Cuba Visit | Part 3 National Pride

by Jim and Melanie

So much imagery we experience of Cuba stems from immigrants washing up on the shores of Florida on rafts or tiny boats. The Mariel boatlifts of 1980 and other stories of refugees can make us think everyone is trying to escape the small island. On the contrary, Cubans are incredibly proud of their country as it is, as well as its past and burgeoning future.

Their literacy rate and education system, and high-quality free healthcare, stem directly from the revolution of the 1950s. But we found some points of pride that cross a longer history. There is a sweet and odd fixation on Ernest Hemingway and the decades of his prominence there. Baseball, the national sport, holds fascination for most. Below we share a few pictures and thoughts on these areas of national pride.

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Ants | Following The Trail To Food

The cool Iowa morning drew me outside to enjoy my cup of coffee. Two Blue Jays were busy calling to each other as they patrolled the backyards. The air was heavy with moisture. Soybeans and corn grew tall.

I reached for my cup and noticed some movement out the corner of my eye. It was an ant, only ⅛” long, moving up a black metal rod. It’s antennae were feeling the way ahead of it. They were keeping it on some sort of invisible trail.

Heading toward food.

It went up and over the arch and down the other side. It carefully negotiated the wire hanger and went down the side of the bottle of sugar water of the hummingbird feeder. Each ant followed the same path to within about 1/2″. The invisible trail guided them well. Returning ants rounded the top of the arch and got to the rail of the deck where they moved along the edge to the left. They disappeared over the side and headed down to the ground somewhere. Two tiny bodies are visible about halfway up the post in this picture.

The prize at the end of the trail.

Close inspection showed several ants gathered around some pools of sugar water. Their mouths were touching the water. Each ant showed no movement for several minutes. They seemed to be drinking their fill of the sweetness. I watched several back away from the sugar water and begin their trek in the reverse direction along the trail.

Drinking their fill.

I wondered if I could tell whether their abdomens were any larger because of drinking sugar water for several minutes. Positioning the camera and setting it for macro closeup, I patiently waited for one to come down so I could get a nice view in silhouette. Several attempts failed. They moved too fast. Then, success. To my amazement, their little bellies were so distended they were translucent. Light shined through them. What a fun nature lesson this morning.

Heading home…belly full.

Supermoon v.2.0 | Another One?

In case you missed it last month…

How I See It

Maybe you were one of the fortunate ones last month to see the July Supermoon. My blog post explained quite a bit about it. There were news stories, images, and streaming webcams covering it. It was hyped as a big deal. For some of us, it was.

Well, here we go again. There is another even bigger Supermoon this month on August 10. It will be the biggest perigee full-moon of 2014.

Mark your calendar. Watch for it in an evening sky near you.

Science @ NASA

PS: There is yet another coming in September. You will have another chance if your skies are cloudy.

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Supermoon | Just An Illusion?

How I See It

It’s time again for the Supermoon. This post is for those who will have clear skies on the evening of July 11 or 12 and want to see the Moon closer and bigger than normal. Full moon is actually at about sunrise on July 12 when it is setting in the west for those of us in the U.S. Most people don’t notice it setting full. The view of it at evening moonrise, before or after full, will appear almost exactly as it does at moonset the morning of full.

First, a little sciency stuff. This won’t hurt a bit.

• The Moon takes about a month to orbit Earth.
• The Moon’s orbit is not a circle around Earth. It is a bit oval-shaped.
• During the closest part of the orbit it is called Perigee.
• During the farthest part of the orbit it is called Apogee.
• Closer things look bigger and farther things look smaller.
• The…

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