Q is for Queens and Princesses and Royals Update

Royal Baby is Born!

Recently, I talked about the fact that Ward didn't know that Kate, Prince William's wife, was pregnant. This amazed me because I didn't think you could filter this information out because it seemed to be everywhere. Well, some how he did as well as a few of you. Some of you said to let you know when Kate had the baby. In case you've been able to also filter out the birth. Here's the facts.

Kate delivered a baby girl Saturday, May 2, 2015. The baby weighed 8 lb 3oz. The name is not yet announced. 

USA Today

Details and Commentary. 
More than you may want to know.

--Kate delivered the baby three hours after she entered the hospital. All of the press was saying that she had a three hour labor. Well, maybe. Most people know that you can be in labor for a long time before you go to the hospital. I'm guessing that Kate had medical professionals around her before she went to the hospital, so who knows how long she was really in labor. For her sake, I hope it really was short and sweet.

--A few hours after the new princess was born, William brought the big brother, George, to the hospital to see his sister. He is as cute as ever and has learned to wave politely to the crowds. His training to be a royal has begun.

--The crowd outside was anticipating an appearance by Kate after they saw her hairstylist enter the hospital. Sure enough, about an hour after that, Kate emerged looking beautiful with the new baby. The baby is taking after her mother. Newborn perfection of a perfect chubby face.

--Also, Kate walked down steps in high heals while carrying the new princess. William attentively gave her a hand, but she didn't need it. Really, is she still numb? Aren't there some areas that still require some walking gingerly? I know I still had some after a few days, let alone a few hours, with both a vaginal and C-section births. I would have never been able to walk in heels like that just after giving birth. But then again, I have never been able to walk in heels like that anytime.

--Kate gave birth Saturday morning and she and William took the baby home that evening. They buckled the baby in the car seat and drove home. Just that easy. Well sort of, security was everywhere and they went to the palace instead of where they're really going to live 100 miles away.

--The name has not yet been announced. Alice, Charlotte, and Diana are favorites with the bookies, who by the way aren't doing as well as they hoped because more people bet on the baby being a girl than a boy. I'm not too excited about the name because the royal babies always have a long string of official names and then the parents call them whatever they want.

--More details will emerge in the next few days. If anything earth shattering happens, I'll update you. However, now it's time to let a young family to get to know each other in private.

BTW, Miss Landers informed Ward of the blessed event. He reacted to the good natured teasing he got about missing the boat on this one too. Actually, he might be kind of proud of it.

A Second Look--May 1, 2015

I am ready for a posting break after the A-Z Challenge, but there's just too much going on outside to not share some of it. Thus, a Second Look today.

Here are some things I saw this week 

during a Second Look.

The dogwood have been coming out recently. They among the last to bloom of the spring trees and my favorite.

We have both white and pink dogwood trees.

I first noticed this redbud tree a few years ago. I usually think of it dotting the hillsides where I grew up.

Remember the wooly bear caterpillars from last fall? Here is a recently hatched white tiger moth from one of them.

Weathered sweet gum ball

I turned around one day and the bleeding hears were blooming. The last time I looked, the leaves were just coming up. Surprises like that are one of the things that makes spring so fun.

It's calving season and it's been fun to watch the babies. This brave one has strayed a little way from its mother.

Speaking of little ones, the birds are preparing for some of their own. We have three different kinds of nests being built in the nest boxes. This is the third one for the sparrows. I keep removing their nest, so the bluebirds have a chance. I may leave this one since the bluebirds are working on a nest in another spot.

Blue jay and daffodils 

Z is for Zoos

We like to visit zoos and try to if we can when we're traveling. Not only do we like seeing the animals, we like the lush landscaping that often accompanies them. Below are a few pictures from the National Zoo in Washington, D.C., the Baltimore Zoo, the Toronto Zoo, the Philadelphia Zoo and the North Carolina Aquarium.

Y is for You All

I grew up in West Virginia where there seemed to be a dividing line between the way people talked. To the north people spoke more with a Midwestern/nothern accent and to the south there was more of a southern accent. I actually saw a map once that showed this dividing line. From my experience, it made a lot of sense.

If you went one county north of me, you would hear a more Midwestern sound. Go one county south of me and you would hear more of a country, southern sound. These variations also happened between towns to the more rural areas. I was a town kid living more to the north, so I didn't have much of an accent. Well, we all have an accent one way or another, but I sounded more like a news anchor than Ellie Mae Clampett. People have often been surprised when I tell them that I'm from WV. They think I should have much more of a southern drawl.

Edgewater Beach Resort. This is where I first learned about my You all.

That was until I spent one summer in northern Wisconsin and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. I had just graduated college and before heading off to grad school, I was doing a summer of field work for the USGS (United States Geological Survey) there. After spending the day in swampy muck with almost unbearable numbers of mosquitoes, we spent the evening at the bar in the local fishing "resort" where we were staying. We made fast friends with the owners and several of the locals that hung out there.

One evening, Gary, one of the owner's sons, said that I had a very southern accent. He said, "You talk like this," with very drawn out twangy words. Very southern. He also said that I said, "You all." Well, I guess I did sound kind of southern to someone who lived much further north than I did. But I had never noticed that I said you all. I learned in English class that you could be both singular and plural and that's the way I wrote it. I thought I talked that way also. I knew I didn't say the southern contraction Y'all, but I hadn't realize that I said a form of it.

That summer, I tried to stop saying you all and use you for both singular and plural like I thought I was already doing. And I couldn't do it. If a group of people were standing around and I said, "Do you want to go to the movies?" I would wait for a minute and then had to add all so my meaning was clear, "Do you all want to go to the movies?" Without the all I was afraid that they wouldn't understand that I was inviting all of them. That's when I figured out that in my world you is singular and you all is plural.

And that's how it's been ever since. Just like it was before. You is singular and you all is plural.

What do you say? You, you all, y'all, youins, ...

X is for X with a tail

Mr. Dimmick

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I had the same math teacher all four years of high school--Mr. Dimmick. He taught math in a very logical and systematic way--just as it should be. He also made it seem like a game. We learned the rules of the game, and then we knew how to play. It seemed as easy as that. And he was very careful to make sure that we knew the rules.

Anyone, who has done much algebra, knows that there can be a lot of steps involved in solving a problem. Mr. Dimmick insisted that we be very systematic with our steps including making the unknown X that we were solving for with a tail. That way it would not be confused with X that was used for multiplication. Now to most, this seemed like an overkill. In fact, I've never run into anyone who had a math teacher who was this strict with the details and steps that needed to be shown in a problem.

However, this attention to detail paid off for me in college. When I was in my first calculus class, there came a point in the middle of the semester where complicated equations had to be broken down algebraically so they could be easily integrated. Most everyone in the class was confused when they were trying to do this. In fact, the teacher handed out worksheets so students could practice algebra again. But I didn't need them. Mr. Dimmick's careful teachings were still with me. Including making a tail on every unknown X in the equations.

I'll have to admit, decades later, I do not remember all of the math that Mr. Dimmick taught me, but I do remember that he taught me well and making my X's with a tail was an important part of that.

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But wait there's more:

I remember a story Mr. Dimmick told one day about his four year old granddaughter. He asked her what zero meant. Her answer was, "That's when you don't hold up any fingers." He had a big grin as he told it and it made me smile too.