After a record-setting warm autumn, the temps have dropped as early signs of winter arrive in the city. It sets the tone for upcoming holidays as stores and online shopping move to holiday sales in hopes this will be a good season. There are holidays sales ahead but many retailers are already marking items down. This week I threw away a few old things and updated my wardrobe for the winter. Didn't need much but its fun to shop.
Ladies ... this year I'm feeling velvet or velour jumpsuits, be they new or retro. I couldn't find anything I liked in the stores but I did find two velour jumpsuits on eBay - emerald green & brown (new) - for a fraction of their retail price. They arrive within the week.
Also keeping me warm ... Workers are back on my roof this morning - hammering away as I blog - putting a new roof on my building complete with insulation. The area over my apartment has been completed so we shall see. One thing I learned about roofing when I owned a home is patching a hole is just a "temporary fix," like meditating or praying to solve a major issue. An old roof needs to be replaced whether it was damaged by the severe natural disasters that are befalling us, or just worn down though time like many souls.
There was a warm reception for the performers last night the 51st annual Country Music Association Awards which kicked off with a tribute to the victims of last month's Las Vegas tragedy. Darius Rucker led an all-star group of country superstars in a rendition of his Hootie and the Blowfish hit "Hold My Hand". On stage with him was a who's-who of the country world including Keith Urban, Lady Antebellum, Tim McGraw & Faith Hill, Garth Brooks, Reba McEntire and more. CMA Awards hosts Carrie Underwood and Brad Paisley not only paid tribute to victims of the horrific shooting at the Route 91 Harvest Festival in Vegas but also the most recent mass shootings that have made headlines, also recognizing the victims of the hurricanes that devastated Texas, Florida, the Caribbean and Puerto Rico. Read more
Celebrating Carl Sagan: 13 fun facts about the cosmic genius on his birth anniversary
India Today - November 9, 2017
Carl Sagan was born to Jewish parents in Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, NY. He was American astronomer, cosmologist, astrophysicist, astrobiologist, author, science popularizer, and science communicator in astronomy and other natural sciences. His best known scientific contribution is research on extraterrestrial life. Sagan assembled the first physical messages sent into space: the Pioneer plaque and the Voyager Golden Record, universal messages that could potentially be understood by any extraterrestrial intelligence that might find them. He is world-famous for writing popular science books and for co-writing the award-winning 1980 television series Cosmos: A Personal Voyage. He wrote the novel Contact, the basis for the 1997 film of the same name starring Jodie Foster. Sagan believed that the Drake equation suggested that a large number of extraterrestrial civilizations would form, but that the lack of evidence of such civilizations (the Fermi paradox) suggests that technological civilizations tend to destroy themselves rather quickly. Sagan also played a prominent role in the U.S. space program, with his involvement in the Mariner, Viking, and Voyager spacecraft expeditions.
But without it we go nowhere.
