Category Archives: Rochester, New York

Mark your sundial

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Scientists are predicting that the next bout of intense solar activity will come sooner, and be more intense, than the last one.

We may start to see some action as soon as this fall. Peak activity will hit about 2012.

As a practical matter, we’re even more dependent on technology than we were the last time this happened (around the turn of the millenium). So this is going to be . . . interesting.

Fortunately, we also have the aurora borealis. During the last period of peak solar activity, I saw northern lights all the time here in Upstate New York. I am really looking forward to seeing them again.

This sounds like a great idea

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I just found about about this via Zinnian Democracy: according to Mark Hare at the Democrat and Chronicle, Kenichiro “Ken” Sato, 27, a museum art director from Sendai, Japan who has enrolled in a public administration program at Monroe Community College, has obtained a $15,000 grant from Rochester’s Arts and Cultural Council to turn downtown into an outdoor photography museum.

The plan is to hang 300 photos on tall and not-so-tall buildings. About 100 would be large, 100 feet by 50 feet and 15 by 15. The rest would be 5 by 8 feet, displayed at eye level. Some would depict local history, the rest would be selected from photos submitted internationally.

I must say, I have a very good feeling about this.

And — Skunk Tracks!

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skunk tracks

The snow is wet, and my skunk ducked under the deck on his way across my property which muddied his feet a bit — perfect for leaving several sets of pretty clear tracks.

Along with the size of the tracks (1.5-2 inch long prints) one way to tell a skunk track is that the claws on the front feet are markedly longer. (They use them to dig for food–that’s how they tear up peoples’ lawns if they have grubs.) Skunks are also “pacers;” that refers to their gait and the way they place their feet. Pacers leave two rows of tracks, and each row has alternating front and back foot prints.

Usually you can see five toes on both the front and back feet of skunk tracks, but in some cases you can’t. In the tracks in this photo, only four toes show on the back foot print.

Here’s a great online resource for identifying animal tracks, and here’s another.

Skunk!

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I happened to look up from my desk a few minutes ago and saw a skunk heading across the street into my lawn!

I grabbed my camera and dashed out the front door. It had snowed last night, so I was able to tell from his tracks where he had headed — up my driveway. I caught up with him next to my garage — I yelped at him, and he whirled around and lifted his tail :-)

I repeated that several times, grabbing shots. Unfortunately, none was a killer pic, but here’s the best of the lot.

skunk in rochester ny

Isn’t he cute????

No where to go but up?

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Michael Caputo thinks that lawmakers may well choose to raise Monroe County sales taxes in the near future. The reasons he thinks this likely: County Exec Maggie Brooks will hold the line against a property tax increase, and lawmakers show no sign of having the political will to make significant budget cuts.

Getting buttered in Rochester

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Searching for the perfect Friday post, and lo, I discover that Rochester’s own Century Discount Liquors made The Wall Street Journal‘s Friday Tastings column: “Taking Sides in the Butter Battle” (subscription required).

Turns out, a rebellion is brewing amongst wine drinkers, who are demanding the return of the buttery Chardonnay. Good for them, I say! Butter Lovers, Unite! So columnists Dorothy Gaiter and John Brecher, being gracious & tolerant sorts, phoned wine shops in various cities around the country

and posed this question: “If we walked into your shop this minute and asked you for a buttery American Chardonnay, what would you sell us?” We said they could choose one over $20 and one under $20, but they had to answer right away from wines that were on the shelf.

One of the stores they called was Century, where Michael Misch, general manager, recommended a Chalk Hill ($28) and Franciscan ($14).

So isn’t this grand? Now if you’re looking for bottled butter, you don’t have to say so out loud — and attract sneers from the anything-but-Chardonnay shoppers — or resort to passing a note to a clerk, which could get you mistaken for a criminal.

Otoh, pairing a Chardonnay, buttery or not, with the cold front that’s moved in today may well be the height of gauche. I’d better Google that, I think . . .

Yellow Stuff

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Rochestarians are understandably uneasy. What’s happened to winter? Our average annual snowfall is 92.3 inches. So far this season, we’re up to ten: two inches of snow in January, three inches in December, and five in November.

clematis seed pod in winter

My daughter is particularly bummed — she wants snow, and is fervently hoping the Groundhog sees his shadow on Thursday.

I’m with her on this one, albeit for different reasons. Drop the other shoe, Mother Nature, and get it over with!

[tags] annual snowfall, Rochester weather [/tags]

Upstate, Downstate

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Zubalove, in a post about NY State politics, references one of the state’s archetypes: the perennial rivalry for money and political power between New York City and “Upstate.”

(Upstate, for anyone who has never been here, is about as different from NY City as you could imagine: a patchwork of New Englandish, rural communities, woodlands [some quite extensive], dairy farms, and small-to-medium cities, most of which are a bit tattered around the edges.)

Zuba writes:

The increasing chasm between the economy of a world-class metropolitan area and the milder and volatile rust belt characteristics of upstate becomes more and more difficult to negotiate every year. This regional problem transcends political party, because neither group seems incredibly willing to stand up and make the necessary changes to the financial barriers of this state. As long as downstate hums along, it doesn’t faze any of the leaders in Albany that the cost of doing business in this state is astronomical and the tax rate is oppressive.

It’s the tyranny of the majority: Upstate is more sparsely populated than our state’s famous namesake city, therefore, our priorities tend to be backburnered. Sure, the politicians pass through to garner swing votes during election season (in 1999, the Clintons famously chose Skaneatales for a summer vacation, in large part to help soften the Upstate turf for Hillary’s upcoming Senate run). But we live in a very large shadow, and short of breaking the state in two, we always will.

Zuba suggests that we can adjust the balance of power by breaking up the status quo of our state government, and mentions a new book by Jay Gallagher, Gannett News Service’s Albany bureau chief, cheerfully titled “The Politics of Decline.”

It will be interesting to see what Gallagher prescribes — and whether anybody pays any attention.

It’s an hawk, it’s an owl . . .

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No, it’s a Northern Hawk Owl, and Junk Store Cowgirl trucked her family out today to look at it.

This species of owl, she writes, isn’t supposed to be found this far south, so it’s generating a bit of excitement in the local birding community. It’s also stirring up sentiments of a different kind:

In a bid to keep the owl around, some birders have been releasing pet store mice into the fields near where the owl’s been spotted. So I knew we were in the right area when I spotted a sign saying, “Do not release live mice on my land.”

LOL

Here is a site with some info on this owl. It’s a pretty distinctive-looking bird. I can see why people are excited.