Philip the Bard's Harappan Blog: Preparing for the Yam Festival

Welcome festive readers. Thanks for being here.

This week we’re getting ready for the Kushan Yam Festival. Certainly the event will honor the Kushan Yam and all the wonderful things you can do with them but that is only part of the event. There will also be sports, music, arts and crafts and of course much socialization.

Planet Kusha is a beautiful world and we have a happy population of active, hard working people. We socialize often. We work hard and we play hard. 

People have been working hard in the yam fields and the harvest is almost complete. Next week the work will be done and we play hard.

Never mix red wine and Oodo.

Philip Normer

Kushan Year 88

Earth Year 2480

Philip the Bard's Harappan Blog: The Kushan Yam Festival

Welcome open readers. Thanks for being here.

The Kushan Yam festival is coming again! Many preparations are yet to be made. Relatives are making plans to be here in Harappa City. Recipes are being refined. Ciders and brews are being finished and musicians are practicing new acts.

Me and my band the Gutterminds have been preparing for weeks. We’re adding some new Harappan folk songs and a couple of rock and roll songs from the Earth Classical Rock Era.

A new stage is being built in the City Square. A tent city is being set up on Rodin’s Field, east of town. Many of the out of towners will set up there. Shops, eateries and sports fields will be set up there as well. It will be a complete city before the end of the festival.

This week I’ll spend some time discussing preparations for the Kusha Yam Festival.  Next week the event takes place and I’ll have reports from the action.

Never mix red wine and Oodo.

Philip Normer

Kushan Year 88

Earth Year 2480

Bubba's Friday Blog: Working at Finnriver Farm and Cidery

Welcome beloved readers. Thanks for being here.

Trying to work a full time job, finish my novel and write a blog five days a week is tough. I like to write the blog in chunks. That way I can try to create a flow from one post to the next. However when you are pressed for time that can get tough.

Today I’m going to share some of my experiences at Finnriver. Which is where my work is taking me these days.

It started out as a part time job hosting in the tasting room but it has developed into a full time job with me spending time helping with production of Finnriver Ciders.

Don’t worry I don’t mess with the recipes, but who knows I may someday get an idea for a new cider. I spend time labeling and bottling.

The tasting room is for me something like a musical performance. Giving a tasting is like singing a song. You don’t have to sing the song the same way every time but there are certain notes you have to hit. I love interacting with the customers and sharing a product I happen to enjoy very much.

Working on the production crew is more of a team effort. Each of several persons are required to perform specific tasks in a line of tasks needed to bottle or label a bottle. I enjoy the sense of teamwork and the accomplishment of a pallet of beautiful cider bottles.

The crew are all fun, hard working young people. They all love being at Finnriver. So do I.

The management of the farm are the kind of people you love to see achieve success. They are honest and earnest with a real commitment to making their corner of the world a better place. It is nice to go to work not having to worry about the ethics of the company I work for.

Family obligations and life took me out of the work force for some time and when my wife and I settled on the Olympic Peninsula to be near family I hoped to get a job. Someone over sixty that hasn’t had a “job” is several years in not what most employers are looking for. I have often joked that someday I would have to be a Wal Mart greeter. Indeed that seemed the only kind of job available and the jobs that were out there were going to younger people.

Finnriver Farm and Cidery took a chance on me and I am going to do everything I can to make them glad that they did. . .  And I am going to have a great time doing so.

I will continue to offer my views on science and society here on my Friday blog but I will also be telling stories from the farm as they come. For example yesterday they were “disgorging” which is opening the sparking cider bottles after “riddling” to loose the sediment plug. By it self not too fascinating but the process is made more fun by the farm dogs. They love to eat the plugs. When the bottles are opened the pressure from the carbonation pushes them out with force. The dogs leap and flip to catch them as they fly across the courtyard. It is better than a frisbee dog show.

Come by Finnriver some afternoon you might get to see this and many more fascinating things that happen there. And If I’m in the tasting room I’ll show you a great time.

Never mix red wine with Oodo, but cider is fine.

Earth Year 2014

Philip the Bard's Harappan Blog: Looking for lifeless planets in the Milky Way

Welcome great readers. Thanks for being here.

I have been discussing the demise of planet Kusha these past couple of days. Granted it’s not happening for several hundred thousand years, but if we had to move, is there somewhere we could go.

Yes. There are indeed worlds out there capable of supporting life that are not already colonized by living things. There aren’t many but they do exist. Most planets capable of supporting life do. The theory of the primal bacteria is supported by the notion that anywhere in the Milky Way we’ve been where life could possibly survive, we’ve found life there.

Surveyors are out scanning the galaxy looking for sterile planets in the “Goldilocks Zone”. They are being catalogued and watched. My guess is that they will be settled soon so as to beat the Galactic provisions against settling planets that already have life.

There are also being searched for evidence for the primal bacteria. Scientists have been trying to find this bacteria for  along time and so far have come up empty handed. There have been a few close calls but none so far have had all the characteristics required for the first life. There is hope that something will be found on the sterile empty worlds.

Never mix red wine and Oodo.

Philip Normer

Kushan Year 88

Earth Year 2480

Philip the Bard's Harappan Blog: The End of Planet Kusha

Welcome festive readers. Thanks for being here.

Yes, planet Kusha is a dying planet. It’s core is cooling and solidifying. Eventually the magnetic field will weaken and the world’s life will begin to die.

Am I worried about this? Um, not really. Most scientists think this will not happen for six to seven hundred thousand years.

Until then we party on here on planet Kusha. But that begs the question, “How soon doe we need to start looking for a new world?”

How many worlds are out available for colonization? Further the question must be asked if there is any life on any potential world do we have a right to move there and take over?

We humans colonized Harappa which had complex life. We took over there world and in fighting amongst ourselves destroyed the planet. The black wolves on Harappa are all dead now as well as all the other indigenous life. Who knows that they weren’t destined to evolve into something with more intellect. Perhaps it would have been one of them to stop the coming Cosmic War.

This is a dilemma that there is no answer to. Not even Max Gavaskar came up with a good answer for these questions. Unless you can find a lifeless world you can terraform you are going to end the evolutionary path of living things.

Tomorrow we’ll look at what kinds of worlds are available.

Never mix red wine and Oodo.

Philip Normer

Kushan Year 88

Earth Year 2480

Philip the Bard's Harappan Blog: Autumn on Planet Kusha

Welcome helpful readers. Thanks for being here

Fall is coming to planet Kusha. Yes, Kusha has a winter. Kind of. We get rain and some mountains get snow. I mean even Harappan had snow and it was a hot world. 

Here on Kusha we only get snow in the high mountains. Kusha is an old world and its geology is settling down. It is suspected that this world will become unlivable in less than a hundred thousand years. Buy then the magnetic field will diminish due to the solidifying of the planet’s core. The internal heat of this world is cooling and is suspected to continue doing to till the planet freezes.

The age of Kusha is one factor that has made living here so pleasant but also carries the seed of our world’s end. There are very few natural disasters here. Volcanos are mostly entirely extinct. The crust of Kusha is very stable as the inside of the world solidifies. The climate is stable as well but slowly cooling. Several thousand years ago when the Fordians were occupying the world it was a much warmer place. The Fordians liked it that way. They prefer a mean temperature around 35º to 40º. The actions of the Fordians raised the temperature to levels even they found uncomfortable but the cooling trend has wiped away most of the environmental damage done by the Fordians.

Tomorrow: more on the future of Kusha

Never mix red wine and Oodo.

Philip Normer

Kushan Year 88

Earth Year 2480

Bubba the Science Fan's return to the blog.

Welcome gentle readers. Thanks for being here.

I am back from a short respite in writing my blog. Philip the Bard will return tomorrow with tales from Max Gavaskar’s life and more.

The final book in the Max Gavaskar series will be coming out soon. Hopefully, before the holidays. I have been in contact with the cover artist and I eagerly anticipate her work on the cover. 

I am editing the draft and preparing it for the “real” editor. I think it will be the best book in the series.

The future of the blog? I can’t say for sure how long I will be writing this blog. At least until after the final book comes out. There will be some back story that I can delve into then. There are some things I don’t want “out there” until readers have had a chance at the book. I don’t want to reveal too many spoilers.

When the blog is done it will be a chronicle of the universe I have created. This content along with the Max Gavaskar series, and the as yet unpublished Harappa comprise the Harappan History Project. 

There are certainly untold stories left in this Universe but I am not sure exactly what form they might take. I have a hope that someday fan fiction will fill in some of the gaps. I have yet to hear from any of my readers outside of my friendly circle so I don’t know what the feelings about Max and her world are. If there is no interest there will be no continuation of Max’s story.

Her story it self is told fairly completely in “The Mother of the Galaxy” and I doubt that readers will be left feeling that her story is unfinished. Yes, there are parts of her story untold that might be fodder for future books but the story started when Marcus Johnson left Earth with 2000 followers will be told to its conclusion.

The end of Max’s story does have a “tease” about possible future conflicts, some may find that story intriguing.

In the mean time, Philip the Bard will dish about Max and her friends and I will be offering my observations about recent scientific advances and occasional social commentary.

Be here.

Never mix red wine with Oodo, but cider is fine.

Earth Year 2014