Saturday Morning -- What Could Be Finer -- April 11, 2020

Sitting outside, on the lawn, under the trees, watching the robins, enjoying lox and cream cheese on a bagel, Keurig coffee, no wind, bright sunny morning, surfing, blogging, and reading Aristotle's Lagoon.

I won't post the top stories of the week until later today.

I hear there's now a bacon glut.

I'm playing "Monopoly" at our local grocery store. I have any number of instant winners for bagels or donuts. This a.m. I rode my bike next door to Tom Thumb (a regional grocery store), walked in with an instant winner, and walked out with my free bagel. Back home in a New York minute, toasted it, put lox and cream cheese on it and all in about fifteen minutes.

I'm waiting for a smoked salmon glut.

I can't even imagine being anywhere else right now if I had to drive or fly to get there.

On television last night, there was something called "Free Form." I had not seen that before. The feature movie was shown with limited commercial interruption. I like that better than TCM. On TCM there are no opportunities to fix a snack, etc. With "limited commercial interruption" it's the best of both worlds. The feature last night: "Back to the Future." The original. Why is watching something on television always seem better than watching the same thing on DVD?

I was blown away this morning when I realized it costs more to ship hand sanitizer than it costs to produce it. And there's now a glut of that also.

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Word For The Day

Test. No, this is not a "test." The word for the day is "test":

In biology, a test is the hard shell of some spherical marine animals, notably sea urchins and microorganisms such as testate foraminiferans, radiolarians, and testate amoebae.

The term is also applied to the covering of scale insects. The related Latin term testa is used for the hard seed coat of plant seeds.

As part of our curriculum, I am working with Sophia on the five main groups of animals (those with spines -- she says, "like spines on a book") -- she knows the five as: fish, birds, frogs (amphibians), turtles (reptiles) and people (mammals). I was quite impressed that she could recall the five groups.

When you get right down to it, among the amphibians, there are only three "groups": frogs, salamander, and caecelians. So, for her to say "frogs" instead of amphibians, good for her.

Same with reptiles: lizards, snakes, crocodiles/alligators, and turtles. That's about it. I'll probably have to spend a bit more time with her on reptiles -- that's a real grab bag of odds and ends.

Back to test.

I know the word for a turtle's shell: carapace, but I only learned recently that "carapace" only applies to that part of the shell we normally associate with the turtle, the top 90% of the shell.

Quick: the proper name for the bottom ninth of the turtle's shell?

I am with Sophia from 9:30 a.m. to about 8:30 p.m. Monday through Friday, and 2:30 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays, and I find there is not enough time to do all the things we want to do.


Of course, between 2:00 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. weekdays she is over at her friend's house (something she would not be allowed to do if she lived in Detroit). By the way, her friend's mom wears a corona surgical mask even when in the house, though lately she has been wearing it less.

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The Apple Page

I assume I am the only iPhone user that did not know about "Voice Memos."

I discovered the app today; built into every iPhone; no need to download.

The app syncs across all Apple devices.

"Voice Memos" was hiding in the "Folder" icon on my iPhone SE "desktop." Along with the compass; "Find My"; and, "Contacts."