Thought for the Day - July 25,00

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day - July 25,00
From: Gervase
Date: 27 Jul 00 - 11:31 AM

Good grief - Geraint!
Not just a good journalist but a good singer too. Hopefully he'll be at Towersey.

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day - July 25,00
From: Peter T.
Date: 27 Jul 00 - 10:57 AM

I believe that dragonflies are supposed to be a better solution to mosquito elimination (I am no expert).

yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day - July 25,00
From: SINSULL
Date: 27 Jul 00 - 10:48 AM

Peter,
I took my normal route to work today and discovered that the city in its eagerness to eliminate Nile Fever (2 years too late, but that's another thread) mowed down my little patch of wild flowers. I feel as if I have lost a friend.
Mary, the Arrogant American

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day - July 25,00
From: GUEST,Roger the skiffler
Date: 27 Jul 00 - 09:46 AM

Try this, 'Spaw.
Yoghurt may bring wind of change

by Geraint Smith

British scientists have developed a solution to the flatulence of the world's cows - believed to be a significant factor in global warming.

They plan to give them a daily dose of bacteria in a yoghurt-like additive to their food.

By the very nature of their digestive systems, cows, and to an extent sheep, contribute a quarter of the greenhouse gas methane to the atmosphere.

Researchers at Scotland's Rowett Research Institute have now found a bacterium that breaks down the methane into two far less damaging gases - hydrogen and carbon dioxide.

© Associated Newspapers Ltd., 27 July 2000

RtS

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day - July 25,00
From: bob jr
Date: 26 Jul 00 - 12:40 AM

did you know that thoreaus retreat to the countryside consisted of him in a cabin on the outskirts of town that his folks visited every week bringing food and gifts...walden wasnt the same after i found out what a fraud he was..oh well

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day - July 25,00
From: katlaughing
Date: 25 Jul 00 - 03:24 PM

The "T" is for Thoreau....just a little farther north....you are an inspiration to this writer, Peter. Thanks.

Spaw....OH, Ssssspppppaaaawwww, git your silly ass out back here in the faery garden and look at this litter mess!! Bring a broom!

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day - July 25,00
From: SINSULL
Date: 25 Jul 00 - 01:12 PM

Hopeless! Just plain hopeless!

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day - July 25,00
From: catspaw49
Date: 25 Jul 00 - 01:06 PM

Peter always brings out the best in me.

Spaw

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day - July 25,00
From: SINSULL
Date: 25 Jul 00 - 12:51 PM

Let's hope not, Roger.
My world is full of black-eyed-susans and huge sunflowers. Thanks for sharing yours, Peter.
Spaw, don't make me take you out behind the wood shed. Confine yourself and your gases to an appropriate thread.
Mary

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day - July 25,00
From: GUEST,Roger the skiffler
Date: 25 Jul 00 - 11:33 AM

Poor old Pete is trying to save the environment and dear old 'Spaw is trying to destroy the ozone layer single handed!(no, handed isn't quite right is it?)
RtS

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day - July 25,00
From: Jeri
Date: 25 Jul 00 - 11:33 AM

I usually feel guilty about not chopping things down and so causing an eyesore - right up until the time the Joe Pye, asters, and goldenrod bloom and the place is covered with butterflies. Last year, I couldn't go out without being buzzed by what I first thought were very large bees, but in fact was a pair of hummingbirds. (Hope they return this year.)

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day - July 25,00
From: Jim the Bart
Date: 25 Jul 00 - 11:31 AM

Ah! That gentle aroma - as if the gasbag had just discovered brown as a scent. . .

M. Spaw, you are incorrigible.

Mr. Peter T. -
Thanks, once again, for capturing the moment so well. Although knowing what I'm missing makes it a little harder to sit here in this office, reading your descriptions helps a whole lot. I wouldn't start the day without looking for 'em. I appreciate it.

Bart

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day - July 25,00
From: Peg
Date: 25 Jul 00 - 11:22 AM

Peter T: flawlessly spoke and beautifully rendered as always. I would like your permission to quote you at some point, in a writing project I have in the works...

and damn it all when are you going to write a book already?

Your musings on nature rival those of some of our greatest naturalist writers, Peter Matthiessen, Wendell Berry, Maxine Kumin, among others...

thank you for these daily doses of inspiration that prompt us to slow down and gaze and sniff and listen...

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day - July 25,00
From: catspaw49
Date: 25 Jul 00 - 11:00 AM

BBBBRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAWWWWWWMMMMMMMPPPPPPPPP

.......aahhhhh..............

Spaw --- Sensitive Reader

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day - July 25,00
From: Peter T.
Date: 25 Jul 00 - 10:07 AM

Nice to have a sensitive reader(s), MM, through those seasons.

yours, Peter T.

Subject: RE: Thought for the Day - July 25,00
From: MMario
Date: 25 Jul 00 - 09:41 AM

Peter - you have been day by day taking us through the changing seasons. Thank you. You have helped me be far more aware of the cycle of life around me then I have been in years. Familiarity does tend to breed, mayhaps not contempt, but perhaps indifference? You have re-awakened my senses to wonder and appreciation

Subject: Thought for the Day - July 25,00
From: Peter T.
Date: 25 Jul 00 - 09:22 AM

How can we tell it is high summer in the meadow? Of course the susans and the sumacs and the thistles are almost head high, but the real feeling is in the slight reddening tinge that turns some yellow flowers orange and some green one's darker. It is subtle, like the slightest breath of ripeness: that little deepening of colour under the sun. It is as if the colours have got their range, and are now into saturation. As if a young painter had really discovered green, and had been trying out all the variations, and had finally hit on the right shade. And when the thought comes that for each of these flowers this is their one chance to try out red, and orange, and yellow, and green in their lives, it makes you stop on the hills and ridiculously wish them well: touch them and say, yes, flower, that is how it is done, no flower will ever do that better than you, thank you.

There are so many summer subtleties: if you are out in the fields at daybreak, the dew does not lift off lightly as it does in early summer: it warms in place, like sweat on a body. The noise of the meadow changes: it is all much busier and more complex, but also fuller and slightly muffled because of the huge increase in understory vegeation. The raspberries have gone into deep purple, under darkenening green leaves. Some of the June flowers are just finished, like the earlier stages of some vegetal rocket, propelling the later flowers into bloom. And they all come, purples and browns and reds. Yes, the meadow is in full summer.