A happy Saturday morning to everyone.

All week Marcia has been hopping onto Facebook as soon as she gets up. “What would cause her to do that?” you ask. Here’s the scoop; all week Kim in Canada has been posting updates and photos of their calf birthing – expecting 16 in total.

So, all week long my recovery has been aided by a full calf report as I drink my morning Java.

Now, these aren’t little barn-yard pets around the farm. These calves are a product. While Marcia sits and stares at the posted photos and comes out with whispery “coos” and awws, I tend to think along different lines, lines such as………………

“The leather jacket I’ve been wearing for 10 years has been worn longer by me than the cow that it came from.” ~ just a shower thought

EOTWAWKI – (End of the world as we know it), otherwise Friday April 22nd coined as Earth Day. Don’t get me wrong, I actually enjoy recycling, often will walk to get an errand done, or take public transportation to town. I love clean air and pure water. I think Solar, wind, and other forms of power are great.

However, so much of doing better for the earth has been hijacked by the doom sayers and the extremists. Here are a few predictions from 45 years ago – the first Earth Day:
• Nobel Prize winner Harvard biologist Dr. George Wald warned shortly before the first Earth Day in 1970 that civilization will end within 15 to 39 years.
• Stanford professor Dr. Paul Ehrlich declared in April 1970 that mass starvation was imminent; “100-200 Million People per Year will be starving to death during the next ten years.”
• “Demographers Agree Almost Unanimously … Thirty Years From Now, the Entire World … Will Be in Famine.” Environmentalists in 1970 really believed in a scientific consensus predicting global famine due to population growth in the developing world, especially in India.
• “In A Decade, Urban Dwellers Will Have to Wear Gas Masks to Survive Air Pollution.” Life magazine stated in January 1970 that scientist had “solid experimental and theoretical evidence” to believe that “in a decade, urban dwellers will have to wear gas masks to survive air pollution … by 1985 air pollution will have reduced the amount of sunlight reaching Earth by one half.”
• “By the Year 2000 … There Won’t Be Any More Crude Oil.” On Earth Day in 1970 ecologist Kenneth Watt famously predicted that the world was quickly running out of oil.
• And the big one – the world was at the precipice of the next Ice Age.

Aaron – is my new personal jeweler. As a young teenager my grandfather gave me a signet ring. It’s stunning and I’ve always loved wearing it. Over the years wear-and-tear took a toll on its band – it finally developed a crack. Then I came to realize that along with the years of wear the ring (and also my wedding band) appeared to have shrunk –no, my fingers did not get fatter.

It took a good while, many phone calls and drive-by events prior to coming across one Aaron Rubinstein. Mr. Rubinstein, a Polish immigrant and Holocaust survivor is the artist I had been looking for. To jewelry he is a surgeon and at the same time he’s a Picasso; he LOVES jewelry. I guess I’ve spent an hour chatting with him – not certain if he was interviewing me, or if I was interviewing him. Anyway, the results are amazing. Thanks Aaron and Happy Passover.

A Condo for a Yard – If Marcia had one misgiving about moving to a condo it was the loss of a garden. That misgiving has been put to rest.  Our building had two planters in front of the building – empty.

Starting last year there was discussion on filling them. Talk turned into an event, flowers and two small Cedars were purchased. The whole front of the building has ‘perked’ up. The next thing you can probably guess at – the flower beds required mulch. Thirty-five bags were picked up at Lowe’s. We’ve been spreading the stuff and the building ‘perked’ up even more.

That is when Marcia discovered that the flower-bed on the triangle was horrifically in need of a gardener. Yesterday and the day prior Marcia could be seen in front of the Condo. She’s happy.

Rumpke – collects our garbage – except this week they did not. Off to the phone, button pushing through English versus Spanish – done. Go past bill-paying, and eventually connected with their commercial rear/front loader division (side loaders are for recycling) customer service (very nice).

It turns out that at 3:00am, in the dark, the driver could not get the bin’s wooden enclosure gate open. If I were to leave the gate doors open he’d swing by again and perform the necessary pick-up (at just beyond 80-degrees this quickly becomes a necessity).

Done.

Well, not quite. Just after dark I opened the gates and placed a brick by one of them so the one door would stay open. Now, we live in an urban area. Some things you just expect – wrappers in the gutter and thumping music from cars (after all this the corner of Chaos and Mayhem). Looking out one last time prior to heading for bed I realized that some kind soul had carefully closed both doors. Thanks so much, it really is appreciated unexpected.

However, slippers on and already in my nightwear, I slunk (or is it ‘slinked’) around the corner and down the sidewalk to the enclosure. Doors were quickly re-opened, and the brick replaced.

In the morning prior to running out Marcia lifted the one lid and checked the container. It was a thumbs-up moment.

Fini – Happy Passover to Cathy and to all my Jewish friends. Happy Birthday (today) to our Jason. Tomorrow it’ll be nephew Connor’s turn.

This weekend it’s two soccer games. Then this afternoon it’ll be a Food-truck cook-off competition at the kid’s school. Tomorrow it’s off to the roof-top garden at a local craft brewery, Rheingeist, to properly celebrate Jason’s special day.

To everyone, make it a great week and everyone, stay safe.

Cheers.

Dirk