Ant Man

Once in Texas I was hanging with some friends on a dirt bike riding excursion, which became apparent meant Mark and I watching Tim hog the bike and ride laps around a field someone had been riding on before. I saw some large ants trying to live in a subterranean nest right in the dirt bike path. Idly I saw a tiny pebble just slightly larger than the main ant hole, the size of a peppercorn, and I picked it up and gently lodged it there, with a feather light tap of my finger just to make the bugs work for their salvation.
 
The big returning ants became excited when they returned, unable to enter, and crawled ineffectually around and over the tiny pebble. Then, I saw the most interesting thing: one ant carried a tiny splinter of wood, and lodged it under the pebble and began worrying it. It seemed the ant was literally using a lever. This so contradicted my view of the universe that I shouted a curse! My companion glanced my way and as I began to explain the unbelievable, Tim decided to roar through on the motorcycle at that moment, obliterating the entire tableau permanently, ants, pebble, hole and all.
 
It's not the sort of thing you forget.

Pistol Pete

Here is Pistol Pete, normally called Petey or Pete.

Golden Bee

Some More Pictures

Wasp Wood

Here is a photo I took of some firewood that had some kind of wasps in it. It's white oak that sat for six months after I felled it; not exactly on the ground but maybe 2 feet off the ground. Minor limbs kept the bulk of it from resting on the soil.

As always, if you click on it and then right click on it and pick "view" it will open up in a new window and you can magnify it for more detail.

Right now this is my screen background.

The Education Situation

Looking on the internet for a graphic which showed a map of the United States warped into equal population areas and colored by education level, I couldn't find one. So I made one, and wow, is it crude. However, it is roughly accurate. The darker blue is more education, the white less.

(I used Sqirlzmorph and two maps.) As always, click on the cartograph to view it larger.

From this we see that Donald Trump is the next President.

The horror!

More Pictures