Where the Sidewalk Ends
[You may have seen this post on Substack. Explanation at the end.] I thought of this 150 yr old farmhouse and the land around it as my story for life. Then life says maybe not. That was Fragments One. I…
fred
Fred First holds masters degrees in Vertebrate Zoology and physical therapy, and has been a biology teacher and physical therapist by profession. He moved to southwest Virginia in 1975 and to Floyd County in 1997. He maintains a daily photo-blog, broadcasts essays on the Roanoke NPR station, and contributes regular columns for the Floyd Press and Roanoke's Star Sentinel. His two non-fiction books, Slow Road Home and his recent What We Hold in Our Hands, celebrate the riches that we possess in our families and communities, our natural bounty, social capital and Appalachian cultures old and new. He has served on the Jacksonville Center Board of Directors and is newly active in the Sustain Floyd organization. He lives in northeastern Floyd County on the headwaters of the Roanoke River.
An Object at Rest
? On the very positive side of “why this writing space gets no love” of late, as I wrote recently on Substack, the coming of spring and summer has been liberating! The landscape beyond beckons me through the sliding doors,…
In or Out of The Game after 70?
I was watching The Crown yesterday while eating my usual and customary lunch apple. A line from the script grabbed my attention. It was spoken by the frail and apparently dying sister of Admiral Mountbatten as she languished in her…
Blogging without a Net
This spaghetti might not stick to the proverbial wall, but I’m slinging it anyway. And I’m telling anybody that’ll listen. Old dog: new tricks? So often at Fragments, the image has been the story; the memory; the point of the…
You Don’t Bring Me Flowers
You Don’t Bring Me Flowers Anymore June 11, 2002 It was just a couple of days before my much-anticipated travels Out West to see our daughter. I was in the bedroom fretting over the details of the trip. Ann called…
On Short Shelf Life
Had coffee with a friend recently–a few years my senior–who showed me a picture on his phone. I recognized it as a raven. He said it was a tattoo. His own. He described the recent decision and related experience in…
BlueBird Breakfast
I posted this morning over at Substack where the friction is less than here in WordPress. You can go there and read my musings about diets and digestion, with more to come about bugs for breakfast in your own bowl…
The Quantum Brain
A Multidimensional Quantum Orchestra Between our Ears? TL; DR :: Offering just below the drive-through window for those who have to keep moving on a Friday. Following—the summary of the A QUANTUM COMPUTER BRAIN, created by the GhostReader AI function…
The Everyday Brain
The three pounds of pink pudding we carry in our cranium has to be the most researched and debated organ in the (known) universe. If you follow the visible tip of the iceberg (the part I post somewhere public) you…
Where Am I?
If you don’t know where it is you want to go, you’re not going to know when you get there. After so many years when this website was either neglected by the writer, ignored by readers or sabotaged by hackers…
Birds Behaving Badly
I could not resist the alliteration, even though this you-wanna-piece-of-me Osprey (from Sarasota 2017 visit) is the baddest bird I could find in my limited ornithographic collection. Yes I made up a word. So sue me. I did have a…
Panpsychism: A Light on Consciousness
Photo by Greg Rakozy on Unsplash I asked a GPT4 model this question and got the answer below. For giggles. Actually, I hope to write on this topic soon, and some of these points are helpful points for directions one…
IF Power is Out on a Three Dog Night
The wife and I are living under the jurisdiction of a new Energy Domain: new to solar panels, new to heat pumps and new to Generac propane generators. We are not so new to power outages, and wondering about “best…
Space is a Crowded Place
Space satellites may soon have to be capable of parallel parking if it gets any more crowded. And it definitely WILL!
Digital Maps to Nature Literacy
TOOLS TO MEET OUR NEEDS We create tools to work for us: to dig foundations, to hoist steel girders for bridges, to record our words and thoughts for others or capture a likeness of another in a silver emulsion of…