Explorations of a Life
I’m addicted to the quotes from Gandhi - they were written all over the walls at the ashram. Even now, I find myself murmuring them to myself during the day.
Seat 6D
Gorgeous image of Mars.
“But what this picture so spectacular are the graceful blue-gray swirls arcing across the dunes. These are caused by dust devils, which are a bit like mini-tornadoes. … The important thing to note here is that the sand in the craters of Mars is actually dark grey in color, since it’s made of basalt. The reason it looks red in pictures is because covering the sand is a thin layer of much finer dust, and the dust is what’s red. When a dust devil moves over the Martian surface, it can pick up the very light dust particles, but not the heavier sand grains. So those blue-grey swirls are tracks where the dust devil has vacuumed up the dust, revealing the darker sand underneath.”
An Open Letter to the United States Senate: Don’t Deceive Taxpayers by Hiding Health Care Reform Costs!
Beyonce’ shows total class by giving her time up for Taylor Swift to have her well deserved moment. Props to Taylor for reacting so professionally when Kanye West showed what an ass he is, and dissed her.
Top 10 Extreme Observatories : Discovery Space : Discovery Channel
OMG, I want to go here! This shall be on my “when I visit Japan” to-do list.
“Whoa, there! A subterranean observatory? How is an astronomer supposed to study the stars when he or she is buried nearly a mile under a mountain in the Japanese Alps? Welcome to the world of neutrino astronomy — and the beautiful and bizarre observatory that scientists nicknamed “the glass cathedral.”
The Super-Kamiokande (Super-K) neutrino observatory looks like something from a 1970s space comic — even a “Moonraker” era James Bond wouldn’t kill someone inside this thing. It’s essentially a giant cylinder lined with 11,000 glass photomultiplier tubes and filled with 50,000 tons of crystal-clear water. Constructed in an abandoned zinc mine, the observatory resembles an artificial subterranean pond. Maintenance crews even take a small boat out to inspect the tubes.
The Super-K observatory exists because of something known as Cherenkov radiation, which is produced by charged particles and scattered by neutrinos in the water. The particles, zipping around even faster than the speed of light, emit a measurable glow, called Cherenkov radiation. The glass tubes lining the inside of the observatory detect this glow and the resulting information helps astronomers to, among other things, identify supernovae.”
Guilty Pleasures … I admit it, I enjoy watching Dancing with the Stars. You always know certain celebrities who will do well, but it’s more fun to watch the surprises. This year, Chuck Liddell and Anna Treybunskaya are the pair I’m anxious to watch.
