valley views Fool’s Spring returns A
s I sit here writing this, there’s a bit of dirt still under my fingernails. The spring bug has bit me, and I decided it was time to start my planting for this year. With my luck, it’ll be snowing as you read this. To be honest, the spring bug has been under my skin for months now, but I’ve forced myself to hold back from launching into my favorite new season activities. It’s that wonderful time of year where even people born and raised in Montana wonder if spring is finally rolling in, or if it’s yet another fool’s spring. And I’ve been fooled before. Fool’s spring, like fool’s gold, looks a lot like the real thing to the untrained eye. Typically,
there are several every phone to check the weather, and of course I year, usually starting couldn’t be bothered to around March, when a glance at few days in a row of the paper or unseasoncheck the ably warm news that Monday weather get morning. I everyone excited for remember merrily the end hopping of winter. A Taylor’d Approach on the bus Hints of to go to green might Taylor Davison Editor, Valley Journal school in even start my sandals. to become Then wadvisible. Then the snow returns as ing through the snow in those same sandals to get if it never left. home after a snowstorm My earliest recollecblew in while I was in tion of being fooled by class. this phenomenon was as You would think I’d a preteen. After a beaulearn. tiful, balmy weekend, I While I certainly was sure the following school day would be just didn’t make that mistake again, my version of this the same. This was back as an adult is getting before I had a smart
Move the cloud above the clouds T
he internet-undeincreasingly reliant on the internet. The majority niably the backof us receive bone of our modthis service ern world through – it influsome sort of cable or ences our tower-based banking, commuwireless sysnication, tem. Howshopping, ever, a sigben there and enternificant shift DONE that tainment. is coming to Ben Stone In the last internet serMedia Production, Valley Journal vice, one that decades, promises better services we, as consumers, are
10 - May 11, 2022
for rural states like our Montana. Ever wonder what the internet is? A good description is a (mostly) interconnected network of computers circling the world. The majority of this interconnectivity is supported by more than 430 undersea fiberoptic cables. Together these cables span more than 800,000 miles. This marvel of technology provides you with nearly
my garden started before we’re done getting plant-murdering frosts in the dead of night. I know I’ve dodged some of the fool’s springs this year at least. A couple weeks ago, I was finally able to pull my shorts out of the closet and spend some time sitting outside in the sun. A few days later, my family in Helena got a three-foot snow drift across their driveway. Even when we know better, fool’s spring is easy to fall for, and many of us still do to some extent every year. It’s the eagerness for the birth of spring, for longer days and warmer weather and getting to play outside again. For green grass and full trees and plants popping up by the doz-
ens. It’s the eagerness for these things that make us fall for it time and time again, even just a little, and especially when we know better. While the month “spring” occurring in can be a pretty good indicator of whether warm weather is a fool’s spring or the start of the real one, things start to get a little less clear once May rolls around. Historically, May either means we’re finally in the clear for lasting warm weather, or one more blizzard will roll through and make sure the buds starting to surface never quite make it to bloom. This year I’m cautiously optimistic. I’ve kept a close eye on the forecasts, I’ve bided my time, and now, maybe, my first
instant access to information on a computer located on the other side of the globe. Without underwater fiber optic cables, the internet, as we know it, wouldn’t exist. This submarine approach to internet infrastructure is excellent for densely populated coastal areas where the substantial cost of laying cables can be offset by a large base of customers who pay a monthly fee
for access. Consequently, for rural, landlocked Montana, the financial viability of installing such infrastructure is often not feasible. Instead, rural areas are forced to rely on slower methods of connection such as copper phone lines or wireless tower systems. The combination of slower connections and fewer paying customers culminates in higher prices for
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round of plants will get to live to see the warmer months. But just in case writing this is tempting fate, all of us who jumped on the opportunity to get our gardens going might want to ready our tarps.
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