Evolving

                        
DARWIN DAY: Today is Charles Darwin's birthday, so it seemed fitting we were studying genetics and evolution. We watched a couple of lectures, during which time we learned about a deviation from Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium due to something called the Wahlund effect, and how F_ST measures differentiation as extent of the Wahlund effect.

We also spent some time reviewing our previous' four-weeks' worth of work, as it's mid-term time. We reviewed the in-video problems, the 'thought problems' and the graded problem sets for week 1 and I was thrilled that the kids and I remembered the terms, concepts, and the answers to all of the problems. Tomorrow, we'll tackle weeks 2, 3 and 4 and take the mid term this weekend.

CURL UP: One of the most exciting events in the Winter Olympics is curling. (Hey you there, stop snickering. I'm serious - mostly.) Today, we read a cool article about the physics involved in the sport. One of the things we learned is that curling ice is deliberately made bumpy (they spray droplets on the surface, which freeze). The bumps let the granite curling stone travel faster, because there's less friction than if the stone's whole surface was on the ice.

However, the bumps also make that granite spin (or curl, hence the sport's name), so that's where the furious brooming comes in - it's to make the ice more slippery and impact the stone's curl or curve.

I love this 1909 photo of men in Ontario, Canada, curling. 

This was long before anyone was wearing those fancy curling pants, like the Norwegian Olympic team.

photo: Kenny Louie, Kennymatic

BEFORE THE FAB FOUR: We watched another lecture in Week 1 of our "Music of The Beatles" class with professor John Covach, Chair of Music at the University of Rochester, Director of the University of Rochester Institute for Popular Music, Mercer Brugler Distinguished Teaching Professor, and Professor of Theory at the Eastman School of Music. Today, the prof focused on the British music scene before The Beatles shot to the top. We learned about skiffles - a type of music that grew out of the post-war British jazz scene. 

Professor Covach singled out "The Lonnie Donegan Skiffle Group" for popularizing the genre, and pointed to his 1956 rockin' version of Lead Belly's "Rock Island Line" as a breakout hit. We went and found it on YouTube, of course. Lonnie takes a while to get to it, but once he does, the song rollicks right along. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wI4nRD-DRpk

It will be interesting to see how we transition from Lonnie Donegan to The Beatles. It's hard to believe John and Paul met and started making music together when they were such young men - just 14 and 15 years old. Wow.

ROVER OVER?: First thing this morning, I saw a headline declaring Chine's moon rover Yutu, or Jade Rabbit, completely dead.

According to multiple reports, the rover failed to properly shut down/prepare for a two-week lunar night, during which cold would likely damage critical components.

However, later in the day I read an update saying the Chinese have received a signal from Yutu, so maybe it's not down for the count. Time will tell. ...

In reading some of the comments on the first story, declaring Jade Rabbit lifeless, some were very critical of China's space program, claiming they rush to launch before critical details - like safety - are tended to. A couple commentators specifically cited Long March 3B, a 1996 disaster I knew nothing about. 

Turns out it was a heavy rocket carrying a satellite that dramatically, horrifically shot horizontally off the launch pad, crashing into a nearby village, causing catastrophic property damage, and killing more than 500 Chinese, making it, by far, the worst spaceflight related accident in human history. 

I found some shaky footage of the catastrophe online.


YouTube also had a segment taken from a portion of a Discovery channel show about the disaster.

Art & Science

Image Credit: NASA/David Roy
US of LANDSTAT: We watched online on Feb. 11 of last year as the Landsat 8 satellite launched from California last year. The map above is one of the first complete views of the US from Landsat 8. It shows up as strips because, according to NASA, "Landsat 8 collects data in 185-kilometer (115-mile) wide strips called swaths or paths. Each orbit follows a predetermined ground track so that the same path is imaged each time an orbit is repeated. It takes 233 paths and 16 days to cover all of the land on Earth. This means that every land surface has the potential to be imaged once every 16 days."

BRITISH INVASION: This afternoon the kids and I had the pleasure of starting a course called "The Music of The Beatles" through the University of Rochester. Per the course description, the six week class "will track the musical development of the band, starting from the earliest days in Liverpool and Hamburg, moving through the excitement of Beatlemania, the rush of psychedelia, and the musical maturity of Abbey Road." Sounds good! Our professor is Dr. John Covach.

I went ahead and ordered the recommended reading book, "Beatlesongs." It's a one-volume account of every Beatles album and single, organized chronologically and in running order, providing song info and Beatles' comments.

The first lecture did a nice job of introducing names of the major players in the band's evolution (the members, producers, record companies, roadies, photographers, you name it). One of the things Professor Covach was quick to point out was the birth years of each of The Beatles, and noting their ages when they 'invaded' America. John was the 'elder' statesman - at 23! The youngest, George, was just 20. W-O-W. How overwhelmed they must have been!

The kids just adore The Beatles music, and absolutely LOVE Paul McCartney and Wings. They ask me to play Wings in non stop rotation in the car, which makes me happy, as I was exactly CJ's age when "Wings at the Speed of Sound" came out, and I couldn't get enough of it. Cool that we're getting to enjoy it together, and that we will all soon have a much better appreciation for and understanding of The Beatles.

SHAKE YOUR BOOTY: "Why does my gluteus feel like it's shaking?" CJ asked shortly after we finished a rigorous "Just Dance" session this afternoon.

I explained to him it's because he danced his butt off, LOL.

It really is a fun way to get a workout, that's for sure. The last song we did was Kris Kross' "Jump"


HOLY MAMMOTH!: Exciting find in the South Lake Union part of Seattle today. Officials from the Burke Museum (on the University of Washington campus) confirm that construction workers have uncovered a mammoth tusk that appears to date back to the Ice Age, between 10,000 and 11,000 years ago.

No news on what will become of the tusk, as it was discovered on private property and is not associated with an archaeological site. That means it's up to the landowner to decide what they would like to do with the tusk,

Check out the story, complete with photos where you can see the tusk, on the Seattle PI's Web site http://www.seattlepi.com/local/komo/article/Construction-crew-finds-ancient-mammoth-tusk-in-5226137.php#photo-5866739

MOON MOVIE: If you haven't seen this Pixar short, "La Luna," you should. It's simply lovely.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oh9jIdPH48g

Fluffy Stuff

SNOW DAYS:  This weekend brought some precipitation in a pretty form - a few inches of snow blanketing the Emerald City. 

The kids had a blast playing in it, of course. Per her request, I filled some squeeze bottles of colored water for Annabelle, who painted on the snow with it. And, of course, they had to have a (rather tame) snowball fight.

Despite the snow, we managed to make it over to Rick's house to work on his floors some more. Slow, painstaking process trying to save 100 year old wood, removing and re-installing dozens of boards (to cover up where we removed wall. We're nowhere near done.

We also tackled a couple of other minor projects, including getting his washer and dryer up and running. It was handy having Annabelle around, as she could wedge into the small space between his washer and dryer and help attach the dryer's exhaust hose.

STUDIO VISIT:  We were back at Rick's today, working again, but had to leave a little after 2 to make an appointment at the Pacific Science Center. There, we toured the '"The Studio" area of  the center, and offered our feedback to a staffer as part of a focus group we've been participating in for about a year now.

The exhibit we toured today was all about the West Nile Virus. It was super educational. We'd all heard of the virus, but now we all have an understanding of its genesis, the threat it poses and how you can protect yourself.

The first case is traced back to Uganda. By 1999, it had reached NYC. 

It didn't take long for the virus to spread across the United States. 

We watched a series of five short videos about how the disease is tracked at the present. For instance, locally, researchers from Washington State University set out traps to collect mosquitoes. The traps are baited with dry ice, because they emit Co2, which the mosquitoes are drawn to.

The trapped specimens are identified by species, which is important because out of the 40-plus types of mosquitoes in the state, there are only two species of mosquitoes in Washington state which carry West Nile virus, Culux tarsalis and Culex pipiens.

We learned about hot spots in the state for the West Nile virus  (east of the Cascades).

We also learned that the majority of people can get bitten by an infected mosquito and not have a reaction (represented by the green beads below), while some have a flu-like reaction (represented by the yellow). In rare circumstances, a person can become gravely ill - or even die (represented by the red beads below).

The exhibit included the story of a Washington winery owner, Paul Champoux of Champoux Vineyard, who darn near died from a mosquito bite in 2009. He's still struggling with the after effects.

MEANWHILE, IN SOCHI: We've been watching some of the Olympics since they started last week.
This morning, on NBC's Olympics' Web site, we watched a video about America's top short track speed skater J.R. Celski (a local guy!) and four-time Grammy winning artist Macklemore (another local guy). Turns out the two have a number of things in common, beyond geography. http://www.nbcolympics.com/king/video/10000-hours-jr-celski-and-macklemore?post_id=572443862_10152039777163863#_=_

Friday Fun

AN APPLE A DAY: We're so lucky - we live in the apple capital of the United States, if not the world. In any given grocery store we have a buffet of amazing apples available at a very reasonable price.

That's why this photo from the International Space Station really struck me. Photographed by an Expedition 38 crew member, off the the apple's right, you can see the ISS Progress 54 cargo craft, which delivered 2.8 tons of cargo to the station Wednesday. It launched from the Balkinour Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on Feb. 5.

It was one of those increasingly occuring 'hurry up' dockings. The cargo vessel reached the ISS in just six hours - so that apple should be pretty darn fresh!

Often as we navigate the produce section, we ogle the apples and remark about how lucky we are to live in an apple capital! 

REDDY: We're able to stand on Earth and pick Mars out in the night sky from time to time. Naturally, that goes both ways.

Good ol' Curiosity has a nice image of Earth from Mars. Look hard. You'll find the dot of light in the twilight Martian sky ... it's just left of center ... 

Here's an enhanced version, complete with our Luna.  

The image was captured using the left eye camera of Curiosity's Mast Camera (Mastcam) about 80 minutes after sunset on the 529th Martian day of the rover's work on Mars (Jan. 31, 2014). 

Per NASA, a human observer with normal vision, if standing on Mars, could easily see Earth and the moon as two distinct, bright "evening stars." Fun to think about. 

Images: http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/spaceimages/details.php?id=PIA17936

OLYMPICS PHYSICS: We watched some of the first Winter Olympics 2014 events last night but tonight the official opening ceremonies got underway.  A highlight was watching Valentina Terishkova, usher the Russian flag into the stadium.

I have no doubt that one of the things I've loved about sports since forever is the science involved. Earlier today, we read an interesting article speaking to that point:  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/02/06/science-of-winter-olympic-videos_n_4696561.html?ir=Sports

HOME WORK: We're still plugging away on our intro to genetics and evolution course. Today's lecture was all about the fascinating Hardy-Weinberg  principle, which states allele and genotype frequencies in a population will remain constant from generation to generation in the absence of other evolutionary influences. If that doesn't have you nodding your head in agreement, I don't know what will. :)

Mercifully, the math behind the principle is beautifully straightforward and intriguing. What's great is through really interesting topics, the kids are learning the math they would be learning in a stand alone/traditional education. They're learning percentages (adding, subtracting and multiplying), math order, how to square a number, solving for X, and so on. 

BOARD: Since it's Friday and all, we had to celebrate the week end by going to our favorite relax spot, Chuck's on 85th. There, we played a mostly fun board game called Taboo. It's a hybrid of Password and 25,000 Pyramid, for people of my era keeping score at home. ;)

The gist of it is you have your partner guess the word on a card, without using the word itself or five additional words listed on the card, plus no gestures. It's harder than it sounds.                                                                                                       

Team Annabelle and Christian mopped up the floor with CJ and me. CJ's approach to the game was saying ONE word and then giving me a steely eyed stare, expecting me to guess the word. I mostly failed. 

Afterward, we moved onto a physical game - Jenga - with a new-to-us friend, Lou, with whom we shared a table at the always busy spot.  Over the course of a beer he described himself as an autistic drummer. He fit right in with our family. :) Lou had a BLAST playing Jenga with the kids. The first two games went down in a 'normal' time, but the third one was an epic match, with others in the place looking on.                                                            

It went down shortly after this ... 

SAY WHAT?: Late this evening, Christian stumbled across a site where you have to have a keen ear to identify which language it is you're listening to. Check it out and have fun with it!

http://greatlanguagegame.com/

Back to It

THROWBACK THURSDAY: Here's one from the archives ... from our first week of Magnolia Prep, in September of 2009. My oh my, how things have changed! We now have a hardwood (not just plywood!) floor, there's a living room where that light wall behind them is, and the kids look SO much older now, don't they?

MAKE UP DAY:  We headed up to Shoreline today to catch up on some of the stuff we missed yesterday when we were at the Seahawks celebration.

I felt bad the kids missed school, since it's the ONE day a week they go. But I wasn't about to lie about where we were and what we were doing. In fact, I sent a photo of the kids at CenturyLink Field to the kids' science teacher. Apparently she put it up on the board during class, so they were there, in a way. ;)

The science teacher was kind enough to quickly but thoroughly go over what they'd missed in class, and tell them what they need to study for their unit final next week. They also got caught up on their Math Quest game.

Speaking of missing things, we missed the launch of a European Ariane 5 ECA rocket from French Guiana. However, NASA astronaut Rick Mastracchio was watching and captured its trail with a camera. Pretty wild, watching a rocket launch from space. 

Meanwhile, on Mars, Curiosity has successfully made its way over the "Dingo Gap" sand dune on Mars. The photo below (rear view) shows the sandy soil it traversed.
                   
Using recent imagery from MSL, panoramacist Andre Bodrov has put together a super cool, interactive panoramic of the area. Check it out!

Mars Panorama - Curiosity rover: Martian solar day 530 in The World

REFLECTIONS:  I was so cold and tired last night, I did little more than share photos about the day. There are a couple of things worth mentioning.
- There were MANY times yesterday I regretted where I chose to have us sit because it was so darn cold. There were some seats that were in the sun for some of the day, but we didn't move. In retrospect, that's OK. There was a family in the seats in front of us, two parents, three kids. Daughters about 11 years and 3 months, and a son about 3. The parents were, shall we say, not very attentive to their kids' well being. For instance, the baby had on an adorable crocheted-in-Seahawks' colors headband, matching her mother's and her sister's, but NOTHING else on her little bald baby head. Did I mention it was 18 degrees where we were sitting? And the poor baby was in tights and a little cheerleader dress, poor thing. Her nose was redder than Rudolph's. And then there was the boy. He was understandably squirrely, and would stand up on his chair from time to time, which was super scary, because they were folding, movie theater type seats, and he'd stand back too far and the seat would start folding up and he'd start falling. The mother managed to notice ONCE, and told him in a half hearted way to stop, but she didn't watch him, so he'd be right back to doing it. So, it became MY job to be on high alert. And sure enough, at one point he stood too far back on his seat and he started to pitch forward. he was head first falling for the concrete when I said, "OH GOD!" lunged out of my chair (directly behind him, thank god) and grabbed him around the waist just before his skull hit the concrete. I held him in mid air for a moment, in shock. I'll never forget the look on the face of his older sister. She was just staring at me, slack jawed. I deposited the kid back on his seat, wordlessly. The mother had turned around at this point. Did she even say anything to me? No. She just lazily said to her son, "I told you not to stand on the seat." Meanwhile, the sister is still staring at me. Bottom line: I'm glad we sat where we did.

- Despite the fact that there were 700,000 to 800,000 people at the parade, there was no rioting, no widespread reports of untoward behavior. Fun was had by all. Congrats, Seattle, on a wonderful, community event.  Last night the town was still buzzing. We stopped at Full Tilt to get the kids ice cream (I know, like they hadn't been cold enough all day!) and the guy working the counter was an African American, with dredlocks and a doubly pierced nose. He asked if we had been to the parade, and we told him our story, and he told us about he and his friends riding their BMX bikes down to the parade all the way from Columbia City. That's dedication in the freezing temps! One of the things he brought up was what a unifying factor it was for the city. It was so much more than just a sporting event. It was about community and civic pride and connecting with your neighbors far and wide.Very true. And then this morning, there was a truck cruising our alley and it parked by our carport. I saw an elderly African American gentleman looking up at me in the house, so I went outside to see what was up. As it turned out, he was a scrapper, looking for recycling. But the first thing he said to me was, "Did you go to the parade yesterday?" And the two of us talked about how great it was for the city. Definitely one of those days where decades from now, people will be swapping stories about where they were and what they were doing during the celebration.

Seahawks Celebration

SUPER CELEBRATION: Normally, Wednesdays have us up north for math and science classes. Today was not a normal day. Today, the city of Seattle was celebrating its first ever Super Bowl victory. Of course, we had to be part of the celebration. 

We left home at 6:50 this morning, bound for the Seahawks' stadium in the Sodo neighborhood.

When we arrived near the site, thousands of fans were already in the area, and some 700,000 plus fans were lining the parade route from Seattle Center to the stadium. We circled around looking for parking, and after a bit of discussion, wound up going and getting Christian at his workplace (also in Sodo) and switching the Honda I was driving with the Honda he'd stashed just a half hour earlier, near the stadium.

The kids and I sat in our lil Honda Fit from 7:30 to about 9 a.m. It got cold while we were waiting, but CJ wouldn't let me idle the car for heat, reminding me we'd be killing polar bears. Damn conscience. ;)

When I deemed it time to hike to CenturyLink Field and stand in line to get into the venue. Gates were supposed to be at 10:30, but ALL of the stadium's 75,000 seats were general admission today. Yippee! Like a Who concert in the '70s! Having lived through the festival seating era, I knew what to expect and coached the kids about how to stay safe in a crowd like that. 

We got inside the venue (about 10:35), and found good seats right away. 

And then, the wait was on. The parade was supposed to start at 11 a.m., and get to CenturyLink at 1:30. Well, the parade didn't start until 11:50 or so, and the procession was slowed down by the fact that around 800,000 people were pressing themselves in along the parade route, including to the street. It was slow going.

I think the festivities started where we were at about 3 p.m. That's right - we spent 4.5 hours sitting in the cold and shade waiting. Woo hoo! Good times! Thankfully, I'd dressed the kids in a ridiculous number of layers, had packed good snacks, and plenty of entertainment. The only thing on them that really suffered was their poor cold toes. :(

Christian joined us about 11:30. While we waited, we watched coverage of the parade on the stadium's big screens. 

I think my favorite shots were of Marshawn Lynch throwing Skittles to the crowd and the crowd throwing Skittles back at him. For weeks now people have been knocking him as 'anti social' because he wouldn't provide a steady stream of quotes on demand during media events at the Super Bowl. But Marshawn is NOT anti social, he's just anti stupid blathering. He's all 'bout that action, boss." And today, during the parade, no one was more animated than him. And when he finally arrived at the stadium, he DANCED in, beating his own drum. 

The shots of the crowd along the route were eye-popping ... 

There were so many people, that cell phones were rendered nearly useless - the networks crashed. I anticipated this happening and was glad I'd called Christian immediately to let him know where to find us. 

The crowd inside the stadium was something to behold, as well. 

We waited, and waited and waited. Finally, the program began. We got to hear the Blue Thunder perform and see the real live 'sea' hawk wing its way in.

One of the highlights of the afternoon was a brand new Boeing 787 flying overhead, decked out with a sweet Seahawks' graphics package.

 Below it banks just north of Smith Tower.

We also got to see 'our' banner fly overhead. 

This is the one we signed a couple weeks back. It flew over the Super Bowl stadium, and now it's back in Seattle for a victory lap!

Fresh from his NFL Hall of Fame induction on Saturday night, Seahawks legend Walter Jones raised the 12th man flag for today's festivities.

Eventually, the players were introduced, biggest number (99) to smallest (3).

 Doug Baldwin walked in backwards, filming the crowd, as did Golden Tate.

And former UW Husky Jermaine Kearse got a rousing welcome.

 The last team member to emerge was #3 - quarterback Russell Wilson.

 And he was carrying a silver statue - namely, the Lombardi trophy!

I still have a hard time believing that a Lombardi trophy is now part of Seattle history. It's been a long time coming!

Coach Pete Carroll spoke at the ceremony.

The ceremony ended with team owner Paul Allen hoisting the trophy up high, while fireworks and confetti filled the stadium.

It's nearly 11 p.m. as I type this, and I'm still chilled to the bone. Hopefully a hot shower in the morning will cure that, but being cold was a small price to pay for being a part of today's events. It's something the kids will remember the rest of their lives.

Scouting and Scheming

                        
ANOTHER WIDE-EYED NIGHT: Sleepless in Seattle continues. I thought we'd relax once the Super Bowl was over, but now our obsession has shifted to the victory parade and ceremony on Feb. 5.

The parade, mostly down Fourth Avenue between Seattle Center and CenturyLink Field, is open to the public, of course, because it's on public streets. However, with upwards of 300,000 people expected, it's going to be a tight squeeze, and the sidewalks aren't that wide. So, the kids and I went out scouting the parade route for potential viewing spots this morning.

We had decided the Seattle Central Library, the King County Administration Building, and City Hall were probably our best bets by the time we returned home. However, upon checking my email, I found an offer from a friend for two tickets to the celebration at CenturyLink Field. Woo hoo! - but only half of the number of tickets we'd need. So then it was time to turn to Craigslist and scrounge up a pair from a scalper. That turned into an odyssey taking about four hours, but I was finally successful. Yippee! So we're going to the big party - lucky us.

It's going to be a loooooong day, though. Traffic in this city can be a hours-long nightmare on a 'normal' day. I can only imagine how tomorrow is going to be. Actually I know exactly how it's going to be - it's going to be The Worst Day Ever, and it's going to be below freezing for a good part of the day.  So, we need to be prepared. We have layers and layers of clothes, snacks packed, and blankets. Our electronic devices are charged and the cars are gassed up. We're going to head to the stadium district V-E-R-Y early. Ridiculously early, because I'd rather be there, sitting in our car reading books than laying in bed wide awake, wondering what horrors might await me traffic wise if I leave later.

Doors to the stadium open at 10:30, and the actual event starts around 1. It's going to be a long day, but a fun day - I hope!!

I just read a headline that said officials are now predicting 500,000 people for the parade - that's 200,000 more than they were predicting this afternoon.

Lordy, I'm not going to sleep a lick tonight. I should just drive down there now ...

In other news, we did some math, science, writing and reading today, it wasn't all about the Seahawks. Really. It wasn't. ...

One of the fun things we learned today was about a wobbly planet the Kepler space telescope has spied. It would be a wild ride living there!

Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech