Stop oppressive gardening!

Garden gnomes, according to folklore, help tend gardens at night, when they awaken from their ceramic state and touch the gardens with their magic, causing flowers to grow. Gnome Liberationists are people who advocate the "freedom" of garden gnomes, often by stealing them and moving them to new locations. They've been featured in movies, tv, and local news stories. The garden gnome prank is known as gnoming or gnome hunting. One variation is the travelling gnome prank where kidnapped gnomes are sent on trips around the world. The travelling gnome became the basis for Travelocity's advertising. The first Garden Gnome Liberation Front began in France in 1997 during which over the course of the year, stole over 150 gnomes. Organizations formed for the stated purpose of "freeing the ceramic creatures from forced labor in gardens." They argue that gnomes are captured, sold, and kept as slaves, ripped from their Northern Woodland homes, stripped of their freedoms, and forced to tend to the gardens where they are set. A couple of demonstrations performed by the front include repainting "freed" gnomes to make them unrecognizable, and a "mass suicide" in 1998 where 11 gnomes were hung from a bridge with nooses around their necks and a note reading "when you read these few words we will no longer be part of your selfish world, where we serve merely as pretty decorations." It's unknown where and when the prank first started but now it's a worldwide phenomenon.

Heart, inverted.

Situs inversus is a congenital condition where the major visceral organs are reversed or mirrored from their normal positions, making it so the heart is on the right side of the thorax rather than the left. The condition includes not only the heart but the stomach, spleen, liver, gall bladder and intestines, as well as all of their respective nerves and blood vessels. It occurs in less than 1 in 10,000 people. The condition was first seen and drawn by Leonardo da Vinci in the 15th or 16th century, but wasn't described until the 18th. The condition generally doesn't affect the health of people who have it any more than that of those who don't. Most people are unaware they even have opposite organs until they seek medical attention for an unrelated problem. This can sometimes cause confusion when signs and symptoms are on the wrong side. Organ transplantation can be complicated being that situs inversus not only means the organs are on the other side, but they're mirrored, and the orientation of what needs to be attached doesn't fit as easily. The condition can often be found in one of a set of identical twins, who knew?

Warrior Dash!

A grueling 3-4 mile marathon, Warrior Dash is an event held in locations all over the country where participants not only run the distance, but have a number of obstacles to overcome along the way. Costumes are encouraged, there's no time limit because it's not a race, and the prize? Not cash, but a beer and music to celebrate completing the feat!

The amputee rock climber

Aron Ralston is a 35 year old mountaineer and adventurer. In May 2003, on a solo hiking trip in Utah, was forced to amputate his lower right arm in order to survive when a boulder fell and trapped him. He was working as a mechanical engineer for Intel in 2002 when he left his job to climb all of Colorado's "fourteeners", or peaks above 14,000 feet. He spent five days trying to break or dislodge the boulder when on the fifth day, dehydrated and delirious, he prepared to amputate his own arm with just a camping multi-tool. After he freed himself from his trapped and dead arm, he was still 17 miles from his truck, to get to which first he had to rappel down a 65 foot sheer. Hiking through a canyon, he met a Swiss family on vacation who alerted the authorities to send a helicopter rescue team.
Now with a prosthetic arm, he climbs more than ever, finishing his "fourteeners" as well as Denali, Kilimanjaro, and an expedition through the Grand Canyon. He intends to summit Everest one day, but for now is the subject of Danny Boyle's latest film, 127 Hours, about the true story of his 2003 accident.

Pipe Dream

Kent Jenkins is a college freshman at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles, who built himself a musical instrument out of pvc pipes, modeled after one used by Blue Man Group. Here's a video of him playing it :)

Arsenic-eating bacteria?!

Arsenic, until recently, has been known as a universal poison to all types of life. But an organism found in California's Mono Lake can live and grow entirely off of this deadly chemical. The common element bacteria takes to survive is phosphorus, making it unheard of that this one thrives from such a toxic one. Until now, it wasn't believed that any such creatures could survive without phosphorus, being that it is one of the six essential components for the survival of all life. The reason this is of such interest to scientists is because it proves that life exists in harsher environments than we ever imagined. This is especially a big boost of hope for all those in search of intelligent life on other planets. Conditions that used to mean life was impossible...is now possible.

Enoshima's Christmas display

For the last five years, an aquarium in Kamakura, Tokyo, has powered a 6'6" tall Christmas tree by electric eel power. Inside the eel's tank is a pair of aluminum plates that act as electrodes to power the lights of the tree every time the eel moves.
This year, they've added another display along with the tree that uses human power to work this time. Visitors stomp on a pad to make a Santa Claus robot sing and dance. The display's creator, Kazuhiko Minawa, imagines what the light produced by a Christmas tree powered by all the electric eels in the world would look like. But if you were to do that, why just power a Christmas tree?

Cathedral of junk

In a small suburban backyard in Austin, Texas lies a structure made of lawn mowers, car parts, kitchen utensils, ladders, and pretty much anything else you can think of. It began in 1988 when its architect, Vince Hannemann, started building a clubhouse out of junk, which today he estimates measures over 60 tons of it. Visitors inquire about its significance, but Vince denies any profound meaning. He just did it for fun. He's happy to show visitors its climbing spires of trash and greenery should they be curious enough to come and see it.

The art of displacement

Parkour, or free-running, is the practice of traversing elements in all settings, urban and rural. the goal is to move from one point to another as quickly and efficiently as possible by way of aerial rotations, spins, jumps, flips, and running. People who practice, called traceurs or traceuses, focus on developing physical fitness as well as speed, efficiency, and keen spatial awareness. According to one of the founders, David Belle, the idea is to move in a manner that gets you the furthest, fastest, as if you are running from or chasing something. Other than basic movements and techniques for beginners, there is no list of "moves" in parkour, since there is no particular field that traceurs practice. Every area presents new obstacles and challenges that are only overcome by training on the combination of multiple factors--angle, speed, body type, obstacle make-up, momentum, and absorption and redistribution of energy. It's a unique sport in that it relies on the body itself rather than any equipment.
So, enough of the boring explanation. VIDEO TIME.

X-ray vision

So I subscribed to National Geographic and the first issue I get has one tiny article on this man Nick Veasey, who takes x-ray photographs...of anything and everything. His work goes from insects to teddy bears to ipods to jets. What a way to see through the world around us.

Wtf? Carillon?

So a "carillon" is this huge set of 23 or more bells housed in a free-standing bell tower or belfry. It's played by a hitting a keyboard called a "baton" with your fists, and pressing the keys of a pedal keyboard with your feet. The keys are attached to metal clappers for the bells by a series of levers and wires. This is the heaviest musical instrument in the world, the bells alone weighing up to 100 tons. No way are you getting that thing on a tour bus. Such a bell tower in Florida, called the Stephen Foster Memorial Carillon, is the world's largest tubular bell instrument, at 200 feet tall and containing 97 bells. In medieval times these kinds of bells were used to alert people of war, fire, or storms, but in the 17th century methods of bell tuning were developed to make them into musical instruments. The musical range of carillons is determined by the number of bells each one has. Since it is the striking of the bell that causes it to sound, the harder you strike, the more intense the note. The higher notes/smaller bells are played by the fists, with the lower notes/larger bells being played by the feet. Carillon bells can give the impression of sounding out of tune since the overtones above and below the fundamental frequency are so strong that they almost overpower the note intended to sound.
Look at this guy. What a badass.

Mexico's underwater river (and friends).

The word "cenote" comes from a Mayan word meaning "well" and is used to describe sinkholes that have exposed rocky walls and contain groundwater. The water in these cenotes is often very clear since it comes from rain water slowly infiltrating through the ground. They are often the result of cave roofs collapsing to reveal extensive flooded cave systems beneath. These systems can have subterranean tunnels that reach all the way to the ocean. If such a cenote is a landlocked body of water whose tunnels lead to the ocean, it's what's known as an anchialine pool. In these pools, the pure rainwater floats atop the denser saline water from the sea. The sharp change in salt concentration over a small change in depth causes a blurry swirling effect due to the refraction between the different densities. Cool!
So one such body of water is the Cenote Angelita in Mexico. It's not an achialine pool, but goes straight down 200 feet. The first hundred are freshwater, and the last hundred are salt water--the extraordinary part is the layer of hydrogen sulfate that separates the two. Not only that, but there are trees at that depth as well, making it look like a most beautiful and eerie underwater river.
Quintana Roo, Mexico is home to the Ox Bel Ha ("Three Paths of Water") cave system, which is the longest explored underwater cave in the world, with 110 miles of underwater passages.
Other flooded cave systems include Dos Ojos, and the now combined Nohoch Nah Chich/Sac Actun cave system, both of which are also in Mexico near the Caribbean coast of the Yucatan Peninsula in Quintana Roo. Dos Ojos has no less than 25 sinkhole entrances and more than 20,000 feet of caves and tunnels. It also contains the deepest known cave passage in Quintana Roo, a cenote known as "The Pit" measuring at 396 feet.
These caves are super popular for diving, and of course, swimming!

Signmark

A coworker and I have been writing raps about Starbucks just for fun, and reading about rapping today I found out about a deaf rapper from Finland who goes by the name of Signmark. Marko Vuoriheimo is a 32 year old native of Helsinki who was born into a signing family. He believes that the deaf community should not be seen as a disabled one, but rather a linguistic minority with their own culture and history. Apparently he has signed poetry and music since he was a child, although he didn't start creating his own music until 2004. He rhymes his signs by making sure they have the same sort of hand form, and the bass line helps him follow the music and time his rhymes. He starts by using giant headphones to "listen" to music made by a friend where he concentrates on the rhythm of the bass to get the flow to rhyme his words and signs.

Musical sculptures?!

Around the world, people have gotten pretty clever with manipulating natural phenomenons (phenomena?) in order to produce music. The Sea Organ, for example, is an architectural object in Croatia which is a series of tubes and a resonating cavity underneath marble steps at the shore of the ocean, whose waves and wind create random notes. The sculpture was designed by a man named Nikola Bašić, is 230 feet long and has 35 pipes built under the concrete. The harmonies change as you walk along the promenade but are never dissonant despite the randomness of the sea and wind, since the pipes were all tuned to be able to sound good together. A similar object in San Francisco is the Wave Organ, another acoustic sculpture that rather than being particularly musical, tends to amplify the sounds of the sea's rumbles, gurgles, and sloshes through a series of pipes that interact with the tide and project the sounds to listeners at different stations. Lastly, the High Tide Organ is a structure attached to the sea wall in Blackpool, England that uses the force of the tides to produce the harmonic series in B flat. At high tide, the swell of the sea pushes air up through 18 organ pipes built within the sculpture, causing it to sound.
On another note, the Singing Ringing Tree is a sound sculpture in the northwest of England that generates discordant, haunting sounds as the western winds of the moor blow through it. It stands at about 10 feet tall, is composed of galvanized steel pipes, and covers a range of several octaves.
Also in the group of musical sculptures are singing roads, or musical roads, the first of which was created in 1995 in Denmark by Steen Krarup Jensen and Jakob Freud-Magnus, who called their creation the Asphaltophone. It's made of a series of raised pavement markers. The Melody Road and Singing Road in Japan and Korea respectively, are musical roads constructed of a series of grooves carved into the pavement at intervals. The tunes are based on the depth and spacing of the grooves, as at close intervals they produce higher sounds, and at widely spaced intervals, they produce deeper ones. In Japan there are three Melody Roads, and in Korea there is only the one. The one in Korea was designed specifically to help motorists stay alert and awake, whereas the Japanese ones were constructed for tourism. Also, the Civic Musical Road is a quarter-mile stretch of road in Lancaster, California, whose grooves cause the finale of the William Tell Overture to resound as you drive over it.

Shea's Castle

Today I found the last place it could possibly be. I set out around seven...the sun was near setting but not too near. Everything was covered in that sweetlight, the photographers call it. The wind made my little car sway as we headed west. Toward the poppy fields. I figured now would be a good time to go. No one would be out looking at the flowers when they're all curled up tight like pencils against the cold wind. I pass a puddle collected by recent rain on the side of the road. The field to the left is covered with cows, one with a tiny calf shivering between its legs. Almost passed it--an easy to miss dirt road on the right. I take it a little ways, and there it is. The castle gate!

I've heard from people about a castle that's out in the desert somewhere...but no one seemed to know exactly where, or what it was called, or anything else about it. They'd say it was near Lake Elizabeth or Lake Hughes, or by the aqueduct or in this direction or that, and I've been looking for ages on random roads and hikes and never found it.
Geocaching to the rescue! A cache was described to be near it, so in looking for the cache, I found the castle, that I now know as Shea's Castle, or Sky Castle. It was built in 1924 by Richard Peter Shea, a developer from New York who made his fortune with the development of Hancock Park in Los Angeles. He moved to California in hopes that the health of his wife Ellen would improve. He spent two years building what was designed to look like an Irish castle, its 17 rooms, 5 foot thick walls, hand-carved grillwork, and huge stone step entrance costing more than $500,000 in the 1920s. Shea had dreamed of owning a castle since he was a boy, but unfortunately in 1929 when the stock market crashed, the bank took over his "Castle of Dreams." His wife died shortly after, and as the story goes he went to a pier in Venice, and with a bag containing his wife's ashes tied around his waist, lept to his death, dying alone and penniless. The castle has since passed through a variety of owners, including Roy Rogers, Tommy Stewart Lee, a woman named Dolores Fuller Burchett who turned it into a working ranch, and a non-profit flying group who added a runway, lake, and dam. The property also has natural springs as well as petroglyphs, and has been a location for films and tv shows.
I slid under the gate, but as I got closer I could see a man at the front door of the castle like a sentry. I got as close as I dared for fear of him seeing me, then turned around. Seeing the aqueduct running right above the castle property, I went back to my car and got back to the road where I parked and walked along the aqueduct to get a closer look from above, safe on public land.
I never found the cache. But finding the castle was better than any old box of trinkets in a bush.

Eyjafjallajökull!

In the news-- the "island-mountain-glacier" known as Eyjafjallajökull has been active in Iceland this month for the first time since 1823. It is one of the smaller glaciers of Iceland, situated to the south of the country, and its 39-mile-square icecap covers a volcano whose summit is 5,466 feet. The volcano's crater is at 1.9-2.5 miles in diameter and has erupted twice in 2010--once on March 20th and once on April 14th. The volcanic system of Iceland runs directly through the middle of the country from southeast to northwest and has much to do with the beautiful and dramatic landscape of the region. Seismic activity in the volcano area was first detected in December of 2009, during which thousands of small earthquakes occurred. Activity increased up until the first eruption on the twentieth of March in a popular nearby hiking region known as Fimmvörðuháls. The eruption was relatively small in scale up until the second eruption on the fourteenth of April, which was estimated to be 10-20 times larger than the initial one. The eruptions caused quite a bit of air travel disruption across northern Europe, along with some rare electrical storms. Scientists fear that tremors from Eyjafjallajökull could set off an even larger eruption at the neighbouring Katla volcano about 12 miles away. Katla followed Eyjafjallajökull the last three times it erupted, and since it is overdue on its typical schedule of awakening every 80 years or so, there is good reason for the Icelanders to be wary. The two volcanoes are thought to be connected by a network of magma channels, and Katla happens to be beneath Myrdalsjökull, one of Iceland's largest glaciers. Katla has shown no signs of seismic activity so far, but should it do so, it would cause an even more dangerous eruption. Residents would have to evacuate incredibly quickly to avoid flash floods that would inevitably tear down the mountain, along with burning gas, molten earth, and ash that would shoot to extremely high altitudes.
The name "Eyjafjallajökull" is very literal one, made up of the words "eyja" (island), "fjall" (fell or mountain), and "jökull" (glacier). The whole Icelandic language tends to be constructed similarly, such as the word for "library" translating literally to "book house."

The raft floated down the river sank.

Believe it or not, that sentence is grammatical. It's an example of what's known as a "garden path sentence"--a sentence "for which the responder's most intuitive interpretation is an incorrect one, ultimately luring them to an improper understanding of it." So basically they're sentences you begin reading in one manner, before a word or tense conflicts with the original path of comprehension and forces you to backtrack and look for other possible structures.
"The raft floated down the river" makes sense until you reach the word "sank."
Wtf?
The raft, that was floated down the river, sank.
OH! :)
Such sentences are rare in verbal communication due to stress and tone of voice but in written word, meanings often get so tangled up in tenses. The "syntactic ambiguity" is fun to read though. You realize:
"the old man the boat" means "the boat is manned by old people,"
"the man whistling tunes pianos" means "the man, who is whistling, also tunes pianos,"
"the woman returned to her house was happy" means "the woman, who was returned to her house, was happy,"
and "the tomcat curled up on the couch seemed friendly" means "the tomcat that was in a curled-up position on the couch, seemed friendly."
On a related note..."crash blossoms?" Headlines gone wrong. Crash blossoms are newspaper headlines with wild and sometimes humourous syntactic ambiguity, such as "Squad helps dog bite victim" (The squad helped the dog bite a victim? No no, the squad helped a victim of a dog bite!), "Man shot in chest, leg knocks on door for help" (A man was shot in the chest, and a leg knocks on the door for help? No: the man, who was shot in the chest and leg, knocked on a door for help.) and "Robot helps stroke victims in Portland" (The robot was stroking victims in Portland? OH, the robot was helping victims of STROKES in Portland.)
The girl writing the blog giggled.

All around the world

Circumnavigation is defined as travelling all the way around the world by any method, as long as the route covers at least a great circle (a circle running along the surface of a sphere so as to cut it into two equal halves) and passes through at least one pair of points antipodal (diametrically opposite) to each other. Widely recognized circumnavigations include ones made (or attempted) by sea, air, or soley human power. Nautical voyages are made via the Panama and Suez Canals, making use of the trade winds conducted by the circulation of the earth's atmosphere. In aviation, routes are often taken by way of jet streams, which circulate the northern and southern hemispheres without crossing the equator. To this date no one has quite circumnavigated the globe entirely by human power (by Guinness World Record standards), but notable attempts have been made. The first sailing circumnavigation was made in 1522 by a Spaniard, Juan Sebastián Elcano. In the 1580s, a Franciscan friar by the name of Martín Ignacio de Loyola was the first to circle the world twice, and the first to do so in both directions, westward and eastward. There are many records related to completely sailing around the world, and currently 16-year old Abby Sunderland has been en route since February of this year attempting a solo circumnavigation that if completed will make her the youngest to do so alone. The first aerial circumnavigation was done in 1924 by the US Army Air Service, and nine years later, the first solo one was made by a pilot named Wiley Post. Several people have walked, hitchhiked, or bicycled somewhat around the world, but obviously the oceans are somewhat of an obstacle to complete a circle entirely by land-favouring ways of transport. If I were a braver girl, maybe I'd try it, too.

Geocaching!

A marvelous game of hide-and-seek, "geocaching" is a hobby where people use gps devices to conceal and locate 'caches'--generally small, waterproof containers that contain a logbook, and often little trinkets or toys. Players can make them out of any sort of container and put anything they want in them. Once they hide one, they report it on the geocaching website, where other people can locate and go in search of them. Some are pretty easy to find while others require long hikes, climbing up trees, or even diving underwater to find. There are understood rules of conduct to take part in geocaching, one of which is if you take something from a cache you must leave something else behind. If a cache is vandalized or stolen, it is said to have been "muggled" or "plundered." A modern take on the 150-year-old game of letterboxing, geocaching is played in over 100 countries and on all seven continents. As of this writing, there are over a million active geocaches in activity. There are all sorts of fun things involved such as "travel bugs," which are plastic figurines sporting a PIN-embedded tag, that are moved from cache to cache by geocaching participants who log their travels. "Geocoins" are similar objects, often engraved with tracking numbers as well as a symbol or design representing a certain geocacher's handle. Some caches involve a series of multiple discoveries, some are meant to be found at night by way of reflectors, some you have to solve a puzzle or code to find, and some are meant to be taken once found and hidden somewhere else by the latest finder.
I went in search for the first time today in the desert around my town. I had no luck, but I think I was searching for one too hard for a newbie. I did meet a stranger, however, who gave me some clues and a pointy walking stick in case of snakes ^_^

The University and Airline Bomber

Know anything about Dr. Theodore John Kaczynski?
Yeah, I didn't either.
Better known as the Unabomber, Ted Kaczynski, famous for his campaign of mail bombings, is also a mathematician and social critic, albeit being incarcerated. He was born in Chicago, an intellectual child prodigy, and became an assistant professor at UC Berkeley by the age of 25 but resigned two years later. In the summer of 1971, he moved to a small residence of his parents' in Lombard, Illinois, and two years later moved to just outside Lincoln, Montana in a remote cabin he built himself. He did so in order to live a simple life without money, electricity or running water. His goal was to become self-sufficient and it was here that he became driven to start his bombings. On a walk to one of his favourite remote spots he found the development of a road and was outraged. In his "Unabomber Manifesto" written as Industrial Society and Its Future, he detailed, among other things, "getting back at the system" rather than his original goal of survival skills and primitive technologies. He proceeded to send 16 mail bombs to university professors and airline officials between 1978-1995, injuring 23 people and killing 3. He often included letters, some to his former victims, demanding his manifesto be printed in a newspaper or journal, or his terrorist actions would continue. The US Department of Justice ended up publishing it in the New York Times as well as the Washington Post in favour of public safety, and also with the hope someone would recognize the author's writing style. Before its publication, Ted's brother David was already suspicious of him being behind the bombings, and in the end it was him who turned him into the FBI, who in April 1996 arrested Ted Kacyznski at his cabin in Montana. He is currently living a life sentence in prison without the possibility of parole in Florence, Colorado. His manifesto can be read here, and though his actions were extreme I'm definitely curious about the thoughts behind such a person.

$20 louder.

I bought one of those little baby amps that are battery powered so you can strap it to yourself and walk around playing. I can't wait to try it out.

The silent immortal invasion?

For as long as humanity has existed, we've fought death and tried to reverse aging by any means necessary. Every day you read about some food that has been found to be good for you or some remedy to help you live younger longer. Our bodies start to sag and we prop them back up, organs and limbs deteriorate and we try to fix them, but invariably no matter how hard we try and no matter how much smarter we feel we're getting about our health, we're dropping quicker than ever.
Who knew it was a jellyfish that would find the fountain of youth?
The turritopsi nutricula is a species of jellyfish that constantly undergoes a process called transdifferentiation, where one cell is transformed into another. Salamanders and sea stars do that to an extent, which is how they regrow limbs. This jellyfish, however, is able to reverse its aging process by reverting from its mature adult stage to its first stage of life and back over and over again. Theoretically this can happen indefinitely, rendering the animal biologically immortal. They are native to the Caribbean, but since there seems to be no natural end to its lifespan, they've spread and can now be found in oceans around the world.

Inhale, exhale.

There is no reason for this post except that I found this picture and I like it.

Sardinian centenarians

You know the term 'sardonic?'
Comes from the people of Sardinia, a region of Italy on the second-largest island in the Mediterranean. The eating habits, activities, social life, and other aspects of the Sardinian lifestyle contribute to making this region, along with the Japanese island of Okinawa, the area with the highest rate of centenarians in the world. Their diet consists of mainly whole-grain bread, beans, vegetables, and fruits, along with goat's milk and wine high in flavonoids. The exercise they get and the social life they lead contribute greatly to their longevity and it's no wonder Americans are so miserable. The Sardinians live in strong, healthy families. They celebrate their elders and laugh with their friends and they have a true purpose in life, whether it's farming or shepherding. Even the grandparents are out every day at five in the morning doing what they have done their entire lives, because they are healthy and happy. They're not discontent, running in a race they don't know what they're running for. They're not stressed about where their careers are taking them their entire lives. Their diet isn't based around a cheeseburger. And they're not caught up making insincere conversations on facebook. They just live, and it's one of the purest examples of simple, pure happiness. Living with friends and family, having a purpose, and eating healthy. It's so simple. Why can't we understand?

Darker than the deepest sea

This is my favourite picture of Nick Drake. I fell in love with him four years ago the way everyone sometimes falls in love with the beauty they see in strangers they'll never know. His voice is the sweetest sound to me, and I fell asleep to one of his albums every night for months. I wanted to marry him but I found out he died before I was even born.

LifeGem

I shouldn't make light of this because it's likely something I would do...but there is a company out there who will turn the ashes of a deceased loved one into a diamond for you. No joke. Apparently they can extract the carbon from a lock of hair or existing cremated remains and convert the carbon to graphite, and then a rough diamond crystal to wear. According to some info I got in the mail, you can even have your pet turned into a diamond, and in 2007 such a diamond was made from the remains of Ludwig van Beethoven and auctioned off for $202,700 on ebay for a charity in support of underprivileged children. Part of me wants to laugh, part of me takes it seriously, and part of me is just amazed by the idea.

Mobile Bay jubilee

On the shores of Mobile Bay, Alabama, a curious thing takes place between June and September. All at once, many species of eel, fish, crab, and shrimp will swim from deeper waters and swarm to the shallower coastal area of the bay. It's speculated that this occurs when rapid depletion of oxygen in the waters of the bay drives the sea life to seek areas less affected by the oxygen shortage. The lethargic nature of the animals and the sheer number of them during these occurrences attracts large crowds with the promise of easy to catch seafood. Jubilees most often occur in certain conditions. They tend to happen in August, commonly on the upper eastern shore of the bay, just before dawn, with an incoming tide and an easterly wind. The coastline where jubilees frequently take place is densely populated, so when someone should spot one, they alert their neighbours so everyone can rush to the shore and gather a harvest of seafood. The event is somewhat akin to a community beach party. Some beach party for all the fish and crabs desperate to survive.

Ladybugs from the sea

Today I was on the beach in Ventura, when in the ocean breeze suddenly was a bunch of ladybugs, landing on me and all around me! Why?

DINOSHARK

Today, what do I see on yahoo but an advertisement for a movie called Dinoshark coming on tv tomorrow night??? Apparently the 150-year old dinosaur shark beast has come to wreak havoc at a tropical resort. I don't know why but I am dying to see it.

Let there be light?

What on earth is St. Elmo's Fire?
The scientists write about it all weird and complicated, but basically what happens is during an electrical storm at sea, a sort of plasma lamp type of thing occurs at the ends of the masts on ships. It was regarded by sailors with awe and was so named for the patron saint of sailors--Saint Erasmus of Formiae (St. Elmo was a mispronounciation of St. Ermo). The "fire" is usually bright blue or violet due to the ionization of air molecules, and appears on tall, sharply-pointed structures such as aircraft wings, chimneys, lightning rods, spires, and of course, ship masts.
St. Elmo's Fire is often confused with ball lightning, which is a separate meteorological phenomenon. Ball lightning is an atmospheric electrical phenomenon identified as glowing, spherical objects varying greatly in size, resembling lighting but lasting quite a bit longer than a lightning bolt. The scientific data on this phenomenon is scarce because of how infrequent and unpredictable it is, making its existence still somewhat debated and controversial. Accounts of ball lightning vary widely, by the direction it moves, what it is attracted (or unattracted) to, how it behaves, how it looks, etc. There are also many hypotheses attempting to explain how it comes to be, from electrical charges in natural magnetic fields, to silicon struck by lightning vapourizing and glowing in the air as it oxidizes, to the passage of black holes through Earth's atmosphere--but nothing is concrete.
What about the "foolish fire" known as the Will-o'-the-wisp? Folklore accredits the phenomenon to any number of fairies, ghosts, spirits, or even animals, who carry or direct the light for reasons good or bad. The Irish tale is that of a condemned man named Jack who carries around an ember from the fires of hell to light his way through the spirit world. The British believe the light is in the hands of a rogue fairy who leads travelers off the beaten path to be lost forever. In other European tales the light is said to be a lost soul of the dead who are either mischievous or malevolent in nature and intend to lead followers to their death. In the US, the ghost light of the will-o'-the-wisp is mainly attributed to railroad workers killed in work accidents or lost miners whose ghosts now carry lanterns as they wander. Other cultures believed the light to mark the location of a hidden treasure. But as it turns out, it's often nothing more than the oxidation of a couple different chemical compounds igniting on contact with oxygen, causing glowing lights. Or is it?
Other ghost lights include the Min Min Light of eastern Australia, the Naga fireballs in Thailand, the Hessdalen lights of Norway, the Paulding light in Michigan, and the Marfa lights in Texas just to name a few. All are similarly described, yet unexplained, light phenomena that occur enough to be reported, denied, speculated, investigated, and debated.

The great destructive noise!

Every February or March like clockwork, a phenomenon known as a tidal bore occurs every year in Brazil, South America. The "pororoca" as it is known locally, occurs at the mouth of the Amazon River where an incoming spring tide from the Atlantic Ocean is strong enough to push a wave upriver and against the current. Though many tidal bores occur around the world, the pororoca of the Amazon is the biggest, with waves up to 13 feet high, traveling as much as 8 miles inland upstream on the river at up to 13 miles an hour. The wave is popular with river surfers and a championship has been held every year since 1999. This can be quite a feat due to the turbulent nature of tidal bores, often carrying entire trees and other debris in its wake. These bores are also characteristically loud due to the surging waters mixing, and once a captain heard the low rumble of the pororoca an hour before it reached his ship. In 2003, a Brazilian by the name of Picuruta Salazar rode the wave 7.8 miles in 37 minutes, the current record.
Check it out.

Fire in the sky

When you think about really neat or beautiful clouds, cumulus always comes to mind--those big poofy epic-looking ones before a storm. But without those high level, wispy cirrus clouds in the atmosphere you'd never get incredible optical phenomena such as halos, fire rainbows, light pillars, sun dogs, and a "circumzenithal arc" known as the Bravais' arc. Cirrus clouds are made of plate-shaped ice crystals high in the atmosphere that are formed when water vapour freezes at above 26,000 feet. They are so thin because of how sparse the moisture at that altitude. These clouds are the perfect medium for the refraction of light to make amazing sights in the sky.
There are a great many halos and arcs of varying degrees that can occur in different circumstances, with different angles, latitudes, times of day, and even light sources. There is a name for every possible optical phenomenon ever recorded.
Circumhorizontal arcs, or "fire rainbows" for example, are ice-halos, whole or in part, formed by the crystals in cirrus clouds. These halos don't occur unless the sun is very high in the sky. Latitude also plays a part in the ability to see them--these halos are impossible to see above 55° north or below 55° south. Around the summer solstice it is visible for a greater or lesser time depending on location. In Los Angeles, California the slot of visibility is much greater than say, London, England.
Parhelia, or "sun dogs" are mock suns that appear on either side of the sun, generally seen when the sky is low. Often they appear so bright they can easily be mistaken for the real sun. They always stay at the same altitude as the sun, and are red-coloured nearest the sun. They are always aligned, and often visibly merge into the "parhelic circle," which is a horizontal arc through the sun often seen in similar conditions.
Light pillars are formed by the reflection of light from ice crystals with near horizontal parallel planar surfaces. What? Just another angle of light dispersion in a vertical line above (or occasionally below) the light source, be it the sun, moon, or even streetlights.
Circumzenithal arcs look somewhat like inverted rainbows but again are caused by the refraction of light through ice crystals rather than that of raindrops.
Each of these kinds of phenomena need certain conditions to appear, and probably you will never see two the same.

For the love of Poe

As mysterious as the disputed cause of Edgar Allan Poe's death, is the male figure in a black coat and hat who comes to offer tribute to the writer every year since January 1949, a century after Poe's death. The "poe toaster" enters the Westminster Hall and Burying Ground in Baltimore, Maryland in the early hours of the morning on every January 19th (Poe's birthday), where he raises a cognac toast before departing, leaving three red roses and a half-empty bottle of Martell cognac on the grave. The roses are said to represent Poe himself, his wife Virginia, and his mother-in-law, Maria Clemm. The significance of the cognac is unknown but for notes left by the toaster indicating the bottle was left to continue family tradition. Many of the bottles have been kept at the Baltimore Poe House and Museum. The toaster often left notes in addition to the roses and cognac, some simply in devotion to Poe, but others indicating the "torch" of being the Poe toaster was going to be passed. In 1993 a short note read to that effect, and in 1999 another one was left saying the original toaster had passed away the year before and a son had taken over the tradition.
In 2006, much to the dismay of the Edgar Allen Poe House and Museum curator Jeff Jerome, several people attempted to accost and identify the toaster, possibly angered by notes left by the new toaster. In 2001 and 2004 the toaster left notes commenting on current events, causing somewhat of a furor.
In 2007, around 60 people showed up for the event, and in 2008, nearly 150.
In 2009, on the 200th anniversary of Poe's death, suddenly the crowd was much smaller than in past years, and in 2010, the Poe toaster failed to make an appearance for the first time since the tradition began.
One thing the curator has never revealed to the media is a gesture the toaster apparently makes every year, in hopes of one day identifying him.

Saturday shelves

Today I went to the bookstore to get one book and I came back with two. The book was for my health class, I'm doing a book report on it, that was easy enough. Going back to the front of the store to the registers I pass by the children's section where someone is reading Peter Rabbit to a group of children.
"...in the neatest sandiest hole of all, cousins--Flopsy, Mopsy, Cotton-tail and Peter. Old Mrs. Rabbit was a widow; she earned her living by knitting rabbit-wool mittens and muffetees (I once bought a pair at a bazaar). She also sold herbs, and rosemary tea, and rabbit-tobacco (which is what WE call lavender)." I remember when mom used to read us that.
At that big display of books right next to the register I see "No One Belongs Here More Than You" by Miranda July and it's six bucks so I get it and start reading the stories as soon as I leave the store.
As I read them I wish I was that unafraid. I wish I could tell the kind of stories that people read, the kind of stories that people love, the kind of stories that people quote and retell. Because if I could tell the kind of stories that people read maybe I could feel beautiful.
So far I like this part the best:
Do you have doubts about life? Are you unsure if it is worth the trouble? Look at the sky: that is for you. Look at each person's face as you pass on the street: those faces are for you. And the street itself, and the ground under the street, and the ball of fire underneath the ground: all these things are for you. They are as much for you as they are for other people. Remember this when you wake up in the morning and think you have nothing. Stand up and face the east. Now praise the sky and praise the light within each person under the sky. It's okay to be unsure. But praise, praise, praise.

Sky's the limit

Did you see that movie Up? Where the old man takes off in a trip with scores of balloons attached to his house?
Apparently, "cluster ballooning" is a real-life version of that Pixar movie. People literally attach themselves to bunches of balloons--not quite everyday party balloons, but relatively small weather balloons--and take off. It's a lot harder than traditional hot-air ballooning, being that a cluster of balloons doesn't have a vent for altitude control, but rather they rise uncontrollably. Cluster balloonists often use bottled water as a ballast and have to frequently cut balloons to maintain their altitude.
A man named Lawrence Richard Walters, nicknamed "Lawnchair Larry" or the "Lawn Chair Pilot" took flight in such a manner in the summer of 1982 from San Pedro, California to controlled airspace near Los Angeles International Airport. Without any prior ballooning experience he attached 42 helium-filled weather balloons to an ordinary patio chair and launched into the sky.
In November 1992, Yoshikazu Suzuki left from Lake Biwa, northeast of Kyoto, Japan via cluster ballooning, was sighted in the sky once and never seen again.
The Guinness Book of World Records credits Mike Howard of England and Steve Davis of the United States as the balloonists to have, in August 2001, reached the highest altitude by cluster ballooning--a height of 18,300 feet.
In April 2008 a Roman Catholic priest by the name of Adelir Antonio de Carli used 1000 balloons to make a flight as a fundraiser, but was lost and found dead in the ocean near Rio de Janeiro three months later.
Licensed pilot Jonathon Trappe in June of 2008 reportedly attached a cluster of balloons to his office chair, flew 4 hours and 50 miles, then returning to the ground and apparently going about his life.
FUN

The diver's cemetary/underwater caves!

On the coast of the Red Sea in Egypt, lies a 426-foot deep submarine cave or sinkhole, known simply as Blue Hole. A shallow opening at about 20 feet deep known as "The Saddle" faces the sea, and at a depth of 170 feet, a 85-foot long tunnel known as "The Arch" leads to the open sea as well. Blue Hole is a infamous site for diver deaths, with most accidents occurring during divers' attempts to find the Arch. The Arch is known to be very deceptive due to the odd angle at which it is found, the dim lighting that gives the illusion that it is about half as long as it is, the inward current, and the fact that the Arch continues to the seabed beyond view. The Arch is also particularly dangerous because it lies at a depth beyond the recreational diving limit (131 feet) set by the Professional Association of Diving Instructors, at which nitrogen narcosis begins to take its toll. Nitrogen narcosis is a state similar to alcohol intoxication or nitrous oxide inhalation which can alter consciousness to any degree between mild euphoria and delayed responses, to hallucinations and death. Narcosis can be so severe that a person can lose all survival instinct, such as the case of Russian diver Yuri Lipski, who died at 300 feet below the surface in April of 2000.
"Blue Holes" also refer to the general existence of similar vertical caves in the sea, and there are many around the world, namely in the Bahamas and Belize. They are described as roughly circular, steep-walled depressions commonly in limestone or carbonate platforms. They are so named for the deep blue in the center of the hole contrasting by a lighter blue on the outside. They are often anoxic waters, or waters lacking dissolved oxygen due to poor circulation. This environment supports bacteria but not much sea life. The deepest blue hole is Dean's Blue Hole, located in the Bahamas at a depth of 663 feet. The next deepest blue holes are only just half that deep. The Great Blue Hole in Belize was made famous by the french diver Jacques Cousteau and is a popular spot for tourism.

Sea of Trees

Deep in a forest at the base of Mount Fuji in Japan lies a place shrouded in mythology. The trees are so dense and wildlife is so scarce, it's an eerily quiet location, perfect setting for death. It contains several rocky, icy caverns in its dark depths which have become popular tourist destinations.
Aokigahara, or the Sea of Trees, is a popular place for suicides--the second most popular after San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge. Despite warnings in Japanese and English, more than 500 people have died in the forest, mostly to suicides. The popularity of the location is often credited to a Japanese novel published in 1960 called Kuroi Jukai which ends in the suicide of two lovers in the forest, although the place has been associated with death long before the novel was published. The Japanese custom ubasute--the abandoning of a sick or elderly relative in remote place and left to die--was practiced into the 19th century and the ghosts from the people who had died are said to haunt the forest.
An average of 30 people a year are reported to have committed suicide in the forest yearly, although the rate grew to 100 in 2003, when the local government stopped publicizing the deaths in order to downplay Aokigahara's association with suicide.
Other than people seeking to end their lives, the rugged and unforgiving terrain attracts all sorts of hikers and thrill-seekers, as well as treasure hunters who seek out discarded wallets and other effects from people who are soon to need them no more.
Part of the appeal of people taking their last journey here, I imagine, is dying at the foot of Mount Fuji, a sacred place. Maybe they seek nothing more than a romantic death steeped in culture.

Cryptids--earth's elusive mammals, reptiles, marsupials, crustaceans?!

Today, I'm 23, but years ago I was just another little kid exploring. On a trip to Morro Bay with my family once, my sister and I stumbled upon this unrecognizable mass that had washed up on the shore. Something white and blubbery, about the size of the tire on a car, shaped like a horseshoe crab, but much too large and not crab-like at all. We poked at it with sticks, turned it over, did dances around it, and drew pictures in the sand depicting its life as whatever creature we decided it was, but we never knew exactly what it was. And at the end of the day we all got back in the truck and went home to forget about it.
Likely, it was some bit of a whale or other sea creature, but it could have been a "globster," a term coined for an unidentified organic mass that washes up on the shoreline of the ocean or any other body of water. The nature of globsters remains a mystery even as the tissues from them are often tested and identified by scientists. Many of these monsters that have been found have been identified, but often globsters lack apparent bone structures, tentacles, flippers, or eyes, making it difficult to determine the species if it is a known one. Some globsters that have been thought to be plesiosaurs were in reality the rotting carcasses of basking sharks. Globsters of all shapes and sizes have been sighted, examined, photographed, and reported since the St. Augustine Monster of 1896, which ended up being a mass of blubber from a sperm whale. The "Montauk Monster," one such globster that never was identified, washed up on a beach near Montauk, New York in July of 2008. By its dental patterns and front paws, it was speculated to be a raccoon, yet it had what appeared to be a beak and the legs seemed too long in proportion to its body.
These monsters and globsters can also become known as "cryptids," creatures whose existence has been suggested but unrecognized by the scientific community, or regarded as highly unlikely. The most famous of these cryptids are of course, Bigfoot, the Loch Ness Monster, and the Chupacabra. But hey, there's a whole field of study dedicated to the study of these alleged animals, although no scientist has ever been employed to study it--cryptozoology. People are either afraid of, intrigued by, or skeptical of the unknown, and we always will be.

Old people rule

I don't have much to say except to show you this:

One of the cutest fucking things I've ever seen in my life. I guess they have been married 62 years, and the man is about to be 90. I love that they still touch each other's bums when they switch over. I hope I am that cool when I am old.

Denmark's starling ballet

This morning as I drove toward my friend's house, I was stopped at an intersection where a flock of birds were swooping back and forth over the street. A few miles away there are two gas stations across the street from each other, and all day, a flock of pigeons will do that and it's mesmerizing, just like watching fire or the ocean--where it is constantly moving yet always staying the same.
In the marshlands of southwestern Denmark, I guess a similar thing occurs every spring and autumn as groups of starlings migrate between winter grounds in south Europe and summer breeding grounds in Scandinavia. They gather in flocks of thousands, and up to a million birds during the hours just after sunset and make huge formations in the sky before settling on where to roost for the night. It's quite a dance and sometimes the birds are so numerous that they seem to block out the sun, hence the name for the phenomenon--"sort sol" which translates to "black sun" in Danish. The flocks make incredible, fluid shapes in the air and apparently do so for hours before roosting. I see videos about things like this, or read about them, or even just see that flock this morning--and sometimes there's so much amazing shit in this world that I just can't take it.

To explore the infinite abyss

Today I went with a couple friends to Una Lake--what's known locally as the "bottomless lake" of Palmdale, California. It goes relatively unnoticed near Palmdale Lake which is a popular fishing and hunting location in the area. Turning north on Sierra Highway from Avenue S, it's not even a half mile down on the left side. It's all fenced off and adorned with No Trespassing signs, but does that ever stop anyone? The lake is one of several along the San Andreas fault line which may be why it's said to be bottomless. Local folklore tells stories about cars that have driven off the road into the water and never been found, scuba teams that have gone in trying to find the bottom and been lost, and swimmers that have disappeared. People also claim to have seen glowing lights or bubbling on the surface of the water, strange animals, fish with legs or without eyes, or a bat-like sea monster similar to the one said to be seen at nearby Lake Elizabeth, another lake along the fault some twenty miles away. These "lakes" are really what's known as "sag ponds"--depressions caused by fault movement stretching the land and filling with water. From Una Lake westward it goes Palmdale Lake, Lake Elizabeth, Lake Hughes, and Munz Lake, all bodies of water caused by seismic activity along the fault line. Is it really bottomless? Do the ghost stories and disappearances have any truth? Who knows, but it is a beautiful place. With a marsh stretching out east into a field with the snowy San Bernadinos in the background, the cool breeze of impending spring, and the sound of the train pumping past--being next to an abyss, while a little eerie--was peaceful.

Bra-ttention, please.

We've seen picket, wrought iron, chain link, and barbed wire fences...but ever see one of underwear?
A public road reserve in Central Otago, New Zealand, once boasted what became known as the Cardrona Bra Fence, a rural fence that one day in early 1999 sported four women's bras, for no apparent reason. By the end of February, it had accumulated about sixty, when they were anonymously removed. At this point the story reached the New Zealand media, causing more bras to appear. By October 2000, the bras had amassed again to about 200 when the fence was cleared once again. By early 2006, nearly 800 bras had been attached to the fence and the story spread as far as Europe. Some locals welcomed the fence as a quirky tourist attraction but others thought it was distasteful and even insulting. Although it became the most photographed place in the area, and most of the letters regarding the fence were positive, the city council ruled to remove the fence in April 2006.

Homelessness is such a strange career.

Last night this homeless man in a wheelchair was hit by a car and killed crossing a major intersection right by the starbucks where I work. My best friend told me about it--she was sent home from work early because of it, the "disturbance" slowed down business.
A coworker had made a joke about it but someone just died, she said.
The world is so fucked up, he was just trying to live, but now he's gone and life goes on and nobody cares. I was listening to this mix you gave me and this really dark song with cello came on and I felt nauseous, she said.
I didn't remember then but tonight I realized I'd met him. Last week as I went to see a movie with a couple friends I gave him a few dollars. He asked me about my beetle, and he just wanted to talk. Tonight it hit me too. Hit me that he's just gone. She said once, "Homelessness is such a strange career. Depending on the compassion of other human beings to survive."
And here I sit in my house, typing about him on my laptop. I'm drinking some tea and I just took a shower. I'm not hungry. The heater is on to keep the cold at bay. I'm healthy, warm, full, I have a home, I'm listening to my favourite band, and relaxing after work. No one has taken away my dog because I can't afford the license to have him. No one is hauling me off in a cop car for standing in front of a store pleading of strangers to help me be able to eat. I sleep behind a closed door, and my clothes are clean and whole. I'm known by the government as a string of nine numbers, I'm known to my job as a string of seven, my existence is marked in digits if not by family and friends. I survive, working a part time job and seeking another, going to school, and functioning in society.
Anything I ever have to complain about having to endure seems so incredibly whiny, selfish, and completely unimportant. I know I will forget how I feel now and grumble about having to buy gas, pay rent, go to work, do homework, but I fucking have a car, a place to live, a job, and an education. There are a thousand tiny things I think about and complain about in a day and I pray to God I never forget or take advantage of what a privileged, spoiled brat I am. What lucky sons and daughters of hungry beasts we are when we're all going to be ghosts one day.

Old school wanderlust

Gypsy caravans! I guess RVs are just a modernized version of what they had going on, but no Komfort or Winnebago can compare to traditional "vardos" as they're called, no matter how many comforts and features. How COOL and unique would it be to live in and travel around in one of those elaborate wagons? "Gypsies" refer to the English Romani people, an ethnic group of Europeans whose origins go back to medieval India. According to history, the caravans were originally used in 1810 by circus performers in France, and it wasn't until later in the century that British Romanichals started building wagons with their own characteristic style of decoration. The Romani vardos were elaborately painted and hand carved with symbols depicting their lifestyle, often including birds, lions, griffins, horses, flowers, and vines. They often reflected the individual makers by their particular designs, and it was a custom in their culture in the event of a death to burn the owner's wagon and belongings as a funeral rite.

Did you hear that?

How many things are we able to perceive yet not able to understand? Several times during the summer of 1997, an ultra-low frequency and extremely powerful underwater sound known as the "Bloop" was detected in the south Pacific Ocean by the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Having ruled out several possible origins, including man-made sounds such as submarines or bombs, and geological sounds such as volcanoes and earthquakes, the source of the sound remains unknown. Since it was several times louder than the loudest known biological sound (that of the blue whale), it is also unlikely to have been made by a living creature.
A similar sound, known as "Slow Down" was also recorded in 1997 in the Equatorial Pacific Ocean, and has been picked up several times each year since then. It is so named because it decreases in frequency over about seven minutes. One hypothesis of the sound is that of ice moving over land in Antarctica, but again the source of the sound is unknown for certain.
"The Hum" is a generic term for the phenomena involving low-frequency humming noises that occur in various geographic locations and are not audible to all people. Low-frequency sounds of this nature are difficult to detect with microphones which is most likely why they are so hard to study and identify. Tinnitus, spontaneous otoacoustic emissions (sounds created by our own ears), and colliding ocean waves have been offered as explanations of hums, but as of yet nothing has been proven conclusively to determine the sources.
The sea is probably one of the most mysterious and unknown areas on the planet...too bad that area accounts for 71% of the earth, huh?

Sailing Stones of Death Valley

There's all sorts of people who go out investigating haunted houses and abandoned mental asylums to hunt down and record weird unexplainable things like objects apparently moving on their own, mysterious and usually creepy noises, and disembodied lights or figures.
But there are plenty of places that demand no such attention but are equally and maybe even more mysterious and intriguing, without all the skeptical and often fabricated nonsense.
Death Valley, a desert located in southern California, exhibits a dry lake known as the Racetrack Playa--the stage for the geological phenomenon known as the sailing stones, or moving rocks. Over years, rocks sizing from pebbles to boulders have carved their own trails across the playa without human or animal intervention. The force behind their movement is debated, and theories include strong winds and ice floes in conjunction with a saturated valley floor.
The tracks made by the stones are often inconsistent and variable--some rocks may start out next to each other moving in parallel lines before one abruptly changes direction. The speed in which the rocks move is also unknown, since they move only every two to three years and no one has ever witnessed their movements.
Most of the rocks originate from a dolomite hillside at the south end of the playa. The tracks can be hundreds of feet long, up to a foot wide, and usually less than an inch deep.
Several studies and monitoring programs have taken place over the years, but none have conclusively explained the motion of the mysterious sliding rocks. I bet God's just having fun with us.