I’ve been reading Cronin in Santa Cruz. It’s less exotic than Lolita in Tehran, but more personal. My grandmother, Dinah Cronin, died 15 years ago. During my childhood I visited her a few times in Arizona, but she passed before I got to know her well. So, I’ve been developing my relationship with her through…
“I know that piece of paper is around here somewhere . . .” Getting the newspaper out is sometimes called the “daily miracle.” And while it might not be exactly comparable to walking on water, the daily cycle leaves me ever-awed. The week after classes let out one of our professors, a reporter and editor…
I made a video of my sister-in-law Sara dying eggs in the pysanky technique. It’s a big file, so have a glass of nog to pass the time while it downloads. Enjoy! http://gallery.me.com/hestermandl/100137
I’m stuck at home and dealing with a formidable, unexpected foe: FREE TIME! I think my utter dread of unstructured minutes motivates much of my multi-tasking. Maybe I should be more aware of that. So — I’m creating a blog post, because otherwise, I’d have to…I don’t know what. Anyway. I’m blogging about blogging at AGU….
A few days after the apocalypse, your iPod will find its last utility as a projectile, ineffectually fending off the feral dogs for about 25 seconds–and that’s if you haven’t opted for the Shuffle or something similar lacking heft. I’ve got a problem when it comes to music; it’s not an exaggeration to compare it…
A few weeks ago, I was thinking about my beat. Today, it’s pretty obvious: I’m grooving with whales. I’m twitterpated (again). In elementary school, we watched videos about whaling (I went to a progressive school…). After seeing the videos, I — all of 11 years old — wrote to Greenpeace, wanting to help the whales….
This weekend I visited one of my best friends from my undergraduate days at Harvey Mudd College. The trip put me in a nostalgic mood, and I decided to see if I could dig up some of my school papers from those four years. Here is a typical passage, taken from a report on telescope…
As I wrote in my last post, fear can be a real problem for writers. So much so that there’s actually a book on how writers can overcome it, called The Courage to Write by Ralph Keyes. But fear isn’t all bad. It’s a crucial evolutionary response that keeps us away from danger, and scientists…
Thanks to the Paleo-future blog and nasaimages.org (NASA + Internet Archive project)
The US National Aeronautics and Space Administration is notoriously good at finding means for justifying its science budget, sometimes deploying what amounts to science fiction (see vintage hype image gallery in a separate post). Mostly, though, it’s simple hype. All of us slugs are on the NASA news release list. An unusually cryptic, tantalizing PR…
