What animal is it?

Hints:
[1] It has the ability to run at maximum speeds of about 97.5 kilometres per hour (60.6 mph).

[2] It lays the largest egg of any living bird.

[3] It usually weighs from 63 to 130 kilograms (140–290 lb).

[4] Its eyes are said to be the largest of any land vertebrate – 50 millimetres (2.0 in) in diameter.

[5] It has three stomachs.

Run, Run, Run

Our two grand-children, Abby and Elly, ran round and round a children’s park the day before yesterday. It was safe to run on that soft-to-bouncing ground. Abby started the run and little Elly followed her sister from behind. Though Abby, light-weighted and tall, won several metres before Elly, the latter did not give up the run. She strove on with her own short legs.

Before this, the two sisters went to the top of a slide. They found the slide too hot for sliding because they could feel the heat of the sun when sitting at its top. We told them to play at a lower and shorter slide near by. They both welcomed the idea. Their climbing, swinging, steering at a wheel and tip-toeing over the bars (with my close supervision) occupied almost an hour at the playground. All through the time, their spirits were high. I wondered if they would have nightmares that night.

Buondolce

Finding new things each day is rewarding.

Today from a rack in a “P” Supermarket, I discovered small sponge cakes in packets of ten. Each packet cost about twelve ninety Hong Kong dollars. There ought to be four flavours, which I found only three, namely, chocolate & honey, strawberry and milk. I thought the missing one was orange.

The attractions of these cakes come from low prices, beautiful outlook, “milk & yogurt” and their special flavours. To me, they are a little sweet, but they satisfy me.

The moment I picked them up and studied its "country of origin", I was astonished to see the language used was Japanese. Later I learned from the web-address that the product was from Italy.

Buondolce is just the brand name of cakes while Freddi was the company’s name. This is similar to Camry as to Toyota.

This company produces other products, say, Swiss roll, Omamma, PicNic, Dolcetto and Moretta. Their outlooks are more or less the same, rectangular, except those Swiss rolls.

It is very nice to see Italian food become popular in Hong Kong markets. I do support Italy’s food products.

一個不用上班的日子

今天八月廿九日早上颱風納沙 (Typhoon Nesat) 帶給大部分的香港市民一個不用上班的日子。昨晚我臨睡的時候，天文台仍舊發出三號風球信號；睡醒了，天文台已發出八號東南烈風信號。學生們、老師們不用上課固然開心，上班一族，除了服務性行業的員工，亦不用返工，享有額外半天甚至一整天假期。太太及我今天都無需照顧孫兒，自然放假一天，確要爭取多些時間休息。

今天的快餐店、餐室、酒樓、超級市場、街市、報紙檔、麵包店都照常營業。上述的正正是市民在打風的日子要去的地方。

早上附近的麥當當坐著幾枱青灰間隔制服的九巴司機們 (這裏其中一幅照片中，可見在巴士站過夜的一批巴士還未開走)，因為天文台已經在早上四時四十分宣佈八號烈風信號，全港的巴士停駛了。港島的電車、過海渡輪也不例外。除小巴、的士及港鐵(有限度服務)之外，公共交通工具的停駛帶給在風暴下還要返工的市民不便。

今次納沙只是在香港南面三百公里外掠過，所帶來的災害不大──只是一些大樹及一個巨型棚架倒塌壓著一部的士(的士司機無恙，乘客受傷)。也許清晨一艘浮塢斷纜漂浮向杏花邨岸邊撞擊，威脅民居的事件算是比較嚴重一些而已。

Glue and Oil paint

Abby made two mischievous acts, one on this Wednesday and the other Thursday.

First act: She took out a bottle of glue from her dad’s desk in the reading room, returned to her tiny blue desk in the sitting room and began to squeeze glue onto a page of a single-lined book. Next she used coloured pencils to dip into the glue and draw. Certainly the colour could not go through the sticky glue onto the paper. I warned her not to do this, but she did not listen to me or stop right away. A second thought came to me that in that instant, I should not stop her “creativity”. I let her do it, but warned her that she would dirty the table. Abby went on adding glue onto the page and spilt some onto the table. I was a little agitated.

At first, Elly, sitting next to her sister, was doing something quietly. Soon she joined her sister and wiped her hands onto the thick spread of glue on the page. I was filled with fury at this point because Abby had started the mischievous act which caused her little sister’s hands and fingers all dirty with glue. I seized the bottle of glue and the book, and threw them into the dustbin and carried Elly quickly to the toilet to have her hands washed clean. I feared that Elly would swallow the glue, a chemical which might be toxic to her. I shouted to Abby, too, to clean her hands. I looked like a "mad" man at that time. Obviously, Elly would not like my idea of forcing her to wash her hands. Afterwards, I let grandma to calm and settle her down. I thought that I had to show to my grandchildren that they were wrong and that I was angry at their naughty acts.

Second act: Abby, this time, took out another book and picked an oil-based marker pen to draw on it. I warned her that if she drew out of the pages of the book, she would dirty the table and make the table difficult to be cleaned. The consequence came out that she did dirty the table with a spot of yellow when she flipped the wet page of paint onto it. I was sure that yellow spot would stay there forever. If we use an oil solvent to do the cleaning work, the solvent may as well solve the blue paint of the table. That was an unforgettable “scar” Abby made on her lovely blue table.

Opal

Two young men travelled from Adelaide to Darwin. They stopped at Coober Pedy (in South Australia) which people called it the opal capital of the world. They met several workers at the mine drilling and insert small explosives into holes and blast the red soil up. What they aim at is the opal (蛋白石).

Opal is the national gemstone of Australia, which produces 97% of the world's supply. It is an amorphous form of silica related to quartz, a mineraloid form, not a mineral. 3% to 21% of the total weight is water, but the content is usually between 6% to 10%. It is deposited at a relatively low temperature and may occur in the fissures of almost any kind of rock, being most commonly found with limonite, sandstone, rhyolite, marl and basalt.

Opal's internal structure makes it diffract light; depending on the conditions in which it formed it can take on many colors. Opal ranges from clear through white, gray, red, orange, yellow, green, blue, magenta, rose, pink, slate, olive, brown, and black. Of these hues, the reds against black are the most rare, whereas white and greens are the most common. It varies in optical density from opaque to semi-transparent. For gemstone use, its natural color is often enhanced by placing thin layers of opal on a darker underlying stone, like basalt.

Besides the gemstone varieties that show a play of color, there are other kinds of common opal such as the milk opal, milky bluish to greenish (which can sometimes be of gemstone quality); resin opal, which is honey-yellow with a resinous luster; wood opal, which is caused by the replacement of the organic material in wood with opal; menilite, which is brown or grey; hyalite, a colorless glass-clear opal sometimes called Muller's Glass; geyserite, also called siliceous sinter, deposited around hot springs or geysers; and diatomite or diatomaceous earth, the accumulations of diatom shells or tests.

功夫新星

繼魔法擂台之後，無線推出新節目功夫新星，前者帶出娛樂給觀眾之外，同時吸引喜歡玩魔術的人才出來表演，霎時間使香港產生玩魔術熱潮，是一個不可多得的節目，而後者亦發掘了好些習武的年青人大顯身手(表現拳腳功夫、 舞動不同的兵器)，切磋武藝之餘， 亦訓練其膽量，不斷接受新挑戰。評判團都非常有份量，當中有武術前輩，大師和武打明星，所給予參賽者的批評非常中肯。

參賽者共有十二人， 經過幾輪比賽之後，只留下六位比較出色的賽員角逐最後兩名香港區武術代表資格與另外六位從外國回來的選手比賽。

在決賽中，香港區有一男一女做代表 (穿黑色服裝那兩位)， 其餘六位來自英國、馬來西亞、美國等等不同的國家(穿白色服裝那六位)。最後由香港女代表何佩珉得到評判一致的讚賞奪得功夫新星的榮銜.

評判認為何佩珉耍的棍比很多的演員打得狠，亦很出色。最後何佩珉從武打女星及最佳影后惠英紅小姐手中接過冠軍腰帶成為功夫新星.

Playing Balloons

Elly and Abby play balloons in two ways:

[1] They strike them to me from the top berth of their twin beds and I hit back to them.

[2] They ask me to pump a balloon to a suitable size first and release it with the air escaping from the mouth. The ball will then thrust forward and fly freely before them. No matter where the balloon will fly to, they cheer.

What’s on TV?

Yesterday when I took this photo, Elly was watching TV.

What’s on TV at that time?

She was imitating an action. There are 4 options below.



[1] Someone was licking ice-cream.
[2] Someone was drinking coca-cola.
[3] A dog was licking his master.
[4] A dog was panting in the heat.

過中秋節

今年中秋節很特別，我們在馬鞍山與Connie一家人渡過。

菲臘煮了幾碟精彩的餸菜給大家分享，包括魚手指、釀蟹柳菇、蔥花白切蒸雞、豆豉蒸排骨，清蒸石蚌魚、白灼白菜仔和脆(菲臘形容給艾莉聽)菜芯。

這次又是大廚出馬，有兩菜四肉(豬肉、雞肉、鮮魚和雪魚)，尤其豐富，我們只是在等食而已。

大家的胃口都非常好，除雞骨豬骨之外，全部飯餸都食清光。

飯後每人吃八分一個雙黃月餅，應一下節，又經濟，又保健。

我們一行七人(包括兩位孫女)試闖馬鞍山公園去賞月。未入公園之前，已見人群從四方八面走往公園。大大小小都拿著最近興起的液體塑膠彩環，也有傳統的燈籠，不過用蠟燭燃著的為數不多，現時大多數的燈籠都用乾電芯。

艾莉拿著的是小小的楊桃形燈籠，心情是靚絕的。阿比的則是白兔燈籠，難得有四個比五元大些的小輪子可以給阿比拖著走，不過在凹凸不平的行人路是非常難控制的。

進入公園大門，已經發覺這個馬鞍山「維園」充滿著人，其大部分都是大小家庭成員盤坐在草坪上，各自各精彩，有玩弄手上的彩環，輕談說笑，四處竄跑，也有吃月餅、楊桃等應節食物。菲臘不忘教兩個女兒去賞月。

回想兩年前在加拿大過中秋，當晚菲臘興致勃勃地駕車載我們到溫哥華烈治文近機場的河濱賞月。到了河泮，燈光微弱，空無一人，我們還以為找錯了地方。兜了一個圈子，最後都是在路邊停下來，原因是我們是帶來月餅，多少都要找個地方吃掉它(們)。

踏上堤岸(稍高於馬路)，才發覺這堤壩很窄，我們約走廿步已達水邊。在這裏遠望對岸正是溫哥華國際機場。在頭的右方是高掛的月亮，它令我即時想起兒子正在地球的背面放著假(因香港是在中秋節翌日才是公眾假期)。

當時那裏有點寒意，大家怱怱吃過月餅，想著快些鑽進車子回航，忽然遠處駛來一輛汽車，在我們的車附近停下來，走出車外的人彷彿見到這裏已經有人家在賞月一定是沒有找錯地方，來趁一趁「熱鬧」(其實熱極都是大大小小六個人)。不消一兩分鐘我們已經將車開走了，留下了另外一個家庭去賞一個冷清清的中秋月。

10-year pain on 911 attacks

I remember the breaking news on television at around 9 p.m. Hong Kong Time on September 11, 2001. The camera lens stayed for long on a burning skyscraper, later two, from a long distance. Smoke was coming out of the building. Later on I learned that the twin towers of World Trade Centre in New York City were attacked by two hijacked passenger planes.

These are the facts of the attacks (from Wikipedia) on that single day:

Early on the morning of September 11, 2001, 19 hijackers took control of four commercial airliners en route to San Francisco or Los Angeles after takeoffs from Boston, Newark, and Washington, D.C. Planes with long flights were intentionally selected for hijacking because they would be heavily fueled.

The four flights involved were:
[1]American Airlines Flight 11 (from Boston to Los Angeles)
[2]American Airlines Flight 77 (from Washington to Los Angeles)
[3]United Airlines Flight 93 (from Newark to San Francisco)
[4]United Airlines Flight 175 (from Boston to Los Angeles)

At 8:46 a.m., 5 hijackers crashed American Airlines Flight 11 into the World Trade Center's North Tower (1 WTC), and at 9:03 a.m., another 5 hijackers crashed United Airlines Flight 175 into the South Tower (2 WTC).

5 hijackers flew American Airlines Flight 77 into the Pentagon at 9:37 a.m.

A fourth flight, United Airlines Flight 93, under the control of 4 hijackers, eventually crashed near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, southeast of Pittsburgh at 10:03 a.m. after the passengers fought the hijackers. Flight 93's ultimate target is believed to have been either the Capitol or the White House. Flight 93's cockpit voice recorder revealed crew and passengers attempted to seize control of the plane from the hijackers after learning through phone calls that similarly hijacked planes had been crashed into buildings that morning. Once it became evident to the hijackers that the passengers might regain control of the plane, one hijacker ordered another to roll the plane and intentionally crash it. Soon afterward, Flight 93 crashed into a field near Shanksville.

Three buildings in the World Trade Center Complex collapsed due to structural failure. The South Tower collapsed at 9:59 a.m. after burning for 56 minutes in a fire caused by the impact of United Airlines Flight 175. The North Tower collapsed at 10:28 a.m. after burning for 102 minutes. When the North Tower collapsed, debris fell on the nearby 7 World Trade Center building (7 WTC), damaging it and starting fires. These fires burned for hours, compromising the building's structural integrity, and 7 WTC collapsed at 5:21 p.m. The Pentagon also sustained major damage.

I can feel the pain in the hearts of families of the victims and those who sacrificed themselves to save people from the burning twin towers and at the burning section of the Pentagon. Tribute should be paid to those heroes that fought against the terrorists on Flight 93 plane, thus avoiding it from attacking the White House.

Shogun Burgers

I like Shogun Burgers (將軍漢堡) because of the taste of its sauce. The burgers landed in Hong Kong several times before, but appeared for a week and two and then disappeared. I did not understand why. Maybe it was one of the tactics used by Mc Donald.

Tonight, we went to dine at the Mc Donald at City One. We ordered 2 shogun burgers with chips and cola, a cheese double burger and a Mc Chicken. The shogun burger in my hand was so familiar and the taste had never been forgotten. The success of this burger is the sauce. I hope these burgers will not disappear once more.

Looking up from the square outside Mc Donald, I could see two fast food restaurants, Café de Coral and KFC. Today at 5 p.m., Café de Coral was closed down because it was going to be renovated. From the mouth of one of the service ladies, I learned that Café de Coral would re-open in December. The next-door KFC had a different fate. It would be closed down by 9 p.m. three days later. Probably it would not be found in this area any more.

Recently, I find new information on Mc Donald’s food packages. This time, on the paper container for chips, I see the description of the potatoes used. Earlier, in 2009, I found information on Mc Donald's food in terms of words and cartoons on their packages in Canada. I agree that the information gives effective promotion of the food sold in the restaurant. That is the customers know what they are eating, where they come from and what ingredients there are in the restaurant.

Good news to me this morning (September 13, 2011): KFC will re-open at City One after 2 months' time. This is what the staff tell the customers.

Angry birds

Angry birds is a game I like to play in an i-pad. In the game, players use a slingshot to launch birds using suitable projectiles (拋物線) at pigs stationed on or within various structures, made of wood, ice or stone, with the target of hitting the pigs directly or damaging the structures, which would cause them to collapse and kill all the pigs on the playfield. As players advance through the game, new birds appear, some with special abilities that can be activated by the player.

There are several different types of birds used in the game. In the earliest levels, the basic red bird, the weakest power it possesses, is the only one available. A blue bird can separate into three birds; a yellow bird which can speed up while in the air; a black bird explodes and a white bird can drop explosive eggs. The pigs themselves also appear in different sizes. While small pigs are relatively weak and are easily destroyed either by direct hits or by debris from the damaged structures, larger pigs are able to sustain more damage. Also, some pigs wear helmets as armor, making them more resistant to damage, while pigs with crowns can take the most damage.

It is an interesting game to play, but successes base on the projectiles one choose. Tactics must be taken to break the wooden structures, not the stony ones.

Valencia oranges

Here is a good-looking Valencia orange grown in South Africa.

Let us read about the history and specialities of these oranges from Wikipedia:

The Valencia Orange is a sweet orange first hybridized by California pioneer agronomist and land developer William Wolfskill, on his farm in Santa Ana, United States.

Its name comes from the city of Valencia, Spain, known through history for its sweet orange trees, originally from India. The patented orange hybrid was later sold by William Wolfskill to the Irvine Ranch owners, who would plant nearly half of their lands to its cultivation. The success of this crop in Southern California led to the naming of Orange County, California. The Irvine Company's Valencia operation later split from the company and became Sunkist. Cultivation of the Valencia in Orange County had all but ceased by the mid-1990s due to rising property costs from urban sprawl, which drove most of what remained of the Southern California juice orange industry into Florida and Brazil.

Primarily grown for processing and orange juice production, Valencia oranges have seeds, varying in number from zero to six per fruit. However, its excellent taste and internal color make it desirable for the fresh markets, too. The fruit has an average diameter of 2.7 to 3 inches (70 – 76 mm). After bloom, it usually carries two crops on the tree, the old and the new. The commercial harvest season in Florida runs from March to June. Worldwide, Valencia oranges are prized as the only variety of orange in season during summer.

The following are my opinions towards the oranges:

The colour of the outer skin of these oranges is a “rich” orange and the shapes are good. It is a disappointing thing to find that these oranges are without navels. I agree that these oranges are fit for orange juice because they are sweet, but the skin of each slice of orange is too tough to bite open.

What has happened to this bun?

Look at this piece of bun with a circular hole at its centre. It is the hard work of Elly who makes the hole.

Elly loves sausages. Whenever she is given a sausage bun, she eyes on the sausage alone. Eating only a small bit of bread, she presses her face against her target (sausage) and bites. Her drilling skill for the meat is best when the bread is soft. She is a carnivore, isn’t she? To save food, I am always the person who deals the left-over, which means she eats the meat and I eat the bread.

Summer in Greenland

It is warm in summer Greenland since it has long hours of daytime. The photos here reveal a harbour view in the southwest.

Greenland (part of the Kingdom of Denmark) has an area 10 times as big as that of England. Eighty percent of its land is covered in ice. Its capital is Nuuk (formerly called Godthab). The chief means of transport is by boat or ships.

Its total population is around 56000, eighty-eight percent of which are Greenlanders and the rest Danish and others. The people speak Greenlandic, Danish and English. Their houses are in strikingly bright colours. The National Day is on July 21, which is the longest day of each year.

吃鳳爪

昨天是八月底最後的一天，阿比和艾莉在酒樓首次食豉椒鳳爪。艾莉用手吃雞肶和雞翼已經熟練到不得了，何況是區區半隻雞腳(原因是送上枱前已被切開了)。阿比見妹妹開始吃鳳爪，馬上嚷著要吃另外一隻。

雖然艾莉今次吃的並不是雞肉，而是雞皮，但她吃得津津有味，這是可以從她滿面笑容的食相見得到。阿比見我和妹妹映相，也要我映她吃鳳爪的樣子，那是我求之不得的。鳳爪的吸引力是來自醬汁的味道，我相信兩位孫女是喜歡的。

A Mini-van

Today when I stepped out of a “W” supermarket, I was shocked to see a lovely small black-n-white van at the side of the road. From its classic design and look, I could figure it out to be a Volkswagen.

“When was it first made?” suddenly came to my mind. It seemed to me a toy car rather than a van.

I wonder how the driver drives it on the road without a number plate. Some words (Japanese and English) and numbers were written on its windscreen. Awkward enough, there was a paper strip at the metallic part just below the windscreen. Was it rusty there?

After all it is a clean interesting car. I love it. The words written on the windscreen reflect to me that this car may have been bought back by someone from a deposed car “graveyard” and have its second life.

Joshua Trees

Dated back to March, 2011, Tony found a few mysterious-looking Joshua trees before the gate of University of Berkeley, so he took a few photos of these trees and their shadows on the ground. My wife and I saw quite a great many such trees with rough barks on the way through the desert land to Grand Canyon, Arizona in 2006.

To explore more about these trees, we better refer to Wikipedia:

Joshua trees are supposed to be fast growers for the desert. The trunk of a Joshua tree is made of thousands of small fibres and lacks annual growth rings, making it difficult to determine the tree's age. This tree has a top-heavy branch system, but also has a "deep and extensive" root system. If it survives the rigors of the desert, it can live for hundreds of years with some specimens surviving up to a thousand years. The tallest trees reach about 15 m tall. New plants can grow from seeds, but in some populations, new stems grow from underground rhizomes that spread out around the Joshua tree.

The evergreen leaves are dark green, linear, bayonet-shaped, 15–35 cm long and 7–15 mm broad at the base, tapering to a sharp point; they are borne in a dense spiral arrangement at the apex of the stems. The leaf margins are white and serrate.

The flowers are produced in spring from February to late April, in panicles 30–55 cm tall and 30–38 cm broad, the individual flowers erect, 4–7 cm tall, with six creamy white to green tepals. The tepals are lanceolate and are fused to the middle. The fused pistils are 3 cm tall and the stigma cavity is surrounded by lobes. The semi-fleshy fruit that is produced is green-brown, elliptical, and contains many flat seeds. Joshua trees usually do not branch until after they bloom (though branching may also occur if the growing tip is destroyed by the yucca-boring weevil), and they do not bloom every year. Like most desert plants, their blooming is dependent on rainfall at the proper time. They also need a winter freeze before they will bloom.

Once the trees bloom, they are pollinated by the yucca moth, which spreads pollen while laying her eggs inside the flower. The moth larvae feed on the seeds of the tree, but enough seeds are left behind to produce more trees. The Joshua tree is also able to actively abort ovaries in which too many eggs have been laid.

Swinging Together

Together Elly and sister Abby swung in our public park this Monday, August 29, 2011.

To my surprise, Elly uttered “swing” to me as she first saw it. It was the very first game she chose for the morning. Abby played with other children for a while before she joined her younger sister at the swing.