Sunrise, Sunset

SUNSET:  How many times have we all seen our sun sink below the horizon? 

Too many to count, if we're lucky.

We love this photo of our sun setting - on the Martian horizon!

It was recorded by NASA's Curiosity Mars rover on the mission's 956th Martian day, or sol (April 15, 2015), from the rover's location in Gale Crater.

Interestingly, it's the first sunset observed in color by Curiosity. It's from its left-eye camera on Mastcam. Per NASA, "The color has been calibrated and white-balanced to remove camera artifacts. Mastcam sees color very similarly to what human eyes see, although it is actually a little less sensitive to blue than people are."

In other words, it's not too far off from if we were actually standing there, boots on ground. Awesome.

"Dust in the Martian atmosphere has fine particles that permit blue light to penetrate the atmosphere more efficiently than longer-wavelength colors," according to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory press release. "That causes the blue colors in the mixed light coming from the sun to stay closer to sun's part of the sky, compared to the wider scattering of yellow and red colors. The effect is most pronounced near sunset, when light from the sun passes through a longer path in the atmosphere than it does at mid-day."

You can read and see lots more about MSL/Curiosity here: http://www.nasa.gov/msl andhttp://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl.

BURN, BABY, BURN: First thing we did this morning was check to see if the Russian spacecraft Progress had fallen back to Earth overnight. Turns out, it did. Fortunately, it made its reappearance over the Pacific Ocean and there are no reports of debris harming any thing or one. 

SQUASHED:  Our different-produce-of-the day was a couple of lovely Mexican squash. We used our AS SEEN ON TV! Veggetti to "spiralize" (circle cut) them up, and then they were boiled for a couple of minutes.  I drained them, melted a bit of butter over the hot 'noodles,' crumbled some cotija cheese over them, drizzled on some lime juice and garlic salt, a little black pepper and then we ate it all up like little piggies. Sorry, we don't even have any photos to share. :/

SHORT STUFF:  What is a dwarf planet? Thanks to this snazzy 60-second video from NASA, now we know more! 

Busy Thursday

OUT OF THIS WORLD:  This morning, the kids made a couple of teacher appreciation. cards.  Annabelle used oil pastels and watercolors for the cover of her card.

CJ chose a Hubble photo for his card's cover ...

           Photo credit: NASA
On the inside both put an Amazon gift card, along with a Milky Way bar (get it? 'out of this world?).

SPECIAL SCREENING:  During our field trip to the Living Computer Museum a couple of weeks back, we learned about a free Movie Night they were hosting on May 7, complete with complimentary popcorn and soda pop! We RSVPed right away, and this evening we watched a BBC documentary, "Code-Breakers: Bletchley Park’s Lost Heroes."

We recognized the name Bletchley Park from watching "The Imitation Game" a couple of weeks ago, about the work of Alan Turing and his team to break the wartime code of the Third Reich's Enigma machine. 

However, there was another team working on yet another code-producing machine. As the BBC Web site about the program explains, "In 1943, a 24-year-old maths student and a GPO engineer combined to hack into Hitler's personal super-code machine - not Enigma but an even tougher system, which he called his 'secrets writer'. Their break turned the Battle of Kursk, powered the D-day landings and orchestrated the end of the conflict in Europe. But it was also to be used during the Cold War - which meant both men's achievements were hushed up and never officially recognised."

You can watch a trailer about it here:


I'll have the kids share their impressions tomorrow. 

FRUITY GOODNESS:  In our ongoing campaign to try new-to-us produce every day this month, yesterday we sampled an organic champagne mango we picked up at Whole Foods.

Smaller and flatter than a 'garden variety' mango, it was soft and we think it was ripe enough to eat.

As usual, the kids were a tad pensive at first.

But they each ate several pieces.

Its taste was definitely more tart than a 'typical' mango, and its meat more dense. It had kind of peachy and apricot notes to it, but it definitely produced some pucker, too.

All in all, a lovely little fruit that would be wonderful in some granola or yogurt

THUNDER OVERHEAD:  It was a lovely day, so we spent part of the afternoon up on the roofdeck. 

While there, we heard and saw a military plane roar overhead.

Thanks to this video posted on the KIRO news site, we now know it was a Lockheed F-22 Raptor, the U.S. Air Force's premier current fighters.

They are going to be on display at The Museum of Flight May 9-10. Hope we can get down there to see them!

COMICAL:  So we've started yet another online class. In addition to C# programming, and geology, we're now taking "The Rise of Superheroes and Their Impact On Pop Culture," a class from the Smithsonian via edX. Among other things, the purpose of the class, in part, is "to celebrate the history of comics, and explore the intersection of our superhero stories with the influences of society." Sounds interesting!

It's team taught, and our professors include Stan Lee (!!!) and Michael Uslan, a professor at Indiana University Media School with an eye popping resume. 

TONIGHT'S THE NIGHT (PROBABLY): There's a very good chance that the Russian Progress spacecraft will re-enter Earth's atmosphere overnight (completely uncontrolled, might I add).

In a statement released today, Roscosmos, the Russian space agency, confirmed Progress 59 "will cease to exist" by Friday.  This graphic from the Aerospace Company shows Progress' current trajectory.  Looks like North America isn't in the potential line of fire.  Here's hoping the craft breaks up entirely during re-entry, and if it doesn't, it splashes down in the middle of a large body of water, with no harm to any living creatures. 

Appreciation

SWEET APPRECIATION:  The kids and I put a few hours in in the kitchen over the past couple of days, whipping up some teacher appreciation cookies. 

I'd done blackboards before (thanks to the Oscars-awards themed set I did a couple months back), but the rest of these were new to me.  

You could use the notebook paper ones for all sorts of stuff ... The kids found the quotes for me.

 The globes were my favorite. I can't believe I've never made Earths before!

We hope they enjoyed them. And I hope someone EATS them!

PUT TO THE TEST: This morning, at 6 our time, they were busy on the Space Coast, conducting an important safety test of an uncrewed SpaceX Crew Dragon. Powered by its SuperDraco engines, it was put through a Pad Abort Test from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.

     Photo: NASA

Check out this cool footage of it all - just a couple of minutes from launch to a successful splash down.

https://youtu.be/FRqLNdwsPBM

This test is an important step in getting SpaceX vehicles approved for future manned missions to the ISS and beyond. 

CUPPA JOE: Great news for coffee lovers off planet. The ISSpresso, delivered by the SpaceX cargo mission to the International Space Station a couple of weeks ago, has been put into service and it works perfectly.

Just look at how happy Italian astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti is to have her cup of espresso!

Photo: European Space Agency

One thing that makes partaking it that much better is the new Space Cup. 

         Image courtesy of Andrew Wollman/NASA

Prior to its advent, astronauts would have to suck all their liquids out of a bag.  However, the new coffee cups (3D printed!) have sharp inner corners which allow liquid to be pushed along (rather than pulled), a process called capillary flow.

Scientists say that this fluid delivery system might have positive applications on Earth, for instance, in blood-borne disease diagnostic devices in remote areas.

Speaking of NASA tech benefitting life on Earth, amazing news out of Nepal. Rescuers used a device NASA developed to detect alien life on exoplanet to find survivors buried under as much as 10 feet of rubble after the devastating earthquake. 

Called FINDER, the portable radar unit can detect heartbeats and breathing, and it was used to find four survivors trapped in the rubble for days.

photo: NASA JPL

INCOMING!!!: If you plan on being out and about tomorrow or the next day, you might want to wear a helmet. Check out the progress of Progress' predicted-but-unplanned return to our planet here: http://www.satflare.com/track.asp?q=40619,25544#TOP

TAKE A LOOK:  Curious what it's like in Seattle at any given moment? Check out the Space Needle's newly-upgraded Web cam.  It's now in high definition, you can rotate it 360 degrees, and you can even look back at different times throughout the day. Link here: http://www.spaceneedle.com/webcam/

You can even play "count the cranes" like we do, every time we drive through the South Lake Union neighborhood.

Cinco of May

YOU SAY POTATO:  Continuing our theme of 'let's be adventurous' this month, today's new-to-us Ciproduce was jicama, also known as the Mexican turnip, Mexican yam, or Mexican potato, depending on which source you read.

It almost looks like a coconut - round and hard, with a tough brown outer covering.  

I was busy int he kitchen with a cookie project, so I asked Annabelle to research what it was and how to prepare it.  She settled on a jicama "fries" recipe. One thing she read is that it's important to remove all of the outer skin, as eating it can produce a stomach ache.

As the article suggested, first we tried a potato peeler. That didn't go too well, as the skin was too tough. So, we opted for a paring knife.

When Annabelle read the the recipe she found for jicama fries, I could hardly believe the instructions. It called for both microwaving shoestring sized strips of the stuff on high for 6 minutes, followed by cooking it at 400 degrees Fahrenheit for another 40 minutes. Yowza. 

As directed, we mixed it with some turmeric, garlic, onion powder, smoked paprika and cumin before cooking.

When it was finally done cooking (or overcooking, based on some to of the strips' tips), we were eager to taste it.

It tasted kind of like sweet potatoes, and kind of under-cooked (which seemed impossible at that point). It certainly could have benefited from having a lime squeezed over it and tossing some cojita cheese in with it.

It wasn't bad. In fact, it was good.  But it's not our new favorite thing. That said, nice to have tried it.

ROCKIN': Today, we started a new 4-week class, "The Dynamic Earth: A Course for Educators" via Coursera. It's offered by the American Museum of Natural History, so we have to think it will be worthwhile. 

Per the course description, the class will offer an overview of the origin and evolution of the Earth. We will cover geological time scales, radiometric dating, and how scientists “read the rocks.” We're also going to look at how the evolution of life on Earth has affected our planet's atmosphere. We're especially looking forward to local field trips and learning more about geology in our neighborhood.  

We dove right in today, and have already taken (and passed!) the first week's test!

May the 4th

STAR WARS DAY:  We always look forward to May the 4th, as it has become a Star Wars fans' holiday of sorts over the years.  May the Force be with you is a popular tagline from the Star Wars franchise, and "May the 4th" sounds enough like "May the Force" to the point where the day has been co-opted. 

A family of Star Wars fans, of course, it meant we had to have Annabelle's hair in Princess Leia buns first thing today.  However, she quickly figured out that being a princess can be a bit of a pain. For instance, the hair do isn't very conducive to wearing her headphones. 

One way we observed Star Wars day was by listening to the Cantina song from the original Star Wars movie. However, this very special version is 9 hours, 59 minutes and 59 seconds. 

We probably won't listen to the Cantina song again for a long, long time.


Astronauts are (no suprise) Star Wars fans, too, as evidenced by this photo of current and soon-to-be International Space Station residents.

Oh, and what did the current ISS residents do to celebrate May the 4th day? They watched Star Wars. In space. 

CHANGES: A few days back, we declared May to be a month to try some new things. One of our goals was to try new-to-us produce every day for a month. 

Saturday was kumquat day. 

They're pretty little things. We read up on how to eat them. One way is washing them, rubbing them quickly between your palms for 15 minutes, and eating them whole, skin and all.

This is Annabelle's kumquat face. :)

Tart little citrus fruit, are kumquats. We tried Plan B, which was peeling the little bugger. It didn't make it any sweeter. (Per the Kumquat Growers Web page, in fact, the peel is the sweetest part of the kumquat.)

Sunday was red d' Anjou pear day. 

 Though CJ looks pensive here, that was a bigger hit. It was delicious, actually. 

Traditionally, I like the flavor of pears, but not eating them, due to my disdain for some pears' gritty texture. The red d'Anjou was almost grit free, eating more like an apple. A good discovery.

Today, it was cactus time!

I told him I'd watched a very informative YouTube video about how to prepare it, and felt confident we'd be OK.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9Ufyv7pliY


We carefully removed all the prickly parts, and trimmed the edges off.

Per directions, we sliced them into green bean sized pieces.

Then, they got boiled with some salt and vinegar, and then sauteed with some onion and garlic.

Report: They were tasty. The kids ate all theirs, so I consider it a win.

FREMONT FIELD TRIP:  It was another lovely day weather-wise in Seattle, and this afternoon we got out in it for awhile. 

First, we headed to the Fremont neighborhood, and walked along the north side of the canal for a few blocks.

I'd heard tell of some topiary dinosaurs somewhere in the vicinity.  Fortunately, we found them!

We were happy they had a sign on site telling us a bit about the dinos, which have been in Fremont for 15 years now. 

Turns out they used to 'live' at Pacific Science Center. When I read that, I recalled having seen them there many years ago.

Of course, being in the neighborhood, we had to stop and visit the rocket.

And we popped into the Theo Chocolate retail store for some samples.  So. Many. Samples.

Of course, we didn't come home empty handed, either. 

Theo even has a chocolate version of the topiary dinos.

While exiting Theo, CJ notices a poster regarding a contest to name the dinosaurs.

He is keenly interested in winning this, and has zeroed in on the names Bub Rub and Lil' Sis, a pair made famous by a viral video that's more than a decade old. 

As we were walking away from Theo Chocolate, along the north exterior of the building, we all stopped dead in our tracks at how wonderful the smell was emanating from the chocolate manufacturing portion of their facility. I can't imagine that Willy Wonka's chocolate factory ever smelled any better.

Shortly after, we happily discovered a cool mosaic on the exterior of the Saturn building. 

Called "Invasion of the FoundFacians" (by Jo Braun and Kate Jessup), it has a sci-fi theme. In the upper left, a UFO flies over an alien landscape, and little probes descend from it, toward a landscape that reminded us of photos we've seen of Mars.

After Fremont, we headed west to Ballard, all the way out to the shoreline of Puget Sound and Golden Gardens park. 

It was lovely out there.