We had snow yesterday. Today we sent the snow your way and enjoyed a day that was clear and clean. Cold as hell, but clear as a bell. The museum is closed for a couple of days and I'm hoping the wind will not be making the road between here and Colorado too dangerous to drive. Got a grandbaby I want to play with.
From The Wall Street Journal: When the microbiologist Alexander Fleming famously went on holiday in 1928, he left a dish of bacteria sitting around his London lab and returned two weeks later to a patch of “mold juice,” which became known by another name: penicillin. He won the Nobel Prize, saved countless lives and made an indisputable case for two-week vacations. The origin story of another elixir goes back to San Francisco on a frigid evening in 1905, when a boy named Frank Epperson mixed soda powder and water in a cup with a stirring device. There was nothing original about the concoction until he forgot to bring his treat inside for the night. The next morning, it was frozen. It was also delicious. His completely inadvertent creation is called a Popsicle.
This packhorse bridge in Lancashire, England, is 800 years old. I like to imagine the people who have walked across it.
Very impressive! I grew up near the oldest surviving bridge in America. It's just a little stone bridge that I've driven over a thousand times without thinking about it, but it's been there like 400 years, and people like William Penn and George Washington used it for their travels back in the day. It's amazing how much history is hidden around us. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frankford_Avenue_Bridge
The oldest constructions in the area where I live date to the early 1800s. But the road I live on was once a trail frequented by the indigenous peoples, and I have a humongous walnut tree in the ravine behind my house that probably dates to those days!
Japan, where it could be a thousand years old or put up yesterday. If it was erected anytime between 1940 and 1980, however, it's probably shit construction that needs to come down ASAP. The postwar construction boom was carried out without any safety standards whatsoever.
The problem I've found is that most of the "old" buildings in Japan are relatively recent reconstructions. Being made of wood, these things had a habit of bruning down or being bombed into oblivion by B-29s. The Sensoji in Tokyo had that happen in 1945, so most of the buildings are no more than 80 years old. I visited the Kinkakuji and thought, "Oh cool, pre-Sengoku architecture with the gold leaf and everything". But noooo, it burned down in 1950 and was rebuilt. I guess the oldest building I've been to is either the Kyoto Imperial Palace or Hikone Castle*. But I'll bet they burnt down as well. *Just checked, it was due to be bombed the night WW2 ended, but the war ended at noon. My house was apparently built in the 1920s. I can believe it.
Oldest I've been to in Japan is probably Kiyomizu dera, oldest I've been to is Hagia Sophia (565AD or so).
I am reading all about their amazing sense of smell in An Immense World, by Ed Yong, all about animals' senses. It was recommended to me by Obama (lol) - it was on his list of best books he read in 2022. Dogs have been trained to detect bombs, drugs, landmines, missing people, bodies, smuggled cash, truffles, invasive weeds, agricultural diseases, low blood sugar, bedbugs, oil pipeline leaks and tumours.
I wonder if they could be trained to identify the sex of cattle by smelling piles of their excrement. Spoiler It would be cool to have an accurate bullshit detector. I'll show myself out.
Headline of the Day, from The Babylon Bee: Thousands Of Spirit Airlines Passengers Disappointed Their Flights Weren't Canceled
As an outsider I always wonder just how horrible Spirit must be to have become the default whipping-boy of comedy. But then after all these years in Asia I find any US-based airline to be completely unacceptable. A city bus in Osaka during rush hour is better than premium economy on United, so the idea of a "bad" American airline baffles me.
Oh this +++, except with British Airways. I've never met ruder cabin attendents, who treat you as if they're doing you a favour than on British Airways. And that was in what BA are pleased to call "business class". Mind you, that applies to all aspects of customer service in the UK compared to Asia.
I'd rather swim an ocean than ever take Norwegian Airlines again. Their agents in Gastwick airport hold the all-time record for idiocy, incompetence, and rudeness, and they have serious competition from a particularly toxic agent in Brussels.
I find it's sometimes worthwhile to make a fuss. I was in Narita Airport and my flight had been cancelled due to a typhoon. I got a bit heated with the check-in agent (which is not something you normally do in Japan). A family on the same flight were there too, and the agent was very apologetic but said she couldn't do anything. A short while later, she comes over to me (the family were still there) and takes me to one side out of their hearing. "Because you are supeshuru (special), we got you a direct flight on JAL". Keeping in mind I was originally booked on China Eastern Airways, that was a result.
