Looks like I might get to see a "very close to full" eclipse of the sun on the 22nd of July around 10:50am. The full eclipse will be just north of us so we won't get the full meal deal but pretty darn close, which is cool since I haven't been in a location to see a solar eclipse in forever.
I remember when I was a kid, my dad went off to see one, I am not sure where he went for it but he brought back some cool pictures. I thought it was prett interesting. As kids, our parents were always pointing out the unique things in the skies to us. We would watch lightening storms from under the picnic table in the back yard. We watched for days and days for Skylab to fall in the 70s and we always watched the meteor showers in the August skies.
I have a pretty decent telescope now but I need to see if I can find some solar eclipse sunglasses here somewhere. I would like to get some pictures and even some video if I can through the telescope but I don't want to chance hurting my eyes. According to Wikipedia's website, you can watch it through a video camera or digital output without hurting your eyes but just going through the telescope, viewfinder on a camera or looking at it directly could be very bad. If I were to get the full eclipse, I could watch that but since we will be a bit off, it will never be complete and therefore dangerous at all times during the event.
This site has a lot of info on the eclipse as well as the links for webcasts from my part of the world if you want to check them out.
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Two Years Ago on In My Words...Lunar Eclipse
Monday, July 20, 2009
Solar Eclipse
Sunday, July 19, 2009
Update to Mishka's Reading
I updated my reading blog today with my reads from February thru June 2009. Check them out if you have a chance...
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Three Years Ago on In My Words...Bogged Down
Saturday, July 18, 2009
Suicide bombers kill 8 at Jakarta Marriott, Ritz - Yahoo! News
This is why my mom gets nervous when we travel...
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Four Years Ago on In My Words...Grand Theft Auto
Wednesday, July 08, 2009
Cicada Time
July is a big month for cicada here in Southern Japan...they are called semi. They are very big and noisy here. We had them when I lived in Texas as a kid but I don't remember them being this huge or loud.
Anyhow, this year has been particularly loud...apparently some years there are lots more than others so perhaps this is a busier year. They seem to like the little tree in the middle of our pond so we are forced to be audience to their loud song each day during "semi season". Soon they will be gone.
This morning, I decided to get out and video tape some so I could have the sound as well as the pictures. I also took this picture with our video camera so you could see the detail of one and also see how big they are here. This one was about 3 inches from the top of the head to the edge of the wing.
I know I will miss them when they are gone as they are always a reminder that summer is finally here.
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Two Years Ago on In My Words...Heading Out
Monday, July 06, 2009
Me, Myself and I
Over the last few years I have noticed that the verbal (and now written) use of the word "myself" has evolved into something that is slowly driving me crazy. I do not claim to be an expert in grammar but this one is a peeve I just can't ignore. I have heard this incorrect usage spill from the lips of Americans in all spectrums of society (educators, sports figures, journalists, politicians, movie stars, students....etc). I don't watch enough international television to notice whether it is worldwide or not, so for now I am limiting my peeve to Americans. Now I am starting to see it in written word as well and that is very scary...
I think it stems from the fear of when to use "me" and "I" correctly. This is something that is drilled into all of us at a very early age. Regardless of the trama, substituting "myself" does not correct this or ease this confusion. It is becoming so commonplace that I expect that Webster's will adopt this new use and there will be no going back. Therefore, I am announcing my issues with it again, so I can say I made an effort.
Okay, so here it is. You CAN say "She bought the cake for my wife and me." You CAN NOT say "She bought the cake for my wife and myself." It just doesn't work that way, because if you were to take the wife out of the sentence (the true test if something is grammatically correct), it would be "She bought the cake for myself" and that just doesn't make sense. You can also say "Jack and I were married yesterday." You can not say "Jack and myself were married yesterday." I don't tend to hear the use of "myself" substituted for "I" as often as for "me" but it does happen on occasion.
Now that I have mentioned it, all of you will hear it all the time and it will drive you crazy too....so you can thank me later...ha ha. Great, I feel better now, getting that off my chest. Please remember that I am not an expert, and I am sure there are 47 other grammatical errors in this little blurb that someone could point out. I just had to get my particular peeve out in the open again (and now that I have, let us hope that I don't ever use "me, myself, and I" incorrectly or I will have hell to pay).
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Four Years Ago on In My Words...Me, Myself, and I
Sunday, July 05, 2009
Chirping Madness
Okay, a similar little guy to this image almost drove me crazy last night. He was in our bedroom and would chirp super loud pretty much once an hour. Finally this morning, I was able to figure out where he was and chase him until he got tired and shooed him out the door. I knew I couldn't do another night of him in my room chirping for a girlfriend...it would have driven me insane.
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One Year Ago on In My Words...Irritation
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
New Friend....Not
It is a good thing that I am not the one in the family that hates spiders because this dude decided to take a little cruise out from the side of my desk while I was here on the computer earlier and at first I just saw it out of the side of my vision and thought it was our cat...then I remembered that she was outside so I looked to see and he was just hanging out next to the office trash can.
Of course, I can't let something that big crawl around in my house while I am sleeping so I had to get the Raid out and kill it but at least it didn't give me the heebie jeebies like it would have someone else I know.
Anyhow, this guy had a pretty decent wingspan so I tried to spread him out a bit after he was dead and put the thumbtack in there for perspective. He was easily 3 inches from leg tip to leg tip if not a bit bigger than that. This is the second big one like this I have seen in or near the house this week....must be spider season again.
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Three Years Ago on In My Words...Family Reunion
Monday, June 29, 2009
Flashback
Okay, I know this is a late post but I was in another country without Internet access when I found out about Michael Jackson's death. I was getting ready to hit the hotel gym and just turned on the BBC news for a second when I saw the "breaking news" story. At first, I thought it had to be a joke...I guess I didn't realize he was in bad health at all and I found it so hard to believe he was actually dead.
Anyhow, I am not a celebrity kind of person...yes, I have artists or actors that I like but I don't go all crazy over them and I don't feel like they are a member of my family when they die. So while I was completely shocked to hear of his death, and I did shed a tear, it wasn't so much for him or the loss of his talent on the planet as it was for more selfish reasons.
As my mom pointed out in her post Michael was a bid deal in my house when I was in junior high school. He was one of the first artists that I found on my own (most of my music interests up to that point were influenced by my parent's great taste). At the time, I didn't know his past, all I knew was that this great album came out with this really cute guy on it and the music made me want to dance. I grew up in a small town and we were a bit behind on trends but I did get the "Top 40" on the weekends and we had just gotten cable so I was glued to MTV. I remember when the Thriller video came out and it was such a huge deal. I "loved" Michael Jackson and did wear a single white glove at my junior high graduation (I wish I had the picture here with me to post but it is in storage). I learned to moon walk and taught my dad how to as well during that year of MJ. I loved all the songs on that album and I have it on CD now.
I stopped listening to MJ after the Bad album as my tastes changed but whenever I hear a song from the Thriller album, it takes me back to that year. It reminds me of being in between being a kid and being a grown up and not really being aware of anything outside my little world of school, friends and family. So I guess when I saw that he was dead, I was sad for his family and the loss of his talent for those generations that won't get to know how great of an artist he was, but I was a little sad for the loss of the icon of my preteen years and how much his music influenced my life and brings back those memories for me.
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One Year Ago on In My Words...Ocean
Sunday, June 21, 2009
The To Do List
I am a list maker. Always have been, always will be. I have a few things coming up and I am using those events as motivators to get a few things done around here that just need to be done. I feel like I have several half done projects and I hate that. So my apologies right off because I am going to make an element box to link to the post right at the top for a bit so I can focus on getting some things off my plate, but I'll condense it so it doesn't take up my entire blog. I'll strike them out as I go.
Now
FishtankNew fish
Plants in front
Backyard yard work
Thriftstore tripSpeakersPond
Patio table
Pack for trip
Find travelchecks and copies of passport that I hid from myself
Bank statements
Pay bills
Color hairCut hair
Make items for giftshop
Month end for giftshop
Write up job description for bookkeeping
Projects
Wireless network
Backup blogs
Pictures for Grandma
Update reading blog
Get new laptop
Pictures
Cards
Create new membership form
Resume
Just For Me (most of these won't get crossed off, I just want to remind myself)
Work on Japanese
Stitch quilt squares
Volunteer
Exercise
Clean
Geocache
Beach
Sun
Organize and purge if necessary
Saturday, June 20, 2009
Typhoon Linfa
This may be the only day we can call it that...right now it is at Typhoon Category 1 but it is not forecasted to stay that way...we will definitely get some weather from it but mostly just more rain....
Today the sun is actually out and so is the humidity...so all that complaining everyone has been doing about the rain will be about how hot and humid it is today...haha. But we'll be back to rain probably within a few days.
Hope all this is not going to affect our attempt to fly out on a long weekend vacation next week...
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Two Years Ago on In My Words...Recycling
