A recent list of amazing things and events

I've taken a break because I'm still searching for the focused purpose of this blog.

Right now, I have two things to share. One is an extremely well written and well-expressed account of a bicycle trip taken by two young, twenty-somethings who are friends of my daughter's. If you want to read about two young men taking an adventure and sharing it with stories, pictures and personal reflections, check out, Good Times, Bike Times by Tomas Bielskis and Daumantas Mockus.

As I am determined to blog about mostly things that aren't related to exploring the Solar System, I'd like to briefly comment about a book that I just finished. Entitled Three Cups of Tea, by Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin, it is about a mountaineer who attempted to climb K2 in the Korakoram mountain range in Pakistan, almost died, and was nursed back to life by people in a village called Korphe. The relationships he developed with the villagers resulted in his committment to provide basic needs and schools for children, especially girls in 90 villages across Pakistan and into Afganistan. His fund-raising efforts have come from donations mostly from individuals. The story is truly amazing. This book was on the best seller list for 120 weeks in 2007, but I just came upon it through my Concord Academy book club. In his own way, Mortenson and his friends in Pakistan have been on a mission for peace that is more effective than any counter terrorism efforts any government can put into effect. It is a truly awesome story, one that makes me painfully aware that there are millions of people whose basic needs of clean water, shelter, food and the security are not available and hence they cannot realize their full potential as human beings. There is way too much suffering in the World. I'm still processing the book and its many dimensions.

End of year realization

Three things came together in the past couple of days that have made me realize that things change, and that just because things have happened one way for a long time or even for generations, they may not work that way in the future. It seems obvious when I write it down, but I want to elaborate with some examples.

It started on Tuesday morning when I turned on TV while I was exercising and the movie Happy Feet was playing. I thought it was a movie that a high school friend told me about, so I watched it. (She was actually referring me to Penguins, oh well) One of the movie's themes illustrated the change of cultural ways when the outcast, young, emperor penguin, was rejected by his community because he could not sing; all emporer penguins were singers. Instead the protagonist penguin was born moving his feet rapidly in a manner that was embarrassing to his parents and shocked the community elders. As he grew up, he tried to become part of the community, but finally decided to leave home. He set out to find out where all the fish were going that was leaving his community without food. When he returned, after learning where all their fish were going, this dancing penguin got all of his generation of emperor penguins dancing. It was a poignant scene when the elder penguins couldn't stop the masses from dancing in delight. I noted then that things can change from one generation to the next. And I thought about my Ancient History class in ninth grade where we discussed the role of traditions in society. They are there for social stability but there are times when cultural norms can change for numerous reasons. And whether a culture sings or dances, it doesn't matter.

Then this morning, I heard on France 24 news, which I usually watch while I exercise, about smarva.com, a community lending forum in Germany. All of a sudden I realized that it might be possible that individuals will start lending to small companies, or to other individuals, and that the banks potentially could be superceded. I realized that our current economic stand-still could pick up in ways that I hadn't anticipated and that things will be different, maybe for the better.

Then Marc returned from his new doctor's office. Our doctor of 15 years is moving from her sole practice in Bethesda, to New Mexico. We are looking for a new doctor. Marc commented how nice it was to be in a modern office. There the records are electronic, the prescription was emailed or faxed directly to the pharmacy from the doctor's computer while she was talking to Marc. We have been talking about how important it is to digitize medical records. I got a copy of my 15 years of records, and I entered data into a spread sheet to see how my cholesterol levels have changed over the years. There is no reason that medical records don't show that information routinely. I have a feeling that our new doctors will provide us with more efficient care. We'll see if this potential is realized.

I'm looking forward to the New Year, and the changes they will bring. It may not all be easy and I hope some things will stay the same. But it is an interesting feeling to realize how different things will be. Things I hadn't even thought of, such as individuals lending to individuals. Of course, I'm not going to learn how to evaluate someone's credit worthiness.
Nor will I be making loans. I just think it is an interesting idea.

Post election excitement

It's a new world today. We'd spent a few hours at our neighbors watching the results on TV. Maya their high school daughter kept coming down and comparing the reported results from the internet with those on TV. The electoral college count was different. TV was slower on the declarations, but TV had holograms of reporters and the Capitol in their studio. I don't think that was on the internet. When we felt tired, we retreated to our bedroom to watch McCain's concession speech and then Obama's victory speech. The faces in the crowds were very different at the two events. I also caught on Comedy Central, a Harvard Law Professor who had thought, when Obama graduated from law school, that he would make a great mayor and would be rescuing cats from people's trees. [insert laughter sound track]. At 11:00 Comedy Central pronounced Obama a winner in a pathetic drama between Colbert and Stewart, and I realized that I wanted main stream media's take. It is all history now. I had tears streaming down the side of my face watching. It was hard to turn off the TV as the celebrations from around the world were shown: Times Square, from inside the gates of the White House (CNN, that was a scarey view), Los Angeles, Harlem, places where in my lifetime the streets were filled with angry people rioting and destroying property. When we finally turned off the tube, we could hear celebrations in the distance through our opened window. It sounded like the local high school had just won their season's final football game. The new world is here.

This morning I couldn't help but turn on the TV and surf the channels. CNN rapidly bored me, I wanted to find a local channel. I was actually worried about the state of downtown Washington, but was relieved to see the young revellers who had celebrated their hard work for Obama until 3:30 am as a totally joyous event for their participation in history. The implications are just sinking in. Flipping through the channels brought me 4-5 hour lines in neighboring Prince Georges county where over half the county had voted by 3pm, and there was no line after 5pm.
Heard about swing states that went blue, including Virginia, Indiana and Pennsylvania. I heard some long winded Harvard Law Professor noting the hopes and expectations, and I thought back to Jesse Jackson's tears from the night before.

On the lighter side, even Marc is anticipating not having to bottle up his opinions about a whole range of things that have been going on at work that he now feels he can comment on. How will my work change? Probably not much. I still have to write proposals, review manuscripts, manage grant spending and reporting and do what I can to provide the young adults of the world with enough science and technology background to not return to the Dark Ages. And maybe bring some new knowledge into our conscience.

Now should I turn this into a health blog? I had my third cortisone shot of the year yesterday.
Postanteric bursitis. What are the risks of cortisone shots? Another research topic to pursue for another time. Atleast I can walk into work, which I couldn't do on Monday.

Small asteroid hit Earth as a meteor

A lot has happened since early October. I had a chance to speak to a few people involved in the discovery of the 2 meter asteroid that hit Earth as a meteor the next day. The story
at http://www.azstarnet.com/news/264185 is a good report of the event and the process.
I thought I knew Kowalski, the discoverer, but I don't. I confused his name with that of a colleague of mine. It was a little embarrasing as I went up my colleague and slapped him on the back saying, "Richard, how does it feel to be the person to first discover an asteroid that then hit the Earth?" He just smiled and told me it wasn't him and explained the difference between his name and the discoverer. Whoops!

A crazy election, financial crisis and now this!

If I didn't know the people involved, I wouldn't believe it. An exciting election, world financial crisis and now this! I still have a hard time believing it.
A small, fast moving body was found at Mt. Lemmon, an observatory in Tuscon, AZ, by a colleage. Richard Kowalski, who I know (he's going to be everyone's friend now). Another group of astronomers were able to calculate its orbit, that's another impressive aspect of the story, verify it and then report with confidence, that it was going to collide with Earth! The risk of a Chicken Little situation is high. I can't wait to hear them all tell their stories. The very small asteroidal fragment was named 2008 TC3, (naming conventions exist and aren't very interesting) and it was predicted to collide with Earth Oct. 6, 2008 at 2:46 UT.
Now to see the images. Now is the time to verify what you hear and see. The reports won't necessarily be from people I know. It was predicted to fall over northern Africa, I've already read that it was visible from Europe, but I'll have to do some sorting of reports to see if that is true. The only problem is that I am getting ready to go to a meeting, and I am preparing for that. I think I'll stick to my plans and let others in my office sort through the reports of any sighting, or a meteorite fall. That would be very interesting, if there were a meteorite fall. We live in interesting times. Don't forget that the economy is in upheaval and there is a Presidential election debate tonight. Note this was not predicted to be an impact hazard.

Vine Eaten Tomatoes

For the past few summers we have planted a few things in the sunny spot in our back yard. I do tomatoes and Marc does pepper plants. We have learned to encase our 4' x 6' plot in deer proof netting. I have also installed a foot or so of chicken wire to keep out the rabbits. But I still get burrowing animals, especially when the tomatoes are about to ripen. I've seen squirrels stuck in there and I've seen chipmunks come and go as they please through their tunnels. As a result, we have vine eaten tomatoes!

Butterflies and Caterpillars

An exquisite hairstreak butterfly. It is about 1 cm long and actually stood still on the sunflower leaf long enough to be photographed. If you click on the picture, you can get a closer look.








I kept a pair of these, gave them a green tomato which one devoured while the other formed a chrysalis. Then I waited for them to emerge.
Only one did. I have the pictures but they made a mess while eating, the picture is yucky.





This is called a tomato hornworm caterpillar.
I think the white spikes are parasites, they sure look like it and I've only seen this caterpillar with them. Maybe they are the horns. But they aren't on the other pictures I've seen of hornworms http://insects.tamu.edu/fieldguide/cimg308.html. I don't believe this guy eats anything but leaves. They are too big and juicy for me to capture and watch develop into a moth. See the link above for the outcome of that. If it were to morph into a creature of beauty I probably would have tried.