A tattoo is a form of body modification, made by inserting indelible ink into the dermis layer of the skin to change the pigment. The first written reference to the word, “tattoo” (or Samoan “Tatau”) appears in the journal of Joseph Banks, the naturalist aboard Captain Cook’s ship the HMS Endeavour in 1769: I shall now mention the way they mark themselves indelibly, each of them is so marked by their humour or disposition.

Tattooing has been a Eurasian practice at least since Neolithic times. Dating from the fourth to fifth millennium BC, Ötzi the Iceman, , was found in the Ötz valley in the Alps. He had 57 carbon tattoos consisting of simple dots and lines on his lower spine, behind his left knee, and on his right ankle. These tattoos were thought to be a form of healing because of their placement which resembles acupuncture.

Evidentially, people think body art is pretty. Anyway, it’s in vogue. A lady who worked for me, went with her mother for a tattoo. They each had something inscribed on their ankles.

Youths are adventuresome, do things, and go places they shouldn’t, thinking they’re invincable. It appears  that Miss Holloway made some mistakes. Everyone is entitled to life, liberty, and happiness, and the person that denied her those should be punished to the fullest!

History does repeat itself. Van de Sloot, the accused killer of Natalee, has been convicted of killing another beauty in Peru and is currently serving a twenty-eight year sentence there. Al Capone got his due. O.J. Got his due. No one is above the law.

My wife and I spent a day in Aruba while we were on tour. We took safety precautions and stayed with the crowd; didn’t visit any nightclubs or casinos; and didn’t fraternise with any less-than-savory, scraggly-bearded youth named Joran.

In Siquatapaque, Honduras, a festival is held each fall where the sidewalks are colored, and the streets decorated with pictures made by placing different colored grain, beans, and seed in a colorful arrangement. It’s beautiful.

The Mariner’s Code Of Conduct was alluded to in Lord Jim, a novel by Joseph Conrad, and is apparent in a number of true accounts of the actions of captains on merchant vessels. Captain E.J. Smith on The Titanic was calm and courage all during her sinking. Coast Guard regulations Code 4-2 states that the commanding officer should be the last one to leave a ship in distress. Navy regulations are the same. Neither regulation nor custom demands that a captain go down with his ship.

It could be that he planted a blueberry variety that is not self-pollinating, or that pollination was insufficient. Plant a bunch! This will make it easy for bees to cross-pollinate the blueberry plants. “It takes two to tango” in certain cases.

On one of my mission trips toHonduras, I was allowed to attend a party of expatriates. They were inHondurasfor a variety of reasons. Usually they were looking for something they’d never had or something they had when younger, but lost… Or, maybe someone was looking for them.  One of the group was a formerHollywooddirector and was accompanied by his “painted lady,” who was approximately ninety years old. A couple of gays were fire department retirees.

Another was a retiree who’d gone south to raise blueberries. He had a good crop but a small market. He gave me a small bottle of blueberry wine to bring back home. It wasn’t labeled—thus I disposed of it before I left the country. It proved a point, that one can make wine from anything that will ferment.

Here’s an excerpt:

A New York City subway train holds 1,200 people. This blog was viewed about 7,400 times in 2011. If it were a NYC subway train, it would take about 6 trips to carry that many people.

Click here to see the complete report.

Then I thought of the Canadian geese who came here and stayed. Most any day, we can see 30 or 40 geese at the lake or flying a few thousand feet over to the fairgrounds to forage on the tender-green grass. I’m going to postulate that the birds had encountered warm weather and stopped off here by mistake.  Could these robins be permanent residents who just visited my yard for the day?

I asked my knowledgeable bird-watching friend about them “Were they going north or south,” he replied. This meant he didn’t know.

Heck, we haven’t asked the groundhog yet if winter is over!

Some truisms include:

“With the current economic troubles, expired foods are increasingly becoming a part of America’s diet,” explains The Atlantic. Re-sellers — called “salvage stores” — have seen sales increase over the last few years. At food banks, there has been a 40 percent increase in demand for these items, according to Feeding America.