Here are the content notes for "The Community Couch."

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Here are the character notes for "The Community Couch."

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This is the freebie for the December Poetry Fishbowl reaching its $150 goal. It was inspired by a prompt from jadelennox. It also fills the "Ancestors" square in my 10-1-22 card for the Fall Festival Bingo.

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Today I remade the holiday potpourri bowl.  It needs to be redone every other year or so, because the potpourri and lights wear out.  This year I couldn't find any damn potpourri so I wound up deconstructing a cinnamon-scented pinecone. 

The western U.S. Tried to stop wildfires and it backfired

After a century of stopping fires, much of the West is now dangerously overdue for them.

Much of the western U.S. is overdue for wildfire, with decades of suppression allowing fuel to build up across millions of hectares. Researchers estimate that 74% of the region is in a fire deficit, meaning far more land needs to burn to restore healthy forest conditions. Catching up would require an unprecedented amount of controlled and managed fire.


I told you so.

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Ancient oceans were ruled by super predators unlike anything today

Long before whales and sharks, enormous marine reptiles dominated the oceans with unmatched power. Scientists have reconstructed a 130-million-year-old marine ecosystem from Colombia and found predators operating at a food-chain level higher than any seen today. The ancient seas were bursting with life, from giant reptiles to rich invertebrate communities. This extreme complexity reveals how intense competition helped drive the evolution of modern marine ecosystems. Interestingly, a warm climate with high, shallow seas is exactly where Earth is headed via climate change. After the Anthropocene extinction, many niches will lie open, waiting for new species to claim them.

Today's theme is Languages and Linguistics. There are many posts on Dreamwidth in different languages, but it doesn't have a sort function for them, and communities rarely list it in their Interests. If you know any more communities or bloggers relevant to this topic, please share them in a comment.

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Today is cloudy, chilly, windy, and wet.  It's drizzling now.  At least all the snow and ice melted off though.

I fed the birds.  Unsurprisingly I haven't seen any.

I put out water for the birds.

EDIT 12/18/25 -- I did a bit of work around the patio.

EDIT 12/18/25 -- I did more work around the patio.

It's been raining off and on all day.  It was raining so briskly in the afternoon that not all the outside tasks got done.  Fortunately it's just drizzling now so I finished up what I could.  I haven't seen any wildlife all day, which is sensible of them.

The sky has been so cloudy all day that it was perennially twilight.  At sunset, the sun hit a band of less clouds, so now 3/4 of the sky is bizarre shades of orange-purple.  The road is wet and catching the last light of day like a ribbon of gold.

I am done for the night.