July 25, 2018

Morning sun.

IMG_2189

Up at 4 and with 4 posts up before 7, I got out early for a 3.4 mile walk along the lake. I love doing that in the summer. The temperature never rose above 68° — it's 79° now — and the early sun made the deep foliage come alive.

Adding tags, I realize I haven't used "written strangely early in the morning" in a long, long time. It just doesn't seem strange to me anymore. I love getting up early!

46 comments:

Anne in Rockwall, TX said...

My morning always starts at 4am. I work from home and the data for the reports I produce arrives about 4:45. I get up, go out with the puppers and enjoy the lake in beautiful silence for a bit. I love that hour of the morning.

So many people say it's crazy to have to get up that early. Not so! It's a special time and the rising sun shortly after is a blessing.

Wilbur said...

I've been a early riser my entire life. I'm at my best mentally and physically from 4:00 to 8:00.

There is a predominate calm in sound and wind in the outdoor morning hours. The emergence of the sun makes the wind pick up about 9:00 where I live.

Michael K said...

I usually get up early. If I am working, I get up at 3 or so and drive to Phoenix, about 110 miles to arrive about 6. I watch the sunrise as I drive. If I am not working, I still usually get up at 5 or so. Summer in Tucson, it's bets to get up that early as it will be 105 by 10 AM. This is our monsoon season but the rains stopped last week and it is 112 yesterday and today.

Richard Fernandez has his usual profound column today.

Perhaps the change in zeitgeist led David Brooks to see in bottom-up creation a revolutiionary new sociological model. In his recent NYT article The Localist Revolution Brooks says "we’ve tried liberalism and conservatism and now we’re trying populism. Maybe the next era of public life will be defined by a resurgence of localism."

Localism is the belief that power should be wielded as much as possible at the neighborhood, city and state levels. ... Politicians in Washington are miserable, hurling ideological abstractions at one another, but mayors and governors are fulfilled, producing tangible results ... many cities have more coherent identities than the nation as a whole. ... People really have faith only in the relationships right around them, the change agents who are right on the ground. ...


I guess my NYT subscription ran out or I would read that Brooks column.

Yancey Ward said...

I have always been a night owl by nature, but there have been times in my life that rising really early- like 4-5 a.m. was necessary for work for long stretches of my professional career- like years at a time, so I can understand people who do this as part of their everyday routine. However, when I retired, I made full use of rising late.

traditionalguy said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
traditionalguy said...

The nocturnal slowly replaced by the diurnal. The black becomes gray that becomes a lighter haze that becomes lighted colors while the morning star appears before Sol himself erupts onto the horizon. That is when you turn off the headlights, take off your jacket, and head home.

tcrosse said...

While I was working, I would show up about 6:30. That gave me a few hours to actually get some work done before 9:00 when all the troublemakers would show up, with their damn meetings. That allowed me to GTFO around 3:30 so as to avoid rush-hour.
Here in the Desert Southwest it's a good idea to rise with the chickens and get chores done before it gets too hot.

Professional lady said...

Beautiful photo - you are a very talented photographer. I enjoy your photos a lot.

Trumpit said...

Nature is beautiful. Althouse has an innate eye for natural beauty and man-made beauty, i.e., art. We can't just ignore ugliness in the world; it is pervasive, and part of the human condition. Children have to be taught right from wrong. Children have to be exposed to beauty, and taught that killing is wrong. Children need to read more now than ever. Good thinking requires education, and that's hard work generally speaking. Children will listen to their parents, and other people who can teach them good stuff.

How Trump became a dangerous loser is a good question. He's so disgusting that no one would enjoy reading about him except as an exercise in perversion of the human ideal and spirit. Whatever was done to him, must be classified as extreme child abuse. I'm at a loss how a painful phenomenon as Trump, Mussolini, etc. could be in placed in charge of a government. He's not fit to be dogcatcher.

Tank said...

Allie will not apologize LOL.

Fernandinande said...

I get up so early that it's still yesterday.

Michael K said...

" I'm at a loss"

The story of your life,

Original Mike said...

I love the dawn hours, but I usually see it on my way to bed after having stayed up all night observing with telescope or binoculars.

Nonapod said...

That gave me a few hours to actually get some work done before 9:00 when all the troublemakers would show up, with their damn meetings.

Meetings were invented so ineffectual people could feel like they were contributing something.

Carol said...

I've been sleeping later than I like because it's too hot to go to sleep early and spouse doesn't like using the A/C. So I didn't get up until 7.

So we got to the Rattlesnake a little late, and when we were up in the deep woods at 9 or so it was already too hot, with no breeze.

I would have like to walk faster than the spouse could walk..seems like the slower I walk, the tireder I get.

Bay Area Guy said...

I was at UC Irvine yesterday in Orange County, and it was damn hot. The campus is not too impressive, but the practice area for the LA Rams' training camp is kinda neat.

Of course, it's only a 20-minute drive to Laguna Beach, which is fantastic.

madAsHell said...

I love getting up early!

Our hostess will never enjoy the smell of the napalm.

Michael K said...

it's only a 20-minute drive to Laguna Beach, which is fantastic.

The first year or so when I lived in Orange County, I saw a sales pamphlet for an ocean front estate in Laguna. It was about 2.5 acres with two houses and was for sale for $650,000. I took it home to show my wife and said, "Could you imagine anyone paying $650,000 for a house ?"

Rusty said...

Original Mike said...
"I love the dawn hours, but I usually see it on my way to bed after having stayed up all night observing with telescope or binoculars."

LOL. I'm gathering all the stuff I need to make a lens grinding machine and a lens polishing machine. I want to build a telescope. I just don't necessarily want to use one.
I'm weird that way.

Jupiter said...

Michael K said...

"Richard Fernandez has his usual profound column today."

Fernandez is a pretty sharp guy, but string theory is stone gibberish. Government science.

Roughcoat said...

My border collies wake us early. They want to get the day started. They want to go to work. There's chaos out there and they know that only they can reestablish order. I'd like to sleep late (or later) but they won't allow it. So I guess I'm an early riser. But not by choice. Border collies are such fascists.

Etienne said...

I hired this home remodeler to build out inside my barn. I wanted a little kitchen area and bathroom.

I handed him a sketch I had drawn, showing the basic design, and where I wanted the power connections, sink and toilet.

I had the idea he was the contractor, and these Mexicans would show up to do the work. After we agreed on everything, he arrived the next morning in a rather large truck and trailer full of lumber.

He started chalking the floor, and laying down treated lumber. Then I heard my compressor kick on, and he had attached a small saw and cut a hole in the concrete for the toilet and sink sewage pipes.

Every morning before the sun came up, there he was. He worked until noon when it became too hot. But he didn't screw around. He had an air nail gun that never stopped nailing. It sounded like a firing range.

Two days later we were ready for sheetrock. OK, he's going to sub this out for sure!

Nope, he arrives with some rented stands on his trailer, so he could climb do the ceiling easily, and a lift to raise the sheetrock up with a manual crank.

I asked him if he needed any help, and he told me to just keep away, because he didn't want me to get hurt. Everything he was doing was dangerous to civilians. Ha!

I gave him $360 extra for early completion. It took me longer to paint the new addition then it took him to build it.

Anyway, I'm always amazed at people in the construction industry. These people can never starve. Well, unless they injure themselves. Then they're screwed and have to get a job at 7-11 or McDonalds.

Michael K said...

string theory is stone gibberish. Government science.

The theory he described is interesting but the point was about localism.

Michael K said...

These people can never starve. Well, unless they injure themselves.

As long as they pay workers comp, but some don't.

James Graham said...

Not entirely OT but I once (politely) corrected someone who pronounce "foliage" as if it were a two syllable word, i.e., "folage."

He (politely) told me everyone he knew pronounced it his way.


Nonapod said...

Not entirely OT but I once (politely) corrected someone who pronounce "foliage" as if it were a two syllable word, i.e., "folage."

That's pretty funny.

Personally I don't like when people pronounce "often" with a hard "T". It's not right or wrong, I just don't like it. Does anybody pronounce the "T" is "soften"?

Tyrone Slothrop said...

For twenty years I got up at 5 am because I had to. Now I sleep until the birds are singing and the summer sun blasts through my drawn blinds. Thank God.

Etienne said...

I hate the letter double-U...

It's not a U, it's a V !

tcrosse said...

Personally I don't like when people pronounce "often" with a hard "T"

Worse is when they say "oftentimes".

Curious George said...

"These people can never starve. Well, unless they injure themselves."

Or turn 55. Tough on the body, especially backs and knees.

I Have Misplaced My Pants said...

Dr. K ~ my daughter and husband were in your fair city yesterday so she could tour U of A. She's got it in her head that she wants to go to college in Arizona. She is going to be a pilot and spent a couple of hours at the university, and then four at the Pima Air and Space Museum. Today they are at ASU and tomorrow will go up to Prescott to tour Embry-Riddle. She likes the desert heat much more than the Gulf Coast heat that she is used to.

Kids these days and their helicopter parents: Husband reported that during the dorm visit segment of the tour, one mother asked repeatedly how she would access the dorms so she could 'drop in' on her daughter 'anytime.' "How do I get a key card and PIN of my own?" The docent evidently patiently explained multiple times that parents are not permitted their own access to the dorms* and would have to make arrangements with her daughter if she wanted to visit, and then eventually got exasperated and said "Perhaps an off-campus apartment would be a better option for your family." The poor daughter must have been mortified.

*Evidently it did not occur to helicopter mom that parents of students are capable of rape, etc and perhaps should not be given credentials of their own to come and go from secure residential facilities

Merny11 said...

Best time of the day!

buwaya said...

"Localism is the belief that power should be wielded as much as possible at the neighborhood, city and state levels"

This was the medieval European system, destroyed progressively by the nation-states.
Just as an example, the Spanish Civil Wars of the 19th century were specifically about these, the"fueros" or local rights of the provinces and cities left out of the Bourbon domination. It was masked as dynastic wars, of Carlist vs Isabeline. But at the bottom it was about an overweening Liberal order against the ancient localist conservatism.

In later wars and political movements it was churned up and recycled as ethnic nationalism (hence Basque and Catalan separatists, etc., in the Spanish case).

Look anywhere and you will see this dynamic in some permutation.

traditionalguy said...

Working the 5:00PM to 5:00AM shift includes the 3:30 hour when your sleep cycle goes to war with you. But the pain stops when 5:30 arrives. We are fearfully and wonderfully made.

As an aside, the German Blitzkreig was stunning to the French and English in 1940 because the Wermacht had their troops on methamphetamine. They never stopped to sleep.

Tommy Duncan said...

I've always been a morning person, even in college. It was impossible to go to sleep early in college because everyone else made so much noise until at least midnight. So I learned the joys of taking a nap. Fraternity houses are quiet in the middle of the day, so naps worked well.

I worked nights at a couple of summer jobs while in school. That allowed me to enjoy first the cool of the dawn air and then the explosion of heat as the sun rose. After a shower and breakfast I would enjoy sleeping in the still cool house. By noon the heat would force me out of bed.

Jupiter said...

Michael K said...

"The theory he described is interesting but the point was about localism."

I have some issues with that as well. I live in Eugene, and our charmingly local government is composed of pettifogging busybodies. They have taken a local approach to plastic bags, by banning them. Now that the local whales are safe, they are working on the local problem that there are places in Eugene that are nominally open to the public, but in fact are segregated by sex. They are called "bathrooms", and "locker rooms", and our local Human Rights commission has plans to integrate them.

Jim at said...

How Trump became a dangerous loser is a good question.

A better question would be how such a dangerous loser managed to beat the drunken grandma.

Original Mike said...

Blogger Rusty said...“LOL. I'm gathering all the stuff I need to make a lens grinding machine and a lens polishing machine. I want to build a telescope. I just don't necessarily want to use one.
I'm weird that way.”


Whatcha building? Refractor? How big?

Rusty said...

Reflector. I'm looking at eight inches.

Bleach Drinkers Curing Coronavirus Together said...

Very nice foliage.

Original Mike said...

So you’re grinding a mirror?

Michael K said...

Now that the local whales are safe, they are working on the local problem that there are places in Eugene that are nominally open to the public, but in fact are segregated by sex.

It's your fault for living in Portland which is still not as crazy as Santa Barbara which is now threatening prison terms for using straws, even non-plastic ones.

I was kidding about it being you fault but there are crazy places to live. The Tucson city council is about as crazy but nobody pays attention to them. There is some agitation about the state of the city streets.

Try to get Washington to do something about local problems. Obama was threatening Texas because their state electrical grid is not hooked to the national grid, which is being attacked by Russian hackers.

Hackers working for Russia claimed “hundreds of victims” last year in a giant and long-running campaign that put them inside the control rooms of U.S. electric utilities where they could have caused blackouts, federal officials said. They said the campaign likely is continuing.

The Russian hackers, who worked for a shadowy state-sponsored group previously identified as Dragonfly or Energetic Bear, broke into supposedly secure, “air-gapped” or isolated networks owned by utilities with relative ease by first penetrating the networks of key vendors who had trusted relationships with the power companies, said officials at the Department of Homeland Security.


But not Texas.

Michael K said...

A good example of the failure of local government was Bloomberg who was pontificating on guns and other world matters while the snow was not being plowed on city streets.

Blue cities tend to have goofy local government. When Arizona passed SB 2010 about the border, the Los Angeles city council voted to boycott Arizona. Their staff had to tell them that 25% of LA electricity came from Arizona.

Michael K said...

Today they are at ASU and tomorrow will go up to Prescott to tour Embry-Riddle.

My youngest went to U of A and it is very left wing, at least in the general ed courses.

I have a suspicion that ASU might be a better college but have no evidence.

I had a kid from Embry-Riddle joining the Air Force ( I think) and applying for pilot training.

A good friend of mine, a retired Marine fighter pilot, has his kids at U of A. One is now a Marine pilot and got a BS in Civil Engineering. His brother had a BS and MS in Chemical Engineering from U of A and the youngest is there now.

All will probably do the trick, especially if she does a STEM major.

The Air Museum draws me like honey to flies but not when it is 112 outside. She must be tough.

After August and until May, the school year, the climate is wonderful. Tucson is not as hot as Phoenix and Prescott, I think , is up closer to Flagstaff and should be cooler.

Bad Lieutenant said...

Doc, have you ever been to AMARC, the fabled "boneyard" at Davis-Monthan AFB where they park all the surplus aircraft? That must be a sight.

Re: the getting up early, I got caught by a clickbait that in sum advised me to get up at 5:30am every day. I've been trying it, but the kicker is that I've actually been getting up at 430,330,130 and not getting back to sleep. Prefer to avoid sleep drugs. I suppose the answer may be to work out before bed, but part of the 5:30 plan was to work out early.

Rusty said...

Mike @ 6:14
Yeah. I made a 12 inch chuck to hold the blank and I have a right angle gear reducer that will give me between 1 and 2 revs per minute and a dc motor to drive everything. Plus berings and shafts and stuff. Instead of welding up a frame I think I'll use some 8020.
Should be fun.