Connecticut designated the sperm whale (Physeter macrocephalus) the official state animal in 1975.
The sperm whale played a significant role in the history of Connecticut (in the 1800’s Connecticut ranked second only to Massachusetts in the whaling industry). The sperm whale is now on the federal endangered species list.
The largest of the toothed whales, sperm whales grow to 70 feet in length and can weigh 59 tons. The brain of the sperm whale is the largest of any animal (reaching up to 20 pounds). The sperm whale was immortalized as Herman Melville’s leviathan “Moby Dick.”
Among whales, the sperm whale is unique in both appearance and social behavior. The enormous box- like head sets it apart physically from other whales. Females and their young travel in permanent units (pods), while the much larger males rove between breeding and feeding grounds, and also among groups of females when breeding. Sperm whales are among the deepest diving cetaceans, capable of diving two miles in search of deep water squid, their main food source (a sperm whale consumes about one ton of food each day – squid, fish, skate, octopus, etc.). Sperm whales can be found in all oceans of the world.
Members of a whale pod form strong and long lasting bonds. They protect young calves and the sick or injured of their pod. Other females protect a calf that is not yet capable of deep diving while the mother dives for food.
From Sperm Whale: American Cetacean Society Fact Sheet:
The sperm whale’s head houses a large reservoir containing spermaceti, a clear liquid oil that hardens to a wax- like consistency when cold, and has long been prized by whalers. Ambergris (a strange substance found in large lumps in the lower intestine of sperm whales, formed around squid beaks that remain in the stomach) was used in the making of perfume, and continues to be valuable in spite of its widespread replacement by synthetics.
Sperm whales are still fairly numerous, but selective killing of the larger breeding-age males over many years upset the male-to-female ratio, and the birth rate has seriously declined in some populations. Sperm whales were killed in two massive hunts, the Moby Dick whalers who worked mainly between 1740-1880, and the modern whalers whose operations peaked in 1964, when 29,255 were killed. Most recent estimates suggest a global population of about 360,000 animals down from about 1,100,000 before whaling.
Just after 6 p.m. on April 4, 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. is fatally shot while standing on the balcony outside his second-story room at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee. The civil rights leader was in Memphis to support a sanitation workers’ strike and was on his way to dinner when a bullet struck him in the jaw and severed his spinal cord. King was pronounced dead after his arrival at a Memphis hospital. He was 39 years old.
In the months before his assassination, Martin Luther King became increasingly concerned with the problem of economic inequality in America. He organized a Poor People’s Campaign to focus on the issue, including a march on Washington, and in March 1968 traveled to Memphis in support of poorly treated African-American sanitation workers. On March 28, a workers’ protest march led by King ended in violence and the death of an African American teenager. King left the city but vowed to return in early April to lead another demonstration.
On April 3, back in Memphis, King gave his last sermon, saying, “We’ve got some difficult days ahead. But it really doesn’t matter with me now, because I’ve been to the mountaintop … And He’s allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over, and I’ve seen the Promised Land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight that we, as a people, will get to the promised land.”
One day after speaking those words, Dr. King was shot and killed by a sniper. As word of the assassination spread, riots broke out in cities all across the United States and National Guard troops were deployed in Memphis and Washington, D.C. On April 9, King was laid to rest in his hometown of Atlanta, Georgia. Tens of thousands of people lined the streets to pay tribute to King’s casket as it passed by in a wooden farm cart drawn by two mules.
The evening of King’s murder, a Remington .30-06 hunting rifle was found on the sidewalk beside a rooming house one block from the Lorraine Motel. During the next several weeks, the rifle, eyewitness reports, and fingerprints on the weapon all implicated a single suspect: escaped convict James Earl Ray. A two-bit criminal, Ray escaped a Missouri prison in April 1967 while serving a sentence for a holdup. In May 1968, a massive manhunt for Ray began. The FBI eventually determined that he had obtained a Canadian passport under a false identity, which at the time was relatively easy.
On June 8, Scotland Yard investigators arrested Ray at a London airport. He was trying to fly to Belgium, with the eventual goal, he later admitted, of reaching Rhodesia. Rhodesia, now called Zimbabwe, was at the time ruled by an oppressive and internationally condemned white minority government. Extradited to the United States, Ray stood before a Memphis judge in March 1969 and pleaded guilty to King’s murder in order to avoid the electric chair. He was sentenced to 99 years in prison.
Three days later, he attempted to withdraw his guilty plea, claiming he was innocent of King’s assassination and had been set up as a patsy in a larger conspiracy. He claimed that in 1967, a mysterious man named “Raoul” had approached him and recruited him into a gunrunning enterprise. On April 4, 1968, he said, he realized that he was to be the fall guy for the King assassination and fled to Canada. Ray’s motion was denied, as were his dozens of other requests for a trial during the next 29 years.
During the 1990s, the widow and children of Martin Luther King Jr. spoke publicly in support of Ray and his claims, calling him innocent and speculating about an assassination conspiracy involving the U.S. government and military. U.S. authorities were, in conspiracists’ minds, implicated circumstantially. FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover obsessed over King, who he thought was under communist influence. For the last six years of his life, King underwent constant wiretapping and harassment by the FBI. Before his death, Dr. King was also monitored by U.S. military intelligence, which may have been asked to watch King after he publicly denounced the Vietnam War in 1967. Furthermore, by calling for radical economic reforms in 1968, including guaranteed annual incomes for all, King was making few new friends in the Cold War-era U.S. government.
Over the years, the assassination has been reexamined by the House Select Committee on Assassinations, the Shelby County, Tennessee, district attorney’s office, and three times by the U.S. Justice Department. The investigations all ended with the same conclusion: James Earl Ray killed Martin Luther King. The House committee acknowledged that a low-level conspiracy might have existed, involving one or more accomplices to Ray, but uncovered no evidence to definitively prove this theory. In addition to the mountain of evidence against him—such as his fingerprints on the murder weapon and his admitted presence at the rooming house on April 4—Ray had a definite motive in assassinating King: hatred. According to his family and friends, he was an outspoken racist who informed them of his intent to kill Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. He died in 1998.
Every generation strives to leave its mark upon the world and if, in the process, they can shake up the old generations, all the better. In the process though, what is lost? In the case of whom they aspire to adore and promote and emulate? there is MUCH to be lost. Take my above example—Doris Day versus Taylor Swift.
Doris is wholesome…
Taylor is loathsome…
Doris’s style is iconic…
Whereas Taylor’s is demonic…
Doris loves animals…
Taylor dates animals…
Now I’m sure Doris has her off days like the rest of us, but she was genuinely loved and revered. Taylor, on the other hand, uses the men she dates as future song fodder and nothing more. She is self-centered and spoiled and she could really learn a thing or two from watching Doris.
In lieu of the upcoming solar eclipse, I went looking for eyewear safety and found this article from 2022 on WebMD, and I wanted to bring it here.
What to Know About Solar Eclipse Glasses
Medically Reviewed by Mahammad Juber, MD on August 30, 2022
A solar eclipse occurs when the moon blocks all or part of the sun from your view. Solar eclipses can be partial or total. Although there are two solar eclipses yearly, they are only visible in some areas.
A total solar eclipse, where the moon completely blocks the view of the sun, only happens an average of once every 350 years in a specific location. If you’re lucky enough to be in the path of a solar eclipse, though, it’s important to use solar eclipse glasses to protect your eyes.
Solar Eclipse Eye Protection
Watching a solar eclipse is an awe-inspiring experience, but looking directly at the sun can damage your eyes.
Your retina is located at the back of your eye. It transmits images of what you see to your brain. The light from the sun can damage or destroy the cells on your retina, leading to solar retinopathy, also known as “eclipse blindness”.
What Are Solar Eclipse Glasses?
The only way to safely look at the sun during an eclipse is with solar eclipse glasses. Solar eclipse glasses are made with solar filters that conform to a worldwide safety standard known as ISO 12312-2. Regular sunglasses or homemade solar filters are not safe for watching an eclipse because they transmit sunlight at a rate that is thousands of times too high.
Here are some tips for safely watching a solar eclipse:
Check your solar eclipse glasses before using them. If you see any scratches or damage, don’t use them.
Follow the instructions that come with your solar eclipse glasses or solar viewer.
Supervise children to make sure they’re using solar eclipse glasses correctly.
Cover your eyes with your solar eclipse glasses before you look at the sun. Look away before you remove your glasses.
During the totality, the time when it gets dark becomes the sun is completely blocked out, you can take off your glasses and look at the eclipse. As soon as the sun begins to reappear, though, you need to put your glasses back on.
Never use a camera, binoculars, or telescope to look at a solar eclipse, even if you have your eclipse glasses on. These devices will intensify the sun’s rays and damage your solar eclipse glasses and your eyes.
In honor of the day, I present an April Fool’s Cake. (I didn’t even know this existed…lol)
Ingredients
1 jar (14 ounces) pizza sauce
1/2 pound bulk Italian sausage, cooked and crumbled
1 package (8 ounces) sliced pepperoni
3 cups biscuit/baking mix
3/4 cup whole milk
2 large eggs
2 tablespoons butter, melted
1 teaspoon garlic salt
5 to 6 slices mozzarella cheese
Directions
Preheat oven to 375°. In a bowl, combine the pizza sauce, sausage and pepperoni; set aside. In another bowl, combine the biscuit mix, milk, eggs, butter and garlic salt. Spread half of the batter on the bottom and up the sides of a greased 10-in. fluted tube pan. Spoon meat mixture over batter; cover with remaining batter.
Bake for 35-40 minutes or until browned and a toothpick comes out clean. Invert onto a baking sheet. Arrange cheese over cake. Return to the oven for 5 minutes or until cheese is melted. Using two large metal spatulas, transfer cake to a serving platter; serve immediately.
And, of course, the man of the hour…America’s Fool
I saw these catapults launching everything from peeps to jelly beans to candy corn or even ping pong balls! They looked like a lot of fun—and not just for the young ones! This Easter, when my daughter and her family visits, we’re going to have a contest. First, these instructions on building the catapult will come in an envelope with all the necessary building materials on the table. Contestants will have to construct their catapult, head to the playing field—the hallway—and try to launch their peeps into the Easter basket at the end of the hallway. (Each contestant will have different color peeps for ease of scoring.)
You might suspect that my daughter’s family consists of young children—but you would be wrong! The family of 3, daughter, son-in-law, and teenage granddaughter are very competitive! They have a family game night every week and this small competition will be perfect. The prize? A coveted, LARGE bag of Ghiradelli Salted Caramels.
Craft Stick Catapult
Craft Sticks (7 for each catapult)
Plastic Spoons (strong spoons work best)
Small Rubber Bands
How to build a craft stick catapult:
Stack 5 craft sticks on top of each other and secure both ends with a rubber band. This will be your crossbar.
Next, stack 2 craft sticks on top of each other and secure one end with a rubber band.
Carefully open up the 2 craft sticks and slide your stack of 5 in between them.
Then lay a plastic spoon on top of the top craft stick and secure both ends of the spoon to the craft stick.
Finally, criss-cross one more rubber band around the area where the craft sticks intersect, holding it all in place.
This version does not use a spoon at all:
This version uses a plastic cap:
And there are a lot of more difficult designs as well, like this one:
It should be a fun time, although sacrificing my peeps will be difficult…LOL
Since Easter is at the end of the month, I thought I’d post a carrot cake recipe! It uses grated carrots instead of baby food carrots so I like this texture better. It takes a bit more prep time, but it’s better in my opinion.
Ingredients
Ingredients For Cake Layers: 2 cups Carrots, grated 4 large Eggs 2 cups Granulated Sugar 1 cup Canola Oil 2 cups All-Purpose Flour, sifted 2 teaspoons Ground Cinnamon 3/4 teaspoon Baking Soda 1/2 teaspoon Baking Powder 1/4 teaspoon Salt 1/4 teaspoon Ground Nutmeg
Ingredients for Cream Cheese Frosting: 1/2 cup Butter 1 8 oz package of Cream Cheese 1 teaspoon Vanilla Flavoring 3–3/4 cup Confectioners Sugar 2 to 3 Tablespoons Milk as needed 1 cup chopped Walnuts, optional
Instructions
Make the layers: Grate the carrots, set aside. Place eggs in a large mixing bowl. Add the sugar and the canola oil. Mix on low-medium speed with mixer. In another large bowl, place the level cups of sifted flour. Add the cinnamon, baking soda, baking powder, salt and nutmeg. Whisk all the dry ingredients together until combined.
Gradually add the dry ingredients into the egg mixture, beating just until combined. Fold carrots into batter with a spatula or large spoon. Prepare your two 8-inch cake pans with cooking spray. Divide batter between the two pans. Bake at 350F degrees for 30-40 minutes or until done. Remove from oven. Place on wire rack and cool for 10 minutes. Turn the cakes out of the pans, place layers on wire racks. Let cool completely.
Prepare the frosting: Place butter and cream cheese in mixing bowl. Cream together until smooth and fluffy. About 4-5 minutes. Add vanilla flavoring. Mix lightly. Gradually add the confectioner’s sugar. Add enough milk to reach desired spreading consistency. (Add chopped walnuts if desired.) Spread frosting over layers and decorate as desired. Store any leftover cake in the refrigerator Enjoy!
She’s officially Our Lady Queen of Peace, but unofficially Our Lady of the Delaware Memorial Bridge, since she stands in clear sight of thousands of travelers who cross the bridge from New Jersey into Delaware every day.
Mary’s long journey to Delaware began in 1982, when local artist Charles C. Parks sculpted a giant steel Mary for Santa Clara, California. For a time, she stood outdoors in Delaware, and some Delaware Catholics really liked her. Their desire was rekindled in 1999, when Parks created a second giant Mary — this one for Chicago (which is now in Indiana)– and again stood her outdoors. Frustrated Delawareans could only look on in envy.
Spurred to act, the Catholics of Delaware spent over seven years raising funds for their own giant steel Mary. According to the campaign’s organizers, supporters contributed $500,000 and prayed more than 800,000 rosaries. One wealthy donor successfully got Mary to have the face of Our Lady of Medjugorje, a Mary who made multiple appearances in Bosnia-Herzegovina.
The 34-foot-tall stainless-steel Mary was officially dedicated on May 26, 2007. Her Immaculate Heart, surrounded by a crown of thorns, is hollow, and those who contribute $100 to her maintenance fund can have their names placed inside it through a hatch in the back.
The reserve was established to preserve the spectacular “tufa towers,” calcium-carbonate spires and knobs formed by interaction of freshwater springs and alkaline lake water. It also protects the lake surface itself as well as the wetlands and other sensitive habitat for the 1 – 2 million birds that feed and rest at Mono Lake each year.
Mono Lake is a majestic body of water covering about 65 square miles. It is an ancient lake, over 1 million years old — one of the oldest lakes in North America. It has no outlet.
Throughout its long existence, salts and minerals have washed into the lake from Eastern Sierra streams. Freshwater evaporating from the lake each year has left the salts and minerals behind so that the lake is now about 2 1/2 times as salty as the ocean and very alkaline.
Location/Directions Highway 395, 13 miles east of Yosemite National Park, near the town of Lee Vining, California.
Seasons/Climate/Recommended clothing The weather can be changeable; layered clothing is recommended.
Winter is a particularly beautiful time at Mono Lake. The crowds are gone, a quiet stillness prevails, and snow crystals sparkle on the tufa towers.
In winter, State Route 120 is closed from 5 miles east of the junction of US 395; which allows for access to South Tufa if weather permits. The South Tufa road is not plowed.
South Tufa, Navy Beach, and the Old Marina area are all wonderful places to cross-country ski when snow conditions permit.
Facilities – Activities
Visitor Center
The Mono Basin Scenic Area Visitor Center is a great place to start your visit to this area. The center is located just off Highway 395, north of Lee Vining and includes a variety of exhibits about the natural and human history of the Mono Basin. Visitor center staff stand ready to help you plan your explorations of Mono Lake and the Eastern Sierra.
Outdoor Activities Hiking, photography, bird watching, swimming, boating, and cross-country skiing are just a few of the many activities you can enjoy at this unusual lake.
Photographers come from all over the world to capture the interplay of light on the mountains, desert, and water. The natural history of the lake is described and explained in a one-mile self-guided nature trail at South Tufa. This is the best place to visit if you have time for only one stop. A boardwalk (ADA) trail below the Mono Lake County Park allows access to the north shore tufa area and wetland. A new trail links the Scenic Area Visitor Center near Lee Vining with the Old Marina area at the shore. A trail at Panum Crater leads to the dome and crater rim.
A swim in Mono Lake is a memorable experience. The lake’s salty water is denser than ocean water, and provides a delightfully buoyant swim. Old timers claim that a soak in the lake will cure almost anything. Keep the water out of your eyes or any cuts, as it will sting.
Camping The State Natural Reserve is surrounded by the Mono Basin National Forest Scenic Area, operated by the Forest Service. There are no campgrounds in the State Natural Reserve or the Scenic Area. Established campgrounds are located nearby in Lundy Canyon, Lee Vining Canyon, and the June Lake Loop. Dispersed camping is permitted in most of the Scenic Area above the exposed lake bed lands. Campfire permits are required.
Boating All types of boating are permitted on Mono Lake, although access is restricted to all islands between April 1 and August 1 each year to protect the nesting gulls. Boaters must not approach within 200 yards of Osprey nesting sites located on offshore tufa towers April 1st through Sept. 1st. It is advisable to stay near shore while boating and to be alert for sudden high winds. We recommend launching canoes and kayaks at Navy Beach, on the south shore, where a parking lot is close to the water. For those with boats too large to carry, an unimproved launch ramp is available near Lee Vining Creek. Stop by the Scenic Area Visitor Center for directions or for more information.
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Sew Colorful 