animals, education, Family, gardening, Kids, Nature, Uncategorized, Weather

I Know What I Know

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Yesterday I added my eggshells to my bales.  I use a high nitrogen fertilizer on the bales and somewhere in the past I must have seen something (probably on the internet) that suggested added calcium in the form of eggshells to counteract that.  While I was setting the crushed eggshells around each plant, some of them were blowing away in the stiff wind.  This made me think about my friend, LeAnne.  I’ve known LeAnne for over 30 years and from the beginning I’ve known that she believes that if you get wind in your ears, you’ll get sick. I’ve never even tried to talk her out of this belief, because you can tell that she’s not willing to believe anything else.  In fact, just last week, she mentioned how she had felt bad all day because the day before she had been gardening and it had been quite windy.

As I stood there in the wind, watching some of the eggshells blow away, I realized that I am the same as LeAnne.  I know what I know and it’s not just about adding eggshells to my bales.   Snakes.  I didn’t want YA to have an irrational fear so whenever we were around snakes (zoo, children’s museum, etc.) I made it a point to “pet the snake” in her presence.  So my brain KNOWS that snakes are dry, but my brain also knows that they are slimy.  Airplanes.  I travel for a living; I’ve been on plenty of planes.  I have even researched lift and airplane engineering.  But I still know in my heart of hearts that on every single take-off, when the plane tilts for lift off, the tail of the plane is going to scrap the runway.  The fact that this has never happened, not even once, makes no difference. I know what I know.

Do you “know” something, despite evidence to the contrary?

40 thoughts on “I Know What I Know”

  1. I know that if you plant tomatoes here before Memorial Day, it will freeze, no matter how warm it is or what the weather forecast says.

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    2. We planted our tomatoes, peppers, and a few other items yesterday in defiance of the weather gods. Trying to make up for the fact that last year everything was planted a couple of weeks after Memorial Day. Don’t recall why, but it made for a mad dash toward the end of the season, trying to harvest all the beans, and unripened tomatoes. If it freezes in the next few days, blame it on me.

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      1. I almost always planned on Mother’s Day, although a couple of times in the last 10 years I’ve had to go out and cover stuff up at least one night. This year since it was so freaking cold on Mother’s Day and the day after, we waited until that Tuesday. The bales generate a little more heat than the ground, since they are breaking down internally.

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  2. Rise and Shine Baboons,

    I hesitate to even answer this one, because my answer is political in nature and pejorative. It is also the only example I can think of this morning.

    My Grandfather and his brother, Great Uncle Bob were fire-breathing Republicans who ranted and raved about politics at every possible opportunity. The most memorable moments would occur at the dining table with the family assembled. At one mealtime Uncle Bob, in all of his disheveled, stinking, tobacco-chewing, dribbling glory went off on “Ole Potface.” We could not determine who he was talking about until he got to the phrase, “that useless cripple In a wheelchair who had polio.”

    Ahh, Franklin D. Roosevelt, who my parents revered. This while my father sat at the table in his wheelchair. I thought, “Uncle Bob is nuts and really being a jerk to my dad.” Uncle Bob ranted on cluelessly.

    A few years later my Grandfather had a serious stroke on Election Day, 1976 when Jimmy Carter was elected. He was watching election returns when he went down. He spent the last three years of his life in a care facility.

    I have voted for political candidates that I thought were good candidates, regardless of party (Gov. Robert Ray-R, Iowa, Rep Jim RamsayR, MN) over the years. However, secretly until this moment, I have always been convinced that GOP members are just nuts, despite clear evidence to the contrary. The last three years with #45 in the White House, have not done anything to relieve me of this bias. I do understand the disagreeing with a political policy is different than believing all members of a party are nuts. But Grandpa and Uncle Bob convinced me of my belief. And so it stands. Do I dare “POST?”

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    1. Great post, Jacque. I grew up just a few miles west of you, so maybe it isn’t odd that I had a relative (my dad, in my case) who loathed FDR. As I got older, I realized his fear for Eleanor was even stronger, so strong he didn’t want to mention it. Strong women terrified him.

      That’s the background for what was probably the strangest dream I ever had. In that dream, I was conversing with Jimmie Carter. (Nothing odd about that, as I’ve dreamed of interacting with all modern presidents.) As we spoke, Carter’s facial features began to melt and rearrange themselves, morphing into the face of Eleanor Roosevelt. And in my dream I cried out, “Good God! Dad’s worst fear was right! Jimmie Carter is Eleanor Roosevelt come back to haunt him again.”

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    2. I’ve always felt that, no matter how moderate or reasonable a particular Republican seemed to be at a particular time or on a particular issue that when it came to choosing a side they looked at the craven throng of right wingers and decided, “those are my guys”. That alone disqualifies any of them for me.

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        1. Still, at the end of the day David Brooks looks at the Republicans and decides those are the people he identifies with. That says to me that he holds some core assumptions and orientations I find unacceptable.

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      2. Brooks has committed to refusing to vote for #45, so at least at some level he is not claiming #45 as his own. I have also heard him have a dialogue with those that disagree with his views withOut becoming irrational like so many GOPs do. I disagree with his views on economic matters as well as the role of government, but he can at least give an intellectual explanation of his thoughts without name calling and baiting. Not many of those out there now.

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  3. i know my friend who i talked to yesterday truly believes the conspiracy theory that this corona virus is in reality will be over november 3rd

    he says it’s the flu and he really believes it. i laughed at him and told him it’s hard to admit when you screw up but his guy is the most tremendous denier in the whole history of time. we have never seen a better denier, he is the denying master denier in all of history and we will better prepared in the future after this experience

    i told him i hoped this would be a door opener for other denied issues like global warming and fossil fuel pollution, the huge advantages in plant based diets for the environments ( i wasn’t aware cows and pigs produce more methane and carbon pollution than all the cars in the world and that the total output is created to feed meat eating desires)

    i believe 40% of the population will realize the other 40% is in need of acknowledgement and a wide birth when factoring common sense into the equation of life.

    i always assumed others are smart enough to make a decision that will help is all make the world a better place. today i’m not sure it ever enters their mind

    wind in your ears? plane tail?
    i don’t believe in stupid stuff like that
    i just believe it will all be better tomorrow
    really i do
    now that i think about it i’m not sure why

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  4. Our tortie cat knows that someday, if she tries hard enough, she will catch the ray of sunlight light that I reflect off my cell phone screen on the wall and ceiling above our stero cabinet.

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    1. If you had asked me last week I would’ve said that Guinevere believes that someday she will get a squirrel or chipmunk in the backyard. Unfortunately two chipmunks have proven her correct this week.

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    3. Guess I have more time than I thought… That’s really something about the wind in the ears, VS. Whew.

      I’m especially right in the question of our national “leadership”. I have a high school acquaintance on FB, who is still an avid supporter of #45. The stuff she posts is so sickening I almost unfriended her, but I’ve decided to use the information to try and imagine/understand what she sees that I don’t. Also a relative whose FB posts arel “My Rights Over Your Safety”.

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      1. You’re a better person than I, BiR, but you can at least “unfollow” her so that her obnoxious posts don’t appear on your news feed. I know I have acquaintances who are DT supporters, but they have the good sense to be quiet about it, at least around me.

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  6. I know that when a plane takes off, it helps if I hold my breath for as long as I can and simultaneously have a firm grip on the armrest.

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      3. We had to drive by a small rural cemetery on the way to our Lake Superior cabin. My daughter taught me to hold my breath as we passed it because “you don’t want to breath in any ghost dust.” When I thought about that, I agreed I didn’t want that, so I joined her in holding my breath.

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