Seeds 'n' Stuff

POTTED: We're on Day 2 of UWKC's "Hunger Action Week," and I'm pretty sure thinking about food security and hunger is what prompted the kids and I to sow some seeds today, with hopes of a bountiful garden in the months to come. 

We headed across the Ballard Bridge to Fred Meyer, where we found all of their seeds on sale at half off. "Does this count toward our food today?" Annabelle asked while perusing the packets. I told her it didn't and she replied, "Good!" with enthusiasm. I let the kids each pick three or so packets of what they wanted to grow. Here's what we wound up with.

Once home we promptly got them into some soil. And now, there's a garden in waiting on our kitchen counter. :)

We also planted a Trinidad Moruga Scorpion pepper plant today. It's the hottest pepper on the Scoville scale. 

I'm not sure if a) It will actually grow or b) anyone in this household would eat it, but it will be fun seeing what happens.

We also took time to refill the hummingbird feeder today. Those hummers are hungry things - we have to fill it about every other week.

OVER OUR HEADS:  At some point yesterday, we were caught on camera by Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata on board the ISS. 

He posted it to Twitter, commenting, "Flying over Seattle, WA. SEA-TAC is a big airport."  I highlighted some places on the map for people who aren't able to easily pick them out. 

NUMBER CRUNCHING:  We watched our food budget again today, of course, just two days into a 5-day Hunger Action challenge. 

Breakfast came to $2.77 (60 cents worth of Cocoa Puffs, a half cup of milk [.18], a pot of coffee [41 cents], two eggs for me [.24], and yogurt with an apple, banana and some almonds for Christian [$1.34]). 

Just before lunch, the kids and I went to the store. I have to admit, they were hoping mightily for a free sample in the bakery, but there was nothing there today, darn it. I made them mac and cheese again as soon as we got home, for a total of 48 cents. They also each had a Cutie, which meant another 40 cents. Three of us had a pepperoni stick, for .75. So lunch and snacks totaled $1.63.

Dinner was expensive :0 - 10.70 - YIKES!  We had oven baked, home made chicken 'nuggets' (chicken breast [5.98], eggs [.24], and corn flakes [1.25] to coat them), and fresh green beans [2.71]. The kids also had a couple of cans of Shasta, .52.  The good news is, we have LOTS of chicken left over for tomorrow, and it will be 'free' then.

So we were at $15.10 when the kids started chirping about dessert. Back to popcorn it was, 66 cents' worth. Daily total: $15.78, or $5.22 under budget. Phew. 

BACK TO THE BEATLES: Today we finished up the week 5 lectures for our "The Music of The Beatles" class. One of the lectures was about John's songs on The White Album, including 

"Revolution 9," "Happiness is a Warm Gun," and "Julia." 

When the professor told us Julia was about John's mother, I recalled a famous quote of Lennon's. He once said in an interview, "When I was 5 years old, my mother always told me that happiness was the key to life. When I went to school, they asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I wrote down ‘happy’. They told me I didn’t understand the assignment, and I told them they didn’t understand life.”

I always loved that quote.

John had an interesting relationship with his mother. He spent most of his life living with his aunt, Julia's older sister, but he was very close with his musical, free-spirited mother. He visited her often, and she taught him how to play guitar, banjo, and accordion (whereas his aunt wouldn't even allow a record player in her house). 

Julia was struck by a car and killed at age 44, when John was a teen. He was devastated. His firstborn son, Julian, was named after her. 

Oddly, Julia's grave in the Allerton Cemetery in Merseyside, England, went unmarked for decades - it was just #805 with a plain, wooden cross. Not until 2010, 52 years after she was killed, did a headstone go up. It's inscribed: Mummy, John, Victoria, Julia, Jackie.

After the lectures, we took the week 5 quiz, and each scored 100 percent, keeping our 'perfect' streak alive. This coming week will be the last quiz and the final. 

BRONIES UNITE: One of the things that was trending in the newsfeed today was a story about a 9-year-old boy in North Carolina, Grayson Bruce.  Like CJ and Annabelle, Grayson is a big fan of "My Little Ponies Friendship is Magic." He has a Rainbow Dash backpack he carries to school, and a MLP lunch bag. Some bullies at school started giving him crap about that, including some physical attacks. The school's response? They sent a letter to Grayson's family telling him to leave his pony stuff at home because it's a "trigger" for bullies. In other words, blame the victim. 

How LAME and LAZY is that? So either the administration agrees and is one of the bullies, or they themselves were bullied by the bullies or their parents. In either case, it's clearly not acceptable. 

"My heart has just been broken," CJ said, reading the story.  I challenged the kids to find out more facts than the short story we initially saw provided. Soon, they'd found a Change.org petition in support of Grayson, and they both signed it. 

They also found out the name of Grayson's school (Candler, where Stephen Chandler is principal), and school district (Buncombe County Schools).  I did a couple of minutes of poking around on the district's page and under their "Safe Schools" tab on their front page, I found a link that said "Bullying." Ironically, on their bullying page it says, "Buncombe County Schools strives to foster a climate of respect and personal responsibility among students, and does not tolerate bullying in any form." Well, clearly that's not true, now isn't it?

Further, they say, "Anyone with knowledge of a situation involving bullying can either report the incident to school officials, or if preferred, may report the situation anonymously by either going to the school's homepage to complete an online form (Click on Report Bullying) or by calling our Anti-Bullying Hotline at 225-5292 to leave a message."

Hmm. Guess what we'll be doing tomorrow! :)  Won't be surprised if we find out their 'hotline' message mailbox is full. Bet Principal Chandler's email inbox is bursting at the seams, too (stephen.chandler@bcsemail.org). The very first sentence on his Web page makes me want to 
barf a little. It reads, "As principal, my job is to ensure that the children of Candler Elementary receive quality academic instruction in a safe and nurturing environment." Methinks someone needs to stay after school and write a nice, long essay on what 'nurturing environment' means.

At this point, I almost pity the misguided people who created this which has now gone absolutely VIRAL. It's trending in the top of all news stories in the U.S., right there with the missing Malaysian airliner and the news helicopter crash here in Seattle today. Heck, my favorite story about it so far was by a woman in Australia - her summation of the situation is spot on, IMHO. Read it here: http://www.mamamia.com.au/rogue/my-little-pony-backpack-banned/

CJ and Annabelle found Grayson's family's official Facebook page - https://www.facebook.com/SupportForGrayson . It had over 36,000 likes as of this afternoon. Annabelle created a pony especially for Grayson. She made its body gray, for his name, and used a mane and tail similar to Rainbow Dash, since that's what Grayson's backpack is. She gave the pony a backpack 'cutie mark' as a show of solidarity. Annabelle sent it in a message to the page admin. They wrote back within a half hour, telling her they loved it. :)

I read in another article tonight that Grayson was pulled out of that stupid school situation and is being homeschooled at the present. I'm glad that he's not subjected to that treatment any more, and I don't blame his parents for pulling him out. When you realize that the administration/adults in charge are so wrong headed and are absolutely not going to protect your child, that's about all there is to do, especially in the short term. (I been there, done that!) One report said Grayson's mom is meeting with the district superintendent on Thursday in hopes of helping get things to a place where other kids in the future won't have to experience what her child did.  I hope she's successful. If nothing else, the dolts in that district *have* to have learned by now you DON'T MESS WITH PONIES AND BRONIES. 

Here We Go Again

TOP O' THE MORNING: It's that time of the year again for MPA - Hunger Action Week.  We've been participating in this social awareness experience for FIVE years now. The challenge is to live for one week (Monday-Friday) on a 'food stamps' budget.  For us, that means $21 a day for our family of four.   

Trying to get over a cold, I was last out of the gate this morning. When I came downstairs, I croaked, "I sure hope nobody's had anything to eat yet!" ha ha. 

Since today's St. Patrick's Day, the kid just *had* to have Lucky Charms for breakfast. And not just any Lucky Charms, but LIMITED EDITION ones where all the marshmallows are green clovers. Fortunately, the crap, er, I mean cereal, was on sale big time at Winco last week. 

We checked our receipt and figured out they were 17 cents an ounce. The kids each had 2.25 ounces. CJ always eats his cereal dry. This morning Annabelle proposed going without milk to save money. Sweet of her to offer, but I told her she could have a little milk. 

Of course, if you're going to have something as awful, er, I mean delicious, as Lucky Charms for breakfast, you have to have certified organic milk to balance it out, right? We calculated that a cup of it costs 37 cents, and then poured half that much on her cereal. 

Christian and I split a pot of coffee for breakfast, at 41 cents for the pot of "Seattle's Best." We probably should have gone with the canned stuff to save money!

We had a late morning snack, one "Cutie" apiece.

Earlier, CJ had calculated those to be 20 cents apiece. 

Lunch for the kids was a Winco brand box of mac-and-cheese (can't afford the high falutin' Kraft dinner stuff!). The box of pasta was 33 cents, they used 9 cents worth of milk, and one tablespoon of butter, which we calculated out to cost 6 cents.

All totaled, lunch was 48 cents for the kids. Christian and I were still going on coffee and Cuties, ha ha.

Late afternoon, we each had a stick of pepperoni, which set the family back a dollar.

Dinner, we went with a traditional St. Patrick's day meal. Thankfully, Winco had corned beef on sale for $1.38 a pound last week, so we bought a small ($3.67 total) one of those. We also made baked potatoes (55 cents for the four of us), and carrots - 49 cents worth. The total for dinner was $4.71. Not bad.

The kids each had a soda with dinner, 52 cents for two cans of Shasta diet cola. 

All in all, we did quite well today. The grand total for breakfast, lunch and dinner was $8.86. Go us! That left plenty of room on our $21 budget to enjoy the $5 growler of MacTarnahans, scored as a St. Paddy's day special. And, the kids and Christian all had big bowls of air popped popcorn - 4 ounces of kernels set us back 28 cents for the popcorn, 18 cents for the butter, that's just 46 cents for a delicious dessert. 

Final score: $6.68 under budget. Not bad for a "holiday dinner" day. :)

As a side note, in looking back at the blog to the first year we participated, 2010, we got $22 a day for our family - more money, and groceries cost less five years ago, for sure.

GREEN, GREEN GRASS: Late morning, we headed down to West Seattle. We wanted to pick up a couple things we left at Rick's, and we lugged our lawn mower and weed lopper along, since he owns neither, but his grass isn't waiting on him to get them! 

Annabelle wanted to help, and I was more than happy to let her. (Meanwhile, CJ was busy thinking. It consumed all of his attention.)

The yard looked great when we were done. There's something very satisfying about mowing the lawn, isn't there?

1968: We watched three lectures for our "Music of The Beatles" class. We're on the White Album now, two LPs full of amazing music. Annabelle drew a number of cute ditties in her notes today. Obviously, at one point today, the professor told us when "Hey Jude" went to number one (after a couple of Beatles' singles 'only' cracked the Top 10), it was declared The Beatles had returned.

There was also talk today about The Beatles' trip to India to hang out with the Maharishi. Not sure which Beatle is doing a TM pose here ... 

Truth be told, the entirety of Annabelle's notes are doodling - little drawings all over the page..

The one showing George asking another Beatle to play with him references the fact that on some White Album tracks, The Beatles didn't perform on one anothers' songs, or in some cases, they played on them, but recorded their parts in different studios.  "Cry Baby Cry" and "Piggies" are titles of a couple of George's tunes on the album, and two of Paul's titles are at the bottom.

BIG BANG THEORY: This morning, my Facebook and Twitter feeds were alive with chatter about a BIG scientific announcement. People were predicting it was going to be a monumental discovery having to do with the Big Bang, and at 9 a.m. our time, that turned out to be true. 

I've read a number of articles about it, but what (to me) it seems to boil down to is that there is now direct evidence of gravitational waves rippling through our just born (as in fractions of a second) universe. These waves are proof of cosmic inflation theories (which the kids and I learned about in a wonderful astrobiology course from the University of Edinburgh through Coursera). 

As NASA explained in a press release today, "This is the strongest confirmation yet of cosmic inflation theories, which say the universe expanded by 100 trillion trillion times, in less than the blink of an eye."

Below is a photo (courtesy of NASA/JPL-Caltech) of the BICEP2 telescope.

Stationed at the South Pole, it uses novel technology developed at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. It includes an array of devices that "use superconductivity to gather, filter, detect, and amplify polarized light from the cosmic microwave background -- relic radiation left over from the Big Bang that created our universe," per NASA.

One post I saw today featured Stanford Assistant Professor Chao-Lin Kuo surprising Professor Andrei Linde with results from the BICEP2 experiment. Linde is one of the 'fathers' of the inflationary universe theory, as well as the theory of eternal inflation and inflationary multiverse.

BICEP2 showed, for the first time, gravitational waves, or ripples in space-time. These waves have been described as the "first tremors of the Big Bang."

Stanford has posted it for sharing (under a Creative Commons (Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works license). 

SPEAKING OF STARS: We're all loving the new "Cosmos" series. Last night was the second installment. The kids were rapt, and still talking about it today. If you haven't yet, check it out! Full episodes can be seen here: http://www.fox.com/watch/183733315515

Hooray, Pi Day!

IRRATIONAL DAY: We spent a fair amount of time in the kitchen today, with Pi Day festivities. We've been 'celebrating' Pi Day (March 14, for 3.14159 et cetera) for a couple years now. The fun almost always involves pies of some sort. 

This morning, we set about making mini apple pies on a stick (because all food's more fun on a stick, right?).  Wielding knives, the kids peeled apples. 

Then, we flavored them up with brown sugar, lemon juice, cinnamon and some nutmeg.

Then, we plopped 'em on lil pie crusts, stuck a stick in there, and smooshed 'em together. 

Fortunately, they baked up just fine and the kids report they are delicious. We had homemade pizza pie for dinner. 

This afternoon, we did a couple of pi experiments that we found on Exploratorium's Pi Day Activities Web page.

The first involved carefully wrapping string around the circumference of a circular object. We chose a dinner plate. The kids traced its circumference and cut the yarn.  Next, they took the string circumference and stretched it across the diameter of the plate. The goal was to cut as many “string diameters” they could get from their “string circumference.”  In news that won't surprise pi fans, they each got three complete diameters, and just a smidgen (say about .14 of a diameter) left over. We talked about the math a little bit. I reminded them that if they knew the radius of their plates, they could figure out its circumference. So we measured the 10-inch across plates, and found the radius to be 5. You take 2*pi*r(adius), and you'll get the circumference - and it worked.  The plate had a radius of 5, and using the formula, we came up with a circumference of 31.42, and that's just about what the sum of their yarn pieces was. Yay, math! We did a second task involving pi - and this time their circumference of the kids' heads. Today I learned that hat sizes typically range between 6 and 8, which I knew, but what I didn't know until now was that those sizes come from taking the circumference of a person's head and dividing it by pi. Wow!  The average adult's head ranges between 21 and 25 inches (per Exploratorium).  CJ and Annabelle took turns measuring each other.  CJ's head was 24 inches. Dividing that by 3.14159 gives him a hat size of 7.64, so a 7 5/8 would be just right for him.   Annabelle's head was 21.5. Dividing that by pi gave her 6.8, so a 6 3/4 would likely work for her.  And last but not least, the kids came up with a little song for Pi Day. It just so happens they've been working on learning "American Pie" on their guitars for the last week, so I suggested they come up with a different kind of Pi song. They watched the BrainPOP video about pi to get some ideas for lyrics, and then spent about an hour writing, refining and practicing.  Here are the lyrics A long, long, time ago, on a continent far away, ancient Egyptians did some math around 1700 B.C.E, they calculated pi to be "256 over 81" - on the right path But in 300 B.C.E There was this guy Archimedes "3 and one seventh's" what he said He was close, but now he's long dead But in 263 C.E Chinese Liu Hui calculated to 3 decimal places for you and me And now, we have, our pi [Chorus] So we were singing, "My, my, this irrational pi, 3.14159 and on towards the sky I could say more but I'm too tired to try why you have to be so big, pi? why you have to be so big, pi? INSPIRED: This morning started off rainy, but by midday, it was downright gorgeous.  A photo I'd happen to have seen on a Ballard news blog prompted me to take the kids to the Ballard Locks for our stroll. From the Seattle Municipal Archives, this photo from the 1930s shows the old railroad bridge between Magnolia and Ballard.  It was taken from the Magnolia end, and that's where we started our journey.  We walked around under the bridge for a bit ... as well as just west of it, where we had a lovely view out to Puget Sound. We walked our way to the fish ladder and made our way across the top of the dam to the locks, where pleasure craft and big working boats go through. The Viking Storm made its way to open waters as we watched. On the Ballard side of the locks, we strolled through the lovely gardens. There's not much blooming yet, but soon, very soon! The kids were itching to roll down the terraced hillside (it's much steeper than it looks in this photo). I gave them a go ahead, but told them I wasn't responsible if they hit any goose droppings along the way (there were dozens of Canada geese in the park, wishing we would go away). Below, CJ makes a beeline for a bunch of 'em. Annabelle followed soon after. They changed their clothes when we got home. :) Crossing back to the south side, we noted swirly shadows the wave sculptures were casting.  LIVE, FROM LEO:  Early this evening, we watched a two-hour program on the National Geographic Channel, "Live From Space."  We have seen hundreds of hours of NASA TV, including lots of live broadcasts from the ISS, but this show was worth watching. It was nicely produced, especially for ISS 'newbies." There was lots of great footage from on board the station, explaining its parts and, of course, sharing its breathtaking vantage point of the Earth. We learned about the station's systems (recycling, sanitation, laundry, crew quarters, and more).  There was a segment about Italian astronaut Luca Parmitano's scary spacewalk, when his helmet started filling with water. Poor guy darn near drowned. And what's really disconcerting is they're still not sure why his helmet started filling with water.  The broadcast featured several live interviews with Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) astronaut Koichi Wakata. Five years ago he was the first Japanese astronaut aboard the ISS and right now, he's the first Japanese commander of the ISS.                                                            Photo: NASA/JSC During the show, I tried to access the interactive Web site livefromspace.com, but it was having trouble loading. I'd like to think that was because so many people are interested. Apparently #LiveFromSpace was the number one trend on Twitter during the broadcast. If that's the case, mission accomplished. I'm glad NASA and the other space agencies are making efforts to reach a broader audience.

Tulips and Such

A FIRST: We went for an hour-long walk this morning and lo and behold, we saw our first tulips. Sweet!

Our destination was Terminal 91 - soon to be where all the cruise ships will be coming in. But this morning, it was just us, some seagulls, yachts and a few working boats. 

To get there, we had to walk under the Magnolia/Garfield St/Suicide bridge.

Elliott Bay was calm again today. The kids spent a good half hour plopping rocks into the water. What is it that's so satisfying about that activity? It's right up there with watching a fire burn.

Every once in awhile we'd get buzzed by a jet overhead. That's one of the (many) things I love about living in this city. I wonder how many times a day I gaze up at the sky.

I could ID the sound of a 787 with my eyes closed, for sure. 

Today also involved some science homework, watching the latest episode of "Live from Daryl's House" featuring Brett Dennen, and shopping in preparation for "Hunger Action Week" (much more on that later).

LIVE, FROM LOW EARTH ORBIT!!:   Tomorrow evening - 5 Left Coast USA time - National Geographic will feature a two-hour special program originating from Johnson Space Center and featuring live appearnces by the International Space Station crew.
                              
The broadcast will feature stories about science being conducted aboard the ISS, plus include several live interviews with astronauts Rick Mastracchio and Koichi Wakata.

I do like how they're promoting this event and trying to capture the attention and fancy of people, but truth be told, you can see stuff like this on a near daily basis on NASA TV, which doesn't require a cable package that includes the Nat Geo channel. You just need the good ol' World Wide Web and a browser pointed the right direction: http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/

POSTPONED: On our 'to do' list for this weekend was watching the third SpaceX resupply mission to the ISS. It was originally scheduled for Sept. 16, but late today, I saw notice that it's been pushed back to the 30th. Bummer. 

Rover Over

READY TO ROLL: Today, the kids finished their Mars Science Laboratory Curiosity Rover LEGO kit. 

They've been working on it for a few days now, carefully chipping away at the pages and pages of instructions ... 

... and keeping track of all the parts.

When it was complete, we took the time to review the nicely produced instruction-plus book. It contained many factoids about MSL scattered throughout its pages, and it had a schematic listing the rover's various parts.

We've been keeping pretty close tabs on Curiosity since I was lucky enough to see it launch in person back in November of 2011. 

Lately, we've been concerned about news that MSL's wheels are showing signs of wear. 

You can see a number of pings, dings and such in this (NASA-JPL) photo of MSL's left front wheel, taken by Curiosity's Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI),

And if you look really closely, down at the bottom, toward the first series of three (by design!) holes, there's an all-the-way-through tear.  (photo: NASA/JPL/MSSS)

                         

More photographic evidence of wheel damage is available on these links:

http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl-raw-images/msss/00490/mhli/0490MH0262000003E1_DXXX.jpg

http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl-raw-images/msss/00490/mhli/0490MH0262000001E1_DXXX.jpg

http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl-raw-images/msss/00494/mcam/0494ML1964004000E1_DXXX.jpg

http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl-raw-images/msss/00411/mhli/0411MH0262001000C0_DXXX.jpg

During pre-launch sessions at Kennedy Space Center, I got to see an MSL wheel up close!

The big black wheel is MSL's. It's not rubber (though you might think that, based on its color). Rather, it's made of. The silver wheel in the center is like those found on Mars rovers Spirit and Opportunity. And the tiniest one, with little nubs, was like that found on Pathfinder. 

Here's a cool NASA/JPL photo of prototypes of each of those rovers in the "Mars Yard" at JPL - apparently not as hostile an environment as the surface of Mars! 

Reading up on MSL's six aluminum wheels, each is 20 inches in diameter and has its own driven motor spinning it, and there are six-spoke titanium spindles in the center. Each front and rear wheel can be steered independently, and MSL's suspension is a rocker-bogie system (something our LEGO model reproduced nicely, BTW.) 

From what I can glean online, MSL's wheels aren't anywhere near failing at this point, so fingers crossed Curiosity will continue to roam for a good, long time. 

Back in this photo, when the rover's wheels were all shiny and new, you can see holes put into the aluminum on purpose. 
                          
The holes create a pattern in the Martian soil, as seen below.

The patterns are helpful, as the rover can use them as a visual reference when driving. I learned at the NASA Tweetup/MSL launch that the pattern is Morse code for JPL, the abbreviation for NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which is where Curiosity was designed, built and the mission is managed.

NASA/JPL (cropped from http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/msl/multimedia/gallery/PIA13385.html

In poking around today, looking for answers as to why MSL's wheels are wearing out, I found a fascinating (well, at least to me, LOL) Reddit thread all about it here: http://www.reddit.com/r/askscience/comments/1wnb8s/why_are_the_wheels_of_nasas_mars_rover_curiosity/

But back to LEGOS! While visiting KSC for the launch, I got to see a super duper big LEGO MSL.

It was about the size of a Smart Car, ha ha.

For some reason, I decided to take a close up of its wheel. Maybe I was worried about its design back then. It looked, a little blocky to me. ;)