to the well-being of planet and humanity?

Much of the living systems on the planet stand to be decimated, severely harmed, if not destroyed outright, and all for what? For a lifetime of luxury? How shallow is that! How uncivilized and inhumane!

Then I saw someone change their cover photo on Facebook to a sunset/sunrise, so I went searching my flickr stream for photos of the sky. I haven't changed my cover photo for a while, so I though I would. I had one in particular in mind, though when I found it, I realized it wasn't what I wanted, so I searched on around some more and found something else...anyway...Here are a few photos I came across in my search:


Gull and Gazebo

Joshua Tree

Joshua Tree, a photo by ˇBerd on Flickr.

I have been thinking of this place, Joshua Tree, recently. I remember this trip in 2005. It was a "100 year bloom." Conditions had been just right for a remarkable show of blossoms from the trees. It really was totally awesome. (I don't know why this particular tree doesn't appear to be blooming. and maybe I will dig up some of the other photos to see what's up.)

This was a wonderful place, truly remarkable and awesome, even without a 100 year bloom, well worth a pilgrimage.

Photos!

Photos!

I found the following photos when I was searching my flickr photostream for nature photos for possible use in the Winter 2013 issue of South Sound Green Pages. Here's a wide-ranging assemblage of a bunch of photos, many from around the year 2010.

Donald Trump Answers the Phone at McDonald's

Last November (2012,) on Friday the 16th of the month, I was on the Your Daily Hour With Me program with Kenrick Ward. Toward the end of the hour we called McDonald's and it sounded like the person who answered might have introduced themselves as "Donald Trump." :-)

It happened at about 56:55 into the program. Here's a link in case the above video didn't work to go directly to the point: http://youtu.be/nHcaAtf0Rsk?t=56m55s

Then they said it sounded like we were "in a tunnel."

Then a sauce packet exploded!

It was a good time.

Here's in-video video, showing Kenny's rad American Flag pin: http://youtu.be/tghsN18Y24Y

Gulls on Frozen McLane Pond

January 2013

Photos from Percival Landing

I was just looking for a photo from Percival Landing, the one that's featured on the cover of the January 22 edition of Olympia Power and Light newspaper. When I typed "percival landing" into the search bar on my Flickr account, 792 results returned. And I think there are some that are not properly labeled, so it likely missed quite a few. So, I have quite a few pictures of Percival Landing, many are from the classic perspective looking North from near the "kissing statue" by 4th Ave and Water Street. One of the reasons I have so many photos from there is because that's where the weekly Friday evening peace vigil takes place.

Here are some more mostly of the more recent Percival Landing photos that came up in the search result:





















I also did a high v. low tide comparison photo shoot, see that here: olyblog.net/tidal-fluctuation-and-high-tide

I do hope that you are well, please have a good day, week, month, year, decade, century, millennium, and so on. heehee :-) Berd

Pacific Avenue Scenes (Tacoma)

Tacoma Union Station Train Schedule

Tacoma Union Station Train Schedule, a photo by ˇBerd on Flickr.

I have been attending proceedings in a trial at the United States Courthouse in Tacoma. It is a civil case, brought by a group of six protestors, against the City of Tacoma, in relation to events that occurred in March 2007, when there were protests around the transportation of a shipment of a "Stryker Brigade" from JBLM (then known as Fort Lewis.)

During the trial, the judge, Judge Ronald B. Leighton, told a story about the courthouse. After a morning of questioning the jury, (there were 33 potential jurors in the pool, of which 8 remained to stand duty for the trial,) judge Leighton asked the counsels to make their final decisions about which jurors they chose to eliminate. While he waited for their responses, he told of how the courthouse came to be.

Some of the details from the story he told were:
25,000 citizens gathered for the original Union Station train depot building dedication over 100 years ago.
18 years ago, the building was renovated for use as a federal court. At the time, the building was a home for pigeons, and Pacific Way was home to adult bookstores and drug addicts.
Some "ladies in the community" convinced the government to invest $65 million, and the result was very this "Temple of Justice," this present-day courthouse, with its state of the art courtrooms. It's special, not all courthouses have such features and function.
When the building was dedicated, the ceremony was performed by Bob Kakasuki. Bob was the first Asian-american in federal judiciary.
It was a special event, because when Bob was 11 years old, during World War II, he was transported away from Tacoma Union Station to internment camp.
Justice Bob Kakasuki died 13 years ago.

Sunny Forest

Sunny Forest

Upper South Fork Skokomish Trail, July 2012

Jellyfish and Heavy Rains

Yesterday there were a lot of jellyfish in the waters of lower Budd Inlet, Olympia Washington. The day before the water was quite turbid due to run-off from heavy rains in outflow from the Deschutes river. I posted a couple entries about that on OlyBlog.net: olyblog.net/blog/berd.





I also posted some more photos on flickr:

Tuesday:


Wednesday:



slideshow:

Early December 2012, Olympia, Washington