samhexum

A Forest Hills before time Michael Perlman Forest Hills residents shop and dine on Austin Street, patronize the Midway Theatre, enjoy concerts at Forest Hills Stadium and may have been a Forest Hills High School graduate. These are some “landmarks” granting local character. Now one may be at a loss for words if they walked in the footsteps of our ancestors, just over a century ago. Encounter a land called “Whitepot,” prior to 1906. It was predominantly occupied by wood-frame farmhouses and fields of crops, with “landmarks” on a humble scale. In the early 20th century, some homes were up to 200 years of age, but today, there are none. In 1924, a survey was conducted by local resident Lucy Allen Smart. Colonial farmhouses were typically situated on large parcels of land and exhibited any combination of a porch, pitched roof and shutters. The Whitson Homestead, erected in 1800, still stood on Queens Boulevard, steps away from Backus Place. It became the residence of John E. Backus. The Whitson Homestead. Also along Queens Boulevard was the McCoun-Backus House, which was recognized as one of the best homes of Whitepot at 160 years old. It was demolished a decade earlier. The boulevard also featured the house of prominent Manhattan jeweler Horatio N. Squire (1821–1897). After 150 years, it was demolished in 1923. The McCoun-Backus House. The Judge Jonathan T. Furman House, dating to 1750, stood on Dry Harbor Road, which ended in a cluster of farms facing a large pond. Situated on the property of Cord Meyer Development Company was the Jarvis Jackson Homestead, erected a century earlier. Walking over to Tompkins Lane, a noteworthy site for the birth of landscape artist Clarence P. Tompkins (1862 – 1935) was the Joseph J. Tompkins House at 176 Queens Boulevard. A 200-year-old survivor was known as “The house on the Abram Furman Estate,” and was on the east side of what was called Yellowstone Avenue, formerly White Pot Road (renamed Yellowstone Boulevard). The Judge Jonathan T. Furman House, erected in 1750. The Jarvis Jackson Homestead. The Joseph J Tompkins house. In 1652, Newtown was settled by Englishmen from New England and Whitepot was one of its sections. An early 20th century debate was whether Forest Hills was originally known as Whitepot or Whiteput. If it was spelled “Whitepot,” it would bear relevance to the original purchase of the land from the Indians in exchange for three clay white pots. That was refuted by J.H. Innes, who told the publication “Ancient Landmarks of Queens Borough” that the authentic spelling was “Whiteput.” If correct, the land would be named in conjunction with the Dutch term “put” for a stream that became a hollow pit. Whitepot consisted of six major family farms, which were named after Ascan Backus, Casper-Joost Springsteen, Horatio N. Squire, Abram V.S. Lott, Sarah V. Bolmer and James Van Siclen. Backus (1814–1880) arrived in America from Germany without a dollar in 1829, but in 1849, purchased 40 acres of what was the Remsen estate. His acquisitions increased to 800 acres and with four wagons, he supplied the New York market with wheat, rye, Timothy grass, cabbage, peas, beets and horseradish. He was the “King Farmer of Long Island” and the largest commercial farmer in America. Today, Ascan Avenue bears homage to his name. The Horatio N Squire House The oldest living member of one of the first farming families was Frederick D. Backus (1850–1937), who told Historian Lucy Allen Smart (1877–1960) about Whitepot residents. “The neighbors were few when I was a boy, and some that lived a mile away, we called neighbors. The farmers raised hay, grain and vegetables to supply the New York markets,” Backus said. “Fruit and nuts were in abundance, and every farmer would take his apples to a cider mill, which was located on the Hempstead Swamp Road; now Yellowstone Avenue. The children attended the Whitepot School, but we all had to go to Newtown to church.” He also explained that since few homes had ice houses come summer, food was kept cool by hanging them in wells and tin pails. In the winter, oxen were driven through snow drifts along narrow roads. Whitepot had Dutch influences with the Springsteen family, who owned farmland which would encompass the south side of Queens Boulevard (formerly Hoffman Boulevard) between Ascan Avenue and 77th Avenue. The porch-fronted Springsteen homestead at 112 Queens Blvd. (now 108-36 Queens Blvd.) stood from 1898 until the late 1940s. David Springsteen (1849–1911) represented the ninth Springsteen generation to settle locally and was among the first families in Queens. In the mid-1600s, the family acquired the land under the authorization of a Dutch king. The David Springsteen residence on a Queens Blvd postcard. The area bounded by Queens Boulevard and Union Turnpike was the Hopedale section of Whitepot. The Hopedale Railway Station stood near that intersection, and the architecturally distinct Hopedale Hall accommodated dining and dancing. In 1900, The New York Times reported Whitepot’s population as 30 residents, and consisted of German residents who planted potatoes and celery. In 1906, Cord Meyer Development Company purchased 600 acres in the Hopedale section, and renamed it “Forest Hills” after its high elevation on Long Island and proximity to Forest Park. In March 1931, George Meyer, son of the late Cord Meyer told The New York Times, “Roman Avenue between Queens Boulevard and Austin was the first street to be cut through, and on it, the company started its first building operations, ten two-family brick homes.” Today, only two Neo-Renaissance rowhouses stand proudly from 1906, and are reminiscent of the first signs of development of the newly named Forest Hills. Today, the only known remnant of Whitepot is the landmarked Remsen Cemetery between Trotting Course Lane and Alderton Street. (a block from Trader Joe's) The Remsen family, which immigrated in the 17th century from northern Germany, was among the area’s first settlers. Tombstones range from 1790 through 1819, and include Revolutionary War Veteran Colonel Jeromus Remsen. In 1699, the Remsen family erected a homestead on their farm, which stood adjacent to the cemetery until 1925.

He's extremely shy and unadventurous: https://justthegays.com/video/55047-jesse-santana-folsom-fun-with-rafael-alencar/

Daffodil Project brightens faces and places throughout NYC Narcissus, an Ancient Greek hunter, was so beautiful that when he saw his reflection in a pool of water, he fell in love with it. He spent day and night lying by his reflection until his death. In his place sprouted the Narcissus flower, with petals so brilliantly yellow — today, this flower is commonly referred to as the daffodil. If you’ve noticed these golden flowers appearing all around New York in the spring, chances are they’ve been planted in the fall by volunteers of the Daffodil Project, established in 2001 in the aftermath of 9/11, New York City’s largest annual volunteer program. The project has had more than 400,000 volunteers plant more than 9 million daffodil bulbs as a living memorial to honor New Yorkers lost to 9/11 and more recently, COVID-19. These yellow flowers popping up all over the city are becoming harder to miss by the year, as the number of daffodil bulbs planted in parks is expected to increase to 10 million by 2024. Ivette Vargas, a member of Drew Gardens — a community garden along the West Farms section of the Bronx River — has been volunteering with the Daffodil Project for two years. There are multiple ways in which one can volunteer — some volunteers distribute the bulbs free of charge to the public at the beginning of the fall, and others pick up the bulbs to subsequently plant them all around the city before the first frost. Vargas chooses the latter. This year, the Daffodil Project bulb distribution took place across the five boroughs — the Bronx held its giveaway on Oct. 8 at Mill Pond Park. Vargas and Julio Figueroa, the Drew Gardens manager, picked up four bags of bulbs there, which would amount to 800 bulbs given Vargas’ estimation of each sack having 200 bulbs, she told the Bronx Times. “It’s very peaceful for me to look at flowers, especially daffodils,” said Vargas, adding that she believed that visitors of the garden shared her sentiment. Along with planting daffodils, she has been particularly passionate about providing affordable, good-quality food for the public. “And it got me thinking … I really want to learn to grow my own food and be able to share that with the people who I know,” she said, explaining the origin of turning her passion into a reality. So she took time off of work and traveled to the Dominican Republic in 2016. She would work on a rural farm (“And when I say rural, I mean rural,” she added) for three months and learn about the ins and outs of gardening — permaculture, agriculture, hydroponics and so on. She ended up staying for twice as long as she had intended. Vargas eventually returned to the U.S. — but she had a problem: “I came back with that knowledge, but I didn’t have any place to practice the skills that I had learned,” she reflected. She spent the next few years hunting for a garden that she thought would be a good fit, until she ended up at Drew Gardens in March of 2020. Vargas’ conversation with the Bronx Times took an emotional turn when she revealed how her mother had been diagnosed with leukemia six or seven years ago — another reason behind why she would eventually dedicate herself to growing natural food products. “My mom was a hairstylist for, I don’t know, maybe two or three decades, and a lot of those chemicals, once you make contact with them, you know, most of it, I don’t know — eighty to ninety percent — goes straight into your bloodstream at a time,” she said. Her frustrations over such information being inaccessible to the public thus fueled her passion for educating people on food, and what’s safe and healthy. Beautifying the city If there’s one Bronxite to credit for lifting her neighbors’ spirits by improving natural spaces, it’s Jaleesa Franco, the Castle Hill resident who was affectionately dubbed the “flower girl” after planting 5,000 flowers through the Daffodil Project since 2021. “I want everyone in Castle Hill to be able to see something beautiful in their neighborhood,” Franco told the Bronx Times last year when her story went viral. “We have a lot of beautiful things that are easy to miss, but it’s hard to miss beautiful flowers everywhere.” And Franco is not alone in her vision to beautify her neighborhood. Another participant in the Daffodil Project is Rachel Daykin, a resident of Central Harlem. In 2017, Daykin was the beautification coordinator for her neighborhood block association. That year, upon hearing about the Daffodil Project from a friend, she put in an order for bulbs with the idea of “beautifying [her] block.” “I grew up in the country, so I’m always trying to bring bits of green into the city,” said Daykin, who grew up in Scotland where daffodils were a big part of her springtime. “So I guess there’s a nostalgia piece for me, but I love being able to get with my kids, with other people who might not have grown up with that.” According to Daykin, since 2017, the number of her fellow community members participating in the Daffodil Project since 2017 has increased from five to 35. “And everyone looks forward to it. You know, we make a big sort of community there,” she added. Daykin and her fellow volunteers will be planting hundreds of bulbs in the second weekend of November, and Vargas with the Drew Gardens this weekend, weather permitting — New Yorkers have not had the best of luck this fall, having to deal with persistently rainy weekends. According to Daykin “everyone feels better” once the daffodils are planted. “It always makes me happy to see the daffodils,” she said. Mayra Kalaora is an editorial intern at the Bronx Times.

How plants communicate with each other when in danger It sounds like fiction from “The Lord of the Rings.” An enemy begins attacking a tree. The tree fends it off and sends out a warning message. Nearby trees set up their own defenses. The forest is saved. But you don’t need a magical Ent from J.R.R. Tolkien’s world to conjure this scene. Real trees on our Earth can communicate and warn each other of danger — and a new study explains how. The study found injured plants emit certain chemical compounds, which can infiltrate a healthy plant’s inner tissues and activate defenses from within its cells. A better understanding of this mechanism could allow scientists and farmers to help fortify plants against insect attacks or drought long before they happen. The study marks the first time researchers have been able to “visualize plant-to-plant communication,” said Masatsugu Toyota, senior author of the study, which was published Tuesday [2023-10-17] in Nature Communications. “We can probably hijack this system to inform the entire plant to activate different stress responses against a future threat or environmental threats, such as drought.” The idea of “talking” trees started to take root in the 1980s. Two ecologists placed hundreds of caterpillars and webworms on the branches of willow and alder trees to observe how the trees would respond. They found the attacked trees began producing chemicals that made their leaves unappetizing and indigestible to deter insects. But even more curious, the scientists discovered healthy trees of the same species, located 30 or 40 meters away and with no root connections to the damaged trees, also put up the same chemical defenses to prepare against an insect invasion. Another pair of scientists around that time found similar results when studying damaged sugar maple and poplar trees. These early research teams had a budding thought: The trees sent chemical signals to one another through the air, known today as plant eavesdropping. Over the past four decades, scientists have observed this cell-to-cell communication in more than 30 plant species, including lima bean, tobacco, tomato, sage brush and flowering plants in the mustard family. But no one knew which compounds were important and how they were being sensed — until now. “There was this kind of controversy in the field,” said André Kessler, a plant ecologist who was not involved in the research. “First, how those compounds in general are taken up [by the plant], and then how they are able to change the plant’s metabolism in response to perceiving them.” This study, Kessler said, helped answer some of those long-standing questions. Plants obviously don’t have ears and eyes, but past research shows they communicate with their surroundings by emitting chemicals known as volatile organic compounds, which we can smell. But just as people can speak so many words, plants can produce an array of these compounds for different purposes. Some are used to attract pollinators or as defense against predators. However, one class of these compounds are emitted when a plant is injured: green leafy volatiles. These are emitted by, as the name suggests, pretty much every green plant with leaves, and are produced when a plant experiences physical damage. An example of this compound is the smell released from fresh-cut grass. In the new study, Toyota and his colleagues manually crushed leaves and placed caterpillars on Arabidopsis mustard or tomato plants to trigger the emission of various green leafy volatiles. Then, they spread individual fumes to healthy plants to see if the plants would react. To track the healthy plants’ responses, the team genetically modified the plants so calcium ions would fluoresce when activated inside individual cells. Calcium signaling is important for cellular functions in most living organisms on Earth, including humans. When an electrical signal is sent to our motor neurons, ion channels open and allow calcium to flood inside. This increase in calcium can trigger a neurotransmitter release, which results in a muscle contraction in a muscle cell. Calcium signaling, Toyota said, plays a similar role in plants. Depending on the plant, it can trigger messages to close its leaves or digest an insect. After testing many green leafy volatiles, the team found only two seemed to increase calcium ions inside cells. Additionally, they found calcium signaling first increased in guard cells forming the plant’s leaf pores, or stomata — an important finding, because it shows the compounds are absorbed into the plant’s inner tissues. “They cannot just seep through the surface of the plant easily,” said Kessler, a professor at Cornell University. “They have to go through the stomata, [which] allow the plant to actually breathe carbon dioxide in and oxygen out for photosynthesis.” The calcium signaling, Toyota said, is like a switch to turn on the defense responses from the plant. After signaling increased, the team found the plant increased the production of certain gene expressions for protection. For example, Toyota said the plant may start producing certain proteins to inhibit insects from munching on them, giving the insects diarrhea. “If the plant has lots of these genes, they are now very strong against the insect herbivory,” Toyota said. With this new understanding, researchers say plants could be immunized against threats and stressors before they even happen — the equivalent of giving a plant a vaccine. For instance, exposing healthy plants to insect-ridden plants or the associated green leafy volatiles could boost their genetic defenses, so farmers use less pesticides, Kessler said. The revelation could also help make plants more resilient during a drought, signaling the plants to retain more water. “If you have a plant early in its life exposed to drought, it will actually handle drought better than a plant that was not exposed to that,” Kessler said. “This is also a result of the plant’s metabolism totally changed.” The study has planted many seeds for future research, Toyota said. For instance, researchers “have no idea” why only two specific green leafy volatiles could enter the stomata and trigger the calcium signaling. The next step is to identify the various receptors in the plants, which may be specific to the chemical structure of the two compounds. In response to insect attacks, plants can also produce specific responses based on the species of the herbivore feeding on it, an impressive behavior that Kessler is further studying. “If that plant can mount an adaptive response … this is the definition of intelligence,” Kessler said. “If you understand these kinds of things and how plants do it, it gets you onto a level that questions how we understand the world.” Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2023/10/21/plants-talk-warning-danger/

Who is this ELLEN person and why is he wearing her underwear?

Meryl Streep, hubby been separated for ‘more than 6 years’: ‘They will always care for each other’

Kelly Ripa Admits On ‘Live’ That She Often Fakes Her Own Death To Avoid Sex With Mark Consuelos: “He Thinks I’m Dead Constantly!” I'd kill Kelly Ripa for real if I could have sex with Mark Consuelos. Killer, 70, of pregnant wife emerges from rainforest 22 years after escaping jail as statute of limitations ran out Not THAT old story again! NYPD, Sheriff’s Office raid illegal smoke shop across street from Astoria church I guess GAZOO wasn't so great after all...

Luckily, I'm poor, so I pay relatively little.

still free for Medicare recipients

The adorable one is not a finalist for a gold glove. Maybe it was too many sleepless nights after his beard (I mean wife) gave birth.

Thank God he's back, right? A team that wants a(n adorable) hack who isn't even a finalist for a gold glove to be their third baseman.

Hamburglar Bear caught crashing family BBQ, feasting on 10 burgers and Diet Coke A hungry black bear was caught on video crashing a family barbecue in Tennessee and feasting on 10 hamburgers he snatched right off the grill — then washing it down with a fizzy soft drink.

Your doctor would be shooting me up with formaldehyde.

Six bull sharks inadvertently made their home on an Australian golf course. Then they vanished. For golfers, staying out of the water could be the difference between winning and losing. At one course in Australia, it was the difference between life and death. Because Carbrook in Queensland boasted a membership unlike any other golf club on the planet: six resident bull sharks. From their mysterious arrival to their devastating disappearance 17 years later, this is the tale of the sport’s most hazardous water hazard. Arrival A lake on a landlocked golf course some 14 kilometers (8.7 miles) from the Pacific Ocean may sound like a swim too far for any fish, but the bull shark has a reputation for dipping its fins into a range of habitats. River shark, freshwater whaler, estuary whaler, swan river whaler – the clue is in its other names. While native to warm and tropical waters worldwide, bull sharks have organs specially adapted to retain salt, allowing them to venture deep into freshwater environments that would prove fatal to other sharks due to a loss of sodium. Hence the presence of the stocky-built, blunt-nosed sharks in the Logan River – which slices inland from the sea halfway between Brisbane and Gold Coast before meandering around Carbrook golf club – came as no real surprise to locals in the 1990s. Neither did severe flooding. Severe flooding opened up a route for the sharks to cross from the river (left) to the course's lake. Twinned with the region’s subtropical climate, the club has been a hotspot for floods since its inception in 1978, inundated with water on numerous occasions including in 1991, 1995 and 1996. The downpours were so torrential that on the latter three occasions, the roughly 100-meter land bridge separating the river from the sand-mine-turned-lake beside the course’s 14th hole was totally submerged. A new corridor was opened and – sometime during those three temporary windows – six bull sharks glided into uncharted waters. As the land bridge dried and reformed, the door slammed shut behind them. It would remain closed for 17 years, when the next severe flood event reforged a path to the river in 2013. Carbrook’s Nessie Towards the end of the century, whispers began to trickle around Carbrook’s fairways – all originating from the 14th green. There were reports of loud splashes, large dark shapes moving below the lake’s surface, even laughed-off claims of a tall dorsal fin knifing through the water. “The Carbrook Shark” became a kind of folk legend, Australia’s own Bigfoot, Yeti or – most similarly of all – a local version of another famous lake-dwelling mythical beast. “The Loch Ness monster is pretty similar to what it felt like,” Carbrook general manager Scott Wagstaff told CNN. “It seemed possible but there wasn’t enough truth to it at that point.” The presence of bull sharks (pictured, 2012) at Carbrook was something of an urban legend in the 1990s. Courtesy Scott Wagstaff That was until the early 2000s, when the Brisbane-based Courier Mail turned folklore into fact by publishing a picture of one of the sharks, Wagstaff recalled. Yet despite having played at the club for years, he had never seen them with his own eyes when he started work there in 2010. Determined to satisfy his curiosity, Wagstaff ventured down to the lake armed with his camera and some meat. No sooner had the bait hit the surface, a shark duly appeared. The stunned Wagstaff snapped some shots before taking a short video on his phone to post online. The footage was – by his own admission – “terrible,” but the internet lapped it up: the viral YouTube video has amassed more than 2.3 million views to date. Media interest boomed, and the club embraced its toothy tenants with vigor. A bull shark was added to the club’s logo, its youth program was named the Junior Shark Academy, and feedings were held at tournaments and corporate events – including one special wedding in 2009 where all six sharks appeared at once, Wagstaff recalls. Despite his affection for the sharks, Wagstaff was reluctant to call them pets, though he did nickname one “Patch,” thanks to its distinct back marking. Compared to the crocodiles and snakes dotting other courses in the country, Carbrook’s sharks made for extremely low-maintenance residents. Only two risk-management steps were taken: warning signage around the lake, and the rejection of any business from prospective golf ball divers, who retrieve balls from course lakes to sell them on. “It’s just not worth the few grand a year we get for a contract to put someone’s life at risk,” Wagstaff said. Unprecedented Fascination spread far beyond Australian borders, piquing the interest of one shark-loving scientist and researcher based at Ruhr University Bochum in Germany. Dr. Peter Gausmann published his study on the Carbrook sharks, titled “Who’s the biggest fish in the pond?” in the Marine and Fishery Sciences journal in August 2023. Their extended residence, he argued, sheds new light on just how adaptable bull sharks are. Even without the staff feeding the sharks, hunger was not a cause for concern in a lake 700 meters long, 380 meters wide and 15 meters deep, teeming with fish, from mullets to tarpons and snappers. Gausmann calculated that the sharks would need to consume half a ton of fish per year – or 0.44% of their body weight per day – to meet their energy needs. Having been juveniles when they arrived, sightings verified they had grown to a healthy range of between 1.8 and 3 meters by 2013. Only twice before had bull sharks been recorded surviving for years in isolated bodies of water, according to Gausmann, yet none had ever lasted so long. One group made it at least four years in Panama’s freshwater Lake Bayano in the 1980s, while another survived a decade of high salinity in South Africa’s Lake St. Lucia after becoming trapped in 2002. A stay of at least 17 years in low-salinity waters — more than half a bull shark’s lifespan — was unprecedented. “This out of the ordinary occurrence has shown verifiably for the first time how long bull sharks are able to survive in these low-salinity environments,” Gausmann told CNN. “The study has shown that bull sharks presumably have no limits to their residential time in freshwater environments such as lakes and rivers, and they are presumably – at least theoretically – able to spend their entire lifetime in these habitats.” Vanished Sadly for Gausmann and Carbrook, the true extent of their survivability remains unknown. It’s been eight years since a shark was last spotted in the lake. Their vanishing is a mystery, even to Gausmann. Sightings dropped in frequency after the 2013 floods, leading to fears that some sharks may have returned to the river or died as a result of the storm. Just two sharks were confirmed dead; one found floating on the surface, another killed by illegal fishing. Wagstaff, who had never noticed any sign of ill health among the sharks in more than 100 sightings, saw them only fleetingly after the fishing death. Gausmann believes it was unlikely the remaining sharks died in a “natural way” due to sodium loss or by any other “anatomical” failure, given their adaptability, and therefore theorizes that further illegal fishing is the “most likely” explanation for their disappearance. Whatever the reason, it’s an absence felt keenly by the club. “You can’t help yourself – you walk along the lake and you’re looking in, waiting to maybe catch a glimpse of a fin breaking the water,” Wagstaff said. “The members loved the fact that their golf course was their unique place in the world where we had sharks; they just embraced it. “We’d love to see them again.” Last year, the course was submerged by the biggest flood ever recorded in the area, Wagstaff said. Though devastating financially, closing the club for two months, it sparked hope that new sharks may have crossed from the river to repopulate the lake. Only time will tell, but Carbrook is already planning for a future without its mascot. Plans are in place to fill in the lake and build a new course there over the next decade, with all marine life – potential sharks included – subsequently relocated into waters elsewhere. Whether Wagstaff ever spots another fin in the lake or not, he will remember “Patch” and co. fondly as the guests who helped him overcome his fears. Once afraid of the ocean due to sharks, Wagstaff recently went scuba diving in the reefs of the Sunshine Coast to get up close and personal with some large grey nurse sharks. “There’s this kind of legend about sharks being aggressive because they’re coming into contact with humans, especially bull sharks because of the places they tend to swim – canals, creeks and rivers,” Wagstaff said. “But then to experience them in such close proximity and see how beautiful they are and how graceful they are – now I just find them fascinating, especially the bull shark. “They’re capable, so adaptive, and they are seriously beautiful when you’re a few feet away. It’s an incredible shark.” https://www.cnn.com/2023/10/18/sport/carbrook-bull-sharks-australia-golf-course-spt-spc-intl/index.html

No, that's not why. It's because the guy who uploaded many episodes has deleted a lot of them, and I can't seem to find that episode anywhere on youtube right now.

And what's the price of my freedom from the tyranny of the taxi?

It opens to a full episode for me, but the wrong one.

My back aches with any physical activity. I can barely walk. I resemble Frankenstein when I do. I have had absolutely no quality of life for a decade. How do you expect me to stay on a bike?

Got the RSV, but I'm too young for the pneumonia. And my pulmonologist said I don't need it.

Asked my Dr for a prescription today. Big savings over Advair. Thanks.

I DON'T MEAN TO KNITPICK, BUT I AGREE...