Capitol Hill Blue Forums Hot Topics & Breaking News The RoundTable Round Table for Tuesday, September 25, 2007

Good morning; it's Tuesday, Sept. 25th.

The Great American Desert was the name for the American High Plains – eastern Colorado, western Kansas and Nebraska. (I actually live on the prairie, not the plains - call it artistic license.)



The earliest settlers in this area claimed that the plains were eerily silent. There were no trees at all – therefore few songbirds. People born and bred in the prairie often have a bone-deep love of trees; there’s a reason Arbor Day originated in Nebraska.

Even today, driving through the country, a group of trees usually identifies a farmstead or a source of water. The most common native tree in this part of the country is the cottonwood; they line the banks of rivers and creeks. Their leaves tremble and shimmer like quaking aspen, but they get much bigger. Hundred-year-old cottonwoods aren't rare.



The oldest, largest trees on the prairie acquire names of their own, personalities of their own (ever run across a creepy tree?) and are mourned when they fall.


The best-of
Some trees receive special notice, and special protection. The tallest known tree in the world is a coastal redwood in California, at 367 feet – five stories taller than the Statue of Liberty. Its exact location is a closely guarded secret.The Wild Trees, by Richard Preston, is a wonderful book about those who search for - and climb - the tall trees. His description of the world in the canopy is breathtaking.

How do you climb the world's tallest tree, when the lowest branches are 150 feet of the ground? Click here, if you have about 4 minutes, and an urge to see the view from the top.

The story of the oldest tree in the world isn’t quite so pleasant. The oldest known tree is a bristlecone pine, also in California; it is roughly 4,780 years old. Until 1964, the oldest living tree was 4,862 years old – the oldest living thing ever discovered . In 1964 it was cut down by mistake!

Click on the picture for the story

Trees are a major part of the ecosystem. Wangari Maathai understands that; she is the founder of the Green Belt Movement in Africa. Nobelprize.org says “through the Green Belt Movement she has assisted women in planting more than 20 million trees on their farms and on schools and church compounds." She was also elected to the Kenyan Parliament in 2002 and won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004. Her book, Unbowed, a Memoir, was published in 2006.

Click on the photo to learn about the Green Belt Movement

There’s a note on the dust jacket of my copy of Unbowed:
She would have liked my prairie great-great uncle, I think. He wrote to his sister, in 1876, that he had bought “50 cherries, 50 plums, 100 apples, 100 peaches, paid for in work…Father and Uncle are going to the Republican River after a load of little trees to plant on the edge of the field.” Three hundred fruit trees, plus another load, to be planted by two adults and two children - and watered by hand.

The Western Meadowlark is a songbird that nests on the ground. The song of the meadowlark stays with you awhile, if you are lucky enough to find one. That must be the reason that so many western states love it; it’s the state bird of Kansas, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Oregon, and Wyoming!



Click here, and have a terrific Sept. 25th!

Julia

Great opener Julia!

I've never been to the Great American Desert, but based upon your pictures, it looks like you live in a very beautiful region of the world.

The top 100 reasons it's great to be a guy

including:

"Phone conversations are over in 30 seconds flat.

You can go to the bathroom with out a support group.

You get extra credit for the slightest act of thoughtfulness.

You can write your name in the snow.

Flowers fix everything. "

Beautiful pics & a great opener, Mell! I see these pics & always wish I had some serious wandering time!

COINCIDENCE? I think NOT!


From the Church of Ineffable Stupidity:

a) the cost of US' bribe to keep Blackwater operating in Iraq? $200 billion.
- - -

b) SouthWest Community College, Red Oak, Iowa
If you, as a professor, tell college students that the Adam and Eve story should not be taken literally, you will be fired.

Creston Campus: 1501 W. Townline St., Creston, IA 50801 ~ Phone: 641.782.7081
Red Oak Center: 2300 N. 4th Street, Red Oak, IA 51566 ~ Phone: 712.623.2541
Osceola Center: 2520 College Dr., Osceola, IA 50213 ~ Phone: 641.342.3531



- - -

b) Delphi Corpse.
They plan to fire 6,000 worker to become financially responsible, while asking the BK court for permission to pay $37 million to its top executives in bonuses.
- - -

c) Condi Rice
"we should treat Ahmadinejad like the Pope treated me"
- - -

d) IraqNam
assassinations, murders, bombs and anti-American riots are now so commonplace that US MSM no longer reports on it. At least 4800 soldiers are now dead, but you have to search hard to find the numbers.
The Green Zone has no safe areas left, and mortars continue to fall without warning.
The Anbar province, after its Potemkin performance par execellance, has erupted in assassinations and violence.
- - -

e) Today's GOP
They prefer holding congressional hearings on the MoveON ad, rather than discuss the military budget.

amazing. especially when the facts in the Ad were all true.

ahem

St Brendans voyage

and of course the vikings

the egyptians maybe

and of course those that "discovered" the new world when they moved in and lived there, you know the natives.


or does discovered only count when the discoverers wear trousers

Wow, Mellow Julia, what a nice opener today! I like the change - although I enjoy the "old styles" too.

Beautiful, sunny, unseasonably warm early Fall day here in the Southern App's. I'll be on service calls most of the day today. Beloved is home sick with a stomach something. I gotta refresh my CD case before it's time to hit the road. Y'all have a good one!

Great opening today Mellowicious . Thank you for educting us Ranters about the "Great American Desert."

but Schlack, THEY KNEW where they were going. Ole Chris was still trying to find India, by way of Indiana. And we still call the native population Indians.
- - -


from the church of Ineffable Stupidity:

a) George Bush declares that the economy is strong.

Bank of America will fire 4000 workers in the Chicago area over the next week.
LaSalle will fire 2500 workers of its 4000 in Chicago.
Citibank will add another 1500 layoffs in Chicago.

8000 banking jobs gone - just because of those lousy countrywide commercials.
- - -

b) The Mayor of Jena
is organizing the local KKK and other hate groups to have a counter protest.
- - -

c) Condi Rice
(the Church feels like she has been ignored almost as badly as she has by the Pope. we plan to make it up to her.)