More Blooms

Well, the first two blooms on the top of the plant closed up. Three blooms toward the middle have now opened up as can be seen in the picture.


Here is a closeup of one of the blooms. Needs to be in focus.



A side view of the bloom can be seen here which shows the curling pedals

Flowers of the Queens Tears Plant

The flowers have a orange center with the petals having a light green center and the edges are blueish-purple. Two flowers are out now with five more to go.

Queen Tears Plant

My aunt gave me a plant a while back so I put it in the sun room. Recently, a red stalk has appeared that will form blooms. This plant is watered by pouring water into the center of leaves that form a conical cup. The first picture was taken about 4 days before the next one.

[EDITED: Okay, I need to do my research before posting. It appears this plant is a Billbergia nutans or "Queen Tears". The pictures I am finding on the internet look very much like this plant.]





A picture taken minutes ago from when this post was written shows a multicolor blooms forming. I wonder if they will open?

Trilobites in Louisville

After finding a trilobite imprint in a rock I dug up, my cousin recommended I start breaking the rock apart to see if there were any more. Sure enough, another one appeared that had been partial sheared off. I then tried extract more of it from the rock which worked pretty well. At that point I should have taken a picture but instead I started to try and break that part of the rock away from the main section. When I was hitting on the rock, the force of the impact caused the tail and part of the center of its back to break away thus leaving the image shown below. The rock is like a mudstone and crumbles very easily.

After publishing this post earlier, I did some more research and found that trilobites are arthropods. Their bodies are divided into three sections: cephalon, thorax, and phygidium. In the picture below, I labeled part of the spine breaking away but that was the thorax. They do have spines but in the sense of pointed parts that stick out to fend off predators.



The Trilobite imprint below has been further revealed after using a small awl and hammer to remove pieces of it. It looks like this relatively large trilobite was squished and twisted when it got buried in this mud. I will need to get ruler next to them next time I take a picture.

Whad Ya Know in Louisville

Public Radio's Whad' Ya Know show visited Louisville again and we were there. Our tickets were very close to the stage which was pretty crazy. This show was not a sell out like last time which was somewhat disappointing. Also last time they brought a bottle of Woodford Reserve at the beginning of the show and the host, announcer, and band were all drinking it during the show. It appeared to me that half that bottle was gone by the end of the show. This show a bottle was brought out at the end and only half of it was left so maybe it was being drunk off stage. I can see why this is one of their favorite cities to visit!

The Courier Journal's Bob Hill was interviewed first and he did well in his exchange with the host. It would have been nice to mention that Bob has a local radio show on WFPL about gardening or that he runs a plant nursery. Bob did bring some gifts of some bottled water with a unique name that is produced in Kentucky.

Later local chef Dean Corbett prepared a meal during the second part of the show and the smell was pretty good. It sort of reminded me of being in a Chinese restaurant. Dean was invited to do some imitations which he did (Bill Clinton, Steve Beshear (governor elect)). The one of Steve Beshear was quite good.

Laura Lee Brown was interviewed later in the show and she is one of the main people behind building a new 62 story building in Louisville. She is a decedent of the founder of Brown-Forman who makes Woodford Reserve (sponsor of this show). The theater might be named after the family as well. Our seats were pretty close as I already mentioned in that I am pretty sure on the bottom of her shoe it said Made in Italy on it. The last guest was Chris Morris who is a distiller at Woodford Reserve. He made two Mint Juleps for the Michael and the quiz participate.

Here are some pictures from after the show. I did not take any during the show because I was not sure if that was allowed. There was some sort of announcement before the show about taking flash photography because they were filming the show. I noticed a remote control camera on the stage so it appeared to be being recorded. There were several photographers roaming around taking pictures during the show.

Above pictures shows quiz contestant looking out into theater, Michael Feldman looking to greet members of the audience, and Jim Packard (in background in red).

Kentucky vs. Seattle

My wife and I attended an exhibition game of University of Kentucky versus Seattle yesterday. While the outcome was no big surprise with Kentucky winning, it was a pleasant Saturday evening with dinner before hand not far from the arena. I took a few pictures.

Here are the two teams warming up before the game started.

This picture shows a Kentucky player scoring on the inside.

Here is an outside shot going through the hoop.

During a long TV timeout, the cheering squad brings out the big K and then the wildcat mascot is raised up before to get the crowd standing to raise the cheer.

At the end of the game, the pep band plays "My Old Kentucky Home" while the cheer leading and pep squads sway back and forth. Kentucky won the game 82-63.