Miraz Jordan

Wow! Rarely Glimpsed Shark That Lives For Centuries Unexpectedly Surfaces in Caribbean:

Greenland sharks are the longest-living vertebrates on Earth, with an astonishing lifespan of 250 — 500 years … The sharks live thousands of feet underwater in pitch darkness … they grow, move, and age slowly. Their energy-conserving, slow-paced lifestyle is an essential adaptation to the nutrient-scarce deep sea.

Looked out this morning to see three cows in the neighbour's property. They were supposed to be where the white one is, on the other side of the fence between them. A bit of yelling and encouragement and they crashed through the fence back to the correct side.

Country life.

Hard to believe it's 8 years since we visited Spain, Portugal, Morocco. Fátima was so memorable — a pilgrimage destination with narrow streets, enormous tour buses, gift shops stuffed to the rafters with religious statues, knickknacks and images. The hotel had this enormous poster in the lift.

First time I've seen the word overtourism. A very useful concept indeed.

Crepuscular rays, this morning at 15 minutes before sunrise.

I have a folder of .mp3 files and want to be able to just play a random track.

I spent ages finding out how to make an AppleScript to count files in a folder, get a random number between 1 and the number of files. I was banging my head on how to then play that file. Then I discovered you can just ask for a random file in the folder. Then play it. Piece of cake! 🎶

-- 02 September 2023

-- Miraz Jordan, https://miraz.me

-- AppleScript picks a random .mp3 file from the Korolova folder

-- plays it with Quicktime Player

tell application "Finder"
	
	set random_file to some file of folder "Macintosh HD:Users:miraz:Korolova"
	
end tell

tell application "QuickTime Player"
	
	open random_file
	
	activate
	
	tell document 1
		
		play
		
	end tell
	
end tell

'Library rooficer': Dog captures hearts of many library goers 🐶:

at Northcote Library, there is a dog who has captured the hearts of many. … [Koko the dog] kind of calms everything down, people come in and they look around, it gives that kind of peacefulness in the library as well.

Willow didn't really want to do a selfie with me today. 🐶 😒

(No spoilers) The NYT crossword for 30 August 2023 was a particular delight — all the Across clues tell a story.

This beauty used to graze near us, now she’s further away and we don’t see her so often. 🐴

The sunrise this morning was OK down by the Strathnaver lakes, Waimarie and Te Puna a te Ora (Tranquil Waters and The Wellspring of Good Health).

I've been watching the NZ TV show Far North based on true events of drug smuggling.

If this were a fiction it'd never get to screen as it's just too ridiculous 📺 :

the show is mostly based on a true story … much of the action plays out exactly as it did in real life. … “The reality of what was happening and what they were doing to get these drugs, and the way the real life Ed told me the story, I was like ‘this was so unbelievable’.”

Yesterday and today I planted 3 Tītoki trees and 3 Manuka. I'm hoping that the tītoki will, in time, attract the kererū who seem to have moved into the area.

Hard work though — I'm out of practice at planting stuff.

Is it spring yet?:

New Zealand [has] a 2 month summer and a 2 month winter… the other 8 months are a long drawn out spring and autumn … at least from a weather point of view. … we’re in a “Goldilocks” belt of weather that isn’t too cold in winter and doesn’t get extremely hot in summer.