Walking to work this morning I saw a profusion of butterflies, flurries of them. From a distance they looked like leaves carried on the breeze, but as they fluttered past (so fast!) it was obvious they were on a mission. I think they were “painted ladies”:http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2005/03/27/special_reports/science_technology/12_31_263_26_05.txt flying their hearts out toward the desert and its “new flowers”:http://www.california-desert.org/flower_main.html.
Happy spring, everyone!
Oh, this is just too sad for words. The other day I noticed an ad for the new “GMC Sierra Hybrid Pickup”:http://www.gmc.com/sierra/hybrid_popup.jsp. I was surprised by the idea that US automakers were finally getting on the hybrid bandwagon. Turns out I shouldn’t have been.
Read on for the rant…
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“Parand”:http://www.parand.com/say/index.php/2005/03/23/plugging-back-into-academia/ thoughtfully provided a short list of interesting online academic courseware from “Harvard”:http://athome.harvard.edu/, “MIT”:http://ocw.mit.edu/index.html, and “Berklee”:http://www.berkleeshares.com/ (the music school, not a typo). The Harvard videos remind me of the fun educational/classroom shows (like “Mechanical Universe”:http://www.its.caltech.edu/~tmu/ or “French in Action”:http://www.learner.org/resources/series83.html) I used to watch on UHF channels. I was just thinking about online music lessons, too…
As if we didn’t have enough to worry about, now it looks like “a bloc of southern school districts are successfully removing science from all textbooks”:http://www.ambiguous.org/archive.php3/2005/03/24#robin2005324.1. Sigh.
“But Chris,” you say, “They’re just calling for the removal of sex ed and evolution and the heliocentric model and other such blasphemies. Surely there’s still room for Newtonian physics and some of the less-witchy forms of alchemy.” In reply I just sigh again and continue stocking my remote mountain treehouse with food, water, and “Heinlein novels”:http://www.heinleinsociety.org/.
I don’t know how else to say it. You *must* read “Linda’s travelog of her journey through South America”:http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Gal_on_the_Go_SA/. If it were a book on my shelf (which it should be, it really should), I would be pulling it down, opening it to “the most recent entry”:http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Gal_on_the_Go_SA/message/28, and shoving it under your nose. Then I’d make you take it with you and read it from the beginning.
Go!