With temperatures in the unseasonably low seventies today, it seems like an opportune time to talk about global warming, which frankly, I don't buy.  I know, it's not PC (politically correct) to assert that global warming is a scam, but I dare to.  Some people who have carefully studied the facts have concluded that global warming is not the threat that others, such as Al Gore, claim it to be.  I, however, am not one of those people.  Instead, I base my assessment on two simple anecdotal conclusions:

1) When I was in elementary school, the big threat was the "coming ice age."  It was predicted that Michigan, were I live, would be covered with several hundred feet of frozen snow and ice as the glaciers pushed south.  They warned that we would need to take action to avoid freezing to death.  Now forty years later, that is a ludicrous alarm. 

Yet seemingly it was the same logic of analyzing temperature fluctuations that projected an ice age then as is pointing to global warming now.  I don't think a forthcoming ice age is any more realistic than the ocean rising 100 feet and obliterating landmasses.

2) The scientific community relies on grant money — especially so when their research has no foreseeable economic upside.  The people who receive the most grant attention are those who study alarming things (such as the effects of global warming) and not so much those whose work won't be newsworthy (such as cooling the warming hype ).  Given the competition for grants, the more dire warnings will tend to be awarded more money.  It's basic human nature at work.  And for all those who think scientists are purely logical and their work is strictly scientific, remember that they are just people trying to earn a living like that rest of us.

Yes, the global temperature fluctuates.  Sometimes it trends down; sometimes it trends up.  But catastrophe is not around the corner.  It wasn't 40 years ago and its not now.

That's my story and I'm sticking with it — at least until I'm covered with water — or ice.

I've scratched my head when the AARP first contacted me (Who Told The AARP About My Birthday?) and then ranted a bit more a week later (AARP Revisited). 

The AARP has now sent me three temporary membership cards and increasingly enticing offers to join.  As I recall, the last one was five years for about 50 bucks.  I was tempted, given that I would then be able to receive AARP discounts and what not.  But before I plunked down my hard-earned cash, I opted to check out their magazine and newsletter. Unfortunately, they depressed me.  The articles were for — well, old people.  Reading them made me feel decrepit.  I'm not old, merely middle-aged.  And even then I don't always act like it.

I thought about joining and simply pitching their periodicals, but that would make me feel guilty — both for not reading them and for needlessly contributing to landfill waste.  So, I am still not a card-carrying member of the AARP.  Maybe when I grow up I will change my mind.  Besides, if I join, then I'll have one less thing to blog about.

Regardless, they have now set their sights on my bride.  Even though she is more than a year shy of meeting their age requirements I guess it is a case of "guilt by association" — or more correctly "guilt by marriage."  Sorry, dear.

In the past, an anonymous commenter from the AARP (I'm calling him or her "Terry") has provided feedback on these musings.  I hope "Terry" will post a comment this time.  Or perhaps AARP considers me a lost cause.

I've been blogging for six months now, posting 120 entries.  It's been a learning experience and an enjoyable endeavor.  I'm still not writing as quickly as I would like or as accurately — seemingly every post requires an edit or two. 

Weekly readership has grown to about 700, which should prove to my incredulous wife that people — aside from family — are actually reading my blog.  I receive about one posted comment per three entries — and about twice as many email responses.  Doing a bit of interpolation on the stats, there have been about 13,000 times that posts have been read so far.

My top ten entries are an interesting collection:

1) Goodbye Bobby Fischer - Jan 22; 862 reads
2) New Postage Rates - May 9; 679 reads
3) AARP Revisited - Jan 30; 560 reads
4) Who Told AARP About My Birthday? - Jan 24; 264 reads
5) Do you have Vista? - Feb 8; 261 reads
6) Shall I Bring a Soda or Leave It Be? - Jan 14; 251 reads
7) "Achieve Incredible Weight Loss Results" - Feb 22; 246 reads
8) Senator Jon Tester - Feb 5; 226 reads
9) An Engaging Situation - Mar 11; 194 reads
10) The Christmas Five - Jan 18; 180 reads
tie) The Movie Maven - Feb 27; 180 reads

I assumed after a post had been online for a while, that interest would die off, but that is not the case.  Older entries continue to be read, well past the date they were posted.

I'm also getting a feel for what isn't read as much.  I ponder if I should steer towards topics that have the potential for greater appeal or stick with the eclectic topics that spark my interest.

In any regard, blogging is one way of extending publishing to the Internet.  Yes, my magazines have websites, but blogging takes it to the next level.  So whether it is in print or online, I am a dedicated publisher.

First it was falling leaves and then falling stems.  Now it's falling branches.

Fortunately, the dropped branches are few in number and small in diameter.  In examining the breaks, they are suspicious looking.  Certainly there was a weakness at the point of separation that caused them to break.  Each fallen branch has a small cavity in the center and seemingly an exit hole on the side, as one might expect if an insect egg had been laid inside and hatched.  It's just a theory and I have not researched it, but it seems like a reasonable idea.

Besides, there's nothing I can do about — except pick up the branches.

When the chick-flick 27 Dresses hit the theaters, I passed on it.  But when my daughter bought the DVD I caved and ended up watching it.  I was pleasantly surprised.  Not that I had low expectations, but my even my moderate expectations were exceeded.  (Note to self: If a flick has Katherine Heigl in it, it's worth checking out — as far as I'm concerned, she stole the show.)

If you've seen the movie, you recall the bar scene where the two main characters — emboldened courtesy of adult beverages — try to correctly recall the words and sing Elton John's classic hit, "Bennie and the Jets."  I was never sure of the lyrics either, so I had to look them up — I'm still don't know what the song means.  Anyway, it was a hoot to hear them try to belt it out in their inebriated condition.

The premise of the movie was that Heigl's character had been a bridesmaid in 27 weddings, but never a bride.  The reoccurring gag was the brides claiming that the dresses could be shortened and worn again— of course they never were.

As my daughter began planning for her upcoming nuptials, she recalled similar complaints of friends about weddings they've been in: expensive dresses that they would never wear again and uncomfortable shoes that hurt their feet.

My ever practical and most resourceful daughter has addressed these issues.  She is making the bridesmaids' dresses — so even if they don't don them again, at least it didn't cost them anything.  (For the record, she did buy her dress, which she won't wear again.)

Oh, as far as the uncomfortable shoes — the ladies in the wedding party will be sporting flip-flops, as will the bride.  Problems solved.

Last week I happened upon a friend working on a Word document using Office 2007.

Knowing that Office 2007 is likely in my near future, I asked if she liked it.

"I hate it," was her unequivocal reply.  "And don't even ask me what I think about Vista," she added without hesitation.

That was a bit short of the ringing endorsement I had hoped to hear.  Granted, her Vista comment didn't surprise me, but her sharp dislike of Office 2007 did.  I've been using Office for years — and Microsoft Word and Excel before that.  For me Office is an essentially critical element in my office productivity and efficacy.  Even a slight drop in the effectiveness of the program Office would have huge ramifications in the effectiveness my work office.

This puts me in an even greater quandary about what to do for my next computer — which could happen soon.  I'm already thinking I will opt for Windows XP for my operating system.  Will I need to stay with Office 2003, too?

As far as Vista is concerned, its future is not promising.  According to a study by Evans Data Corporation a few weeks ago, most software developers are ignoring Vista — a whopping 92%.

Do I need to figure out Linux?  Or do I need to switch back to an Apple Mac?  Do I need to wait for Vista's replacement — which should be released before support of XP expires?  It's a lot to contemplate merely because I want a faster computer.

[Read what Microsoft as to say about the future of XP.]

A few weeks ago, I shared about leaves falling from my Maple trees (see Raking Leaves).

In the spring an insect lays eggs in the stems of Maple leaves.  When the eggs hatch, the stems become weak at that juncture and the leaves fall off.  That was June 6. 

At this time, the leaves have stopped falling off (at least until fall when they're supposed to) and now it's the stems' turn.  Apparently, each stem that lost it's leaf now has nothing to do.  So out of boredom or a loss of purpose, they are jettisoning themselves to the lawn below.

It's not a big deal, but I do find this interesting.  I grabbed a handful of them to show you.

Notice the long stem on the bottom. 

The left end was attached to the branch and the right end was where the egg was laid in the stem.  The brown is the trauma caused by the egg hatching and the stem breaking.

I realize this is likely trivial to you, but I find it fascinating!  Tomorrow, I will try to find something that you will find fascinating as well!

Where I live, flooding is a rare thing.  When it does occur, it is generally on a small scale, doing minimal damage.  Aside from watching flooding video on TV, I have little real comprehension of the wide scale power of a major flood and the damage a raging river can cause.

Last week, on my visit to St. Louis, I was able to get a first hand look at the immensity and raw force of the surging waters.  I have posted pictures of what I saw on Flickr.  These shots were taken on Thursday, June 19, about 11 hours prior to the floodwaters cresting; the site was the Jefferson National Expansion Memorial Park (the St. Louis Gateway Arch).

Although the photos aptly show the height of the river and the extent to which it was encroaching the shore, it fails to capture the speed at which the water was flowing.  This was made evident by the rapid rate that trees and other debris moved down the river.  Given the ominous pace of the flooded Mississippi, it is easy to see how destructive it would be to anything in its path.

According to experts, much of the flooding and damage could have been avoided.  Each effort that is made to stop the river from overflowing its banks in one area renders it that much more likely to flood elsewhere — usually downstream.  So, if the river were allowed to naturally overflow into its flood plain without human intervention, excess water could be removed from the river at many points along the way, minimizing downstream disaster.  As it is, attempts to stop flooding only serve to keep all the water contained, flowing towards the ocean.  Eventually, the amount of water continues to expand until it breaches levees and overflows its banks.  When it does the volume of water and the force behind it do great damage.

As such, I am certainly glad that I don't live anywhere near a flood plain.

We (my bride and I) have safely returned from St. Louis.  The ATSI convention was great.  I snapped hundreds of pixs — hopefully a few will be good enough to print.  I also recorded 7 interviews for future podcasts, which will be posted online at podcast.connectionsmagazine.com starting this week.  Lastly, I was posting convention highlights on the Connections Magazine newsfeed.

The drive there and back was uneventful (except for one short traffic delay from an accident).  Driving only took a tad longer than flying.  I surely didn't miss the airport security and all the other hassles of flying.

The hotel was typical for its price class: $9.95 a day Internet access, $3.95 bottled water in the room, and a sign reminding me that they would only provide fresh towels if I asked.  To see what they would do, I didn't ask, but they replaced them anyway.  Why do upper tier hotels pull all this stuff, with the lower priced ones acting much more accommodating and providing better value?  In the room, I was amused by the granite counter-top adorning a vanity with a cheep veneer face.  I do, however, give high marks to a polite and helpful front desk staff.

One evening, we had a chance to visit the arch (just a few blocks away).  Since it's next to the Mississippi, we got an up-close look at the flooding, which was a fearfully awesome sight.

On Friday night, we met my cousin; this was the highlight of the trip.  He took us to a local pizza outlet (IMO'S) and then to Ted Drew's, a local frozen custard stand.  It was the most wonderful tasting dessert I have ever had.  I'm still salivating over it.  Their website mentions shipping orders anywhere in the continental US — for $90.  (This gives me an idea for another "Smokey and the Bandit" sequel: deliver a trailer full of ice cream across state lines before it melts.  And because CBs aren't cool any more, they'll communicate via text messaging from their cell phones.  Very hip.  I'm sure it would be a hit.)

Anyway, if you are ever in St. Louis, you must check out Ted Drew's — you'll be glad you did.  And don't be put off by the long lines — they move quite quickly, plus it's part of the experience.

I've always wondered why we in Michigan pay a 10 cent deposit on soft drink bottles – and as I understand, beer cans — but not on bottled water or other non-carbonated beverages.  If it's a good law, then it shouldn't discriminate a container based solely on its contents.

Well, the Michigan United Conversation Clubs, with its 50,000 members, wants to expand the landmark 1976 Michigan law to include water bottles and other currently omitted beverage containers.  Their rational is that 97% of pop and beer containers are recycled, whereas only 20% of water bottles are.  Requiring a deposit on them will boost that percentage, keeping millions out of the landfills.  That sounds like a great idea.

Unfortunately, it would also put greater pressure on the outlets and their bottle return system, which would need to be expanded.  Plus this would be a new challenge for the bottled water distributors who would need to establish a means to deal with the returns.  (I’m not really sure of the bottle return logistics, but someone has to deal with it, right?)

Given that Michigan's economic situation has not been good for several years and is getting worse, this may not be a good time to expand the deposit requirement as it will hurt consumers.

However, this might be an opportunity to make another tweak to the bill as well.  If the deposit law is expanded, why not lower the amount to 5 cents, matching many other states?  (Such as Connecticut, Maine, Oregon, Vermont, Delaware, New York, Massachusetts, Iowa, and Hawaii.)  This would serve to minimize the impact on the consumer, while still accomplishing the desired effect.

How about it Michigan lawmakers, are you with me on this?  Or too focused on getting re-elected to bother?

Last week, my daughter and I embarked on an animal rescue of prime importance.  I’m not talking about the kind of liberation you might see on TV, like a beached whale, escaped circus animal, bear on an iceberg, or large game stuck in an inexplicable situation.  This rescue was the backyard type; the predicament was a window well.  (You may recall in "Oh Deer" that the wildlife near my house is the decidedly smaller variety.)  It was important because I didn’t want to watch an animal die — or deal with the consequences if it did, which would be inevitable without human intervention.

Our basement has two egress windows and over the years many an animal has gotten themselves stranded in the window wells that surround them.  Many a successful rescue operation has been completed.  There was one rabbit and a couple of birds (the escape trajectory is too steep for some of my featured friends).  In this case, a pail, lowered on a string, along with a dose of patience, does the trick.  Other unfortunate critters have included frogs, toads, and each spring, newts (salamanders — I'm not sure if they hatch there or what).  These can be extricated by hand.  Aside from the mysterious arrival of the Newts, the rest fall into the opening.  

That leaves the moles.  These buggers tunnel up from the bottom.  Never mind that it is four feet deep and the bottom is lined with wire mesh and covered with gravel.  Somehow they work they're way in.  As soon as they exit their tunnel, the gravel caves in and they are unable to dig back out.  In their panicked attempts for freedom, they work themselves into a frenzy and quickly succumb.  Not a pleasant end.  Usually, I don’t find them until it is too late.

This time, Laura saw him right away.  He was moving too fast to catch by hand and the pail technique didn't work as its circular shape provided ample room for escape.  A new method was needed.  It turned out that a square Tupperware container taped to a long board was the tool for the job.  After the sixth or seventh try, I was able to free him (so he could go dig up more of my lawn.) 

So if you ever call my office during the day and I don't answer, it might just be that I’m out on another animal rescue 911.

Today my bride and I are headed to St. Louis to cover the ATSI convention and expo.  It takes almost as long to fly as it does to drive, so we will be cruising the Interstate highway, instead of flying the friendly skies.  Even with gas around the $4.00 a gallon mark, it will be far cheaper and much less of a hassle to drive than fly.

I’m not sure if I'll have time to update this blog until I return, but if this blog goes silent for a couple of days, do not despair – I still love you and will miss you!

My first priority while gone will be to provide updates on the convention.  These will be posted at newsfeed.connectionsmagazine.com.  So if you don’t find me here, check there.

Regardless of what happens the next five days, expect me to be back blogging next Monday at the latest.

Have a great rest of the week!

Monday's blog about the misdirected press releases generated a lot of interest, both in the form of official blog comments, as well as email messages.

Sara, who works in the public relations industry — and sends me good press releases — emailed me her thoughts:

"...love your blog – and cannot believe what utter rubbish press releases you receive!  We work so hard to ensure that our clients' releases are going to the correct journalist, and feel dismayed and disappointed that other agencies cannot be a little more astute when it comes to selecting publications to target!"

From my perspective, I concur that Sara and her company (Berkeley PR) do an excellent job in properly targeting press releases and do so in a professional and helpful manner.  I am sure that if everyone functioned with similarly high standards that I would have had no examples to share in Monday's post.

She further theorized that

"Press releases and other articles are simply distributed to every website and journalist...in the world with the hope that the copy will by syndicated to other sites with embedded hyperlinks – which in turn should help the natural search rankings."

So then, if my blog had included links to the culprits' websites, I would have been doing exactly what they wanted.  I wish I could say that I'm to smart too fall for that, but this time it was just dumb luck.  Notice, however, that I did intentionally link to Sara's company in this entry.  Thanks Sara.

By the way, I had so much fun sharing outrageous headlines with you on Monday that I think I'll do it again sometime.

On May 24, 26, and 28, sportscasters noted that Detroit sports fans had a major dilemma.  Should they watch the Detroit Pistons basketball playoff games or the Detroit Red Wings hockey playoff games?  No mention was made of the struggling Detroit Tigers' baseball games, which were a third option on those days.  (For the record, I leaned towards the hockey games, checking out the basketball and baseball games during intermissions and commercials.)

The Pistons were eliminated by the Boston Celtics in the Conference championship on May 30.  All attention (well, most all Motor City attention) turned to the Red Wings.  They won the Stanley Cup on June 4.  Detroit celebrated with a massive parade on June 6.  (See "Speaking of Sports" for more info.)

Guess what happened on June 7?  The Detroit Tigers won.  And they continued winning, compiling a record of 8 wins and 1 loss since then, with a current winning streak of 6 games. 

Could it be that all they needed was a bit of attention?  Sure, their loyal fans were always there, but the more generic Detroit sports fans were surely watching playoff games.  And sportscasters would certainly want to talk about winning teams on title runs, than the lackluster results of a struggling club, with a losing record, playing below their potential. 

You'd think that when you're being paid the big bucks, you shouldn't need attention to succeed, but in reality professional baseball players are people just like us — and we all do better with a little bit of attention by people who want us to succeed.  Go Tigers!

After yesterday's column mentioning press releases that were poorly targeted, I made a list of the headlines sent my way recently.  None of them have anything to do with what my magazines cover.  Even though the summer months are light for news submissions, I still received quite a few.  For some of them I am not even sure what they mean.  Here is what I received this week in a 48-hour span:

• Free Portal for Telemetry Applications
• HRchitect Consultant Named IHRIM Member of the Year
• Farmers Insurance Group® Puts Some ‘Bite’ In Automobile Insurance In Michigan
• Fujitsu Named Finalist for NXTcomm Eos Award
• Conmio and TietoEnator build mobile Internet Service for Finnish mobile operator
• Unified Communications Magazine Honors Interactive Intelligence with TMC Labs 2008 Innovation Award
• ET Can Now Phone Home
• IP5280 VoIP Provider named finalist for Best Company to Work For in Colorado
• 3 Things Every Parent Needs to Know About Kids and Cell Phones
• Exanet & Datrox Bring Revolutionary Storage Technology to Media & Entertainment Companies
• Detroit Area Foreclosures Slow In May 2008
• India and China Becoming Major Centers of Pharmaceutical R&D
• AutoTrader.com Named "Innovator of the Year" During Verint Systems' 2008 Customer Conference
• Wireless Mundi Receives International Patent Application on Integrated Voice & Data Communication
• DataCore Software Partner Interware Systems Makes DataCore the Foundation of Its Total Enterprise Virtualization Practice
• Three Sequencing Companies Join 1000 Genome Project
• PerfectSoftware® and the workplace HELPLINE® announce strategic partnership
• Fujitsu Announces Connection-Oriented Ethernet Transport for their Packet Optical Networking Platforms
• PerfectSoftware to offer expert employment law advice through its HR and Payroll software.
• Social Software Frequently Lacking in System / Administrative Services

If you're a bit perplexed by these headlines, let me give you one more thing to contemplate: Someone was paid to write and email them to me.  What a waste of time and money.

Each day I receive a plethora of press releases.  While some are exactly the information I seek to share with readers of Connections Magazine and AnswerStat magazine, others are more broadly targeted, and too many are complete mismatches.  Consider the numerous email missives I've received to save the manatees or promote Michigan Special Olympics.  Although both are great causes, they do not comprise the news my readers crave.  Even more off course are the many pleas to promote a "hot" indie band or club.  Oddly they are always from out of state. 

Someday I will share a few of these random headlines, but today I want to zero in on a specific one from yesterday: "Toxic Ties to 'New Shower Curtain Smell' Evident."  It seems that the Center for Health, Environment & Justice is taking a stand against shower curtains made of PVC.  They announced a call-in press conference for this morning.  I've never experienced a phone press conference (actually, I've never experienced any press conference) so I thought I'd check it out.

These guys came across as rank amateurs.  They started late, were unprepared, the technology confused them, the online information was not online during the call, and the audio was so choppy as to be unintelligible.  Sadly, I learned nothing about the dangers of PVC shower curtains — only the dangers of bungling a live press conference.

To their credit, they did place a follow-up call to apologize for the audio problems and answer any questions.  Figuring that I already wasted enough time on the failed press conference, I declined further information. 

Still I wonder if I should be concerned about my shower curtains.

To follow up on Tuesday's Netflix post, many people concur that at some point in the future we will receive all our television and movie transmissions over the Internet.  This is often called convergence.  Personally, I am ready and anxious for that to happen.

However, there is a stirring afoot that could dampen my enthusiasm — the elimination of flat rate Internet access in favor of usage sensitive charges.  In other words, if you use the Internet a lot — such as to watch TV and movies — you will pay more.

Time Warner Cable is conducting a test in Beaumont, Texas with new subscribers.  They will have a monthly allowance of sending and receiving 5 gigabytes of data each month.  After that they will be charged $1 per gigabyte.  A standard movie is about 1.5 gigabytes and a high-def movie is about 6 to 8 gigabytes.  Therefore watching a "free" movie could cost between $1.50 and $8.00.  It seems a lot like paying for shipping and handling on a free product.

Interestingly, they claim that 5% of their customers use 50% of the bandwidth.  I suspect that these folks must be watching movies.  Given this stat, I suspect their real goal is to effectively eliminate high-usage customers.

Although there are a few other instances of cable companies toying with usage charges and usage caps, they are less likely to do so if there is competition in that market.  It is noteworthy, that the network topology of most cable systems is not conducive to high volume Internet traffic, unlike DSL service.

Although this is a threat to watch, there is considerable historic evidence against such a move succeeding, as evidenced by the demise of usage-sensitive dial-up service — in favor of flat-rate service — in the late 90s.

So, until we need to pay to watch our free movies, let's continue enjoying our movies online.

Regular readers of this blog know that I am a big fan of Netflix (an online movie rental provider).  I enjoy receiving Netflix movies via mail as well as streaming video to my computer (which Netflix added last year). 

I have wanted to have the best of both worlds, able to watch streaming video on my television.  (Yes, I am aware that I could make that happen now, but it would be less than straightforward to effectively accomplish.)  Imagine my delight when Netflix announced that a "Netflix Player" would be provided by Roku, allowing this very thing to be accomplished.  In the near future, similar devices will be made by three other manufacturers.  Priced at a one-time cost of $100, they will work in conjunction with my existing Netflix service.

Currently Netflix has 100,000 titles available on DVD for their mail service, with a relatively smaller 10,000 title inventory available for streaming video.  This difference is due to complexities in procuring digital distribution rights from the various studios and content providers.  These issues are expected to be ironed out as the technology becomes more common and user demand increases.

The future trend is obvious, with mailed DVDs eventually being phased out in favor of streaming video. 

For me, I'm ready, but a little apprehensive as well.  Currently, I have four devices connected to my TV (DVR, DVD player, VCR, Analog converter) with five remotes, as well as a couple of video splitters and one adapter.  The thought of connecting yet another device (see the box) and making sure everything works correctly is a bit foreboding. 

Despite my excitement, I'm not quite ready to run out and buy a Netflix Player.  My real preference is to be able to forgo the extra device, merely running a network cable between my hub and TV.  Is that too much to ask?

Last Friday we received some much-needed rain — 1.8 inches in a couple hours; it was a downpour. 

On Saturday, to my dismay, I noticed that a Robin's nest had been knocked out of my crabapple tree.  I was saddened to see three unhatched eggs on the ground.  They had been deserted; it was too late to do anything about it.  (Even had I discovered them right away, the chance of keeping them warm enough to hatch would have been a long shot, not to mention nurturing them if they hatched.)

Interestingly, the nest was intact.  The problem was that it wasn't adequately anchored to the tree.  I could see where it once was attached and though it was at a "Y" it was surely not an optimal one.  Additionally, since Robins often lay eggs twice a year, these parents will need to build a second nest if they intend to try again.

As a nature lover, I derive great joy through the life of animals.  Although dead animals are a real and natural part of nature, it is a side that I prefer to overlook.  Yes, I know about natural selection and the survival of the fittest.  Unfortunately, these babies didn't stand a chance because their parents didn't build a stronger, better nest.  It is a small consolation to know that this particular trait is being effectively removed from the gene pool.

The lesson in this is to be careful on what foundation we build — make sure it is a firm one.  Rarely in the US does this have literal life and death ramifications, but in other parts of the world it does, primarily the third-world parts.  In other situations, the wrong foundation could be living in a bad neighborhood, sending your kids to an ineffective  school, starting a business without a plan or enough capital, investing in a shaky opportunity, and so forth. 

Just as with building bird nests, it is important that we find the right foundation and carefully build upon it.  The consequences of not doing so can be dire.

For the past several years, at about this time, leaves fall from my trees in alarming quantities.  Yes, leaves falling in the spring — enough that they should be raked. 

In our yard are ten Maple trees, which are the culprits (victims) of this phenomenon.

















Apparently, an insect lays eggs in the stems of Maple leaves in the spring.  When the eggs hatch, the stem becomes weak at that point and the leaves fall off.

As you can see on the close-up on the left, the stem is only partially present; the rest is presumably still on the tree (not that I've actually checked).

For the past several years, this leaf problem has been increasingly more pronounced each year.  I assumed this was because the trees were getting larger, ergo producing more leaves, a percentage of which become afflicted and fall off.  However, this year the magnitude of dropped leaves is greatly decreased over last year.  This lasts for a couple of weeks and then it's done.

Fortunately, the majority of leaves stay in the trees — that way they can drop in the fall when they're supposed to, providing ample opportunity for raking.