Tuesday, March 17, 2009 - City of Rocks State Park, Faywood NM
< previous day | archives | next day >
Emory oaks at dawn, Site 12, City of Rocks State Park, Faywood NM, March 14, 2009
Emory oak
Here's what Wikipedia has to say about the Emory oak:
Emory oak (Quercus emoryi) is a species of oak common in Arizona, New Mexico and western Texas (Big Bend National Park), USA, and northern Mexico south to Durango and San Luis PotosÃ. It typically grows in dry hills at moderate altitudes.
It is a live oak in the red oak group, retaining its leaves through the winter until the new leaves are produced in spring, and is a large shrub or small tree from 5-17 m tall. The leaves are 3-6 cm long, entire or wavy-toothed, leathery, dark green above, paler below. The acorns are 1.5-2 cm long, blackish-brown, and mature in 6-8 months from pollination; the kernel is sweet, and is an important food for many mammals and birds.
The tree is named after the United States army surveyor, Lieutenant William Hemsley Emory, who surveyed the area of west Texas where it was discovered in 1846.
Night camp
Site 12 - City of Rocks State Park, Faywood NM
- Verizon cell phone service - fairly good signal - best on west side of the park
- Verizon EVDO service - faster than many places I've camped
- Go to City of Rocks State Park website
- Locate City of Rocks State Park on my Night Camps map
- Check the weather here
That's the Point of Emotions: Survival
That's the point of emotions: survival. Normal emotions are essential to staying alive and well. ... To most people this doesn't make sense. We humans tend to think of emotions as dangerous forces that need to be strictly controlled by reason and logic. But that's not how the brain works. In the brain logic and reason are never separate from emotion. Nothing is neutral. That's what you have to remember. ... A lot of people's emotional life is unconscious a lot of the time, especially when you're calmly thinking something through. You feel like you're just using logic, but you're actually using logic guided by emotion. You just aren't aware of the emotion. ... I recommend Descartes' Error to anyone who's interested in emotions, intuition, and decision making. ... Nature seems to have tried to wire animals and people to have useful emotions, useful meaning emotions that keep us alive long enough to reproduce. Emotions keep us alive by letting us make good predictions about the future, and good predictions let us make good decisions about what comes next.