All things planet Earth

woohoo!!

Sheesh! I have been hunting through my advice material (given to me by a man braver than I) to set up topics for this conference. I know what they will be - just working on their names. You have done this - any advice from you would be most welcome! And, don't we have the most amazing assortment of buttons!

yippeee!

I've been busy!

I see...bravo!

Thank you! (Bowing deeply in acknowledgment to the man who is fixing my errors as I go...)

looks great so far!!

Thanks for saying so. It has been such fun and I am learning incredible things. Now, to get time to post goodies in these topics. Feel free to wander around!

Is anyone from anywhere other than the US able to give us information on what is happening to the rest of the world...I would appreciate any input from Europe and Asia and Africa. We have a few from Australia and would appreciate anything anyone else would like to share. From anywhere, really!

(earth-based, preferably...)

no, we want to know what's going on on Mars but they should direct their findings to paraspring! alex, ree-head? any inputs???

Great job, honey. It's nice to see you've been keeping busy.

Thank you, Dear! - I was delighted to see you here this morning (just past 5am). Visit often - or lurk. It is nice to have you around!

Wolf, what do we have to do to get the others here - or is it just a wait till they find it deal? You cannot know how much I appreciate another Gemini here a lot of the time. I really appreciate you postings!

aw shucks, marcia *blush* i've been wondering how to get people over to poetry, paraspring, and collecting. shoot, i even tried a sales pitch for collecting but they were a no show. *frown*

and I sure haven't figured any of this out, either... just how to make the conferences look pretty!

wer, Dear, when you excel at something as you do at making conferences pretty, you do not need to figure anything else out. That is our job. Get out the ropes and chains...

It looks wonderful, my dear. You have outdone yourself! Very interesting topics, too, but then, coming from you, that is to be expected... ;~D

Too cool, Marcia!!! Way to go!

Thanks Dear! They are keeping me out of trouble by making my brain think of things other than the ones which usually intrude (lust comes to mind first)...!

What's happening in my part of the world? How about heat, heat and more heat and no rain! What's going on? Pennsylvania is starting to look like the desert. Brown grass and blazing white sun. I'm quite distressed. So, Marcia, oh great cosmic guru, what's going on? Site looks terrific!

Thanks Heide. I will post notice of severe drought in the NE on Topic 14, Weather updates. (I had been putting them under Atmospheric Disturbances but caught some flack for it.) Thanks for posting. I really appreciate it - especially from you!

Hiya, Heide! (pretending you live in Texas are you?)

Let's see, if we shift Texas to Pennsylvania, then Hawaii will be in Texas. Is that correct?

close, I think...

What a concept... I like it!

I'm not too crazy about where that lands me :-(

You do not like the Rockies? Most beautiful! The way we are rearranging the Earth, you can pick where you want to put Chicago!

Hey, I just got here (at last) and was immediately struck by the most daring concept possible: to rearrange the earth! Can I move Lisbon somewhere else too? May I choose where or is that predefined because of your previous movements? Better still, can I make it a wanderer? Oh well, this one is not so new, a portuguese writer by the name of Saramago (last year's Nobel Prize ;-))wrote a book where Portugal split away from Spain and started drifting southwest... I haven't read the book yet, but love the idea!

Since this has become a freeform globe, please do move around. A wanderer would be good - it would tie in with the Hot Spot theory of how Hawaii was formed. Your Earthquake in 1755 proved you are in a zone of subduction, so go to it. Let us know where in the world is Gi whilst you are wandering. (Btw, what joy it is to have you posting here!)

ah, so you're movement of Hawaii has no relationship to where I would go (N&E). Was picturing Chicago somewhere up around Iceland by my calculations. :-0

Oh no, this is a plastic Earth in the truest sense of the word. Look what happened with the breakup of Pangea (see plate tectonics) into Laurasia and Gondwanaland then to the eventual place we find today. It just might take a while, but sure as part of California is moving northward in relation to the rest of the state, you will be moving, too. Do not change your wardrobe yet, however. It's gonna take a while.

Guess who's stupid beyond belief? No, not that person! M E ! I didn't get eye protection to look at it, nor did I get filters for my cameras... Guess who won't take pictures of the eclipse... AND I WANTED TO FILM IT! With my Bauer Super 8-camera, where you can set the interval for it to shoot a single frame after the other (trick filming!). Boooohoooo! I am soo dumb! **************************************************************** Discovery Network plans live eclipse coverage August 6, 1999 Web posted at: 12:13 p.m. EDT (1613 GMT) NEW YORK (AP) -- The Discovery Network plans three hours of live television coverage next Wednesday of something mom warned you never to look at directly -- a solar eclipse. The cable channel's cameras will follow the 60-mile wide path where the sun is totally obscured by the moon, from its start in southern England, through France, Germany, Austria, Hungary, Romania to the Middle East and its conclusion in India. It's the most extensive live coverage of any event in Discovery's 15-year history and, the network believes, the first time TV has followed an eclipse in such detail. Eclipse coverage runs from 6 to 9 a.m. EDT, with an hour-long wrapup that night at 10 p.m. "Human beings have always been totally enthralled by eclipses," said Discovery general manager Mike Quattrone, "but if you wanted to see an eclipse, you had to be geographically lucky." People shouldn't stare at the sun because there's a risk of eye damage, but cameras can safely capture an eclipse. Not just show, but science Discovery will do more than beam three hours of the sun. It will explain the science behind the eclipse and show how people in each country react to it. The network hopes to climax its coverage with an arresting image of the eclipse over the Taj Mahal. Discovery will pull its coverage together with the help of Discovery Europe and a dozen European TV affiliates. British broadcaster Mary Nightingale will be the host. The last total solar eclipse in the mainland United States took place in 1979. Discovery has time to make plans for the next one -- it comes on August 21, 2017. Copyright 1999 The Associated Press. *********************************************************** I didn't know where to post this, so I did here. Hope it fits somehow, Marcia. Gosh, I'm such an idiot!

It would have fit in tv, too...but this was a good choice of topics as well...

Not tv - this is FILMING, not video... But it's not the Filming stuff topic in COllecting, nor the Dead Media in Cultures (or Media?). Pity me a bit, though, perhaps then I feel less unfortunate... Oh. I see what you mean - THEY do the tv thing. How silly of me. I'm still wound up on my stupidity not to get some filters IN TIME. Bye bye, my chance!

Take it!!!

What?

Oh, Alexander, I am so very sorry...but, how is your vision? You did not do a Gallileo, did you? I am not ever going to see a total eclipse...the year it was to happen over this Island, everyone had filters, and I had planned to chase it in case of bad wx. My resident driver said it would clear up by the time of the event - so I missed it under the worst cloud cover in Hilo for years. I hate him for that.

Might happen here, too. Gotta improvise on filters for the camera - how? Any ideas? Aluminium-coated helium ballons - translucent enough? Or too thick? Darn! Where's McGyver when I need him?

Alexander, I too left it too late and have no glasses or filters for it. I believe there's something on makeshift filters for cameras in the paper, though, so I'll look it up and post here for you.

cancelled and in syndication methinks...

MacGyver, that is...

Aluminun coated mylar baloons are ok as is fully exposed and developed BLACK & WHITE photographic film (not color!) use several thicknesses and use your eye as a judge of what is visible - use many thicknesses to begin and work down to what is acceptable. It is also excellent for filming sun spots.

You think so? Why not colour films? And that's just to look through, right? No matter, all I can get easily is the balloons... Super 8 Film is not very sensitive (60 Asa?). I'll try, and might also snap a few shots on 35 mm Gi, thank you! Any help appreciated! Where do you sit? I'm in Middle Europe.

Alexander you need the metallic particles to absorb some of the light rays. All dark color film does is make your iris open larger thus incurring even more damage to your retina. I am absolutely sure of this!!!

Sorry, went to the paper but they only say: neutral glass coated with chromium and nickel... They also say you can use colour film of around 100ASA. I live in Lisbon, Portugal, so the eclipse won't be half as spectacular as in Germany... Anyway, I've seen one before with a telescope. We projected the image on a screen and followed it there. It was fun, but I would love one where the light falls and birds stop singing...Like in books and movies, you know... I doubt I'll have that tomorrow... And there may be clouds!:-(

Use a pinhole projector. Gi, I am sure the color film is incorrect. We really got the entire world here for that total eclipse and they kept telling us color film is NOT acceptable due to its being non-metallic...(I am not trying to be right, here - I am trying to save retinas!)

well there goes my bubble gum foil wrapper and a wad of that freshly chewed up gum theory! *grin* i know nothing about the proper film techniques required to record an eclipse. but i do know that meteor showers will be seen over our area this week with a good show on thursday (2 meteors a minute). wonder if my minolta 35mm will take a good pic of that? (if not, it's a good way to use up the rest of the film so i can show you the space shuttle pics!!)

Get a tripod or wall for a steady base then set your lens wide open. Do so for 30 seconds, then a minute then 1 1/2 minutes etc and note your results for the next one. (Should have done some homework...but...) Best way to do the eclipse by projecting it onto a piece of paper on the ground through a pinhole in a paper cup or another piece of paper. If it is windy you might like to use cardboard or stake it to the ground.

Oh yes, and remember to look around. If your eclipse is partial, look at the leaf shadows. They should also project the pinhole image of the partially eclipsed sun. You can even make an aperture using your thumb and forefinger. Enjoy and report back...Please!

For the eclipse in your city (eastern coast of the us only for partial) and for Europe and Africa in totality http://sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse/TSE1999/T99lookNA.html Home page of Nasa Goddard Space Flight Center - this site has it all http://sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov/eclipse/TSE1999/TSE1999.html#GenMaps

Cloudy and overcast now (9:08 am CET). We're supposed to get 95% eclipse - I'm just right North of the main event. I'll try the balloons... No exposed developed b/w here for looking. If I feel like it, I'll shoot 400 ASA colour film for slides and 400 ASA b/w, but then - everybody does that. But I'm gonna trick-film it, if things work out... Wolf, use two cameras loaded with sensitive film (an astronomer recommneded to me the Fuji 800 ASA colour film for prints, approx. USD 7 per film? 400 ASA should work ok, too), both on tripods. One, open the shutter for a minute or more at a time, so you get the streaks. Meanwhile, with the other one and widest aperture, work your way up from 10 sec, doubling at each step. (perhaps make two pictures at each step to be sure). WRITE DOWN ("1. pic - 10 sec, 2nd - 10 sec, 3rd - 20 sec..."), also what objective (50mm to 135mm) and aperture. Looking at the results, you'll be able to see later what was the best setting, and work around that next time. When packing up, point one camera at the North Star (?), and leave shutter open while packing. You'll get the circles showing how the stars wander around the North Pole... The kids will love it!

Alexander, I hope you saw the eclipse... I only had the partial view (went out and someone lent me her glasses for a moment)and did that projection gimmick, but what I saw on television was incredible, even moving. Next time I want to be there (as long as it is a reasonable viewing site, like this was).

uh, alex, i have a camera that doesn't allow me to open shutters and stuff, but thanks for the tip!! maybe i'll get it one of these days. i believe the next eclipse is next year? have a silly question though, alex, can you take a picture through those things that work like submarine scopes (please tell me you know what i'm talking about because my brain has lost the word i'm looking for)!!

Next year, but visible only at the Poles, and I'm not going *there*. There'll be another closer to home in 2005, I think.

Now that this eclipse is over, I will tell you that the gods who control these things do not want me to see it. Anywhere! The year after the totality on this Island, and annular eclipse was visible over Southern California, and I was there. An Annular eclipse is one in which the Moon is smaller in diameter visually in comparison with the Sun's and it appears as though the Sun has a big hole through it. In hot, dry, parched Southern California, for just that day, it was dark and so overcast there was no even a visible darkening of the sky - just as it had been in Hilo the year before. Nothing. Either time. If you want to see an eclipse, be sure I am nowhere in the vicinity!

See, Gi, if you had gone to Turkey as I suggested, they had optimal viewing conditions!

*lol* Karen, and the most amazing accommodations, too!

I was incredibly lucky with the Big Island eclipse of nearly a decade back. Strangely enough, my assignment was to broadcast it on the radio in Hilo (where clouds unfortunately obscured the view in most of town). We set up camp the night before at the 8300 foot level of Mauna Loa next to KGMB-TV's (Honolulu) Big Island repeater. We chose that site because the state's university would not allow us up on the more glamorous Mauna Kea and went the previous night because the road up was to be closed the fol owing morning. It turned out serendipitous despite a bone-chillling night. I used welder's goggles (not the full helmet) and saw a 100 percent eclipse with my own two eyes. KGMB's Big Island engineer, who was also up there, has his ham radio shack on the site. Using a one-watt (that's right, one-watt) microwave remote unit, I broadcast to Hilo not only the eclipse, but traffic reports, weather and cloud conditions and other pertinent information from around the island that was supplied to me via the h m shack. I used my radio sports play-by-play experience to attempt to create a "theatre of the mind" visual for listeners, and the vast majority of the feedback I got was positive, especially since the idea of a radio broadcast of an eclipse is rather absurd, when one thinks about it.

No, John, it was not absurd, it was wonderful for heartbroken in Hilo - Me! You saved my sanity, and as I listened to you and your gift with spoken English, it came alive for me. I could 'see' it through your eyes, and I am eternally grateful for it. I had tears of disappointment streaming down my face, but without your live commentary, I would not have 'seen' it at all! That one little Watt of power did what it had to do just fine for your purposes, and your coverage is the one I will always remembe . A belated Thank You to your boss for allowing this incredible experience to be shared. There is something very special about being up there on the mountains and I am sure you felt more in tune with what was happening than Bob Jones from KGMB did on the Kona side with the circus atmosphere. Mahalo Nui Loa, and thanks for posting in Geo!

oops, looks like I spoke too soon in poetry...I see you've found your way out and about, John!

Ver, I can thank Marcia for that. By the way, Marcia, and I know you will see this--because you are all-knowing and all-seeingyou did a wonderful job designing this conference site and I am impressed with your use of the national weather service hurricane tracking map. I did have a spiritual experience on the mountain with the eclipse that it would have been impossible for Bob Jones to have. If he had just gone to his own repeater site--but that wouldn't have been television friendly. No palm trees, n beach, not a lot of people to interview. BUT WE DID HAVE THE ECLIPSE and he only had a partial view at best.

I am delighted you said that about the Kona-side view of things. Hilo gets the short end of every stick the state has, but, as you pointed out, WE DID HAVE THE ECLIPSE and Bob Jones only had a partial view...I recall seeing his video tape that evening; I was so proud of the the job you did. Thank you for the kind words on this Conference. It would not have been possible with out WER's patient help to make it pretty, David's help in feeding me up-to-date information on volcanoes world-wide, and a bunch of credit to Penn State for teaching me well. I really intend Geo to be informational and timely as well as a Q&A and experiences site. So far, so good. Feel free to add to any of the topics. (Oh, yeah, I also do my homework...ever on the search for current information.)

speaking of david, we ever gonna see him over here? and i would like to piggy bag on john's compliments, this place looks great!!

I am working on him. He sends me information all the time to put in here, including the earthquake in California just after it happened. (His father informed me by email of the one in Turkey!) He says he does not have the time to login. How long does it take to get a username and password? He wastes more time than that wondering what to have for lunch! We should start an email campaign to recruit him, but he just may never forgive me for that. *grin*

Oh, and thank you for your kind thoughts, Wolf. We know why it looks this great...*smile*

Since I put this on other people's conferences, the least I can do is to enter it on my own: PENN STATE 41 ARIZONA 7

Back to Geology. This, contributed by Alexander (thank you! and Note the Hawaiian connection): Source: http://www.nytimes.com/library/national/science/082499sci-ocean-cables.html August 24, 1999 Old Phone Cables Open Sea Bed to Science By MALCOLM W. BROWNE "Making use of thousands of miles of discarded telephone cables, scientists have begun to wire remote regions of deep ocean floor to create an undersea network of geological observatories. "The old cables will serve as deep-sea extension cords running thousands of miles from land-based power stations to sensors, some of which are already sending back continuous flows of data from the ocean floor. "Geologists and other scientists using abandoned cables have set out to collect a bonanza of information about earthquakes, underground nuclear explosions, changes in the earth's internal structure and its magnetic field, fluctuations in the high-altitude ionosphere and even whale migration patterns. "Although seismometers and other geological sensors have long been operating in most land areas, conspicuous gaps in global seismic coverage exist under the world's deep oceans, and oceans cover most of the planet's surface. "But this has begun to change, thanks in part to rapid progress in technology that has made old telephone cables obsolete. "Dozens of such cables are still serviceable, said Dr. Rhett Butler, director of a data-collecting network in Washington called Incorporated Research Institutions for Seismology (IRIS). 'These cables were built to last,' he said in an interview, 'and at least some of them, which went into use in the mid-1960's, still function perfectly.' "One such line is a coaxial cable (similar to the cable that carries television programs into private homes) that was laid across the deep Pacific Ocean floor by AT&T in 1964 from San Luis Obispo, Calif., to Makaha, Hawaii -- a distance of nearly 3,000 miles. At the time, it was among the most advanced phone lines in the world, equipped with powered vacuum-tube repeaters every 20 miles to refresh the telephone signals as they traveled along it. The cable, called Hawaii-2, could simultaneously carry as many as 138 conversations. "But in 1989 a fishing trawler working in shallow water near the California coast accidentally cut the $30 million cable. "The telephone company could probably have repaired the break, but decided instead to abandon the cable; by then, optical-fiber cables had come into use, and the new cables could carry up to a half million conversations with greatly improved sound quality. AT&T announced that it would make the abandoned coaxial cable available to scientists who could find a use for it. "'It took several years for scientists to consider the possibilities,' said Dr. Alan Chave, a senior scientist of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts. 'But last year it all came together and we showed that continuous deep-sea seismic sensing was possible, using these old cables.' "The world's first deep undersea seismic observatory capable of continuous long-term functioning began operating last September. Its seismometer failed two months later because of a short circuit, but Dr. Chave and his colleagues plan to retrieve and repair the instrument in September. With several upgrades now completed, the observatory (called 'H2O,' standing for 'Hawaii-2 Observatory') will then resume operation, midway between California and Hawaii, at a depth of 16,400 feet. "A feature of the unmanned sea-floor observatory is a junction box equipped with eight power outlets and signal connectors allowing scientists to plug more ocean-bottom sensors into the line. Among the supplementary instruments scientists plan to install is a hydrophone capable of listening to whale calls and tracking their migrations. "The cost of H2O, financed by the National Science Foundation, was about $2.5 million. If the project had had to start from scratch by laying its own cable, it would have cost up to about $120 million, scientists estimate. "The idea that led to the project dates from a decade ago. In 1988 a scientist at Tokyo University suggested that abandoned telephone cables might be reused for research, and that suggestion started American scientists thinking. Eventually, a consortium that included Woods Hole, the University of Hawaii and IRIS came up with a plan. A shore-based power station could pump direct current at 5,000 volts into one end of AT&T's broken cable, creating a thousand-mile-long extension cord to power scientific instruments three miles deep. Electricity flowing into the cable would move along it, powering sensors and repeaters, and finally grounding the current into the ocean at the severed end, thereby completing a circuit. "But making H2O a reality was a hair-raising challenge, as Dr. Chave described it. "The tools included the 270-foot research ship Thomas Thompson; the Jason, a deep-sea remotely operated vehicle; and the Media, a remotely operated camera platform to watch the Jason from above, helping Jason's pilot aboard the Thompson to avoid entangling obstacles three miles below him. "The scientists focused their efforts on the part of the cable reaching from dry land in Hawaii to a spot 1,000 miles to the east -- a smooth region of sea floor where they expected seismic signals to be especially useful to geophysicists. Searching the ocean bottom for the cable last summer, the team found it nearly one mile from where they had expected. "In the next step, the team sent Jason down. Using a joystick and a television monitor aboard the Thompson, the craft's pilot, Will Sellers, slowly steered Jason into position, clamped the jaws of its maneuvering arm on the 1 1/4-inch cable, and cut it. "Next came the hardest part: snagging the severed cable with an 800-pound grapnel and hauling the cut end up to the ship. Mr. Sellers had to make sure that the grapnel grabbed the cable at least 16,400 feet away from the cut to create a counterbalance as the cable was hauled up. "'It was like positioning a slippery strand of cut spaghetti on the tine of a fork, making sure that there was enough weight of spaghetti on the loose end to keep the strand from sliding off in the other direction,' Dr. Chave said. "The ship's crew then had to haul up six miles of cable weighing nearly 24,000 pounds -- the maximum weight the ship was capable of handling. The risky operation took an entire day. "Once the crew had wrestled the cable aboard the ship they powered electricity into it and used it to make a telephone call to the National Science Foundation in Washington. The cable worked perfectly, even though it had lain unused for nine years on the ocean floor. "But time and again unexpected problems arose. When the crew began lowering the cable and a 'termination frame' that served as a connection between the cable and an outlet, a chain broke and both cable and frame fell to the ocean bottom. Fortunately the frame fell in a favorable position, so that when the junction box was lowered, Jason's arm was able to complete the setup by connecting the frame with the junction box. Finally, a seismometer built by the University of Hawaii was lowered into position nearby and plugged into the junction box. "Almost immediately, seismic signals began flowing to Hawaii, joining the global torrent of signals from more than 100 other sensors contributing to the IRIS network. After the Woods Hole team returns the repaired seismometer to the sea floor next month, the scientists hope the cable will continue to work for up to 30 years. "Anyone can use the data produced by the network, Dr. Chave said. Other groups, including one in Japan, are also exploiting old telephone cables, although IRIS network is the most extensive. "'The more evenly you can collect seismic signals from sensors all over the world,' he said, 'the better you can tomographically image the structure deep inside the earth. It's a little like taking a clinical CAT scan using an inward-looking telescope. For one thing, the seismic data can tell you about the differential rotation of liquid metal in the earth's core -- a key factor causing variations in the earth's magnetic field.' "In collaboration with a scientist at Bell Laboratories Dr. Chave is also using 10 abandoned cables, all with one end reaching land somewhere, as passive sensors to measure deep ocean currents and changes in the ionosphere. As a current of sea water flows through the earth's magnetic field, an electric current is generated in the water, and a resulting voltage shows up in a cable with one end grounded in sea water. Current is also induced in an ocean cable by the flow of electricity through the ionosphere -- a layer of the atmosphere 50 miles above the earth's surface. "Three years ago the Navy announced that it was abandoning some of the hydrophone sensors it had used to track potentially hostile ships and submarines. Some of these sensors and their associated cables and electronics have been made available for civilian research. "'All this activity is really expanding the reach of geophysical science,' Dr. Chave said. 'We have to thank technological obsolescence for giving us some wonderful tools.'"

It's been a note of the Dead Media project.

Yes! Thank you for pointing that out. I inadvertently lopped that fact off of your email when I posted it.

No sweat! It's really great to see with what kind of other areas technology can connect, apart from original purpose... Often stuff never intended or though of originally!

I am the sort of person who, before I throw anything away, checks to see what else can be done with the item. Sometimes I store these "widgets" for years before the light bulb goes on and I find an even better use than the original. Human ingenuity! Where would we be without it?!

a lot neater perhaps? i save a lot of stuff too, like cool whip and butter containers. you can imagine the state of my kitchen cabinets! and then scrap fabric that i can't bear to part with because if i ever learn to make a quilt, they'd be good to use on a square.

There are so many things happening right now that I though it best to put it in All Things Planet Earth. New Zealand experienced a 6.5 earthquake (thank you, AnneH) and Mt Etna is erupting so furiously it has just about decommissioned its VolcanoCam. I will try to put up relevant information and images in the proper topics when they become available. (Thank you KarenR and AnneH)

In case you're interested we had a little quake in Wales yesterday. It measured 3.5. By the way marcia, sneding me this URL was a sneaky way to get me involved in this conference (SMILE!) Well, I had to have a look didn't I!

Oh! Thanks for that!!! Thank you for taking the bait. There are lots of goodies to interest you in here including atuo-updating weather maps in Geo 14 which a few folks check almost daily. (Scroll through the entire topic and bookmark your particular favorite - I have UK and the Continent in there!

Fun! Now I need to try and find ��s for my growing internet bill (we're billed by the second/minute in the UK)! Is this a special interest area of yours -or just one of many?

As you will discover, it is one of many - eventually I might just be crazy enough to have one for Archaeology and one for Astronomy. am also into lots of Topics on other conferences such as Books/41 Arthurian themes...and Malachology and just about anything else, actually. I need several more lifetimes to become a professional in each of these categories. I did want to become a Geologist but I did not get along with the math, so I studied to be a techinical writer.

Maggie, Gi lives in Portugal and was finally able to find an ISP who would give her unlimited time on the internet. I know you pay by the minute (how terrible that must be!!!) - mine is $20.78/month and it is unlimited - as are just about all of the ISP's in the US. My sympathies.

Unfortunately, the free ISPs are so slow that what you save in Internet bills you spend on telephone bills... I'm still looking for the perfect one!

Auwe!

A lot of this is a new area for me (goody!) I only did a bit of geology when I taught my kids Geography (apart from what I did at school of course, MANY years ago). BTW: my ISP is free (I'm on my third one so far)and seems reasonably fast but it's the phone bills that cripple us here.

Alas, that seems to be the lament of most of the countries in the world outside of the North American continent...and perhaps not all of that, either Feel free to wander and post wherever you'd like!

we should get astonomy and archeology conferences, what a great idea! and then, marcia, think of all the inter-conference links we could have!!!

Oh Yes! I even know which midnight blue marble wallpaper I want for it and which Horizontal bars...and who I want to cfadm for me... Archaeology is excellent as well. Need another life time to come back as one of each of those professions!

Would Angels fit into the Astronomy and ufo's and the like?! They are in the sky, are they not!!! Links galore! Happy thought, indeed! (I like it...can you tell?! *grin*)

nah, couldn't tell one bit, in fact was gonna ask! *GRIN*

Just like any hyper kid, the more !!'s I use the more I am virtually jumping up and down with excitement over the very idea!!!

Such great ideas and we did not act on them. Must check and see what we can do about that with the new year and all. But, no fun doing it be telnet! I know Alexander would be interested in the Archaeology one - for sure!!!

This probably belongs on an astronomy topic, but I didn't see one when I looked at the list of conferences, so here it is. My question is about the age of the universe/earth. The universe is currently estimated to be about 13 billion years old. In that time, stars and galaxies have formed, gone through their life cycles, died, gathered back together as nebulae, then created second and maybe third generation systems. Assuming the earth is only a second generation conglomeration of matter, then all of the heavier elements on the earth came from the first generation. Now the earth is estimated to be already about 4 billion years old. That leaves only 9 billion years--or only twice the time the earth has been around--for that first generation to have lived and died and given rise to the second generation. That doesn't seem like enough time to me! Am I missing something? Were life cycles nebulae and galaxies faster in the early universe? If not, how does the creation of the heavier elements work into the current assumptions on the age of the universe?

Ann, welcome! May I suggest Topic 24 Beyond Planet Earth?! I think our estimation of the age of the universe will continue to be revised upward as we get bigger and better eyes into the past. For just about forever the age of the Universe was thought not to exceed 5 billion years and wa more likely 4 billion. Theories are just that...always subject to revision and correction, fortunately!

I had read a while back where scientists and archaeologists are beginning to suspect that the earth is actually older than they'd previously thought...so much for revision of theories, eh? Seems as if we come to those somewhat "definite" conclusions, then, we have to step back and say, "wait a minute - what if...?" That's the fun of discoveries - rediscovering!

Indeed! When I took Geology in college they were one year away from teaching Plate tectonics! Don't check how long ago that was, but it gives you some idea of how things change!

One of my favorite things to discover is old knowledge which is rediscovered. I know we have forgotten more than we have learned from the time of the Pyramids and Stonehenge. They had the same brain as we are using. Why should they not have had as much success?!

Having few means to pass down detailed science across generations, did the ancients really do more than make constructions to celebrate observed extremes of the sun's path? Please convince me.

Not as far as I know, Mark. They did not come from Lemuria with exotic knowledge or from outer space. If anyone thinks they did, convince Mark and me. (I've read the books out there and they are more unbelivable than the idea that the ancients used magic to do things!)

...just because we cannot replicate the ancient constructions now does not mean it was done by 'other beings' It just means we have not figured it out yet...

Ok, why am I not seeing Response 99? It was posted today and is not showing up. In fact, nothing but what I am posting is showing up right now...test!

Maggie, what did you say? I am curious to the max...on confifty using the ip posts show up but not using the URL. Hmmm... (Wish I understood half of what I know about this stuff!)

Maggie's missing post: Resp 99 of 99: Maggie (sociolingo) Tue, Feb 1, 2000 (16:13) 4 lines We've had a couple of TV series where ancient feats were recreated (?it may be the same as you PBS program). The latest ones were Caesars bridge across a huge river span that he built in a few days, and a kind of crane thing that was built to hoist enemy ships out of the water by one of the greek greats. (Sorry it's late and my brains going kind of dead, so I can't remember details) On a different tack - did anyone see reports about snow in the desert near Jerusalem and 15 inches of snow in Jerusalem itself. I think it was a 50 year record.

Thanks for that and thanks for telnet saving both the URL and the IP posts! We did mention the Jerusalem snow on Geo 14... Thanks, Maggie!

Slightly off topic: We've also got a super TV program just now called 'meet the ancestors'. Using forensic science they link an archeological dig with a recreation from the bones dug up, and reconstruct what the person looked like, their life etc. It's been facsinating. I've always been curious about how people lived, and its great to see the forensic skills put to use in this way. They rebuild the face from the skull, by building up the layers of muscles etc on a skull model. Its a mxture of artistry and science. Recently they did a ten year old girl, and to do that they had to take skin depth measurements from a large number of young girls as they only had adult measurements on computer file. This child (from a millenium ago) had had repeated infections as shown by forensics on the bones, and they determined the sex by DNA testing. She was found in an abondoned grave site a short distnace away from a church which is known to have been there 1000 years ago and which had 'relics'.. It was thought that the child would h ve been taken to the relics (in the surviving crypt) of the church for healing. Pilgrims went through a small wall slit in the church down into the crypt, round the relics, and the out by another slit. An archeological artist drew the scene.

That sounds fascinating (and as DO have an Archaeology topic in here!). I hope Discovery or one of those channels picks it up for us to see. Thanks, Maggie!

Geo factoids HOW MANY ISLANDS ARE THERE IN HONG KONG? 235 islands. WHERE WAS THE FIRST TUNNEL IN RECORDED HISTORY? In Babylon. Built by the Assyrians in about 2100 B.C., the secret 3,000-foot-long passageway linked the royal palace on one side of the Euphrates River with the Temple of Jupiter on the other side. WHAT IS THE DIAMETER OF THE EARTH AT THE EQUATOR? 7,926 miles. (The circumference is 24, 902 miles.) WHAT RIVER IS THE ONLY RIVER TO FLOW NORTH AND SOUTH OF THE EQUATOR? The Congo River, which crosses the equator twice.

Greetings all Well, time to move from the rf field to the geo-magnetic field. But first, any interest in ley lines (no, thats not you use for pickups in single's bars...) There are quite a few in Europe and the UK and there has even been research on the earth mounds in Wisconsin. Interesting connective stuff. BTW, there is quite a lot of power around Stonehenge. Same kind of neat energy around Enchanted Rock in Tx. mike aka cosmo

Aloha Mike! Geo 27 is perfect for you. That started out with Ley Lines discussions. Maps and photos abound. Roam around and make yourself comfortable!

Ok, off to 27! (I see you are posting to classic radio just a minute ago...) Mike

yup! I was following you so you did not get lost. Note that Spring had a problem which caused (or sumthin did) my rc file to delete and took all my wallpaper and horizontal bars and buttons with it. Have reinstated the bars and font colors but...no buttons or wallpaper...*sigh* See ya on 27!

The problem was the /tmp file.

When things are ok it should look like this: $ df Filesystem 1K-blocks Used Avail Capacity Mounted on /dev/sd0a 99135 14975 79203 16% / /dev/sd0h 16873439 9891364 6138403 62% /usr mfs:19 15855 434 14628 3% /tmp thor:/extra/tools 2991146 1362014 1479574 48% /tools

But when the /tmp file says Capacity 0% no one can write to the file system. It's a little kink in the armor of an otherwise bulletproof operating system.

Ah so! I suspected as much, but wondered if it would not just leave the file untouched rather than deleting all of it. Well, I had "a learning experience" and managed to get most of it back on by checking how other rc files were configured. Cfadm pulled me through again! I am gratefulness personified this morning. Now, I have a slightly slow-loading but incredibly beautiful wallpaper to install, if I dare...

HOW FAST DOES LIGHTNING TRAVEL? It travels 90,000 miles a second - almost half the speed of light. (186,000 miles a second). EXACTLY HOW LONG IS ONE YEAR? 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, and 46 seconds.

Excellent statistics, Marcia - can you remind me how fast sound is?

For rule of thumb reckoning, it travels about 5 miles / second (so you can see how close the lightning is hitting by counting by 5's at one second intervals). More precise measurement will have to wait till I get into the other room to get the appropraite book. (Did you just get married? )

Married? No, not unless 6 years ago is "just". Did you infer I got married from my question about the speed of sound?

No, but you came up missing for a while and it was mentioned on Drool that Mark was getting married... But, I should have remembered that it would have been bigamy - you told me you were married in our email about cricket. You are the only Mark around here; I assumed, and you know what that means...! http://arts.ucsc.edu/EMS/Music/tech_background/TE-01/soundSpeed.html Speed of Sound You can measure the speed of sound the same way you measure the speed of a runner, with a stopwatch on a closed track. Find a place where you can hear a good echo, and stand a known distance from whatever the sound is reflecting off of. Fire a starter's pistol and start the stopwatch. Stop the watch when you hear the echo. Divide 2 times the distance (it's a round trip) by the time to get the speed. At 21 degrees C (70�F), you should get 344 meters per second, or 1129 ft per second. At freezing, the numbers are 331 m/s or 1087 ft/s. The proper formula for the change in speed due to temperature is: Where T is degrees Celsius. The works out to about a 0.1% change per degree Fahrenheit. The Speed of sound in water is 1480 m/s or 4856 ft/s. More than 3000 miles per hour. There is a project under way to take the earth's temperature by measuring the speed of sound between the USA and Australia.

WHAT LAKE, ONCE PART OF A SEA, HAS THE ONLY FRESHWATER SHARKS IN THE WORLD? Lake Nicaragua, in Nicaragua. WHEN IT COMES TO WAVES IN THE OCEAN, WHAT IS A WAVELENGTH? The linear distance between the crests of two successive waves.

Here is an easy and excellent Speed of Sound Calculator for those using Metric http://www.measure.demon.co.uk/Acoustics_Software/speed.html

The above calculator has problems - try this one: http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/sound/souspe.html

http://www.discovery.com Earth Loses Weight Larry O'Hanlon, Discovery.com News If the latest measurement of the force of gravity, called the big G, is correct, it will end 200 years of confusion and mean Earth weighs 5.972 sextillion metric tons. That's a tad less than the 5.98 sextillion metric tons listed in some textbooks. A sextillion is a one followed by 21 zeros. The constant G tells how much gravitational force there is between two masses � such as the Earth and moon � that are separated by a known distance. It's a fundamental aspect of the universe that doesn't change, similar to the speed of light. Scientists were able to calculate Earth's mass based on G by applying Isaac Newton's famous equation F=ma. In the equation, "F" stands for the force of gravity (Big G); while "m" stands for mass (in this case, of the Earth); and "a" represents the local gravitational effects of Earth, which scientists already knew. By rearranging the equation, they were able to solve for "m" and thus calculate Earth's mass. University of Washington physicists Jens Gundlach and Stephen Merkowitz their results today at the American Physical Society meeting in Long Beach, California. To arrive at the new constant, the physicists refined an experiment first developed in the 18th century. They used an extremely delicate device called a torsion balance that records the effects of the gravity of four stainless steel balls on a gold-coated plate. The device is similar to one used 200 years ago to make the first big G measurement. But it is computer controlled and contains numerous mechanical refinements that make the more precise measurement possible. If the new value is accepted, it would reduce the uncertainty of G by a factor of 100. "The experimental situation was just hilarious," said Gundlach of physicists� inability to find and agree on G. "Our experiment was designed to clean that up." Because gravity is such a weak force, it is extremely difficult to measure without all sorts of errors creeping in. Physicists have been working hard to narrow down G, but different experiments have actually been coming up with numbers that are spreading farther apart. This has been especially embarrassing to physicists, since the other two most basic of all natural constants � speed of light and Planck�s Constant � are known with great accuracy. Planck�s Constant is a number that helps scientists determine the energy behind electromagnetic radiation. "It�s the least well known of all the fundamental constants," said University of California at Irvine physicist Riley Newman. Newman's team is working on a National Science Foundation grant to measure G. They have also built an instrument, but have a lot of work to do before they find G, he said. Gundlach said he will be watching Newman�s work closely in hopes that the G�s agree. "If they don�t agree," said Newman, "the confusion will go on."

WHAT FOUR STATES HAVE ACTIVE VOLCANOES? Alaska, California, Hawaii, and Washington.

And what are the names of the volcanoes, dear? Btw, the site looks wonderful. Congratulations!

Do you like my new marble wallpaper, too? (It is so good to see you here again - happy me!) I installed it with an artist in mind for the Aesthetics of Earth topic...*hope* Hawaii's active volcanoes: Kilauea, Mauna Loa, Hualalai, and on Maui, Haleakala (with the faint possibility of Mauna Kea added) California's: Lassen and Shasta Washington: St Helens, and any of the other Cascade mountains in the state since they are in the most active part of the subduction of Juan de Fuca plate under the North American Plate (see plate tectonics topic for good maps on the subject) Alaska has too many for me to remember off the top of my head...(there is a map for those, too in Geo 2.)

Sparky Lifesavers If you chew a wintergreen-flavored Lifesavers candy in a dark room and watch in the mirror, you will see electrical sparks in your mouth. Why? The sugar in the candy is in crystal form. When you start shearing the crystal apart with your teeth, you end up with an excess of electrons on one side of the fissure. Just like a lightning arc, they jump across the gap to an area that has a positive charge, and in the process give off light. Interestingly, this works better with wintergreen than other flavors, because much of the light that is emitted is ultraviolet, outside of the visible spectrum. The methyl salicylate in the wintergreen oil is able to absorb ultraviolet light and re-emit it at a wavelength you can see. -- Michael Natkin

I love the wallpaper! I think it's very elegant, like everything in this site, and it's very appropriate too. I meant to mention it specifically. You read my mind. Kilauea I wonder why this one is my favorite! Didn't it erupt in 1983? Interesting fact about the lifesaver. I shall check the mirror the next time I eat one. I watched a show on PBS that was so interesting. It was a Nature special about body changers, and it showed how the salmon (the males ones, I think) slowly lose their shape to become really ugly-looking. This happens as their death approaches. It was amazing! Do we have a topic for animal?

You remembered! Kilauea did indeed begin the current eruptive cycle in 1983 and it is still going strong. Thanks for the kind comments on the wallpaper, too. The lifesaver thing or any wintergreen candy you can snap with your fingers my dad showed me in a dark closet. Never tried it by looking in my mouth with a mirror. My son is unaware of this phenomenon because of the high humidity here. Wintergreen tends to be mushy... Please check SpringArk conference of which Wolf and I are cohosts http://www.spring.net/yapp-bin/restricted/browse/SpringArk/all/new Thanks for asking!

ok, back to the lightening thing, when we see it, we're supposed to count by 5's, one 5 each second? so it's 5, 10, 15? (or, each second counted total multiplied by 5?) i've always used the seconds to judge the distance. interesting!

I count "one thousand and one...two...three" and multiply by 5. It's easier for me. The thousand part makes sure you are counting in seconds and not rushing too fast. Mississippi works, too.

IF YOU HEAR THUNDER 10 SECONDS AFTER YOU SEE LIGHTNING, HOW FAR AWAY WAS THE LIGHTNING? 2 miles away. Sound travels about a mile in 5 seconds. IN GEOLOGY, WHAT IS A CALVING? The breaking off or detachment of an iceberg from a glacier that has reached the sea, or the separation of a portion of a floating iceberg.

HOW MANY ICEBERGS ARE THERE IN THE WORLD? Approximately 320,000. HOW MANY AVERAGE-SIZE HOUSES CAN YOU MAKE FROM ONE GIANT SEQUOIA - THE BIGGEST LIVING THING ON EARTH TODAY? Fifty. The sequoia often extends 300 feet in height and 25 feet in diameter. Its seed weighs only 1/6000 ounce.

Umm I accept the Giant Sequioia is the widest tree - but is it the tallest - our giants here in Oz are very tall - I am not sure if the Gloucester tree in the South West of Western Australia wasn't taller. Also I believe there is a very tall tree and large to boot in N.Z. can anyone confirm. Can't remember for the moment the name of our largest tree - thus I mentioned the Gloucester tree. They are in an area called the Valley of the Giants.

Sequoia semprevirons is the larges thing ever to live on land. I will do citations for you in the next post. What kind of tree is the tallest Oz tree? The Sequoia is a Redwood (evergreen)

Check here for the hugest trees in the USA http://www.americanforests.org/whatnew/BTFacts.html Botanical record-breakers are at this amazing uRL http://daphne.palomar.edu/wayne/ww0601.htm The world's record for the tallest tree goes to another cone-bearing tree native to California, the coast redwood (Sequoia sempervirens). In fact, the tallest living redwood on record stands 367 feet, 62 feet taller than the Statue of Liberty. The California redwoods are rivaled in size by the amazing flowering Australian tree (Eucalyptus regnans). The record for the tallest tree of all time has been debated by botanists for centuries. Some amazing claims for towering Douglas fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii) and E. regnans exceeding 400 feet have never been substantiated by a qualified surveyor. In 1872, a fallen E. regnans 18 feet in diameter and 435 feet tall was reported by William Ferguson, making it the tallest (or perhaps longest) dead tree. According to the monograph on Eucalyptus by Stan Kelly (Volume 1 of Eucalypts, 1977), trees of E. regnans well over 300 feet tall have been measured, but the tallest tree known to be standing at present is 322 feet.

Diatomaceous Earth Diatomaceous earth is a crumbly rock formed from the fossilized remains of microscopic one-celled plants that contain a lot of silica in their cell walls. It takes about 24,000,000 of these shells to make one cubic centimeter of rock. When the rock is powdered, it can be used as an environmentally friendly insecticide. The powder has a very rough texture at a microscopic level. The roughness can lacerate and dehydrate the shells of many insects, killing them over the course of a few hours. Diatomaceous earth has many other industrial uses: as an insulator, a filter, and an abrasive, for example. ...and my father, a chemist, made us our toothpowder using the stuff in purified form along with oil of peppermint and another chalky powder. I was my job to do the stirring so we all got equal amounts of peppermint, grit and chalk. It worked very well!

ON WHAT PLANET IS THE LARGEST KNOWN MOUNTAIN IN THE SOLAR SYSTEM? On Mars. Called Olympus Mons, it's a volcano more than three times the height of Mt. Everest. HOW MUCH SYRUP DOES THE AVERAGE SUGAR MAPLE TREE YIELD EACH SEASON? One to one and a quarter quarts. WHICH BIRD STRAYS AS FAR AS 2,500 MILES FROM ITS NEST TO FIND FOOD FOR ITS YOUNG? The albatross, which has the largest wingspan of any living bird - over 11 feet. HOW MANY MUSCLES DOES A CATERPILLAR HAVE? Four thousand - more than five times as many as a human.

Are the giant trees of Australia and New Zealand evergreens, as well? I find that there are many interesting facts about evergreen trees. The ginko tree, which looses it's leaves in the fall, is related to the conifers, it may even be classed with them. (Marcia probably knows.) About the ginko, it is one of the oldest species of trees in the world. A ginko tree was the only type of tree to survive the blast at Hiroshima. The Sequoia, an evergreen, is currently the largest tree. Lastly, the bristlecone pine tree of the American southwest is the longest lived tree in the world. All that, and they give us oxygen, too.

Apparently they are eucalyptus is a (getting out my book) member of the Myrtle family (which also includes Ohia - Hawaii's hallmark tree) with 70 genera and 2800 species. The Ginko (or Ginkgo) is a living fossil (Marcia cannot remember, so she is looking it up). It is a gymnosperm in a class all by itself. It is the lone survivor dating to the Jurassic some 150 million years ago.

Thank you for clearing up what the noble ginkgo tree is classed as. The ginkgo has many admirable traits, and is highly regarded in herbal lore, used in Chinese medicine, but...When the ginkgo nuts fall off the trees in the fall, they lay there and start smelling like sewage. The ginkgo isn't quite so noble then.

When my eldest sister was at Penn State her dorm had a huge ginkgo tree in the front lawn. (It has since been felled by lightning and antiquity) I recall the "fragrance" well. Unreal!

In the scheme of the book, the author arranged it so the most primitive were at the beginning. Out of amost 1000 pages, The gingko was on page 19 right after the cycads!

Pi Day is celebrated each March 14 at 1:59pm at the San Francisco's Exploratorium. (Reported in the Smithsonian Magazine)

WHAT CREATURE PRODUCES SPERM THAT ARE 2/3 INCH LONG - THE LONGEST IN THE WORLD? Some fruit flies of the genus Drosophilia. Their sperm, more than 300 times longer than human sperm, are six times longer than the fly itself - but hair thin and are balled up. HOW MANY TIMES PER SECOND DOES A MOSQUITO BEAT ITS WINGS? Up to 600. HOW MANY CONSTELLATIONS ARE THERE? 100,000. HOW MUCH HORSEPOWER DOES THE TYPICAL HORSE PROVIDE? About 24. Horsepower is the power needed to lift 33,000 pounds 1 foot in a minute. Scientists came up with the 24 horsepower figure based on a horse weighing about 1,320 pounds.

Going back to trees. I have wandered through the Valley of the giants Oz's tallest trees. They are indeed Eucalyptus, the panoply overhead is something to behold. Wonderful smelling and beautifully shaped trees. You can drive a car through. Immense and majestic - you can almost imagine them fully alive and talking. (shades of Narnia). One of the joys of my life and I get very angry when they are chopped down for chipwood for export to Japan.

Are eucalyptus trees evergreens?

...in a way...but not in the way we think of Evergreen. They are (getting out the book again) in the myrtle family and are NOT considered evergreen. However, there are many trees which keep some leaves on them all year round...including many of the Myrtle family.

What's the best plant for a privacy hedge?

Tried to post a couple of days ago. The tall trees in Australia are called Karri and Tingle. Magnificent trees but very different. Valley of the Giants in South Western Australia has both and is the most wonderful sight you can imagine. It is virtually unpopulated and seems to go on forever. Our population in this state of Australia is large than India and yet has under 2,000,000 people. We have just discovered a vast underground sea. which covers a quarter of a the state and is in some parts some 2,000meters deep. Bodes well for us in the future.

Is your underground sea fresh water? That truly would be a boon! Dry Thunderstorms In desert areas, it is possible to have a thunderstorm where the rain never reaches the ground. The air near the Earth's surface can be so hot that the raindrops simply evaporate on their way down. These storms can be especially dangerous, because the lightning can still strike the ground, causing fires without even the help of the rain to put them out before they grow out of control. This evaporating rain phenomenon is known as virga, and is one of the reasons that you might see precipitation on weather radar even when none seems to be falling.

The underground sea is brackish but treatable. It will make the desert bloom. We have thunderstorms and showers like the ones you have just quoted - you can see the rain coming down in the sky but it never reaches us - often happens in summer.

That happens in the deserts of Arizona and California with the dry showers which never hit the ground!

Since it has not elicited any comments, I guess not many are reading what I post in Paleo (topic 7). There has been some really interesting stuff lately - check it out! Also, I posted two pictures I took last evening of Hilo Bay at sunset and one was taken of me (unbeknownst to me) and that is also posted. Find it and take a look at the Mistress of Geo - if anyone is interested. I was asked if it was recent. yup! Last evening.

IN WHAT DIRECTION DOES THE JET-STREAM FLOW? From west to east. WHY ARE MERCURY AND VENUS KNOWN AS INFERIOR PLANETS? Their orbits are closer to the sun than Earth's orbit. Planets orbiting the sun beyond Earth are referred to as superior planets.

The most abundant metal in the Earth's crust is aluminium. The largest wave ever recorded was near the Japanese Island of Ishigaki in 1971 at 85 meters high. Fulgurite is formed when lightning strikes sand. At the nearest point, Russia and America are less than 4 km apart. The Channel between England and France grows about 300 millimeters each year. Mars has a volcano, Olympus Mons, which is 310-370 miles in diameter and 16 miles high. The Earth experiences about 50,000 earthquakes each year. The lowest temperature ever recorded was 129 degrees below 0 at Vostok, Antarctica, on July 21, 1983.

Invader ants win by losing diversity The Argentine ants that are trouncing U.S. species derive much of their takeover power, oddly enough, from losing genetic diversity. References & Sources Dolphins bray when chasing down a fish The first high-resolution analysis of which dolphin is making which sound suggests that hunters blurt out a low-frequency, donkeylike sound that may startle prey into freezing for an instant or attract other dolphins. References & Sources Spider real estate wars: Wake up early Big spiders in a colony get prime real estate day after day by spinning webs early. References & Sources

Donn, please login and join us. You said you liked learning new things...*smile*

Until he does, he sent me this url which should be on everyone's bookmarks for such cases as those we pray don't happen: EYE ON THE WORLD http://web.beol.net/tabonga/violent.html It has links to every sort of disaster web page, every agency which might be of help or source of information, plus the weird and offbeat at the bottom. I'm gonna check the catastrophism pages, myself...

Actually, you're gonna need permission slips from me to be allowed into some of those catastrophism sites. Taken with a huge grain of salt and a firm grounding in astronomy and geology, it appears ludicrous until you remember those who died because of a comet... Please accept my caveat and if you get upset with what you read there, come here first before you try any Koolaid...

Tried to get in wouldn't let me. Said time out - whatever that means. But I have put it onto favourites to read some time.

That one takes a while to load. All the time out means is that it took longer for the URL to respond to the request to download than your browser allowed. If you poke around inside of the parameters under which your browser runs, you can change that. But, perhaps it was busy. It is very good and worth trying again!

Aha - you are using IE rather than Netscape. That might make a difference, too.

Got it up on my husbands new computer - amazing programme.

You will love having it online. Just watch it when all other things get boring. Love the little icons, too!

yep did all that but messed up his sound card with the sounds of the umiverse!! Wonderful though all the same.

Hope it is not irreversible.......they were amazing sounds!

Sun Dog A "sun dog" is a bright spot in the sky that is always at the same height above the horizon as the sun, but 22 degrees to its left or right. The effect is caused by refraction of the sun's rays by ice crystals in the atmosphere, resulting in a second image of the sun reaching your eyes. (Just as if you hold up a glass of water and look at an object in the room both directly and through the water, you will see two images of it.) Click here to find a nice photograph of this "mock sun" (or parhelion) phenomenon. http://www.photolib.noaa.gov/lb_images/historic/nws/wea00148.htm

Q: How many cubic meters of dirt are in a hole 6 meters long, 2 meters wide, and one meter deep? A: None... it's a hole!

Really Marcia!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WHAT CELESTIAL BODY GOT ITS NAME FROM A GREEK WORD MEANING "LONG-HAIRED"? Comet. The name comes from the Greek kom(t(s, an adjective formed from the verb koman, "to wear long hair." (There is also a constellation, Coma Bernices) WHY DOES THE BRONX ZOO GET BLOOD DAILY FROM A LOCAL SLAUGHTERHOUSE? To feed its vampire bats, part of its captive breeding collection of bats - the largest in the world. (Yuck!)

Flea Facts Summer time is coming fast and that means flea season. Now is the time to "know thy enemy" and prepare for battle. Here are some flea facts to prepare you for the skirmish. There are 2,400 varieties of fleas, including dog fleas (Ctenocephalides Canis). A flea can jump 150 times its own length. This is equivalent to an adult human leaping over the Statue of Liberty. A jumping flea accelerates 50 times faster than the space shuttle! Want to live without fleas? Consider moving to the mountains. Fleas do not live above 500 feet. Fleas thrive in a warm humid environment--about 65 to 80 degrees Fahrenheit and about 70% humidity.

I really need to know that *grin*

Fun Fact: The Earth has a midriff bulge. Due to rotation the Earth is slightly flattened on each of its poles. As a result the circumfrence of the Earth is approximately 26 miles more than the measurement longatudinally around the poles.

Yup! We are thus an Oblate Spheroid as astronomers like to call it. Maggie - it made me itch just posting that data on the fleas.

I hope the self-imposed small tigress (red tabby) is holding up well against flea infestation.

She got a pretty white collar to wear and she is still giving us a wide berth and staring daggers at us. But, I am tired of killing of her fleas on me! Maybe I should get a tastful one for my own...~

Perhaps one with pearls and alexandrites?

There you go! Make that Moonstones and alexandrites and you have a deal! Pearls are too fragile for every day flea collars but lovely for formal occasions. You laugh, but the hippie children - some old enough to get social security - buy the most fles soap and "uku combs" Sheesh! Their personal grooming and hygene leaves a great deal to be desired...

I need help from a Web/Frontpage wizard in fixing the geo links on our main page at http://www.spring.net (reason, lack of time!). My plea has been issued forth!

I hear you but not sure how to do it... Perhaps cfadm will see your plea in here. I;ll try to track down Ann if all else fails. Other than hiding at the bottom of the page in the wrong table (did you want it in the center?) it is lovely and the links work. I am all smiles to have it there, especially now that there are some people now on board who Really know what they are talking about!

This is important.....Please read! How To Build A Fire Pit The wilderness is no place to build a fire pit, but if you want to build one at home here's how. -First, dig a hole in the ground where you want the fire pit. Size the hole depending on the size of the fire pit you want. For most fire pits, a hole one foot deep and three feet in diameter will suffice. -Next, line the bottom and sides of the hole with flat rocks. The rock-lined pit provides an excellent surface for shoveling out ashes, will support the logs better, and helps the fire burn hotter. -Finally, place larger rocks in a ring around the top of the hole. One final note: Never use rocks from rivers and lakes. They have absorbed water and can explode when heated.

IN THE LATE 1920'S, WHO ARRANGED 200 GOLF BALLS IN NEAT ROWS IN THE HOLLOW OF A FALLEN TREE AT A PUBLIC GOLF COURSE IN WINNIPEG, CANADA? A gopher, in the mistaken belief that they were eggs and would make appetizing wintertime eating. WHY DID LOCAL ENVIRONMENTAL OFFICIALS SPRAY-PAINT 108 PINK PLASTIC FLAMINGOS WHITE AND PLACE THEM IN GROUPS AROUND MARSHES IN THE EVERGLADES? To attract snowy egrets, white ibis and wood storks. The plastic flamingos were much cheaper than the white egret decoys. WHAT PERCENTAGE OF MEN ARE LEFT-HANDED? HOW ABOUT WOMEN? 10 percent of men; 8 percent of women. in parting... Wouldn't it be nice if the wattage of a car stereo could not exceed the IQ of the driver? --unknown

We have them in Hawaii and they are called Tarantula Hawks though the name is usually reserved for the much larger cousins in the Southwest of North America. They sting and incapacitate a "cane" (wolf) spider here and drag it somewhere safe to raise her baby. I have watched this industry many times and I am most impressed. She always rises in the air and does a circle for polarization location then off she goes to where her prey is then drags it all the way back to the hole she has dug. Absolutley amazing! Sphex Wasp The Sphex wasp has an egg laying ritual that has become a famous example of how absolutely rigid, instinctive behavior can appear quite intelligent. The female Sphex digs a burrow, stuns a caterpillar, drags it to the edge of her burrow, goes in a for a final check, drags the caterpillar in, then lays her eggs next to it. On the face of it, this looks like quite a well-thought out, intelligent sequence. But if you move the caterpillar a few inches away, when she comes back out from the inspection, she will drag it close again, and repeat the whole process You can move the caterpillar 40 times, and it will never occur to her to just drag it straight in and skip the re-inspection. This is a useful reminder that you can't always attribute human-style motivations to seemingly intelligent behavior.

This has nothing to do with Geo and everything to do with me. Play bagpipes and I will follow you anywhere : HOW MANY PIPES ARE THERE IN A TYPICAL SET OF SCOTTISH BAGPIPES? Five: the intake pipe, a valved tube connecting the bag to the player's mouth; the chanter, a pipe fitted with a double reed and pierced with eight sounding holes, used to play the melody; and three drones, pipes fitted with single reeds that provide the background.

HOW MANY POINTERS WERE THERE ON THE FIRST CLOCKS WITH HANDS - MADE IN THE FOURTEENTH CENTURY? Only one - to tell the hour. Minute and second hands were added in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.

WHAT IS VOG? A Hawaiian cousin of smog - it's a fog caused when sulfuric volcanic fumes mix with oxygen.

HOW DID MASSACHUSETTS SEA CAPTAIN JOSHUA SLOCUM - THE FIRST MAN TO SAIL SOLO AROUND THE WORLD - FIGHT OFF PIRATES ATTACKING HIS SLOOP? He turned away the barefoot pirates by spreading carpet tacks on the deck of his boat. Slocum completed his historic 46,000-mile, 38 month voyage in 1898. WHAT WAS USED TO ERASE LEAD PENCIL MARKS BEFORE RUBBER CAME INTO USE? Pieces of bread. WHAT WAS THE FIRST LIVING CREATURE EVER EJECTED FROM A SUPERSONIC AIRCRAFT? A bear, in 1962. It was parachuted from 35,000 feet to a safe landing on earth. WHAT REASON DID YALE UNIVERSITY GRADUATE STUDENT EDMUND D. LOONEY GIVE WHEN HE SOUGHT PERMISSION IN 1956 TO CHANGE HIS NAME? He claimed the name Looney would interfere with the practice of his chosen profession - psychiatry.

WHAT PIECE OF CONSTRUCTION EQUIPMENT IS NAMED AFTER AN EARLY SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY BRITISH HANGMAN? The derrick, which is named for Thomas Derrick - who carried out more than 3,000 executions during his career at Tyburn, near what is now the Marble Arch in London. IN 1964, A CAPSIZED FREIGHTER WAS REFLOATED IN KUWAIT BY FILLING ITS HULL WITH POLYSTYRENE BALLS. WHERE DID THIS IDEA ORIGINATE? In a 1949 Donald Duck comic, in which Donald and his nephews raised a yacht using ping pong balls. WHAT WAS THE SYMBOLISM BEHIND FLYING A FLAG AT HALF-MAST AS A SIGN OF MOURNING WHEN THE CUSTOM WAS FIRST INTRODUCED AT SEA IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY? The top of the mast was left empty for the invisible flag of death.

Light pulses flout sacrosanct speed limit Week of June 10, 2000; Vol. 157, No. 24 P. Weiss Five years ago, a wave of discontent swept away the 55-mile-per-hour U.S. speed limit. Nowadays, some physicists are taking a hard look at the 670-million-miles-per-hour speed limit of light in a vacuum, or c. Albert Einstein posted this limit in his 1905 theory of special relativity. Although popular lore and some physics textbooks still contend that nothing races faster than c, experiments going back decades have repeatedly shown that light can beat that speed under certain conditions. A few scientists argue that those experiments hint that Einstein was wrong. Two new experiments reveal dramatic additional evidence of superluminal velocity but make no clear case for repealing Einstein's law, scientists say. In one study, conducted in Italy, scientists propagated superluminal microwaves through air by bouncing them off a mirror. In the other, led by a New Jersey researcher, a laser pulse approaching a gas-filled cell's entry window materialized at the cell's exit glass before even reaching the cell. Although superluminal phenomena might someday help speed up computers�an avenue being explored by Raymond Y. Chiao of the University of California, Berkeley�the main excitement around these experiments stems from basic physics implications. More.....http://www.sciencenews.org/20000610/fob7.asp

Science News Week of June 10, 2000; Vol. 157, No. 24 Tsunami! At Lake Tahoe? Surprised tourists could catch the ultimate wave By K. Brown Postcards from Lake Tahoe all flaunt a peaceful, brilliant-blue stretch of mountain water. But geologists have been snapping a very different picture of the lake lately. Far beneath Lake Tahoe's gentle surface, they say, several hidden earthquake faults snake across the lake's flat bottom. These faults put the lake at a bizarre risk for an inland body of water. If the researchers are right, Lake Tahoe tourists could one day feel the ground tremble and, just minutes later, face a tsunami. Roiling waves of water would crest to 10 meters at the shore and crisscross the lake for hours. Tsunamis typically emerge in oceans, usually after a quake drops or lifts part of the seafloor. Undersea landslides�alone or following a quake�can also trigger these giant waves. In 1998, for instance, a tsunami devastated Papua New Guinea, sweeping away more than 2,000 people living on the country's northern coast (SN: 8/1/98, p. 69). And in the past decade, tsunamis have lashed the coasts of Japan, Nicaragua, and Indonesia, as well. But Lake Tahoe? While it may seem improbable, Lake Tahoe holds just the right blend of ingredients to brew a tsunami. For one thing, it has plenty of water. As the world's 10th-largest lake, Lake Tahoe stretches 35 kilometers long, 19 km wide, and, in some spots, 500 m deep. What's more, the lake sits smack in the middle of earthquake country, nestled in a fault-riddled basin that straddles California and Nevada. Dozens of minor or moderate quakes erupt along faults in the region every week, and the Lake Tahoe area is no exception. All it would take, scientists say, is a strong quake directly beneath the lake to send the waters spewing, tsunami-style. To get a better grip on Lake Tahoe's tsunami potential, University of Nevada, Reno geologists have been modeling different quake scenarios. According to their calculations, if a magnitude 7 quake struck either of two major faults under the lake, the bottom could open like a trapdoor, with a chunk of it suddenly dropping as much as 4 m. Just behind it would fall a huge, sinking slosh of water�generating a giant wave that would reach the surface, gather strength, and come barreling to shore as a tsunami. And that's just the beginning. The scientists think the tsunami, in turn, would create so-called seiche waves, mountainous waves that lurch from shore to shore for hours on end. "Think of the lake like a pan full of water. When you knock one end way down, the water surges and then sloshes back and forth for some time," says Gene A. Ichinose, a geophysics graduate student at Nevada-Reno and lead author of the group's study, which appeared in the April 15 Geophysical Research Letters. As in a jostled pan of water, some waves would likely splash past their usual borders�right into the homes and hotels that dot the Lake Tahoe shoreline. As Ichinose puts it, "If you feel the earth shaking for 5 or 10 seconds, get to high ground." Inland tsunamis are extremely rare. Last year, geologist Jody More....http://www.sciencenews.org/20000610/bob1.asp

Parabolic Focus Have you ever wondered why satellite dishes have the shape they do? That shape is a part of a paraboloid, which is what results when you rotate a parabola around its axis. A parabola is the set of points that are equidistant from a fixed line (the directrix) and a central point (the focus). The interesting property of a paraboloid is that if a set of parallel waves (such as you get from a distant transmitter) comes into it, the waves will all be reflected to the focus. So a satellite dish is designed with a receiver at the focus point to collect the signal that comes into the area of the whole dish. This amplification makes it possible to accurately register a weak signal. This same highly directional amplification concept is used in the design of the parabolic microphones that you see in use during sporting events, ensuring that high quality audio can be gotten from the players on the field even in the midst of the immense volume of the crowd.

Holy Cow, That's A Big Horse! A pure-bred Irish draught horse owned by Joanna Shires of England may hit a record for size. The six-year-old horse is 19 hands high (six foot, four inches tall), although most horses of that breed are under 17.2 hands high. Shires says the good-tempered horse is still growing!

IN ASTRONOMY, WHAT IS A WHITE DWARF? The dense, burned-out remains of a star; a stellar corpse. THE HIGHEST SURFACE WIND SPEED EVER RECORDED WAS AT MOUNT WASHINGTON, NEW HAMPSHIRE, ON APRIL 24, 1934. WHAT WAS IT? It was 231 miles per hour. (Winds become hurricane force when they reach 74 miles per hour.) (I was up there in a dead calm. Very disappointing!)

231 miles an hour!!! Incredible.

In the winter that wind can freeze you literally in moments. You can see why I was so disappointed by the dead calm. They test jet engines up there.

- The female king crab incubates as many as 400,000 young for 11 months in a brood pouch under her abdomen. - Because of their extreme elasticity, the human lungs are 100 times easier to blow up than a child�s toy balloon. - From the 1820s to 1960s, the Lehigh River in eastern Pennsylvania, was owned by the Lehigh Coal and Navigation Co., making it the only privately owned river in the United States. - The Roman historian Pliny was so impressed by garlic and its perceived powers, he listed no less than 61 medicinal uses for the pungent bulb. Among them was that of warding off vampires, restoring hair loss, and preventing warts. - The hottest day ever in Canada was July 5, 1937 when the mercury soared to 113 Fahrenheit (45 degrees Celsius) in Midale and Yellowgrass, Saskatchewan. But that's downright chilly compared to the United States where the temperature hit 135 (56.7 Celsius) degrees Fahrenheit on July 10, 1913 at Death Valley, California, and Al'azizyah, Libya, where thermometers reached 137 F (58 C) on September 13, 1922. - The Bactrian camel is the only mammal on Earth that can survive on salt water.

Why do people get goose bumps? Goose bumps are a carryover from the days when humans' bodies were covered with fur. They are caused by the contraction of tiny muscles at the base of each strand of your body hair, and when those muscles contract they cause the hair to puff up. This action served two purposes: 1. It created an insulating layer of air next to the skin that helped keep a body warm in cold weather. This is why you get goose bumps whenever you are cold. 2. It gave your furry ancestors (of course, my ancestors weren't furry) a larger and more menacing appearance in the face of danger; this is why you get goose bumps when you are scared or frightened.

Why are portholes (windows) on a ship round? The constant up and down motion of a ship places a lot of strain and stress on a ship's outer covering, or skin. If portholes were designed at angles, the stress would tend to concentrate at those points and perhaps crack the skin (probably not a good thing). With portholes being round, this stress is evenly distributed around the holes, making it less likely for these cracks to occur.

WHERE AND WHEN WAS THE GREATEST EARTHQUAKE IN AMERICAN HISTORY? It took place in Missouri on December 16, 1811, at about 2:00 p.m. It is estimated the quake would have measured 8.7 on the Richter scale, compared with only 8.3 for the 1906 San Francisco earthquake. However, the Missouri area was sparsely populated in 1811, so the San Francisco quake took more lives and damages more property.

Where in Missouri?

The New Madrid fault.

We discussed this last year in the Seismology topic, as I recall. It actually changed the course of Mississippi River!

Why do dogs sometimes turn around several times before taking a nap? Domesticated dogs, being descendants of wild dogs, still retain some of a wild dog's instincts. Wild dogs typically live in the forest or in the brush, and often have to trample down grass and weeds to make a comforatable place to lie down. They do this by walking around and around in tight circles. It is speculated remnants of this instinct account for a domesticated dog's tendency to turn around a few times before taking a nap.

WHERE AND WHEN WAS THE FIRST RECORDED BASEBALL GAME? On June 19, 1846, at Elysian Fields in Hoboken, New Jersey, the New York Club beat the Knickerbockers, 23-1. On that date, another baseball tradition began: The New York Club pitcher, James Whyte Davis, was fines 6 cents for swearing at the umpire.

WHAT ARE THE HIGHEST AND LOWEST ELEVATIONS IN THE UNITED STATES? The highest elevation is Mount McKinley, Alaska, at 20,320 feet. The lowest is Death Valley, California, at 282 feet below sea level. The average elevation of the United States is 2,500 feet. IF THE FEMALE SIDE OF A FAMILY IS CALLED THE DISTAFF SIDE, WHAT IS THE MALE SIDE? The spear side. A distaff was a stick with a cleft end, used to hold the flax or wool from which a woman spun thread. The distaff was considered a woman's tool, while the spear was a man's. Both ways of describing genealogy are now rarely used.

Why do geese fly in a "V" formation? I know that answer because I talked with some geese one day - as they were chasing and hissing at me in my Dad's backyard. Seriously, who knows, but there are two theories as to why they do it. The first theory speculates the "V" formation allows each bird to take maximum advantage of disturbances in the air created by the flap of the bird in front. These disturbances are generated in an inverted "V" pattern very similar to the formation flown by the geese. The second theory speculates because the bird's eyes are located on the sides of their heads, the "V" formation provides each bird with the best simultaneous view of the flock leader and the direction of the group's flight. You can decide for yourself or make up your own theory.

Have you ever tried to ask the local geese? Are they called "Nene"?

Never asked the Nene, but I sneaked them an oatmeal cookie (very much disapproved by both me and the park service.) They do not fly far enough (do not migrate) to fly in a V, but they are always in pairs.

HOW MANY TYPES OF CLOUDS ARE THERE? There are 10: cirrus, cirrocumulus, cirrostratus, altocumulus, altostratus, nimbostratus, stratocumulus, stratus, cumulus, cumulonimbus. Each of these clouds has a different shape and internal structure. HOW FAST IS THE CONTINENTAL DRIFT? The plates (solid segments of the earth's crust and upper mantle) that consist mostly of continents move at an average speed of about 2 centimeters per year. Europe and North America are moving apart at about this speed. The plates that are mostly under the oceans move faster, at an average speed of about 10 centimeters per year. It has been 200 million years since the original supercontinent, Pangaea, broke up into the continents we know today.

IF THE MOON PASSES BETWEEN THE EARTH AND THE SUN EVERY MONTH, WHY DOESN'T IT ECLIPSE THE SUN? The orbit of the moon around the earth is tilted at an angle of about 6 degrees from the plane of the earth's orbit around the sun. As a result, the moon is usually above or below the line between the earth and the sun - except on certain predictable occasions.

Why are ships referred to as "she?" Many moons ago - that means a long time ago, new sailing ships were dedicated to a goddess who allegedly protected the ship. This goddess would allegedly guide the ship safely to its destination. An image of the goddess was typically carved on the ship's bow, and this carved image led to the ships being referred to as "she."

Why are stop signs red? While the color yellow is the most visible color in the color spectrum, the color red is the most exciting. The color red elevates the blood pressure, increases a person's pulse rate, and heightens the nervous system and tension. This makes the color red the most likely to attract human attention, which is what a person would want in a stop sign.

interesting!

I thought so, and could not think of anyplace else for these little bits of information...so they go here. Were we not talking about this just the other day, Wolfie??

Happy First Birthday, Geo My thoughts and thanks to the man to was so sure I could handle this conference when I was so sure I could not. With infinite patience he held my hand and corrected my errors as I made them. Geo would not have existed without him. I hope he is as happy with my efforts and results as I am. It has been quite a year! Thanks, also, to those who lurk and comment to me privately. I appreciate your thoughts and interest. To those who actually login and participate, my undying gratitude. Without you this would have been the most boring monologue in cyber space. Please continue to post - I will try to keep it interesting! MAHALO NUI LOA

Why did I put this on topic 1? It was the first thing I ever created all by myself here. What a feeling!

this is great!!!!!!! am so proud of you! *HUGS*

Thanks, Wolfie!!! *Big Warm and Fuzzy Hugs*

HAPPY FIRST BIRTHDAY GEO! Thank you Marcia for all the work you do. Geo looks wonderful.

Thanks Cheryl - you helped too! Many thanks for continuing to find it interesting. It has been the most rewarding thing I have ever done outside of raising an incredible son. In this case the birthing pains lasted longer with Geo, but it was entirely worth it!

Happy First Birthday Geo!! Time flies, eh? Congratulations, Marcia! Thanks for creating such an interesting conference!

Wow!!! Thanks Ginny! I consider that high praise, indeed. I know you know about these things and can evaluate what I am doing. Humble gratitude to you! Other than David, Geo has given me the greatest sense of satisfaction. The first 6 months were the hardest. I had to block and tackle some of the posters in the early days...and there are still some who think Geo is forbiddingly intellectual. Riiiiiiight!!! Oh well...

Hey, I shoulda thrown a baby luau like they do here... Virtual Victuals could do the catering. Or the local cyber cafe, Bytes and Bites... Probably just as well I didn't. Poi in the keyboard is something you don't want to contemplate!

Poi in the keyboard? Ech!! :-) Bad enough when people spill coffee on keyboards! (And there's a few crumbs in my keyboard at work, I'm sure...) I've learned a lot by reading Geo, as well as having a lot of laughs. I was always into astronomy and cosmology, but I have a lot to learn about geology. I didn't know anything about volcanos before I met you and David. (And as far as web pages, I only know basic HTML...you've seen my web page!) Anyway, there's always something new to learn...that's what makes life interesting!!

Got that right, Ginny! Hope you are watching the Tall Ships Parade in Boston today as I am (The History Channel is carrying it alive) - hoow glorious the day and how magestic the ships! I have a spill guard vinyl cover on my keys to keep them clean inbetween. It is very easy to become accustomed to, and saves s lot of grief! But poi? Yeesh!

3/4 of the Earth's surface is water....and only 1/4 is land.... The Good Lord's intentions were very clear. A man's time should be divided accordingly. 3/4 for fishing 1/4 for work

What color exactly is poi? Heck, what exactly is poi?

Poi is a leaden greyish purple translucent glutinous starchy substance obtained by cooking the taro root - a corm - then pounding it into a pasty consistency adding water and straining out the fibrous masses as you go. Eventually a uniform consistency is obtained and kept......more next posting

kept twor three days unrefrigerated as it gets more tart and fruity and totally delicious. Fresh is almost tasteless. Anyone hungry?

no, grossed out, yes. sounds really gross, marcia, i'm sorry. what do you do with it once you pound the pulp out of it?

you strain it through cheese cloth and put it in something like a bowl and gradually thin it with water

wolfie - it is soo good when it is ripe and tangy with little white mold on it which you beat into the mix and eat with Laulau and lomilomi salmon! So Ono! (I think it is an acquired taste.)

Cheryl was so grossed out she did not even post a comment. That'll teach you to ask about Hawaiian delicacies. How about raw crab or sea urchin???

It does sound rather like an acquired taste, but I'd probably try it, as long as it doesn't look like ocra. It certainly wouldn't be the strangest thing I've ever tried!! I draw the line at raw fish or meat, though.

Raw fish is wonderful.....funny you should ask... I'm with you on the okra.

Ginny, when you next visit (iki will be here in October!) I will make sure you get the best tasting poi available and let you report back on the state of the staple.

I think I've recovered. Actually, the mold isn't all that gross when you think about it. I eat cheese, which is basically milk which has gone bad. People pay a lot of money for cheeses such as Roquefort and Stilton, which are full of mold. Does the poi start to ferment, which is what gives it the fruity quality? Anyway, I thought an Hawaiian delicacy was Spam. The thought of raw sea urchin is gross, however. Raw sea urchin is for sea otters. Once at a Japanese restaurant I got a whiff of someone else's sea urchin soup. In a word, disgusting. It smelled as though it should have been in the tampon box in the ladies' room. I'm sorry, but that is the most apt desription for the smell.

Yes......gotcha on the sea urchin..do not indulge in any bottom feeders raw. Penecillin is mold, also. It is pure white mold which gives poi its fruity flavor. Ever think of wine? Noble Rot, they call it.

Noble Rot. Yes, the great sweet wines of Sauternes and the Rhine owe their characteristics and longevity to it. Penecillin is also found in the famous ewe's milk cheese Roquefort.

I wonder if wine and cheese parties are ever gonna be the same for our readers

Maybe not. Then again, people who read the Geo conference are tough. They can take it.

Rough, tough creampuffs!

Wow!! Is that good or not??? Yup, Geologist know how to get down and dirty when necessary...and how to remain ladies at all times (or most all time, anyway)

WHAT PERCENTAGE OF THE SAHARA DESERT IS COVERED BY SAND? About 20 percent - the rest is comprised of barren rocks, rocky plateaus and gravel-covered plains. WHAT IS THE LOWEST BODY OF WATER ON THE EARTH? The Dead Sea. At its lowest point, it's 1,315 feet below sea level.

I love the phrase "rough, tough creampuffs". Did you know it is impossible to get sunburn at the level of the Dead Sea? It is. It has something to do with the density of the athmosphere, I think.

I heard something about the Chandler Wobble today. It seems that as the Earth rotates, it also wobbles on its axis. If you could insert a large rod into the North Pole, you'd notice the rod making a circle of 20 miles in diameter. The Chandler Wobble was first noticed in 1891 and since then no one is quite sure why the Earth does this. There is now a new theory claiming the wobble is due to the displacement of vast amounts of water traveling through the world's oceans, such as currents and tides. It seems large amounts of seawater are being pounded into the Earth's crust, which in turn causes the Earth to wobble as it rotates.

I love the phrase "rough, tough creampuffs". Did you know it is impossible to get sunburn at the level of the Dead Sea? It is. It has something to do with the density of the athmosphere, I think.

Hmmmmmm.....interesting theory!

Greetings from where the rocks are other than igneous

Are you in California now? Say hello to the sedimentary and metamorphic rocks. If they answer -- run like hell.

Yes, I am midst the alien flora and fauna of the State of California - which is an altered state in all meanings of the word... Hoping the rocks don't talk to me, and I promise to run for cover if they do.

California is reputed to be an alternate reality. They rocks haven't started speaking yet, have they?

Funny you should ask. I have a sack of volcanic rocks from Long Valley Caldera whihc speak volumes (but you gotta buy the book to understand it.) Great whopping hunks of Obsidian and other volcanic origin as well as a great piece of Granite from the current peaks of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. The people, however, as still very far out and seem to be on another planet. Definitely "Beam me up, Scotty" time here!

From Frank in Pennsylvania There has been some weird news in PA lately. In one of the towns that used to be a coal-mining community a hole opened in the middle of a downtown street. Its surface dimensions were about the size of a car, but the bottom didn't show. They dumped 300 tons of rock down the hole, but the rocks all disappeared! Last I heard, they were drilling exploratory holes all around the area to try to find out what is (and isn't) down there. Of course they assume that there was some sort of settling or cave-in of an old mine under the town.

I've heard of bottomless pits.

Read a book once where rocks were swallowed up in a bottomless pit. I mean literally swallowed - sounds like something the same here! How strange.

are there any in the US?

My Mom used to live in a renovated old house over a coal mine. Despite the renovation work the kitchen floor slanted, if you spilled anything you'd have to run to catch it. Mom has since moved. As far as I know, the house is still standing in one piece. Still, the thought of something that deep under the town is frigtening.

There are reports (Art Bell, if you believe his stuff)of bottomless pits in Oregon.

All you geophiles out there, please note that my AOL IM login name is now changed to Kilauea83A. Please add me to your list just in case you need to get in touch with me. When I transferred the information to this new big computer I managed to forget the old login password. Alas, I had to change it.

Dirty snow melts faster than white snow because it is darker and absorbs mroe heat. Peanuts are one of the ingredients of dynamite. Signals on your telphone travel 100,000 miles per second. An elephant is not afraid of a mouse.

that peanuts thing could explain spontaneous human combustion!

The honey bee is the only bee that dies after stinging. The bat is the only mammal that can fly. Sharks are the only fish that can blink both eyes.

*lol* Wolfie, what peanuts do to my son is unmentionable and objectionable in asocial setting. Pass the Beano!

Lake Michigan is the only Great Lake entirely in the USA. Nepal is the only country in the world which does not have a rectangular flag - it has two triangular pennants, one on top of the other. The great horned owl is the only animal that will eat a skunk. The kiwi is the only bird that has nostrils at the end of its bill.

WHAT IS A QUASAR? It is another name for a quasi-stellar object. It looks like a star but emits as much radiation as an entire galaxy, with a volume far smaller than that of our Milky Way galaxy. No one knows what quasar is; recent evidence suggests it might be a galaxy with a big black hole at the center. WHAT MAKES LAVA LAMPS WORK? The colored stuff is an oil-based mixture that gets more liquidy as the water around it warms up; it moves because of convection currents. Oil and water do not mix, but the homogenize, which is why you should never shake a lava lamp. Lava lites were invented by Craven Walker in England and presented in 1965. They were marketed in America by Adolf Wertheimer.

Lava lites were invented by Craven Walker in England and presented in 1965. Posted presumably to commemorate the death of Edward Craven Walker last week aged 82.

Thanks for that update, Mark. I had no idea, and if they were not still so expensive for a night light, I would have added to his bank account long ago! We Have a real Lava Lamp here but it is atop a mountain and gets out of control from time to time. Better where it is, I think! How is cricket season going??

Fine, thank you. About a month left. Keep posting your unusual facts, Marcia. Always well worth a read.

Thanks, Mark. I still smile when I think of the Saga of the Cricket Ball... Did you get snowed on? Imagine snow in England (4-6") in August...!!!

More trivial stuff to make your day: Your brain is aproximately 80% water. Your feet perspire approximately one-half of a pint of water per day. Here in Houston my feet perspire a whole pint, but that's more information than you wanted to know beside it being damned hot here in Houston. William Moulton Marston was the creator of Wonder Woman. He also invented the polygraph. Flamingos can only eat when their heads are upside down. Abraham Lincoln died in a bed slept in by his assassin, John Wilkes Booth. Chinese celebrate their birthdays only once every ten years.

Wow, I must really be out of the loop. Are you in Houston, Marcia? If you are, the place has a rotten climate, doesn't it? Okay, that's my opinion.

Nope, still in Hilo, Hawaii with my Volcano, Kilauea. Honey, when you wander out of the loop I wil personally pull you back in... Will you do the same for me? I do wander sometimes!

Oh, I am pseting those comments from someone else. My personal feet do not do that...

A toad has no teeth. There are more chickens than people in the world. Plymouth Rock weighs seven tons. Eli Whitney made more money as a gun manufacturer than he did form the cotton gin. The roller coaster was invented in the 17th century in Russia.

From the Trivia guy: There are more sweat glands on the soles of your feet than on any other part of your body, which is kinda why I mentioned sweaty feet earlier in this week's trivia. Speaking of feet, did you know African elephants stay on their feet for 35 to 40 years? According to Goodyear, who allegedly spent 10 years researching this, a person's right shoe will wear out faster than your left shoe. An average person takes 18,000 steps per day. In your average lifetime, you will walk the equivalent of three times around the world. I'm tired just thinking about it. George Washington had a size 13 foot. Robert E. Lee had a size 4.5 foot.

Marcia, you are a wealth of wonderful knowlege. I will pull you back in the loop it you wander out of it, as well. I think I read somewhere that there are 3 sheep for every person in New Zealand. Which brings up a story concerning my aunt's and uncle's vacation to New Zealand several years ago. They were sitting in the hotel's bar, having just started up a conversation with another American. This man had just returned from climbing the highest point in New Zealand. He said when he got up there, he found another climber, an Australian, who said to him, "Did you come up here to get away from the sheep, too? The little woolly bastards are everywhere." It sounds like a comedy sketch line, but my aunt and uncle swear this is what the American climber told them.

That is Hilarious!!! Thanks for sharing! I heard the sheep outnumbered us 10 to one in New Zealand.

They've been breeding furiously it would seem.

It is about the only thing to do in that beautiful country other than browse the ground. Feeling a little sheepish? Visit New Zealand!

You might consider sending that slogan to the New Zealand tourist board.

Too funny! I wonder how their sense of humor is these days about those sheep. I have heard curious things about human - sheep relations. Perhaps it is best to keep a safe distance from the subject considering this Island occupies a place in the same ocean that EnZed does...

Very true.

A hummingbird can not stand on its feet as they are not strong enough to hold them up on a flat surface. Your feet swell during the day and can become 10 percent bigger at the end of the day than they were when you woke up this morning. City Ordinance #352 in Pacific Grove, California (USA) makes it illegal, actually a misdemeanor, to kill or threaten to kill a butterfly. The most popular name for a male cat is Tiger. The state flower of Alaska is a forget-me-not.

HOW MANY TIMES DOES THE AVERAGE HUMAN HEART BEAT? About 100,000 -to pump 5 quarts of blood every minute. WHAT GEM SERVED AS CLEOPATRA'S SIGNET? The amethyst. She believed it had magical powers.

DISCOVERY DISPATCH FOR 8/25/2000 ----------------------------------------------------------- ============= MAIN FEATURES ============= HORROR AT SEA: THE USS INDIANAPOLIS http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&e=S&cf=1&pr=291&c=57862&pa=41 Near the end of World War II, 900 sailors survived the sinking of their ship only to be stranded in shark-infested waters for five days. Hear true accounts from some of the 316 who made it home. JACQUELINE KENNEDY ONASSIS AND VICTOR MATURE: WHO'S THE MISSING LINK? http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&e=S&cf=1&pr=291&c=57866&pa=41 Follow the clues to solve the mystery of the famous person these two famous people had in common. THE APPRAISER'S CORNER http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&e=S&cf=1&pr=291&c=57871&pa=41 Might your fortune lie in grandpa's old army bayonet or grandma's porcelain dolls? Only our appraiser can tell you for sure. 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The program, hosted by Dr. Bob Arnot, premieres Wednesday, August 30 at 10 p.m. ET. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=1&c=57897&pr=291&cf=1&pa=41&e=S EMAIL OUR YOUTH HATE-GROUP EXPERTS http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&e=S&cf=1&pr=291&c=57899&pa=41 Do you have questions about youth hate groups and violence? Go to Discovery.com right after the East Coast and West Coast broadcasts of "Warnings From a Small Town" on Wednesday for live webcasts with our experts. Email your questions now! FEEL YOUR WAY TO BETTER SIGHT http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&e=S&cf=1&pr=291&c=57900&pa=41 WATCH THE GORILLA IN LIVE STREAMING VIDEO http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&e=S&cf=1&pr=291&c=57901&pa=41 THE BEST LONG-TERM CARE http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&e=S&cf=1&pr=291&c=57904&pa=41 Nothing is easy when it comes to choosing a long-term care facility for a loved one, but our guide will help you determine what to look for in a nursing home. REDISCOVERING THE BENEFITS OF CROP ROTATION http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&e=S&cf=1&pr=291&c=57906&pa=41 ======== CHANNELS ======== THIS WEEK ON TV: TLC, SUNDAY, "THE DETONATORS." Join us for a three-hour marathon of explosive entertainment, from fireworks to demolition to blasting into space. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=1&c=57917&pr=291&cf=1&pa=41&e=S DISCOVERY HEALTH, MONDAY, "DESERT VIRUS." Follow the story of the deadly Hantavirus that seemed to come from nowhere to invade southwestern United States in May 1993. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=2&c=57917&pr=291&cf=1&pa=41&e=S TRAVEL CHANNEL, TUESDAY, "KING OF THE PYRAMIDS." Never heard of King Sneferu? Well, if it weren't for him you may never have heard of that Tut fellow, either. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=3&c=57917&pr=291&cf=1&pa=41&e=S ANIMAL PLANET, WEDNESDAY, "STALKING THE BIG CROCS." Wildlife adventurer Wayne Crawford takes you down Africa's Shire River for a look at the closest things to dinosaurs you'll ever see. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=4&c=57917&pr=291&cf=1&pa=41&e=S DISCOVERY CHANNEL, THURSDAY, "CASINO!" Odds are that you'll be fascinated by the hardcore gambling atmosphere of Atlantic City, where the clientele may be blue collar, but the profits rival the biggest in Las Vegas. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=5&c=57917&pr=291&cf=1&pa=41&e=S

The National Safety Council says more Americans choke on toothpicks than choking on anything else. "Celluwipes" was the original name of Kleenex during the initial marketing effort in 1924. There are 11 points on the Canadian flag. Montgomery Ward's first catalog was only one sheet of paper. It was first printed in 1872. I don't believe thery publish the catalog anymore (are they even still in business?). Almost half of the bones in your body are in your hands and feet. Istanbul, Turkey is actually in two continents - Asia and Europe.

Tour plane down: Eight people survive the ditching off Hilo HILO -- Surfers saw it from the beach, and pilots could hear it from the sky: The Big Island plane suffering engine problems had to ditch the plane into ocean whitecaps in Hilo Bay. One person, a passenger, remained missing this morning. But eight people, including the pilot, survived the crash landing of a Big Island Air twin-engine Piper Navajo Chieftain at about 5:30 p.m. yesterday. The survivors were quickly rescued by the combined efforts of a Hilo Fire Department helicopter and boat. Both vehicles were joined today by a U.S. Coast Guard helicopter and the cutter Kiska. Navy divers were to join the search for the missing person this afternoon. more...http://starbulletin.com/2000/08/26/news/story1.html

ooh nasty! Did you see/hear it Marcia?

Only on my public utilities Scanner radio. We did not know about it till the fire rescue units were involved. Had I been monitoring the bands as I usually do, I wold have heard the entire thing. As far as I know, at this hour they still have not recovered the missing person.

Mt. Etna is erupting. Watch it happen: http://www-personal.usyd.edu.au/~gerhard/cam_etna.html

+----------- Bizarre Product Warning Labels -----------+ Batman Costume - Warning: Cape does not enable user to fly. European Camera - This camera will only work when film is inside. Liquid Plummer - Warning: Do not reuse the bottle to store beverages. Toilet Plunger - Caution: Do not use near power lines. Little Ones Baby Lotion - Keep away from children Hair Coloring - Do not use as an ice cream topping. Boot's Children's Cough Medicine - Do not drive a car or run machinery.

Bollide in daytime picked up by weather satellites:

That truly belongs in geo 24 so I will post it there later when I post the entire story of that particular image.

"Instead of giving money to found colleges to promote learning, why don't they pass a constitutional amendment prohibiting anybody from learning anything? If it works as good as the Prohibition one did, why, in five years we would have the smartest race of people on Earth." --Will Rogers

"A university is what a college becomes when the faculty loses interest in students." --John Ciardi "I was thrown out of college for cheating on the metaphysics exam; I looked into the soul of the boy next to me." --Woody Allen "In the hands of a teenager, a seat belt buckle is a lethal weapon." --National Highway Traffic Safety Administration Official on why there are no seatbelts on public school buses "Our schools have been scientifically designed to prevent over-education from happening....The average American [should be] content with their humble role in life, because they're not tempted to think about any other role." --U.S. Commissioner of Education William Harris, 1889 "I have never let my schooling interfere with my education." --Mark Twain

DISCOVERY DISPATCH FOR 9/1/2000 ----------------------------------------------------------- ================ IN THE SPOTLIGHT ================ DIVE INTO A CORAL ADVENTURE We're live in the Bahamas on one of the world's largest barrier reefs, among scavenger sea worms, brain coral and shell-less nudibranchs. Now, how can you resist that? http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=1&c=63492&pr=331&cf=1&pa=41&e=S ANIMAL OLYMPICS: YOU'RE THE JUDGE! Who's the better predator ... the scorpion or the gila monster? Is an archerfish a cooler killer than a croc? Your votes will determine the outcome. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=1&c=62020&pr=331&cf=1&pa=41&e=S THE SIGHTS AND SOUNDS OF DOWN UNDER In Australia you can hear the subtle whispers and the overwhelming roars. The sounds heard nowhere else on the planet. Are you ready for a little listen? Click below to send a FREE greeting with spectacular views of Australia now. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=1&c=62033&pr=331&cf=1&pa=41&e=S http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=2&c=62033&pr=331&cf=1&pa=41&e=S ARE YOU PART OF AN ODD COUPLE? Somehow, neat freaks and slobs seem to end up living together more often that you'd think. Whether you're an Oscar or a Felix, we have some tips on smoothing out the sticky situation. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=1&c=63133&pr=331&cf=1&pa=41&e=S ============= MAIN FEATURES ============= HATE & VIOLENCE: WHAT CAN YOU DO? Are we all destined to be victims sooner or later? Some people don't think so. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=4&c=63501&pr=331&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Test Your Violence I.Q. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=1&c=63501&pr=331&cf=1&pa=41&e=S How Likely Are You To Be Murdered? http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=2&c=63501&pr=331&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Youth & Violence: See Our Poll Results. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=3&c=63501&pr=331&cf=1&pa=41&e=S What would drive a child to kill? http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=5&c=63501&pr=331&cf=1&pa=41&e=S THE DARKEST SIDE OF RICHARD NIXON? A new biography claims that the public knew only a few of President Nixon's demons. Might drugs and domestic violence be parts of the man's already-tarnished reputation? http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=1&c=62060&pr=331&cf=1&pa=41&e=S MONSTER OR LEGEND? YOU BE THE JUDGE. El Chupacabra is a creature that makes Bigfoot look like the Easter Bunny. But although plenty of people claim to have seen him, no one has ever managed to capture him. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=1&c=63493&pr=331&cf=1&pa=41&e=S DON'T KNOW MUCH ABOUT HISTORY? (WE CAN HELP.) Know Your History From A-to-Z. Calamity Jane, Caligula, Charlemagne, Dick Cheney ... and that's just a little bit of the C's. Imagine all you can find about the ancient and recent past. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=1&c=63503&pr=331&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Eavesdrop on a President. The private Lyndon Johnson was not the staid, fatherly figure who addressed the American public on television. Hear his phone conversations on topics ranging from the JFK assassination to Vietnam. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=2&c=63503&pr=331&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Stonewall's Last Stand. It was the Battle of Chancellorsville, and few realized that it meant the beginning of the end for the Confederacy. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=3&c=63503&pr=331&cf=1&pa=41&e=S SEE EGYPT'S HIDDEN GEMS Why see this ancient wonderland just like every other tourist? We have the spots that will run a chill up your spine, and spice up your stories for years to come. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=1&c=63067&pr=331&cf=1&pa=41&e=S TO YOUR HEALTH Ahhhhh ... Choo! Summer allergies still plaguing you? Check out our allergy zone for tips on combating those pesky allergens. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=3&c=63248&pr=331&cf=1&pa=41&e=S STILL GOT THOSE FRESHMAN FIFTEEN? Help someone else avoid them. In doing so, you will help keep off the 11,000 tons of additional weight added to the hips and bellies of the nation's brightest teen-agers every year. 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Over 2500 left handed people a year are killed from using products made for right handed people. A cockroach can live several weeks with its head cut off until it dies from starvation. The worlds oldest piece of chewing gum is over 9000 years old. One quarter of the bones in your body, are in your feet. A giraffe can clean its ears with its 21-inch tongue. In Tokyo, they sell toupees for dogs. Some lions mate over 50 times a day. The poison-arrow frog has enough poison to kill about 2,200 people.

------------ Trapped Miners Eat Coal To Survive ------------ Four Chinese miners showed remarkable endurance and ironclad stomachs by surviving on a diet of coal and leaves when a landslide trapped them underground for 13 days. 33-year-old Wang Bo, a former soldier, took control of the situation and organized his colleagues to save water and start digging their way out. The four were eventually reduced to eating coal, but the trick seemed to work, because after seven days underground, they could hear rescuers digging down. Finally, on August 24, Wang and his colleagues saw the light of day.

A full-grown elephant weighs LESS than the tongue of a Blue Whale...

After all that 'elephant ears' talk in spring ark ....this IS a surprising fact.

Never thought of the connection when I posted the above tongue trivia. Hmmm. Gonna have to check with the only Spanish Pachyderm known in my world.

Go to link below for story on blood fossils ....lost heart trying to transfer it in here... sorry, you'll just have to go and look .... http://www.spring.net/yapp-bin/restricted/read/cultures/29.14

"Spam" stands for Shoulder Pork and hAM. The concept of "escape velocity" applies only to unpowered projectiles, not powered rockets. Maryland has 47 operational State parks, including 7 parks with waterfront areas, covering 90,239 acres The first Band-Aid brand adhesive bandages were 3" wide and 18" long. You made your own bandage by cutting off as much as you needed. P.J. Tierney, developer of the modern diner, died of indigestion in 1917...after eating at a diner. Jerry Rice holds the NFL record for most receiving touchdowns in a single season: 22 In 1995, the CN Tower was classified as one of the Seven Wonders of the Modern World by the American Society of Civil Engineers. The average cost to take a family of four to an NBA game in 1999 was $266.61, based on two adult tickets, two children's ticket, four soft drinks, four hot dogs, parking, two game programs, and two souvenir caps. 100 years ago, Coca-Cola contained cocaine instead of caffeine.

Spectacular Solar Eruption on Sept 12, 2000 Space Weather News for Sept 12, 2000 http://www.spaceweather.com On Tuesday, Sept. 12, less than 24 hours after the sunspot number plunged to its lowest value of the year, the Sun unleashed a surprising full-halo coronal mass ejection (CME). The leading edge of the CME could reach Earth on Thursday, Sept 14. Forecasters estimate a 30% chance of severe geomagnetic disturbances (possibly including aurora) at middle latitudes when the shock front arrives. For more information and images, please visit http://spaceweather.com

A hockey puck weighs 0.38 pounds. In an average lifetime, the average human will produce in excess of 6,250 gallons of saliva (that's spit for those of you in Arkansas). Tuna fish swim at an average speed of 9 miles per hour. They also never stop moving. According to Metropolitan Life Insurance, major league baseball players live significantly longer than the average male - especially if you are a third baseman. The US state of Alaska's coastline is longer than that of all the US coastal states combined.

The Library of Congress houses 30 million books. Babe Ruth never had a losing season...as a pitcher! IBM will capture 4,700,000,000,000 bytes of information at the 2000 Olympics -- almost 1 byte (character) for every person on the planet. On average, we send 38 Christmas cards every year. Wayne Gretzky holds the record for most goals by a center in a season: 92 The average length of a domain name is 11 characters. The US now imprisons more people than any other country. London - A plane carrying 55 passengers circled an airport in western Scotland while an air traffic controller had lunch. The officials at the airport on the island of Benbecula in the Western Isles of Scotland apologized for the incident. They said there was just one controller at Benbecula, and she had to take a lunch break because national air traffic rules forbid any controller from working more than two hours without one. It finally touched down 55 minutes late after the controller returned to her radar screen. The water in most underground layers is salty. Layers containing fresh water are most likely to be found within a few hundred feet of the surface. At depth, fresh water is the exception.

A domestic cat has eighteen claws: fice on each of its front paws and four on each of its back paws. The tip of a whip makes a cracking sound because it is moving faster than the speed of sound. An ear of corn almost always has an even number of rows (twelve, fourteen, or sixteen). Earthworms have five hearts. The cat is the only domestic animal not mentioned in the Bible.

Why do cats have dew claws? Are they like feline thumbs?

90% of all volcanic activity occurs in the oceans.

DISCOVERY DISPATCH FOR 9/15/2000 ----------------------------------------------------------- ================ IN THE SPOTLIGHT ================ THE OLYMPICS SHOWCASE Olympic Science Get the scoop on scientific advances that are helping world-class athletes shatter records at an astounding pace, including a few tricks that swimmers have learned from sharks. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=1&c=73468&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=2&c=73468&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S It's the Animal Olympics! The best athletes in the animal kingdom are squaring off against each other. You're the judge. Here are the matchups: Whale vs. Starfish vs. Anglerfish http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=3&c=73468&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Gila Monster vs. Desert Lynx vs. Wind Scorpion http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=4&c=73468&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Horseshoe Bat vs. Turkey Vulture vs. Aardvark http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=5&c=73468&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Archerfish vs. Grebe vs. Crocodile http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=6&c=73468&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Bird-Eating Spider vs. Fer-de-Lance vs. Arrow-Poison Frog http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=7&c=73468&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Shrike vs. Woodpecker vs. Dove http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=8&c=73468&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S DISCOVER OUR NEW CAM UNIVERSE Exploring your world has never been easier. We've added over 100 new live cams, including real-time views of an asteroid, ferrets and a college dining hall. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=1&c=74091&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=2&c=74091&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=3&c=74091&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=4&c=74091&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Pictures of the Day We're in Taiwan all this month, with some of the most vivid images you'll ever see. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=5&c=74091&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=12&c=74091&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Or maybe you missed some of our previous Picture of the Day road trips to: Paris http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=6&c=74091&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Bimini http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=7&c=74091&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S The Great Lakes http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=8&c=74091&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Turkey and Greece http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=9&c=74091&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Japan http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=10&c=74091&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Tasmania http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=11&c=74091&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S ============= MAIN FEATURES ============= PIGS FLY! (AND OTHER ANIMAL ADVENTURES) Revenge of the Escargot Can you imagine being done in by a killer snail? Would it be a slow death? Would your family try to cover it up by saying you met your end in "another senseless wildlife accident"? So many questions, some of which we can answer. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=1&c=74138&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S What's the strangest creature you've ever seen? Well, we think we can match your experience with the peculiar sea creatures we've run into on our expedition to study coral in the Bahamas. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=2&c=74138&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=3&c=74138&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Pigs Fly! ... in the face of medical convention, that is. A new surgical technique using pig intestines is rewriting the book on animal-to-human transplantation. Among the many questions raised is: Why pigs? http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=4&c=74138&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Starting Sunday: Ask the Experts About Ticks! Outdoors people don't fear bears. Or mountain lions. Or wolves. But they quake in terror at the prospect of confronting the tiny, and sometimes lethal, tick. Our experts are here through Sept. 23 to fill you in on these creatures. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=5&c=74138&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S SUCCESS IN SCHOOL ... PSSSST, HERE'S THE SECRET Maybe you haven't been the most ebullient student in the past. Well, there's no time like the present to change all that. Create a new image. Show those hand-raising, answer-knowing, down-their-nose-looking smart kids in your class that you're in on their secret. Let Webmath, A-to-Z Science and Brain Boosters be the advantage you've been looking for. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=1&c=74160&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=2&c=74160&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=3&c=74160&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=4&c=74160&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=5&c=74160&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=6&c=74160&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Gluing golf balls, oranges and basketballs on sticks and calling it the solar system just doesn't cut it anymore. Science Fair Central will take you to astronomical levels on your next project. And we're ready to announce the 40 finalists in the Discovery Young Scientist Challenge, too. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=7&c=74160&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=8&c=74160&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S MEET YOUR FAVORITE TV PERSONALITIES You're at "Crocodile Hunter" Headquarters Steve Irwin is not your ordinary, mild-mannered animal expert. Join his discussion groups, learn his lingo in our Aussie glossary and check out his latest video ... the "Crocodile Rap!" http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=1&c=74194&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=2&c=74194&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Watch "Crocodile Hunter" Any Time You Want Shocking, wild and chock-full of crocodiles, alligators, pythons, wild pigs and other beasts! Visit the Discovery Store if you can't get enough of TV's most incredible animal expert. You'll find a great selection of videos with all of Steve Irwin's exciting adventures. Get close ... REALLY close ... to some snapping, sharp-toothed creatures! http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=3&c=74194&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Laugh and Learn With Christopher Lowell Shine a little light into your living space (and your life) with the design inspiration that can only come from Christopher, then check out the incredible work that his fans accomplished when they discovered, "You can do it!" http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=4&c=74194&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=5&c=74194&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Bring Christopher Lowell's Tips and Tricks Right Into Your Home Think you're not creative? Then visit the Discovery Store where you'll find Christopher's new book, "Christopher Lowell's Seven Layers of Design." Learn secrets for transforming your home into a personal oasis, and discover how easy it is to decorate your rooms with creativity and flair. You'll be painting, pasting and pleating in no time! http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=6&c=74194&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Lynette Jennings, Simply Extraordinary We have background information on your favorite design-and-decor diva, along with her personal-appearance schedule and the showcase of America's most beautiful homes. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=7&c=74194&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=8&c=74194&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=9&c=74194&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Inside Information for "Home Matters" Fans! We can tell you everything you've always wanted to know about Susan Powell, not to mention the scoop on field correspondent, Chris McWatt. (Sorry ... guess we did mention it, didn't we?) http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=10&c=74194&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=11&c=74194&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S GOOD HEALTH: YOU CAN MAKE IT HAPPEN Abs-olute Power! How do they get those six-pack abs? Join world class athletes like Mia Hamm for an interactive lesson in motivation and fitness. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=1&c=74236&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Dinner With "The Jetsons" Intergalactic goulash, black hole peas and planetary pudding. In the year 2120, what kind of food will keep your space colony healthy? http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=2&c=74236&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S The School Lunch Crunch With lunch periods across the country squeezed to just five to 10 minutes, kids barely have time to eat. Many of them forgo the noontime meal completely, leaving them in a nutritional deficit. We have expert tips on helping your kids beat the lunchtime crunch. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=3&c=74236&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S DINOSAUR CORNER Did you ever wonder what a dinosaur sounded like? So did we. Here's what the top dinosaur experts told us. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=1&c=74252&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S And there are brand-new theories on how dinosaurs moved, too! http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=2&c=74252&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S THE NEWS FROM SPACE Black Holes: One Size Does Not Fit All. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=1&c=74254&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S New Section of Space Station Is Ready for Occupancy. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=2&c=74254&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S ======================= INTERACTIVE MINDERS ======================= **Discovery's Tools** Send an E-Card http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=2&c=73297&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Get your Health I.Q? http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=3&c=73297&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Build a Roller Coaster http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=4&c=73297&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Search the Night Sky http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=5&c=73297&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Create a Hurricane http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=6&c=73297&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Watch the Growth of a Baby http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=7&c=73297&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S *****Can't Miss TV This Week***** Travel Channel, Sunday, Travel Channel Presents A three-hour marine marathon, featuring Niagara Falls, the Mississippi River and the world's most dangerous port. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=1&c=73306&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Animal Planet, Monday, Jack London's Call of the Wild What happens when the unsinkable Molly Brown blows into town? http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=2&c=73306&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Discovery Channel, Tuesday, On the Inside: Family Plots The more people involved in a murder, the more likely all will be caught. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=3&c=73306&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S Discovery Health, Wednesday, Bodies on Ice Cold can kill, but might it also be the key to immortality? http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=4&c=73306&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S TLC, Thursday, The Ultimate 10 Dangerous JobsSome you'd guess (like skyscraper construction). Others may surprise you. http://ww9.lfmn.com/actv/sr2.asp?u=1002755137&v=6117&url=5&c=73306&pr=404&cf=1&pa=41&e=S

Mauna Kea may get extremely large scope Mauna Kea may be considered for a telescope with 10 times the light-collecting area of the world's largest optical telescopes, already atop the Big Island mountain. University of California and California Institute of Technology researchers who developed the 10-meter Keck telescopes have proposed building a 30-meter California Extremely Large Telescope (CELT). Almost routine discoveries have been coming out of the twin Kecks. CELT's mirror would allow astronomers to look deeper into the universe with more detail. "It means you can study fainter, more distant objects in the same vein of many observations at Keck, but you can do them better," said Jerry Nelson, University of California-Santa Cruz professor of astronomy and astrophysics who heads the telescope design working group. Mauna Kea and several sites in Chile have been mentioned for the CELT, which project leaders hope to build in 10 to 15 years. Joseph Miller, director of UC Observatories/Lick Observatory, estimated the cost at about $500 million. "We're working on the conceptual design but we don't have money in the bank so anything could happen two years from now," Nelson said in a telephone interview. "People could say, 'Whatever happened to CELT?' It's not a sure thing but we have strong support at the highest level of academic institutions." The master plan for Mauna Kea anticipated such a telescope, according to Robert McLaren, interim director of the University of Hawaii Institute for Astronomy. In the plan, it's called "Next Generation Large Telescope," describing the class of telescopes CELT falls into -- bigger than a 25-meter aperture, McLaren said. But while the plan foresees a telescope like CELT, such a project "would have to be fully reviewed, assessed and approved," he said. As a one-time Hawaii resident, Nelson said he'd like to see the new telescope go to Mauna Kea. "But for a project like this, you have to look for the best site for scientific and technical reasons, as well as fold in political things." A couple of sites in Mauna Kea's summit area might be suitable for a telescope as massive as the CELT, he said. "Nonetheless, one must be sensitive to the political issues in Hawaii about developing the summit of Mauna Kea," he said. If that site is chosen, Nelson said, project leaders would work with the community to address concerns and "not steamroll" over them. Since the Keck telescopes are owned and operated by UC and Caltech, which CELT would be as well, Nelson thinks "there would be a very strong connection. I could envision the same headquarters in Waimea." Because of the high maintenance costs of such facilities, however, the universities might end up selling or trading off part of Keck to support CELT, Nelson said. "It's all highly speculative as to what would happen in 10 years," he said. McLaren said there is a trend to give the national astronomy community more access to large telescopes, mostly in private hands, in return for more federal support. "In the case of Keck, it's unlikely that would happen real soon," he said, noting NASA is a partner in the telescope operation. Nelson said CELT leaders probably will start thinking seriously about sites in a year and aim for a decision in about four years. With CELT and adaptive optics, astronomers should be able to study galaxies and other distant things with better angular resolution than the Hubble Telescope, he said. "You really win bigger by a bigger telescope, with more light sensitivity and better resolution, sharper. We will learn more about what's happening at the distant edge of the universe." CELT also will be powerful in exploring star-forming regions and planet formation, Nelson said. "It has a lot of potential. Our (astronomy) communities are really excited about this. "Experience has shown when you're building new facilities like this, the most exciting stuff that comes out of it you haven't anticipated at all -- things you just didn't even know."

Stuff about things having nothing whatsoever to do with this conference.... A jumbo jet is 16 times more fuel efficient than a Concorde. So, just how good was that 6-iron from 218 yards that Tiger Woods hit from a fairway bunker, over water and right at the flag, to win the Canadian Open? The Toronto Sun asked three area professionals to go to the 18th at Glen Abbey on Monday and try it. None came closer than Woods' shot, which landed 18 feet behind the flag in the first cut of rough. Ashley Chinner, who tied for 13th in 1998 Canadian Open, hit the green three times with a 6-iron. His best shot was to 30 feet from the fringe. Chris Neale, golf director at Glen Abbey, got one of his seven shots on the green with a 4-iron. Tom Jackson, who played the Canadian Tour for 12 years, hit the green three times with a 5-iron, the closest one 40 feet away. "The remarkable thing is that Tiger did it with so much on the line," said Chinner, who also works as a teaching pro. "I think everyone knows he can pull that shot off. But under that situation, it was incredible. He worked the distance out perfectly so he took as much of the risk out as possible." http://espn.go.com/golfonline/tours/s/2000/0912/738970.html In response to changes in sea temperature, humpback whales adapt their calls so they can be heard by other humpbacks over the longest possible distance. 64% of Detroit, Michigan residents own a mobile phone. London - Stephen Brain, 30, won the holiday cheeserolling race in western England. Racers chase 8-pound double Gloucester cheese down a steep 300-yard course at Cooper's Hill near Gloucester. The first racer to finish behind the fast-rolling cheese gets to keep it. The races were canceled in 1998 because 27 racers were injured in the previous year's competition. This year, only one contestant was taken away in an ambulance. Historically cheeserolling was once just one event in a big spring celebration which included long-forgotten sports including "grinning for the cake," "jumping in the bag," and "chattering for a bladder of snuff by old women." In the early 60s, IBM developed the Q7 for System Development Corporation, a private company funded by the U.S. Air Force to develop software for early air defense systems. Jerry Rice holds the NFL record for consecutive games with a touchdown: 13 Abraham Lincoln (the 16th president) carried letters, bills and notes in his stovepipe hat. When two zebras stand side by side, they usually face in opposite directions.

Q. Is there a physiological limit on power output for humans? A. A person's power output rises when appropriate periods of rest are included. In 1916 a man carrying 92 pound pigs of iron 35 feet up an 8 foot high incline into a train carriage. The man carried 1,156 pigs into the train in a 10-hour day. Assuming he weighed 145 pounds and rested for about 15% of the time, this is some 200 watts average output--a remarkable figure. In fact, it is about as much energy as a human could hope to put out in a 10 hour day and was only accomplished after the introduction of rest periods! The previous record without rest had been 305 pigs. Proper rest *tripled* the total work output (if you include carrying the man's own weight back and forth). Bicycle racers use this sprint-coast-sprint sequence to maintain the highest possible average speed.

For those of you who are big Olympic fans like I am: LEARN TO SPEAK AUSSIE Ready to hit the frog and toad? Sydneysiders are waiting for you. But you might not be able to understand them if you didn't realize that "frog and toad" means "road". Learn these words from Oz before you go. Billabong = A watering hole Woop Woop = The middle of nowhere Bruce = Man Sheila = Woman Footy = Australian Rules football Mackers = McDonald's restaurant Amber Fluid = Beer

In the English language, more words begin with the letter "s" than any other letter. On average, a person swallows 295 times while eating a meal. The left bank on a river is the left side as you look downstream. If you attempted to commit suicide in England in the 1800's, and were unsuccessful, you would face the death penalty. Only the female mosquito bites. (Discovery Channel's promo ads had men dressed as mosquitoes biting humans... Egad!)

The most common surname in the world is "Chang." A golf ball, when driven off a tee, can reach speeds up to 170 miles per hour. A Chinese checkerboard has 121 holes. A person's left hand does 56 percent of typing. The Disney dog, Pluto, was originally named Rover.

1. Debra Winger was the voice of E.T. 2. Pearls melt in vinegar. 3. It takes 3,000 cows to supply the NFL with enough leather for a year's supply of footballs. 4. Thirty-five percent of the people who use personal ads for dating are already married. 5. The 3 most valuable brand names on earth: Marlboro, Coca-Cola, and Budweiser, in that order. 6. It's possible to lead a cow upstairs...but not downstairs. 7. Humans are the only primates that don't have pigment in the palms of their hands. 8. Ten percent of the Russian government's income comes from the sale of vodka. 9. The sentence "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog," uses every letter in the alphabet. (Developed by Western Union to Test telex/two communications) 10. Average life span of a major league baseball: 7 pitches. 11. A duck's quack doesn't echo, and no one know why. 12. The reason firehouses have circular stairways is from the days of yore when the engines were pulled by horses. The horses were stabled on the round floor and figured out how to walk up straight staircases. 13. The airplane Buddy Holly died in was the "American Pie." (Thus the name of the Don McLean song.) 14. Each king in a deck of playing cards represents a great king from history. Spades - King David; Clubs - Alexander the Great; Hearts -Charlemagne; and Diamonds - Julius Caesar. 15. 111,111,111 x 111,111,111 = 12,345,678,987,654,321 16. Clans of long ago that wanted to get rid of their unwanted people without killing them used to burn their houses down-hence the expression "to get fired." 17. Hershey's Kisses are called that because the machine that makes them looks like it's kissing the conveyor belt. 18. The name Jeep came from the abbreviation used in the army for the General Purpose" vehicle, G.P. 19. The highest point in Pennsylvania is lower than the lowest point in Colorado. 20. The only two days of the year in which there are no professional sports games (MLB, NBA, NHL, or NFL) are the day before and the day after the Major League All-Star Game. 21. Only one person in two billion will live to be 116 or older. 22. The mask used by Michael Myers in the original "Halloween" was actually a Captain Kirk mask painted white. 23. If you put a raisin in a glass of champagne, it will keep floating to the top and sinking to the bottom. 24. Snails can sleep for 3 years without eating 25. Actor Tommy Lee Jones and vice-president Al Gore were freshman roommates at Harvard. 26. The fingerprints of koalas are virtually indistinguishable from those of humans, so much so that they could be confused at a crime scene. 27. Months that begin on a Sunday will always have a "Friday the 13th." 28. The man, who plays Lt. Commander Montgomery Scott on Star Trek, is missing the entire middle finger of his right hand. 29. The Eisenhower interstate system requires that one mile in every five must be straight. These straight sections are usable as airstrips in times of war or other emergencies. 30. There are 293 ways to make change for a dollar. 31. All of the clocks in the movie "Pulp Fiction" are stuck on 4:20.

6,000,000,000 hits are expected on olympics.com this month. The Dead Sea is 1,300 feet below sea level. Michigan State University has the largest single campus student body (about 44,000) of any Michigan university, and is one of the largest universities in the country. The US incarceration rate plays such a distorting role in the labor market that one study found that the US unemployment rate would be 2% higher if prisoners and jail inmates were counted. - Justice Policy Institute, "The Punishing Decade" A snail can sleep for 3 years. The velocipede was the first bicycle with pedals The Eiffel tower grows six inches every year. In the summer the metal expands to make the tower grow, but in the winter the metal contracts to shrink the tower once again. Compared to the net worth of the average American, a nice home in Palo Alto, California costs Bill Gates $2.00.

Q. What is the world's most popular beverage? A. Despite the billions of dollars spent to promote colas and other sodas each year, soft drinks don't even rate second in the international beverage market. The dominant thirst quencher is water, but when it comes to man-made refreshment, tea reigns supreme. The worldwide obsession started over 4,000 years ago in China, when some tealeaves blew into a pot of boiling water. Today there are over 3,000 varieties of tea making up the five and a half billion pounds grown around the world. In the global tea drinking Olympics, the Irish are the biggest consumers, followed by the English in second place and the people of Qatar in third.

New Element Discovered The fire at Los Alamos has lead to another unexpected consequence. A top secret scientific document - discovered in a bunker whose security systems were mostly destroyed by fire - reveals the existence of a new element. The document describes what appears to be the heaviest element known to science. It has been tentatively named Governmentium (Gv). This new element has no protons or electrons, thus having an atomic number of 0. It does, however, have 1 neutron, 125 deputy neutrons, 75 supervisory neutrons and 111 team leader neutrons, giving it an atomic mass of 312. These 312 particles are held together by a force called morons, which are surrounded by vast quantities of lepton-like particles called peons. Since it has no electrons, Governmentium is inert. However, it can be detected as it impedes every reaction with which it comes into contact. According to documents, a minute amount of Governmentium causes one reaction to take over four days to complete when it would normally take less than a second. Governmentium has a normal half-life of approximately three years; it does not decay but instead undergoes a reorganization in which a portion of the deputy neutrons, supervisory neutrons, and team leader neutrons exchange places. The mass of Governmentium actually increases over time, since with each reorganization some of the morons inevitably become neutrons, forming new isotopes. This characteristic or moron promotion leads some scientists to speculate that Governmentium is formed whenever morons reach a certain quantity in concentration. This hypothetical quantity is referred to as the "Critical Morass." Although it is odorless and tasteless, you will know it when you observe it.

A moment for a serious subject - the maintainance of Spring. Yesterday, the entire Spring shut down. I felt as though someone dear to me had died. There was NO was to see Geo or anything else in any of the other conferences. Karen and I emailed and she took up the problem with Terry. We are woefully behind in our payments for the use of Yapp software. check that url above. After the first slash, that is the program which allows all things to happen here. Without it, we do not exist! Karen explained it to me thusly: I have spoken with the woman who wrote the Yapp software and she has explained why we have some periodic site losses in the afternoon, which btw corresponds to midnight GMT. It has to do with the number of hits we experience daily and the fact we are exceeding them. Just FYI, it doesn't matter if you do or don't post at Spring because lurkers generate hits as well. She has generously offered to bump up the license limit if the old license is paid for. BTW, the license is a one-time thing. Therefore, folks, this is a request for donations. All payments should be mailed to: Spring Accounting Department 182 Clover Road Cedar Creek, TX 78612 Checks and money orders should be made out to "The Spring". Be sure to include the login ID of the account. Karen can now accept PayPal payments if you like. And for those who haven't signed up for these electronic payments and would like to do so, let me know. If people sign up under my referral, I would get a signup bonus of $5, which I will turn over to the Yapp cause. Please help if you can! Karen already has my contribution and I used PayPal. It is a simple process and the funds are safely in her account. Thanks for helping keep spring flowing and Geo alive!

Lightening, not people, starts most forest fires. In 1924, American Robert LeGendre shattered the world long jump record with a leap of 25 feet, 4 inches. However, the jump was part of the pentathlon competition and LeGendre could muster only a third-place finish overall. The actual long jump competition was won with a jump of 24 feet, 5 inches. Mosquitoes have killed more people than have all the world's wars combined. 40% of Americans have married their first love. Elephants have been known to remain standing after they die. Uranus is the only planet that rotates on its side. The Oakland Bay Bridge took over 1,200,000 rivets, with a good crew installing 800 rivets per day. The temperature in eastern Siberia can get so cold that the moisture in a person's breath can freeze in the air and fall to the ground. The Utah state animal is the Rocky Mountain Elk.

From Terry concerning the need for funds to keep Spring going... Also, our monthly rate just went up about 20 times, according to the invoice I just received. Your credit card will automatically be processed. You will receive a confirmati on e-mail when your card is charged. Your total payment due is $946 (to quote the email I just received).

Oregon was jointly occupied by the US and Canada from 1818 to 1828. 90% of the visits by patients to doctors are caused by conditions that are either self-limited or beyond the capabilities of medicine in the first place. - FJ Ingelfinger, "Arrogance," New England Journal of Medicine 303(1980) http://upalumni.org/medschool/ Jerry Rice holds the NFL record for consecutive 100-catch seasons: 3 Top 10 Products sold at Toys"R"Us 08/16/98 to 08/22/98 1. Sony Computer playstation system w. dual shock controller 2. Acclaim N64 WWF Warzone 3. Nintendo Nintendo 64 system 4. Galoob Spice Girls dolls 5. Hasbro Preschool Talking Teletubbies 6. Nintendo N64 Banjo-kazooie 7. Acclaim Playstation WWF: Warzone 8. Evenflo trendsetter travel system 9. Mattel Hot Wheels Basic cars 10. Mattel Hot Wheels Mechanix Vehicles IBM's Q7, a vacuum-tube computer, had 30,000 vacuum tubes. At Vicksburg, Mississippi the United States Army Corps of Engineers Waterways Experiment Station is the world's largest hydraulic research laboratory. A bird's eye takes up about 50% of its head. In 1859, 24 rabbits were released in Australia. Within six years the population had grown to 2 million Certain fireflies emit a light so penetrating that it can pass through flesh and wood.

In the 1800's, people thought the eggplant was poisonous and called it the "mad apple." "Jack" is the most common name in nursery rhymes. An adult has 206 bones. Newborn infants have 300 bones. The first minimum wage was established inthe USA in 1938 - all 25 cents per hour.

Life at the South Pole ...nice pix http://astro.uchicago.edu/cara/vtour/pole/dome/life/sun/ and a tour of the south pole center http://astro.uchicago.edu/cara/vtour/pole/

Yeah, thanks for putting that here...I was wondering where to put it....this is fine!!!

George Washington nicknamed New York as the "Empire State." Alaska doesn't have counties. Technically, neither does Louisiana (Parishes.) Your tongue is the only muscle in your body that is attached at only one end. Honeybees and turtles are deaf. "Shiek" means "old man" in Arabic.

New measurements Ratio of an igloo's circumference to its diameter: EskimoPi 2000 pounds of Chinese soup: Wonton 1 millionth of a mouthwash: 1microscope Time between slipping on a peel and smacking the pavement: 1 bananosecond Weight an evangelist carries with God: 1billigram Time it takes to sail 220 yards at 1 nautical mile per hour: Knot-furlong 365.25 days of drinking low-calorie beer because it's less filling: 1 liteyear 16.5 feet in the Twilight Zone: 1 RodSerling Half of a large intestine: 1semicolon 1000 aches: 1megahurtz Basic unit of laryngitis: 1hoarsepower Shortest distance between two jokes: A straight line 453.6 graham crackers: 1 pound cake 1 million-million microphones: 1 megaphone 1 million bicycles: 2 megacycles 365.25 days: 1 unicycle 2000 mockingbirds: two kilomockingbirds 10 cards: 1 decacards 1 kilogram of falling figs: 1 FigNewton 1000 grams of wet socks: 1 literhosen 1 millionth of a fish: 1 microfiche 1 trillion pins: 1 terrapin 10 rations: 1 decoration 100 rations: 1 C-ration 2 monograms: 1 diagram 8 nickels: 2 paradigms 2.4 statute miles of intravenous surgical tubing at Yale University Hospital: 1 I.V.League 100 Senators: Not 1 decision

That's wonderful. Very funny, Marcia.

My son, who sends very few forwards sent that and I just about wiped me out. A contingent of gentlemen who will appreciate it and do not read Geo(that I know of) I am wondering how well it translated into other languages. Do Spaniards and the English understand what an Esquimo Pie is???

Er, actually there were a few that didn't compute ...eskimo pie being one of them, but being the 'academic' I am I didn't like to show my ignorance!!!

An Eskimo Pie is chocolate covered vanilla ice cream and is disk-shaped. Play on words, of course. We all must learn thing like that fag means different things on either side of the Atlantic... Next puzzlement - I need to know what needs translations!

Thanks - never heard of that!!!! Yup, Fag does have two different meanings at least here .....! considering the others ....

wait, back a few posts...how did our monthly usage costs increase 20 times? what happened there?

Good question Wolfie .....

Terry explained in in How's your connectin to the Spring topic which is linked to Drool . Topic 43, I think! Lots of lurkers? (Yeah, those millions of men who are checking out that URL I posted in Yahoo and AOl and on ICQ.) I do not have any way of checking who is lurking so I have no idea where they are looking, but I'll wager a goodly sized jewel that it is NOT in Geo!!! Karen also explained in the post I put with my own comments attached. I have no idea where they are lurking, I just know I never want to see Geo go invisible agin!!!

I am haing considerable trouble getting my email. I can send it but the only incoming I can get is kilauea83@yahoo.com at the moment...*sigh* And there has just been a massive CME!!! Look for Aurora!!!

Just been out and looked ...clear night (for once!!) but nothing except stars to be seen .... *sigh*

*sigh...perhaps tomorrow night...the photons are just beginning to hit here now. Just an aside...anyone who thinks Telnet for email is the best there is...Arrrrgh!!! Three email programs and only one works!!

Almost like cable television, 63 channels and nothing fit to watch on any one of them, at most times.

I spent 4 months in a home with itd own TV dish. I had 900 channels of nothing to watch! Olympics, however, I make an exception for. I'll wantch anything Olympic! The letters "M.G." on the British sportscar actually stand for "Morris Garage." Calvin Coolidge's will was one sentence long. One of the primary reasons the mayflower pilgrims ended their voyage at Plymouth rock was pretty much the same reason people today suspend their journeys: they ran out of beer. You have to count all the way to one thousand before the letter "a" is used in spelling a number. Fireflies light up as a means of sexual attraction.

Most of the books you own today will disintegrate in 50 years (approximately) unless they are printed on acid-free paper. Seals have been known to swim for as long as 8 months, and as far as 6,000 miles, without touching land. New York's World Trade Center has over 43,000 windows. I'd hate to have to pay and replace all of them. An ant's sense of smell is comparable to a dog's. William Shakespeare has no living decendants. (but His publisher, John Heminge does... Me!)

The candlefish is so oily that it was once burned for fuel. 23 publishers rejected Dr. Seuss's first book. The Library of Congress houses 80 million non-book items. To keep from being separated while sleeping, sea otters tie themselves together with kelp, often drifting miles out to sea during the night. Montana has the largest migratory elk herd in the US. IBM's Q7s were deployed in pairs to ensure a backup if one went down, and took up three floors of a building, with one floor entirely devoted to air conditioners. The brightest star in the sky, Sirius, gives out 26 times as much light as the sun. Human bones can withstand stresses of 24,000 pounds/square inch. In the Old West a "straight shooter" was an honest person you could rely on. "Shooting straight" meant that the person was like a bullet's path: true, not crooked.

A hummingbird feeds at 1,500 flowers per day. As of 1999 the white population in California is 16,500,000 while there are now 17,000,000 Latinos, Asian Americans, blacks and Native Americans. The Latino population has grown 35.8% in the 1990s to 10.5 million. The Asian population grew by 36.8% in the 1990s. Wisconsin has 7,446 streams and rivers. World Population growth: 1 billion in 1804 2 billion in 1927 (123 years) 3 billion in 1960 ( 33 years) 4 billion in 1974 ( 14 years) 5 billion in 1987 ( 13 years) 6 billion in 1999 ( 12 years) Projected World Population: 7 billion in 2013 ( 14 years) 8 billion in 2028 ( 15 years) 9 billion in 2054 ( 26 years) Venetian blinds were invented in 1769, by an Englishman. Tidal effects are moving the Moon further from the Earth into slower orbits and lengthening our day in the process. This will not stop until the Moon is in geostationary orbit and the Earth's day length equals the month length. The Spanish Inquisition once condemned the entire Netherlands to death for heresy. Compared to the net worth of the average American, where $100 will buy you tickets, food and parking to take your family to see an NHL hockey game, Bill Gates could buy the team for 100 "Bill bills".

I love watching the Olympics too, Marcia. I think the defining moment of the current games will be Cathy Freeman winning the 400 meter race. It seemed that the whole world loved her; although not as much as the Australians, of course.

I love watching the Olympics too, Marcia. I think the defining moment of the current games will be Cathy Freeman winning the 400 meter race. It seemed that the whole world loved her; although not as much as the Australians, of course.

That was a really strange hiccup on one of my posts. I don't know what happened.

It happens when lots of postings are being processed at the same time. It is a glitch in Yapp software that used to happen to me a lot!!! If all of the oceans in the world evaporated, Hawaii would be the tallest mountain in the world. Honey is used to make antifreeze. Dog meat is a delicacy in China. A fella by the name of Robert Earl Hughes used to be the heaviest person in the world. He weighed *just* 1,067 pounds. Shooting stars are not stars - they are meteors.

The above mention of Hawaii refers to The Big Island of Hawaii. The surrounding sea is 28,000' deep (8534.4M) and almost 14,000' above sea level (4267M) making a total height of Mauna Kea (the highest peak ) 42,000' (13,161M) That's a whol lot of mountain when you consider that the mass of Mauna Loa is large enough to contain several mountain chains and is really just a side peak on the entire mountain mass amking up this island. Actually, the Island of Hawaii is made of five fused volcanoes: Kohala, Mauna Kea, Hualalai, Mauna Loa, and Kilauea. The list is from oldest to youngest. Mauna Kea and Kohala are considered dormant (though Kohala might just be extinct), Hualalai and Mauna are currently dormant, too, but they have erupted in recent history. Kilauea is active, even as I write this.

(This alst post reminded me ...Marcia, did you get the Hawaii pix I sent ....or do I need to resend them ...oops!! they're on the laptop!!! Pray I get that modem fixed ...found the problem ...got computerworking fine, just modem not..time's running out for me...)

Many healing words said in behalf of your laptop!! Black-eyed peas are not peas. They are beans. The flying fox is not a fox - it is a bat. Catgut string does not come from a cat - it is from a sheep's intestines. The kangaroo rat is not a rat - it is a gopher. The silkworm is not a worm - it is a caterpillar. Blackboard chalk is not chalk - it is plaster of Paris. The pineapple is a berry. St. Patrick was born in Britain. A prarie dog is not a dog - it's a rodent. A horned toad is a lizard.

The first McDonald's was opened in 1955. The revenue from the first day's business? $366.12 www.olympics.com has thus far been viewed by 5.7 million people from 146 countries. Drop Tea tablets, developed by the Towa Company of Tokyo, are made of tea leaves tightly compressed into pellets. To make a fresh brew you just drop three or four into hot water. Because the compacted leaf surfaces are protected from air, they are claimed to stay fresh longer than loose leaves. Added to hot water, the leaves open up to brew Earl Grey, Darjeeling, Assam, apple or lemon tea. Polymethyl methacrylate (PMMA) is more transparent than glass. http://www.psrc.usm.edu/macrog/pmma.htm If there was a bathtub large enough to hold it, the planet Saturn would float. The winter of 1847-48 was so extraordinarily severe in the country that heavy ice formed in Lake Erie. When it was broken up during the latter part of March, the winds swept the ice into the entrance of the Niagara River at Buffalo, where it jammed in a solid mass, completely choking the outlet of Lake Erie, with the result that on March 29, 1848, the falls of Niagara were practically dry. In the Middle Ages, monks were forbidden to eat meat. If you are divorced man you are four times more likely to die in an accident than if you are married. The Alamo is located in San Antonio. It is where Texas defenders fell to Mexican General Santa Anna and the phrase "Remember the Alamo" originated. The Alamo is considered the cradle of Texas liberty and the state's most popular historic site.

(healing prayers for the laptop worked ..I'm back online after reinstalling Win98! Dyed my hair to cover grey caused by the crash, and now reinstalling all my programmes and realising I lost all my links etc again .. GRRR)

Think I should dye mine too...but it will not turn a living room into a bedroom and keep my favorite painting wall from being turned into a Wall of Fame....!!! What color do you sugggest??? Right now, something witchy and black sounds about right! Brava and kudos on your recovered modem. That was scary!!! Back it all up on your zip drive NOW!!! *hugs*

Backed all data and progs I haven't got disks for before I reformatted hard disk!!!! Now downloading slowly to make sure everything works properly before adding new progs. Still waiting for unlock codes for Norton sysem works to arrive ...I NEED that!!! Nah, black would look awful with your colouring ....I always go pretty close to natural ..that way roots don't show and it just enhances ...may not help LR prob but sure boosts ego ....and gives confidence to stand firm ... HUGS

Oh, I hear you! Amen! Anyway, I turned grey much too young - the few I have - but not chestnut again. Look miserable as a blond. How about flaming red??? Yeah, I know...make it subtle and match what you already have!!!

I'm just lazy ...want to lift the colour, but can't be bothered with touching up roots and stuff ...not much grey, but fading a bit ...and it will be bleached by the African sun soon ...

I think I will remain as was intended by nature. in this BIG little town, it surely would be wondered about, Maybe that is what this town needs...a bit of fresh gossip to talk about, but, not about me!!!

The FBI go through 1,000,000 rounds of ammunition each month at their training center. The Princess Anne and Princess Margaret hovercrafts have stopped service across the English Channel. Originally designed to last 10 years, they operated for 32, logging a million hours of operation across the 6 vessels. They had a top speed of 60 to 70 mph and were raised 12 feet in the air when the air cushion was inflated. Doctors, as a trade, stand high in the ranks of those who go mad, top themselves, filch pills, sniff gas, run from their spouses, weep in the night, live chronically disjuncted lives. - M Bywater, "The Doctors We Deserve?" http://upalumni.org/medschool/ The top 5% of American wage earners pay 86% of the total income tax collected. Wood Frogs can survive being frozen. In fact, they spend winters frozen on land, thawing in the spring. The planet Pluto takes 248 Earth years to orbit the Sun. For twenty of those years, it is closer to the sun than the planet Neptune. The nature of its orbit, however, always prevents it from colliding with Neptune. One day on Pluto is about the length of a week on Earth. When Heinz ketchup leaves the bottle, it travels at a rate of 25 miles per year. Jerry Rice holds the NFL record for longest consecutive games with a reception streak: 193 Only 4% of Americans asked the parents' approval for their bride's hand.

Heinz ketchup travels at the amazing rate of 25 miles per year. That would be perhaps even slower than the sloth which moves so slowly fungus grows on its fur.

Marcia, you might not want to go with ketchup red hair. You might consider red, but not quite that red.

Or Sunkist orange, either. No, being subtle is more my style. Not into anything flaming unless it is NOT im public... That Ketchup thing must be just after you have dislodged the initial plug and you end up with half the bottle on your hamburger! As the daughter of a chemist, I know how to avoid that happenstance.

Well, I'm pleased with my new hair colour ..yup, subtle chestnut ..brightened it up nicely ...now where's the scissors???

Here are 5 questions. See if you can answer them. Answers will follow, but don't cheat! 1. Where was Kentucky Fried Chicken's Colonel Sanders born? 2. Name the three countries closest to the United States. 3. What do the following ten places have in common: Atlanta, Cleveland, Dayton, Hartford, Jacksonville, New Haven, Newark, Norfolk, Philadelphia, and Phoenix? 4. What country celebrates Thanksgiving on the second Monday of October? 5. Where is the world's largest garbage dump? **************** Answers: 1. Indiana. 2. Canada, Mexico, and Russia. 3. They are all towns in New York state. 4. Canada. 5. Staten Island, New York.

The Earth's atmosphere is, proportionally, thinner than the skin of an apple. Top 4 Favorite Traditional Amusement Parks: 1. Kennywood, (West Mifflin, PA) 2. Knoebel's Amusement Resort, (Elysburg, PA) 3. Cedar Point, (Sandusky, OH) 4. Blackpool Pleasure Beach, (Blackpool, UK) Mongooses were brought to Hawaii to kill rats. This did not work as rats are nocturnal while the mongoose hunts during the day. The space station is a $60 billion effort of 16 nations. It will cover almost an acre and have as much pressurized space as a Boeing 747 when completed in 2005. Nevada native tribes include the Shoshone, Washo and Paiute. Australia's new parliament building in Canberra are one of the largest buildings in the southern hemisphere, with 4,500 rooms and about 2,700,000 square feet of space.

Contact Earth Imagine if you will... the leader of the fifth invader force speaking to the commander in chief... "They're made out of meat." "Meat?" "Meat. They're made out of meat." "Meat?" "There's no doubt about it. We picked several from different parts of the planet, took them aboard our recon vessels, probed them all the way through. They're completely meat." "That's impossible. What about the radio signals? The messages to the stars." "They use the radio waves to talk, but the signals don't come from them. The signals come from machines." "So who made the machines? That's who we want to contact." "They made the machines. That's what I'm trying to tell you. Meat made the machines." "That's ridiculous. How can meat make a machine? You're asking me to believe in sentient meat." "I'm not asking you, I'm telling you. These creatures are the only sentient race in the sector and they're made out of meat." "Maybe they're like the Orfolei. You know, a carbon-based intelligence that goes through a meat stage." "Nope. They're born meat and they die meat. We studied them for several of their life spans, which didn't take too long. Do you have any idea the life span of meat?" "Spare me. Okay, maybe they're only part meat. You know, like the Weddilei. A meat head with an electron plasma brain inside." "Nope. We thought of that, since they do have meat heads like the Weddilei. But I told you, we probed them. They're meat all the way through." "No brain?" "Oh, there is a brain all right. It's just that the brain is made out of meat!" "So... what does the thinking?" "You're not understanding, are you? The brain does the thinking. The meat." "Thinking meat! You're asking me to believe in thinking meat!" "Yes, thinking meat! Conscious meat! Loving meat. Dreaming meat. The meat is the whole deal! Are you getting the picture?" "Omigod. You're serious then. They're made out of meat." "Finally, Yes. They are indeed made out meat. And they've been trying to get in touch with us for almost a hundred of their years." "So what does the meat have in mind?" "First it wants to talk to us. Then I imagine it wants to explore the universe, contact other sentients, swap ideas and information. The usual." "We're supposed to talk to meat?" "That's the idea. That's the message they're sending out by radio. 'Hello. Anyone out there? Anyone home?' That sort of thing." "They actually do talk, then. They use words, ideas, concepts?" "Oh, yes. Except they do it with meat." "I thought you just told me they used radio." "They do, but what do you think is on the radio? Meat sounds. You know how when you slap or flap meat it makes a noise? They talk by flapping their meat at each other. They can even sing by squirting air through their meat." "Omigod. Singing meat. This is altogether too much. So what do you advise?" "Officially or unofficially?" "Both." "Officially, we are required to contact, welcome, and log in any and all sentient races or multibeings in the quadrant, without prejudice, fear, or favor. Unofficially, I advise that we erase the records and forget the whole thing." "I was hoping you would say that." "It seems harsh, but there is a limit. Do we really want to make contact with meat?" "I agree one hundred percent. What's there to say?" `Hello, meat. How's it going?' But will this work? How many planets are we dealing with here?" "Just one. They can travel to other planets in special meat containers, but they can't live on them. And being meat, they only travel through C space. Which limits them to the speed of light and makes the possibility of their ever making contact pretty slim. Infinitesimal, in fact." "So we just pretend there's no one home in the universe." "That's it." "Cruel. But you said it yourself, who wants to meet meat? And the ones who have been aboard our vessels, the ones you have probed? You're sure they won't remember?" "They'll be considered crackpots if they do. We went into their heads and smoothed out their meat so that we're just a dream to them." "A dream to meat! How strangely appropriate, that we should be meat's dream." "And we can mark this sector unoccupied." "Good. Agreed, officially and unofficially. Case closed. Any others? Anyone interesting on that side of the galaxy?" "Yes, a rather shy but sweet hydrogen core cluster intelligence in a class nine star in G445 zone. Was in contact two galactic rotation ago, wants to be friendly again." "They always come around." "And why not? Imagine how unbearably, how unutterably cold the universe would be if one were all alone."

TFTD-L@TAMU.EDU US Code as of: 01/23/00 Title 4, Sec. 8. Respect for flag No disrespect should be shown to the flag of the United States of America; the flag should not be dipped to any person or thing. ... (b) The flag should never touch anything beneath it, such as the ground, the floor, water, or merchandise. (c) The flag should never be carried flat or horizontally, but always aloft and free. (d) The flag should never be used as wearing apparel, ... -http://www4.law.cornell.edu/uscode/4/8.html ***** tftd would like for the US Olympic Committee to instruct the US athletes on proper conduct including respect for our flag.

that was funny!

About the meat, I trust. I loved it and did not want it to languish in Screwed unappreciated! The flag comments should also be meaningful to you... *hugs*

IBM's Q7s used 10% of Santa Monica's power and were left on day and night for fear of causing destructive surges in the city's power. It has now been revealed that Colossus was in fact the world's first electronic digital computer, not ENIAC. http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,39198,00.html A student of Carroll High School was blocked from accessing his high school's home page from his own high school's library computer. It turns out the high school had installed filtering software to filter "all questionable material" and this included filtering out pages containing the word "high." http://dfn.org/Alerts/contest.htm Compared to the net worth of the average American, who might buy a plane ticket on a Boeing 747 for $1200, Bill Gates could buy three 747s for 100 "Bill bills". The first police force was established in Paris in 1667. Police dogs were first used in Scotland in 1816. The Texas Rangers, established in 1816 were the first US state police force. The first police car was an electric powered vehicle in Akron, Ohio in 1899. The Internet Trade Show List lists 595 Internet-related trade shows. The brain requires 25% of the oxygen used by the body. The earth's magnetic field pulls the electron beams hitting the cathode ray tube in computer monitors. Every computer monitor has to be calibrated relative to its position in the earth's magnetic field. Adjust a monitor in the northern hemisphere and its colors will be wrong if you plug it into a computer in the southern hemisphere.

Half of the peanuts grown in America are used to make peanut butter. Boston College is in Chstnut Hill, Massachusetts. Leonardo da Vinci could draw with one hand and write with the other - all at the same time. A kangaroo can hop at a pace of 40 miles per hour.

Robert E. Lee was buried barefoot as the coffin was too small to allow for his boots. The electric razor made its debut in America on March 18, 1931. General Custer's soldiers called him "Hard Ass." Ping Pong is the national sport of China. A bear has 42 teeth.

VIRUS ALERT!!! October 06, 2000 You may have heard about a variation of the LoveLetter virus called the "US PRESIDENT AND FBI SECRETS". It's a 'worm' virus that spreads through e-mail as a chain letter. The worm uses Microsoft's Outlook e-mail application to spread. The subject header will be US PRESIDENT AND FBI SECRETS=PLEASE VISIT(HTTP://WWW.2600.COM) or a randomly generated 6 letter word displayed in all capital letters, or it might be blank. The worm will also include a randomly chosen attachment. The size of the attachment is approximately 12,609 bytes. Our current virus signature files will detect this worm. However, if you receive an e-mail prefaced with "US PRESIDENT AND FBI SECRETS" (Even if it sent by someone you know!) DELETE THE E-MAIL IMMEDIATELY!

The cornea of the eye is the only living tissue in the body that contains no blood vessels. Nutrients come from the tears and from the liquid that fills the chamber behind the cornea. Pigeons and hummingbirds have tiny magnetic particles in their heads that respond to the Earth's magnetic fields and that they use for navigation. In the marriage ceremony of the ancient Inca Indians of Peru, the couple was considered officially wed when they took off their sandals and handed them to each other. If you blow in a dog's face he won't like it, but take him for a ride in the car and the first thing he does is stick his head out of the window. Jerry Rice shares the NFL record with Steve Young for most touchdowns by a WR-QB combo: 84 For over 20 years the medical literature has carefully documented the under-treatment of all types of pain by physicians. http://upalumni.org/medschool/appendices/appendix-76.html The 12,831 foot long Akashi Kaikyo Bridge is the world's longest suspension bridge. It was opened on April 5, 1998. Staying awake for 17 to 19 hours can dampen your mental and physical reaction times as dramatically as two drinks. http://www.sciam.com/news/091900/5.html 100 years ago, 18% of households in the United States had at least one full-time servant or domestic.

High altitude and continuous darkness in winter combine to make interior Antarctica the coldest place on Earth. The lowest temperature ever recorded was -126.9 F at 11,500 feet above sea level at the Russian station of Vostok on August 24, 1960. Dolphins don't automatically breath but have to tell themselves to. IBM spent seven years working on the systems for the Sydney Olympics. The first sponsored television was in 1930 and was seen on 44 television sets. Rain contains vitamin B12. On Thursday, October 5, 2000, the space shuttle program will launch its 100th shuttle. The program has transported into space 596 people and 3,000,000 pounds of cargo. Wayne Gretzky holds the record for most All-Star game points in a career: 25 A hummingbird hums because of the nature of the 10 primary feathers on each wing. These feathers are extremely long and narrow. When the wings flap, these feathers vibrate, making the humming sound.

HOW DID MANHATTAN GET ITS NAME? It's a derivative of the Indian word Manahachtaniek, which means "the island where we all get drunk," apparently referring to a spirited encounter between the Native Americans and some newly arrived Dutchmen. WHY DOES IVORY SOAP FLOAT? Too much air - originally an error in production. In 1878, Harley Procter and cousin James Gamble decided to create for their company a white soap that would rival the popular castile soaps of their competitors. The product was successfull. Then, in 1879, a worker mistakenly allowed the soap solution to be overmixed. The new version of the soap was an immediate success because it bobbed to the surface of the water.

Here on Earth it's almost always true, that tomorrow will follow today. Yet there is a place where yesterday always follows today. Where is this place?

I don't know, since I'm meat I may well be at a disadvantage. The posting on the aliens was too funny. So where is it that yesterday always follows today? This is one of those Sphinx Riddle things, isn't it? A bear has 42 teeth. I'll take your word for it as I don't want to wait a few months, find a hibernating bear, pry its mouth open, and count the teeth. The world's largest garbage dump, the Freshkills Landfill on Staten Island is well on its way, or just has become, the highest point on the east coast of the United States. The Dutch actually bought Manhattan from a tribe of Indians who lived in what is now Brooklyn. There were Indians living on Manhattan at the time, but they lived up in what is now Washington Heights. As far as I know, no one consulted them on the deal. Have those imported mongeese become a problem in Hawaii? Lastly, Happy Thanksgiving to all the Canadians at Spring.

*gonna kill me* Tomorrow comes before yesterday in a dictionary...*ducking*

Loved that meat one...blame that dictionary one on my being meat...

i did love the meat story!

I should post it in Food/vegetarian so Autumn will see it!

Originally developed in the Philippines around 1500, the Yo-Yo was a weapon. It consisted of a four pound stone attached to a rope about 20 feet long. Tribesmen used it in two ways. When hunting, they stood off to one side, held one end of the rope and threw the rock towards the legs of an animal. The rope became tangled around the animals legs, and with a tug, the hunter brought the animal down. Against enemies, the stones would be dropped on their heads. The tribesmen would quickly recover the stones, ready for a second blow if necessary. In 1927, an American named Donald Duncan saw a Yo-Yo in a museum and spent the next several years transforming this concept into his new toy. His Yo-Yo's were made of wood, and the name - the same as the Philippine weapon - is a legal trademark. Only later did Duncan discover that toys similar to his Yo-Yo, had been made of ivory with expensive silk strings, had been used in China as far back as 1000 B.C., and had showed up in Europe centuries later. This enabled other toy manufacturers to make similar toys legally, though only Duncan was ever allowed to use the name Yo-Yo. On October 7th, 2000 a 38-year-old Slovenian became the first person to ski nonstop down Mount Everest. It took five hours to ski from the peak to the 18,000 base camp. Incredibly, a sherpa recently set the record for the climb from base camp to the peak of just 16 hours! http://everest.simobil.si/eng/default.shtml Napster users downloaded 1,390,000,000 MP3 files ...in September, 2000. Babe Ruth struck out 1330 times. 20% of American men proposed on one knee. The 28th President (Thomas) Woodrow Wilson allowed sheep to graze on the White House lawn during World War I; their wool helped raise money for the Red Cross. Despite its size, IBM's Q7 had a single CPU running at about 12 KHz (83,333 times slower than 1 gHz Athlon) and 64K of RAM (1,000 times less than the minimum today). Cats spend 70% of their time sleeping. Fossilized remains of life 50 million years ago have been arranged in unusual forms, which is Lemmon's mark of distinction at the world's largest petrified wood park in South Dakota.

All of this is memorable stuff, but nothing like as memorable as my day has been. My son brought his new fiancee home to meet his volcano, to wlak the lava flows and to admire the glory of a lava flow in the night. Imagine this great lady's courage! She accepted his proposal even after meeting me in July!

Overshadowing them all was the W incident...in th ecategory of momumentality

During the Cambrian period (500 million BC) an Earth day was only 20.6 hours long. Cisco Systems and Microsoft capitalized on the windfall profits of their employees to wipe out their federal income tax bills last year. Cisco, the second-most valuable U.S. company, behind General Electric, eliminated a $1.8 billion income tax liability by deducting the gains that its employees realized from stock options during the company's most recent fiscal year. Microsoft, the world's largest computer-software company, recorded a $5.5 billion tax benefit by deducting its employees' profits from stock options during its last fiscal year. Microsoft reported federal and state tax liabilities of $4.74 billion in the year ending June 30. http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1004-200-3145717.html Only 15 to 20% of the population functions well in an environment where they are to be competitive with others. John Walker, an English chemist, never patented the match that he invented because he thought it was too important to be anything but public property. The Klondike Historical Park in Seattle is only 5000 square feet and can be safely explored in about an hour. It is also inside. In 1937 the tiny asteroid Hermes came within 500,000 miles from Earth. In ancient Greece women didn't start counting their age until their wedding day, rather than the actual day they were born. They believed the wedding date was the real start of a woman's life. Young priests of the island of Leukas, Greece were required to don the wings of an eagle and plunge from Cape Dukato into the sea in order to qualify for service at the temple of Apollo. This feat was routinely performed for hundreds of years yet no diver was ever hurt. The height of the dive? 230 feet. Black cats are considered lucky in England.

This will not update but the page does regularly and you can see what my kiddies will be feeling as they reacquaint themselves with Kilauea: http://tux.wr.usgs.gov/results/seismic/BigIsland.html

In the above image, which is a satellite image inhanced, please notice the sea bed just off the southeast coast... Notice the Fan of sediment there? That came from massive faulting and slumping into the sea from that flank of Kilauea volcano. It will as surely happen again as tomorrow will. I just do not want to be here for the earthquake and resulting tsunami from this "mass wasting!" You will also notice similar fans of slump off the north end of the island. Loihi, the name in red at the bottom of the image just off the southeast tip is the newest volcano in the chair. The hot spot is moving!

and how are your babies doing?

My *babies* are fanstastic. Today they are paying homage to the volcano and introducing her to the relism of fluid rock. I wanna go, too, but he wants it to be a special introduction - which I certainly understand! Still, I wnt to go see....*sigh* I might as well be living living in the middle of the outback of Australia for how close I get to that most amazing of sights. ...polishing up my Alexandrite and thinking Wonderful Wild and Wicked things...

For those of you about to travel: Here's a little tip from me to you as an experienced traveler. Wake-up calls: worst way to wake up. The phone rings; it's loud; you can't turn it down. I leave the number of the room next to me, and then it rings kind of quiet, and you hear a guy yell, "What are you calling me for?" Then you get up and take a shower. It's great. -- Garry Shandling Thanks for asking about my kiddies, Wolfie! *hugs*

Q. Why are most cameras black? A. For a while, chrome was popular as a camera finish, but professional photographers covered it in black tape to cut down on surface reflections and that led to the color change. The activist is not the man who says the river is dirty. The activist is the man who cleans up the river. - H. Ross Perot

good one mr. perot! that's interesting about the camera. those pros are constantly fiddling with lights and stuff they don't need the extra frustration of "where's that reflection coming from"!! i've selected an alexandrite out of the amulet catalog. it's simulated but the whole thing is still gonna cost $600 (setting and all). may have to wait for a good raise!

Oooh...if it is like my "Mexican Alexandrite" (not the real one I wear all the time!) it will be beautiful and you will love it!

Northern General Ulysses S. Grant owned slaves who were not freed until after the Civil War had ended. Timekeepers have clocked the action in a 60 minute football game to actually be around 14 minutes. Leon Uris dropped out of high school to join the US Marines. In 1978, a college professor conducted a study of fingernail biting. His findings also revealed approximately 15% of Americans admitted to also chewing their toenails. Pigs can run a 7.5 minute mile.

A typical American hospital has three to four times more employees than patients. Your skin is about 3/16th of an inch thick. Did you know the federal withholding tax taken out of each American's paycheck was enacted as part of a "temporary" wartime measure? Talk about fuzzy math. The Hawaiian alphabet has only twelve letters. Sioux Indian Chief Crazy Horse was called "Curly" as a child. .

Honey is used as a center for golf balls and in antifreeze mixtures. There are 6 Internet Service Providers serving Iceland. The Library of Congress has 530 miles of shelves. Jerry Rice is one of the NFL's best-conditioned players. Several people, including the Secretary of State and the Secretary of the Navy, were killed when the ten-ton "Peacemaker" gun exploded during a firing from the first propeller-driven warship, the U.S.S. Princeton. They were on a cruise on the Potomac south of Washington, D.C., in 1844. President John Tyler was also on board with his fiance, Julia Gardiner -- they were unhurt as they were in a cabin below deck. IBM had 2,000 employees along with 4,000 volunteers working in shifts round the clock at the Sydney Olympics. On Thursday, October 5, 2000, the space shuttle program was to launch its 100th shuttle. Shuttles have orbited the Earth about 13,500 times, travelling 350,000,000 miles -- equal to going to the sun and back twice. Big tobacco has played another trick on the public, according to a paper published in the latest issue of the journal Tobacco Control. Instead of finding ways to reduce levels of harmful secondhand smoke, manufacturers chose to hide it, adding chemicals to their cigarettes that mask the smoke's odor and visibility. What's worse, those additives may actually make ETS more dangerous. http://www.sciam.com/news/091200/2.html The salamander is the official South Carolina state amphibian.

i'm depressed about the pigs being able to run faster than me *frown*

honey is in the middle of golf balls? hmmmm, bet it's not edible!

It takes more calories to eat a piece of celery than the celery has in it to begin with. Top 4 Favorite Theme Parks: 1. Busch Gardens Williamsburg, (Williamsburg, VA) 2. Disneyland, (Anaheim, CA) 3. Cedar Point, (Sandusky, OH) 4. Paramount's Kings Island, (Kings Island, OH) 5 years after being one of the judges who condemned 19 people of witchcraft in Salem, Massachusetts in 1692, Samuel Sewall stated the convictions were a mistake. If you pause Saturday Night Fever at the "How Deep Is Your Love" rehearsal scene, you will see the camera crew in the dance hall mirror. 6% of Americans proposed over the phone. America spends 14% of its GNP on healthcare: $1,000,000,000

Precipitation What is hail and is it dangerous? Are raindrops really tear-shaped? Big and small snowflakes Can snow be coloured? Sounds of snow Which day is the snowiest? The sound of hail What do you call it when snow evaporates before hitting the ground? I would like to know when it is too warm to snow? What determines whether precipitation will fall as freezing rain or snow? What is the Bergeron Process? Why are all snow flakes six sided? What is hail and is it dangerous? David Bowes, a Grade 11 student in Chatham, New Brunswick was curious about the formation of hail and how dangerous it is. While hurricanes, tornadoes and lightning grab all the headlines, hail is one of the most dangerous and certainly most destructive of all severe weather phenomena. Each year it injures a few Canadians, kills thousands of farm animals, wildlife and birds and causes millions of dollars damage. Now I don't know whether hail has ever killed anyone in Canada. It has killed hundreds in India and in China. And in the United States, at least 3 people have been killed by falling hailstones including a 3-month old boy, and it caused a single-engine plane to crash. For a hailstone to grow, it must be captured or held up by powerful thunderclouds while new layers of ice are continuously being added. In most cases, frozen raindrops or ice balls are caught up in a kind of atmospheric trampoline as they fall from clouds. The ice particles are thrown back up into freezing air by strong updrafts where they acquire another layer of ice. These updrafts can continue to bounce the growing ice pieces back and forth - sometimes 25 times or more. Eventually the hailstones grow too heavy to be supported by the thunderstorm's updraft and fall to the ground as hailstones - the size of peas or as big as grapefruits or even bigger. top Are raindrops really tear-shaped? Adam Taub of Thornhill, Ontario wonders whether raindrops are really tear or pear-shaped like you see on cartoons, advertisements and posters. High-speed photographs of most raindrops nearing the earth show them to be more like mushroom tops or hamburger buns - not at all tear-shaped. The falling speed of raindrops is directly related to their size. Small drops, those less than 2 mm in diameter, tend to remain round as they fall. The surface tension is sufficient to hold it together as a nearly perfect sphere. Larger raindrops fall at a speed around 30 km/h. Because the air pressure or resistance is greatest on the bottom, the drop flattens there which makes the droplet bulge on top. The side edges bulge out because air pressure there is lower. So the large raindrops tend to be flat on the bottom, round on top and wider than they are high just like a hamburger bun. Really large drops, those say 6 mm or more across, become distorted into a shape rather like a parachute and then they break up into smaller drops. top Big and small snowflakes Peggy Power of North York asks why are snowflakes quite big on certain days, and then smaller on other days? The shape and size of snowflakes ultimately depend on the temperature and the amount of water vapour available in the cloud where the flake first forms, and in the layers of air that the flake falls through as it descends. Some soggy flakes, measuring about 2 cm in diameter when they reach the earth, are conglomerations of 100's of matted-together flakes which have passed through relatively mild and moist air. On the other hand, dry snow tends to arrive as small, single flakes, unlikely to bind with other flakes as they fall through dry, cold air. Nearly anything can happen to a snowflake as it drifts and tumbles earthward. Pieces break off, evaporate or melt. They bump into each other and sometimes bind together. If the wind is too strong, the big flakes will rip apart and you'll only see fragments. Also the greater the distance a snowflake falls the larger it usually becomes. About a century ago, monster snowflakes which were larger than a medium-size pizza supposedly fell from the skies over Montana. top Can snow be coloured? Mr. Eloi DeGrace of Dartmouth sent me a clipping from a newspaper in 1819 citing a peculiar find of red snow. How can that be? In 1818, Sir John Ross, the noted Arctic explorer discovered large deposits of red-coloured snow in Greenland. It was found to contain red-tinted, microscopic plants and animals. Pure snow is white, but snow is never pure. It contains much more than just frozen moisture and air. Pollen, single-celled organisms, specks of dust, dirt, sand, and ash and traces of pollution are sometimes in sufficient quantities to affect the colour. The foreign material is carried by wind currents before the snowflake begins to fall. Yellow snow (it's not what you think) can be coloured by pollen from a near-by pine forest fell in Pennsylvania; pink snow has fallen on Vancouver Island; pale-blue snow fell in the French Alps presumably coloured by copper salts in the dust from the Sahara desert. During the Dust Bowl in the 1930s, black and brown soils from Oklahoma and Texas coloured snow in Eastern Canada. Snow can also change colour after it falls. Colonies made up of algae, fungi and bacteria living among the crystals feed on the nutrients in the snow. top Sounds of snow Clayton Trought of Aurora Ontario asks why does snow squeak when you walk on it. I am sure you have noticed that the colder the temperature, the fluffier the snow and the squeakier the sound it makes when you walk on it. One explanation is that when the air and snow are only slightly below freezing, pressure from walking compresses and partially melts the snow crystals underfoot. Now, lubricated by a thin film of water, the snow can flow and little sound is made. But on cold days, when the temperature is, say -15C or lower, foot pressure is not sufficient to melt the snow. Instead, when you step down, the individual cold ice crystals move abruptly, slipping and crashing into each other. The sudden rubbing or smashing produces that familiar cold-weather creaking sound. Because the sound produced by snow is related to how cold it is, you can use it to tell the temperature. The louder the snow cries the colder the temperature of both the air and snow. Another possible explanation is that the pressure of stepping on the air-filled snowflakes rapidly expels the air and produces the characteristic squeak or crunchy noise we know so well. top

Did you hear about the big meteorite that fell in Northern British Columbia, it was on NPR this morning. To quote http://search.npr.org/cf/cmn/cmnpd01fm.cfm?PrgDate=10/13/2000&PrgID=3 -- NPR's Richard Knox reports on clues to the earth's formation that are falling from the sky. Last January, a real estate agent in Canada witnessed the crash of a meteorite he described as a gigantic white light from the sky. A week later an amateur scientist discovered pieces of the meteorite, collected and preserved them in the freezer. Scientists now say it's the best sample they have yet to study how the earth was formed. (4:51)

And more details at http://www.discovery.com/news/briefs/20001012/sp_meteorite.html

Cross posted from Springark Thursday October 12 4:41 PM ET Scientists Find Completely New Animal in Greenland http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/nm/20001012/sc/life_animal_dc_1.html COPENHAGEN, Denmark (Reuters) - Danish scientists have found a completely new kind of animal down a cold well in Greenland and are keeping a colony of them in a fridge, the Arctic magazine Polarfronten reported on the Internet Thursday. The 0.1-millimeter long freshwater organism does not fit into any one of the previously known animal families -- making it only the fourth such creature to be discovered on the planet in the past 100 years, Polarfronten said. Studies of the animal named ``Limnognathia maerski'' show that it shares some characteristics with certain seawater life-forms. Scientists from Copenhagen University and Aarhus University in Denmark have established a new phylum -- or family -- for the tiny animal, whose most remarkable feature is a set of very complicated jaws. It has now got its own branch, Micrognathozoa, on the tree of the world's known animals, which are divided into slightly more than 30 families, Polarfronten said. Limnognathia maerski, which reproduces through parthenogenesis, uses its jaws to scrape the bacteria and algae it feeds on from underwater moss growing in icy wells which freeze over during the long Arctic winter. The animal was found in samples taken in 1994 from a well in Isunngua on Disco island in northwestern Greenland. A colony of the tiny creatures, all females, is in a refrigerator at Copenhagen University. Greenland, the world's largest island, is part of Denmark.

Positively amazing, but boring...nothing male around at all??!

Trick or Treating under the Stars Thursday's Classroom for Friday, Oct. 13th http://www.thursdaysclassroom.com In little more than two weeks, millions of kids will be outdoors after nightfall on Halloween. Don't let your students go Trick or Treating unprepared -- a basic knowledge of the northern autumn sky will make Halloween more fun than ever. This week's activities include: o Draco-Lanterns -- transform traditional pumpkin carving into a truly stellar experience! o Toothpaste Constellations -- Do you have trouble convincing your kids to brush their teeth? Now you can put all that neglected toothpaste to good use in this constellation art project. o What's Your Angle? -- Students learn about triangles and quadrilaterals as they grow familiar with the autumn constellations. o Hands Up! -- One of the most useful tools for navigating the night sky (and learning the basics of angles and degrees) is right by your side. o The Crazy Constellations Coloring Book -- Students can color original art by Duane Hilton as they follow along with this week's lessons. ...and more! Please visit http://www.thursdaysclassroom.com

WHAT WAS THE FIRST ZOO IN THE UNITED STATES? It was the Philadelphia Zoological Gardens, which opened in 1874. In 1938, it became the site of the first children's zoo. Founded and operated by the Zoological Society of Philadelphia, the Philadelphia Zoo currently houses more than 1,400 specimens of over 400 species. WHAT IS SILLY PUTTY MADE OF? The rubberlike compound is composed, in part, of boric acid and silicone oil. Invented at the General Electric laboratories in the 1940s as an inexpensive synthetic rubber for use during World War II, it gained its greatest popularity when New Haven, Connecticut, store owner Paul Hodgson bought a large quantity of it, put it in small plastic eggs, and called it Silly Putty.

note that there is a new topic in springark for those newly discovered critters. that meteorite was way cool!

Yeah, I need a piece of a meteorite for my collection. Even a wee little one no one will miss...oh, and a moon rock would be nice. Shoulda made off with the one I guarded that time... Parthenogenic Critters on SpringArk...gonna check!

The largest crocodiles ever were Deinosuchus, from the late Cretaceous era. They were up to 50 feet long. One skull that was found was almost six feet long. If IBM's Q7 failed, it would run a diagnostic, telling you what rack of tubes to pull and what tube to replace in the rack. Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York was founded in 1861 by a brewer named Matthew Vassar. The Oakland Bay Bridge was completed 6 months ahead of schedule and millions under budget and is considered one of the 7 wonders of the modern world. The total weight of all insects Earth, is 12 times greater than the weight of all people. The height of the Eiffel Tower varies as much as six inches depending on the temperature. It took engineers 22 years to design the zipper. Ancient Egyptians slept on pillows made of stone. The US has the world's most violent weather. Each year it experiences 10,000 violent thunderstorms, 5,000 floods, 1,000 tornadoes and several hurricanes.

Benjamin Franklin was the 15th child of a Boston soapmaker. A dragonfly eats, on average, 300 mosquitos per day. An inch-thick rope of spider's silk can withstand up to 140,000 pounds of pressure. In 1968, there were 5 million-dollar lottery winners who did not claim their prize. A horse can look forward with one eye and backwards with the other.

Frogs never drink -- they absorb water through their skin. The book that Neo hides his money and software disks in is a copy of "Simulacra and Simulation" by the Jean Baudrillard. The book argues Baudrillard's thesis of "hyperreality": the idea that multiple copies annihilate the ancient relationship between copy and original... The British government has sanctioned insurance companies' use of genetic tests for inherited diseases. http://www.newscientist.com/dailynews/news.jsp?id=ns999968 When North America was first settled, beavers grew to the size of bears. Blonde beards grow faster than darker beards. Worldwide, about 40 square miles of land are transformed into desert each day. Rhode Island was the last of the original thirteen colonies to become a state.

A Matter of Time A Mind-Warping Memo to Kick-Start Your Brain on a Marvelous Monday Morning "The time of physics is defined and measured by a pendulum, whether it is the pendulum of a grandfather's clock, the pendulum of the Earth's rotation around the sun, or the pendulum of the precessing electron in the nuclear magnetic field of the hydrogen maser. Time, therefore, is defined by periodic rotation - that is, by motion related to a point moving uniformly around a circle." These are the words of physicist Edgar Lipworth, as reported by the occasionally apocryphal but invariably colorful Tom Robbins in his book, Even Cowgirls Get the Blues. Apocryphal or no, Lipworth's assertion found a warm corner in my mind where it circled, laid down and then napped for awhile. Upon waking, the strange thought yawned, stretched its arms and said, "All movement happens in Space; height, width and depth - the first three dimensions. And as you already know, the fourth dimension is Time. Light moves through space and according to Einstein, Time stands still at the speed of light. Light, my friend, is the pendulum of the universe, marking and measuring time. And just as faith is the evidence of things not seen, color is the evidence of light. Color is the momentary, visible bridge between space and time." Scratching my head, I asked, "Are you sure?" For a long time there was nothing but silence in my mind. Then, just as the thought was vanishing over the horizon, it called over it's shoulder, "Let there be light. Remember?" And then it was gone. But I had other thoughts to replace it on the playground of my brain. Here's one of the more interesting ones for you to ponder - "Time is the mirror in which our choices are seen. And it is through our choices that our values and beliefs are revealed... If you want to know what a person believes, you need only to watch what they do." But the only useful, practical, valuable thought among all these, my most recent thoughts, is found in the answer to the following Question: "If objective, fourth-dimensional reality is this meeting place that we call the space-time continuum, (composed of height, width, depth and time,) then what would a three-dimensional reality be?" Ah, but the answer to that question is an illuminating and profitable one, indeed. I'll share it with you in next week's memo. Roy H. Williams MMMemo@wizardofads.com

England is smaller than New England. Some teenagers are now fearing technological obsolescence because their younger brothers and sisters know more about computers than they do. Robots in Japan pay union dues. During the Vietnam War, more people were killed in the US by guns and explosives than US soldiers in the war zone. - Deane Jordan 100 years ago, there were about 230 murders per year in the US. In 1769, Nicholas Cugnot, a French military engineer, built the first self-propelled car. Designed to pull artillery, the three-wheeled vehicle could travel about 2.5 miles per hour while carrying a cannon and four people. Most fish don't really sleep but rather go through a period of decreased activity that allows their body to regenerate. On the other hand, many coral reef fish do sleep and when they do they sleep by standing on their tails or leaning on a rock!

How does a bird find a worm in the ground? Before the sun rises and warms up the earth's surface, earthworms usually crawl up to the earth's surface while it is still cool and damp with the morning dew. That's also the time they fall prey to the "early" (and hungry) birds. When a bird stands on the ground near a worm which is crawiling underneath, the bird can feel the earth's vibrations with its feet. The bird can also hear the worm tunneling in the earth below with their ears.

I heard a good piece on NPR this morning, a reporter carries video equipment and tapes his journey though a previously untravled part of the African interior. The animal and insect sounds nearly drown out this late night narrative. Worth catching!

So Japanese robots pay union dues. That's very funny. How exactly do they work out the accounting in regard to this? Your son's fiancee as thus far passed two trials, meeting you and facing the volcano. Aren't there usally three trials? What's the third going to be? Tomorrow comes before yesterday in the dictionary. It's a good think you ducked because I was ready to use a virtual yo-yo as a weapon. It's just as well I didn't since I'm mostly a menace to myself when using a yo-yo. No cracks about my being a yo-yo, please. Basically I refer to myself as quirky. I know that someone here will figure out this riddle, probably Marcia. So here goes: It's the beginning of enternity, the end of time, and found in space.

My son's fiancee did the third trial first..fell in love with my son and managed to make it reciprocal while winning over his friends' affections. Even the House male likes her! About those robots...amazing opening for graft, huh! Yo-yos tend to attack those whose ineptitude they sense. I have had my share of bruises, thank you... ...the letter "E" Wish we could get NPR radio on this side of the island....

There are over 7,000 PCs and 2,000 touch-screens and 540 servers at the Sydney Olympics. By 1880, Standard Oil refined 95% of the oil in the U.S. The number of people accessing the Internet in China is now the same as the number of people in France: 7,200,000. Rugby, North Dakota is the geographical center of North America. It's marked by a 15 foot rock obelisk and flanked by poles flying the U.S. and Canadian flags. The first cook book was written by the Greeks in 400 B.C. Henry Ford went broke five times before succeeding. Autumn leaves actually do not turn color. They lose one color, green, and show other colors they've had all along. The change is also caused more by the shortening of the days than by cooler weather. - Deane Jordan, "1001 Facts Somebody Screwed Up"

Saying 'goodbye' for the next 5 months ...off to Timbuctoo (well, near it anyway ...same country). Look for Marcia posting in Cultures and travel for me. See you all in March unless I get to an internet cafe or something ... Maggie

take care maggie!

God Speed Maggie, luv! +----------------- Bizarre Superstitions ------------------+ Spilling salt is considered bad luck, probably because it was once so valuable. Superstition has it a person is doomed to shed as many tears as it takes to dissolve the spilled salt. Evil spirits can't harm you when you stand inside a circle. Suspend a wedding band over the palm of the pregnant girl. If the ring swings in a circular motion it will be a girl. If the ring swings in a straight line the baby will be a boy. A knife as a gift from a lover means that the love will soon end. [Especially if the knife is delivered to your back.] If you use the same pencil to take a test that you used for studying for the test, the pencil will remember the answers. The number of Xs in the palm of your right hand is the number of children you will have. You must hold your breath while going past a cemetery or you will breathe in the spirit of someone who has recently died.

My right palm has one X and I have one child.

Weekend Meteors NASA Science News for October 18, 2000 On Friday the 13th of October a brilliant fireball startled stargazers in Texas and Kansas. But that was just a piece of space junk -- a real meteor shower arrives this weekend. FULL STORY at http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2000/ast18oct_1.htm?list89800 ---

i have 2 x's that i can really see and i have two kids!

How weird! How does that matter, and is it only a female manifestation?

i have heard that when palm readings are taken, one should read the weaker hand. it seems that the dominate hand changes due to use. i wonder about guy's hands.

yup, but certain things apparently only show up on dominant hand. Check how many grandchildren you're gonna have!!!

checked house male - he has only one X...and two natural children...

how do i do that?

I just asked a young teenage lady and she found 6 Xs on her hand! Not in HER future, she says. She said probably have two - the first one and quintuplets for the second one! Her mother has 2 Xs and 2 children...

the AM has none.......wait, i got it on the grandchildren! took me a minute!

she has three x's

Huh!!! You'll have at least 3 then...*grin* Cats have over one hundred vocal sounds. IBM's Q7 could play video and text games and track 400 airplanes simultaneously. 29% of Americans can not drive a stick-shift car. Microsoft was the worst performer in the Dow Jones Industrial Average this year (2000). By age sixty, most people have lost half of their taste buds. Poverty -- not cancer, not AIDS, not heart disease -- is the number one killer in the world. P.T. Barnum never said "There's a sucker born every minute". The shrimp's heart is in its head. America media mogul Ted Turner owns 1.5% of New Mexico.

Q. Why do we read from left to right? A. The ancient Greeks started out writing from right to left, as many present day languages still do. They then adopted a style known as "boustrophedon" a reference to turning the way an ox turns a plow. This super efficient style went from left to right and right to left on alternate lines, saving the eyeballs the trip back to the right side to start a new line. Around 500 BC, the Greeks began to write exclusively from left to right. The reasons for the change are uncertain, but may have to do with a new split reed pen that was easier to move in that direction.

Examples of different types of energy: 1. Kinetic energy - falling water from a dam or wind. 2. Heat energy - anything burning. 3. Electrical energy - obtained from an electric current. 4. Potential energy - energy locked up in coal, oil, gas, food, and wood. 5. Mechanical energy - a wheel turned by falling water. 6. Solar energy - heat from the sun. 7. Gravitational energy - from anything falling. 8. Atomic/nuclear energy - from splitting an atom.

What makes a cat purr? A cat has two sets of vocal cords when born. One set, contained in a cat's voice box, makes the "meow" sound. The other set, which are actually false vocal cords, are vibrated upon inhaling and exhaling, which produces an involuntary continuous purring sound.

Have a safe journey and an enjoyable visit, Maggie.

Marcia, I'm sorry it took so long to get back. You are absolutely right, the letter "E" is the beginning of enternity, the end of time, and found in space. I knew you'd get it. I'm glad to learn that your son's fiancee passed all three of her tests. The house male approves as well. How about the little fur-person, the marmalade princess? Speaking of kitties, they can purr and eat at the same time. I always wondered how they did that. Thank you for explaining how they generate that sound. There's always something to learn at Geo.

When my Master Programmer handed me Geo and told me I was to create the first topic, I thought I had chosen a totally useless topic; one so inspecific that nothing would fit in here. I have found it most versatile of late. After all, we ARE all things of Planet Earth! Miss Kitty, the marmalade princess is skittish of everyone but the male of the species. If I come bearing edibles then she will tolerate me and fling herself tummy-up on my shoes to be petted. Otherise, she just tolerates the rest of us but catches rats almost 1/2 her size and presents them to us. Yak!! Good Kitty!

He who blindly quotes what he reads must at times admit he is an fool. CORRECTION: Microsoft could not be the worst performer in the Dow Jones Industrial Average, because it is listed on Nasdaq. Thanks, Richmond. ************************************************************* At age 16 Confucius was a corn inspector. 1,500,000,000,000,000,000 bytes of unique information are generated each year, the equivalent of 250 books worth for every man, woman and child on the planet. Of these 1.5 Exabytes of information, 93% of it stored digitally. http://www.sims.berkeley.edu/how-much-info/ The average car produces 4 times its weight in exhaust gases over the life of the car. Cleveland, Ohio got the first traffic light on Aug. 5, 1914. Jerry Rice is a 10-time ALL-PRO (1986-90, 92-96). The garden equipment maker Wolf-Garten has built a prototype machine fitted with an array of four lasers that cuts grass to an accuracy of 1/25th of an inch. Powerful lasers evaporate water from the grass and chop the dried residue into tiny particles. A stream of air then blends the cuttings with fertiliser before depositing the mixture onto the lawn. The mower also includes mobile Internet access and a CD player to entertain you as you cut the lawn. http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns226055 Horses were originally used to pull railway cars. 80% of your body temperature escapes through your head. Polar bears can smell a person up to 20 miles away.

+--------------- Bizarre Historical Trivia ----------------+ 100 years ago.... Only 14 percent of the homes in the United States had a bathtub. There were only 8,000 cars in the US and only 144 miles of paved roads. Alabama, Mississippi, Iowa, and Tennessee were each more heavily populated than California. With a mere 1.4 million residents, California was only the twenty-first most populous state in the Union. The tallest structure in the world was the Eiffel Tower. The average wage in the U.S. was twenty-two cents an hour. The average U.S. worker made between $200 and $400 per year. Sugar cost four cents a pound. Eggs were fourteen cents a dozen. Coffee cost fifteen cents a pound. Most women only washed their hair once a month and used borax or egg yolks for shampoo. Drive-by-shootings - in which teenage boys galloped down the street on horses and started randomly shooting at houses, carriages, or anything else that caught their fancy - were an ongoing problem in Denver and other cities in the West. Plutonium, insulin, and antibiotics hadn't been discovered yet. Scotch tape, crossword puzzles, canned beer, and iced tea hadn't been invented. Some medical authorities warned that professional seam- stresses were apt to become sexually aroused by the steady rhythm of the sewing machine's foot pedals. They recommended slipping bromide - which was thought to diminish sexual desire - into the woman's drinking water. Marijuana, heroin, and morphine were all available over the counter at corner drugstores. According to one pharmacist, "Heroin clears the complexion, gives buoyancy to the mind, regulates the stomach and the bowels, and is, in fact, a perfect guardian of health." Coca-Cola contained cocaine instead of caffeine. There were about 230 reported murders in the U.S. annually.

Queen Victoria used cocaine. It was an ingredient in an elixer she took for "women's complaints". There is also an ad for Bayer aspirin from the 1890's which states, "Bayer aspirin with herion. Strong pain relief." Last but not least, there was Coca-Cola which originally did have a small amount of cocaine in it.

Ah, yes... No wonder they called them "The Good Old Days" Laudinum is what was prescribed for almosty anything which ailed a woman. It was tincture of opium, and it probably kept them from complaining much!

In the Arctic, the sun sometimes appears to be square. An ordinary light bulb converts only 10% of the inputted electricity as light. The rest is dissipated as heat. Seven nuclear submarines lie on the ocean floor: five are Russian, two American. In addition, dozens of obsolete Soviet submarines are rusting in just a few feet of water in various Russian ports. http://www.sciam.com/2000/1100issue/1100scicit2.html The first envelopes with gummed flaps were produced in 1844. In Britain they were not immediately popular because it was thought to be a serious insult to send a person's saliva to someone else. Babe Ruth wore a cabbage leaf under his hat to keep his head cool. He changed it every two innings. In England, in the 1880's "pants" was considered a dirty word. The Blesbok, a South African antelope, is almost the same color as grapejuice. The first baseball stadium was built in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in 1909. The chance of contracting an infection during a hospital stay in the US is 1 in 15.

I shall remember when sending post to Britain to moisten the flap with a sponge. ...and to tuck a cabbage leaf under my baseball cap...

The Year is: 1800 1 vote gives Thomas Jefferson the presidency over Aaron Burr 1839 1 vote wins the Massachusetts governorship for Marcus Morton 1868 1 vote saves Andrew Johnson's presidency 1941 1 vote strengthens selective service before World War II 1960 1 vote per precinct gives JFK the presidency 2000 1 vote, your vote, can make the difference November 7th In America, as well as the rest of the world, 1 VOTE DOES MATTER. Be the ONE. Make the difference, SEND THIS TO A FRIEND.

The Empire State building was struck by lightning 8 times during a 24 minute thunderstorm. There are 26 known spellings for the name of Libyan leader Mummar Quaddafi. Carolyn Shoemaker has discovered 32 comets and about 800 asteroids. Owls are the only birds who can see the colour blue. The katydid bug hears through holes in its hind legs. Blue eyes are the most sensitive to light, dark brown the least sensitive. America once used a five-cent bill. 30,000 people work on the US Space Shuttle program. Vladimir Lenin bought 9 Rolls Royces while heading the Soviet Union.

As a young lifeguard at a beach near Dixon, Illinois, future 40th US president Ronald Reagan rescued 77 people from drowning. There were over 4,000 scooter-related injuries in August, 2000. http://www.sciam.com/news/102400/4.html 15,000 people per day are signing up with AOL. There are now 25,000,000 AOL members worldwide, in 16 countries and 8 languages. Clark Gable used to shower more than 4 times a day. Andrzej Makowski is the youngest person on record to receive a driver's license. He received his license when he was just 14 years and 8 months old. Oregon has more ghost towns than any other state. Wayne Gretzky won the goals, assists or points season title 29 times and owned all 3 titles continuously for a 4 year stretch. Procter & Gamble Co. spent $199,000,000 in TV ads in 1996. Ostriches live about 75 years.

Oct. 25th Solar Coronal Mass Ejection Space Weather News for Oct. 25, 2000 http://www.spaceweather.com This morning a full halo coronal mass ejection sped away from the Sun faster than 620 km/s. The leading edge of a solar wind shock wave could arrive in the neighborhood of Earth later this week and possibly trigger auroras. For details and animations please visit http://www.spaceweather.com

This May Explain A Lot New research indicates that incompetent people tend not to know they are incompetent. Not only that, they also tend to be very confident that they know what they're doing -- even more confident of their own competence than people who really do know what they're doing. The New York Times reports that Cornell University psychology professor David Dunning reached those conclusions in a study he conducted with a graduate student, and wrote about his findings in the December 1999 issue of the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. The researchers concluded that one reason incompetent people do not know how much they do not know, is that the cognitive skills required to be competent are also required for recognizing actual competence. Researcher Justin Kruger told the Times that the incompetence of incompetent people "robs them of their ability to realize" they have a problem. It also makes it difficult for incompetent folks to recognize competence in others. By the way, the researchers say they also noticed that people who can't tell a joke tend not to realize that they're not funny -- and as a result they persist in telling jokes badly. -From the National Association of Science Writers

45% of Americans consistently follow the speed limit. IBM's Q7 could play "Stars and Stripes Forever", using the tape drives as trombones, the line printers as percussion and the bit speaker as the flutes. The London subway (Underground) first opened in 1863. Henry Ford bought a Rolls Royce in 1924. When caught driving it, he said, "My Ford was being serviced so I drove over in the next best thing!" At birth a panda is smaller than a mouse, weighing about four ounces. A 1995 survey of 149 medical students found that all of them, 100%, had been introduced as "doctor" by hospital staff. This not only violates federal and professional guidelines, it's explicitly illegal in Massachusetts. http://upalumni.org/medschool/appendices/appendix-1.html The IBM systems at the Sydney Olympics involved 13 million lines of computer code. The Egyptian's wore something akin to a kilt.

Re the Coronal Mass Ejection (CME) mentioned in post 459. This image is awesom Better still go to the url at post 459 and click on the small image to see the larger one. I have never seen one as large as this. Northern climates, please check for Aurorae, please!!! Extreme southeen ones, check too! The come back and tell us all about it!

Lunar Leonids 2000 NASA Science News for October 26, 2000 Next month the Moon will plow through a stream of debris from comet Tempel-Tuttle, the parent of the Leonid meteor shower. Meteoroids that strike the Moon don't cause shooting stars as they do on our planet. Instead, they hit the lunar terrain at high speed. Scientists will be watching for signs of impacts as the Moon heads for a close encounter with the Leonids. FULL STORY at http://spacescience.com/headlines/y2000/ast26oct_1.htm?list89800

i like the incompetent people explaination. that is classic!

Yup!!! I also put in in screwed. How much better a place that that for such an subject. I guess The Man has more than his share of them working for him...

Thanks to John in Canada, we have this handy URL to use for time corrections for all over the world. I will use it often! http://www.worldtimeserver.com/

As the rest of the world moves their clock hand back and hour tomorrow night, we move the entire state 1000 miles closer to the rest of you. Not sure how it impacts us in relation to the Orient or Australia but we remain on Hawaiian Standard Time Year round. Maybe the world just gets 1000 miles smaller for Standard time?!

Yes, it's that one weekend a year, which is 1 hour longer than all the others, expect one. This weekend is 2 hours longer than that one. It's back to standard time for me.

William, you were right. No one reads Geo on Sunday. Maybe I should stage cricket matches...? Bullfights...? Football games...? (Your choice of definition of "football") *sigh*

On what night is Halloween observed when Oct. 31 falls on a Sunday? Halloween isn't an established holiday by law. It is traditional that Halloween is Oct. 31 no matter what day of the week it falls on. Halloween dates from 837 when Pope Gregory IV instituted All Saints or All Hallows Day on Nov. 1 to take the place of an earlier festival known as the Peace of the Martyrs. The day was set aside to honor all saints, known and unknown. Halloween then is a shortened form of All Hallows Eve - the evening before All Hallows Day. Certainly, you have a choice of celebrating it on Oct. 30, Saturday, if you wish. Many of the area parties will be held then rather than on Sunday. It's probably appropriate to say some people equate Halloween with the occult or Satanism and don't approve of it at all.

FAST FACTS: I don't know about you, but in my student days, mastering English grammar seemed about as easy as learning the art of black magic. Well I was apparently onto something. The word "grammar" entered medieval English as "gramarye," via Scotland. The Scots got it from the French word, "grimoire," which meant a collection of magic spells. The connection was made between grammar and magic because most people then were illiterate, so any linguistic smarty-pants was metaphorically seen as dabbling in sorcery. I wish they had retained grimoire. It sounds more like the way I felt about the subject.

(and the funny thing is halloween was made to divert the evil spirits in paganism believed to roam the earth before midnight of Oct 31 and has nothing to do with satamism at all) the ritual was to dress as scary as possible and place jack-o-lanterns at the gates to scare off the ghosts that wanted to party before All Saint's Day! But the scary thing is that satamists have used the day to celebrate their religion. and that is hilarious (grimoire)!!

ABCNEWS.com Oct. 31� The original Halloween had little to do with fake blood, vampire teeth, or trick-or-treating safety patrols. Halloween traces its ultimate origins back to the Druids�a Celtic priestly class�who believed that the spirits of the dead would roam the earth at the turn of the new year on Nov. 1. According to this pagan Celt tradition, the veil between this world and the other was at its thinnest on this �all souls� day and people would dress up and paint their faces to remove differences between the two worlds so they could better interact with the souls of the dead. Costumed villagers would offer up a feast and then parade to the outskirts of town leading the ghosts away. The Christians added to the festival in the seventh century by making Nov. 1 a celebration of all the known and unknown saints and martyrs�hence the name All Saints Day or All Hallows Day. The night before was known as All Hallow E�en or Even (evening) and the day after, Nov. 2, became known as All Souls Day. Over the centuries, pranks, bonfires, belief in the return of the ghosts and dead souls, fortune-telling and ritualistic games began to be associated with Oct. 31 and Nov. 1. Tricks, Treats and Lit Vegetables Trick-or-treating is a recent 20th century American phenomenon, but it has roots in ancient customs. The Irish originally initiated a custom hundreds of years ago where groups of farmers would go house to house soliciting food for the village. Prosperity was promised for generous givers and threats were made against the stingy villagers. The custom of trick-or-treating is also related to the Gaelic practice of giving cakes to the poor at Samhain or �summer-end,� a seasonal festival that coincided with All Souls Day. They came to be called �soul-cakes,� and in return recipients were obligated to pray for a good harvest. The custom of carving jack-o�-lanterns is thought to derive from an old Irish custom of creating lanterns out of vegetables. In Ireland and Great Britain, customs included throwing stones, vegetables and nuts into a fire �to keep the spooks away.� People would also hollow out turnips and pumpkins and place a lighted candle inside to drive evil spirits away from the home. An American Mega-Holiday The Halloween holiday in America became popular in the 1920s and 1930s. At that time, Halloween activities were fairly simple�kids would bob for apples or play with Ouija boards. According to costume experts, witch and ghosts costumes were common, as were Chinese and Japanese dress in response to the Asian arts movement at the end of the century. The modern movie-making industry would later inspire the more elaborate monster and horror-themed costumes we know today. With the help of mass merchandising efforts, Halloween has become a multimillion-dollar event and a good excuse for little kids and plenty of adults to overdose on the sugar.

Happy Samhain (pronounced SAW-wen), everyone. We were all pagan once. Get in touch with your roots! Ovedose on empty calories (sugar)...

Time to look skyward as your go house-to-house: Halloween Aurora Watch Space Weather News for Oct. 31, 2000 http://www.spaceweather.com There is a slight chance for middle-latitude aurora on Halloween night, the result of a solar eruption on Sunday that probably sent a coronal mass ejection in the direction of our planet. For details please visit http://spaceweather.com.

Why did the Russians name their cocktail after Mololtov? Now let's see, was it three parts gasoline to one part vodka, or three parts vodka to one of gasoline? Hold the vodka, please! Add a little borscht? Only for color. Shaken or stirred? Not on your life. As for why the Russians named this simple gasoline bomb -- gas in a bottle with a wick -- after Molotov, they didn't. The Finns, who first threw it at the Russians, named it. And why were the Finns being so rude? Because in 1939 the Russians invaded Finland, once part of the Russian Empire under the czars. The outnumbered Finns had to resort to guerrilla warfare and sarcastically honored Vyacheslav Molotov, then Premier of the USSR, with their "cocktail." But the bombs didn't stop their much bigger foe, and they were soon, uh, Finnished.

Not new but good to remember: From the World Village Project, which says the 1,000 person "village" would have 584 Asians, 124 Africans, 95 Eastern/Western Europeans, 84 Latin Americans, 55 Russians, 52 North Americans, 4 Australians and 2 New Zealanders. As far as language, 165 would speak Mandarin, 86 English, 83 Hindi, 64 Spanish, 58 Russian and 37 Arabic, with the rest made up of people speaking Bengali, Portuguese, Indonesian, Japanese, German, French and 200 other languages. There would be 329 Christians, 178 Moslems, 167 non-religious, 132 Hindus, 62 Buddhists, 45 atheists, 3 Jews and the remainder "other." Some 330 would be children, and only 60 would be older than 65. Twenty-eight new babies would be born each year, and 10 people would die every year. Other interesting information: 70 would own automobiles; 200 people would control 75 percent of the wealth and fewer than 10 would have a college education.

+--------------- Bizarre National Holidays ----------------+ NOVEMBER IS November is... International Drum Month November is... Peanut Butter Lover's Month November is... Slaughter Month November 1 is ... Plan Your Epitaph Day November 4 is... Waiting For The Barbarians Day November 5 is... Gunpowder Day November 8 is... Dunce Day November 9 is... Chaos Never Dies Day November 13 is... National Indian Pudding Day November 18 is... Occult Day November 20 is... Absurdity Day November 22 is... Start Your Own Country Day November 28 is... Make Your Own Head Day November 30 is... Stay At Home Because You're Well Day

wow, we wasted tax money to make these days official?

What about November 7th, national throw away your vote day?

exactly! but i'm going to vote anyway. cuz then i can complain!!

Yup... Me too. I vote in each and every election insuring my right to complain about what ensues. And, they are expecting something like less than 50% voter turnout?! A lot of people are gonna be biting their tongues!

At The Smithsonian: Earthquakes Through Time: The ~55,000 earthquakes with magnitudes 5.0 that have occurred since 1960 are sequentially displayed on more than 30 colorful world and regional physiographic maps. The sizes and colors of the dots correspond to the earthquake magnitudes and depths, respectively. An option permits the display of tectonic plate boundaries and names. A powerful advanced-users mode allows the generation of cross-sectional and 3-dimensional views that provide a window into the Earth's interior. Eruptions Through Time: This program sequentially displays ~1300 eruptions from 1960 to 2000 on more than 20 different maps. Plate boundaries and earthquakes can also be shown. Triangle sizes reflect eruption magnitudes and their colors distinguish eruption types. The name of the volcano is displayed for the duration of each eruption, providing a visual primer to the world's most active volcanoes. Smithsonian Exhibit Version: Earthquake and eruption data are combined on a single world map that dramatically emphasizes the point that earthquakes and volcanic eruptions outline plate boundaries. This same program is featured on a 40" monitor in the Geology, Gems, and Minerals Exhibit Hall in the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of Natural History. Seismic Waves: Six major earthquakes are highlighted to show how the resulting seismic-wave fronts travel through the Earth and across its surface. Three simultaneous views can be seen in this program: a cross-section through the Earth's center, a 3-dimensional view of the Earth from space, and seismogram traces where seismic stations sequentially record the arrival of different types of earthquake waves.

------------------- The Great White Pig ------------------- SPAIN - Not many fishermen would expect to haul in a wild boar after casting their nets 3 miles out at sea. But that is just what happened to a group of fishermen in Spain. No one knows how the wild pig managed to end up so far out at sea, or how it managed to survive for so long. The boar will reportedly be released into the wild near their home port of Tarragona as soon as it has recovered fully from its ordeal.

...without comment (some of my best friends live and work in London... my favorite of all cities in the world... London, England - All of London is aghast at a new study that revealed that people who believe they have been abducted by aliens exhibit 5 times higher rates of ESP. Some in the UFO community have said this proves that the implants that aliens leave inside the abductees turn them into human receivers.

Oh dear... Billy Graham was once considered the best Fuller Brush salesman in North Carolina. "Utopia" is an ancient Greek word meaning "nowhere." Casanova traveled with a custom-made portable bath made for two. A dolphin's brain is bigger than a human's. A golf hole is four inches deep. Clark Gable's middle name was Clark - his first name was William. U.S. Presidents Grant, Taft, Hoover, and Eisenhower never held any other elective office.

France's King Louis XIV was on the throne so long he was succeeded by his great grandson. Jousting is the official state sport of Maryland. A cucumber is 96 percent water. A dime has 118 ridges on it.

Election Day in the USA... VOTE!!! "I don't want to set the world on fire," goes the song. "I just want to start a flame in your heart." Or perhaps just induce heartburn, depending on how the romance goes. But no matter what course love takes, we often resort to fire for metaphors to describe it. This particular expression derives from another of life's passionate activities: politics. In 19th century America, people cared enough about their party's candidates to march in parades for them. These campaign parades were great spectacles. Bands joined in the fun, and partisans carried torches to show how strongly they felt about their favorite. Eventually, "carrying a torch" as an expression of passion also became synonymous with strong romantic feelings for someone. Of course, in love as in politics, you don't always win. You may even get burned. (Source: WHY YOU SAY IT by Webb Garrison) ---------------

Okay, so who was it that sat around and counted the ridges on a dime? November is Peanut Butter Lover's Month. Marcia, since you're fond of peanut butter, how are planning on celebrating? Thanks for all the information on Halloween and Samhain. I know I'm late on this, but the Day of the Dead celebrated in Mexico seems a really fascinating holiday.

How I would choose to celebrate it is not appropriate to put here. However I like to get very persoal with peanut butter and share it with someone V E R Y special...

Who invented sunglasses? It was definitely not some Hollywood movie star. But shades of Tinsel Town, the first sunglasses � there was no single inventor -- were used to hide behind. Fifteenth century Chinese judges didn't worry about being recognized. But they did care, in the interests of being even-handed, about hiding their reaction to trial testimony. They didn't want people to follow their eye movements so they wore smoked-tinted quartz spectacles to conceal them. Our modern, widespread use of sunglasses to keep out the glare, however, stems largely from pilots in the 1930s, who began to wear them to shield their eyes from the sun. Civilians quickly emulated the aviators. Some even adopted sunglasses for fashion as well as protection, hoping to make their social life take off. (Source: EXTRAORDINARY ORIGINS OF EVERYDAY THINGS by Charles Panati)

FAST FACTS: Elevators rank as the safest form of transportation and have the record of only one fatality every 100 million miles traveled, That's pretty good, unless you happen to be the one. Steps on the other hand, are five times more dangerous than elevators. That's because very few people trip over an elevator. (Source: USELESS DIGEST)

The ridges on ccorduroy are called "wales." There are eleven time zones in Russia. Fish can become seasick if kept aboard a ship. The average American carries four credit cards. It takes four hours to hard boil an ostricj egg: it weighs 30 ounds.

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I own a Mrs. Byrne's dictionary, from it I learned that a deuteragonist is a supporting actor. Mrs Byrne's can offer hours of fun browsing. About that ostrich egg...How many omelettes could you get out of one?

Love obscure words. If make obfuscating that much more effective! WHY CAN WE SEE THOUGH GLASS? Because solid though it may seem, glass is really a viscous liquid. I'll pause a moment while that crosses your synapses and bounces among your neurons. Mind you that's a viscous, not vicious liquid such as a mix of vodka and champagne. A viscous liquid stiffens when cooled, but never becomes completely solid. Unlike solids, in which the atoms arrange themselves in a rigid, crystalline molecular structure, glass atoms just hang out, helter- skelter-like. Light can squeeze between them. The molecular make-up of glass, unlike that of ordinary solids, such as wood, also keeps it from absorbing visible light. Its structure also prevents the loss of light through internal reflections, characteristic of a solid. Only glass' outer surface reflects light, which makes it considerably more useful than, say, silver or tin for eyeglass lenses.

superheating of sand makes glass, right?

selting the silica in sand and adding Borax for flux... Yup!

Melting the silica in sand and adding flux makes glass.

The largest tree in the world weighs more than 6,000 tons. There are over 15,000 people in the Witness Protection Program. More than 90% of battery lead is recycled, compared to 62.5 percent of aluminum cans, 35% of glass containers and 69% of newspapers. The anthrax vaccine program has clearly resulted in the loss of more personnel than the very thing it was designed to protect against. - Dan Marohn, American Airlines & Air National Guard F-16 pilot [More than half the pilots in his 163rd Fighter Squadron left over the anthrax vaccine.] RAM is 25,000 times cheaper in 2000 than in 1985. One study showed that people who drank one to three cups of coffee per day were 30% less likely to commit suicide than non-drinkers. Those drinking six cups a day were 80% less likely to kill themselves. A "threnody" is a song of lamentation, or "dirge". The longest traffic jam in Japan's history was 84 mile long and involved 15,000 vehicles. Despite being a nine-inch-tall bird (unlike in cartoons), the roadrunner can run as fast as a human sprinter.

betcha that tree is a Sequoia giganteum

From Maggie in Mali: NOTICE OF REVOCATION OF INDEPENDENCE To the citizens of the United States of America, In the light of your failure to elect anybody as President of the USA and thus to govern yourselves and, by extension, the free world, we hereby give notice of the revocation of your independence, effective today. Her Sovereign Majesty Queen Elizabeth II will resume monarchial duties over all states, commonwealths and other territories including New Jersey. To aid in the transition to a British Crown Dependency, please comply with the following acts: 1. Look up "revocation" in the now official Oxford Dictionary ($75). Start spelling English words correctly. 2. Learn at least the first 4 lines of "God Save The Queen" 3. Start referring to "soccer" as football 4. Declare war on Quebec and France 5. Arrest Mel Gibson for treason 6. Close down the NFL. Learn to play rugby 7. Enjoy warm flat beer and steak and kidney pudding. Train waitresses to be more aggressive with customers and not to tell you their names. 8. July 4th is no longer a public holiday, this has been replaced with November 5th 9. All members of this British Crown Dependency will be required to take 6 weeks annual vacation and observe statutory tea breaks. 10.Driving on the left is now compulsory - recall all cars to effect the change immediately. 11.Report to our Consulate General in NY - M Wragg - for your new passport and job allocation. 12. Add the Royal Insignia to the top of the Washington Monument - and the Queens Christmas speeches to the Lincoln Memorial. 13. Stop referring to the World Series of Baseball and instead call the National Series of USA, Cuba and Japan. Tax collectors from Her Majesty's Government will be with you shortly to ensure the acquisition of all revenues due (backdated to 1776). Thank you for your cooperation and have a nice day!

now that cracked me up (esp. the backdate of taxes due!) *laugh*

As of September 1998, the highest recorded mileage for a car was 1,615,000 miles for a 1966 Volvo P-1800. California is in no danger of sliding into the Pacific. It will eventually slide into Canada. The continental plate it's sitting on is traveling north, not west. The world's first Electric Trolley System was introduced in Montgomery, Alabama in 1886. 95% of the known cases of gout occur in males. Known as the "Rich Man's Curse," attacks are often thought to be caused by an overindulgence in rich foods. It is a deficit in purine metabolism and in certain steroid hormones. 2/3 of us speed up at a yellow light. The Eiffel Tower was built by Gustave Eiffel, who also built a dam in Russia and locks for the first attempt at the Panama Canal. Eiffel also designed the right arm of the Statue of Liberty and the full steel structure holding it all together. In the wettest place on Earth, Hawaii's Mount Waialeale, it rains about 90% of the time: 480 inches per year. The reason Scotsmen still wear the kilt is because it is a source of pride. The kilt displays a Scotsman's tartan-- the color of his clan. Because of the Dress Act of 1746, Scots were banned from wearing kilts or tartans and thus it became a matter of pride to wear them. Each Shuttle is worth about $3,000,000,000 and costs another $1,000,000,000 to launch.

Yeah, that tax deal gets everyone!

What's the weather forecast for Mt Waialeale today?

if it's like Hilo, RAIN is the weather-du-jour every day!!!

The reason that all lightbulbs, even tungsten filamented and halogen gas filled ones, eventually wear out is that the filament metal slowly but steadily evaporates. In fact, the reason a "halogen" (tungsten halogen) bulb lasts longer is that the halogen gas helps to redeposit some of the evaporated tungsten atoms back on the filament. "Raiders of the Lost Ark" featured 7,500 boas, cobras and pythons, and 50 tarantulas. PepsiCo spent $236,000,000 in TV ads in 1996. Cats spend 15% of their time grooming. Certain fireflies emit a light so penetrating that it can pass through flesh and wood. In 1867 US Secretary of State William H. Seward offered Russia $7,200,000 (or two cents per acre) for Alaska. When it comes to doing invasive procedures like spinal taps, the majority of 1500 medical students surveyed (63%) seldom or never obtained specific permission. At the same time, "72% of patients indicated they would be upset to find out they had been the unsuspecting subject of a novice's first spinal tap." http://upalumni.org/medschool/appendices/appendix-2a.html Charles Dickens kept the head of his bed aligned with the North and South poles believing that the earth's magnetic field would pass longitudinal through his body and ensure a good night's rest.

His head was toward the North or South? Or did it matter? I always sleep with my head to the South.

About the only way I can arrange my bedroom is with my head to the north. Have no idea about Dicken, though. If it geomagnetism he is thinking about it seems, like a compass needle, the head should point to the north. Do no know!

my head's to the south.....hmmmmm

maybe my genius is running out of my toes?!

Wonder what the feng shui experts say about this?

I'll check - think I once covered that in another topic. Time for me to check back...stay tuned!

The London Underground carries 2,500,000 passenger a day, on 500 trains. Planting trees won't save the climate: http://www.sciam.com/news/111500/5.html Anthrax spores are routinely found in animal hides. In 1999, Bill Gates made $4,566,000...per hour. The strongest muscle in the body is the tongue. The saguaro cactus blossom is the official Arizona state flower. McDonald's uses 500,000,000 pounds of hamburger each year. The longest alphabet is Cambodian -- 74 letters.

A standard Slinky contains 87 feet of wire. There is $480,000,000,000 in US currency in circulation. Fearful of hospital infections, some surgeons are giving ALL their patients potent antibiotics. Shouldn't they be kept for emergencies? http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns226048 Michael J. Fox's middle name is really Andrew. Most men's bodies are composed of about 40 percent muscle; women's bodies are 30 percent muscle. Chances of being hit by lightning in your lifetime is 1 in 600,000. Risk of dying by lightning is 5 times greater for men than women. 21% occur in June, with the riskiest state being Florida. 800 tornadoes a year strike the U.S., causing an average of 80 deaths and 1,500 injuries per year. Miami Beach pharmacist Benjamin Green invented the first suntan cream by cooking cocoa butter in a granite coffee pot on his wife's stove, and then testing the batch on his own head. His invention was introduced as Coopertone Suntan Cream in 1944. IBM was paid more $100,000,000 for its services at the Sydney Olympics.

"Indiana Jones" was the name of George Lucas' pet Malamute. On Nov 16th, 2000 ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers) announced that they had chosen ".biz," ".aero," ".name," ".coop", ".info", ".pro" and ".museum" as new top level domain names. http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200-3730464.html There have been 250,000,000 Dr. Seuss books published. Hard drive storage is 12,000 times cheaper now than in 1985. There are 45,000 large dams in the world. 5 countries have more than 1,000 large dams each. People surfing the Web at home spent 23% more time online this year than last year. http://news.cnet.com/news/0-1005-200-3731909.html People who bought the first Kodak cameras had to mail them back to Rochester, New York for reloading. The country of Togo has the lowest crime rate in the world, with an average of just 11 reported crimes annually for every 100,000 people.

Dunkin' Donuts serves about 112,500 doughnuts each day. The rudder from the Titanic weighed more than the Santa Maria. A new VW beetle can handle more weight than many popular SUVs. The community of Mountain View, Arkansas is called the Folk Capital of America. The little town preserves the pioneer way of life and puts it on display for visitors at the Ozark Folk Center State Park from March through October. If a person counted at the rate of 100 numbers a minute and kept counting for eight hours a day, five days a week, it would take a little over 4 weeks to count to one million and a lifetime (80 years) to reach a billion. A South African bullfrog can grow to be 35in in length. In England there is no difference between a pig and a hog, but in the U.S. a pig over 180 pounds is considered a hog. In 1968, a convention of beggars in Dacca, India, passed a resolution demanding that the minimum amount of alms be fixed at 15 paisa (about three cents). It is unlawful to refuse a person a glass of water in AZ.

Are you like me? "QWERTY," the keyboard's first five letters, vividly describes my typing ability. My fingers function less than felicitously. I am a hunt-and-peck has- been, devoid of digital dexterity, clueless in coping with the keyboard's loopy logic. Why do they make it hard on us? Why do keyboards ignore alphabetical order? Blame the typewriter. The first machines in the 19th century did go from A to Z. But this stymied good typists because the most frequently used keys were contiguous. When typists struck, say, the "a" and "b" keys in rapid succession, the spokes carrying those letters often jammed. The solution: separate these and other often- used keys. Computers carried over the QWERTY keyboards that people were already used to. These machines never jam; they just crash, destroying our work and driving us to drink. (Source: EVER WONDER WHY? By Douglas B. Smith)

Marcia, I am tempted to say that you are a wealth of useless knowlege, but it is such wonderful knowlege. Besides, is any knowlege ever really "useless".

Irrelevant information is my specialty. I am still worried about those bullfrogs 3 feet long!!!

Best time to buy a computer: right after Christmas, you save about 25%. Best time to buy a big-screen TV: the day after the Super Bowl, average savings are about 50%. General Motors Corp. spent $285,000,000 in TV ads in 1996. Of 1600 medical students who were asked, "Do you specifically ask permission as a medical student to perform invasive procedures [like spinal taps]?", 56% said "Never." http://upalumni.org/medschool/appendices/appendix-2a.html The word "Psychic" comes from the Greek letter "Psi" - Unknown. More turkeys are raised in California than in any other state. Every year of a dog's life is not the equivalent of seven years in human terms. Best estimates now are that the first year is worth about 18 to 21 years, and each year thereafter four. A girl, in the Vacococha tribe of Peru, to prepare her for marriage at the age of 12, is placed in a basket in the hut of her prospective in-laws and must remain suspened over an open fire night and day for 3 months. It took 670,000 hours to put the 31,000 insulating tiles on the original Shuttle. The national flag of Mozambique features the silhouette of an AK-47 Kalashnikov assault rifle. It is the only national flag that features the symbol of a gun.

Psychic comes from the Greek word psyche, meaning soul or butterfly.

OOOhhhh... I like that. I think the nymph so named came to a bad end when she fell in love with Narcissus. Or was that Echo. Gotta brush up on my Edith Hamilton. Thank you, Mark!

+-------------- Bizarre Thanksgiving Trivia ---------------+ Cut and planed lumber was hard to come by in the New World, and since the Pilgrims didn't intend to go back to Europe, they dismantled the Mayflower and used it's lumber to build a barn. Ben Franklin wanted the turkey, not the eagle, to be the U.S. national symbol. He considered the eagle a "bird of bad moral character" because it lives by being a shrewd thief. Franklin Roosevelt tried to change the Thanksgiving holiday date to the next-to-last Thursday in November in order to create a longer Christmas shopping season, but was forced to move Thanksgiving back to its original date because of negative public response. The heaviest turkey ever raised weighed in at 86 lbs, about the size of a large German Shepherd. It was grown in England. When Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin sat down to eat their first meal on the moon, their foil food packets contained roasted turkey and all of the trimmings. Turkeys can drown if they look up when it is raining. Turkeys in fields near the Air Force test areas over which the sound barrier was broken were known to drop dead from the shock of passing jets.

PLUM PUDDING... Here's a dish with a peekaboo ingredient: who knows where it's hiding. In fact if you were to dive into a plum pudding with sensitive electronic detection devices, you would find nary a plum in the place. A treat for desert since the earliest Thanksgiving celebrations, plum pudding's ingredients include flour, sugar, spices and suet (fat). This mush is steamed, not baked, and is unleavened, making it pudding rather than cake. As for plums, the stealth ingredient that lends its name to this post-turkey goo, credit linguistic practices currant, uh, current in colonial America. "Plums" and "plumbs" were what they called raisins, the final ingredient in plum pudding.

Bulls do not charge because a cape is red. They charge because of the movement of the cape -- it does not have to be red or any other bright color. The Jefferson National Expansion Memorial consists of the Gateway Arch, the Museum of Westward Expansion and St Louis' Old Courthouse. Ants stretch when they wake up. They also appear to yawn in a very human life fashion before starting work each day. The underside of a horse's hoof is called a frog. Two French toolmakers were the first engineers to put the engine in the front of the car. This gave the car better balance, made it easier to steer, and made it much easier to get all your luggage in. The ant can lift 50 times and pull 30 times its own weight. The number one selling snack in the U.S. is potato chips. And the #1 item ordered in restaurants? French Fries. Emperor Henry VII (1269-1313) of Germany, during his reign as Duke of Luxembourg, was so proud of his police efficiency that he offered to reimburse personally any victims of robberies occurring within the boundaries of his duchy.

What bird has the longest migration path? You think that you're keen on piling up those frequent flyer miles? Consider the Arctic Tern. When it flies south it covers almost the distance from the North to the South Pole, 11,000 miles in all. This 17-inch winged wonder flies further than any of its fine-feathered friends. It's habitat ranges from New England well into the Arctic Ocean, from which it migrates south in August. After spending part of the winter in Antarctica it does the Tern-around, flying the 11,000 miles back to its home, arriving in June. Do you suppose it's ever occurred to this birdbrain that it gains nothing by flying from one cold place to another cold place for the winter? Who's its travel agent? (Source: HOW A FLY WALKS UPSIDE DOWN by Martin M. Goldwyn)

WAS PUBLIC KISSING EVER A CRIME IN THE UNITED STATES? Yes, and it still is in some places. In 1656 in Boston, a Captain Kimble was placed in the stocks for kissing his wife in public on the Sabbath. To this day, it is illegal in Indiana, for a mustached man to "habitually kiss human beings." In Cedar Rapids, Iowa, it is still a crime to kiss a stranger. WHAT IS THE LARGEST SHARK ATTACK EVER RECORDED? On November 28, 1942, hundreds of British seamen and Italian prisoners of war were killed by sharks when a German U-boat sank the steamer Nova Scotia off the coast of South Africa. Nine hundred men were on the ship when it sank; 192 were left when a rescue ship arrived.

*laugh* that kissing thing!! *LOL*

All 17 children of Queen Anne died before she did. Some ribbon worms will eat themselves if they cannot find food. Spain has 1,196 large dams, fifth most in the world. Modems are about 2,500 times cheaper in 2000 than in 1985. The state of Florida is bigger than England. Blind people can pick out the meaning of a spoken sentence more quickly than sighted folks. http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns226050 Colorado has the highest mean altitude of all the states. California police in the 1920s thought they had gotten the drop on a moonshiner. What they found, instead of a still, was Philo T. Farnsworth's invention: the television.

was Philo the child who invented TV? there was something on discovery about a 14 year old boy who actually invented television. i can imagine that blind people can really tell what's going on since they must rely on inflection and tone and such rather than rely soley on facial expression. how hard it must be to not be able to read others' nonverbal action--but i'm sure that they can tell because of their heightened use of other senses. hmmmm.....gives me something to think about!

Yup!!!! Philo T. Farnsworth!!! 23 publishers rejected Dr. Seuss's first book. Over 1,000,000,000 pounds of depleted Uranium exist in the US. It is radioactive and has a half life of a billion years. http://www.iacenter.org The world's oil companies are now finding only one barrel of oil for every four that we consume. - Colin Campbell, oil geologist New Scientist, July 10, 1999 Political enemies of President Teddy Roosevelt once schemed to humiliate him by hiring a professional boxer to purposely bump into him on the street and start a fight. The boxer did what he was supposed to, but was promptly beaten up by Roosevelt shortly after the fight began. In 1992 further studies by the New Jersey Department of Health confirmed a 6.9 fold increase in bone cancer in young males. (Cohn, Perry D. Ph.D. "An Epidemiological Report on Drinking Water" Fluoridation and Osteosarcoma in Young Males, New Jersey Department of Health, Environmental Health Service, Trenton NJ November 8, 1992) http://www.bruha.com/fluoride/ Chrysler spent $370,000,000 in TV advertising in 1996. The world's oldest piece of chewing gum is over 9000 years old. The London Underground has over 260 stations and 16,000 staff.

marcia, i just love this stuff. wonder what makes them think to look stuff like this up!!

People like me Wolfie - we are far too curious!!! When we don't care about something, why do we not "give a hoot" about it? Well I suppose we might be distinguishing ourselves from owls, which give a hoot about everything. But what's the point? I, for one, am quite sure that I'm not an owl�you, too?--and I don't feel the need to give such comparisons any further thought. A little research shows that the expression comes not from birds but rather the backwoods. In nineteenth century rural America people declared something valueless by saying it "wasn't worth a hooter." (Don't even think about that word's meaning in modern slang. We're not goin' down that dirt road). "Hooter" was the backwoods pronunciation of iota, the smallest letter in the Greek alphabet, which we still use to imply that something has little or no value. Hoot is simply a contraction of hooter. And if you don't like that, I don't give a . . . hoot. (Source: DICTIONARY OF WORD AND PHRASE ORIGINS by William and Mary Morris)

Are there any living creatures that never die? Because there's no justice in the world, I'm sure that my next-door neighbor, who plays his stereo at 2 a.m., will end up in this category. Beyond him, science offers slim pickens' when it comes to immortality. In fact we've got just two kinds of candidates -- sort of. Theoretically, some one-celled animals divide indefinitely and thus maintain their biological integrity. But scientists have not counted any such activity much beyond 10,000 generations, just about the point where the brain cells of the scientists themselves give up the ghost. Then there's the hydra, an aquatic creature with a clever trick. It regenerates, replacing its cells with fresh ones that it grows about every month or so. There's no end to it. That's more comebacks than Richard Nixon or Bill Clinton could ever claim. (Source: Martin M. Goldwyn, HOW A FLY WALKS UPSIDE DOWN) FAST FACTS: November The second week of November is National Split Pea Soup Week, according to the USA Dry Pea and Lentil Industry. They used to serve that stuff in my high school cafeteria, but they spelled it Split Pea Soup Weak. November 3 is National Sandwich Day, brought to you � of course as a public service � by Ziploc Sandwich Bags. The company was also going to sponsor a sandwich week, but feared they might be spreading themselves too thin. (Source: THE BOOK OF DAYS)

It costs 4.2 cents to print a US legal note (dollar bill). Coffee increases alertness and enhances performance on certain tasks. Tests on drivers and typists prove that two cups of coffee can help. However, research shows it helps most if the drinker is bored or fatigued. Only 27% of the total risk estimates fell within the order of magnitude reported in the literature. For every complication, many physicians made underestimation or overestimation errors by several orders of magnitude and a few consistently denied existence of any risk. [For example] substantial percentages of physicians under- estimated the risk of death due to [hernia repair] by a factor of 100 or even 1000. http://upalumni.org/medschool/appendices/appendix-2a.html The nation's first scheduled steam railroad began in New Castle, Delaware in 1831. Michael Jordan's high school basketball team cut him. Richard Hooker's novel, M*A*S*H, was rejected by 21 publishers. The power propelling the Shuttle upward at launch is equal to that in 23 Hoover dams. Pope Paul IV, who was elected on 23 May 1555, was so outraged when he saw the naked bodies on the ceiling of the Sistene Chapel that he ordered Michelangelo to paint over them.

King Louis XIV of France owned about 1,000 wigs. 13 boxes of jello are purchased every second in the US. Ole Evinrude, a Norwegian immigrant, founded the Evinrude outboard motor company in 1909. On average, a woman will speak 7000 words over the course of a day while a man will only speak 2000 words in a day. The fastest fish is the sailfish: up to 60 miles per hour. The "spot" on 7UP comes from its inventor who had a red eyes. He was albino. Punta Gorda in Florida means "fat point" when translated from Spanish. The name was given to the city because a broad part of the land in Punta Gorda juts into Charlotte Harbor. 220 billion computer chips are made each year. Brandy is from the Dutch "brandewijn", meaning burnt or distilled wine.

Q. What does Parallax mean? A. While looking at an object, cover first one eye, then the other. The object appears to move. Parallax is the apparent movement of an object as a result of two different points of view.

That 7,000 word avg for women vs. 2,000 words for men ties in with the MSNBC study I just saw that says women listen with both sides of their brain while men only use the left side, could it be the same for speech? This is a drastic difference. The left side of the brain is the one that interprets language. Go to msnc.com and search for "men brain" and you'll find this fascinating article about the differences in how men and women communicate.

men and women brains are wired differently. women are used to using all their senses to interpret everything around them. perhaps as a protective mechanism from our earlier periods of nurture and self-preservation. that is interesting. maybe it just means we talk too much? *LAUGH*

I can monitor several conversations and read at the same time. I know of at least one man who can also - but it is rare.

The Indonesian coffee Kopi Luwak is the most expensive in the world, selling for $300/pound. The reason its so expensive is the way it is processed. Its beans are ingested by a small animal called a Paradoxurus. The beans are then extracted from the excreta and made into Kopi Luwak. The heart is not on the left side of the chest. It's about in the center with its strongest portion on the left side, thus, it can be heard slightly better from the left. 44% of American men tailgate to try to speed up the person in front of them. Women blink nearly twice as much as men. Kangaroos can hop as fast as 40 miles per hour. By the late 1930's, more than thirty radio serials reached a daily audience of forty million, twice the audience reached by television soaps today. This vast audience was a bonanza for program sponsors. "Ma Perkins", a successful radio serial, sent the sales of Oxydol, a laundry detergent, through the roof. Soap companies plunged into the business of producing serials that featured their products, and they so dominated daytime that serials became known as "soap operas". Processing power is about 200 times cheaper in 2000 vs 1985. Japan has 2,675 large dams, fourth most in the world.

This may come in very handy for conversions: http://www.webcom.com/~legacysy/convert2/

Q. Where does the "blue blazer" come from? A. Blue jackets were ordered for all crew members by the captain of the HMS Blazer in the middle 1800s. They were good looking, and caught on with everyone.

How did they choose which presidents to carve on Mt. Rushmore? Well it's a good thing they didn't vote on it or we might still be facing a blank mountain. South Dakota's Mt. Rushmore is said to have been named for a lawyer who was just passing through (sounds like a presidential election, doesn't it?). In the 1920s the state's tourism board decided that it would take more than that name to fill the local hotels so it proposed to have a sculptor carve on the mountain the images of famous figures from western history, such as Kit Carson. They hired John Borglum, who had already been engaged to carve Robert E. Lee's visage on Stone Mt. in Georgia. Borglum had a better idea for Mt. Rushmore: presidents Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt. And so it came to pass. (Source: JUST CURIOUS, JEEVES by Jack Mingo and Erin Barrett)

A New Star in Space NASA Science News for December 1, 2000 Something in the heavens is growing brighter and it will soon become one of the most eye-catching stars in the night sky. No it's not a supernova. It's the International Space Station! FULL STORY at http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2000/ast01dec_1.htm?list89800

Track the new star using this url: http://liftoff.msfc.nasa.gov/realtime/JTrack/Spacecraft.html

Can't wait until those solar panels are fully fitted - it's going to be so *cool* to see the space station from Earth!!!! I want to go!!!

Me too, Mike! After I posted the ISS and J-track information I went outside to look for it overhead. The skies were spectacularly clear - you could see the Great Galaxy in Andromda with naked eye deespite a quarter moon and a street light next to me. As I was scanning the sky I noted the most amaxing huge fireball! It was the color of a yellow frosted Christmas tree light - yellow-orange and bright but not brilliant which makes me think it was a piece of space junk. It had along tail sparkling with debris as it fell south to north.

Does the U.S. Constitution guarantee an American's right to own a gun? Whoa! Don't point that thing at me! I know this is a controversial issue, with feelings running high on both sides. So in my tradition of fearlessly following the truth wherever it may lead, I'm going to offer a little, uh, ammunition for each side. The Bill of Rights says, "A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed." So unless you and the other folks who hang at the pizza parlor constitute a state militia, the Constitution doesn't guarantee your right to own so much as a peashooter. On the other hand (the one with the trigger finger), the states are sure as shootin' free to regulate or not regulate private gun ownership. So go for it -- the legislation of your choice, not your gun, that is. (Source: DICTIONARY OF MISINFORMATION by Tom Burnam)

14,000,000 Bic pens are sold daily in 150 countries. The toothbrush was invented in 1498. The cells which make up the antlers of a moose are the fastest growing animal cells in nature. Archduke Karl Ludwig (1833-1896), brother of the Austrian emperor, was a man of such piety that on a trip to the Holy Land, he insisted on drinking from the River Jordan, despite warnings that it would make him very ill. He died a few weeks later. Scientists discover 10,000 new species of insects every year. The catfish has the most taste buds -- over 27,000.

The largest wave ever recorded was near the Japanese Island of Ishigaki in 1971 and was 260 feet high. Experiments conducted in Germany and at the University of Southampton in England show that even mild and incidental noises cause the pupils of the eyes to dilate. It is believed that this is why surgeons, watchmakers, and others who perform delicate manual operations are so bothered by noise. The sounds cause their pupils to change focus and blur their vision. The hydrogen filling the Hindenburg airship did not explode, and the 35 dead were either killed by burning diesel or jumped to their deaths. In 1997, a retired NASA scientist found that the real culprit was the flammable fabric of the airship's outer skin, not the hydrogen. Many pesticides contain fluorine as an "inactive" ingredient -- serving as the adjuvant ("ferry") that delivers the agent to its target. Because they are considered "inert", listing is not required on labels. [As a Chemical Engineer, I can tell you that Fluorine is the EXACT OPPOSITE of inert. Inert means unreactive, and Fluorine is the most reactive element known to man. HF, Hydrogen Fluoride, can etch glass!] http://www.bruha.com/fluoride/html/pesticides.htm Of the 500 to 1,000 chemicals used in the manufacture of silicon chips, some are known or suspected carcinogens-- such as arsenic, which allows chips to better conduct electricity and is vital to the chip-making process. It takes over 60 people, spending four months and using 6,000 gallons of paint, to paint The Eiffel Tower. Trains in the London Underground average 20.5 miles per hour (counting stops). Hawaii is the only state that grows coffee. About 20% of adults have or have had a cockroach that called their inner ear canal home -- they enter while you sleep!

If a US coin has the letter "S" printed on it, it was minted in San Francisco; a "D" means it was made in Denver; no letter at all means it was minted in Philadelphia. The odds against a flipped coin coming up with the same side showing ten times in a row are 1,023 to 1. The mill, equal to one-tenth of a cent, was declared the lowest money of account by the US Congress in 1786. The mill, as a coin, was never minted. "E Pluribus Unum," the Latin expression appearing on US currency, means "one out of many." Abraham Lincoln was carrying Confederate money when he was assassinated.

Why do we tell someone who's all riled up to keep their shirt on? Our clothes often speak for us in more ways than one, dressing up many colorful English expressions. For example, "now the shoe is on the other foot," "even a big shot puts on his pants one leg at a time," and "keep it under your hat." As for keeping your shirt on when you get all huffy-puffy, there was once a practical reason for such behavior. In the 19th century men's shirts were more restrictive than they would later become. Men who were angry enough to throw a punch needed to take it off before they could get it on. Keeping their shirts on thus kept the peace. By the 1920s styles had changed, but by then the expression had entered the language and could be heard everywhere -- except in burlesque houses. (Source: HEAVENS TO BETSY! & OTHER CURIOUS SAYINGS by Charles Earle Funk)

A boustrophedonic layout is where alternating lines are oriented left-to-right and right-to-left instead of the standard Western layout of left page top-to-bottom, then right page top-to-bottom. It is the layout that was used in the infamous Florida "butterfly" ballots. The Chunnel officially opened May 6, 1994 The new public network will be cheaper. - Equipment will be 70 % cheaper; - Access lines, 60 to 80 % less; - Maintenance, 50 % less; - Provisioning, 72 % less The American Film Institutes "Top 10 All Time Movies": 1. Citizen Kane (1941) 2. Casablanca (1942) 3. The Godfather (1972) 4. Gone With The Wind (1939) 5. Lawrence Of Arabia (1962) 6. The Wizard Of Oz (1939) 7. The Graduate (1967) 8. On The Waterfront (1954) 9. Schindler's List (1993) 10. Singin' In The Rain (1952) The shuttle has 6,000,000 parts. Mountains are formed by a process called orogeny. A survey in Academic Medicine found that 89% of trainees personally observed unethical conduct by residents or attending physicians. http://upalumni.org/medschool/appendices/appendix-2b.html Gertrude Ederly was still a teenager when she became the first woman to swim the English Channel on August 6, 1926. Not only did she swim the channel, but she broke the speed record held by a man.

Singin' In the Rain, by the way, is how most people feel about this election according to the latest scientific poll. Can you say boustrophendonic?

I can say it because I took archaeology in college!!! Still want to be incarnated as one...*sigh* We had an election? This millennium?! Hope they decide the outcome before the next one begins!

U.S. GEOLOGICAL SURVEY NATIONAL EARTHQUAKE INFORMATION CENTER World Data Center for Seismology, Denver Reply to: sedas@neis.cr.usgs.gov or neic@usgs.gov The following is a release by the United States Geological Survey, National Earthquake Information Center: A major earthquake occurred about 95 miles (150 km) west-northwest of Gyzylarbat, Turkmenistan at 10:11 AM MST today, Dec 6, 2000 (10:11 PM local time in Turkmenistan). A PRELIMINARY MAGNITUDE OF 7.2 WAS COMPUTED FOR THIS EARTHQUAKE. The magnitude and location may change slightly as additional data are received from other seismograph stations. No reports of damage or casualties have been received at this time; however, this earthquake may have caused substantial damage and casualties due to its location and size.

When it's exactly midnight, is it A.M. or P.M.? Welcome to the Twilight Zone. The correct answer is "neither." Midnight is a transitional, imaginary moment in time, neither here nor there. Midnight is defined as twelve hours after noon. At noon the sun reaches its zenith or high point -- the "meridian" in A. M. (before the meridian) and P. M. (after it). But since the sun never actually stops, that "point" doesn't really exist -- it's just a convenience. Similarly, midnight is the transitional moment between (P. M.) after the meridian, and (A. M.) before it. In reality the time may be just before (A. M.) or after (P. M.) midnight, but never midnight on the dot. Noon, at least, is in the middle of the day, whereas midnight is the dividing line between days. Poor midnight: it never has a nice -- or any -- day. (Source: THE STRAIGHT DOPE by Cecil Adams) FAST FACTS: One small step for whom? When Neil Armstrong became the first human being to set foot on the moon, what he also stepped on was his lines. He was supposed to say, "That's one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind." And that's what encyclopedias and almanacs quoted. The only problem, as he acknowledged later, is that he left out the "a" and actually said, "That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind." "Man" and "mankind" mean the same thing in this sentence, so he has us taking a small step and leaping at the same time. Had he done that himself he would have fallen flat on his face. Heck, for that we could have sent Chevy Chase to the moon. (Source: BIG SECRETS)

Mars has a volcano, Olympus Mons, which is over 300 miles in diameter and 16 miles high. The dragonfly has about 30,000 lenses covering the retina of its eye, and thus sees many, many images where we see only one. Bryan J. Patrie, a Stanford graduate student invented the Watercolor Intelligent Nightlight, which informs midnight bathroom-goers if the toilet seat is up or down without having to turn on the light. There is about as much water on Earth now as there was three billion years ago. 80% of Americans sing in the car. Joseph Stalin refused a German request to swap prisoners in World War II. His son, who was captured during the war, died in a prison camp as a result.

that water thing is true. the water isn't going anywhere, just the locations of it has changed (although waterways may seem dried up, the water has actually just been evaporated back into the atmosphere in the form of rain, fog, etc.). think about it for a second. a very interesting fact! thanks marcia!!

Thanks Wolfie - you're the best!!! There are no rivers in Saudi Arabia. Elk River is the home of the Idaho Champion Western Red Cedar Tree, the largest tree in the state. Estimated to be over 3000 years old this giant is more than 18 feet in diameter and stands 177 feet tall. "BIC" is a shortened version of founder Marcel Bich's name. 315 entries in Webster's 1996 Dictionary were misspelled. Removable storage is about 100 times cheaper in 2000 vs 1985. India has 4,291 large dams, third most in the world. Seoul, the South Korean capital, means "the capital" in Korean. The official, neutral name of Switzerland, which has multiple official languages, is the latin "Confederation Helvetica", or the Helvetic Confederation, hence the "CH" on license plates. In 1998, 9,200,000,000 US legal notes were printed.

I love the new reddish spacer bars. Did you miss me? You don't have to answer that. Anyway, I've missed reading all the fun and interesting facts on this topic. So I hope that Marcia, the Goddess of the Geo Conference had a wonderful Thanksgiving. I also hope that things are going well for Curious Wolfie, the Alpha Male, and the Pups. One of the earlier posts concerned the word "psychic" and its etomology in the Greek word "psyche" meaning soul, and symbolized by the butterfly. The Greek mythologial character Psyche was noted as had fallen in love with Narcissus. She didn't. Psyche was loved by Eros, the Roman Cupid, much to the chagrin of his mother Aphrodite, the Roman Venus. I believe it was Echo who pined away until nothing but her voice was left for love of the beautiful youth Narcissus. I have a geographical fun fact, West Virginia is the only American state which sits entirely on a mountain range.

Of course we missed you, Cheryl! Marci's probably having her morning coffee about now. That image of Echo is powerful.

hi cheryl!! i love these facts too marcia!!!!

I'ze here! Yeah, part of the joy of having a conference is putting fun stuff on it. That you are also enjoying it is double pleasure! Yup, Cheryl I did miss you - but you know that *hugs*

Oooh, and you noticied my red horizontal bars!!! It took e mages to find just the right length and thickness to look right. I like these very well, indeed. You are the first to mention them (Wolfie was in on my choice when I posted them originally so she knew right away.)

Windmills always turn counter-clockwise, except in Ireland. 22% of computers break down every year, compared to 9% of VCRs, 7% of big-screen TVs, 7% of clothes dryers and 8% of refrigerators. Coffee only boosts intellectual speed and not physical power. It takes 286 kilowatts of power to produce a single six-inch silicon wafer. Salvador Dali once arrived to an art exhibition in a limousine filled with turnips. The street names in the game monopoly come from Atlantic City, New Jersey. The March Hare character in Alice in Wonderland is based on the behavior of hares in the spring, when they often jump up and down and bang the ground with their big hind feet. Bruce Lee was so fast that they actually had to slow the film down so you could see his moves. That's the opposite of the norm. Pez was invented in 1927 by Eduard Haas, an Austrian anti- smoking fanatic, who marketed peppermint-flavored PEZ as a cigarette substitute.

Why is it that if you do something from the beginning, you're starting from scratch? If you know the origins of the expression, "to toe the mark," you should have a good idea of what starting from scratch is all about. If that includes you, please leave the room now. How can I feel like a smarty-pants if you know as much as I do? That mark you are asked to toe is the starting line of a race, a line that was originally scratched on the ground. Ordinarily everyone starts from that scratch line, beginning at the beginning. But sometimes contestants in sports such as golf or horse racing are given an advantage and don't have to start from scratch. Handicaps are useful when uneven experience, skill, or size dictate that fairness can only be served by artificially leveling the playing field.

how come ireland's windmills turn backwards?

Yeah, I wondered that too. Will check the prevailing winds and the methods of attaching sails to the mills. However, did you ever have a pinwheel on a stick when you were a kid? I used to make them, and by attaching alternate corners to the usual ones you could reverse the rotation. I think this is just a local tradition of pinning the sails in Ireland. But, I will search further so see if that is the case.

interesting--i never tried to mess with the pinwheels. now let me see if my kids have any left! *grin*

You can make them out of manila folders or construction paper, too... ----- Hydrogen is less hazardous than gasoline. Spain grows 98% of all green olives. "Beijing" means northern capital in Chinese. Butterflies taste with their feet. The statue "The Thinker" by Rodin is actually a portrait of the Italian poet Dante. In a 1998 sampling of 1700 American second year residents, 46% saw others falsifying patient records; 70% saw others mistreating patients. 28% of the residents stated that they had been required to do something that they believed was, "immoral, unethical or personally unacceptable. http://upalumni.org/medschool/appendices/appendix-2b.html

George Washington never pledged allegiance to the flag of the United States of America. Nor did John Adams, Thomas Jefferson or Andrew Jackson put their hands over their hearts and recite the litany so familiar to Americans. Lincoln didn't do it either. Even President Chester A. Arthur �of course you remember him�never took the Pledge. That's because the Pledge dates only from 1892. The words familiar to every American school child were written that year by Francis Bellamy, a staff member at Youth's Companion, a boy's magazine, as part of a Columbus Day celebration. (Source: DICTIONARY OF MISINFORMATION by Tom Burnam) ------- Not so mellow yellow There's been much concern in recent years about the danger posed to artists' health by some of the materials they use in their work. But when the British government banned a paint color called Indian Yellow back in 1908, it had nothing to do with protecting artists. This color was produced by feeding mangos to cows and then collecting their urine, from which were derived the magnesium and calcium salts used to make the paint. (Don't try that at home!) The government banned the color because officials thought it unfair to make cows pig out on mangos. (Source: JUST CURIOUS, JEEVES)

euw!!!

yeah, I just sent it to an eminent artist friend of mine. Have you sniffed your Old Masters paintings lately???

nope (don't have any)....but it made me wonder about the red M&M's!!

The ball at the top of the flagpole is purely decorative now, but it originally contained one match and one .45 caliber bullet, for the Color Guard to burn the flag and shoot himself in the event of inevitable capture. Venture capital invested in Internet companies has topped $80 billion in the first three quarters of 2000, compared with $60 billion for all of 1999. Ants stretch when they wake up in the morning. When the shuttle comes in for a landing, it does so at a 22% descent angle. Normal commercial aircraft descend at a 2% descent angle. Minneapolis, Minnesota is home to the oldest continuously running theater (the Old Log Theater) in the U.S. Some people think that the stage musical Les Miserables runs a bit long, but it's a mere flash in time compared with one of the sentences in the novel on which it is based. This 3-page, 823-word sentence is divided by 93 commas, 51 semi- colons and 4 dashes. Waste products from the production of a single six-inch silicon wafer include 25 pounds of sodium hydroxide. Ostriches stick their head in the sand to search for water. The Chunnel is 31 miles long (23 miles under the sea and 8 under land).

i've also heard that ants yawn!!

never got that close to one. Wonder how they saw that? Maybe I don't want to know the grad student laboring so hard to create a thesis...

haha!!

(you ok?)

(yeah, I am, but B is not and I am concerned!) Heard back from artist about the Mango and urine yellow paints: I DID know about Indian yellow, and in fact, I have a large tube of it. I think it is a synthetic version of the urinary product, but has some marvelous effects unattainable with any other yellow. The fact that each of these colors has a very unique and tangible base is one of the things I think of as the very esoteric (while remaining thoroughly earthbound) aspects of the art and science of painting. I can actually smell the difference in colors, since they are made from distinct elements, basically. I know them as a cook knows the fragrance of each spice. Fortunately, my Indian yellow is synthetic.

The photo most often requested from the U.S. National Archives is that of the meeting between Elvis Presley and President Nixon in 1970. Presley had requested that Nixon make him an honorary drug enforcement agent and Nixon accommodated him. The name LEGO is from the Danish, "LEg GOdt," that translates to "play well." The deepest London Underground tunnel is 221 feet below ground. There is no rice in rice paper. Pez candy gets its name from the German word for peppermint, Pfefferminze. An eagles nest can weigh as much as two tons. The MGM lion lived in Memphis until his death. The plural of piecemeal is flockmeal. Strawberry Point, Iowa is home of the world's largest strawberry.

More then 25% of the world's forest are in Siberia. Edwin Land received 535 patents during his lifetime, then second only to Thomas Edison. Thomas Jefferson anonymously submitted design plans for the White House. They were rejected. A snail can sleep for 3 years. If a spider dismantles his web, that means a bad storm is near. Historically, only Hawaiian men danced the Hula. The US has 6,575 large dams, second most in the world. Many sailors used to wear gold earrings so that they could afford a proper burial when they died. "Tug of War" was an Olympic event between 1900 and 1920.

(i shall keep B in my prayers) these facts are really fun. i mean, we knew snails were slow but three years to sleep? so do they take a year to actually fall asleep, a year to sleep, and a year to do the waking up? *laugh*

(Thanks, Sweetie! Me too!) Good questions about the snails. Dontcha wonder who bothered to watch them for 3 years...! Think I dated him once...

"Smith" is the most common last name in the USA. Rounding out the top ten, in order, are: -Johnson -Williams -Brown -Jones -Miller -Davis -Wilson -Anderson -Taylor Paul Revere took his midnight ride on a horse named Brown Beauty. In China, the day a child is born it is considered one year old. There are 1,792 steps to the top of the Eiffel Tower, 296 steps to the top of the Leaning Tower of Pisa, and 168 steps to the crown of the Statue of Liberty.

What do the letters "S-O-S," as in "help" stand for? Well, it doesn't stand for anything. These letters were chosen for Morse Code as a distress signal because of their somplicity - three dots, three dashes, and three dots. It *doesn't stand for "Save Our Ship."

CHRISTMAS SOLAR ECLIPSE FOR NORTH AMERICA http://www.skypub.com/sights/eclipses/solar/001225partial.html

In 1899 an electric vehicle captured the world land speed record with a speed of 66 MPH. The press as a whole refused to believe the Wright Brothers for nearly five years after their first flight. Editors discarded invitations to witness numerous flights. "Bandwidth will increase in the same way that memory has increased in PCs," says Don Listwin, senior vice president at Cisco Systems Inc. He expects performance to double and prices to be cut in half every 18 months. Olympic games in 1900 included croquet, fishing, billiards, and checkers. Sequoia trees can be over 3,000 years old because the bark is virtually impervious disease, insects and even fire.

(I have done this - straight under one!) Is it possible to drive around a rainbow? Legend has it that there is a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, and a song in a famous movie suggests that we can expect to find a wizard and a wicked witch over the rainbow. But what's on the reverse side of that colorful arc? Whatever it might be, it's all in the eye of the beholder. Put away that roadmap because rainbows don't exist in an actual location. They are the product of sunlight hitting tiny drops of moisture in the air. The light is refracted and broken up into its component colors, producing the light show we call a rainbow. If you move, your change in perspective will change the rainbow, but you can never get around it. Well since it's all inside your head, so to speak, you could spin around to try to get behind it. But then you'll fall down, banging your head, and all you'll see are stars. (Source: TRIUMPH OF THE STRAIGHT DOPE by Cecil Adams)

An average American uses 168 gallons of water per day. Every year, without fail, the Amazon river bursts its banks, flooding an area of forest the size of England. A grain elevator in Hutchinson, Kansas is 1/2 mile long and can hold 46 million bushels in 1,000 bins. There are only four sports that are completely native to the U.S.: baseball, volleyball, basketball, and roller derby. 109 people have cancelled their subscription to National Geographic to protest their use of metric measurements. The two hemispheres of a dolphin's brain work independently. For 8 hours, the entire brain is awake. The left side then sleeps for 8 hours. When it wakes up, the right side sleeps for 8 hours. Thus the dolphin gets 8 hours of sleep without ever having to stop physically. The number of births in India each year is greater than the population of Australia. Waste products from the production of a single six-inch silicon wafer include 2,840 gallons of waste water.

While performing her duties as queen, Cleopatra sometimes wore a fake beard. 40,000,000,000 packages/yr of Ramen noodles are consumed. An opossum does not sleep while hanging upside down by its tail. As much as 40% of the entire world's varieties of freshwater fish are to be found in the Amazon River basin. Grants, New Mexico was at one time known as the carrot capital of the country. In 1962, the FDA tried to prohibit the sales of vitamins and minerals in all but very limited potencies and combinations, by first classifying, and then regulating them as prescription drugs. Coffee is the second largest item of international commerce. The largest is petrol. Neptune has not yet completed one orbit since its discovery.

A rat can last longer without water than a camel. Recent studies have found that the increase in moral reasoning and moral development normally expected for the age and education level of medical students are not occurring over their four years of undergraduate medical education..." Evidence is beginning to appear that demonstrates that the structure of medical education may actually inhibit moral reasoning ability rather than facilitate it. Ethical sensitivity increases between the 1st and 2nd year but then decreases throughout the rest of medical school, such that the 4th-year students are less ethically sensitive than those entering medical school. - "Medical Education" Journal http://upalumni.org/medschool/appendices/appendix-2b.html There are significant problems with storing hydrogen. A tank full of hydrogen gas at atmospheric pressure would need to be 3000 times larger than a gasoline tank for a similar journey. Six Major Actors Who Never Won an Oscar (times nominated): Richar Burton (7) Peter O'Toole (7) Greta Garbo (4) Kirk Douglas (3) Cary Grant (2) Morgan Freeman (2) Michael Jackson owns the rights to the South Carolina anthem. The subject of the Mona Lisa was a Florentine merchant's wife. Her lack of eyebrows reflected the custom in Florence in those days to shave them off.

Ursid Meteor Surprise NASA Science News for December 18, 2000 The normally meek Ursid meteor shower could surprise sky watchers with a powerful outburst on Dec 22nd when Earth passes through a dust stream from periodic comet Tuttle. FULL STORY at http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2000/ast18dec_1.htm?list89800

Yes Virginia, there really is a Christmas eclipse! Thursday's Classroom for Dec. 18, 2000 http://www.thursdaysclassroom.com Reliable sources at the North Pole report that Santa Claus and his reindeer plan to linger over North America after sunrise on Christmas Day, long after all the presents have been delivered. Why? The Jolly Old Elf is hoping to catch a glimpse of a partial solar eclipse! This week's episode of Thursday's Classroom features stories for kids and seven original lesson plans about the coming solar eclipse. For details visit http://www.thursdaysclassroom.com The Dec. 25th eclipse will be limited to North America, but if you live elsewhere we have lessons for you, too. Please see "Interplanetary Christmas" for plenty of educational holiday activities: http://www.thursdaysclassroom.com/index_09dec99.html Happy Holidays!

A hippo can opens its mouth wide enough to fit a four foot tall object inside. The opera singer Enrico Caruso practiced in the bath, while accompanied by a pianist in a nearby room. Coffee seems to help extroverts more than it helps introverts. Wyoming was the first state to give women the right to vote. A quarter has 119 grooves on its edge, a dime has 118 grooves. Douglas MacArthur's mother used to send letters to his military superiors suggesting they promote her son. The cost of raising a medium-size dog to the age of eleven is $6,400. A hummingbird weighs less than a penny.

Happy Winter Holidays to one and all! Merry Christmas, Happy Boxing Day, Happy Hannukah, Joyous Kwanzaa, Blessed Ramadaan, and Happy Winter Soltace, unless you're in the Southern Hemisphere, in which case, Happy Summer Soltace, and for any antique Romans out there, Happy Saturnalia!

I was all ready to deck the halls of Geo for the holidays until I saw the veritable plethora of them. I echo Cheryl's comments. Season's Greetings, to all.

Check what Peace on Earth means when we all work together... http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/image/0011/earthlights_dmsp_big.jpg Thanks Gandalf, for reminding us!

MIDWINTER FESTIVAL OR CHRISTMAS Midwinter, or rather the winter solstice, marked the end of the first half of the Celtic year. It marked the date of the southernmost rising and setting of the sun. By our calendar, the day of the longest night usually falls on 21st December. The Celtic festival of the winter solstice, like Samhain, also had Roman and Christian festivals grafted onto it, the very important celebration of Christmas, and the Roman festival of Saturnalia. The festival dedicated to Saturn began on the 19th December. It celebrated the overthrow of the old father-god, Saturn, by the new father-god, Jupiter or Deus Pater (God the father, although in this context he is actually God the son). These gods have direct counterparts in Greek mythology (Cronos and Zeus) and in Celtic mythology (Bran and Bel or Belin). The basic symbolism is very ancient and a trifle convoluted. The goddess (Madron, mother of all creation, the moon) is married to the god Mabon (her son, the Sun). The renewal and continuation of the marriage (creation, the kingdom, life and the harvest) depends on the aging god (or king) being replaced by the young god (his twin, also Mabon, the new Sun, the new king). The Saturnalia also known as 'Dies Natalis Invicti Solis', the Day of Birth of the Unconquered Sun. Resulting from this title, the Saturnalia also became associated with the New Year. Subsequently the Romans created a new god to oversee the transition on the following Kalends, or first month day. He was Janus, the two-headed god who looked back over the past and forward into the future. His name gave rise to the naming of this first month, January. The Saturnalia was a fire festival, homes were decorated with evergreens, candles, and especially constructed coloured lanterns. The formal festivities lasted seven days though the whole of the preceding month was dedicated to Saturn. Personal gifts were exchanged, wrapped in coloured cloth. Popular festival foods were figs, dates, plums, and pears and apples, fresh melons and pomegranates from Africa, quince preserved in honey, sweet bread, cakes and pastries pressed into the shape of stars, nut breads, cheese pies, shelled pistachios, filberts, pine nuts and walnuts accompanied by cider and mulled wine. Many of these customs seem to be synonymous with the traditional festivities of Christmas. In fact Christ's birth-date was deliberately and artificially set in the third century AD to coincide with, absorb and supersede the pagan festival dedicated to Saturn. It is not certain when Christ was born, research has put his birth most likely in the spring. Some of the many controversies caused by the switch from the old Julian calendar to the Gregorian by Pope Gregory XIII in 1582 persisted in the popular folk story that Christ was actually born on January 6th. At midnight on the eve of that day animals kneel in homage to the Christ Child in mangers and stables. The theme of the advent and the virgin birth is, of course, not Celtic or Roman, although there are virgin births in other religions and mythologies. Specifically Christian though, are the three Magi. Two midwinter tradition, almost certainly Celtic in origin are the Yule Candle and the Yule Log. Early Welsh texts, a good example being the 'Romance of Amergin', give us detailed evidence of the Druid preoccupation with trees and their mythological and religious significance. The Yule Log was directly associated with fire and the purifying embodiment of the sun god. Bringing the Yule Log indoors was symbolic of bringing the blessing of the sun god into the house. The collecting, hauling and kindling of the wood were conducted with great ceremony. The word Yule, however, is derived from the Middle English 'yole', from the earlier Anglo-Saxon 'geol'. It's meaning is unclear but could be related to 'geolo' (yellow) or 'geoleca' yolk. The word appears in a variety of spellings, in Old Norse and other Teutonic languages, it appears though, to have no Celtic counterpart. The Goidelic for Christmas is 'Noillach' (Scots Gaelic) or 'Nollaig' (Irish) related to the Brythonic 'Nadelik' (Cornish) or 'Nadolig' (Welsh) derived from the Latin 'Natalicia'. The Yule Candle was very large and ornamental, usually blue, green or red in colour, which was lit at the beginning of the Christmas season and associated with several superstitions. It could only be extinguished using a pair of tongs, blowing out the flame invited bad luck. Only the head of the household could light or extinguish the flame. The unconsumed remnant of the candle was preserved as a protection, to be lit during thunderstorms to prevent the house being struck by lightning. Its tallow was rubbed on the sole of the plough before spring ploughing, to bless and promote the seed. The lit candle was displayed in a window, as a sign of goodwill, a custom still widely observed in parts of New England and rapidly spreading throughout the rest of the US. These associations derive from the ancient Celtic veneration for the candle as a symbol of light in the darkness of winter. The Romans used oil lamps, but the Celts made candles from wicks or reeds dipped in tallow rendered from beef lard. Some sources erroneously list pig fat, this does not set firmly enough for candle making, it would have been used in lamps only. The Yule Log had a number of associated superstitions. It had to burn steadily without being extinguished, or bad luck would follow. It could be cut down on one's own land, or accepted as a gift from a neighbour, or be stolen from the forest, but it could not be bought or sold: the exchange of money for a Yule Log would destroy its magic properties. It was decorated with evergreens and dragged to the house by oxen if it was too heavy to be manhandled. In Cornwall, the figure of a man was chalked on the log, to be consumed by the fire. Did this represent an earlier sacrifice by burning? Wine, cider or ale, and sometimes corn, was sprinkled over the log before it was lit. Apparently some communities soaked the log for several days before it was ready for the fire. One must presume the alcohol was initially burning rather than the soggy log. After the Yule season, part of the unconsumed log was kept safely to one side and used to ignite the new log in the following year, probably from the communal bonfire. The remainder was kept to attach to the plough in the ploughing season and the ashes were gathered up and sprinkled on the land to ensure a good harvest next year. The two plants still associated with the Yule, namely the holly and the ivy, were also associated with the Celts and the Saturnalia. Saturn's club was of holly wood and his sacred bird, the golden crested wren, nested in ivy. Holly represents the letter T (Tinne) in the Ancient Druidic alphabet Beth-Luis-Nion. It is the totem tree of the oak god's twin (or father), the holly god, or Green Knight, represented by Bran in the British tradition, Cronos in Greece and Saturn in Rome. He is the god of the waning part of the year, while his brother-son Bel is the god of the waxing part of the year. When Christian mythology began to include aspects of earlier pagan mythology, John the Baptist became identified with oak. He was beheaded at midsummer, the day of transition between the oak king and the holly king, in turn leading to the identification of Jesus with the oak's successor, holly. This is the origin of the lines in the carol 'The Holly and the Ivy'�. Of all the trees that are in the wood, the Holly bears the crown and, I feel, is a small demonstration that Christians then were perfectly comfortable sharing the traditions of the Celts. In Middle English the word for holly was spelt 'holi' this was derived from the Old English 'Holen'. Holy was also spelled 'holi' from the Old English 'halig'. There has been an association of holly and Holy ever since. A further connection with Jesus is the shape of the letter itself. The Hebrew 'Tav', the Greek 'Tae' and our letter T all graphically represent the cross of the Crucifixion. Ivy represents the letter G (Gort) in the Ancient Druidic alphabet Beth- Luis-Nion. The vine and the ivy share the characteristic of growing spirally and both are associated with resurrection. As with holly, ivy is associated with Bran, Saturn and Cronos and had many of the same attributes. Then of course there is the Mistletoe, one of the Druids most sacred plants and venerated in folk-law way after the Druids passing. With good reason too, the plant contains eleven proteins and lectins (which are currently being investigated for anti-cancer effects). Its known uses, ancient and modern, include the infusion of dried leaves and berries which makes a tea that has hypotensive (reduces blood pressure), cardiac stimulant, diuretic and sedative properties, when taken by humans (this is not a suggestion). It has been demonstrated to have an antineoplastic (tumour reducing) effect on animals. The custom of kissing under the mistletoe at Christmas seems to confirm Pliny's description of it as an acknowledged aid to fertility, although it was also an earlier custom to hang mistletoe in the porch of a house as a more general and innocent sign of peace and hospitality. In Christian times, mistletoe was carried as a defense against witches, or placed in a baby's cradle to prevent its abduction by fairies.

Ooops, citation for the above got away from me: http://www.fortunecity.com/roswell/shaman/99/midwinter.html

Imbolc An additional festival was added later. This is Imbolc and was held in Leinster to celebrate the Goddess Brigit. This festival marks the ending of Winter's grip and the passing of the influence of the Crone or Cailleach to the Maiden of Spring. It is the time of the first lambs and of new beginnings. Brigit's sacred flame was tended in Leinster in a sacred center for female Druids. This festival was usually one of the home and the hearth and was usually presided over by the female head of the house. http://www.summerlands.com/crossroads/library/celticfi.htm

******************************* ECLIPSE STUFF POSTED ON GEO 24 *******************************

Where did the iceman get the ice he delivered to homes before refrigeration? You've seen old movies in which a big burly guy delivers the ice that kept food cold in the icebox. But you never see where he got the ice to put on his truck. Was it magic? Did HE have a refrigerator � perhaps a truly pre-production model? Not at all. Before civilization advanced to the level of TV dinners and keeping leftovers frozen for months because we can always pop them in the microwave, they actually got ice from very cold places, such as frozen ponds in the winter. They even shipped it in from Alaska. The problem was keeping the ice from melting. The solution was sawdust as insulation � on the ice itself and between the walls of the icehouse, where ice was stored. With that kind of insulation it could even be shipped south to Latin America! Cool, heh! (Source: DO FISH DRINK WATER? By Bill McLain)

+-------------- Bizarre Christmas Traditions --------------+ In Italy they have no Christmas trees, instead they decorate small wooden pyramids with fruit. In Caracas, the capital city of Venezuela, it is customary for the streets to be blocked off on Christmas eve so that the people can roller-skate to church. An artificial spider and web are often included in the decorations on Ukrainian Christmas trees. A spider web found on Christmas morning is believed to bring good luck. It is a British Christmas tradition that a wish made while mixing the Christmas pudding will come true only if the ingredients are stirred in a clockwise direction. A traditional Christmas dinner in early England was the head of a pig prepared with mustard. Sending red Christmas cards to anyone in Japan constitutes bad etiquette, since funeral notices there are customarily printed in red. In Norway on Christmas Eve, all the brooms in the house are hidden because long ago it was believed that witches and mischievous spirits came out on Christmas Eve and would steal their brooms for riding.

The stopwatch on 60 Minutes is made by Heuer. An ant has five noses. A cave man's life span was only 18 years.

Cinderella is known as "Tuna" in Finland. In days long ago, when men who worked on the railroad visited a brothel, they left their red lamps outside - and there you have the coining of the phrase "red light district." A duck feather weighs approxiamtely .016 to .063 grams. The term "senator" means "old man" in Latin. Earthworms don't have eyes or ears.

Why do we call a wild fight a real "donnybrook?" There are all kinds of gradations of conflict and colorful ways to describe them. For example, there's the rhubarb between you and your neighbor over a backyard fence, the parents of kids who have been fighting who go at it themselves hammer and tong, and the brouhaha over who had the right of way on the freeway ramp. On the spectrum of contentiousness, a donnybrook is helter- skelter and Katy-bar-the-door. And why not? The word comes from a fair begun in medieval times at Donnybrook, on the site of the modern Dublin. The fair was held amid much drinking. One boisterous thing led to another. People were pleased as punch to be having such a grand old time and before you know it they were punching as they pleased in the midst of a general melee. In fact you could call it a real donnybrook. (Source: HEAVENS TO BETSY! & OTHER CURIOUS SAYINGS by Charles Earle Funk) Mix up Ivory soap didn't always float. Proctor and Gamble's famous product began life in 1878 as White Soap. It smelled good, had a rich, white color, and sunk like a stone if you let go of it in the bathtub. Then the guy who ran the machine that mixed White Soap's ingredients neglected to throw the off switch one afternoon when he took his lunch break. The soap that resulted had more air in it. The lighter bar floated, consumers loved it, and the rest is history. I just thought you should finally know the real story � a matter of history coming clean, so to speak. (Source: EXTRAORDINARY ORIGINS OF EVERYDAY THINGS)

AT WHAT WIND SPEED DOES A SNOWSTORM BECOME A BLIZZARD? Wind speed in excess of 35 miles an hour is considered a blizzard. WHAT IS THE WARMEST MONTH OF THE YEAR IN THE ARCTIC? The month of July, when the average temperature is no more than 50 degrees F, 10 degrees C.

And you thought you had a bad job... Beijing Scoops the Last Ladles of Nightsoil BEIJING (Reuters) - Ending a century-old tradition, nightsoil collectors have cleared the last lavatory in Beijing by hand, another milestone in what has been dubbed the "toilet revolution" sweeping China. Armed with long-handled ladles and wooden barrels, six collectors on Saturday paid their final early morning call on two courtyard homes on one of Beijing's famous "hutong" alleyways. The squat-style "draught lavatories" -- pits that can accommodate only one user at a time -- were once common in the Chinese capital. But modern public conveniences with flush toilets have made them obsolete. Not that nightsoil collectors are now out of a job altogether. Much of the sewage from public toilets, as well as residential blocks and tourist hotels, still drops into septic tanks that are cleared by nightsoil trucks with long nozzles attached to suction pumps. The small green trucks are a familiar sight darting about the streets of Beijing on their way to the suburbs, where their human waste is spread on cabbage patches.

Pez is one of the most secretive companies in the US. It is not even known who currently owns the company. The world's longest fence is 1,000 miles longer than the Great Wall of China. 3,307 miles long, it runs half the length of Australia and is designed to keep the Dingos separate from the sheep. 1,000,000 one dollar bills would weigh 2,040 pounds. The British fired 2,876 shells into the Bismarck on the day they sank it. Supermassive black holes contribute about as much energy to the universe as do all the stars combined. http://www.sciam.com/news/121400/2.html There are only 2 original parts on the President's limousine. Contrary to popular belief, most black widow spiders don't eat their mates. The Chunnel is 131 feet below the English Channel floor. China has over 22,000 large dams, the most in the world.

Q. What continent has the most silver? A. 50% of the world's silver is in South America. Peru has 12%. The rest is mostly in North America. Mexico, Canada and the US all have large silver reserves. In the rest of the world, silver is mainly found in Australia, Poland and some of the former Soviet republics.

They say (on a tv show I saw the ohter night) that the S African diamond trade is moving to the NW territory, where they have specially micro marked diamonds. This is a region not marked in bloodshed or strife, so the diamonds are sought after because they aren't tainted with overtones of repression.

That is nice to know. Does DeBeers own that, too? Theyhave a huge stockpile of diamonds which are NOT rare, to make them more expensive, but the ones out of Russia are lovely and much more affordable since DeBeers cannot control them. Even colored ones! Why don't doors in homes open outward as they do in all public buildings? The reason for the outward orientation of doors in public places is simple: in case of danger, as in a fire, people have to be able to open the door and pour through the doorway quickly and in great numbers. If the doors opened inward, people might pile up at the exit as everyone pushed to get through at once instead of stepping back to allow space for the door to be opened. Doors open inward in homes � at least the front door does � because they sometimes have to be removed from the hinges in order to allow furniture to be moved in. If the hinges were on the outside, burglars could also remove them. Since there are fewer people in a home, there's no danger of a pileup at the door in case of fire. (Source: WHY DO DOGS HAVE WET NOSES? By David Feldman)

Millennium Meteors NASA Science News for December 29, 2000 One of the most intense annual meteor showers, the Quadrantids, will peak over North America on January 3, 2001. Observers in western parts of Canada, the USA and Mexico could see an impressive outburst of shooting stars, numbering as many as 100 per hour. FULL STORY at http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2000/ast29dec_1.htm?list89800

WHAT DID BLIND CELLARMASTER DOM PERIGNON SAY WHEN HE DISCOVERED CHAMPAGNE IN 1668? "Oh, come quickly, I am drinking stars!" WHAT DOES THE WORD KOALA MEAN IN AUSTRALIA'S ABORIGINE LANGUAGE? Koala means "no drink". This Australian marsupial gets all the liquid it needs from the eucalyptus leaves it eats.

There were 1,511,300 drunken driving arrests in the US in 1999. 407,100,000 people have Internet access as of Dec, 2000. There are three earlier versions of La Giaconda, the Mona Lisa painting's real name, underneath the top layer. In one of those versions da Vinci allegedly gave his subject not only eyebrows, but a beard, moustache and sideburns as well. Devoid of its cells and proteins, human blood has the same general composition as seawater. There are about 8,600 species of birds on Earth. Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, and Virginia were the 13 original American colonies. The phrase "a red letter day" dates back to 1704, when holy days were marked in red letters in church calendars. Without using precision instruments, Eratosthenes measured the radius of the Earth in the 3rd century B.C. and came within 1% of the value determined by today's technology. The practice of naming hurricanes began early this century when an Australian weather forecaster decided to insult politicians he didn't like by naming devastating tropical storms after them.

Why is that liquid refreshment served in big bowls at parties called punch? If one can legitimately describe what you are drinking as "spiked," you might easily conjecture why the drink is called "punch," especially if you wake up prone next to the punch bowl. You might never know what hit you. But the word's origin is not so direct. It was a product of the British colonization of India. In the northern part of that land the Brits came upon a refreshing native drink made from rice alcohol blended with tea, sugar and lemon, all diluted with water. The colonizers, noting that the drink had five ingredients, used the Hindi word for five, "punch," to describe it. Now of course you also have five fingers, and if you curl them into a fist . . . . Just a thought. (Source: WHY YOU SAY IT by Webb Garrison)

General Custer was the youngest general in US history. He was promoted at age 23. Waste products from the production of a single six-inch silicon wafer include 7 pounds of miscellaneous hazardous waste. UN statistics show that 88 nations have a lower death rate than the US. Early systems of measurement used body parts to calculate length. A cubit ran from elbow to middle fingertip. The distance from fingertip to fingertip of outstretched arms was a fathom. Oreos have been the number one selling cookie in America since their introduction in 1912. Elephants have 4 teeth. As they wear out, they are replaced, up to 6 times. After that, the elephant can't eat and starves. Maine is the only state whose name is just one syllable. The highest temperature ever recorded on Earth was 136 degrees Farenheit on September 13, 1992, in Azizia, Libya. The bottle-nosed whale can dive to 3,000 feet in 2 minutes.

+-------------------- Bizarre Holidays --------------------+ JANUARY January is... National Fiber Focus Month January 1 is...First Foot Day January 2 is...Run Up the Flagpole and See if Anybody Salutes It Day January 8 is...National JoyGerm Day and Man Watcher's Day January 10 is... Peculiar People Day January 11 is... National Step in a Puddle and Splash Your Friend Day January 12 is... Feast of Fabulous Wild Men Day January 22 is... National Answer Your Cat's Question Day January 23 is...Measure Your Feet Day January 24 is... Eskimo Pie Patent Day January 27 is...Thomas Crapper Day January 28 is... National Kazoo Day and Rattle Snake Round-Up Day

Why is the flag flown at half-staff to honor someone who has died? The Greeks and the Romans believed that the souls of the dead began their journey to the afterlife by crossing the river Styx � rowed across by a fellow named Charon. With our modern transportation, we wouldn't be caught dead making such an important trip in so tacky a manner. Yet we still honor the passing of prominent people with a custom that stems from a time when travel by boat was where it was at. The flag at half-staff, originally unconnected to death, comes from an old naval ritual. When a ship lost a battle, the crew was obliged to fly the winner's pennant from the top of their mast. In order to make room for it, the losing captain ordered his own flag lowered halfway. By implication, this gesture of respect was also a symbol of loss. Even after this custom faded, captains might dip their flag to a passing ship as a sign of respect, like tipping one's cap. Eventually the practice was adopted to honor the dead. (Source: EVER WONDER WHY? By Douglas B. Smith) ---------------------------------------------------------- Look for the silver lining In one of history's most famous assassinations, Charlotte Corday stabbed to death French revolutionary Jean Paul Marat. She gave it to him while he was taking a bath. No doubt you have seen the famous painting that depicts the scene. But history had the last laugh: She killed an already dying man. He was in the tub to treat an invariably fatal skin disease. Nevertheless, had Charlotte let nature take its course we wouldn't have that famous painting, now would we? My mother always said that you could find something good in most everything. (Source: THE JOY OF TRIVIA)

Listen to the Quadrantids tonight Space Weather News for January 2, 2001 http://www.spaceweather.com The Quadrantid meteor shower will peak over North America before dawn on Wednesday morning, January 3rd. No matter where you live you can listen to the shower by tuning in to a radio meteor listening station at the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center. The installation, located in Huntsville, AL, is perfectly situated to detect a Quadrantid outburst. For more information and realtime audio please visit http://www.spaceweather.com

Tiger Woods made $9,188,321 on the PGA Tour in 2000. He averaged $459,416 per start, $110,703 per round and $1,622 per stroke. By the year 2005, Bill Gates' wealth could overtake the GDP of the United Kingdom. A cricket's chirps can tell you the temperature. Just count the number of chirps it makes in 15 seconds and add 40. The result is a good approximation for the temperature in degrees Fahrenheit. Birds do not sleep in their nests. They may occasionally nap in them, but they actually sleep in other places. Tremendous, stupendous, hazardous and horrendous are the only words in English that end in "dous". Internet data alone is expected to account for 90 percent of the world's bandwidth by 2003.

There are more than 50 different kinds of kangaroos. The first Rolls-Royce Silver Ghost is worth more than twice its weight in gold -- an estimated $50,000,000. When Clyde Tombaugh discovered the planet Pluto, he announced the coordinates of its orbit. Astronomers around the world retrieved old photographs and -- sure enough, there was Pluto, right in front of their faces. Nobody had seen it because they didn't know where to look. Half the world's population now live in cities. The Greek unit of currency, the Drachma, has been in use for 2,650 years. In 1830 the first railroad station was built in Baltimore, Maryland. The U.S. interstate highway system requires that 1 mile in every 5 must be straight. These sections can be used as airstrips in a time of war or other emergencies. The ZIP in Zip-code stands for Zoning Improvement Plan. Most mammals view color only as shades of gray.

Q. Which nations of Europe consume more food than they produce? A. Nearly all the nations of Europe run billion-dollar food deficits. Only three European countries have billion- dollar or better food surpluses: the Netherlands, Denmark and Ireland.

50 different kinds of kangaroos? wow!!

I only know of Red kangaroos and the other ones. Not 49 other ones!!! CORRECTION: The U.S. interstate highway system requires that 1 mile in every 5 must be straight. These sections can be used as airstrips in a time of war or other emergencies. HpstrDufuz points out the truth here: http://www.snopes.com/autos/law/airstrip.htm ADDITION: Tremendous, stupendous, hazardous and horrendous are the only words in English that end in "dous". HpstrDufuz adds "apodous", a zoological term meaning "having no feet". ************************************************************* The first Harley Davidson motorcycle, built in 1903, used a tomato can for a carburetor. 15% of U.S. women send themselves flowers on Valentine's Day. West Virginia is the only state to have acquired its sovereignty by proclamation of the President of the United States. Margaret Mitchell has sold 20,000,000 copies of "Gone With The Wind". The largest incense stick ever made was almost 15 feet long and 6 inches thick. In the 1940s a survey listed the top 7 discipline problems in public schools: talking, chewing gum, making noise, running in the halls, getting out of line, wearing improper clothes, and not putting paper in wastebaskets. A more recent survey lists these top 7: drug abuse, alcohol abuse, pregnancy, suicide, rape, robbery, and assault. Arson, gang warfare, and venereal disease rounded out the modern "top ten". - George F. Will Although in America today life expectancy at birth is near the best of any civilized country in the world, at age 40 life expectancy is near the bottom. - New York State Medical Journal, Sept. 15, 1955 The rumbling sound your stomach sometimes makes is called a "borborygmi." The brain accounts for just 2% of body weight, but burns up 20% of our daily caloric intake.

A sunrise/sunset calculator from the U.S. Naval Observatory website. http://aa.usno.navy.mil/AA/data/docs/RS_OneYear.html Put in your lat/lon and time zone, and you're in business

Happy Birthday Kilauea 0930 January 3, 2001 You know how hard it is to remember anniversaries, especially "after all these years." Well, that happened today until a sentimentalist reminded us that today is the 18th anniversary of the ongoing eruption, which was born on January 3, 1983, and is now a healthy adult with no sign of early senescence. ___ Lava continues down Pulama pali and onto the coastal flat this Wednesday morning at 0454. More of the flow on the pali is crusted, however, so that the scene is less colorful than it has been for the past week or more. Most of the lava is confined to the east flow, where one river descends the pali amid a sea of patchy incandescence from past, still hot, surface flows. The west flow is dark except for one small incandescent spot, possibly a skylight, high on the pali. Lava fed by the flows continues to pond high on the coastal flat, some 2 km or so from the coast. The position of glow this morning suggests that the lava has not moved significantly seaward in the past 24 hours. The crater of Pu`u `O`o is dark this morning. Seismic tremor is weak to moderate near Pu`u `O`o and weak below Kilauea's caldera. The tilt at Kilauea summit and along the east rift zone is flat.

ok, someone gave a name to the rumbling tummy sounds? they must've had a lot of time on their hands!

check our your filtrum and AM's frenulum... (may not have one, actually) Every sailing ship had to have cannon for protection. Cannon of the times required round iron cannonballs. The master wanted to store the cannonballs such that they could be of instant use when needed, yet not roll around the gun deck. The solution was to stack them up in a square-based pyramid next to the cannon. The top level of the stack had one ball, the next level down had four,the next had nine, the next had sixteen, and so on. Four levels would provide a stack of 30 cannonballs. The only real problem was how to keep the bottom level from sliding out from under the weight of the higher levels. To do this, they devised a small brass plate ("brass monkey") with one rounded indentation for each cannonball in the bottom layer. Brass was used because the cannonballs wouldn't rust to the "brass monkey," but would rust to an iron one. When temperature falls, brass contracts in size faster than iron. As it got cold on the gun decks, the indentations in the brass monkey would get smaller than the iron cannonballs they were holding. If the temperature got cold enough, the bottom layer would pop out of the indentations spilling the entire pyramid over the deck. Thus, it was, quite literally, "cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey."

Q. What did European clergymen originally think of hot chocolate? A. Chocolate drinks were the first form of chocolate to spread widely in Europe but clergymen were not pleased. They considered the caffeine kick of chocolate a spur to bad behavior.

Theodore Roosevelt was the only US president to deliver an inaugural address without using the word "I". Mysterious monolith appears in Seattle park. http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/28/15774.html There are significant problems with storing hydrogen. You could liquefy and compress the hydrogen, but this is costly and uses between 20 and 40% of the energy eventually stuffed into the tank. Also, the tanks themselves are robust and heavy--hydrogen only accounts for between 5 and 7% of their weight even when they're full. For buses and trucks this isn't a problem but it effectively limits the range of a hydrogen car to half that of a regular one. The Seattle Space Needle is 605 foot tall and is attached at its based with 72 bolts, each 30 feet long. Aunt Jemima was a real person. Our original expectation [in studying three dental school classes in California] was that, as the students progressed through dental school, they would learn more about professional ethics and display a higher level of ethical responses. The exact opposite occurred. In the first year 67% had a high ethics score. In the final year it had plummeted to 18%. Approaching the end of their professional education, the students were at the nadir of ethicality. http://upalumni.org/medschool/appendices/appendix-2b.html The world's largest alphabet is Cambodian, with 74 letters. Canada has more lakes than the rest of the world combined. [100,000 of which are in Manitoba, according to that province's license plate]

So that's where that expression comes from!

Seems we passed it past an archaeologist or two. One,who also enjoyed it, said there was not evidence for that brass plate in archaeological finds, but agreed with me that it was probably the creation of under used and over active college students. Sill a clever story! Why do we sometimes call a hodgepodge a mishmash? If you come from the northeastern United States, you might suspect that there's a spelling error here. Isn't it "mishmosh?" Isn't this another one of those slang Yiddishisms that have made their way into colloquial English, like something being "kosher?" Well, no. It's not even Yinglish, that blend of English and Yiddish that produced language-bridging expressions such as "fancy-shmancy." Mishmash, in fact, has a fairly old English pedigree. It dates from about 1500, about the time that "mash," a crushed mixture with the consistency of mush, also entered the language. Mishmash is what linguists call a reduplication, a doubling of a word root or syllable to form a new word. The result is a word that sounds very much like what it describes. And that's the whole megillah. (Sources: Dictionary of Word and Phrase Origins by William and Mary Morris; The Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, edited by C. T. Onions; The Oxford Companion to the English Language, edited by Tom McArthur) Cinderella is one of our most beloved children's stories. Who can forget the mistreated girl who ends up with the Prince and the glass slipper? Whoa! There ain't no glass slipper. This error came about because the most well known version of the old legend � the one from the Mother Goose stories � contains a mistranslation. The fellow who got it from the old French mistook "pantouffles en vair," slippers lined with white squirrel fur, for "pantouffles en verre," slippers of glass. White squirrel fur? Not only does she really believe that she has a fairy godmother, she's also kinky to boot? (Source: FABULOUS FALLACIES)

Elephants have poor hearing. At age ninety, Peter Mustafic of Botovo, Yugoslavia, suddenly began speaking again after a silence of 40 years. The Yugoslavian news agency quoted him as saying "I just didn't want to do military service, so I stopped speaking in 1920. Then I got used to it". A skunk can propel its spray 10 feet. Penguins don't always live in cold climates. Though they can be found in the South Pole, they can also be found on the equator. The Chunnel uses 3-tube construction: the two main tubes are 24 feet in diameter, and carry trains in each direction. The service tunnel provides ventilation and access for personnel. Babies are born without knee caps. They don't appear until the child reaches 2-6 years of age.

Travel Channel, Tuesday "Hawaii Volcanoes" Join us in paradise to check out the most active volcanoes in the world.

Q. If I heat a 3 foot long iron bar, I can hold it at one end with my bare hands. If I then dunk the bar in water, it gets too hot to hold and starts to vibrate. Why? A. When red-hot iron touches water near atmospheric pressure, it boils the water so fast that a thin film of steam completely separates the water from the hot metal. So you can think of the bar as being in a closely fitting bubble of steam, surrounded by water. The bubble is unstable because of its buoyancy, so liquid water touches the iron at some point soon after the creation of the film. Where they touch, steam is produced very rapidly and it drives the iron and the water apart again. This movement drives the opposite side of the iron bar against the opposite side of the bubble. Again it contacts liquid water, and the the bar gets driven back toward the first point of contact, hence the vibration. The heating of the iron at the cooler end is caused by steam flowing upward along the rod. Its buoyancy drives the steam upward and it follows the rod because of the Coanda effect-- flowing fluid tends to follow a surface because if it tries to flow away from the surface it leaves behind a partial vacuum that draws it back. The steam then condenses on the rod where the rod is below 212 degrees. This will rapidly heat the whole rod to 212 degrees.

Just how heavy and cumbersome was a suit of armour? You've probably seen movies in which a knight in armour was lifted by a winch onto his horse, so heavy was his protective covering. Or maybe you've seen the scene where Sir Somebody is knocked from his horse and can't get up without assistance. "Poppycock," as we used to say in medieval England. Those suits of armour weighed no more than about 50 pounds and were flexible enough to permit Sir Laughalot to walk around. You wouldn't want to play squash in one, but they were not much more constricting than a business suit, the armour worn by today's corporate warriors. Which reminds me: A couple of years ago, in a museum, I saw a knight in armour from the medieval kingdom of Bohemia, later part of the Czech Republic. Could this have been the origin of the phrase, "The Czech is in the mail?" Just a thought. (Source: DICTIONARY OF MISINFORMATION by Tom Burnam)

Happy Belated Birthday Kilauea! You've become a healthy adult in 18 years. So is Kilauea of legal drinking age in the state of Hawaii? I hope that every celebrated, and continues to have, a Happy New Year. On the subject of holidays, Twelfthnight or Epiphany was January 6th, and I can say Merry Christmas because January 7th is Orthodox Christmas.

Age 21 legal drinking age in Hawaii. LUNAR ECLIPSE TONIGHT NASA Science News for January 8, 2001 On January 9th sky watchers across some parts of Earth will enjoy a total lunar eclipse. But what would they see if they lived, instead, on the Moon? This story considers Tuesday's eclipse from a different point of view. FULL STORY at http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2001/ast08jan_1.htm?list89800

really? we have a near full moon tonight (i mean, it's right there)... check your email, sweetie!

Quite excitingly, the full moon is right outside my apartment and about to go into eclipse over the next hour or two. All I have to do is cross the street and look up every half-hour or so.

And now almost total eclipse..... Eclipsed from the bottom up

Wheeeeeeeeee!!!! Live and direct! Thanks Mark and big hugs for your eye-witness account. *** Jackie Bibby holds the record for sitting in a bathtub with the most live rattlesnakes: 35 of them. The Seven Deadly Sins are lust, pride, anger, envy, sloth, avarice, and gluttony. The Seven Virtues are prudence, courage, temperance, justice, faith, hope, and charity. The Moon travels around the Earth at 66,641 miles per hour. The Statue of Liberty's mouth is 3 feet wide. Ross Perot resigned from the General Motors Board of Directors because of the decision to purchase Hughes Aircraft Company. Holland gets by on a total of four food additives. We have over 1,400. - US Congressman Fred Richmond, Chairperson, Subcommittee on Domestic Marketing, Consumer Relations and Nutrition The Netherlands and The United States both have anthems that do not mention their country's name. Natchez, Mississippi was settled by the French in 1716 and is the oldest permanent settlement on the Mississippi River.

And now the full moon is back, (at 66,641 mph?). It disappeared bottom first, and then reappeared right side first. Strange.

Lunar eclipse from the Midlands, England... Partial: http://www.cix.co.uk/~aal/partial.jpg Totality: http://www.cix.co.uk/~aal/totality.jpg

Thanks, Ian, and friend Anyone else take pictures???

YOu just KNEW this was gonna happen, didn't you??? From Reuters: An estimated 1,500 white witches are planning to gather in Britain, Sweden, Iceland, France, Canada and Austria during the eclipse to ward off any doom it may bring, the BBC reported.

I had a sneaking suspicion.

This now from MSNBC about Stonehenge: http://www.msnbc.com/news/513457.asp?bt=nm&btu=http://www.msnbc.com/tools/newstools/d/news_menu.asp Been there and seen it - they restored it Just enough in my opinion. Thoughts?

1. In Shakespeare's time, mattresses were secured on bed frames by ropes. When you pulled on the ropes the mattress tightened, making the bed firmer to sleep on. Hence the phrase "goodnight, sleep tight". 2. It was the accepted practice in Babylon 4,000 years ago that for a month after the wedding, the bride's father would supply his son- in-law with all the mead he could drink. Mead is a honey beer and because their calendar was lunar based, this period was called the honey month or what we know today as the honeymoon. 3. In English pubs, ale is ordered by pints and quarts. So in old England, when customers got unruly, the bartender would yell at them to mind their own pints and quarts and settle down. It's where we get the phrase "mind your P's and Q's" 4. Many years ago in England, pub frequenters had a whistle baked into the rim or handle of their ceramic cups. When they needed a refill, they used the whistle to get some service. "Wet your whistle" is the phrase inspired by this practice. 5. In ancient England a person could not have sex unless you had consent of the King (unless you were in the Royal Family). When anyone wanted to have a baby, they got consent of the King, the King gave them a placard that they hung on their door while they were having sex. The placard had F.*.*.*. (Fornication Under Consent of the King) on it. Now you know where that came from. 6. In Scotland, a new game was invented. It was entitled Gentlemen Only Ladies Forbidden ... and thus the word GOLF entered into the English language. (don't think #5 is correct...)

A group of owls is called a parliament. Jordan's national anthem does not mention the country's name. No president was an only child. Wisconsin's streams and rivers, if joined end-to-end, would stretch 26,767 miles. The Baby Ruth candy bar was actually named after Grover Cleveland's baby daughter Ruth. A dragonfly can fly up to 30 miles per hour. President James Garfield could write Latin with one hand and Greek with the other--simultaneously!

The tuatara lizard of New Zealand has 3 eyes: 2 in the center of its head and the third on top. Malaysia's national anthem does not mention the country's name. The average life span of an umbrella is 1 1/2 years. A rock band amplified at close range is 140 decibels -- 100,000 times louder than the 85 decibel level that causes permanet hearing loss from prolonged exposure. Julie Nixon, daughter of Richard Nixon married David Eisenhower, son of Dwight Eisenhower. Andrew Johnson, was the only president who was a self-educated tailor. He made his own clothes and that of his cabinet. A piano has to withstand 15 tons of force from the strings. It would take 212 years to drive a car to the sun, at 50 miles per hour.

I don't think any of the "facts" in No 655 are right. P's and Q's comes from "pleases and thank-yous". "Wet your whistle" started out as "whet your whistle" to do with whetting (sharpening) your appetite, and golf comes from a Dutch word. I suspect the source may be a wind-up.

Ah yes, Mark, thank you! Feedback is much appreciated! This from a fellow Londoner: I would take all this with a significant pinch of salt. # At the time of Shakespeare people slept on wooden beds, as anyone who has been to the Shakespeare museum will tell you. # Not too sure of the origins of mead but it was certainly made and served in the inns of England at least 1000 years ago. # Pints are the order of the day in English pubs, never quarts (A filthy European intrusion into our way of life as far as I'm concerned). This has been so forever to the best of my knowledge. # I have never heard of whistles in ceramic jugs. A simple.."another pint if you please inn keeper" would have worked just as well and been less trouble. # I think not. I am inclined to believe that certain citizens would not have waited for the consent of their intended partner before taking action, let alone the monarch. ..and two real ones for you. Derivation of the word POSH. A relatively modern introduction into the English language. When wealthy couples travelled across the Atlantic to New York from Southampton and back, they would always have a cabin on the port side of the ship on the outward journey and starboard on the homeward leg. This meant that the sun always shone through the porthole of their cabin. Thus...Port Out Starboard Home gave rise to POSH. The Royal Fish The sturgeon is a royal fish. Any sturgeon caught in British territorial waters must be offered to the king or queen of the day. Only when the monarch declines the offer can the fish be eaten by its capturer.

CORRECTION: Thee Baby Ruth candy bar was actually named after Grover Cleveland's baby daughter Ruth. No, it was named after Babe Ruth. The Ruth Cleveland thing was a dodge to avoid paying royalties, and was later used to keep a product bearing the Famous Ballplayers name off the market. - HpstrDufuz ************************************************************* The "Cob" in cobweb is an old English word for spider. President Taft got stuck in his bathtub on his Inauguration Day and had to be pried out by his attendants. Jerry Rice holds the Super Bowl record for most receiving touchdowns in a game: 3 Lie detectors do not. Independent research consistently shows they are barely better than chance at detecting lies. That is why they are not admitted into a court of law unless both sides agree to it, and often not then. London was the first city with a population over 1,000,000, in 1811. The Practicioner, a British medical journal, has determined that bird-watching may be hazardous to your health. The magazine, in fact, has officially designated bird-watching a hazardous hobby, after documenting the death of a weekend bird-watcher who became so immersed in his subject that he grew oblivious to his surroundings and consequently was eaten by a crocodile. At the Rocky Mountain Front Eagle Migration Area west of Great Falls, Montana more golden eagles have been seen in a single day than anywhere else in the country. 87,000,000 people in China have a family name of Li. Abe Lincoln's mother died when the family dairy cow ate poisonous mushrooms and Mrs. Lincoln drank the milk.

CORRECTION: Lincoln's mother died of mushroom poisoning It was in fact a plant called white snakeroot, that was transmitted via milk. - Dave ************************************************************* Andrew Jackson thought that the world was flat. Consumers spent $10.7 billion in online shopping during the 2000 holiday season, up from $5.2 billion in 1999. If persons in the untreated group die at any time in the study interval, they are reported. In the treated group, however, deaths which occur before completion of the treatment are rejected from the data, since these patients do not then meet the criteria of the term 'treated'. - Hardin B. Jones, PhD, ACS 11th Annual Science Writers Conference 362,000,000 Oreos have been sold to date. In 1865 opium was grown in the state of Virginia and a product was distilled from it that yielded 4% morphine. In 1867 it was grown in Tennessee: six years later it was cultivated in Kentucky. During these years opium, marijuana and cocaine could be purchased legally over the counter from any druggist. The average person falls asleep in seven minutes. Even though a mosquito beats its wings 600 times per second, it only travels about one mile per hour. The Chunnel was the biggest civil-engineering project of the 20th century.