Autumn: part ll

Look at this lovely carpet of leaves in my back yard. (It's worth clicking to enlarge).


You can almost hear them whispering “don’t sweep us up, don’t sweep us up” can’t you?

You will probably remember that what impresses me so much about the trees here is their ability to multi-colour (ooh, a new verb is born). Well, the leaves do it too.

These leaves have decided that those of them on one branch will be yellow, those on another will be green. How do they do that? A fine example of peaceful democracy.



Here, they’re all mixed up together.



I wonder if that creates more friction between them, or if they still happily co-exist, green and yellow, at such close quarters. Does the tree engineer the design and control when each leaf may change from green to yellow, or does each leaf have free will?

Look here, though, how within a single leaf, the multi-colour effect is achieved. These do that clever thing that the trees do, holding on to one colour in the middle while letting a new colour creep in at the edges.



This one is a work of art. Deep red veins traced against that subtle orange background, on an even deeper red stem. Perfect.



A couple of final glorious pictures, just because I can’t resist, and it’s going to be at least 10 months till autumn comes round again.






And don’t you just love this song? (a rather clunky version of it!)



To me, it captures the whole essence of the way our lives are marked by change. The seasons are a part of that. The music somehow manages to be both melancholy and cheery at the same time, which is masterly, for change is, surely, both our enemy and our friend, a stealer and a giver.

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Autumn

I absolutely love autumn. And I absolutely love autumn here. The colours are amazing, and the days can still be warm. Even if the weather isn't warm, it's usually sunny and bright, and the light has a particular quality to it. I love it.

Three years ago, (that long?), I did a couple of blog posts about autumn, with pictures of trees and leaves, and I'm going to re-run them here. It's interesting to see how then I was busy comparing autumn here with autumn in the UK. It's a sign of how long I've lived here, that I no longer do that. I just enjoy autumn for what it is, and I enjoy the familiarity of it. I know what to expect.

Three years ago, I wrote this:

Trees in Britain have to get their shows done so quickly, and in the damp. A few days, and they need to get from green foliage to bare twigs. They manage a little colour, but have to speed on through to dead brown leaves pretty fast. The trees here have the luxury of week after week of slowly fading temperatures, and still have the energy to choreograph their colour changes with finesse. What impresses me most, is the way one tree can exhibit different colours at the same time. We had two trees in our garden that were, for days on end, red at the top, yellow in the middle, and still green at the bottom. Traffic lights. I couldn’t get far enough away from them to photograph them, more’s the pity, but here are some other examples I found.

Look how this tree shades itself from orange to green, left to right.



This one decided to do it from top to bottom.



These ones do it from the inside out. See how they’re red at the ends of their branches, but still green at the core, as if holding on to summer in their hearts while bravely waving their hands at the oncoming autumn.



Impressed? Just wait till you see this. Group choreography. These five babies have got together for a chorus line performance.



Great show, gals. (That isn't a floating roof, by the way. It's just that someone painted their store the exact same shade of blue as the autumn sky.)

Some trees are just too bursting with their own creativity to bother with that shading effect, and they mix up the colours in a great effusion. This one gives us a beautiful two-tone green and yellow.



I left in that stunning little red bush for you to see. What an effort it made – the least I could do was not to crop it out of the picture.

This one couldn’t wait to decide which colours to go for, so threw them all in together and mingled them up. The photo doesn’t do it justice. Click on it to enlarge it - go on, you know you want to.



To finish, here is a glorious display of autumnal splendour.



Look at the rich red, the startling yellow, the mellow ochre, the luscious green. Even that little shrub in the front is shimmering in maroon and silver.


Which one? Well, it's a bit small, I admit. You probably can't appreciate it properly.



I'll enlarge it for you - I'm sure it's well worth a closer look.




Those lovely autumn tones...




Hang on...









It’s a fire hydrant. I’m getting carried away here.

This post was trees. The next is going to be leaves.

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Calling all Hawaiians, New Hampshirites and Vermonters

I have a list of the 50 US states. Whenever we see a car licence plate from another state, we cross that name off the list. (I know. Hours of fun for all the family.) After nearly five years, there are three remaining states: Hawaii, New Hampshire and Vermont. So if you're from New Hampshire or Vermont, and are planning an across-the-continent road trip (it could happen, you might be fed up with your autumn colours), please get in touch. I could design you a route that passes nearby me, and we could rendezvous. All I need is to see your licence plate.

As for Hawaii, well, you were always going to be a challenge.

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Degrees

Not of the Higher Education variety. Though I must tell you about the MA I'm doing some time, because that would be a good post (stop yawning at the back there).

No... this post is about degrees Celcius and degrees Fahrenheit, prompted by a list of things that still surprise Not From Around Here, an American blogger who's lived in England for six years. Though, just to clarify, she's not surprised by the use of Celcius; she's surprised at her own lack of adjustment, and that she still has difficulty with it.

I'm going to let you all in to the inner workings of Iota's mind. I feel a bit embarrassed about this, but I know we're all friends here. Just try not to laugh too audibly at me in the comments. Here goes...

For all the years I lived in Britain, I never really coped with Celcius. So when I heard the weather forecast, I would mentally convert to Fahrenheit. To do this, you divide by 5, multiply by 9, and add 32. Yes. I really did do that every time I heard or watched the weather. Every time. It became a habit. I liked to think that I was exercising my brain in an Alzheimer's-protective sort of a way, but truth be told, it was just one of those little weirdy quirky kooky things that YOU LOVE SO MUCH ABOUT ME (stop laughing at the back there). I have to confess (and this is where the Alzheimer's-protection theory falls down), that I couldn't remember the result from one day to the next. So if Michael Fish said "it'll be the same tomorrow as it's been today", I couldn't short-cut the calculation. I'd do it all over again.

There are a couple of sneaky tips. It's worth knowing (if you're stuck in the same loop as I was) that 16C is 61F, and 28C is 82F. Ha! Genius. Except you do have to remember that it's 16-61 and 28-82, and not 15-51 or 17-71 or 18-81 or whatever, otherwise you'll be into that divide by 5, times 9, and add 32 manoeuvre all over again, just to check you've got it right. Which I did have to do. Frequently. It's a pity that the Great Fire of London happened in 1666, not 1661, because that would have been an easy way of remembering. Though then I wouldn't ever have remembered the date of the Great Fire of London, because it wouldn't have ended in 66 like 1066. Perhaps William the Conqueror could have made his move 5 years earlier, in 1061, and then everything would have lined up nicely.

Another easy-to-calculate temperature is -40 degrees, which is the same in C and F. Ta-da! Sadly, not very useful to know that one, when dealing with UK weather forecasts.

The other point I should confess to, is that it never made any difference anyway (stop that snickering, or join Husband, who always found this amusing). Having dutifully converted to Fahrenheit, I really didn't have much idea of how the figure correlated to the experience. I mean, I knew 32F is freezing, and that if it's in the 90s you're probably on holiday somewhere Mediterranean, but as for the gradation in between, well, I was always a bit in the dark (or out in the cold, if it was, and this being Britain, it often was). Husband gave me a rule of thumb (being a decent bloke), that if it's 60F you can just about get away with no jacket over a long-sleeved shirt. I know, I know. You have to remember, (a) he is a bloke, and (b) we were living in Fife among the hardy Scots. Over time, I've recalibrated that to 64/65.

Being in America has been a real education for me in what temperatures feel like. I now can read the weather forecast and know whether to wear jeans or shorts, whether to take a cardy or not, whether my feet will be cold in flip-flops. I tell you, it's a whole new thing. It's partly because the range is so huge, compared to the UK, that I've been more interested. It's partly because the forecasting is so good and reliable, that it's worth paying attention. It's partly because I see the temperature much more frequently than I used to - the dashboard of the car, the computer, winking digital signs outside shopping malls, churches, gas stations, restaurants, etc. I feel rather proud of myself. I've cracked this Fahrenheit thing. I'm hot stuff at Fahrenheit.

And I much prefer being 98.4 than 37 point whatever it is. Or 36. Can't remember. There's more room for manoeuvre. We all know that 100 means 'ooh, getting a bit high here'. Three digits is a helpful clue. Nice and easy. In Celcius, it's a matter of a decimal point or two between life and death. Much too scary. I need a bigger range of temperature when it comes to health. And yes, since you ask, I do have two thermometers. I don't trust either of them, actually. I do also have a conversion chart in the medicine cabinet, which I printed out before I'd got round to buying a Fahrenheit thermometer.

There you are. All you wanted to know, and more, about temperature conversion in daily expat life. Well, my daily life anyway. I'm guessing my approach might not be entirely typical. I'm going to stop now.

I want the perfect muffin, or nuffin

Why can't I bake muffins? I've tried several times. They don't turn out light and fluffy, and poking over the top of the muffin case. They turn out a bit hard and a bit dry, and barely reaching the top of the muffin case. I don't do any super-healthy wholemeal recipe. In fact I've probably tried several recipes over the past few years. I don't think I can be a proper American mom until I can bake muffins (and yes, I do already make a mean apple pie).

Let's have a poll. I'm relying on you, Bloggy Friends. Don't let me down. I can't accept I have no future in muffins. You can select as many answers as you like, and/or leave me a comment with further information.

Adding infancy to injury

It's bad enough trying to get to grips with school years being called "grades" and how the numbers equate, when you arrive in the US. Then there's the whole issue of college years. For a long while, that was just a mystery to me, until I took the bull by the horns, googled the answer, and then spent a few minutes chanting "freshman, sophomore, junior, senior" to myself, until it became ingrained in my mind. Not ingrained in the same way that it's ingrained if you've lived through it yourself and it becomes second nature, but ingrained enough for day-to-day purposes.

What I hadn't realised was the extent to which High School grades use this terminology too. So it's no good that I know that High School is grades 9 to 12. Nobody talks about 9th grade. I now have to shelve that knowledge, and start talking about 14-yo as a freshman. "He's in his freshman year at High School" I say.

I know what you're thinking. You're thinking "wow, those expat mums are so impressive... We really have no idea the burdens they carry... Someone, give them an award".

At least you'll be comforted to know that I'm not alone in my struggles. I have a helpmeet in the form of 7-yo. She has recently been reading Dick King-Smith's "Sophie" books. When Sophie starts school, there is talk of her brothers being in the juniors. This confused 7-yo, so I explained. It's nothing to do with being college juniors or high school juniors. In England, Kindergarten, first and second grades are called "Infants" and third, fourth and fifth grades are called "Juniors". So far, so straightforward. (I was a bit hazy on the exact demarcation, but given that these things vary from LEA to LEA, and given that I'm not sure that terminology is still used in any case, I didn't worry too much.)

A few minutes later, 7-yo came back with further questions about "Insults and Juniors".

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More second grade homework

I wrote recently about 7-yo’s homework, and how I hate the way she is being taught ‘correct’ and ‘incorrect’ ways to interpret passages of English. It’s getting worse. Could you bear it if I whinged on about it again? Given that you, my readers, are among some of the finest writers I've ever come across (and I sincerely mean that), let's see how you'd fare in second grade English homework.

Sam swims quickly.
Sam swims well.

Question : What is the best way to combine these two sentences?
Answer (choice of 4):

1. Sam swims quickly and Sam swims well.
2. Sam swims quickly, well.
3. Sam swims quickly, well too.
4. Sam swims quickly and well.

The right answer is number 4. But 7-yo had chosen number 1. I have to say I agree with her. That sentence has a lovely rhythm. It’s almost like a nursery rhyme or chant. It echoes the movement of someone swimming front crawl. It has a symmetry. It swings along. I actually quite like numbers 2 and 3 as well.

Of course it depends on your definition of “what is the best way…”. I note that it doesn’t say “what is the correct way…” (thank goodness). I would prefer to see it rephrased “what do you think you’re meant to think is the best way…”. At least that would be good early training in exam technique.

I’m sure you’re going to say that it’s important for second graders to learn grammar, and that these are just grammar exercises, and won’t quash her literary creativity. And you’re probably right. But the words “dumbing down” spring inexorably to mind. (Perhaps I wouldn’t mind so much if the letters that have come home from the three primary schools my children have attended weren’t sprinkled with typos and grammatical mistakes.)

Then I stopped to think. Do I care so much about how her brain is being trained in maths? Or any other subject? Do I have a strong opinion on what she should or shouldn’t be doing in PE? Do I react so strongly, either positively or negatively, when she talks about what she’s done in Art or Music? The answer to all these is no, not really. Opinions here and there, varying from mild to strong, but nothing gets under my skin to the same degree as her English homework. This says more about me, than about the education system (though I think my opinions stand, none the less).

If there’s one thing I’ve learnt about being a parent, it’s that you learn such a lot about yourself in the process. I knew all along that I love words, and that how we put them together is important to me. I didn’t need the reminder of 7-yo’s homework really. But it’s interesting to see what things push our own personal buttons.