A Christmas Lesson in Fractals

What a fine Christmas Day: Hubby and me, daughter and fiance, my sponsor & spouse for dinner; expenditures minimal but pleasure in giving maximal, small thoughtful gifts and lovely times. Wishing such peace for everyone....

A Midnight Course in Fractal Geometry

Sleepless again    a repetition of many nights
Windows in the pentagonal glass room reflect
Endless patterns of white Christmas lights
Cheerful chaos erupts
From ordinary roofs and shrubs
Curves and angles and loop de loops
Swing in a wind rocking a storm in its arms
A rope of blue light transforms the invisible
Fence     Waves on a blue sea undulate
Again and again and again
In the looking glass
Infinite points of light
Form infinite replicas of stars
Repeating themselves until they vanish
In the midnight place      Men know how
To wrest order from chaos
They can turn these patterns into formulas
Explaining why the shapes make sense
But they can’t say why
The stars make peace
On a December night

Peace on earth, Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night.


Poetry Jam: "solitary"

Today's Peculiar News

Thanks to my garden for a bouquet in November.

So between breathing treatments for pneumonia, I found these snapshots of life on our planet in today’s newspaper:

Two gargantuan bubbles have been discovered erupting in the center of our Milky Way galaxy, NASA scientists say. With the energy of 100,000 supernova explosions, the bubbles might be a “belch” from the black hole known to be at the center of the Milky Way. “Wow,” said one astrophysicist.

The world’s whales seem to be suffering from severe sunburn, indicates a study out of the Gulf of California, and the thinning ozone layer might be the cause. Whales spend lots of time on the ocean’s surface, said a study author, and they can’t put on clothes or sunglasses to protect themselves from ultraviolet radiation.

A little more of Pompeii crumbled on Saturday with the collapse of the gladiator barracks. Surviving the explosion of Vesuvius 2,000 years ago, the ancient city struggles with modern life. Said an Italian spokesman, “We’re tired of commenting on the continual collapses and damage to the archaeological heritage of our country.”

Regarding the worst oil spill in U.S. history, former BP chief Tony Hayward told the BBC this week, “What was going on was some extraordinary engineering. But when it was played out in the full glare of the media, of course, it looked like a lot of fumbling and incompetence.”

Creative cuisine: On today’s menu for the powerless Carnival cruise ship adrift off Mexico following an engine fire, a head-to-head chef cook-off might make something fabulous of the U.S. Navy food supplies ferried to the ship’s 4,500 passengers: Pop Tarts, crab meat, croissants, and Spam.

Finally, today’s quote: “It is a stupidity second to none, to busy oneself with the correction of the world.” (Moliere)

Colossal Fossil Bugs

Colossal Fossil Bug Discovered

Scientists have found a claw
belonging to a scorpion eight feet long
if it were intact

The biggest bug ever! exclaims the newspaper
exhilarated by the find
as momentarily am I, a Scorpio

more so, maybe, than a Leo or an Aries
who could give a rat’s ass for scorpions
even if they are eight feet long

I am shocked too upon considering
that horror movie makers may be the visionaries
of the world—imagine, omigod

Why only a claw? Where is the rest
of the scorpion, and is it in another rock
longing for its warrior self

wrenched from it how? in battle or love
or a simple stupid accident when it was fishing
for a morsel it could have done without

But its hard-to-fathom age—
400 million years, say the paleontologists
with miraculous certainty

is what really gives me pause to wonder
how the hell do they know


******
Today’s news reports that marine biologists have recorded 17,650 species living in the ocean depths where the sunlight ceases. They are weird shaped and living on the snow-like decaying matter that drifts down from above.

They hope to announce by the end of the ongoing census that a million or more species remain unknown, in addition to the 235,000 living in the extreme ocean depths, which they thought was a desert until this plethora of living things showed up. On land, they’ve catalogued 1.5 million types of plants and animals.

It costs $50,000 a day to operate the equipment. What’s the daily cost of the war?

I don’t know why this fascinates me so much. It’s not going to change my life. But I like the idea of people searching for our fellow creatures, and the great myriad life forms make me thankful to live on planet Earth.

My gratitude list today:
Scientists who ask questions and seek answers.
Colossal fossil bugs.
Sobriety, which makes me marvel at life.
That God put me on planet Earth and not the moon.
That recovery has brought me to a Higher Power who knows all.
That we have brains, and God helps us use them.
That I can read.
That I can write.
That I don’t have to drink today to get all jazzed up about life.
Happy Thanksgiving.
Cheers,
Chris

The photos are from sciencecentric.com