my virtual notebook

Earthweek A Diary of the Planet

I really love this website--the little icons, the sense of unease but also curiosity that most of the stories induce--just the whole shebang is right up my angle--check out the curious, mysterious bat plague, or the item about the end of an era...: Earthweek-A Diary of the Planet

Friday, 04/27/07: Pinker faculty breakfast: Project 365: #180

Friday, 04/27/07: Project 365: #180 
Originally uploaded by cathie.

This was fun - Pinker really was a great guest speaker! His talk the night before was all about the psychology of swear words and of course he did mention a lot of them, but he didn't "use" them...i.e. he didn't swear. It was quite entertaining and interesting.  And the next day the participants in the faculty coterie got to have breakfast with him. He was gracious and answered all our questions very well. (and signed our books and let us take his picture).

Mesmer

Anton Mesmer-link

and just because I like the word here's a link to:

a wikipedia article about Schimmelpilz, or mold/mould.  I love how the english language wiki article is lighter on the text than the German but has great pictures of moldy bread and cream cheese! Yum!

Now back to work...which, by the way is reading "Der Schimmelreiter",which means of course "The Moldy Horse Rider"....(actually dappled grey, but the German word refers to mold).

Questions that came up in German class today

1. When did Alexander Fleming discover penicillin?

Wann hat Alexander Fleming Penicillin entdeckt?

2. When did Beethoven compose the 9th symphony?

Wann hat Beethoven die 9. Symphonie komponiert?

cryptic note to sis: I'll get to the geneology stuff soon, hoffentlich!

Trying to understand: Non-Euclidean Geometry

Non-Euclidean geometry: I'm getting ready to teach Theodor Storm's Der Schimmelreiter (The White Horse Rider/Dykemaster) in which Euclid's Elements is mentioned. The story has a lot to do about (physical) space and man's changing relationship to it. I should check to see if there are academic articles or even dissertations that talk about geometry (Euclidean or other) and Der Schimmelreiter.

Crocheted chaos

crocheted chaos   via Rebecca's pocket

Galvanism links

link to come back to

Gross but interesting: extreme worms! (osedax)

Here's a link to something I read about in the morning newspaper: extreme worms

I probably won't have time to read the morning paper all the way through once things get busy with school so I'm enjoying it while I can!