Wild boars may prevent people from returning to towns near Fukushima

I know I hinted twice that I would celebrate Purim on this blog, I've decided to skip it this year because today marks the sixth anniversary of the Fukushima triple disaster.  That is an occasion much more on topic for the blog's themes, so today I observe an anniversary of DOOM instead of joy.*

After six years, conditions have managed to improve near the ruin nuclear plant, enough that people might return.  Gizmodo has the story.

In just a few weeks, the residents of a Fukushima city will finally be allowed to return to their homes. Trouble is, the place has been overrun by hundreds of belligerent and potentially radioactive wild boars, prompting public safety concerns.

At the end of March, the six-year-long evacuation order will be lifted for Namie, a city located just 2.5 miles (4 km) from the damaged nuclear power plant. Radiation levels, now measured at 0.07 microsieverts an hour, are the same as they are in other areas of Japan. Namie is the closest area to the nuclear meltdown residents have been allowed to return to since the disaster on March 11, 2011, but the continued presence of wild boars in the region is making prospective homecomers nervous.

Newsy has more in Boars overrun Fukushima.



High radiation levels drove people away from many areas of Fukushima.
I shouldn't have been surprised.  As the video noted, Chernobyl became an impromptu wildlife refuge, complete with radioactive wolves, so the evacuation zone around Fukushima becoming one as well should have been expected.

Finally, the idea of Fukushima being infested with radioactive boars evoked the image of the giant boar demon from the opening scene of "Princess Mononoke."  I wasn't the only one to think that, as Gizmodo used the following illustration for their article.


Geeky minds think alike.

*No, I won't observe it tomorrow, as that is the beginning of Daylight Saving Time.  I'll save it for next year, when it falls on the evening of February 28th -- perfect timing!

Service interruption from worst storm in DTE history

Yesterday was the first day I did not post an entry to this blog since March 29, 2011, almost six full years ago.*  The reason was the largest weather-related power outage in DTE Energy's history.  The Detroit Free Press told the story in High winds cut power to record-setting 1M in Michigan.

DTE Energy is calling it the largest weather event in its history: Gusts over 60 m.p.h. hammered southeast Michigan Wednesday, cutting power to more than 1 million utility customers between the area's two major power companies.
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DTE Energy reports more than 700,000 customers in total were affected by Wednesday's power outages, and Consumers Energy reports more than 300,000 in total affected.

Power went out at my house just before noon on Wednesday and didn't come back on until between five and six in the afternoon Thursday, for about 30 hours of no electricity.  On top of that, I had no service from my internet provider until after 7:00 P.M. today, less than an hour ago.  The outage must have hit their local servers.

As for the cause, blame the weather and changing climate as high winds, rain, and record mild temperatures all played a part.

DTE Energy reports more than 4,000 power lines were pulled down by falling trees from "sustained wind gusts equating to tropical storm levels, just shy of category one hurricane strength."

"Due to the unusually warm weather this winter, as well as significant rainfall, the ground is very soft and saturated. That, combined with the high winds, caused trees to uproot, falling onto DTE's poles and power lines, resulting in widespread outages," according to a DTE Energy news release.

The cause of the high winds baffles me, but the rain and warm winter I can blame on climate change.

Hundreds of thousands of people are still out of power, but service is being restored, as WXYZ reported in DTE working to cut power outages by half tonight.


I may have been inconvenienced, but others are having it much worse.

*I could post more videos of the damage, like I did for 10th worst storm in DTE history, but I'm too tired and not feeling it right now.  Also, I could backdate an entry to fill in the calendar for yesterday, but I've decided I want that missing day to stand as a silent monument to the storm.

Equality in work and politics for International Women's Day 2017

I opened Happy National Pancake Day 2017! by declaring "I love holidays, even fake ones" and closed it by noting that "There are a bunch of holidays, real and fake, coming up this month, with Purim, Pi Day, The Ides of March,  St. Patrick's Day, and Nowruz all on this blog's calendar."  It turns out that I missed on that I had celebrated here twice before, International Women's Day, which is today.*  Like National Pancake Day, I skipped it last year because of the election, and like yesterday's combination of commerce and charity, I'm resuming observing it this year.  Happy International Women's Day!

I begin the celebration by sharing 2017 International Women's Day from the United Nations.

United Nations - UN Secretary-General António Guterres' hails women for their many contributions on International Women's Day, 8 March 2017. This year's theme is “Women in the Changing World of Work: Planet 50-50 by 2030”.

Yes, we need everyone, male and female, to deal with climate change, sustainable development, and conflict resolution.  The Crazy Eddie in me likes that.

One of the places where women can achieve equality and parity in the workplace is through politics.  CNN has that story in More women running for office to oppose Trump.

CNN's Kyung Lah interviews women who were inspired to run for political office and get involved in politics after President Donald Trump won the election.

Trump's election is doing more than just inciting women and men to march in protest.  I wish all these candidates luck, strength, and skill in their efforts.  We will all need them.

*Another is World Wildlife Day, which falls on March 3rd.  I saw that and thought, darn, a great holiday to observe on this blog, just like World Oceans Day.  Then I looked again at the date of More evolution in action among urban animals and realized that I had posted it on March 3rd.  I had celebrated World Wildlife Day and didn't even know it!

Happy National Pancake Day 2017!

I love holidays, even fake ones.*  Last Saturday, it was Marching Music Day.  Today, it's National Pancake Day, which I celebrated two years ago.  Since I skipped last year, I'm sharing WXYZ's National Pancake Day from 2016, which is why they mention the election.


I'm probably not partaking, as I'm on a diet.  For those of you who are, have fun for a worthy cause!

*There are a bunch of holidays, real and fake, coming up this month, with Purim, Pi Day, The Ides of March, St. Patrick's Day, and Nowruz all on this blog's calendar.  Looks like a festive month!

Trump's wiretapping claim shows his vulnerability to conspiracy theories

The latest installment in Trump and Putin's Bad Bromance came Saturday, when he claimied, without evidence, that Obama wiretapped him.  He followed that up by asking Congress to investigate Obama over wiretap that his White House refuses to provide evidence for.  That didn't completely get people's minds off the Trump campaign's relationship to Russia, but it did suck up all the oxygen on the Sunday talk shows.  I offer CNN's Rogers: Trump is feeding 'conspiracy meter' as an example of the range of reaction, most of which did not support Trump.

Jake Tapper dissects this week in politics with our State of the Union panel Rep. Mike Rogers, Jennifer Granholm, Dana Loesch, and Bakari Sellers.

First, Jennifer Granholm and Mike Rogers -- Michigan represent!  Second, that list that Bakari Sellers ran through works very well as Trump's greatest conspiracy theory hits.  This is not a new feature of Trump's.  It was noted more than a year ago in The Federalist's Military Strategist Explains Why Donald Trump Leads—And How He Will Fail.

While he’s very shrewd and swift in observing, orienting, deciding, and acting when he’s on familiar terrain, Trump draws information from a fairly closed loop.
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The way Trump has dealt with facts in his public statements is a tipoff. Political speech routinely incorporates assertions of fact that range from debatable to unverifiable to provably false, and sometimes this is a sign of shrewd cynicism rather than self-deception.

But Trump has repeatedly made statements that he and his team had clearly made no effort to verify in advance, drawn from sources whose credibility should have been huge red flags, even though they were outside the common cultural and media conventional wisdom and therefore likely to be challenged.
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Trump has repeatedly made statements that he and his team had clearly made no effort to verify in advance, drawn from sources whose credibility should have been huge red flags.

The recent dustup over Trump’s claim—which was, at best, severely exaggerated—that he had seen video of thousands of Muslims celebrating 9/11 in Jersey City is a classic example of this. So is the fact that Trump cites Infowars reporting in campaign speeches based solely on having clicked a link on the Drudge Report, and has gone on Alex Jones’ conspiracy-theory-soaked show to trade praise with Jones.

When I first mentioned Alex Jones on this blog, I called him a "tinfoil hat wearer."  I still think so.  So, apparently, does Stephen Colbert.  Watch Infowars' Alex Jones Is Trump's CAPS LOCK Advisor.

Trump's new confidant is a right-wing conspiracy theorist whose rants are best enjoyed on mute.

New?  Trump has been listening to Jones for years.  Still, I'm glad the mainstream media has found the Trump-Jones connection worth examining.  That's the good news.  Here's the bad news.


Here's to everyone, including Trump, learning that the voices in Alex Jones' head are not reliable sources.

Hollywood gets political at the 2017 Academy Awards

Two months ago, Hollywood got political at the Golden Globes.  That happened again last week, as ABC News reported Oscars 2017: Politics Take Center Stage.

Host Jimmy Kimmel live tweeted at President Trump while Iranian director of "The Salesman," Asghar Farhadi, delivered an acceptance speech read in his absence in protest of Trump's executive order on immigration.

ABC News included more of Farhadi's speech in Oscars 2017: Best acceptance speeches during the 89th annual Academy Awards, some of which made political and social statements unrelated to Trump.

Listen to Academy Award winners thank their cast, crew, friends and family during their acceptance speeches during the 89th annual Academy Awards.

Finally, here is the New York Times commercial that irked the Tweeter-in-Chief so much.

The New York Times has a new marketing campaign: “The truth is more important now than ever.”

Here's to the New York Times (and the rest of the news media) working hard to uncover the truth in a time when the truth is most needed.

I'll have more on the Oscar winners and losers later this week.  Stay tuned.

March Forth with Santa Clara Vanguard at the 2017 Rose Parade on Marching Music Day!

I'm a sucker for holidays and a big fan of marching bands and drum and bugle corps, so it should come as no surprise to anyone that I'm celebrating Marching Music Day, which is today, March Fourth.  To mark the occasion, I'm revisiting My favorite marching bands and one corps in the Rose Parade today.  In that entry, I previewed the performances of the Santa Clara Vanguard drum and bugle corps (SCV) and three competitive high school marching bands, Arcadia, Broken Arrow, and Lawrence Township with performances from previous appearances at the Rose Parade for the marching bands and a clip of last year's DCI Championship performance for SCV.  Today, I'm posting this year's performances both at the Rose Parade and at Bandfest (or the equivalent, as the second day of Bandfest had less than ideal weather for marching).*

SCV participated in the opening of the parade.

This was the opening ceremonies for the 2017 Tournament of Roses Parade.

That was from HGTV.  The rest of the videos are from Music213.

Santa Clara Vanguard got to close the 2017 Pasadena Rose Parade, too.

Santa Clara Vanguard performing their musical selections at the 128th Pasadena Tournament of Roses Parade on Monday, January 2, 2017. Santa Clara Vanguard kicks off their 50-year anniversary by participating in the 2017 Pasadena Tournament of Roses Parade. Formed in 1967 in Santa Clara, California, the entire SCV organization strives to crate a positive atmosphere where young people can grow and mature into resposnsible young adults; succeeding both as individuals and as members of this group. Over the years, the Santa Clara Vanguard has developed a long-standing reputation for excellence This fantastic group is a six-time Drum Corps International (DCI) World Champion.

And here is SCV at Bandfest.

Santa Clara Vanguard performing at the 37th Annual Pasadena Tournament of Roses Bandfest at Pasadena City College on Friday, December 30, 2016.

Follow over the jump for the marching bands.

More evolution in action among urban animals

Last month, I explored how Eastern Coyotes AKA Coywolves were evolving and becoming better adapted for urban life.  It turns out it's not just coyotes.  Newsy reports how coyotes and other animals evolve to live in cities.

Animals are evolving to live in cities. They can change their behavior and biology to thrive in a place meant for humans.

While I knew about how coyotes changed their behavior around people (the neighborhood in Los Angeles where I grew up had coyotes coming down out of the hills to hunt cats 50 years ago), I didn't know about how birds change the pitch of their songs or how city mice have larger brains than country mice -- city living makes animals smarter too!

Speaking of coyotes in urban settings, Fox 47 in Lansing passed along Coyote sightings rising in residential neighborhoods two days ago.

The Michigan Department of Natural Resources is offering new advice to help neighbors make their homes less appealing to coyotes as the number of coyote sightings in residential neighborhoods increases. Biology experts said coyotes are looking for food and residential neighborhoods can make that search easy. Put away your trash bins, bird feeders and pet food so coyotes are not attracted to them. Keep these kind of items away from your yard.

I learned something from both videos, making the time watching them well spent.  Any day I learn something is a good day and I hope its a good day for my readers, too.

Warmest February on record in seven Michigan cities as well as major cities across U.S.

I mentioned that the weather was warming up, with near record temperatures expected a couple of weeks ago in Driving update for February 2017: Pearl.  Those record temperatures arrived and stuck around for most of the rest of the month.  The result, as MLive reported yesterday, was the warmest February in over 100 years of records in some Michigan cities.  Seven cities had their warmest February ever, Ann Arbor, Grand Rapids, Jackson, Kalamazoo, Lansing, Muskegon, and Saginaw/Bay City.  Three, Detroit, Flint, and Traverse City, had their second warmest February on record.  Eight of those records go back to 1998, which was a warm winter caused by an El Nino.  I remember playing soccer with my son in my former Ann Arbor home's snow-free back yard wearing only light jackets that year.  That last month was warmer than 1998 in seven Michigan cities strikes me as remarkable.  Only in Flint does the 1998 record still stand.

It was also the warmest February on record over much of the eastern part of the U.S., including Washington D.C., New York City, New Jersey, Philadelphia, Buffalo, Cleveland, and Baltimore.  The Washington Post story provided a startling perspective, reporting "The average temperature in D.C. last month was 8.7 degrees warmer than a normal February and nearly 1 degree warmer than a normal March."  Wow!

As for the local effects of the warm February, WOOD-TV reported on three tornadoes in SW Michigan Tuesday.

The National Weather Service says three EF-1 tornadoes touched down in Southwest Michigan Tuesday night.

As the segment noted, these are only the second, third, and fourth tornadoes reported in Michigan during February.  And I thought Michigan being struck by tornadoes on the Ides of March five years ago was early!

WOOD-TV also noted that Warm February temps mean less maple syrup.

The warm weather Michigan has been experiencing lately is threatening syrup production, shorting the season and cutting sweetness.

At least we're not having early warm weather followed by a cold snap that's bad for the fruit crop, except for wine grapes, not yet at least.  That could still happen.

Finally, WXYZ reminds viewers that An early spring may be bad for your health.


AH-CHOO!  Welcome to the 400 ppm world.

SpaceX announces it will take tourists around Earth's moon next year

Last week, I posted a Falcon 9 first stage landing video, which was a triumph for SpaceX.  This week, Elon Musk's space company made even bigger news by announcing the first tourist trip around the moon planned for 2018.  Al Jazeera English reports.

US tech company SpaceX says it plans to send two space tourists around the moon late next year.

SpaceX, owned by billionaire Elon Musk, says it will use a special spacecraft which doesn't require astronauts.

Al Jazeera's Victoria Gatenby reports.

Before I offer my reaction, I'm sharing those of the people interviewed by CBS Los Angeles in SpaceX To Send 'Private Citizens' On Flight To The Moon.

Hawthorne-based aerospace company SpaceX has announced its plans to send the passengers following a series health and fitness tests later this year.

I concur that this is likely to be overly ambitious.  The Falcon Heavy hasn't been launched yet, so it isn't human-rated.   As for the Dragon 2 capsule, it may be, but according to Tech Crunch, the timing will be close.

Still on track for 2017 is an uncrewed demo launch, now targeting Q4 with the updated timeline. Dragon’s being designed with reuse of up to 10 missions possible, SpaceX notes, and other testing happening for crewed missions during 2017 include testing of spacesuits, parachutes, the crew access arm and more.

This puts SpaceX and rival Boeing in closer proximity in terms of crewed commercial mission launches, with the latter aiming for a first test flight in June 2018, and a crewed test to follow in August. If SpaceX hits its revised timeline, we should see the demo without astronauts launch in November 2018 [Based on the preceding paragraph, that is probably a typo; it should read 2017.], with the first crewed launch in May 2018, so still ahead of Boeing’s time frames.

The Al Jazeera America video mentioned Musk's relationship with Trump.  Trump policy on space was one of the few things about Trump's campaign that I liked, even if I thought it would come at too high a cost.  So far, my thoughts about the cost have been right.  Here's to hoping Musk and SpaceX succeed, so I'll at least get some lemonade out of the lemons America has been handed.