Full and double

With the return of the rain, the double rainbows make a comeback, with the added benefit of a double full rainbow:

These two weren't as bright as the double rainbow we saw a couple of weeks ago, but in my opinion, a full rainbow is equally as impressive as a shining half-bow.

Bread crusts

In a radio advert I heard recently, its primary voice actor said something about "not throwing their bread crusts away". While it was obviously said humorously within the context of the advert (I don't remember what the advert was about, but that is immaterial to the purposes of this post), it did get me thinking: why do people often throw the crusts of bread away?

The crust is not any less edible, less tasty, or even less healthy (as far as I'm aware) than the rest of the loaf, yet a significant amount of people seem to not bother eating it. I performed a Google search and it brought up some discussions on the subject of throwing away bread crusts, and among the reasons for not eating the crusts were that they're dry, likely to fall apart, pure dislike of the end pieces, and even because the crusts "are not a symbol of wealth".

None of the above rationales are convincing to me. Too dry? They can be toasted. Fall apart? Doesn't make them inedible. Merely dislike them because they're the ends? Same. Not a symbol of wealth? Neither is soup but plenty of people eat that. When there are millions of people starving in the world I think these are fairly poor reasons to not eat something as simple as bread crusts. Even feeding the crusts to birds or ducks is a better choice than throwing them away, in my opinion.

As for me, I eat the crusts as they are still a part of the bread even if they are the end pieces. There are plenty of options for them: for some examples they are nice with jam spread on top, used for cheese on toast, peanut butter is a good choice; and yes, I will also eat them without any sort of topping. Crusts are good: utilise them! Be creative!

How about you? Do you eat bread crusts?

The Whitehouse

This made me smile the other day:

I know it's "The Whitehouse" rather than "The White House", but still, minor things such as this always make my day.

Roses on the fence

These roses are growing next to one of our fences:

Here's a zoomed-in look at them:

Considering the fence is a minimum of eight feet in height, these flowers are from the tallest rose plant I've ever encountered. While I was able to take some decent zoomed shots of the roses, it would have been great to have seen this bunch up even closer! (They are inaccessible from the other side.)

Here come the Olympics

Well, here come the Olympics; the opening ceremony will be starting shortly. It's hard to believe that it's been one year since I wrote this post about the Olympics beginning in a year's time. I agree with what I said back then in that I hope the 2012 London Olympics will be a success and that there will not be too many problems.

"Fireflies" - Owl City

I know this is another Owl City post, but last night I watched the newly-released video for "Good Time" by Owl City and Carly Rae Jepsen. After I watched it I realized that I had not yet seen the video for "Fireflies", Owl City's biggest hit to date:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=psuRGfAaju4

When this song was hit back in 2009 I remember the video being praised on the Open House Party; every time I listen to "Fireflies" the track brings back a lot of memories of that year. "Vanilla Twilight" has a similar effect (I watched that video for the first time ever last night, too). Both are incredible songs and have imaginative videos.

Owl City's third album, The Midsummer Station, is scheduled for release on the 20th of August in the United Kingdom and the 21st of August worldwide.

Window screens

While I am pleased to have sunny weather again, there is one thing I wish our house...and others, had in the absence of air conditioning: window screens.

Before we moved back to the United Kingdom I knew that summer here would probably be more uncomfortable at times as the vast majority of houses do not have air conditioning. I didn't expect for the windows to not have any sort of screens in them to protect against insects coming inside: there are few things worse than it being a hot day, you're in a hot room, there is a breeze outside, but the room's windows open out onto bushes where bumblebees and wasps like to hang out.

Fortunately, I'm not the only one with this view: my parents and brother agree that the windows should have screens in them, as does one of my cousins. My cousin is often hot at night in summer but if he opens his window the neighbourhood cats enter his room and disturb him.

Not that I want to moan about the weather here...after all, we've had rain for nearly the entire summer so far! It would just be good if more houses here had screens in their windows.

Final answer to the "Who's On Heart" competition

It took six months, thirteen days, 914 rounds of the game, and 1263 unique incorrect guesses, but finally, the remaining voice to the "Who's On Heart" competition was identified (past posts here and here). The person? Former Vice President of the United States Al Gore.

I was shocked twice this morning, the first occasion being to discover that the competition was over, and the second was learning that the last voice, the person saying "on", was Al Gore. After subsequently hearing "on" a couple more times and listening to it in context with the rest of the spoken sentence I could tell that the voice was Gore, although he was not someone I had ever considered for the voice. Kevin Taylor was the person to correctly guess Gore and he has won an impressive £60,000 with his answer.

As far as I'm concerned, I am satisfied with the competition: Tina Turner, Al Gore, and Joely Richardson are a diverse trio and I think they were a well-chosen group. Not everyone agrees, unfortunately, as I have read trolling comments in regards to Gore being one of the three (some people saying that he's not a celebrity to a few others whining about the person being an American politician rather than a British one), but most people don't seem to have a problem and are glad the competition is now over.

The three voices, both the individual words and the sentences they were used in, can be found on the Heart website: here's the link for Tina Turner, for Al Gore, and for Joely Richardson.

Red and pink

The weather has been absolutely lovely today; in the afternoon I took the time to capture the following images of some roses in our front yard:

This red rose is impressive to view in person but it looks just as magnificent in an image.

A beautiful pink rose; it's great to have different coloured roses growing in such a small garden.

The pink and red roses together, with the focus being on the pink one. From where the two roses are positioned it is not possible to have them both in focus within a single picture.

Hot air balloon

It was a surprise to see this hot air balloon yesterday evening; it appeared to be landing in a field near our neighbourhood:

It has been a very long time since I last saw watched a hot air balloon land...I certainly didn't expect to see one from my bedroom window!

Colby O'Donis

There was something I didn't write about in yesterday's post about Lady Gaga, primarily because it was irrelevant to her and her overall career, but I feel it bears a mention. I'll introduce it in the form of a question: what happened to Colby O'Donis?

As I said in my previous post, Colby O'Donis was featured in "Just Dance" four years ago, and a few months prior to his work with Lady Gaga becoming a major hit he had released his own successful song called "What You Got", and his track featured Akon. He subsequently vanished until Akon's single, "Beautiful" featuring Kardinal Offishall and O'Donis, was released in January of 2009.

Ever since "Beautiful" left the charts I have not heard anything more about O'Donis, and I don't recall ever hearing "What You Got" on the radio again, either. I have looked to see if he is releasing any new music, but at present there is nothing. It's ironic...myself and others were concerned about Lady Gaga being a one-hit wonder that we didn't stop to consider that the person she featured in her very first single would be the one who would disappear from the scene!

I hope that O'Donis is finding success in whatever path he chose to take. I remember "What You Got" very well, and it would be good for him to return to the spotlight.

Four years of Gaga

Around this time four years ago a particular song started playing on my radio. The track sounded unusual, and was very different to both all the other music that I had heard on the radio that year and to almost everything I had ever heard on the radio overall. It was a dance-pop/electropop song...highly suitable for clubs but unlikely to perform well on the major American music charts. I found myself loving the song and knew to appreciate it while it lasted, so I took the time to research it online and find out about the artist who sang and composed it.

Which song was it? "Just Dance" by Lady Gaga and featuring Colby O'Donis. O'Donis I already knew about from a track he released earlier in 2008 with Akon called "What You Got", but Lady Gaga was an entirely new person. Although "Just Dance" had been released three months prior in April, in July there was still a dearth of information about Lady Gaga, in which the most common pieces about her were that she was from New York City and had worked with Lady Starlight.

"Just Dance" quickly proved to be an incredibly popular and catchy song, and before long Lady Gaga became known throughout the United States. Her debut album, The Fame, was released in August; by this time, Lady Gaga was well on her way to establishing herself in the music business.

Unfortunately, in the late summer of 2008 there were several people (including me, I have to admit, although I wasn't on the radio to discuss my feelings on the subject) who expected Lady Gaga to be a one-hit wonder and to vanish from the scene a year later. This wasn't because of any particular problem with her, but rather, because her style of music had not exactly been having major chart success in the United States for the years up to "Just Dance" (I even recall one radio presenter pointing this out), so there were thoughts floating about that she'd be a mere flash in the pan...at best. Still, I had hoped that she would have a couple of successful singles, at the very least.

Lady Gaga's subsequent achievements shattered both my and others expectations of her. "Poker Face" was released in the United States in September, at which time "Just Dance" became an international hit. In early 2009, "Poker Face" performed strongly on various charts; then three more singles from The Fame, "Eh, Eh (Nothing Else I Can Say)", "Love Game", and "Paparazzi", were released.

In the latter half of 2009, Lady Gaga released The Fame Monster...an EP and her second major release; the first single was "Bad Romance", which was followed by "Telephone" featuring Beyoncé Knowles, "Alejandro" and "Dance in the Dark". The Fame Monster and its singles were successful worldwide; Lady Gaga was clearly a household name by the time her official second studio album, Born This Way, was announced for release. As The Fame and The Fame Monster are often considered to be part of one album, the subsequent massive success of Born This Way and its singles ensured that Lady Gaga would not be limited to being a one-album wonder.

Gaga has also been honorable by using her status to promote worthwhile causes. Her second album's lead single, "Born This Way, is about self-empowerment and self-respect, and her two major areas of activism have been LGBT rights and anti-bullying. She was an influential and powerful campaigner in having "Don't ask, don't tell", a law barring open gays and lesbians from serving in the US military, repealed (DADT was overturned in December 2010); she has also spoken various equality marches in the United States and Europe. Lady Gaga and her mother, Cynthia Germanotta, formed the Born This Way Foundation, an organization focused on addressing the problems young people face - such as bullying and intolerance, and on wanting to build a kinder, more accepting world as a whole. I have deep respect for people who use their fame to help others, and Lady Gaga qualifies as one of those people.

I also respect Lady Gaga for the way she treats her fanbase and how much appreciation she seems to have for it: she truly appears to love those who consider themselves her fans (the "Mother Monster" and "Little Monsters" terms she invented to describe the relationship between herself and her fans tickles me). I dislike famous individuals who treat their fans with disdain, who have forgotten that it is because of their audience that they were successful in the first place. Lady Gaga doesn't strike me as that type of person.

Lady Gaga appears to be everywhere nowadays in terms of media coverage: on average, I observe Lady Gaga in the news about once a day, but fortunately, unlike a lot of other celebrities who are often in the news frequently for poor reasons, Lady Gaga's coverage is mostly positive or neutral towards her. Putting aside odd instances such as the meat dress, as I implied in the previous paragraph she seems as though she is a really genuine, wonderful, and caring person...not at all somebody deserving of negative or outright hateful opinions and thoughts.

Lady Gaga has come a long way from the era of working with Lady Starlight (who, to her credit, was a huge boost to Lady Gaga's career), and the days of "Just Dance": I am glad she has turned out to be an enduring artist, I wish her continued success with her music and her activism, and I am looking forward to her third studio album. Taking everything into consideration, I think the world is a better place with Lady Gaga around.

The purple poppy

For today's post, more back garden flower pictures; these are of a purple poppy:

I do have a few more flower-related posts coming up at some stage, but I hope to have more content involving writing very soon!

Cat mayor

I was amused and impressed to read about the mayor of Talkeetna, Alaska. He was elected to the position fifteen years ago when a write-in campaign was mounted for him; he defeated the main candidates, with the people of Talkeetna being fed up with the usual types running. His victory is all the more impressive considering the fact he is a cat.

Stubbs has spent nearly all of his life as the Mayor of Talkeetna. Unfortunately his title is only honorary, owing to his non-human status, but the people of Talkeetna are happy with this and have continued to re-elect Stubbs since his initial election to the mayoralty. He is highly popular in the town and has turned out to be a great tourist attraction for the place; even better, he seems to love all the residents of Talkeetna, regardless of who they are.

Perhaps it's time to start electing more cats as mayors. Could you imagine New York City or London having a cat each as their mayors?

My main camera and irony

For once, I thought I would post a picture of the piece of equipment I use to take high-quality images. This is my main camera, a Canon PowerShot S2 IS:

The irony here? That would be this image not being high in quality, as it was taken with my phone. Unfortunately, I don't own two powerful cameras!