The Guardian for this meeting was Eos Amaterasu. The comments are by Eos Amaterasu.
Initial greetings...
Pila Mulligan: hi Eos
Eos Amaterasu: Hi Pila (we're in the gap with no closing bell :-)
Pila Mulligan: ah, ok ...
Pila Mulligan: quiet forever?
Eos Amaterasu: quiet encompassing everything
Pila Mulligan: hi Cal
Eos Amaterasu: Hi Cal
Calvino Rabeni: Good evening :)
Pila Mulligan: how are you both this evening?
Eos Amaterasu: Pretty well....
Eos Amaterasu: saw some very vivid evening sunlight streaming through the forest trees today
Upcoming RL retreat at Windhorse Farm in Nova Scotia
Pila Mulligan: is everything prepared for the retreat next week?
Eos Amaterasu: Heh... lots of details emerging into focus
Pila Mulligan: :)
Eos Amaterasu: just took care of the food preferences question
Calvino Rabeni: I'm feeling good tonight too, overall
Eos Amaterasu: I'm looking forward to the forest being the container for the retreat
Eos Amaterasu: where we "rez", so to speak
Pila Mulligan: the devil is in the details they say
Eos Amaterasu: rez-urrect
Pila Mulligan: so the gods must be in the larger frame of thinigs
Calvino Rabeni: Ah but the saying was also "God and the Devil is in the details"
Eos Amaterasu: there is the god of small things (novel by Arundhati Roy)
Pila Mulligan: hmmm :)
Eos Amaterasu: like that better, Calvino
Eos Amaterasu: seems more true
Sayings contracting...
Calvino Rabeni: There is a linguistic tendency for sayings to contract
Calvino Rabeni: so one might often wonder what they used to be
Calvino Rabeni: such as - what came before "the proof is in the pudding" ?
Eos Amaterasu: every detail can be a lens for the tao
Calvino Rabeni: Yes
Eos Amaterasu: the proof is in the eating of the pudding?
Calvino Rabeni: Yes, or the proof of the pudding is in the eating
Pila Mulligan: 1615 when Miguel de Cervantes published Don Quixote, in this comic novel, the phrase is stated as, "The proof of the pudding is the eating."
Pila Mulligan: via Google :)
Pila Mulligan: everything is in Google
Eos Amaterasu: the proof is in google
Pila Mulligan: "Seeing the small is insight" Lao Tse
Eos Amaterasu: "no poetry but in things" says the same thing
Eos Amaterasu: Any shapes of slides to glide into the next 90 secs?
Eos Amaterasu: heh heh
Get ready for a koan...
Calvino Rabeni: Sure - get ready for a Koan afterwards :)
Calvino Rabeni: heh
--BELL--
Eos Amaterasu: Hi Para
Pila Mulligan: hi Paradise
Paradise Tennant: smiles hiya cal ..eos pila :) good to see you all :)
Calvino Rabeni: :) Para
Pila Mulligan: et tu
Eos Amaterasu listens for the koan...
Pila Mulligan: Cal predicted a koan after the break
Calvino Rabeni: mmmm
Calvino Rabeni: here it comes
Calvino Rabeni: What would You do - with the question "Does a Dog have a Buddha Nature?" ?
Paradise Tennant: smiles a huge smile ..knows the answer to this one!
Pila Mulligan: :)
Eos Amaterasu listens to Paradise
Paradise Tennant: smiles
Paradise Tennant: yes .. yes would be the answer :)
Pila Mulligan: Chao-chou said, "Mu"
Paradise Tennant: ("Zhaozhou" is rendered as "Chao-chou" in Wade-Giles, and pronounced "Joshu" in Japanese. "Wu" appears as "mu" in archaic Japanese, meaning "no", "not", "nonbeing", or "without" in English. This is a fragment of Case #1 of the WúménguÄn. However, a similar kÅan records that, on another occasion, Zhaozhou said "yes" in response: Case #18 of the Book of Serenity.
Paradise Tennant: goes with the book of serenity :)
Pila Mulligan: :)
Paradise Tennant: can we do another ?
Calvino Rabeni: If Bruce were here, I would ask him to ask Bear - "Hey boy, do you have a Buddha Nature" - and then to let me know his findings
Calvino Rabeni: Have we plumbed the depths of what one would do with that question?
Eos Amaterasu: mu
Paradise Tennant: no answer from blue :)
Pila Mulligan: what would you offer Cal?
Calvino Rabeni: Well it is apparently a trick question
Eos Amaterasu: does buddha nature have dogs?
Calvino Rabeni: It doesn't ask "does a dog have a buddha nature"
Calvino Rabeni: it asks "what would you do with the question" ...
Eos Amaterasu scratches his ear
Paradise Tennant: lol
Pila Mulligan: Google, again: "Chao-chou's Enlightenment is known as funi daido, 'the non-duality of the great Tao'--- a near synonym for the buddha-nature empty of self...."
Eos Amaterasu: I think you let the question sink down into the ground of your be-ing, where you're coming from
Calvino Rabeni: Along with that consideration - which unfairly, I knew about since I put the question - I would first turn off the part of my mind, that is a data bank or question fetching device :)
Calvino Rabeni: And I'd then see if I had anything in me that could see buddha nature in a dog
Eos Amaterasu: it's a question deepening device
Paradise Tennant: smiles
Calvino Rabeni: After that, well - who knows :)
Paradise Tennant: sees radiant buddha nature in dogs :)
Calvino Rabeni: Maybe buddha nature sees itself between human and dog
Pila Mulligan: here's another koan I thought of today:
Calvino Rabeni: I have a "hunch" feeling the answer is yes, but I'd go into it more
Pila Mulligan: can a caterpillar learn to fly?
Eos Amaterasu: mu
Pila Mulligan: :)
Paradise Tennant: smiles
Calvino Rabeni: mu is the opposite of "um" by the way - it indicates expression of already contained knowledge, rather than the catching and condensing of it
Eos Amaterasu: :-)
Pila Mulligan: hum
Calvino Rabeni: Pila got a running start there
Eos Amaterasu: Upcoming 90 secs: who listens to silence?
--BELL--
Calvino Rabeni: Well, nice to listen
Eos Amaterasu: there's a kind of suspension of oneself
Paradise Tennant: smiles
Paradise Tennant: yes
Eos Amaterasu: I discovered a koan once
Calvino Rabeni: Rilke listens to silence too - this poem called Bell:
"Sound, no longer defined by our hearing.
As though the tone that encircles us were space itself expanding."
Calvino Rabeni: Good evening Bruce :)
Paradise Tennant: hiya bruce :)
Pila Mulligan: hi Bruce
Calvino Rabeni: Calvino Rabeni listens for Eos' koan
Eos Amaterasu: Here is the koan:
Eos Amaterasu: what is the original topic off which we are digressing?
Calvino Rabeni: That's easy :)
Calvino Rabeni: ... just kidding
Paradise Tennant: lol
Paradise Tennant: likes koan humor!
Pila Mulligan: our beliefs?
Calvino Rabeni: "Who Am I" is always serviceable
Calvino Rabeni: Eos?
Eos Amaterasu: Are you Eos?
Paradise Tennant: Show me your original face before your mother and father were born?
Paradise Tennant: smiles
Pila Mulligan: :)
Eos Amaterasu: "in another time's forgotten space, your eyes looked from your mother's face"
Paradise Tennant: nods :)
Eos Amaterasu is rolling away the dew
Calvino Rabeni: heheh
Eos Amaterasu: We've been talking all our lives: what is the original topic off which we're digressing?
Calvino Rabeni: a lot of wisdom refs are spread through the Dead
Pila Mulligan: from The Secret of the Golden Flower: “when the one note of individuation enters into the birth, human nature and life are divided in two. From this time on, if the utmost quietness is not achieved, human nature and life never see each other again.â€
Calvino Rabeni: Awwww
Paradise Tennant: buddha nature :) is the origin .. the beginning the end :)
Pila Mulligan: yep
Eos Amaterasu: as the buddhists say, the path is to see the ground as the fruition
Eos Amaterasu: drunks do it all the time :-)
Bruce Mowbray does not have a clue what "Buddha Nature" might be.
Calvino Rabeni: I'm reading New Seeds of Contemplation, by Merton
Bruce Mowbray: Read that in 1977 -- probably one of the most pivotal books in my spiritual path.
Calvino Rabeni: my question is, this koanish business, somewhat similar to contemplation
Eos Amaterasu: How so, Bruce?
Bruce Mowbray: Pivoted me - turned me around.
Bruce Mowbray: Opened up Western contemplation for me -- Up until then it was all Eastern mysticism, for me.
Calvino Rabeni: Yes I relate to that too
Bruce Mowbray: What are you thinking of the book, Cal?
Bruce Mowbray: Welcome, Ewan.
--BELL--
Ewan Bonham: Hi folks
Pila Mulligan: hi Ewan
Eos Amaterasu: Merton on contemplation:
"life itself, fully awake, fully active, fully aware that it is alive. It is spiritual wonder."
Paradise Tennant: hiya ewan :)
Calvino Rabeni: I like the preface about the author wishing he didn't have to use the word "contemplation" because of its temptation to grasp as an instrument or commodity - and the idea that the book is not about adding another "how to" onto the to-do list
Ewan Bonham: Intresting
Calvino Rabeni: I also note, this is christian contemplation, while I think contemplation could be bigger than that
Ewan Bonham: Contemplation is such a personal word
Bruce Mowbray: You might also enjoy Merton's "Contemplative Prayer." -- but I liked "New Seeds" more.
Bruce Mowbray: Yes it is, Ewan.
Pila Mulligan: I've always considered contemplation as one of three elements of meditation (those being breathing, posture and contemplation) such that in the grand scheme it can take almost any form
Eos Amaterasu is wondering about template and contemplate
Pila Mulligan: the template may be our natural form
Calvino Rabeni: A pragmatic or metaphysical assumption underlying this version of contemplation - "There is an irreducible opposition between the deep transcendent self that only awakens in contemplation... and the superficial, external self ..."
Bruce Mowbray: I sometimes think of 'contemplation' as when I no longer hold the silence - but the Silence holds me.
Calvino Rabeni: Eos, the word means to mark out a space, in which to take the true measure of something
Ewan Bonham: Bruce ã‹¡
Paradise Tennant: smiles at bruce held in silence :)
Calvino Rabeni: That being the temple (the space) and the template ( measure)
Eos Amaterasu: Bruce, so the "true measure" holds you
Bruce Mowbray: I know nothing, except that I am held.
Calvino Rabeni: Perhaps that is connected with the buddhist "taking refuge"
Bruce Mowbray: I feel like that, yes.
Eos Amaterasu: implications are... limitless... Merton pretty much burst the bounds of his church and other frameworks toward the end of his life
Pila Mulligan: and some say he died because of it, but he died happy
Calvino Rabeni: Where did he go with it?
Bruce Mowbray: I doubt that he would have returned to Gethsemene.
Eos Amaterasu: I think he went to "life itself, fully awake, fully active, fully aware that it is alive."
Pila Mulligan: Wiki: On December 10, 1968, Merton had gone to attend an interfaith conference between Catholic and non-Christian monks. While stepping out of his bath, He reached out to adjust an electric fan and apparently touched an exposed wire, and he was instantly electrocuted. He died 27 years to the day after his entrance into the Abbey of Gethsemani in 1941.
Bruce Mowbray: I highly recommend his "Eastern Journals" -- the last published work, a memoir of his final trip.
Bruce Mowbray: He's clearly "gone east" -- and I don't think he could have returned.
Eos Amaterasu: I think he went back to the roots
Eos Amaterasu: not especially east
Bruce Mowbray: yup.
Eos Amaterasu: (except insofar as the east is where the light comes from)
Bruce Mowbray: But he was so far from his Catholic establishment (at the monastery) that I don't think he would have been able to return there.
Eos Amaterasu: Quite possibly
Bruce Mowbray: He might have moved in with Joan Baez, perhaps. . .
Pila Mulligan: a freind in Louisville in his youth was being castigated on the street one day by a priest for having long hair when this monk intervened on behalf of the kid -- the monk was Merton
Eos Amaterasu: His social behavior was also starting to stretch the boundaries, so to speak
Bruce Mowbray: since she tells about his massaging her toes.
Bruce Mowbray: Yup.
Eos Amaterasu: He and Chogyam Trungpa had become very close
Bruce Mowbray: Also friendly with the Dalai Lama, Martin Luther King, and so many others ahead of their time.
Paradise Tennant: smiles
Eos Amaterasu: also close friend of Ginsberg et al
Paradise Tennant: chogyam trungpa .. :) also .. stretched boundaries :)
Calvino Rabeni: Yikes - here's another for the "Not Knowing" shelf
Calvino Rabeni: You Don't Have to Be Buddhist to Know Nothing
Paradise Tennant: really they all were .. creating new frontiers of understanding
Paradise Tennant: What Makes You Not a Buddhist :) Dongsar Rinpoche :) also excellent
--BELL--
Eos Amaterasu: Contemplation brings you to the origin, the unvarnished-by-you: as Bob D says, "to live outside the law you must be honest"
Bruce Mowbray: "no direction home. . . acomplete unknown."
Calvino Rabeni: A self-defined individual
Bruce Mowbray: a complete. . unknown.
Eos Amaterasu: universe-defined individual
Calvino Rabeni: Can a dog contemplate?
Eos Amaterasu: or as a Christian would say, "not I, but Christ lives in me"
Bruce Mowbray: If you need to ask, you probably will not accept my answer to your question.
Eos Amaterasu: Can a human contemplate?
Calvino Rabeni: Or is it only available to beings with a certain capability?
Calvino Rabeni: Yes, same question
Paradise Tennant: smiles
Bruce Mowbray: Perhaps you should ask the dog.
Pila Mulligan: I bet Jesus also likes jazz
Paradise Tennant: lol
Paradise Tennant: and hip hop
Bruce Mowbray: one hip dude, for sure.
Calvino Rabeni: You weren't here earlier Bruce, I was going to ask you to ask Bear and then let us know
Eos Amaterasu: Does Jesus have buddha-nature?
Calvino Rabeni: That is to ask Bear if he has a buddha nature
Eos Amaterasu: Bear?
Bruce Mowbray: Bear has taught me much in his ten years.
Bruce Mowbray: (my dog).
Bruce Mowbray: Neither Bear nor I have a clue about Buddha Nature.
Pila Mulligan: you may have it then
Calvino Rabeni: hehe
Bruce Mowbray: perhaps. . . perhaps not. . .
Bruce Mowbray: "have it". . . . no thanks.
Paradise Tennant: The buddha nature is simply the birthright of every sentient being, and I always say, “Our buddha nature is as good as any buddha’s buddha nature.†This is the good news that the Buddha brought us from his enlightenment in Bodhgaya, and which many people find so inspiring. His message—that enlightenment is within the reach of all—holds out tremendous hope
Paradise Tennant: sogyal rinpoche explaining buddha nature
Paradise Tennant: sort of the .. birthright of being sentient ... thinking .. so shared by all creatures who think
Bruce Mowbray: The Buddha Nature that can be explained is not the true Buddha Nature.
Paradise Tennant: well
Paradise Tennant: not sure I agree
Eos Amaterasu: Care, or compassion, is considered the other essential aspect of buddha nature (besides the noetic)
Pila Mulligan: while walking in the woods a few days ago a large white owl flew close by at head level and peered over with intelligent eyes in a gaze full of humor
Bruce Mowbray: . . . and I doubt that it has anything to do with one's capacity to think. . . (but I've had a very challenging day - and besides, what do I know anyway?)
Eos Amaterasu: knowingness plus care seems to characterize sentient beings
Paradise Tennant: buddha nature as an experience .. of being free of distraction .. is not easily articulated but the basic idea . of it .. is straight forward
Eos Amaterasu: unfortunately software development has focussed only on knowingness
Eos Amaterasu: and software runs the world!
Bruce Mowbray: I agree that "it" can be experienced -- just not explained.
Pila Mulligan: but that doesn't stop people from trying (to explai:)
Ewan Bonham: i wonder if they can make a software that can lead to enlightenment
Ewan Bonham: ã‹¡
Calvino Rabeni: @eos, we're waiting for a relational algebra of not knowing
Bruce Mowbray: ;-)
Eos Amaterasu: I want to develop intentional software, for symbiotic care
Calvino Rabeni: I'd like to hear more about that, surely
Ewan Bonham: Eos, what do you mean?
Bruce Mowbray changes his shirt to one that better represents what he "knows."
Eos Amaterasu: Our software has been designed to mimic our reasoning and knowing aspects
Eos Amaterasu: but care, and intention, has been ignored.
--BELL--
Eos Amaterasu: When's the last time you saw a piece of software that included, or required, the three (or more) laws of robotics?
Bruce Mowbray: cyber empathy?
Calvino Rabeni: Not only that - WHO has been ignored.
Eos Amaterasu: If our software doesn't participate in our contemplation then that contemplation won't find expression in the world
Calvino Rabeni: yes!
Eos Amaterasu: social software is interesting in that regard, because it is more driven by human intentions
Calvino Rabeni: The "ineffabilists" might not take keenly to this line of work
Calvino Rabeni: However, it's worth a try
Calvino Rabeni: Have you thought of how to get around that slight problem?
Eos Amaterasu: ineffabalists tend not to write code
Calvino Rabeni: Yes, but .... they have a point, and do the code-writers understand it sufficiently?
Eos Amaterasu: No, the code-writers are too busy doing CGI
Calvino Rabeni: Well, there's the rub, I guess
Eos Amaterasu: (I did not think Inception was contemplative)
Ewan Bonham: Perhaps we are onto something
Ewan Bonham: Is it possible if software can instruct us in contemplation and compassion
Calvino Rabeni: There are some who bridge those cultures
Calvino Rabeni: maybe for instance Nova Spivak
Eos Amaterasu: software is good source of metaphor
Ewan Bonham: that may allow us to contemplate in our own way
Bruce Mowbray: bio-feedback, brainwave monitoring?
Calvino Rabeni: (not sure If I spelled correctly) - formerly of Radar Networks
Eos Amaterasu: Yeah, Nova gets it
Ewan Bonham: Bio feedback is a step in that direction
Paradise Tennant: smiles hiya steve :)
Bruce Mowbray: Hi, steve.
Pila Mulligan: hi Steve
stevenaia Michinaga: hi all
Eos Amaterasu: What would it mean for software to "contemplate"?
stevenaia Michinaga: gtsy
Paradise Tennant: smiles
Paradise Tennant: rather than calculate :)
Eos Amaterasu: exactly! (so to speak)
Calvino Rabeni: It might serve as an AID, somewhat like mandalas do
Calvino Rabeni: And as a reminder for the possible dimensions of a topic, including the experiential
Calvino Rabeni: I gues I don't think it can DO contemplation, any more than a logic engine "thinks"
Calvino Rabeni: But I think it can SUPPORT humans activities better in that direction
Eos Amaterasu: does a human being "think"?
Calvino Rabeni: Yes :)
Eos Amaterasu: software can kind of somewhat to a very limited extent "think"
Eos Amaterasu: but it's a zillion miles from "caring"
Pila Mulligan: hi Lucinda
Ewan Bonham: Can software make a connection of mind and heart?
Calvino Rabeni: I think you're asking, eos, if we can go from the Global Brain to the Global Heart
Bruce Mowbray: Hi, Luci.
Eos Amaterasu: I don't know if software can really connect to either mind or heart
stevenaia Michinaga: nice Komona Lucinda
Ewan Bonham: Perhaps it is just an offering
Eos Amaterasu: we need global heart as much as global brain maybe more so
Lucinda Lavender: HI Cal, Pila, Bruce Para, Steve, EwanEos...
Ewan Bonham: Like a book offers wisdom
Calvino Rabeni: Yes
Eos Amaterasu: Hi luci
Ewan Bonham: but you have to read it to get it
Paradise Tennant: smiles Hiya lucinda ..gtsy :)
Ewan Bonham: And you have to apply what it says in your own way
Ewan Bonham: hi lucinda
Bruce Mowbray: "internalize" it.
Ewan Bonham: yes
--BELL--
Paradise Tennant: smiles .. well I think I will shut down my soft ware for the night :) thank you all . as always for the wonderful conversation :) namaste
Calvino Rabeni: _/!\_
Calvino Rabeni: Paradise :)
Pila Mulligan heads off to a late afternoon RL walk -- nice to see each of you -- bye for now
stevenaia Michinaga: bye Pila
Eos Amaterasu: Ciao!
stevenaia Michinaga: see you soon
Bruce Mowbray: G'day-night, Pila and Para.
Paradise Tennant: waves nite all :)
Calvino Rabeni: Calvino Rabeni goes back to software systems - bye all :)
tylor Wroth: does any1 need personal bodyguard a security
Eos Amaterasu: bye cal
Bruce Mowbray: G'night, Cal
Eos Amaterasu: I should also leave - late here
Bruce Mowbray: welcome, tylor.
Lucinda Lavender: Bye Para and Pila:)
stevenaia Michinaga: night all
tylor Wroth: thx u need security are bodyguard
Eos Amaterasu: tylor, have you been here , to play as being, before?
Bruce Mowbray: G'night !
Bruce Mowbray: Come pitch yer tent in the front row, tylor.
Lucinda Lavender: Bye Steve
tylor Wroth: are u guys hiring security
Eos Amaterasu: No...
tylor Wroth: i am looking for 1 or bodyguard
tylor Wroth: for free
Eos Amaterasu: Sorry to abandon you - thanks everyone!
Bruce Mowbray: G'night, Eos.
Lucinda Lavender: Bye Eos:)
Ewan Bonham: Well, folks. C'ya later.
Ewan Bonham: ty
Bruce Mowbray: Me too - to bed.
Bruce Mowbray: G'night everyone.
Lucinda Lavender: Bye Ewan:)
Lucinda Lavender: Bye Bruce:)
Bruce Mowbray: Good luck with the security issue, tylor.
Lucinda Lavender: :))
Bruce Mowbray: poof!
Lucinda Lavender: Well things dissappear I guess...
Bruce Mowbray: yup.
Bruce Mowbray: Are you ion the Time Sessions group, Luci?
Bruce Mowbray: in.
Lucinda Lavender: yes...
Lucinda Lavender: But I am not writing reports
Bruce Mowbray: I had a lot of trouble posting my report tonight. I hope someone will straighten it out.
Lucinda Lavender: I have been too busy and I do not feel ready
Bruce Mowbray: I understand.
Lucinda Lavender: good to know
Lucinda Lavender: what was the reporting problem?
Bruce Mowbray: I could not figure out hoe to get my report into the right folder. . . but someone will find it and put it there, I hope.
Bruce Mowbray: how.
Lucinda Lavender: sure...they probably will
Lucinda Lavender: Do you have a mac?
Bruce Mowbray: Nope -- just a regular PC that I built myself.
Lucinda Lavender: ah
Lucinda Lavender: you know it inside out then
Bruce Mowbray: several years ago, actually -- but I keep upgrading stuff in it.
Bruce Mowbray: yeah. . . so far so good.
Lucinda Lavender: you like trees don't you
Bruce Mowbray: According to the SL info, I'm not even supposed to be able to get into this world... but it's working.
Lucinda Lavender: cool
Bruce Mowbray: Yes, I love trees.
Lucinda Lavender: what trees are in your yard?
Bruce Mowbray: Oh my -- SOOOO Many!
Bruce Mowbray: I live in a forest!
Lucinda Lavender: !!
Bruce Mowbray: really!
Lucinda Lavender: In Ohio?
Bruce Mowbray: Yep.
Bruce Mowbray: close to the terminal moraine - where the glaciers stopped.
Lucinda Lavender: north south east or west?
Bruce Mowbray: south central.
Bruce Mowbray: about 45 miles south of Cols.
Bruce Mowbray: VERY rural -- nearest town is 15 miles away.
Lucinda Lavender: I do not know that part but have been to the north
Lucinda Lavender: around lake erie
Bruce Mowbray: Cleveland, Toledo, Akron...?
Bruce Mowbray: Oh Lake Erie.
Lucinda Lavender: just travelled thru
Lucinda Lavender: Indiana to Pa
Bruce Mowbray: OK.
Lucinda Lavender: used to live up on the lake in pa
Bruce Mowbray: Yep - - - one needs to traverse the Buckeye state twixt those two. . .
Bruce Mowbray: Well, then. . . Titusville, Meadville, Erie?
Lucinda Lavender: mostly deciduous then?
Lucinda Lavender: North East
Bruce Mowbray: OH. Wwell, yes, mostly oaks, maples, some spruce, though.
--BELL--
Lucinda Lavender: It is in the North west corner
Bruce Mowbray: Lots of trees I cannot name.
Lucinda Lavender: hmmm
Lucinda Lavender: nice
Lucinda Lavender: curious what owls soundlike...
Bruce Mowbray: I have a couple of them in my yard -- hear them nightly.
Lucinda Lavender: oh
Lucinda Lavender: size?
Bruce Mowbray: yep. sometimes I can't tell the difference between the counds in SL and the sounds coming in through the window.
Lucinda Lavender: me too
Bruce Mowbray: size of trees or owls?
Lucinda Lavender: owls
Bruce Mowbray: I have not seen them - only heard them.
Bruce Mowbray: Trees very dense.
Lucinda Lavender: wild life?
Bruce Mowbray: Oh my yes!
Lucinda Lavender: big cats?
Bruce Mowbray: you name it. . . deer, scunks, racoons, possum, rabbit, squirrel, chipmunk... beaver, woodchuck... LOTS of wildlife.
Bruce Mowbray: no big cats that I've heard of. Coyote, though -- LOTS of coyotes.
Bruce Mowbray: They set up a big howling every night.
Lucinda Lavender: aah yes!
Lucinda Lavender: exciting to hear
Bruce Mowbray: Love that!
Bruce Mowbray: Well, Luci, it's time for my carriage to turn into a pumpkin.
Bruce Mowbray: So I shall bid you happy dreams.
Lucinda Lavender: Good idea!
Lucinda Lavender: thank you and the same to you...
Bruce Mowbray: See you again soon.