Journal Entries
The singing princess
Posted Feb 16, 2021
Of the 49 movies Julie Andrews has made, I've seen 25.
I've just seen "The Singing princess" on DVD. I ordered it from Amazon on Friday. It arrived on Saturday, and I saw it Saturday night.
She was 16? when she recorded the three songs she sings. You could not have told she was that young. I don't know if she had found her ideal vocal coach yet, but does it matter?
The plot: 13-year-old Princess Zeila of Baghdad is of age to be married. her uncle has arranged for three princes from nearby kingdoms to vie for her hand. Unfortunately, evil Jafar has a magician who flies around turning the messenger to stone so the three princes won't be invited. Jafar wants Leila (and the kingdom) to himself. Bummer!
Amin, a pre-teen whose father is a minstrel, vows to thwart Jafar. Amin has cute, charming snakes and a magpie who flies through a window to remove an enchanted gem that was supposed to make Leila fall in love with Jafar.
Amin ultimately goes into the woods to see a wise elderly woman who has Aladdin's lamp.
When in doubt, reach for a Deus ex Machina.
It all ends well. Leila and Amin marry. Amin will become Caliph in time. I guess Baghdad isn't ready for a ruling Queen Leila.
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Latest reply: Feb 16, 2021
Genealogy spread heavy and thick
Posted Feb 15, 2021
My family met via Zoom today, and they seemed to think that I should take charge of writing a history of the family. That would be easier said than done, given the vast reaches of family history. If your ancestors procreated at a rate of about four generations per century (give or take), that means a multiplier factor of sixteen for every century that you go back. Let's disregard the guys who lost their wives in their 40s or 50s or 60s and started afresh. After all, plenty of brides began pumping out children at a younger age than they might nowadays.
Anyway, I've put together all my personal recollections of what various relatives have told me, together with whatever misinformation there is in websites. I emailed it to my sister, who will hopefully forward it to the other family members.
My surname is Harvey, which is roughly the 240th most common surname in the U.S., and the 98th most common in the U.K. My sister married into the Wilkins family, which descends from Ethan Allen's grandfather (Allen led the successful Americans in the battle of Ticonderoga in the American Revolution.).
There are other surnames here and there across the generations -- Peters, Rossman, Bemis, Holt, Bates, Steele, Griesemer. You can detect some Pennsylvania Dutch and Northern Irish in these surnames.
I don't feel like tackling much more than the Harvey lines. it might be good for other family members to divvy up the Peterses and Holts, etc.
My niece-in-law advocated hiring a professional genealogist. We will need to choose our battles, though. Go back three centuries, and you have 16 to the 3rd power, or 4096, give or take. Go back to the Battle of Hastings, and it's 16 to the 8th power (4294967296) or 9th power (68719476736).
How many of our forebears were horse thieves or other ne'er-do-wells? Maybe I don't want to know. One ancestor was a first cousin of President Benjamin Harrison (who was himself the grandson of a president). Probably no royalty, but who knows? 68 billion ancestors was a lot more than the world population in 1066.
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Latest reply: Feb 15, 2021
living without tap water
Posted Feb 10, 2021
ten days ago, during the third day of a 4-day spell of very cold weather, my incoming water pipes froze solid.
Since then, I have bought lots of spring water in gallon jugs. I have harvested rain water or melted snow. Bathing? Showering? I bought several packages of moistened wipes and rubbed them on parts of my body that I can reach (this does not include my back.)
I tend to drink spring water anyway, so I had about a dozen gallons of that anyway. This ahs since grown to about twenty gallons. The rain water is used for flushing the toilet, which I do every second or third day.
Today the plumber plugged the heating tape into an outlet. I hope the tape is viable.
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Latest reply: Feb 10, 2021
A bone to pick with Punxsatawney Phil
Posted Feb 2, 2021
For reasons not obvious to me, the Philadelphia Inquirer has a news feed for my computer (Philadelphia is bout 400 miles away from me, so local it's not). I keep seeing news items featured, but when I colick on them, I'm not allowed to read them because I'm not "subscribed." If I'm really interested, I go on Google and try to find other sources for the information.
Anyway, today I learned that Punxsatawney Phil (I think I've spelled the town right) saw his shadow, which means six more weeks of winter.
Well, my neighbor has a groundhog under his shed. If that groundhog came out, he (she) would not see any shadows. Would my neighbor's groundhog even come out? Well, it's forty degrees now.
Anyway, the question is whether all the groundhogs (or even most of them) would agree. One groundhog should not be allowed to decide the matter of Spring's timing for a whole country. Or, if Phil has jurisdiction just for Punxsatawney, and the leading groundhog(s) in neihboring areas did not see their shadows, would it make meteorologocial sense to have Curwensville, Indiana, Brookville, etc. be in a different season (Spring) than Punxsatawney (Winter)?
Yeah, I know I'm quibbling over nothing.
The sky is medium gray here in Boston. It's raining, though show has both preceded and will likely follow the rain.
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Latest reply: Feb 2, 2021
death rate form Covid-19 in the U.S.
Posted Jan 20, 2021
I realize that this is premature, but here is the latest count for cases and deaths:
Today's coronavirus / COVID-19 numbers in the US
From the Center for Systems Science and Engineering at Johns Hopkins University
Confirmed US cases: 24,255,934
Confirmed US deaths: 402,269
I did the math. That's about a 1.6% death rate. If a preponderance of the cases are too recent to have proceeded to either death or recovery, then the mortality rate may become higher.
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Latest reply: Jan 20, 2021
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