Jerry "The Bear" Garcia

I'm not a "Dead Head" but I have a crochet friend who has a friend who is. This is going to get complicated...so I'll try to explain. When we cruise I usually join the crochet group on the ship. In February we had 8 sea days on a Hawaii cruise....and there I met a wonderful group of a dozen women. Every sea day we knitted or crocheted and talked and had a grand time. It was such a good time that we have stayed in touch with each other. On that trip I made this teddy bear blanket

....and one of the women, Lori,  said the teddy bears looked like Jerry "The Bear" Garcia of the Grateful Dead. Well, a couple of weeks ago, Lori wrote to me saying that her local bookstore owner was a "Dead Head" and she would love to make him a scarf with the bears on it...and she asked for the pattern. Unfortunately, I don't have a good pattern for the Bears because I have it memorized. I asked her what color she would like and I would make the scarf. Brown was chosen and 

I made the scarf (and a matching cap) and sent it to her yesterday. Teddy Bears rule! 

Fury

We saw Fury last night. It's a World War II drama aimed at the male market. It's the opposite of a "chick flick" in other words. Lots of tanks and blood and guts and a little glory. It's a good story. It's done well. It graphically shows the horrors of war. After seeing it, I have to wonder about a religion that touts war and killing as sacred and necessary. For a more complete review of it see the other DrCs blog.

Sunset

Isn't that amazing!

Rabbit Trails

We share our property with a bunch of jackrabbits. The rabbits are fast ...we've clocked them at 25 miles per hour...and they leap great distances too. It's fun to watch them glide across the land with grace and speed. It's interesting to see where the rabbits travel. They always use the same paths. I'm guessing they have used the same pathways for centuries. I know they've used them for the last 30 years!

Because it is so dry right now, the rabbit trails are more evident. Here are a few of our rabbit trails. No matter the season, the trails are always in place. These are ancient rabbit corridors. I wonder what made these pathways the "right" roads to travel? Scientists have studied grizzly bear trails in Alaska and discovered some of the trails are thousands of years old. Has anyone studied the lowly rabbit trail?

Mt. Shasta

In the north state we have a tall mountain....well, a tall volcano, to be exact. At 14,179 feet, Mt. Shasta dominates the area. Her magestic form is just about perfect. Normally covered with glaciers and snow (Shasta is the Kurak word for "White Mountain") today she looks barren and gray.

One more piece of evidence that California needs some rain. As you can see, some of the trees are getting ready for fall. Maybe that's a harbinger for rain.

BTW, Mt. Shasta is considered an active volcano. There are several fumeroles on the side of the mountain still smoking away. Her last eruption was in 1763, and she seems to have 600-800 year cycle between eruptions. She is a a"stratovolcano" also called  a composite volcano. Two "famous" stratovolcanos were Krakatoa and Vesuvius. I've not seen Krakatoa, but I've seen Vesuvius. That mountain too, is a towering giant with Naples in the foreground. 

As another aside, I don't know why I call Mt. Shasta a "she"...it seems to fit. 

Clever Design

I love things clever. Yesterday I had a pedicure and I was unable to put on my sandals right away, so I was given a pair of flip-flops that are absolutely wonderful. They are not comfy. They are not attractive. They are clever.

What starts out as a relatively strange looking oval,  

becomes a perfectly acceptable "flip-flop" just by attaching the back loop to the top. 

Good design needs to be rewarded!

iOS8 is Pretty Good

iOS8

The newest operating system for iPhone and iPad has been out a few weeks. I downloaded it the 3rd day after it arrived, and for the most part, I've been pleased with the changes. I won't call the changes "improvements" because I'm not sure they are all better than iOS7. 

I do like the fact that the nice folks at Apple decided to use black print instead of the stylish medium gray print they had on iOS7. While the gray was pretty, it was impossible to see. I like the new keyboarding options too, including a more intelligent "word anticipating sub-routine.' The new system tries to "guess" what you are going to type next, and much of the time, it's right. The downside is it sometimes guesses wrong and the result is amusing or embarrassing or somewhere in between. With the new keyboard system, it's imperative to proofread your work. (I remember telling my students to proofread their papers...it was true then and it's true now.)

I'm still undecided if I like my iPad and iPhone being so connected. I know how to work each stand alone unit, but now, when my iPhone rings, so does my iPad. I'm not sure that is necessary. What is that doing to battery life on both devices? I'm sure it's eating power as we speak. In addition, when Yosemite, the new Mac OS comes out in a few days, all Mac devices will be inter-connected.

That leads to another issue...power! The new health app is a power eater. Something that is going to count the steps you take each day is going to be on all the time...and when you look at battery usage, you might find it's using 60% or more of the power you use each day. That's a lot of power to tell you how many steps you walked.

Siri has gotten a little bit better. I use Siri a lot. She's my "go to timer" when I cook. I ask her to find folks and places, and she does a pretty good job. Now, if you are plugged in, you can say "Hey Siri" and she will answer you back. This is useful if you are in your car, charging your iPhone. Even though the latest research by AAA says that even hands-free cell phone use is distracting, there are times when it's necessary to use the phone when you are driving. I've also discovered that if Siri does not understand the name I'm asking her to find, I can now spell the name and she will find it. In the past when I've tried that, she has gotten flustered and found really stupid non-related words. Siri seems to be better "connected" to Safari. Now I can ask her to call a local business and first she will check my contact list then she checks online. She's a very useful tool. (I still use the original voice, but you can change the voice if you wish.)

If you need to call one of your favorite people, double click on the home button and your favorites appear at the top of your screen making them easier to call. If you don't like that feature, you can turn it off too. In fact, many of the features that were added can be turned off by finding them in settings and pushing the button from green to white.

For me, the best change is the built-in photo editing application. Both the iPhone and the iPad are pretty good cameras, and now you can edit your photos better than before. You have far more control over color and light than with the previous version. It's not as wonderful as Photoshop, but it's darned good! 

As I said, I'm pleased with the new iOS8. Given that, I've not downloaded it for an iPhone 4. I've read that it's best on iPhone 5 and 5S and iPad 4 and 5. When I get my iPhone 6 (not 6+) I'll be very familiar  with it.