nuclear reactors in japan

i wanted to share some information about the issues surrounding the nuclear reactors in japan since the massive earthquake and tsunami hit last week.

you can read an informative article by maggie koerth-baker: nuclear energy 101.

or watch below as the professor from the periodic table of videos sits down to have a chat about what's going on inside the nuclear reactors in japan:



here's another video that really shows in the strength of flowing water. its amazing how quickly the volume increases. (thanks to commenter kevin for the public link!)

whats the opposite of a white christmas?

i have severely failed the first battle with my new oven. i have no idea what happened... the cookies were in for no longer than 5 minutes! apparently the temperature was a lot higher than where i thought i placed the marker on the dial.

::hangs head in shame::


so... what's the opposite of a white christmas??

a tan christmas!

...i'm heading to the beach :)

guatemala sinkhole

it has certainly been a rough week for the central american country of guatemala. the big picture gives a rough idea of the aftermath of the volcanic ash from pacaya volcano eruption, landslides caused by tropical storm agatha, and this amazing photo of a sinkhole that swallowed an entire building in guatemala city!!


the sink hole is estimated to be 30 meters wide and over 60 meters deep. and looks like something straight out of science fiction. incredible.

these things have formed before, could easily occur again, and maybe shouldnt be called sinkholes.

food that doesn't rot

i applaud nonna joann for her experimental efforts! she bought a happy meal from mcdonalds and let it sit on her shelf for an entire year to see what would happen to the food inside the box, and to contemplate the reality of our fast food society.

she writes, "It smelled delicious for a few days. I’d get a whiff of those yummy French fries every time I walked into my office. After a week or so, you could hardly smell it. My husband worried that when the food began to decompose, there would be a terrible odor in our home. He also worried the food would attract ants and mice. He questioned my sanity."

the photo below is the happy meal ONE YEAR AFTER it was purchased. the results of her experiment have disturbed me.


the contents DID NOT DECOMPOSE or mold or change appearance in any appreciable way. seriously, this is scary!

except for honey, ALL things classified as "food" should decompose. the truth of our species is that everything we eat was once living, from plants to animals. i know its easy to remove ourselves from this fact when so much food at stores is offered in processed forms and comes to us in boxes and cans, but that doesnt change where our natural food sources come from or how our bodies use it.

nonna goes on: "Food is broken down into it’s essential nutrients in our bodies and turned into fuel. Our children grow strong bodies, when they eat real food. Flies ignore a Happy Meal and microbes don’t decompose it, then your child’s body can’t properly metabolize it either. Now you know why it’s called “junk food.”

I think ants, mice and flies are smarter than people, because they weren’t fooled. They never touched the Happy Meal. Children shouldn’t either."

amen.

are you vajazzled?

i will always be a vajazzle virgin.

to witness this weird spectacle, here's a NSFW-ish video.

i'm still feeling traumatized by the discovery of this uncomfortable-looking phenomenon that must be ridiculously expensive.

earthquake in chile, telescopes seem undamaged

during the wee hours of the morning, a magnitude 8.8 earthquake hit chile southwest of santiago. there are several major observatories in chile which house some of the largest telescopes on earth. the gemini-south telescope lives at the southern-most observatory, which is about a 7 hour drive north of santiago. a friend has reported that he could feel a rumble at the telescope, but no damage occurred as a result of the earthquake and observations will carry on as normal tonight! i havent heard news from the other observatories, but they all live several hours farther north of the earthquake epicenter.

the earthquake generated a tsunami that is currently propogating across the pacific ocean. it is set to hit hawaii at 11 am local time. i have several friends using telescopes on mauna kea right now, and some in airplanes traveling there, so i'm sending positive thoughts their way! i'll keep you posted on any news as i hear it.

the big picture has an early set of photos from chile.

UPDATE: aside from some power outages and lack of communication soon after the earthquake, no major telescope facilities have suffered damage. the ESO facility in santiago reports no damage. the university in concepcion is another story... news from colleagues is that people they know working in concepcion have relocated to stay with friends in other cities (mainly santiago) until the infrastructure is fixed a bit. read more at SarahAskew.

galaxies of garbage

yes, humans have purposely created islands in unexpected places - dubai, for example. but we've also accidentally made other islands, whose total size may add up to be TWICE THE SIZE OF TEXAS!

thats right: trash islands! off the pacific west coast of the US, 1000 miles northeast of hawaii, live several massive, synthetic, growing islands of our rubbish. our synthetic products and the whirling ocean currents have conspired together to create floating piles of plastic leftovers from our lives. we have multiple huge and expanding mountains of refuse living in the vortices of earth's oceans.


yuck!

what can we do? reuse items that dont break up: plastics! reuse plastic bags, or get cloth bags that you can use infinitely! increase the use of biodegradable materials wherever possible. buy a cup or more permanent water bottle to drink from , instead of opening several plastic water bottles a day.

of course, as a single individual my efforts wont decrease the rate at which the galaxies of garbage are growing, but i think as a society, we have to get better at reusing what we buy. we just plain dont need all this *stuff* in our lives!