Back at It

MUTANTS: We have been neglecting our genetics class this week, as we'd been focused on getting the kids ready for their musical performance last night. Now that that's out of the way, today we refocused our efforts, watching the final video for Week 2 of "Introduction to Genetics and Evolution,"

Above, Annabelle depicts a genetic mutation in a fruit fly, resulting in one with tiny eyes.  Below, again, we're dealing with a mutation. In this case, there's a recombinant - an offspring with a different combination of alleles from either of its parents.

Here we have a disease that attached itself to the G gene.

And here, Annabelle uses some memes to illustrate what the professor was talking about. "All your genome base are belong to us" is a take on the video game nerd meme "All your base are belong to us," a terrible translation in the 16-bit game "Zero Wing,"  a 1989 game. 

Her "1 million markers" doodle has to be said a la Dr. Evil, from "Austin Powers." 

In the bottom half of the doodle (above), a choir of angels (both made from lower case letter "c"s) sings while the upper case Cs proclaim their innocence (even though they were the disease carrying component).

And this is depicting a G linked to a disease.

And, finally, here is a sketch depicting the fact that when pink and white blossomed pea plants reproduce, the division of the offspring will be a ratio of 9 pink and 7 white. 

My notes and CJs are a LOT less picturesque. In fact, they're picture free - but full of facts!

PENNED: CJ does lots of self-directed learning, and for the past couple of weeks, he has been working his way through the whole BrainPOP catalog. Today, he started watching their videos about English (writing and famous authors and books). While he was watching a video about poetry, I decided to have the kids write a poem about the Seahawks, using T-W-E-L-V-E as the first letter to each line. I jotted one down, as well. Can you guess who wrote which one?

To get to the Super Bowl
We had to work hard
Even against the 49ers
Leaving and winning the NFC Championship
Very hard
Even then, we must beat the Broncos

Together
We win
Everyone doing their part
Legion of Boom bucking Broncos
Victory shall be sweet
Excellence exemplified

Touchdowns, passes, and stuff of the like
Whether it be day or night
Eleven may not be enough
Louder, bigger, faster, stronger
Valor on-field and off
Enter the 12th Man

BETCHA: This afternoon Annabelle asked CJ if he thought she could balance a cup atop a dollar bill. He was skeptical, naturally. Within seconds, she'd set this up.

Interesting!

So how is it done? Any guesses out there?

If you want to know the answer right now, check out this YouTube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UXfIRHoJu-o  It's one in a series of videos by a YouTube user "Quirkology," posted by psychologist and author Richard Wiseman.

BREEZY: A Facebook friend posted a link to a neat-o animated map showing the wind speed all across the U.S. Check it out here: http://hint.fm/wind/

On With the Show

SHOW TIME: Today we had two main items on the agenda. First and foremost was get the kids' songs dialed in for the show tonight. Second was making treats to share this evening. The cookies and deviled eggs part was easy. You don't have to be in the correct pitch and tempo for those. ;)

At one point today, I wished the kids had picked less ambitious songs. Perhaps something by Everclear or Green Day - you know, something with two or three easy chords. But no, that was not their path. Instead, it was something a tad (well, light years) more ambitious for their public debut - Imagine Dragons and Pink Floyd. 

It was cool that Rick and Kennedy were able to come to the show and serve as stage techs. :) They couldn't ask for more experienced hands!

Annabelle was up first, singing "Radioactive." 

She did a great job. :) 

CJ came up after with the even more ambitious 'Time' by Pink Floyd. Get this - we got to the performance venue a little early tonight, so we went to a nearby place for a quick snack and drink. While we sat there, what song of all songs in the history of everything came on? "Time," by Pink Floyd. The song CJ would be performing in a few minutes. Talk about Kismet. Crazy, isn't it? I mean, in the history of all songs EVER, that's the one on in the Shoreline diner? What are the odds? (Wait - sounds like a good math problem to us!  Stay tuned!)

Here's a still shot of CeeJ, and here's his performance.

As he listened to it, he ran into the room and said he was embarrassed how bad it sounded. We told him not to fret too much - it was recorded on a crappy cell phone microphone. 

I'm glad he cared how it sounded. That's the whole point.  ...

Short Stuff

LOOPY: In short order, Annabelle has become a Rainbow Loom pro.

Today, she tackled an 'expert level' video tutorial for a honey bee bracelet (http://youtu.be/ROqLgi-MV3k)

At one point she got stuck and set it aside for a few hours, but I encouraged her to backtrack if need be and work through it. Within five minutes her troubleshooting paid off and she was the proud owner of a new bee bracelet.

PRACTICE MAKES SOMETHING: The kids had several music practice sessions today. They are scheduled to perform tomorrow night. Ideally, they'd be stone cold ready. However, I think some finger crossing is in order this go round. :/

I found myself repeatedly using sports analogies today as they were practicing. We talked about the point of practice (to try to improve), and how bad practice is probably worse than no practice, because it just reinforces bad habits instead of ingraining good ones.  I told the kids the Seahawks certainly didn't get to go to the Super Bowl just because they wanted to. It took weeks/months/years of practice as individuals and then together, as a team.

At one point today, I noticed CJ doing some odd stuff with this head/mouth and so I had Annabelle go get a mirror and hold it up so he could see what was going on.

They'll certainly practice more tomorrow before the evening's show. Here's hoping things magically come together...

Meanwhile, I'm neck deep in cookies to take to the event, which is why today's post is super short. I'll be glad when Thursday is over.

Electra-fying

RIVETING: This afternoon, we took a field trip down to The Museum of Flight. It's been too long since we've been there, and every time we're there it's a) enjoyable and b) we see something we've never seen before.

As soon as we walked in today, I noticed that the movie "Space Junk" was playing (in 3D!) in less than an hour. We bought tickets to see that (just $4 apiece), and then spent 50 minutes wandering about. We almost always head to the WWI and WWII wing, but today, we veered the other direction, heading for the Great Gallery, which we tend to visit least often. As we headed that way, I remembered that the Museum's recently-acquired Electra was now on display there.

We'd watched the gorgeous Electra fly in back on Sept. 20 of 2013.

How that silver bird gleamed in the sun!!!

It's one of only three of its kind still in existence, and this one has been restored to look just like it did when Amelia Earhart flew it on her final voyage.

Now, its wings are clipped and it's a museum piece. A super shiny museum piece.

It makes for an excellent mirror.

Here's CJ, studying a map of Amelia's final flight.

It's impossible to get a good shot of the whole plane, so here's an iso of part of her tail.

After the Electra, we made our way back to the refurbished theater. We were the only four in attendance for the 2:50 showing of "Space Junk."

If you don't care about anything ever getting off planet, this movie would not interest you in the least. If you are interested in spaceflight and exploration, you'd find it all extraordinarily unsettling. I won't go into great detail, instead, I'll just share the trailer (http://youtu.be/-hl28A9NfU4)

One of the major events the movie covered was the February 10, 2009, destruction of Cosmos 2251 & Iridium 33. It marked the first major collision of two satellites in Earth orbit. The operational Iridium satellite was destroyed, as was the non-working Cosmos. As a result of the collision, there are more than 100,000 pieces of debris in low Earth orbit (LEO). If you've seen the movie "Gravity," it gives you a good idea of just how awful space debris can be for those trying to work and live in LEO.

HAWKING: Everywhere you go in this town, the Seahawks are front and center. Such was the case on the way in to the Museum of Flight.

There are billboards next to the highway ...

(I couldn't help but notice the WA. state, King County and city logos on this billboard. Our tax dollars at work? I love me some 'Hawks but ...)

Even the place we stopped for linner (late lunch/early dinner) had some great signs out front. Here was its south side ...
                                        
and here was its north side.
                               
And for those of you who might only be listening to the narrative the national media is trying to write about Richard Sherman, check out this video and think again.
http://www.nfl.com/videos/nfl-films-presents/0ap2000000254372/NFL-Films-Presents-The-trash-talking-cornerback 

Fun 'n' Games

ONE AWAY: This weekend we were in full on Seahawks mode, what with the home team being just one game away from the Super Bowl.

We had a houseful of friends over on Sunday, and suffered our way through four quarters of tense football. It wasn't until there were 22 seconds left in the game until I felt not miserable. And a minute or two later, I felt great. Seahawks to the Super Bowl, for the second time in their history!

LOOMING: Today, Annabelle finally broke out the Rainbow Loom she received for Christmas and set about learning how it works.

Christian helped her a bit and before long, she was cranking out bracelets. She was Most Pleased.

WAKE UP CALL: Today was a huge day for the European Space Agency. For the past 31 months, their Rosetta - a comet-chasing spacecraft - has been in slumber.

Launched in 2004, Rosetta is headed for a meeting with comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Rosetta went into slumber in June of 2011, operating on solar energy alone.  Today, per schedule was wake up day!

Graphic: European Space Agency

Naturally, there was a fair amount of excitement surrounding waking up a spacecraft after a 2.5 year slumber. Needless to say, ESA officials were thrilled when Rosetta woke up exactly as scheduled.

photo: ESA
“We have our comet-chaser back,” said Alvaro Giménez, ESA’s Director of Science and Robotic Exploration, in a press release. “With Rosetta, we will take comet exploration to a new level. This incredible mission continues our history of ‘firsts’ at comets, building on the technological and scientific achievements of our first deep space mission Giotto, which returned the first close-up images of a comet nucleus as it flew past Halley in 1986.”

If Rosetta connects per plan, it will be the very first space mission to rendezvous with a comet, land on a comet’s surface, and the first to follow a comet as it swings around the Sun. To me, that sounds like trying to thread tiny moving needle!  As of today's Rosetta is about 9 million km from its target. 

                         

Upon wake up, @ESA_Rosetta's Twitter account declared, "Hello, World!"

Here's a short video about Rosetta's wake up call. 

GAME ON: This afternoon, we finally got around to trying out one of Christian's Christmas presents, Star Trek Catan.

COMPLICATED game. The set up and learning curve took us about an hour.

We finally hit our stride, and CJ was today's victor.