If you’ve had trouble getting in, or receive a new post that you saw two days ago, I’m here to take the blame. In trying to correct some stupid error message coming up since the last round of upgrades (that did not disappear when I rolled back,) I messed up some stuff and had to restore from a backup file. So a post I made two days ago is about to reappear.
Meanwhile, if you get some
I was about to pick up a plastic storage bin out in the yard today when I noticed a little crab spider perched on it, so naturally I went to get the camera. He (yes it’s a male) was amusing himself by trying to balloon away, casting a webline into the wind until it was carried off, whereupon
The weather has been spastic as all git-out, and I’ve actually postponed meetings with a couple of students because it’s been raining frequently and unpredictably, despite many meteorologist’s claims otherwise. Yesterday as the weather cleared I got out to a park that I don’t visit too often, having left early to beat the rush hour traffic, and had some time
At 12:06 am this morning, I find out that yesterday was National Grouch Day, a holiday I could actually get into, and I missed it. I even had a student and thus was on better behavior than normal, so I was extra cheated.
I just checked there is no National Spider Photographer Day, and no National Godless Heathen Day, so this was my one chance to shine, and I missed it. Someone can
I’m sorry, it’s what I’m finding to photograph.
So about a month ago I mentioned that the green lynx spiders (Peucetia viridans) that I’d been observing had all made egg sacs one on the dog fennel plants, one on the butterfly bush, and one on the rosemary bush. They have all since hatched, and I’ve been watching the new spiderlings
Note: I’ve had this is draft form for several days, tweaking it and waiting for a good opportunity to put it up I try to rotate and space out posts, and just recently put up another of the numbered series posts. Then this morning, Jerry Coyne at Why Evolution Is True posted virtually the same sentiment, and now I look like I’m copying him. So here it is anyway.
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Pfsssshh. Like that’s gonna stop someone from driving off with the lake…
Lyssomanes viridis, known to those of us who do not speak dead languages as the magnolia green jumping spider, is a lovely translucent green spider that wouldn’t hurt a fly um, is harmless to anything larger than a honyebee and is undeserving of any arachnophobic reactions. Until you get close. Really, really close.
Because, while all jumping spiders have the same equipment, on the magnolia
Just in case anyone hasn’t seen this subject the last nine times I approached it, I find ‘free will‘ to be a corrupt concept, a common belief without rational support (which gives it plenty of company.) And no, I’m not going to broach it again. Instead, we’ll look deeper into the question of whether we should retain some illusions.
When we’re learning how to do something even vaguely artistic, there is a series of pitfalls that can arise: while concentrating on following “rules” or guidelines or better techniques or whatever, we can get too wrapped up in details and forget the more important aspects, like style and message and appeal. This particular topic is one, in the
