:: Link-n-blogs ::

:: Friday, June 21, 2002 ::

I found my first letterbox yesterday! I went for a long walk with Simon (my dog) at the West Hartford Reservoirs. It was a beautiful evening. The clues made it very easy to find. It was fun. The act of searching for the letterbox, of having a goal, added interest to the walk.

One thing I noticed is that most, if not all, of the previous finders use store bought stamps. When I did all of my reading on the hobby, I learned that most people (supposedly) carve their own stamps. That's why I carved my own simple stamp. No big deal. I like my stamp.

The MDC (the water people) have been cutting down a lot of trees in the woods around the reservoirs. One sign mentioned a parasitic disease that was infecting one type of tree. Another sign stated that it was part of the management plan. The sign said that wooded areas around reservoirs had to be maintained in a different way than other forests. A lot of fallen, dead wood areas are needed for a variety of reasons. They are probably right but the areas where they cut down a lot of trees weren't very pretty.

Here is a link to the MDC web site. The final paragraph on the page has links to other parts of the site that deal with watershed management.

Discuss Letterboxing


Discuss Watershed management

:: Barly 7:19 AM [+] ::
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"It's a good thing it missed the Earth, because we never saw it coming," Steve Maran of the American Astronomical Society said.
Now that is an understatement if I've ever heard one! It seems that an asteroid the size of a soccer field passed within 75 thousand miles of earth. That is closer than the earth.

I guess the troubling part is not only did we not see it coming, but noone saw it until three days after it passed.

The asteroid was not big enough to destroy all of the life on earth but it would have been quite destructive if it had hit near any civilized area. It would have been similar to the 1908 asteroid explosion that leveled 800 square miles of trees in Tunguska, Siberia. Here is a cool site about what is known of that event. The site also includes some pretty cool painting of what it may have looked like at the time.

Discuss Asteroids hitting earth


:: Barly 6:55 AM [+] ::
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Looks like the people at Scientific American are throwing down the gloves. Look out creationists, here are fifteen answers to your nonsense!
Thanks to Knee-jerk!

Discuss Fifteen Answers to Creationists


:: Barly 10:46 AM [+] ::
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Forget about developing electric cars! We won't need them, soon (hehe)! Scientists have teleported a laser beam. It's only a matter of time (OK OK, quite a bit of time) til we are beaming ourselves to the mall.

Discuss Teleporting

:: Barly 9:02 AM [+] ::
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According to a new study, people who watch a TV show with sex and violence are less likely to remember the commercials that ran during the show.

Only judging from this short article, it seems that the study is legitimate and it raises some interesting questions (most notably...Why?). I did have a bit of a problem, though, with some of the comments from the researchers;

"There is emerging literature demonstrating that sexually explicit media promote sexual callousness, cynical attitudes about love and marriage, and perceptions that promiscuity is the norm, say the study authors. The authors believe their research may deter advertisers from advertising on certain types of programming."

It sounds to me as if at least some of the researchers had an agenda or, maybe, a not purely objective mindset while running the study.

Discuss Sex, violence, and ads




:: Barly 7:56 AM [+] ::
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