Ummagumma

  We did not have a lot of fall color this October.  What we did get to enjoy was mostly yellow in color.  Here a couple of maples we planted long ago managed to show off a bit.  For the most part though, the warm weather just made the leaves fall off without much change in hue. October is my favorite month of the year.  We usually get cooler weather, bright blue skies, and, of course, fall color.  This October was warmer and wetter than usual.  The lowest temperature here for the month was only 46 degrees, which means we did not have a frost or even anything resembling cold weather.  Most of our oaks at Twin Oaks are hybrids of willow, water, and pin oak variety.  These trees have little color.  They turn light brown and simply fall off.  Without colder weather, this October saw very little in the way of leaf color.  Normally, our autumn color is at its height around Halloween.  This year it will be later - or not at all.  We had multitude of clear, blue sky days wi

Bryse Wilson's unexpectedly great start in the Braves Game Four win against Clayton Kershaw was the highlight of the NLCS for me.  It had been 19 years since the Atlanta Braves made to the National League Championship Series.  Going up against the Los Angeles Dodgers, best team in baseball during the regular season, we had quite a task ahead of us.  Would our young starting pitchers keep it going?  Would the Braves bats stay hot?  A long-time friend of mine and I have been in touch almost daily since mid-August about these Braves.  He grew up a Giants fan so there is no love lost between either of us and the Dodgers.  We were both apprehensive because 1) the Braves have found so many ways to choke in the postseasons past and 2) the Dodgers are such a solid, talented ball club.   No baseball "expert" thought the Braves could beat the Dodgers. Max Fried started off shaky in the first two innings but, once again (and this can not be overstated), this postseason when the Bra

The number of new COVID-19 cases per day in the US since the beginning of the year.  Notice we have recently moved back up to a consistent 50,000+ cases each day.  This does not bode well for Christmas.  This graph is available from the Johns Hopkins website. Reality finally caught up with Donald Trump.  He caught COVID-19, spent time at Walter Reed getting aggressive treatment against the virus, and his re-election campaign started falling apart .  His ridiculous activities surrounding his " hospitalization " (which I put in quotes to remark about his joy ride while receiving treatment), his over-the-top unmasking of himself following the visit were political theater of the absurd. The American people are now finally seeing how absurd it all is.  How do I know?  Not from any public polling, although the latest fivethirtyeight poll gives Biden an 85 percent chance of winning the election (as of this post).  Hillary's margin was never that large in 2016.  But the tr

Travis d'Arnaud rips a high fastball for a double into the gap, driving in two runs in Game Three.  The Braves are playing incredible postseason baseball right now. I did not know what to expect going into the National League Division Series between the Atlanta Braves and the Miami Marlins.  The Braves were the better team, I felt, but the Marlins had never lost a postseason series.  Miami has been the Wild Card winner twice and gone on to win the World Series both times (1997 and 2003).   It was time for that to change, but could the Braves bats stay hot and their pitching remain as solid as it was closing out the season? Game One started off well enough.  Ronald Acuna, Jr. became the youngest player in baseball history to hit a lead-off home run in the postseason with a monster blast.  But after a great first inning, Max Fried did not look sharp and was pulled after 70 pitches...and giving up 4 runs.  Not a good start at all for the young Braves southpaw.  But, the fact he on