The 984-Foot Asparagus

I did not know this. Did you? From those omniscient individuals at mentalfloss.com:

  

The Eiffel Tower was originally supposed to be in Barcelona, but the city thought it would be an eyesore, and rejected Gustave Eiffel's plans. That meant he was forced to repitch the project elsewhere. Luckily, Eiffel found a home for his idea in Paris, where the Tower could serve as the main archway for the 1889 International Exposition.

   The Tower didn't exactly go over well with the Parisians, either. The enormous iron structure was immediately belittled by critics, and one especially harsh reviewer

The Smell Test

Fascinating! ~ and so important. A study by a graduate student at the University of Florida has shown that a simple smell test using peanut butter can pinpoint those in the first stages of Alzheimer's (story, video, slideshow): http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/10/09/alzheimers-smell-test-peanut-butter_n_4072892.html

And the Winners Have Been ... UPDATE

britannica.com

The first Nobel Peace Prize was awarded in 1901. It went to businessman Jean Henri Dunant of Switzerland (see http://somanyinterestingthings.blogspot.com/2013/05/cross-and-crescent.html) and economist Frédéric Passy of France. Interested in learning who's won since then? (story, interactive chart): http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/10370215/Every-Nobel-Peace-Prize-winner-from-1901-2012.html
   It's quite possible that our little Malala Yousafzai just may win this year, but she's not sure that she should. "There are many people who deserve the Nobel Peace Prize, and I think that I still need to work a lot," she said when asked about it. "In my opinion, I have not done that much to win the Nobel Peace Prize": http://www.npr.org/blogs/parallels/2013/10/10/231388814/will-a-pakistani-teenager-win-the-nobel-peace-prize
   For a graphic explaining the nominating process, see http://www.britannica.com/blogs/2009/10/the-nobel-peace-prize/
   This year's winner is the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (story, video): http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-24490925

Disney Feels Good

Disney has figured out a way of allowing viewers to "feel" textures, using electrostatics to simulate friction. "If we artificially stretch skin on a finger as it slides on the touch screen, the brain will be fooled into thinking an actual physical bump is on a screen even though it is smooth,” explained Ivan Poupyrev, director of the interaction group at Disney Research (story, video): http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/disney/10367418/Forget-3D-Disney-aims-for-Texture-TV.html

His Dog Spot

the late Cal Worthington and one of his "dogs"                              youtube

Love him (OK, recognize him) or hate him (Frank Zappa called him a monster), anyone who watched TV in Southern California between 1971 and the 1990s has to admit that car dealer Cal Worthington's ubiquitous ads were hard to forget ~ mostly because they were on so often. And the man didn't even like cars!: http://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2013/10/09/death-of-a-salesman/

Urine Luck

Well, like so many things we blithely throw away, it turns out that our urine has many valid uses ~ and the Smithsonian knows them all: http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/science/2013/08/from-gunpowder-to-teeth-whitener-the-science-behind-historic-uses-of-urine/

The Whole Sorrowful Land

Last year, I shared a very eye-opening piece on the Democratic Republic of Congo and its tragic history of war, colonialism, slavery, and exploitation. (The post included, btw, a link to Joseph Conrad's awesome Heart of Darkness, from which comes the title of this post [see below for the excerpt.]): http://somanyinterestingthings.blogspot.com/2012/12/heart-of-darkness.html
   Africa may seem a continent away (*smile), but what goes on there is important to us all. It is also important to understand why what is going on there (or anywhere) is going on. In this case, it started in the late 15th century (story, video): http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-24396390
   Here's the passage from which I got the title for this post: "She was savage and superb, wild-eyed and magnificent; there was something ominous and stately in her

Gotta Make Art

Francisco de Pájaro

When ya gotta, ya gotta, and Spanish artist Francisco de Pájaro (a pájaro is a bird!) has to create. So when his hometown of Barcelona passed a law forbidding painting on the street, he found new, albeit temporary, canvases in the trash we leave behind ~ and moved to London (story, lots of photos, and note ~ some of them may be a little too graphic for children): http://societeperrier.com/art-is-trash-the-street-artist-turning-trash-into-art/#.UlWt8yQtfgf

Brilliant Creations

Michel Séméniako

The illuminating work of French photographer Michel Séméniako. Translation of the captions: Since the 1990s, he's been using a technique called light painting to give color to nighttime landscapes. ... (for the videos:) Valery Faidherbe filmed the creation of one of Michel Séméniako's photos ... and put together a montage in which light, time, and space merge (photos, videos): http://www.laboiteverte.fr/les-light-paintings-michel-semeniako/

Just Because: 'The Thousand Hour Day'

The first time I found this book, it was in one of my parents' many crammed, wonder-filled bookshelves. It's a long book, and emotionally draining, but I couldn't put it down. The title refers to the six weeks after the Nazis invaded Poland. The book, a historical fiction by W.S. Kuniczak, follows the stories of various people in completely diverse situations but all in that same period of time.
   I loaned it to someone, never got it back, and forgot who had it. That was several years ago. Since then, I had occasion to recall it many times, wishing I still had it, but as I couldn't remember the exact title or the name of the author, Google as I might, I couldn't find it.
   The second time I found this book, I was in a rental condo in Mammoth. This was last summer. I noticed that the owners were readers and that they read some pretty heavy-duty books. Intrigued, I started looking through their bookshelves ~ and guess what I found? Right.
   Because there's so much to this book, a part of one section alone won't give an idea of its scope, so I'm regaling you with a couple of excerpts. Also, I usually post the first few paragraphs of a book, but in this case, I'm starting a little further in.

Hang yourself, brave Crillon;

We fought at Arques and you

were not there.

Fall 1939

And soon, my friend, we shall

have no more time for dances …

…

Sunday, August the twenty-seventh

 THE CORRESPONDENT

  …

   Coming to Berlin at this time had been his idea. The office in New York had seen no need for it. They had not been sure that anything would happen. The world had circled above reality for ten years, after all. They thought the British and the French would do it again: shuck off their obligations and back away smiling. Then Roosevelt wrote to Hitler asking for guarantees that German appetites were satisfied after Austria, the Sudetenland, Memel and the Czechs, and Hitler read the letter in the Reichstag, rattling off a long list of names of countries, planets, states and geographic equations in which Germany had no interest (all to the thunderous laughter of the deputies), and William Shirer cabled his report about the reasonable nature of Hitler’s demands, and the foreign

Meanwhile, Back in North Korea

Children extol the joys of agricultural self-reliance.            David Guttenfelder

In a story in National Geographic, a journalist and photographer share their views of North Korea, which they have visited several times in the last year. Although their movements are restricted and they are under the constant, vigilant watch of their "minder," they are able, once in a while, to catch a fleeting glimpse of life behind the facade (story, link to slideshow): http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2013/10/north-korea/sullivan-text#

Swift ... and Strong

© Daniele Occhiato

Researchers now have proof of something they long suspected, but it came with an impressive surprise. While they were pretty sure that the Alpine swift spends the majority of its time in the air, they found that, in their migrations, these birds actually fly nonstop for about 200 days: https://www.sciencenews.org/article/alpine-swifts-fly-nonstop-more-six-months

That Smarts

reason magazine has a good section it calls "Brickbats," in which they enumerate various rather outrageous and, in most cases just plain stupid, moves by authorities, companies, or individuals not just in the United States but elsewhere in the world. Here are a couple from the November issue:

In April, Tom Hoffman got a $66,000 water bill from the city of Dallas, Texas. Because he has autopay and the bill was for more than he had on hand, his bank locked down all

Celebrating Mass

So Peter Higgs, from the UK, and Francois Englert, from Belgium, have together won the Nobel prize in physics. Herewith, an interview with the man whose name will forever be tied to a particle (story, video): http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-22073084

The Fabric of Her Life

Benerito held 55 patents. AP photo/Eric Risberg

Annnd, once again, the obits provide a fascinating biography of a most interesting individual, in this case, one Ruth Benerito (this is the correct spelling of her last name; I looked it up). Not only did this woman earn a Ph.D. in physical chemistry at a time when not many of her gender were seeking advanced degrees or frequenting the halls of that particular department, but she and her team came up with what the New York Times called "one of the most significant technological developments of the 20th century." No matter what you may think of the aesthetic qualities of wrinkle-free cotton, you have to admit that its invention made a big difference to a whole lot of people (story, video): http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/10/the-woman-who-changed-americas-social-fabric-with-actual-fabric/280363/

Out of One, Many

Bryan Cranston as Walter White                                     Frank Ockenfels/AMC

Story vs. plot and one screenwriter's thoughts on what Breaking Bad means to the art of TV writing: http://www.culturalweekly.com/new-tv-narratives-why-breaking-bad-matters.html

Wealth and Responsibiity

projecthigherlife.org

How and why the wealthiest couple in Zimbabwe went from riches to poverty to riches and now take care of 40,000 orphaned and vulnerable children in their own country and beyond: http://www.forbes.com/sites/mfonobongnsehe/2013/10/02/the-millionaires-wife-who-feeds-40000-children/

The Mice That Roared

So we have a government shut-down with no sign of an end. This situation, only the culmination of the kind of behavior we have been seeing in Congress for the last six years, was inevitable after the election of those who proudly call themselves Tea Partiers. Most had very little, if any, experience in government (which is what made them so popular with certain voters), and all evinced a hard-core rebelliousness and obstinacy akin to religious fervor. To be sure, there is intransigence on both sides, but as the impasse continues, I find myself focusing on the Republican party and wondering exactly which members are refusing to negotiate, and what are they thinking?: http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2013/10/32-republicans-who-caused-the-government-shutdown/280236/

Know Van Gogh

The Bedroom is one of the paintings the app explores.                    screen shot

Speaking of artists with tragic lives (see post just below), the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam has created an app for tablets called Touch Van Gogh. It allows one to explore some of his paintings in depth, learning about their history, his world, his technique, and more: http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2013-10-04/computing/42716504_1_rijksmuseum-van-gogh-museum-new-app
   To see how the app works, go to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4BDIm1oRwYg

The Artist Within

This is the offering that showed up in my inbox this morning from Poem-A-Day. It's interesting how, sometimes ~ actually, quite often ~ the story of an artist can alter the way one sees his/her work. This is one of those cases.

At a Dinner Party

by Amy Levy

 

With fruit and flowers the board is decked,
    The wine and laughter flow;
I'll not complain--could one expect
    So dull a world to know?

You look across the fruit and flowers,
    My glance your glances find.--
It is our secret, only ours,
    Since all the world is blind. 

 
Amy Levy was a British poet and novelist born in London in 1861. Her poetry and other writings are often celebrated for their exploration and interest in feminist themes, Jewish female identity, and same-sex love. She committed suicide on September 10, 1889, two months shy of her twenty-eighth birthday.

Nat Geo at 125

El Paso, Texas, 1939                                     Luis Marden/National Geographic

The iconic National Geographic turns 125 this year, and to celebrate, it's put together some of its best photographs ~ including, of course, that mesmerizing one of the Afghan girl in a Pakistan refugee camp (slideshow, videos, related links): http://www.mnn.com/earth-matters/wilderness-resources/photos/celebrating-125-years-of-epic-photography/iconic-images

Love Mead Tender

The first time most of us ever heard about mead was in Beowulf (remember Heorot, the mead hall that Grendel invades?) ~ it was probably the last time, too, unless you've been to a Renaissance Faire or your kid, like mine, comes home with some he made at his college co-op. Get ready to hear more about it. Mead seems to be making a comeback and moving out of private kitchens and into the wider market, but this isn't your ancestor's honey-based drink: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24184527

Real Cowboys Don't Use Escalators

Some moving stats from wisegeek.com:

As of 2013, the state of Wyoming is thought to have two escalators in the entire state, both of which are located in the city of Casper. In comparison, the entire United States has around 35,000 escalators, according to 2013 figures from the National Elevator Industry. Each Wyoming escalator is located in a Casper bank location, whereas escalators tend to typically be found in airports and shopping centers. It is thought that perhaps the reason Wyoming doesn’t have more escalators is because many buildings

Level Playing Field

We Americans are always trying to figure out where our education system's gone wrong, assuming that it has. We compare ourselves to other countries and find that we come up lacking. We blame all sorts of things, and some of these accusations make sense and others don't. Without jumping into the fray myself, I'll just say that this is an interesting article that suggests that part of the problem, at least at the high school level (but, I will add here, sometimes winds can carry smoke far from its source), is our glorification of organized sports: http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2013/10/the-case-against-high-school-sports/309447/
   The wisest comment I've seen on the subject came in the form of a Letter to the Editor in the Sept. 29, 2013, edition of the Los Angeles Times. It was by Chris Daly, of Yucaipa, who was responding to an article about the Los Angeles school district's program giving students their own iPads (a program that, by the way, has so far been a very expensive headache for a variety of reasons):
      "L.A. Unified School District (and all American) officials need to see what successful education programs do rather than going for the latest fads.
      "In her book The Smartest Kids in the World and How They Got That Way, Amanda Ripley follows three American exchange students through a year at high schools in

Shut Down

According to an NBC News story quoting the Office of Management and Budget, the 1995 and 1996 government shutdowns, which lasted a total of 27 days, cost $1.4 billion. That, the story continues, is $2 billion in today's dollars (http://nbcpolitics.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/09/27/20723289-why-a-government-shutdown-could-be-a-pricey-proposition?lite).
    To understand the reasons for the high cost, it behooves one to understand the set of rules governing such an event ~ rules written in the late 1800s: http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2013/09/the-odd-story-of-the-law-that-dictates-how-government-shutdowns-work/280047/

Bad Food! Bad! Sit! Stay!

I was happy to see the recent spate of articles about food waste and the confusion over "consume by" dates. Personally, I've never paid attention to them, and I've always been shocked (shocked, I tell you!) by the perfectly good food I've seen friends blithely toss down the drain and into the trash can (not even a composting bin). Maybe this momentary coverage of the latest issue du jour will give some pause for thought. To that end, here's a list of five foods that do not go bad the instant their "sell by" date is reached. And to it, I would add one more: cheese. Just cut off the colorful bits and enjoy the rest. Honestly!: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-magazine-monitor-24305902

Caffeine, Free ~ Sept. 29

National Coffee Day (who knew?) is Sept. 29, and there are a few deals to be had at certain chains and companies!: http://www.parade.com/166874/leahingram/national-coffee-day-2013-whats-free/?utm_source=parademagazine&utm_medium=print&utm_campaign=vanity20130929

The Emotional Email

It had to happen. Researchers at the National Research Council Canada have put together a program that can deduce your gender and personality by analyzing the words you use in your emails or other social media. Yup. Fascinating ~ and yet somehow creepy: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn24286-what-your-email-style-says-about-your-personality.html#.UkdqNrwtfgd

The Sight of Sound

Kraftwerk's "Transistor"                                Martin Klimas

Wanna know what "Time" really looks like? How about "Toccata and Fugue in D Minor"? German photographer Martin Klimas did, so he photographed the way pools of paint reacted on a membrane when the sound was turned way up high. He calls the results sonic sculpture: http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/artscience/2013/09/the-sounds-of-pink-floyd-daft-punk-and-james-brown-as-expressed-by-flying-paint/

Just Because: 'Behind the Beautiful Forevers'

My brother gave me this book for some holiday, or maybe for my birthday. I can't remember. Either way, I finally started reading it during my recent vacation, and though I haven't finished it, I have to say that, like everything he has recommended, it's very good and extremely worthwhile. The subtitle is "Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity," and it's by New Yorker staff writer Katherine Boo. As a reporter, Boo spent a lot of time in India, and this book is what is called on the jacket "narrative nonfiction."

prologue: between roses

July 17, 2008—Mumbai

Midnight was closing in, the one-legged woman was grievously burned, and the Mumbai police were coming for Abdul and his father. In a slum hut by the international airport, Abdul's parents came to a decision with an uncharacteristic economy of words. The father, a sick man, would wait inside the trash-strewn, tin-roofed shack where the family of eleven resided. He'd go quietly when arrested. Abdul, the household earner, was the one who had to flee.
   Abdul's opinion of the plan had not been solicited, typically. Already he was mule-brained with panic. He was sixteen years old, or maybe nineteen—his parents were hopeless with dates. Allah, in His impenetrable wisdom, had cut him small and

The Best Vintage

bottled memories                             screen shot

How incredibly cool is this?!? Here's a how-to on this creative way of displaying pictures (slideshow): http://www.diynetwork.com/decorating/how-to-turn-old-bottles-into-picture-frames/pictures/index.html?affiliate=blocker&omnisource=SEM&c1=Slideshows&c2=Outbrain&c3=RSS&c4=How-to-Turn-Old-Bottles-into-Picture-Fra

Changing Their Minds

De Mello and her students                                 from the Projeto Uerê website

Brazilian social activist Yvonne Bezerra de Mello teaches the children of the favelas (slums) according to a method based on neuroscience. She developed this approach after 30 years of research in the slums of Rio and elsewhere, and it works so well that it has been adopted by 150 state schools in the city and is being studied by teachers around the world. "Intelligence can be repaired," de Mello says, "and we have found the way to do it": http://www.theguardian.com/teacher-network/teacher-blog/2013/sep/17/teaching-favela-schooling-street-children-pedagigy-neuroscience-achievement-gap

Not Who You Think You Are

We now know that what we do, where we live, and how we live can change our genetic makeup. Fascinating enough, but that's just the beginning. Scientists are learning more about something some had long suspected: Sometimes, our genetic makeup is not ours alone. The ramifications of this reality are deep for geneticists, for genetics counselors, and even for forensic scientists: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/17/science/dna-double-take.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

No Comment

The website of the 141-year-old Popular Science magazine will no longer be allowing comments on its articles. The online content director explains why, saying "because comments sections tend to be a grotesque reflection of the media culture surrounding them, the cynical work of undermining bedrock scientific doctrine is now being done beneath our own stories, within a website devoted to championing science": http://www.popsci.com/science/article/2013-09/why-were-shutting-our-comments
    And along those lines, Stephen Colbert comments on youtube's move to moderate comments (not for the younger crowd) (video): http://www.hulu.com/watch/537751
    (P.S., "Ron Paul 2012") 

To Read or Not To Read

In honor of Banned Books Week (Sept. 23-29), here's a list of some of the books that have been challenged and/or banned here and around the world. It includes classics like To Kill a Mockingbird ("Challenged at the Moss Point, MS, School District [1996] because the novel contains a racial epithet. Banned from the Lindale, TX, advanced placement English reading list [1996] because the book 'conflicted with the values of the community.'"), Sons and Lovers ("In 1961 an Oklahoma City group called Mothers United for Decency hired a trailer, dubbed it 'smutmobile,' and displayed books deemed objectionable, including Lawrence's novel."), The Call of the Wild ("Banned in Italy [1929], Yugoslavia [1929], and burned in Nazi bonfires [1933]."), and Lady Chatterley's Lover ("Dissemination of Lawrence’s novel has been stopped in China [1987] because the book 'will corrupt the minds of young people and is also against the Chinese tradition.'"): http://www.ala.org/bbooks/frequentlychallengedbooks/classics/reasons

Waka Waka.

stag, New Year's Day, Romania                     Charles Fréger

Strohmann, carnival, Germany               Charles Fréger

From Poland to the Pyrenees and many places in between and beyond, creative and beautiful animal costumes are still a large part of the festivities (and thanks to my son for finding this) (slideshow): http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2013/04/europes-wild-men/freger-photography#/01-pyrenees-bear-local-670.jpg

Museum Day ~ Sept. 28

On museum day live!, Saturday, Sept. 28, admission to certain museums around the country is free. But you'll need special tickets (story and link for tickets): http://www.mnn.com/family/family-activities/blogs/grab-a-free-ticket-to-your-favorite-museum-this-saturday
   Go here ~ http://www.smithsonianmag.com/museumday/venues/ ~ to find out which museums around you are participating.

The Finger

I honestly did not know this! from wisegeek.com:

Fingers and thumbs do not contain any muscles. Rather, they are composed of bone, ligaments and tendons. The tendons connect the skeletal structure of the fingers to the palm and forearm muscles to make movement possible.

More about fingers:

• The skin on the fingertips has many more nerve endings compared with most of the body.
• Contrary to popular belief, cracking the knuckles will not cause arthritis.
• On average, women have longer index fingers and men have longer ring fingers.

Meeting Merkel

Merkel celebrates winning her third term.                                                 AFP

W gave her the friendly little back rub seen 'round the world, so he was obviously feeling close to her, but what do we really know about Germany's Angela Merkel? (story, videos): http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-24159595

My Very French Vacation

the countryside around Bédoin                                                                   KW

So here are a few observations from my recent visit to France:
    1. The Jack Russell terrier is, without a doubt, the most popular dog there, both in the country and in Paris. They were everywhere!
    2. In case anyone is interested, in Paris, it's all about red lipstick. Interestingly, it can look sophisticated or punk, depending on who's wearing it.
        2a. Gray hair can be chic and beautiful.
    3. Freeway noise barriers are at a slight angle, like this: \—/. For the most part, when the freeway goes over a river or other picturesque area, the barriers are transparent. I did a little research to try to find out why the angle, whether, for example, that had an effect on the barrier's efficacy, but all I could find was one reference to it as a way of mitigating a high barrier's visual effect. For an interesting summary of barrier research, see http://www.dot.ca.gov/newtech/researchreports/reports/2010/ucprc-rp-2010-04.pdf
    4. Roundabouts are a great way to slow traffic down, add interest (via vegetation

Plugging In, Turning On

I'm not saying Europe is perfect or that we're not, but after two (magnificently wonderful) trips there in the last few years, I feel that one thing they have all over us is cultural maturity. Of course, as with everything, there are benefits and shortcomings to both zeitgeists, the older and the younger. My focus just now is on the general, everyday attitude toward the environment, current resources, the past, and the future of all. They acknowledge the complexity of the interactions involved. For example, they have, for the most part, kept the narrow streets of their past and, instead of widening them, have learned to live with them. They drive small cars (i.e., they understand that bigger is not necessarily better; in fact, glitter and pretension are notably bad form). They take the metro (which goes everywhere). They walk a lot. There are easily accessible rental bikes and itty-bitty cars everywhere: rent one here, drop it off there.
   I was reminded of all this by an email noting that Sept. 28-29 are, together, National

United State

I do love William Carlos Williams, and here's another reason why:

Marriage

by William Carlos Williams

So different, this man
And this woman:
A stream flowing
in a field.

How (Not) To

We are in France. When I have a little more time, I'll share some of the interesting things I've learned and seen here, but in the meantime and for your edification, here's a shot of a very educational poster my husband saw the other day and had the presence of mind to photograph for posterity!

We Are There Yet!

It's official. We have now entered interstellar space. Newly analyzed data from NASA's Voyager 1 show that, for the last year, it has been traveling through the ionized gas that is in the space between the stars. "We literally jumped out of our seats when we saw these oscillations in our data," said Don Gurnett, who led the analytical work together with the plasma wave science team at the University of Iowa, Iowa City. "They showed us the spacecraft was in an entirely new region, comparable to what was expected in interstellar space, and totally different than in the solar bubble": http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2013-277&cid=release_2013-277

The ... You Know, That Thingie

Ha! There really is a word for that familiar, craggy kind of smell of the rain: petrichor. It comes from the Greek words petra (stone) and ichor (blood of the gods and goddesses) and was coined by two Australian researchers in 1964. Mental Floss' John Green is full of fascinating facts like this as he teaches us 48 Things You Didn't Know Had Names (video): http://mentalfloss.com/article/52660/48-things-you-didnt-know-had-names

The Smell of Wartime in the Morning

An interview with Jeremy Scahill, national security correspondent for The Nation and author of Dirty Wars: The World Is a Battlefield and the recent documentary of the same name, regarding America's covert wars, Obama's use of drones, and more (video): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1qqw-2-GR2k

Biiiiig Building

Linda Garrison

The largest building in the world is the Pentagon, in Washington, D.C. But guess where the world's second-largest is? It's Parliament Palace, in Bucharest, Romania. Built by the country's infamous dictator, Nicholae Ceausescu, it is 12 stories high and has more than 3,000 rooms. (It is also, fyi, the world's heaviest building and the largest administrative building.) The parliament still meets there, and there is a conference center, but most of it is unused these days (story, slideshow): http://cruises.about.com/od/danuberivercruises/ig/Parliament-Palace-in-Bucharest/Bucharest---Parliament-Palace.htm

This Is Your Brain on Sleep

An animal study has found that sleep turns on the genes that foster the formation of myelin, which protects the nerves of the brain. Lack of sleep turns on the genes involved in cell death and cell stress response. Just one more reason to catch your z's: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/09/130903193807.htm

Vroom-Vroom

Batman was there.                                                    Scott Olson/Getty Images

Scott Olson/Getty Images

Read more at: http://www.heavy.com/news/2013/08/110th-anniversary-harley-davidson-milwaukee/5/

Aug. 31 marked the celebration of Harley-Davidson's 110th birthday. Share the pride and the joy through photos of the event and attendees (slideshow): http://www.heavy.com/news/2013/08/110th-anniversary-harley-davidson-milwaukee/

Faster Than We Thought

With the help of radiocarbon dating and computer models, a team of archaeologists has put together a definitive timeline of early Egyptian culture. It concludes that the space of time between the advent of farming and rule by a monarch was much shorter than previously thought: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-23947820

Who Said That?

Quick! Whose last words were purportedly "I should never have switched from Scotch to martinis"? (Hint: It's the same person who claimed, a few years earlier, that "the whole world is three drinks behind"): http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-23944612

A Little Soot With That Ice?

A study led by NASA scientists found that soot from an industrializing Europe led to the end of the Little Ice Age in the mid-1800s. The black particles settled on glaciers, absorbing the heat from the sun and thereby causing the ice to melt: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2013-267&cid=release_2013-267

The Iceman (and the Typist) Cometh

Milkwoman, Cheshire, England, ca. 1950 George Pickow/Three Lions/Getty Images

An interesting and charming little group of photographs of five jobs that don't exist anymore except in some people's memories (slideshow): http://www.weather.com/family-kids/countdown-labor-day/jobs-past-vintage-photos-20130827

From Sea to Plastic Sea

Most of us do our share and more to recycle, feeling very virtuous as we rinse and toss. We know that our plastic and other recyclables will go to a recycling plant that will sort it and distribute it accordingly. For most of our plastic, that means sending it to China. Yes, that's right. Sending it (think carbon footprint). To China. Because we don't have the facilities to deal with it ourselves. Well, now, as could have been foreseen, China's getting a little pickier about the plastic it accepts. And that has resulted in some of our localities limiting the kinds of plastic they are able to accept, which means more plastic, once again, in our landfills: http://qz.com/117151/us-states-banned-from-exporting-their-trash-to-china-are-drowning-in-plastic/

Heart of the Matter

Where is the sultan's magnificent heart? Sultan Suleiman I (Suleiman the Magnificent) was born in 1494 and died, some say of surprise at the end of his siege of a Hungarian castle, in 1566. His body was taken back to Constantinople, but his heart, legend has it, was buried there. Or was it?: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-23884892

Motivation Equation

a slight reworking of Maslow's theory

Seventy years ago, psychologist Abraham Maslow published "A Theory of Human Motivation," which prioritized people's needs into five levels and posited that when the basest (the physiological) was met, the need to meet the next higher one would kick in, and so on to the highest (self-actualization). The theory was embraced by the business world, but it also attracted its share of critics. It has since been flipped, flopped, and reworked, but none of that, contends one psychologist, negates its huge role in shifting the study of psychology from focusing on external rewards to understanding the importance of internal needs: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-23902918

Syria 101

Shia, Sunni, Alawite, Druze, Assad, Al-Qaeda ... The history of this area is long and the alliances many and complicated, but the fact is that, at its base, what we're talking about here is real people. People like you and me. Around 100,000 killed, almost 7,000 of those children, and about 2 million refugees so far. And now the U.S. is considering military action. How can we wrap our heads around all this? Here is one good place to try (story, video): http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/08/29/9-questions-about-syria-you-were-too-embarrassed-to-ask/
   Another resource is this town hall put together by moveon.org. It's from Aug. 30, so some of the comments are already out of date, but the background information is valid and informative (video): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7oGbKr6IxZs#t=810

Meet Ununpentium

It's official. The newest addition to the Periodic Table of the Elements is Ununpentium, aka element number 115. It's one of the heaviest elements yet and has a half-life of 173 milliseconds: http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/elements/2013/08/unumpentium-the-new-artificial-element.html

The Power of Thought

I don't think I can do any better to introduce this post than quote the first paragraph of this story, which goes like this: "Scientists achieved the first remote human-to-human brain interface this week, when Rajesh Rao sent a brain signal over the Internet that moved the hand of colleague Andrea Stocco—even though Stocco was sitting all the way across the University of Washington's campus." What follow are more examples of what the brain can do, with a little help from technology (or vice versa): http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2013/08/130829-mind-brain-control-robot-brainwave-eeg-3d-printing-music/

Nuts to You

from wisegeek.com (and always good to know!):

A cashew apple is the fruit that grows on the cashew plant, which tends to be more well known for the nuts that grow on it. The cashew nut actually grows first inside of a kernel, which then develops a small yellow or red fruit. It is originally native to Brazil but also grows wild throughout warm climates, especially in South America, Central America and East Africa. Cashew apples tend to spoil quickly, often in less than a day at room temperature,

Avaaz Upon a Time

Avaaz's Ricken Patel                                              Dan Callister/The Guardian

There once was a little boy who moved with his family from Kenya to Canada and went to a First Nations school on a reservation. When he was 3, his mother read him a story about a boy befriending a Kalahari bushman. When he was 4, his brother, who is nine years older, explained the Cold War and the human cell to him, and when he was 9 or 10, he read Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee. This is the boy who became the man who founded the self-described "campaigning community" Avaaz, which now has more than 25,400,000 members worldwide: http://moreintelligentlife.com/content/features/robert-butler/man-behind-avaaz?page=full

From Adolf to Icon

Getty Images

A brief history of the car that, according to a commission of British car makers in 1945, would be “quite unattractive to the average motorcar buyer,” but that ended up, in the 1960s, being the biggest-selling foreign-made car in America (story, slideshow): http://www.bbc.com/culture/story/20130830-the-nazi-car-we-came-to-love

Going Home

David Good and his mom                                                               David Good

David Good's dad is an anthropologist. David grew up with him in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. But at the age of 25, he decided to find his mother. And so he journeyed deep into the jungles of the Yanomami, on the border between Venezuela and Brazil (story, lots of pix, video): http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-23758087

The Crest of a Wave

The Pearl                                                                                     Orhan Cileli

While some are working to forestall climate change, others are figuring out how we can live with its consequences. From telescoping piers to oil drums, desalination systems to Pearls, here are five ideas for homes that can withstand the rising waters: http://www.care2.com/causes/5-amphibious-houses-built-to-survive-the-coming-floods.html

Trips for the Rest of Us

screen shot

OK, nerdy citizens of the United States ~ time to step up (to the Nerdy Day Trips website) and share our delights with the rest of the world. This is a point of pride. Just look at their map (above). The United Kingdom is filled with so many pins, you can't even see them all. (I just added the Museum of Jurassic Technology in Culver City and the Exploratorium and Alcatraz in San Francisco, though our coasts are pretty well represented): http://nerdydaytrips.com/

Picturing the Global Small-Arms Trade

This story actually presents two interesting and important phenomena at once: the small-arms trade and visualization technology. Putting together an interactive map of the former exposed some surprising truths about which countries are more active in the import and export of small arms. At the same time, it showed how using the latter makes subjects and information more accessible and easily digestible (for another example of this, see http://somanyinterestingthings.blogspot.com/2013/08/we-all-want-to-change-world.html): http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-23822086

Home Alone

Herman's cell                                          Herman Wallace

It was an email from Amnesty International that got me to this link, a trailer for the documentary Herman's House. The film tells the story of Herman Wallace, who has been in solitary confinement in a prison in Louisiana for 41 years, and of the artist whose journey with him started when she wrote to him with one question. What kind of house, she asked, would a man who lives in a 6'x9' cell dream of? (video): http://hermanshousethefilm.com/

Stranger Than Fiction

Jason English and his Facts Machine                                               screen shot

Who said geeks have no sense of humor? Well, really, I don't know if anyone ever said that. The point is, the geeks and nerds (see http://www.wikihow.com/Tell-the-Difference-Between-Nerds-and-Geeks for a lesson in how to distinguish them) over at Mental Floss do, and this video about interesting video-game facts proves it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2sMveDtvyK8

E-I-E-I-O

Of course, this is basically about donations and getting the word out (not a bad thing), but it's kind of a cute little quiz. Answer a few multiple-choice questions and find out which barnyard animal you most resemble: http://action.hsi.org/ea-action/action?ea.client.id=104&ea.campaign.id=22337&ea.tracking.id=email&ea.url.id=165232&ea.campaigner.email=TUe3OkIFLhYj2rsXIMBbDmT%2FUPvVmPFBanIkY7du0EE=&ea_broadcast_target_id=0

Walls of Green

KW

Not too long ago, I went on a home-garden tour in the nearby town of Venice, CA. One of the houses had a beautiful living wall lining one side of its courtyard ~ and a garden on the roof (see pic). It's not just homeowners who are greening their living spaces this way; commercial concerns are doing the same ~ for the benefit of us all: http://www.care2.com/causes/5-awesome-living-walls-from-around-the-world.html

We All Want To Change the World

April 1984                                                                                     screen shot

Fascinating timeline showing every protest in the world since January 1979 as tracked and coded by the Global Database of Events, Language, and Tone and adapted by Penn State doctoral candidate John Beieler. (The accompanying story points out some unintentionally misleading characteristics that one should keep in mind before jumping to any conclusions) (story, interactive timeline): http://www.foreignpolicy.com/articles/2013/08/22/mapped_what_every_protest_in_the_last_34_years_looks_like?page=0,0

'On the Road' Again

Paul Rogers

On Aug. 15, "the Mexican girl" who transfixed Jack Kerouac and whom he immortalized in On the Road, died. Her name was Beatrice Kozera (Bea Franco, then), and it was only three years ago that she learned that her fling with the writer in 1947 had become part of a book, or, indeed, that the writer had ended up writing at all: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2397641/Inspiration-Jack-Kerouacs-On-The-Road-Beatrice-Kozera-dies-aged-92.html

   Artist Paul Rogers has created an "illustrated scroll" in which he drew a picture for every page of On the Road (he posted each part as he finished it, so if you want to begin at the beginning ~ which, you know, is what Alice's King suggests one do ~ scroll about four-fifths of the way down): http://www.paulrogersstudio.com/index.php?section=news&news_cat=832&d=true

Webs of Wisdom

Multnomah County Library, Portland

Apparently, a fellow named Mike once wrote to author E.B. White (Charlotte's Web, Stuart Little, The Elements of Style) asking for some tips on how to have a book published. This is what he got in response (all aspiring authors, take note!):

   And here, since we're on the subject, is a wonderful interview with the man (E.B., not Mike) preceded by an equally wonderful essay about a visit to his farm: http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/4155/the-art-of-the-essay-no-1-e-b-white

Worth Rereading

Good things to know, from wisegeek.com:

Refried beans are actually fried only one time, although many people believe that their name implies that they have been fried more than once. Their name, however, is thought to come from the Spanish word refritos, which translates to “well-fried,” rather than meaning that they have been fried and then fried again, or "re-fried." The dish traditionally is prepared by cooking beans, often pinto beans, in two ways. They typically are boiled in water until the beans are softened, and then they are mashed before being fried in lard. Occasionally, the mashed beans might be served as they are

Old New World

Here's an interesting poem I found in my inbox today, courtesy of Poem-A-Day. I almost didn't finish it, but then I got caught up in the whole dueling time-space-culture ambiance of it all and saw that it was really, in a straightforward and simple way, saying something very deeply true about the contradictions and similarities of the human condition.

 

Ode to Lil' Kim in Florence

by Barbara Hamby

We're in a taxi on the way to see Andrea del Sarto's last supper, 
          which was in the country when it was painted 
but is now in the suburbs beyond the old city wall in an ex-convent,
          and our driver turns the radio to an English station
playing an American song, yes, Lil' Kim's "How Many Licks," 
          and Miss Kim, you are not singing about throwing punches, 
but for a while I don't notice because my husband 
          is talking about where we will eat dinner, but like a bullet
the lyrics penetrate the armor of the city, the fresco, the tagliata

For the Win

from africasacountry.com

Growing up in South Africa, S'manga Khumalo saw his first horse when he was 14. This July, he became the first black jockey to win the Vodacom Durban July, Africa's biggest ~ and richest ~ horse race. "As I came to the number one box down at the grandstand, my mum was there in front," he recalls. "She was screaming and thanking all the people that made it possible and also looking back to her family and to our ancestors" (story, video): http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/09/smanga-khumalo-south-africa-horse-racing