tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-64551454215241005562024-02-22T11:54:13.484-08:00Pendred Noyce: View from the WindowseatPennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.comBlogger275125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-34751792596271298952016-12-02T15:18:00.000-08:002016-12-02T15:22:52.106-08:00<div class="MsoNormal">
Why Fantasy?<o:p></o:p></div>
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Today Calumet Editions published my young adult novel, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=beechwood+flute">THE BEECHWOOD FLUTE</a>. Some might ask why after seven books focused on science (both fiction and nonfiction) I decided to return to writing fantasy.<o:p></o:p></div>
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The easy answer is that I finished a first draft of this book six or seven years ago, before <a href="http://tumblehomelearning.com/">Tumblehome Learning</a>, before the <a href="http://tumblehomelearning.com/g-a-s-products/">Galactic Academy of Science</a> series or my books of biographies of women in science. When I started FLUTE I had just completed <a href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/B005NI7QTM/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1">LOST IN LEXICON</a>. Maybe my head was just in fantasy mode. <o:p></o:p></div>
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But it’s really more complicated than that. I never aspired to write a traditional fantasy with dragons and curses and magic spells. In LOST IN LEXICON, I set myself a specific challenge, to build a quest adventure around common topics in middle school mathematics and English language arts, to make them teasing and fun for brainy readers. Now, in the new book about a flute boy who wants to be a soldier, I wanted to explore certain questions of psychology and identity. To do so, I needed a society that highlighted issues of bravery and justice in a way that would be clear to young readers.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Ursula LeGuin is the paramount artisan of this kind of fiction. She sets up a world in which she can ask a set of questions to challenge us. What would life be like in an anarchist utopia? What if we were not always the same sex, but changed from one to the other periodically and unexpectedly throughout life? Kiran’s world is neither as unfamiliar nor as unexpected as those LeGuin has created, but an ability to create my own parameters allowed me to make his dilemmas and decisions more stark and clear.<o:p></o:p></div>
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After drafting THE BEECHWOOD FLUTE I put it away for several years. I had to know that it would still seem authentic to me after a wait. I moved back to the <a href="http://www.lostinlexicon.com/">world of Lexicon</a>, where I could ask myself a much more playful question: What would life be like in a place where the most important thing was how well a person sings? This was my nod to the theory of multiple intelligences and my rueful admission that in such a world (Lexicon’s Land of Winter) I would definitely occupy the lowest social class. That was my motivation in writing <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Ice-Castle-Adventure-Music-ebook/dp/B008FZWL8Q/ref=pd_sim_351_2?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=B008FZWL8Q&pd_rd_r=W8W3NCWV6V0GT1FEH0X3&pd_rd_w=xLIyM&pd_rd_wg=j3Lo8&psc=1&refRID=W8W3NCWV6V0GT1FEH0X3">THE ICE CASTLE,</a> which is a more developed though less-known tale than the first Lexicon book.<o:p></o:p></div>
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Eventually I returned to THE BEECHWOOD FLUTE, rethought it and deepened it. I hope you get a chance to <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Beechwood-Flute-Pendred-Noyce-ebook/dp/B01N006BJB/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1480716753&sr=8-1&keywords=beechwood+flute">read it </a>and let me know what you think. <o:p></o:p></div>
Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-33279649975817950512016-06-16T12:03:00.003-07:002016-06-16T12:03:55.462-07:00It's so long since I've posted on this blog that I've practically forgotten how.<br />
<br />
Still, here I go.<br />
<br />
Today, British Member of Parliament Jo Cox was attacked and murdered as she met with constituents in West Yorkshire. Bystanders reportedly heard the attacker, a middle-aged white man, shout "Britain First!" as he attacked her first with a knife (as a man from a nearby dry cleaners fought to stop him) and then with a gun. He then also attacked a 77-year-old man, who was taken to hospital but is reportedly not severely injured. Jo Cox died at the scene.<br />
<br />
Several thoughts come to mind.<br />
<br />
<span style="color: blue;">1)</span> <span style="color: blue;">Political violence has come to the West. </span>If early reports are correct, then the attacker justified himself with his cry of "Britain First!" Britain First is the name of a right-wing party, Christian and nationalist, that holds demonstrations around or even invades mosques. Party leader Paul Golding condemned the attack, releasing a video statement calling it a "damned right despicable act of criminality," according to the <i>Guardian.</i><br />
<br />
Of course, we don't know yet whether the shooter actually believed he was making a political statement. Jo Cox was known as an advocate of Syrian civilians, and the shooter may have considered her worthy of assassination on those grounds, but we don't know yet. If so, is he a representative of radical Christian extremism? Was Robert Lewis Dear, who shot twelve people outside a Planned Parenthood Clinic in Colorado Springs last fall, also a representative of radical Christian extremism?<br />
<br />
<span style="color: blue;">2) Even strong gun laws didn't prevent this gun murder. On the other hand, </span>with his gun, which according to a bystander looked "old-fashioned," even "home-made," the shooter only managed to kill one person, not the six Jared Loughner shot with a semi-automatic pistol when attacking Gabby Giffords in 2011, or the 49 killed by Omar Mateen with a semi-automatic pistol and semi-automatic rifle in the Pulse nightclub.<br />
<br />
<span style="color: blue;">3) There's plenty of hatred to go around.</span> A self-styled pastor from Sacramento preached to his congregation on Saturday that no Christian should feel sad about the deaths of the "sodomites" in Orlando. "I think it's great," he said. "I think it helps society. . . . The tragedy is that more of them didn't die." This from a man who considers himself Christian.<br />
<br />
What's my point? I believe the line that divides us from the anarchy and horror of people routinely murdering one another for their beliefs and words is thinner than we think. We can't have armed guards for every situation, nor can we reasonably hope or advocate (with the NRA) that every person will be armed and trained for self-defense. No, we have to ratchet down our rhetoric by speaking with respect of our opponents, make violence less efficient by rendering semi-automatic weapons harder to get, and assure every would-be shooter that their name will be forgotten and their cause harmed by any violent action they take.Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-32100575738946380322013-01-08T13:41:00.002-08:002013-01-08T13:41:47.357-08:00Tumblehome TalksMost readers of this blog know that a year and a half ago I joined with three friends to start <a href="http://www.tumblehomelearning.com/">Tumblehome Learning</a>, a company that seeks to inspire kids about science and engineering through adventure stories, mysteries, and associated activity kits and games. And what a ride it's been.<br />
<br />
Right now, Tumblehome Learning is preparing for our first visit to the New York Toy Fair in February. There we'll display our first five books, four kits full of related science experiments, and two Mixing in Math products for math games at home. We'll also showcase a brand-new product, Dr. Tan's Supergrams, which combines an ancient Chinese puzzle, Tangrams, with a cutting-edge new technology, Augmented Reality. Supergrams will be the first demonstration of our concept of transmedia--in this case, motivating kids to work on a puzzle in the real world in order to unlock a 3D image online.<br />
<br />
(If you want to learn more about Dr. Tan's Supergrams, please visit our <a href="http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/536178671/dr-tans-supergrams">Kickstarter project</a>. Maybe you can even help us reach our fundraising goal.<br />
<br />
Tumblehome's flagship product series is the Galactic Academy of Science, or G.A.S., series. These combine short books (they average less than 25,000 words and are written for kids ages 8-13) with kits of hands-on science activities. In each book, a pair of middle school students prepping for a science fair stumble across a scientific mystery. A teenager from the future appears and challenges them to travel back in time and interview scientists and engineers of the past. These encounters give the kids the tools they need to solve the mystery and ace the science fair.<br />
<br />
Two GAS books are available now, and the third will be available by mid-February. They are:<br />
<br />
<i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Desperate-Case-Diamond-Chip/dp/0985000805/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1357680830&sr=8-1&keywords=Diamond+Chip">The Desperate Case of the Diamond Chip</a></i><br />
<i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Furious-Case-Fraudulent-Fossil/dp/0985000856/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1357680911&sr=1-1&keywords=Fraudulent+Fossil">The Furious Case of the Fraudulent Fossil</a>,</i><br />
<i>The Vicious Case of the Viral Vaccine</i><br />
<br />
Coming soon will be:<br />
<br />
<i>The Horrible Case of the Hackensack Hacker</i><br />
<i>The Baffling Case of the Battered Brain, and</i><br />
<i>The Curious Case of the Climate Caper.</i><br />
<i><br /></i>
I could go on about Tumblehome Learning, but what I really wanted to do was to tell you that as I'm growing busier with the company, I have less time for personal blogging. Instead, I'm contribution ideas and some wording to Tumblehome Learning's own blog, <a href="http://tumblehometalks.wordpress.com/2013/01/">Tumblehome Talks</a>. If you're a parent interested in science education, quick updates on education policy, and general parenting tips, Tumblehome Talks is a good blog to follow.Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-50206230023361570072012-12-15T11:41:00.003-08:002012-12-15T11:41:37.238-08:00Gun control and gun rights: Can we find a middle ground?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsrt_qZUAMcrsdjZNuOBHTaBGy3UQ2lYv9yo_vbVKgkF_l1FuOg8fKuQU-qVdTlo-xvkSZZksC7_F05aiYypdGiuCLWSub3mPo0nP6imX_gFcMbA7CPG4B5mxvhziJjEcjXFPoP5Uyl5o/s1600/Newtown+crying+girl.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsrt_qZUAMcrsdjZNuOBHTaBGy3UQ2lYv9yo_vbVKgkF_l1FuOg8fKuQU-qVdTlo-xvkSZZksC7_F05aiYypdGiuCLWSub3mPo0nP6imX_gFcMbA7CPG4B5mxvhziJjEcjXFPoP5Uyl5o/s1600/Newtown+crying+girl.jpeg" /></a></div>
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Another week, another mass shooting in America. This time it was children who were slaughtered. Another disturbed young male, suicidal, decided to go out with a bang. Some people slit their wrists or hang themselves, some get roaring drunk and drive into a tree, and some load up the guns and ammunition and drive to a crowded place to shoot strangers. In this case, children.<br />
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How can we stop this?<br />
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We can increase school security. We can push to diminish the number and violence of first-person shooter video games. We can advocate for more effective mental health screening and treatment. But at some point we have to <i>also</i> talk about the role of guns in these episodes of mass murder.<br />
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Sometimes, given our Second Amendment and the tremendous political influence of the National Rifle Association, it seems that the gun conversation is one we can't have in America. Both sides are strident. Both sides argue through the veil of hyperbole and emotion. But I think in fact there is more agreement than we know. A look at recent <a href="http://www.pollingreport.com/guns.htm">polls on gun control </a>suggests that this is so.<br />
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In an August CNN poll, thirteen percent of respondents said there should be no restrictions at all on gun ownership, and ten percent said guns should be illegal for anyone except police and "authorized personnel." <span style="color: blue;"><b>76% of people fell in between</b></span>.<br />
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On the one hand, there are people who believe that guns, including semiautomatic weapons with large weapon clips, are needed to protect us against government tyranny. On the other hand, there are people who believe that widespread gun ownership makes us less safe, even those of us who own guns and know how to use them. In between are people who cherish traditions of hunting or who keep a handgun at home, feeling more secure at the thought of bing able to protect themselves in a gun-heavy world.<br />
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So where is the middle ground? What could a majority of Americans support?<br />
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<span style="color: blue;"><b>96% of Americans support the notion of requiring a criminal background check</b></span> before purchasing weapons. That's more than the number who support any restrictions at all, which is odd. Maybe when people are asked about "some restrictions," they immediately assume the worst.<br />
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We already have background checks, of course, and waiting periods -- but only for those in the gun business. These restrictions have prevented 1.8 million sales of guns to felons. But they don't apply to the 40% of sales that occur between private individuals. The "<a href="http://www.csgv.org/issues-and-campaigns/gun-show-loophole">gunshow loophole</a>" is one that can and should be closed.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiA21ZxZ3uu7Xo-VbynIUJec6MUEc99TLrajgSdFM7vmdz3HpE6mA2O-tJW9Jtjlb97qGX5F59Cd0JqOcEy9dClE_TPY2Wt5QKCcxHQb8d5vciisti5HB2gZmZGdZmQq9nzYOq7rsxY4Zc/s1600/semiautomatic.weapon.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiA21ZxZ3uu7Xo-VbynIUJec6MUEc99TLrajgSdFM7vmdz3HpE6mA2O-tJW9Jtjlb97qGX5F59Cd0JqOcEy9dClE_TPY2Wt5QKCcxHQb8d5vciisti5HB2gZmZGdZmQq9nzYOq7rsxY4Zc/s1600/semiautomatic.weapon.jpeg" /></a></div>
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A majority of Americans --<b><span style="color: blue;">57% to 42%-- support "a ban on the manufacture, sale and possession of semi-automatic assault guns, such as the AK-47. </span> </b>For ten years, from 2994 to 2004, we had such a ban, but it expired, and efforts to renew the bill have not made it to the House or Senate floor. This is something the people want, and voters should press their representatives to let the debate out into the open.<br />
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A larger majority, <b><span style="color: blue;">60% to 40%, want to see a ban on the sale of high-capacity or extended ammunition clips</span></b> that allow multiple bullets to be fired before reloading.<br />
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These two limits make urgent sense. No matter how mad or vicious a killer, it's easier to kill lots of people with semi-automatic weapons and extended application kits than it is with a weapon that takes longer to fire and load. <b><span style="color: blue;">This is about the body count.</span></b> Without these weapons and supplies, mass killings would still occur, but the numbers killed would be lower. And nobody needs assault weapons and extended ammunition clips for hunting. Or if they do, they're pretty terrible hunters.<br />
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<b><span style="color: blue;">76% support requiring owners to register their guns</span></b> with local government. This is good, but we've seen time and again that registered gun belonging to a qualified owner can still be used by family members to commit horrible crimes. What liability does a gun owner have for crimes committed with a poorly-secured gun? Of course, sometimes the liability question is moot, as the gun owner is the first one killed.<a href="http://aje.oxfordjournals.org/content/160/10/929.full"> Epidemiological studies</a> show that a person with a gun in the home is almost 2 times as likely to die from homicide and 10 times as likely to die from suicide as a person without.<br />
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I know NRA members who support the restrictions and safeguards listed here, even though they are represented by a lobbying group that adamantly opposes any restriction. The NRA tends to consider any restriction as an attempt to undermine a fundamental Constitutional right to self-protection. If we can convince a broad base of the 50% of Americans who live in gun-owning households that the vast majority of us do not support the idea of taking away their guns but merely want to decrease the frequency and extent of mass murder, maybe there is common ground. Maybe the membership can convince the NRA that such extremism in the name of liberty is no virtue, not when it comes at the cost of the lives of our children.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLmeTws5doIouInnLjSoHA4PQcZOL9WVMsDjNUJxtOoz4yyg6jaGIClRJokGvaFmnHoz29eNsIpyLrwTWcSrPDr7BQkvm-4v0hJS8GEAiQtMpyvm6vS8Eu8zsK0ATDizxThLDpNpWlhdU/s1600/mourners+in+Newtown.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLmeTws5doIouInnLjSoHA4PQcZOL9WVMsDjNUJxtOoz4yyg6jaGIClRJokGvaFmnHoz29eNsIpyLrwTWcSrPDr7BQkvm-4v0hJS8GEAiQtMpyvm6vS8Eu8zsK0ATDizxThLDpNpWlhdU/s1600/mourners+in+Newtown.jpeg" /></a></div>
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How about you? Hunters, gun owners, those of you who have never fired a gun... where would you draw the line?</div>
Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-12215372151658799342012-12-07T07:58:00.002-08:002012-12-07T08:11:43.527-08:00Remembering Kit Ward<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgR8Mgcm7q67pr1s5cxn0985CSZ2o2GnTbJaDI3-6Bl5V8gJifRd_yCtnZaCd2GaXTjRD5DfA9e2TsBZ2K5sk6bFJ4nqB5f0UP41CpgDJ6Rb36NzAua_15KN5x52l7Ab1d39sVlLRfmV8s/s1600/kitward2.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgR8Mgcm7q67pr1s5cxn0985CSZ2o2GnTbJaDI3-6Bl5V8gJifRd_yCtnZaCd2GaXTjRD5DfA9e2TsBZ2K5sk6bFJ4nqB5f0UP41CpgDJ6Rb36NzAua_15KN5x52l7Ab1d39sVlLRfmV8s/s1600/kitward2.jpeg" title="Kit Ward" /></a></div>
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I met Kit Ward when she was an acquiring editor at Little, Brown. She had just read the manuscript of my novel <i>Tulku</i>, and through my agent she asked me to come in and talk about it. Needless to say, I jumped at the chance.<br />
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I arrived in Kit's cozy Boston office to find a kind, soft-spoken woman only a couple of years older than I. She liked the novel, she said, and she thought it had promise, but it needed more work. She spent an hour going through the manuscript with me, showing where she needed more character development, sharper description, braver confrontation of the book's themes. She spoke in a lovely, soothing voice. I agreed with her suggestions and promised to work on them. On my way out, Kit gave me a book.<br />
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Three months later, I sent her the revised manuscript. She liked it and took it to the Acquisitions Committee. On the day of their meeting, I sat anxiously by the phone, waiting for my agent to call. I already felt bruised and raw. Two days before, my father had died suddenly at the age of 62, and my husband and I were about to fly to Texas for his memorial service.<br />
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My agent called. "I'm sorry. They said no." He told me he had nowhere else to send my novel. It was over. <br />
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The next week, after I was home from Texas, Kit called me. She had fought for the book, she said. The sales team had turned it down because they didn't know how to describe it in a single phrase. It used to be, she told me, that a publishing house like Little, Brown would take on a young author who seemed promising but not a sure bet. An editor would work with that author over time, helping to grow her talent. Now those days were gone. But, Kit said, she still believed in my novel. Soon she would be leaving Little, Brown to start her own literary agency. She'd love to represent me. But that would take a few months, and in the meantime, she'd refer me to her friend Millie Marmur.<br />
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Millie tried to sell the book, but without success. By the time Kit became my agent, there was really no place else to send it. Kit tried to be encouraging. She suggested I write a memoir about growing up in Silicon Valley as my father started Intel. I wasn't ready for that. I tried to write a few stories, but my heart wasn't in it. I took the creativity I had poured into my writing and applied it to helping establish the Noyce Foundation instead. I threw myself into math and science education. Kit and I lost touch.<br />
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Years later, when I had written <i>Lost in Lexicon </i>and couldn't find an agent for it, I stumbled across Kit's phone number. Holding my breath, I dialed the number from fifteen years earlier. "Hello, this is Penny Noyce," I said, hoping she would remember me.<br />
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"Penny, I was just thinking about you!" Kit exclaimed. <br />
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I sent her <i>Lost in Lexicon</i>, a brainy fantasy adventure in a world of words and numbers. Kit loved it, and though it had been years since she'd last represented a children's book, she took it on. <br />
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The year dragged on. Kit forwarded rejection notices. She told me the editors she had carefully selected, thinking they would love the book as she did, found it too old-fashioned and didactic. Finally, after a year, her voice full of regret, she told me she couldn't sell the book. "I think it's a wonderful book," she said. "But I've decided not to take on any more children's books. I don't understand the children's market anymore." And then she asked, "What are you going to do?"<br />
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I was going to publish the book myself, I said. And I was going to do it right, with proper editing, design, and art. Kit offered to help me navigate the process. She introduced me to a friend, Karen Klockner, who served as art director and guided me through the publishing process.<br />
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<i>Lost in Lexicon </i>won awards and succeeded in the marketplace so well that Scarletta Press decided to publish a second edition to make it the cornerstone of their new children's line. George Ward, Kit's husband, supplied the mathematical drawings for both <i>Lost in Lexicon</i> and its sequel, <i>The Ice Castle</i>.<br />
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As one small way of thanking Kit for her faith in me during the stuttering years of my writing career, I named a character in <i>The Ice Castle</i> after her. The Kit of the book is a kitchen servant, loyal and industrious and brave. She has a beautiful speaking voice.<br />
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Just after Thanksgiving, Kit Ward died suddenly after a brief and catastrophic illness. I'll miss her. Her voice at the other end of the phone line always left me feeling comforted, encouraged, and uplifted. I felt a strange guilt when I learned Kit had died of pancreatic cancer, the same disease I gave Great Aunt adelaide at the start of <i>The Ice Castle</i>.<br />
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Remembering Kit, I still seek good solid editing for my own writing. At the same time, I've become an editor myself, working with authors over time to polish their work and hone their skills as they write for Tumblehome Learning. And oddly, after all this time, as I work on adapting for children a biography about my father, I find myself making the book half biography, half memoir. The book is going to be called <i>Do Something Wonderful.</i> I wish I could show it to Kit.Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-24355746854986836792012-11-11T06:08:00.002-08:002012-11-12T07:14:27.738-08:00Fun with MalapropismsWhat is a malapropism? It's a form of speech error named after the comic character Mrs. Malaprop in Richard Sheridan's 18th century play <i>The Rivals</i>. Here she is: a talkative woman with intellectual pretensions, using words whose meanings she doesn't really know.<br />
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<tr><td><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2WwXde-apt4vyx3_OG-bQgIMAa7cNFlhKdLbjFf80dAPUq62LWAWc19OprF9P3PlusXP5LEcwWAgt7RhKpBkTUGC1-GMPSc0AUyFoRzayKgs1v811rLs_aII6-tVP8JH-3MSXfakCiRI/s1600/Mrs+Malaprop.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg2WwXde-apt4vyx3_OG-bQgIMAa7cNFlhKdLbjFf80dAPUq62LWAWc19OprF9P3PlusXP5LEcwWAgt7RhKpBkTUGC1-GMPSc0AUyFoRzayKgs1v811rLs_aII6-tVP8JH-3MSXfakCiRI/s1600/Mrs+Malaprop.jpeg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="font-size: 13px;">Celia Imrie as Mrs. Malaprop</td></tr>
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For example, Mrs. Malaprop says of an acquaintance that "she's as headstrong as an allegory on the banks of the Nile." She advises another character, "Illiterate him from your memory." She replaces "alligator" and "obliterate" with other, similar-sounding words.<br />
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These examples illustrate several important points about malapropisms.<br />
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1) A proper malapropism is always a real word.<br />
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2) The mistaken word is almost always the same part of speech as the word meant.<br />
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3) The mistaken word is usually the same number of syllables as the word meant.<br />
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4) The pattern of stresses laid on the syllables is usually the same, as in "alligator" and "allegory" or "obliterate" and "illiterate."<br />
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For comic effect, it's good if both the words replaced and the words used to replace them are rather uppity words.<br />
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In my novel <i>The Ice Castle</i>, the nomad chief Kanzat fancies himself master of a large vocabulary. He uses big words whenever he can, and often as not he misuses them. Some of his mistakes are malapropisms; others are neologisms, where he makes up a word that sounds right. <br />
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When Kanzat first meets Ivan and Daphne, he uses a number of made-up words:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
And envoyed from which commune, shall I ask?</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
You haven't journaled far, not without tents nor furs nor weapons.</blockquote>
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Mute, eh? Speakless but spoke for, I take it?</blockquote>
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At other times, he uses real words incorrectly. These are the true malapropisms. In the middle of the story, Kanzat says of a message he is delivering:<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
It discerns the little singer.</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
One of [the Diva's] courtiers, the Lord High Chamberpot or whoever, gave me this and disclaimed it most urchin to deliver. </blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
Tell me what the missile says. </blockquote>
In literature, malapropisms are used for comic effect, usually to poke fun at a pretentious person posing as more educated than he is. That's a good description of Kanzat. For me, including him in the second Lexicon book (whose subtitle is <i>An Adventure in Music</i>) provides a way of returning briefly to the kind of wordplay that make the first Lexicon adventure,<i> Lost in Lexicon</i>, such fun to write.<br />
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Part of the fun of malapropisms involves introducing ridiculous images in the reader's mind. In writing these malapropisms, I couldn't help but picture a royal official squatting over his chamberpot and an unwashed, ragged child delivering a missive that shoots out of her hand.<br />
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Have you ever uttered a malapropism? Have you heard others use them? Do you have a favorite you've read or heard? Send them in!Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-87217493539116547522012-10-18T14:04:00.001-07:002012-10-18T15:56:20.149-07:00Six more cool facts about water ice and dry ice<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgl1qdDkhEndXDu3AkwfZvSSrf1OtczAMAbms0V6KrIicCIZbtHJdnm0ypZnRmzEBHpxNAlScwmQ6Z0AO4gScWX5xj-4QEIFJDJU-aIX1qQU0YApYGPjAMeXWOxjuYZ51YRcIjynMO5St8/s1600/ice+hotel.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgl1qdDkhEndXDu3AkwfZvSSrf1OtczAMAbms0V6KrIicCIZbtHJdnm0ypZnRmzEBHpxNAlScwmQ6Z0AO4gScWX5xj-4QEIFJDJU-aIX1qQU0YApYGPjAMeXWOxjuYZ51YRcIjynMO5St8/s320/ice+hotel.jpeg" width="320" /></a><br />
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For my first ten cool facts about ice, visit <a href="http://windowviewblog.blogspot.com/2012/08/dry-ice-and-water-ice-ten-cool-facts.html" target="_blank">this post</a>. And now, on to six more!<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgl1qdDkhEndXDu3AkwfZvSSrf1OtczAMAbms0V6KrIicCIZbtHJdnm0ypZnRmzEBHpxNAlScwmQ6Z0AO4gScWX5xj-4QEIFJDJU-aIX1qQU0YApYGPjAMeXWOxjuYZ51YRcIjynMO5St8/s1600/ice+hotel.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><br /></a><br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxwPYMqaGc4SX_c0x8KLLJZv4VkptZRWhg8R54NFnDfkdqBqhaIakmkxmd19IKyqE0GDff-8izxkqb0DKkIUYY0zQSPe2sN4EKI5t4B9Aph-dBcGUQn7Efms6ViqjslaPcfr1Rj1VtY68/s1600/dry+ice+pumpkin.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><br /></a>1. There are a couple of places in the world-- Quebec City and Jukasjaarvi, Sweden among them, where you can stay in a hotel made of ice. These hotels are a little fancier than the ice castle occupied overnight by the Diva in my novel <i><a href="http://www.indiebound.org/book/9780983021964" target="_blank">The Ice Castle.</a></i><br />
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My sister-in-law has stayed in an ice hotel and slept in an ice bed. Her verdict? "It was cold."<br />
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2. Carbon dioxide exists in liquid form only at high pressure, above 5 atmospheres. This is the pressure you would feel 132 feet below the ocean surface.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxwPYMqaGc4SX_c0x8KLLJZv4VkptZRWhg8R54NFnDfkdqBqhaIakmkxmd19IKyqE0GDff-8izxkqb0DKkIUYY0zQSPe2sN4EKI5t4B9Aph-dBcGUQn7Efms6ViqjslaPcfr1Rj1VtY68/s1600/dry+ice+pumpkin.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxwPYMqaGc4SX_c0x8KLLJZv4VkptZRWhg8R54NFnDfkdqBqhaIakmkxmd19IKyqE0GDff-8izxkqb0DKkIUYY0zQSPe2sN4EKI5t4B9Aph-dBcGUQn7Efms6ViqjslaPcfr1Rj1VtY68/s1600/dry+ice+pumpkin.jpeg" /></a>3. How to make dry ice: Take a carbon dioxide-rich mixture of gases, and pressurize it until it turns to liquid. Then release the pressure. This allows some of the liquid to vaporize, which cools the remaining carbon dioxide liquid enough to transform it into the solid known as dry ice.<br />
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4. Dry ice, as it sublimates (vaporizes), can attract mosquitoes or bedbugs, which are drawn to carbon dioxide. How about a dry ice mosquito trap? Or placing an open thermos of dry ice beside that old couch your friend is lending you, before you lie down?<br />
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5. Mars has polar snowstorms of dry ice snowflakes. The snowflakes are very small, about the size of human red blood cells. Paul Doherty showed that carbon dioxide snowflakes will not have the beautiful crystalline structure of H2O snowflakes. Instead, they'll be cubes, octahedrons, and cuboctahedrons, which are basically cubes with the corners sawed off. For more about dry ice on Mars, read Paul Doherty's <a href="http://www.exploratorium.edu/mars/snowflakes.php" target="_blank">blog post </a>on the topic.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyGCS-HSn3nFlMQVj06hWvuOshoR3yBISGR_HiTgFPmled3j_HLxdx_cHfFSYhTOKmeqfJr13jeG2gRqyJY9cJq7V-naZINTHk2e8hb7Q9wVXzNThShndSUFm8ZToNi9eji_6avFaFj3c/s1600/Arctic+sea+ice.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjyGCS-HSn3nFlMQVj06hWvuOshoR3yBISGR_HiTgFPmled3j_HLxdx_cHfFSYhTOKmeqfJr13jeG2gRqyJY9cJq7V-naZINTHk2e8hb7Q9wVXzNThShndSUFm8ZToNi9eji_6avFaFj3c/s1600/Arctic+sea+ice.jpeg" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2Pjk4K6d3o9KBzFNpcuH6SIHDRWQwBbvoiSph4O11wOms_tFR_rUuih3blBv62-MGcgVRrY9zc9rDdVp6aKthQ0vTcUn7e4OK1A-WK-igK0YEZnSDllQ6A5LvtL95jFxHHkV3Jw-LTwk/s1600/glass+of+water+with+ice.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh2Pjk4K6d3o9KBzFNpcuH6SIHDRWQwBbvoiSph4O11wOms_tFR_rUuih3blBv62-MGcgVRrY9zc9rDdVp6aKthQ0vTcUn7e4OK1A-WK-igK0YEZnSDllQ6A5LvtL95jFxHHkV3Jw-LTwk/s1600/glass+of+water+with+ice.jpeg" /></a>6. If all the floating sea ice of the Arctic melted, how much would sea level rise? Not at all. Floating ice already displaces the same volume of water it would occupy if it melted into water. For the same reason, the water level in a glass filled with water and floating ice will not rise as the ice melts. (If the ice cubes are packed in to the glass and not actually floating, the result may be different.) <br />
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Note, however, that if all the sea ice of the Arctic melted, that would reflect a warming of the oceans. Warmer water expands, so we would sea some sea level rise - not because of the melting, but because of the expansion that comes with warming.<br />
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<br />Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-3067913328162472742012-10-17T19:11:00.000-07:002012-12-08T06:12:27.869-08:00Ten sharp facts about glass<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRR1BfEn7TNH3q5btbUQc_MCcOZjvUMjl_xRqNcr4WL-1o6Qf3oPXTNLG5DJGj_F1tc5PTUFIWZSXTJHIxs_Q4tii4Vb030cAmr_VniyYctwDLx9Lgi3ukuCXxWokdBUR75guSuXwcdto/s1600/obsidian.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgRR1BfEn7TNH3q5btbUQc_MCcOZjvUMjl_xRqNcr4WL-1o6Qf3oPXTNLG5DJGj_F1tc5PTUFIWZSXTJHIxs_Q4tii4Vb030cAmr_VniyYctwDLx9Lgi3ukuCXxWokdBUR75guSuXwcdto/s1600/obsidian.jpeg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">obsidian</td></tr>
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In my middle grade novel <i><a href="http://www.indiebound.org/book/9780983021964" target="_blank">The Ice Castle</a></i>, Daphne's friend Mr. Silica runs a glass factory that plays an important role in the story. As I poked around researching the book, I learned a lot of fascinating tidbits about glass.<br />
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1. The definition of glass is "an amorphous solid," which means a solid with no crystal structure, where the atoms and molecules are arranged more or less at random.<br />
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2. Volcanic glass is created when magma cools suddenly, not allowing crystals to form in the cooling rock. One common form of volcanic glass is obsidian, black, smooth, and shiny.<br />
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3. Another natural form of glass is found in fulgurites -- glass tunnels made when lightning strikes sand and heats it to its melting point. The Museum of Science in Boston has a fulgurite many feet long.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQz3shajxXM2c4wA4PF4JuGxOuUE4mShgVtgJU74yxNFWaPI01EZZEYkS4KVq-AnCNhOPEXkO1BrAT1PeV8Z6P_Q2ONiIvNcvUS9BfcQ3jLvE-HhgRcxYinYxLZzLZwhgPuMzXDbbEp-E/s1600/fulgurite+2.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="129" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQz3shajxXM2c4wA4PF4JuGxOuUE4mShgVtgJU74yxNFWaPI01EZZEYkS4KVq-AnCNhOPEXkO1BrAT1PeV8Z6P_Q2ONiIvNcvUS9BfcQ3jLvE-HhgRcxYinYxLZzLZwhgPuMzXDbbEp-E/s320/fulgurite+2.jpeg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The sand cast of a fulgurite several inches long</td></tr>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKdw4KkI7kMyHR0xN9NEpSaWl0fmGSivcRBI5kHRjxPKW6lTtHR-Ya0v20d6uge76XNZmyQSQuVFCFopmjbhVFkM9Rd-ufrmY0WM50ws-Nywdrkhyphenhyphen1pao3alTZsJL-wOI5yxpaxApR_S8/s1600/fulgulrite.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKdw4KkI7kMyHR0xN9NEpSaWl0fmGSivcRBI5kHRjxPKW6lTtHR-Ya0v20d6uge76XNZmyQSQuVFCFopmjbhVFkM9Rd-ufrmY0WM50ws-Nywdrkhyphenhyphen1pao3alTZsJL-wOI5yxpaxApR_S8/s1600/fulgulrite.jpeg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Fulgurite - see the glassy inner surface</td></tr>
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4. The earliest glass was made in Mesopotamia and Egypt in 3500-2500 BCE. Early glass beads may have been formed accidentally as sand melted in the slag heap of furnaces for purifying metal.<br />
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5. The Romans were probably the first to use glass for windows, around 100 CE. Glass windows did not become common in ordinary houses in England until about 1500 years later. Other houses still used animal horn to keep the cold out while allowing entry of some light.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1lciZdoDrTsU-G0OnZ3vQcJpd-bCHzo81ZGWihZzLTQ19xJ0njBaYkAPONcDFy8so0HHp3NASUeh-PgQELBGuoa84cA2LXjUdtAW4OvNtk2k8tvIc8KPMIPd23uteG4ftndz82I_RoI4/s1600/float_glass_11.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1lciZdoDrTsU-G0OnZ3vQcJpd-bCHzo81ZGWihZzLTQ19xJ0njBaYkAPONcDFy8so0HHp3NASUeh-PgQELBGuoa84cA2LXjUdtAW4OvNtk2k8tvIc8KPMIPd23uteG4ftndz82I_RoI4/s320/float_glass_11.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Tinted float glass</td></tr>
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6. The most common form of manufactured glass today, soda lime glass, is made up mostly of silcon oxide, or sand.</div>
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7. To make large flat panes, molten glass used to be poured and allowed to spread on a flat surface, which led to the glass being thicker in the middle. To address this, glassmakers spun the flat surface, leading to thicker glass around the edges.</div>
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8. Today, flat panes of glass are often made by the "float glass" method, in which molten glass is floated on another liquid surface, such as molten tin. Gravity smooths and flattens the glass.</div>
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9. Manufactured glass can be colored, but it is valued for its transparency. About 92% of the light that falls on a pane of clear glass passes right through.</div>
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10. "Gorilla Glass," first developed by Corning in the 1960's and perfected for Apple products, is a strong, hard, flexible glass that is difficult to scratch. Gorilla glass is now used in hundreds of millions of mobile phones, computer displays, and other screens.</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjs17fJ_aAzDh_HZd7ZohjJ4_K5-Y998ybMt1NacTZvxGITw56wTurgj05BVRb9l2QDcB4x4IzWpHJvE_48biUSFYhoHHG_PZOMRO2v3U2eaWG5Y8t2dg4LGMraVQuchEukwUWjtDt7-kQ/s1600/gorilla+glass.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><img border="0" height="245" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjs17fJ_aAzDh_HZd7ZohjJ4_K5-Y998ybMt1NacTZvxGITw56wTurgj05BVRb9l2QDcB4x4IzWpHJvE_48biUSFYhoHHG_PZOMRO2v3U2eaWG5Y8t2dg4LGMraVQuchEukwUWjtDt7-kQ/s400/gorilla+glass.jpeg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Gorilla Glass from Corning</td></tr>
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Glass, from skyscraper windows to contact lenses, is an amazing bit of technology that has been part of our lives for millennia and yet continues to improve. In <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0983021961/ref=s9_simh_gw_p14_d0_i1?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-2&pf_rd_r=1YHCZHV39GWF2H2YEYB2&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=1389517282&pf_rd_i=507846," target="_blank">The Ice Castle</a>, ambitious Itzo Silica worries whether he can improve his technique enough to fill a mysterious order from the Palace of Music...but he won't reveal to anyone what the order is for.</div>
Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-73980402378807662512012-10-15T12:35:00.000-07:002012-10-15T12:35:08.713-07:00Visiting Pineland<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhV5q7liyeE3d6J7FEhyphenhyphenVEQemCLQtTjjTibJ9ee9p41kdZ1iW7_iJVKAlSGBw1P6rIDv64xiRdf15yzpLesJWMW11B8Miv8R-FEULnOml5So2bO9qPQeGx8donpO8ttc7N9WuPyx2fcGco/s1600/kids+at+Pineland.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhV5q7liyeE3d6J7FEhyphenhyphenVEQemCLQtTjjTibJ9ee9p41kdZ1iW7_iJVKAlSGBw1P6rIDv64xiRdf15yzpLesJWMW11B8Miv8R-FEULnOml5So2bO9qPQeGx8donpO8ttc7N9WuPyx2fcGco/s400/kids+at+Pineland.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
Over the weekend we took four of our kids and some friends to visit Pineland in New Gloucester, Maine. The Pineland story is one of renewal and vision, so I wanted the kids to learn about it.<br />
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In the early 1900's, Pineland was the Maine state "school for the feeble-minded," a place where those unable to care for themselves could live and perhaps learn some simple farm work or craft. Mental patients, orphans, the poor, and social undesirables also sometimes found themselves shipped to Pineland.,Among those were the African-American families evicted in 1912 from Malaga Island in Casco Bay, as told in the Newbery Honor-winning novel <i><a href="http://www.indiebound.org/hybrid?filter0=Lizzie+Bright+and+the+Buckminster+Boy&x=0&y=0" target="_blank">Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy.</a></i><br />
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Although at one point Pineland had two farms, 28 buildings, and over a thousand residents, changes in standards of care and the de-institutionalization movement gradually led to the school losing residents, funding, and reputation. Eventually, in 1996, the last residents left, and the school closed. Many of its buildings were now derelict and its farms abandoned.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeYZVu_nTubLvr63riyINz2EHr3qsygggJbqpuxQX0tJf7m5COS1_jDM5ufjFhkYLpwYHj8g_WrQNDOuk2IXpWb-EOpg0F0JhWeOGUR3QmwpYuP-u8Z7yOccgLsEfE60tY2y4ElCG6ZL0/s1600/Pineland.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeYZVu_nTubLvr63riyINz2EHr3qsygggJbqpuxQX0tJf7m5COS1_jDM5ufjFhkYLpwYHj8g_WrQNDOuk2IXpWb-EOpg0F0JhWeOGUR3QmwpYuP-u8Z7yOccgLsEfE60tY2y4ElCG6ZL0/s1600/Pineland.jpeg" /></a></div>
In 2000, the Portland-based Libra Foundation, founded by my mother, bought Pineland and 1600 surrounding acres from the state. Libra's president, Owen Wells, had a vision of building a multi-use campus with commercial buildings surrounded by a farm used for education and for supporting Maine farming as a way of life. The foundation spent tens of millions of dollars restoring the campus, barns, fencing, and surrounding farmhouses. We built a world-class equestrian center and 30 kilometers of cross-country ski trails. We brought in a prize Holstein herd, Angus cattle, and Dutch Warmblood horses.<br />
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Today the Pineland campus is a serene and lovely place to work. Over 300 people in 25 businesses occupy the restored brick buildings. Farms, woodlands, ponds and gardens now comprise over 3500 acres set midway between Portland and Lewiston. Visitors come for weddings, for hiking or skiing on <a href="http://www.pinelandfarms.org/recreation/PF_Trail_Map_2007.pdf" target="_blank">thirty kilometers of trails</a>, for corporate retreats, or for educational events from cheese-making to felting. We have sheep, chickens, beef cattle, prize milkers, dressage horses, and seasonal pigs.<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAMQk2uo8ZGr1EWD7RR9ksKpsEE_e_6Fvm3CfuVLbgmzDXAXDeNcSDvli-Chs_NAA7KwAWxE7bivnzJSaLBIVH7IVPkf1Zo97RhyphenhyphenXkCrL97Vv8NNp1hdPINpcB0zQbgZ88TFYiG95j4Y0/s1600/Pineland+cheese.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgAMQk2uo8ZGr1EWD7RR9ksKpsEE_e_6Fvm3CfuVLbgmzDXAXDeNcSDvli-Chs_NAA7KwAWxE7bivnzJSaLBIVH7IVPkf1Zo97RhyphenhyphenXkCrL97Vv8NNp1hdPINpcB0zQbgZ88TFYiG95j4Y0/s1600/Pineland+cheese.jpeg" /></a><br />
Saturday night my family stayed in the very comfortable (huge kitchen, two living rooms) five-bedroom <a href="http://collyer%20brook%20farmhouse/" target="_blank">Collyer Brook Farmhouse</a>. Craig Denekas, current president of Libra, along with Owen Wells, gave us the tour Sunday morning. We bought a pumpkin at the <a href="http://www.pinelandfarms.org/index.htm" target="_blank">market and Welcome Center</a>, which is stocked full of Maine products and wonderful sandwiches. Downstairs, visitors rent skis in the winter, and just outside, the cross-country trails lead across the fields and into the woods.<br />
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We toured <a href="http://www.pinelandfarms.org/cheese/" target="_blank">the creamery</a>, a state-of-the-art cheese-making facility, which now processes 20,000 pounds of cheese each month. Mark, the cheese-maker, walked us through the process from pasteurization through adding rennet and bacteria to raking up the curds to stopping the process with salt, squeezing the cheese into bricks or wheels, and finally aging the bricks in the cold storeroom for up to two years for extra sharp cheddar.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMzoOtAmNgk1M9ZMwhN-Ws7MBRWXelMy9QpM5njpzbC84gfeU94k4D0ruP07U3GZdcxtbP59dkzgEyU4h-4vr8zcL34gL4bypEn5-r9SS_s8_pxVR3wlIoWRsAw_TOMQKiB6argsOb8J8/s1600/4+kids+at+Pineland1.12.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhMzoOtAmNgk1M9ZMwhN-Ws7MBRWXelMy9QpM5njpzbC84gfeU94k4D0ruP07U3GZdcxtbP59dkzgEyU4h-4vr8zcL34gL4bypEn5-r9SS_s8_pxVR3wlIoWRsAw_TOMQKiB6argsOb8J8/s1600/4+kids+at+Pineland1.12.gif" /></a></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzwKEw64Cw7XqbiQFfl2XpZon8ntInhFJ4V8fqt-ZpF_3dvfdc177AIJ5iev4qcHgRWYMnSX41nWOnsJ1eARLYvu9xek_agy5QwKUsW97N5lg93mXgZOAlu_UuEV2i3hWuq2S2qn5M1kA/s1600/4+kids+at+Pineland1.12.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjzwKEw64Cw7XqbiQFfl2XpZon8ntInhFJ4V8fqt-ZpF_3dvfdc177AIJ5iev4qcHgRWYMnSX41nWOnsJ1eARLYvu9xek_agy5QwKUsW97N5lg93mXgZOAlu_UuEV2i3hWuq2S2qn5M1kA/s1600/4+kids+at+Pineland1.12.gif" /></a></div>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj57iQ1ldHit4ESmJk2690-GM_kDYGCMYWTKYSQ_itu1kJphoFMB3GgSwFfDmRq9iIU7_10t417OLJDP1_ipFNCt6dU3KICnVhxWiqBUBllGHzFpDO_jMyeY6hUmi3HCCSsN65S90MDPlw/s1600/among+the+tomatoes.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj57iQ1ldHit4ESmJk2690-GM_kDYGCMYWTKYSQ_itu1kJphoFMB3GgSwFfDmRq9iIU7_10t417OLJDP1_ipFNCt6dU3KICnVhxWiqBUBllGHzFpDO_jMyeY6hUmi3HCCSsN65S90MDPlw/s320/among+the+tomatoes.jpg" width="320" /></a>Next we visited the hydroponic greenhouse, where without pesticides, and with nutrients dissolved in water, the manager grows fat tomatoes, bean sprouts, lettuce and cucumbers. From the greenhouse we traveled to the cow barn to see the noble and patient-looking cows chomping and guzzling. In the calf barn we found that a calf's tongue is surprisingly rough, and that calves like licking hands and sucking on fingers. Finally we visited the riding center, a huge indoor arena with two attached fifteen-stall barns. There a prospective Olympic dressage champion mare went through her paces on a lunge line, switching from walk to trot to canter on signs from her trainer too subtle for me to see.<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJSt0CYfppsHRJ7pkbFoAm0tznqBqcpvtH4g7THBIe1FYKocGoU-R4uwr5rqFI0qEjcsBe0W1okRKdOxRWpjDCgh2YN6ZNwKI4ve7DzQUSwZtb8Dd-HzsxWu_SzjUVA3uKBE7X08wT2Ns/s1600/cow+and+Ryan.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; display: inline !important; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhJSt0CYfppsHRJ7pkbFoAm0tznqBqcpvtH4g7THBIe1FYKocGoU-R4uwr5rqFI0qEjcsBe0W1okRKdOxRWpjDCgh2YN6ZNwKI4ve7DzQUSwZtb8Dd-HzsxWu_SzjUVA3uKBE7X08wT2Ns/s320/cow+and+Ryan.jpg" width="320" /></a><br />
After our tour (and <a href="http://www.pinelandfarms.org/visitors/visitors_guide.htm" target="_blank">tours are available to all</a>) we returned to the Welcome Center for lunch. The kids, intrigued by their grandmother's legacy and the Libra Foundation's unique brand of economic philanthropy and renewal, kept asking questions. I was glad we had finally found time for this family exploration.Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-55761695090841171492012-10-08T15:18:00.001-07:002012-10-08T18:09:47.047-07:00Five Reasons to Support Indie Bookstores<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5Sr7R_xsxmoT7qGapFAODlAxfDQMe4sdqKUke52LR-N5OhdhUPjRX20s5M5cAsPaOlViG_aYfwzsCujuQzpEKWr8rOuqf6qk11_9cnWkJfkXrl1PdpAc8XiK31j4j51zGDbvalcM4E6E/s1600/bookstore+interior.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5Sr7R_xsxmoT7qGapFAODlAxfDQMe4sdqKUke52LR-N5OhdhUPjRX20s5M5cAsPaOlViG_aYfwzsCujuQzpEKWr8rOuqf6qk11_9cnWkJfkXrl1PdpAc8XiK31j4j51zGDbvalcM4E6E/s1600/bookstore+interior.jpeg" /></a></div>
What's so great about independent bookstores? Why should you support them?<br />
<br />
1. <b> Indie bookstores are run and staffed by people who know and love books. </b>These are people who work in a bookstore for the chance to be around books and people who read them. They know they're not going to be making huge profits. <br />
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2. <b>Indie bookstores support literacy. </b> They partner with schools, organize book clubs, and showcase local authors. <br />
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3. <b>Indie bookstores are cozy and welcoming.</b> They're a human size, usually 2000-3000 square feet instead of 20,000 square feet like a big box store.<br />
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4. <b>They're local. </b> When you support an indie bookstore, you're supporting the vitality of the neighborhood surrounding it. If you want a place to browse, talk about books, and support brave and hardworking entrepreneurs in your neighborhood, make regular visits to your local independent bookstore.<br />
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5. <b>They're opinionated.</b> Independent bookstores have their own publication, Indie Next, a quarterly newspaper that contains recommendations from independent bookstore owners and staff. Instead of just reading about bestsellers or books with the biggest advertising budgets, you can read recommendations from astute and sympathetic readers.<br />
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6. Here's a <b>bonus </b>reason for the month of October: you can win a stocking stuffer. Visit your local independent bookstore, buy a book, scan the receipt, and send it to me at penny@tumblehomelearning.com. In return, I will send you a <b><a href="http://tumblehomelearning.com/shop/tangrams" target="_blank">Tangram set.</a></b> If your scanned receipt show that you bought a copy of <a href="http://scarlettapress.com/" target="_blank"><b>Lost in Lexicon</b> or <b>The Ice Castle</b>,</a> I'll send two Tangram sets.*<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7Nt9r613HMx8WbjzMNEbYQSxn_1uHKBhNCFoXSXVpyqh440SHY1cV1zPl0FG0nfGhxRps2ECzT5ETM9GHz3kv7jWlnB-V8mEbdFY920mg1zdaFdC2NHEftqMsYV_QXex41Bo0ouwpj8o/s1600/Tangrams-square-200x253.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi7Nt9r613HMx8WbjzMNEbYQSxn_1uHKBhNCFoXSXVpyqh440SHY1cV1zPl0FG0nfGhxRps2ECzT5ETM9GHz3kv7jWlnB-V8mEbdFY920mg1zdaFdC2NHEftqMsYV_QXex41Bo0ouwpj8o/s200/Tangrams-square-200x253.jpg" width="157" /></a></div>
If you need help locating your closest independent bookstore, check<a href="http://www.indiebound.org/indie-store-finder" target="_blank"> here.</a><br />
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Go on. If it's been too long since you stepped into that local store with its smell of books and its crowded shelves, make this the week you visit. You'll enjoy it, and before long you'll even have a new puzzle to use or share for the holidays.<br />
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* Offer good while Tangram supplies last. (We have about 900 left.)Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-31392718327826193322012-09-30T09:11:00.000-07:002012-09-30T09:12:58.276-07:00There's Always a Reason to Cheat<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEo7ukFzj6SjRsRwh3JXqIUuk7BcEnwt65PAb44v0jfmzAYWnlg_h_5viDYCy__7QR7F2u2VhCjy-bfSC8b4unRz_hJkqCU_zVM7VEhc9hBs1SE1NyYTIW9nTGl3ePvzNol1nQ-x9yNb4/s1600/Annie+Dhookan.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEo7ukFzj6SjRsRwh3JXqIUuk7BcEnwt65PAb44v0jfmzAYWnlg_h_5viDYCy__7QR7F2u2VhCjy-bfSC8b4unRz_hJkqCU_zVM7VEhc9hBs1SE1NyYTIW9nTGl3ePvzNol1nQ-x9yNb4/s1600/Annie+Dhookan.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Annie Dhookan</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Annie Dhookan is a forensic chemist who spent nine years testing samples for drugs at the Massachusetts crime lab. It's likely that she cheated during that whole nine years. She cheated coming in, by stating that she had a master's degree in chemistry when she didn't. According to a<a href="http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/2012/09/30/how-chemist-drug-lab-scandal-circumvented-safeguards/A29LZnAw1eW4hvjn4xX7rL/story.html"> front-page story </a>in today's Boston Globe, she cheated in the lab by taking shortcuts, guessing at results, and, when necessary, substituting positive samples for ones that had proved negative. Now 30,000 samples she handled are under question, the cases of over 1000 convicts will need review, and twenty drug case defendants have already been freed or had their sentences or bail reduced.<br />
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Dhookan cheated for a reason. She was under pressure to be productive, to work quickly. She wanted to excel, or seem to excel, in her job. The Globe quotes John McShane, a senior instructor in identification techniques at the American Chemical Society, as saying, "You are judged by numbers in the lab. There is a culture of pressure to get it done with no new resources." (McShane goes on to add that the pressure is no excuse to cheat.)<br />
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So Dhookan cheated because it would help her get ahead, and because she could. Insufficient supervision, according to the Globe article, facilitated her deceit and sloppy procedures.<br />
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<b>There's always a reason to cheat.</b> Recently, Harvard College, Stuyvesant High School, and the College Board (who bring us the SAT college admissions test) have suffered from well-publicized cheating scandals.<br />
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The Harvard case is the least clear. A reputedly easy government course that traditionally allowed group work suddenly disallowed it on a take-home final exam. Apparently some students didn't take the change of policy seriously. Maybe they didn't think the change of policy was fair. The class included lots of athletes who had expected an easy A, including co-captains of the college basketball team. College athletics is demanding and exhausting, and working together on the test no doubt seemed an easy and not-so-terribly-bad way to get a good grade while still playing hard. The take-home exam provided an easy opportunity.<br />
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As for the Stuyvesant cheating scandal, one ex-student who was not involved <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/28/opinion/cheating-at-stuyvesant-high-school-and-in-life.html?ref=cheating">wrote</a> to the New York Times,<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
When the difference between a 93 and a 94 means the difference between an Ivy League school and a slightly lower ranked one, is it any wonder that students cheat? It is the mechanism of grading itself that incentivizes cheating.<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: Times, 'Times New Roman', serif;"> </span></blockquote>
This writer blames the "false precision" of grading for the cheating epidemic. This is a terrible argument on two counts. First of all, a difference between a 93 or 94 on one test never determines what college you get into. This is just a story kids tell themselves. Second, schools, employers, colleagues, spouses, always make judgments about good and less good performance. There is always a line. In a track meet it may be a hundredth of a second. There is always very little difference between a performance just above or below the line. Does that mean everyone who falls below the line should cheat?<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjr9u52wW0TcCdv9mshoPElnJJ0CJaf1gOXaJLbNtp1Xe-DqUaaQsPHvcAxdDxQcg6YGUlBG2CGHt3XxevBiE-5xplQd5CXXckNB7B3hwHd1KSvoEmJfxu1EefDGxVv3LLzuFKxzloKJA8/s1600/students+taking+SAT.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjr9u52wW0TcCdv9mshoPElnJJ0CJaf1gOXaJLbNtp1Xe-DqUaaQsPHvcAxdDxQcg6YGUlBG2CGHt3XxevBiE-5xplQd5CXXckNB7B3hwHd1KSvoEmJfxu1EefDGxVv3LLzuFKxzloKJA8/s1600/students+taking+SAT.jpg" /></a></div>
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SAT scandals generally consist of some students hiring others to take the test in their place. As a Christian Science Monitor<a href="http://www.csmonitor.com/USA/Education/2011/0928/SAT-cheating-scandal-Are-stakes-getting-too-high-for-college-admission"> article </a>notes of one such incident,<br />
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<blockquote class="tr_bq">
It’s also renewing concerns that the pressure placed on students to score well on a single test, which plays a big role in determining the academic future for so many high-schoolers, may be encouraging them to cheat.</blockquote>
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Again, the argument is that it is the measure that is largely to blame for the cheating. There is something unfair or too pressured about how the measure is applied. Of course students will cheat. We wring our hands about how unfair the system is, and then we increase security at test sites.<br />
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All these cases of cheating seem to share one feature. The cheaters feel that something unfair about the evaluation process justifies them in cheating. If the world were just, they seem to imply, cheating would not be necessary.<br />
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Well, the world isn't just, and cheating is not necessary. I'm not going to argue that the SAT is a perfect test, that colleges are right to weigh small score differences in making judgments, that grading in high school is entirely objective or fair, or that state chemistry labs should continue to do more with less. I'm just pointing out that there's always a reason to cheat. People who cheat because they feel somehow aggrieved or justified in one situation are likely to feel just as aggrieved and justified in the next situation that allows cheating.<br />
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We've all cheated sometimes in our lives. I still remember peeking under the blindfold in Pin the Tail on the Donkey once at a birthday party to win the prize. I also remember that the prize wasn't that great and the burning feeling at the pit of my stomach lasted all day. Today I park at a meter even when I don't have enough quarters, and I hope I don't get caught. Some of us cheat on our taxes (I don't) or on tests (I don't). But we shouldn't fool ourselves that the "reason" for our cheating lies<i> out there </i>somewhere. The temptation lies out there; the opportunity lies out there; the excuse lies out there. The <i>reason </i>lies inside ourselves, in our hopes to get an advantage over others. If we don't recognize that reason inside us and struggle against us, we all risk betraying those who trust us and making ruins of our lives and reputations.<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<br /></blockquote>
Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-73842638706211312262012-09-18T21:30:00.002-07:002012-09-19T03:53:05.165-07:00Diamonds: ten scintillating facts<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtXjZHsy2EqbzEsNA7XlZx9zQr1ZdEDWwBIKk2vLvdgHqjGfFWApwgWLNtx3su83YikCFXuNICkl9oU3mjrqjghfugsMR1ATnjkR6kIBPEOB1ytKm89kVZTp_Tkxkc6mBD4sdqokuTUy0/s1600/yellow+diamond.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtXjZHsy2EqbzEsNA7XlZx9zQr1ZdEDWwBIKk2vLvdgHqjGfFWApwgWLNtx3su83YikCFXuNICkl9oU3mjrqjghfugsMR1ATnjkR6kIBPEOB1ytKm89kVZTp_Tkxkc6mBD4sdqokuTUy0/s320/yellow+diamond.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
1.<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 7pt;"> </span><!--[endif]-->Diamonds were first mined in India 3000 to 6000
years ago.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
2.<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 7pt;"> </span>The name “diamond” comes from a Greek word
meaning “unbreakable.” Another word from
the same root is “adamant,” meaning either incredibly hard or utterly
unyielding in attitude or opinion.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
3.<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 7pt;"> </span>Diamonds are a cubic crystal of pure carbon –
the same material as coal or the “lead” (really graphite) in pencils.<o:p></o:p><br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
4. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 7pt;"> </span>Because diamond is made of carbon, combusting it
with heat and oxygen leads to the production of carbon dioxide gas, as first
demonstrated by chemist Antoine Lavoisier in 1772. Lavoisier used lenses to
concentrate heat of the sun on a diamond surface until it began to vaporize.<br />
<br />
5.<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 7pt;"> </span>Just one stray atom in a million can give a
diamond a distinctive color. If the
stray atoms are boron, the diamond will be bluish; if nitrogen, it will be a
faint yellow.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<br />
6.<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 7pt;"> </span>In 2011, the recently discovered Cora Sun-Drop, a 110-carat yellow pear-shaped diamond, sold at auction for $10.9
million.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<br />
7. Not only is diamond the hardest naturally
occurring substance, it’s also the best thermal conductor. That is, it will transfer heat from one place
to another </div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
much better than any metal.<br />
<br />
8.<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 7pt;"> </span>Every year, 33,000 kilograms of diamonds are
mined, while another 110,000 kilograms of diamond are manufactured
synthetically. Only 20 percent of mined diamonds are large and pure enough to
be gem grade.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<br />
9. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 7pt;"> </span>Cutting a diamond to make a gem generally
removes about half the weight of the diamond.<br />
<br />
10. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 7pt;"> </span>Most
earthly diamond was created 1 to 3 billion years ago in the pressure and heat
of the mantle around 100 miles under the earth’s crust. Diamond comes to the surface in volcanic
events as magma rises through the crust.</div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast">
To learn more about diamonds, check out Mae
and Clinton’s adventures in my scientific mystery for kids, <i><a href="http://tumblehomelearning.com/shop/the-desperate-case-of-the-diamond-chip">The Desperate Case of the Diamond Chip. </a></i><o:p></o:p></div>
<!--EndFragment-->Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-4047278843645649002012-09-05T16:18:00.002-07:002012-09-06T14:45:27.799-07:00Inventing a musical instrument<div style="text-align: right;">
</div>
When I was a medical student, I had a neighbor named Danny who lived across the street. He was young and brilliant with computers, and he played the violin. But he had one ambition that puzzled me: he wanted to invent a musical instrument.<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTkIJWUe2sNP-BI2b55-U9M0TMPyefoppYA3P37y1F5PWg2hyebOMDZGgDKcl_8za_5Ede4g5OOF-uGcpBPmnKxFOlOvUM3EzKkV2rDMQlC2iZfJ2aoYk1iQwGvuhsJK4YDhaZSLbvuV8/s1600/glass+harmonica.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjTkIJWUe2sNP-BI2b55-U9M0TMPyefoppYA3P37y1F5PWg2hyebOMDZGgDKcl_8za_5Ede4g5OOF-uGcpBPmnKxFOlOvUM3EzKkV2rDMQlC2iZfJ2aoYk1iQwGvuhsJK4YDhaZSLbvuV8/s1600/glass+harmonica.png" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Glass harmonica</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
In my unmusical way, I tried to imagine what a new instrument might be. What family would it be in, I asked Danny: wind? string? percussion? He just shook his head. I disappointed him by thinking within the grooves of old paradigms. But the only instrument I could think of that really broke out of these categories was the glass harmonica. <br />
<br />
The truth is, I don't know if Danny ever invented his instrument, but this evening I heard a story on NPR about John Cage (1912-1992), who played an important role in avant-garde art and music. His most famous musical piece, perhaps, is 4'33," a piece where the musician sits at the piano not playing for four minutes and thirty-three seconds while the (initially puzzled) audience hears ambient sound.<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7VGo72F-Nven9vQPqphUVKGGMx577aptBZWdjFqLRVkaq1rHbdNDrTejjzf6wz_roOJIceTZQPlLXyqtbdfH1DI7Jj9mNcUQSSJ5DRPur9cS27A-hOYdONapWiG4-l9PCj1CLVT1nL6Q/s1600/John+Cage.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7VGo72F-Nven9vQPqphUVKGGMx577aptBZWdjFqLRVkaq1rHbdNDrTejjzf6wz_roOJIceTZQPlLXyqtbdfH1DI7Jj9mNcUQSSJ5DRPur9cS27A-hOYdONapWiG4-l9PCj1CLVT1nL6Q/s1600/John+Cage.jpeg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">John Cage</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Cage, whose hundredth birthday would have been today, also experimented with "new" instruments, which were essentially variations on old ones. For example, he used the "prepared piano," which is a piano with various objects stuck between the strings. This instrument combines piano notes with percussion. Presumably a musician could do the same thing with a guitar or even a harp. People can also strike their fist on the strings of the piano or click on the keys of a woodwind instrument without blowing into the mouthpiece. According to Wikipedia, some even put a saxophone mouthpiece on a trombone. But none of these would have satisfied Danny; they're all just variations.<br />
<br />
A new way of producing electronic music might have satisfied him, but I think he was looking for something simpler and more concrete, a new way of creating vibrations. In place of a vibrating string, drumhead, or air within a column, why not ball bearings rolling in a pot or balloons of different size rubbing together... or... or... well, you think of something.<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhU0oMw6blG5s_BEw-3fC0TECV0gzPS7DeTWuxem4NStqfUaQUtoghwBxH4d4rCquNRX8dydfeKvn1eqOkR2HOaznkbCkzpdzGdNXl-peSLnurofRXQ73Js8lc9J4EBAd_yw-xdGVhVKZg/s1600/Morris+dancers.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="263" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhU0oMw6blG5s_BEw-3fC0TECV0gzPS7DeTWuxem4NStqfUaQUtoghwBxH4d4rCquNRX8dydfeKvn1eqOkR2HOaznkbCkzpdzGdNXl-peSLnurofRXQ73Js8lc9J4EBAd_yw-xdGVhVKZg/s320/Morris+dancers.jpeg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Morris dancers - an inspiration for the miners of Lexicon?</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
In <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0983021961/ref=s9_simh_gw_p14_d0_i1?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-2&pf_rd_r=0P307ZKT0MJD06BBCK7K&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=1389517282&pf_rd_i=507846">THE ICE CASTLE</a>, a half-crazed hermit sits deep in a cave trying to invent musical instruments. In fact, he's trying to <i>re-invent</i> them in a society that has banned them. He ropes Ivan, one of the novel's protagonists, in to help him. Ivan is frustrated to realize that although he's familiar with lots of musical instruments at home, he hasn't examined any of them closely enough to draw one or fully explain how it works. Now there's a thought experiment: if you were stranded in a completely alien culture, could you show them how to make the musical instruments that are so familiar to us?<br />
<br />
<br />
In the end, with the help of an ancient manuscript, some mathematics and some experimentation, Ivan succeeds in helping the hermit. He figures out the principle behind tuning stringed instrument. Ivan and his friend Fort also find a way to make an entire band of miners, dancing with bangles on their wrists and ankles, into a kind of group musical instrument. I guess in the end Ivan did invent a new musical instrument--and so did I. I just haven't tried to play it yet.<br />
<br />
<br />Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-72533759712904388202012-08-31T19:01:00.000-07:002012-08-31T19:04:11.274-07:00How common is perfect pitch?Perfect pitch, the ability to recognize (and usually name) a musical note heard without reference to any other note, is considered rare and special in the western world. A common estimate is that perfect pitch in found in only <span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: magenta;">one person in ten thousand</span> in the US and Europe.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Perfect or absolute pitch is more common than that among singers and musicians, including Julie Andrews, Beethoven, Chopin, Mozart, Jimi Hendrix, Bing Crosby, Yo-yo Ma, and many more. (See one list <a href="http://www.perfectpitchpeople.com/">here</a>.) Perhaps half the musicians in a symphony orchestra can identify a note by name when it is played alone. Is perfect pitch a marker of musical talent?</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheG4yO7cRHDZisRoWP7hTft3sRuxzv8wuE_xtX_C5rUSzNLlgotTz6VxKp8M95g5ehUmk5dx8ElTlq9NF7Wkiz28CpYDzSMKWaAyQ27PLJCCRS0jz7GImH9iRwGvHlIVaq96XptBA-xKM/s1600/Chopin.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEheG4yO7cRHDZisRoWP7hTft3sRuxzv8wuE_xtX_C5rUSzNLlgotTz6VxKp8M95g5ehUmk5dx8ElTlq9NF7Wkiz28CpYDzSMKWaAyQ27PLJCCRS0jz7GImH9iRwGvHlIVaq96XptBA-xKM/s320/Chopin.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Chopin at the piano</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Probably not. True, musicians with absolute pitch can tell whether a tune is played in the key of A flat or B flat. Their ability to distinguish notes by name probably leads a different esperience of music, allowing them, for example, to unconsciously associate colors with particular pitches. In practice, however, playing music is more about patterns and relationships among notes than it is about the names of the notes. Skilled musicians can easily transpose from one key to another. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
It turns out that relative pitch - the ability to tell how far one note is from another - shows up later on the evolutionary tree than absolute pitch. Birds and many mammals recognize particular notes. Songbirds,<a href="http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/08/080826080600.htm"> for example</a>, can recognize a series of notes, but if the researcher transposes the notes up or down by a couple of steps, the birds are completely flummoxed.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Recent research has built on this bird research to demonstrate that many more people have absolute pitch than previously thought. In the past, researchers asked subjects to name notes they heard. People untrained in music can't do that - they don't know how to label the notes they hear. But if a researcher asks people untrained in music to sing a well-known folk song, many will sing it in the correct key. That is, they retrieve and produce the "right" starting note, even if they can't name that note.</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
So it's hard to test for absolute pitch among non-musicians, because they can't "name that note." Researchers at the University of Rochester have found a way around this problem. Elizabeth Marvin and Elissa Newport <a href="http://www.esm.rochester.edu/theory/elizabeth_marvin/">taught </a>non-musicians a short string of notes and then asked them to identify this sequence when it was embedded in a longer melody. Musicians with absolute pitch and many non-musicians tended to identify the sequence of notes when it was played in the right key but "miss" it when it was transposed into another key. That is, those with absolute pitch were relying (like birds) on identifying the exact pitches they had learned rather than the pattern of notes. </div>
<div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0ayTTab8_p53VorvVpnRdMogeCngUrWk_4ZTRi78ekdAu6ucbdWYZQm0gTUMvPs81w0QsRU6U7mnt27AjEVUqcLdetC2tz7LOXLxpLkvoSZHTLiK3lzIGjPxyFgzxlGolUG1d_r4JliU/s1600/kids-listening-to-music.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="282" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0ayTTab8_p53VorvVpnRdMogeCngUrWk_4ZTRi78ekdAu6ucbdWYZQm0gTUMvPs81w0QsRU6U7mnt27AjEVUqcLdetC2tz7LOXLxpLkvoSZHTLiK3lzIGjPxyFgzxlGolUG1d_r4JliU/s320/kids-listening-to-music.jpg" width="320" /></a>Perhaps, then, the fact that absolute pitch is more common identified among musicians than among non-musicans simply means musicians know the names of the notes they hear. But again, it's not that simple. Researchers in the US and China have studied absolute pitch among music students in the US and China. <a href="http://philomel.com/pdf/JASA-2006_119_719-722.pdf">Their findings are clear</a>: absolute pitch is more common among students who began their musical studies earlier. Starting at age four makes absolute pitch much more likely than starting at, say, age eight or nine. But an even more striking finding was that Chinese students who started learning music at any age were many times more likely than American students to have absolute pitch.</div>
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The researchers hypothesize that tonal languages such as Chinese, which require young children to hear and reproduce different pitches for different meanings, help children develop a stronger sense of pitch. Growing up with a tonal language is like starting musical training at birth.</div>
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Perfect pitch and the question of musical nature vs. nurture play important roles in the society of the Land of Winter described in my novel THE ICE CASTLE. Only students with perfect pitch can graduate from school and enter the highest ranks of society. Children of the rich and privileged are raised with music all around them. The poor, on the other hand are discouraged from making any kind of music, and musical instruments are banned. The society strongly believes that musical ability is an inborn marker of virtue and nobility, and the rich and powerful create a self-fulfilling prophecy where the children of the poor are very unlikely to show evidence of such ability. Kids deprived of music are less likely to develop absolute pitch, and even those with this ability will be unable to demonstrate it without musical training.</div>
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Is there any analogy between the way the citizens of the Land of Winter approach the question of musical talent and the way we in our society approach other aspects of intelligence? Musing on that question is left to the reader. Meanwhile, to test your own relative pitch, check<a href="http://windowviewblog.blogspot.com/2012/08/testing-your-musical-hearing.html"> here,</a> and to learn if tone deafness is real, visit <a href="http://windowviewblog.blogspot.com/2012/08/is-tone-deafness-real.html">here</a>.</div>
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Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-70931693207015453412012-08-22T15:15:00.000-07:002012-10-19T05:21:11.958-07:00Dry ice and water ice - ten cool facts<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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Interested in ice? In honor of the publication of <i><b>The Ice Castle, an Adventure in Music,</b></i> here are 10 random facts about ice.</div>
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1) Regular ice is frozen water.
Dry ice is frozen carbon dioxide, and it’s very cold, below -78 degrees
Celsius. Unlike water, carbon dioxide
does not go though a liquid stage as it cools from a gas stage to a solid
stage. Similarly, dry ice doesn’t
melt. Instead, it changes directly from
solid into a vapor or gaseous form. This change is called sublimation.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjS2CrffBX5FnbbzlEApIr8pYz3Gfpkt-_ffS-JKkaQPlIuYppQp90J9HX6yOw-cQ3KS8UZeO88Z96T3mU_q1cr4Ml5Phb1rdqdOJwNHOdyxDNYuHokL2qm6RPt3cXCbcKDdwm0FOXA8JM/s1600/ice+cave.png.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="192" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjS2CrffBX5FnbbzlEApIr8pYz3Gfpkt-_ffS-JKkaQPlIuYppQp90J9HX6yOw-cQ3KS8UZeO88Z96T3mU_q1cr4Ml5Phb1rdqdOJwNHOdyxDNYuHokL2qm6RPt3cXCbcKDdwm0FOXA8JM/s320/ice+cave.png.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
2) Ice covers about 10 percent of the Earth’s land mass and
about 7 percent of its oceans.<o:p></o:p></div>
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3) Water is one of very few compounds in the universe that expands
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That’s why ice floats on water.
It’s also why a closed bottle of water, left out in the freezing cold,
can push its top off or even burst.<o:p></o:p></div>
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4) The reason ice looks cloudy is because of tiny air bubbles trapped in the water as it freezes. You can actually get clearer ice cubes by starting off with warm or hot water, which has less dissolved air in it than cool water coming straight from a frothy faucet.</div>
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5) The water at the bottom of the deepest oceans is actually -4
degrees Celsius. Why is it still liquid
when it’s below freezing? Remember,
water has to expand to form ice. The water at the bottom of the ocean, crushed
under all that water pressure, can’t expand to form ice crystals, even though
it’s very cold.<o:p></o:p></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQfPKNbJ-SCBd6fuvyzfqGKYmrXVwUSM7nI8Q3YJTvnoH1xgPSIEeOZOJppIuXzzyTlQ1QlYUYFeDusko60Hl5bYftN1x9vuZEO71cfX16TM1ah5uXsFZze1lZyHby4levDZbyaREPgtU/s1600/dry+ice.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQfPKNbJ-SCBd6fuvyzfqGKYmrXVwUSM7nI8Q3YJTvnoH1xgPSIEeOZOJppIuXzzyTlQ1QlYUYFeDusko60Hl5bYftN1x9vuZEO71cfX16TM1ah5uXsFZze1lZyHby4levDZbyaREPgtU/s320/dry+ice.jpeg" width="320" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
6) Dry ice sinks in water.
Its specific gravity (density compared to water) is about 1.5. If you drop it in water, though, you’ll get
wild bubbling and an outpouring of what seems to be cold steam. That’s why dry ice is great to cool your
punch at a Halloween party.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
7) The ice in comets is not the nice crystalline structure we
know. Instead, it’s an amorphous
(without form) random arrangement of molecules known as “glassy ice.” On earth, glassy ice can only form when water
is rapidly cooled to -137C.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
8) Sea ice is important to regulating global temperature,
because the white, bright ice reflects back 80% of the light that hits it and
helps to keep the ocean cool. Once sea
ice melts, the dark-colored ocean absorbs ninety percent of the sunlight,
leading to greater warming.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
9) Algae grow between the cracks in sea ice and even on the
underside of the ice, providing food for tiny shrimp-like krill throughout the
dark, cold arctic winter.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
10) In the science fiction book <i>Cat’s Cradle</i> by Kurt Vonnegut,
ice-nine is a special form of ice crystal that causes any water it comes in
contact with to solidify immediately into more ice-nine. Throwing a tiny piece of ice-nine in the
ocean could instantly dry up all the water in the world.<o:p></o:p><br />
<br />
11) Bonus fact: In <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Ice-Castle-Adventure-Music/dp/0983021961/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1348156075&sr=8-2&keywords=lost+in+lexicon">The Ice Castle: An Adventure in Music</a>,</i> Ivan and Daphne are stuck in the Land of Winter, where social status and opportunity are determined solely by how well a person sings. Spring will come to the Land of Winter only when the Diva sings her way free of a castle built of ice.<br />
<br />
For more cool facts on ice, check <a href="http://windowviewblog.blogspot.com/2012/10/six-more-cool-facts-about-water-ice-and.html" target="_blank">here</a>.<br />
<br />
For facts on diamonds, try<a href="http://windowviewblog.blogspot.com/2012/09/diamonds-ten-scintillating-facts.html" target="_blank"> here.</a><br />
<br />
And for facts on glass, visit <a href="http://windowviewblog.blogspot.com/2012/10/ten-facts-about-glass-natural-and-man.html">here.</a></div>
<!--EndFragment-->Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-3605189852903676532012-08-19T18:04:00.002-07:002012-08-19T18:04:38.567-07:00Testing your musical hearingI just ran across a<a href="http://detrave.net/nblume/perfect-pitch/"> great game</a> for testing your ability to hear notes and intervals. Give it a try and tell me what you think. I'm not very good at it, but I have the feeling that if I played for a while, I'd improve at hearing and remembering intervals.<br />
<br />
For an more complicated online version of the old game Simon, which gives light and color cues as well as sounds as it challenges you to reproduce a tonal pattern, visit the Games page on my Lexicon Adventures <a href="http://www.lostinlexicon.com/">website</a> and look for <a href="http://www.lostinlexicon.com/games-and-activities/">Tone Memory.</a><br />
<br />Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-44240654633344955602012-08-16T14:08:00.005-07:002012-08-16T14:40:14.635-07:00FutureDude on Venus<br />
<blockquote type="cite">
<div>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Today I'm sharing an interview with Jeffrey Morris, lead author and artist for the new graphic novel<b style="font-style: italic;"> Venus: Daedalus One. </b>Jeffrey has a beautifully illustrated <a href="http://www.futuredude.com/">online magazine</a> that celebrates science and exploration, and he's currently running a <a href="http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1657688528/mars-daedalus-two-a-new-realistic-sci-fi-graphic-n?ref=live">Kickstarter campaign</a> to help finance the creation of his second planetary graphic novel, <b><i>Mars: Daedalus Two.</i></b></span></div>
</blockquote>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwvMsFEXzSDVlNm5cRhFybmQ8yaauG0uo8tE-39gBgLxDuUeiiylEOU5Lqtmplwy0uq9UYgG4jwyk8GDByDV7pmTFPmzC9w9c37DJvbLo2A3TdQawul8ygueKOtXo6JXUzFzWUbg5OcXs/s1600/planet-venus.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiwvMsFEXzSDVlNm5cRhFybmQ8yaauG0uo8tE-39gBgLxDuUeiiylEOU5Lqtmplwy0uq9UYgG4jwyk8GDByDV7pmTFPmzC9w9c37DJvbLo2A3TdQawul8ygueKOtXo6JXUzFzWUbg5OcXs/s200/planet-venus.gif" width="198" /></a> <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">Jeffrey is a gentle person with a real dedication to kids and the future, and his comics are exciting while still managing to stay free of the sexism and violence that mar so much of this art form.</span><br />
<h4>
<blockquote style="font-weight: normal;" type="cite">
<div>
<i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">How do you make a graphic novel? </span></i></div>
</blockquote>
</h4>
<h4>
<i><blockquote style="font-style: normal; font-weight: normal;" type="cite">
<div>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">We start with a solid story concept with strong visual potential—which in the case of Venus: Daedalus One was a 110-page feature film script. As an illustrator, I also created a dozens of pencil sketches and marker renderings to get a sense of what the world in our story looked like. Many of these were translated into computer generated images that we could fly around and manipulate. All of the aforementioned media served as the basis for a comic artist to begin building the actual panels and pages. I worked hand in hand with him and colorists to bring the full vision of the script to life in comic form.</span></div>
</blockquote>
</i></h4>
<h4>
<i><br /></i></h4>
<blockquote type="cite">
<div>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><i>What's Venus like, and what made you decide to write about it?</i></span></div>
</blockquote>
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpUQM2ZV8gpdho-zQwjjmGvvS2C62_Q5H58lwhKBkDk-iNnHlG5zW-dK7HG6ESMgbVJ6D5pAoyiEmJsYFgPxnsy9dsiWjW2doHg0AQOQYRQjc-RM1ArH31AW4i2vgp05crv4FKBSD1le0/s1600/Venus+surface.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="239" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpUQM2ZV8gpdho-zQwjjmGvvS2C62_Q5H58lwhKBkDk-iNnHlG5zW-dK7HG6ESMgbVJ6D5pAoyiEmJsYFgPxnsy9dsiWjW2doHg0AQOQYRQjc-RM1ArH31AW4i2vgp05crv4FKBSD1le0/s320/Venus+surface.jpg" width="320" /></a><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">I wanted to tell a futuristic story set within our own solar system with a focus on one of the inner planets. Quite a few books and movies have taken place on Mars, while virtually none have occurred on Venus. I think a primary reason is that Venus is a pretty inhospitable place. Searing heat, crushing pressure and scalding acid are the norm. There is no water and little to no chance of life as we know it. I thought it would be fun to throw a group of conflicted characters into a environment that challenging.</span><br />
<br />
<br />
<blockquote type="cite">
<div>
<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><i>Do you think we'll find life on other planets in our solar system?</i><br /><br />Absolutely! It is inevitable and just a matter of time. The key question is whether or not human curiosity can outpace waning public interest, partisan politics, and shrinking science budgets. Eventually, we need human minds, eyes, and hands directly on location throughout the Solar System in order to use our innate instincts and intuition to help us uncover the clues that will lead us to life. However, in the meantime, we should continue to launch a barrage of space probes, like NASA's Curiosity, to every possible destination. They are our emissaries for now.</span></div>
</div>
</blockquote>
<br />
<blockquote type="cite">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgpUQM2ZV8gpdho-zQwjjmGvvS2C62_Q5H58lwhKBkDk-iNnHlG5zW-dK7HG6ESMgbVJ6D5pAoyiEmJsYFgPxnsy9dsiWjW2doHg0AQOQYRQjc-RM1ArH31AW4i2vgp05crv4FKBSD1le0/s1600/Venus+surface.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"></span></a></div>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0cAalDyKngCNqu9F9kYNJ6W0Ve7SQWCeeWHnPc-93BSbL4S7DmgAxTwExbunipf8eg48TEewSnVtWLzy5hEUmfTuBofDC2UxRzUFPUcACXsbjS9ZJWgixQfuOoW20vbxCFsEQehiDW-M/s1600/MarsKS-ad.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi0cAalDyKngCNqu9F9kYNJ6W0Ve7SQWCeeWHnPc-93BSbL4S7DmgAxTwExbunipf8eg48TEewSnVtWLzy5hEUmfTuBofDC2UxRzUFPUcACXsbjS9ZJWgixQfuOoW20vbxCFsEQehiDW-M/s1600/MarsKS-ad.jpg" /></a></div>
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;"><i>What are you working on next?</i><br /><br />I currently am developing <i><b>Mars: Daedalus Two </b></i>and several other realistic science fiction stories. Each is part of an ever-expanding world of hard science-fiction titles. My team and I want to establish a niche for ourselves as the purveyors of visually stunning futuristic media that entertains, educates and never underestimates the intelligence of the audience.<br /><br /><i>Ten years from now, looking back on your work, what do you hope to see?</i></span><br />
<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: 'Trebuchet MS', sans-serif;">I hope to have made a real difference in the average person's perception of tomorrow while energizing a base of individuals to work for a better future. I intend to do this by building several successful hard sci-fi franchises that are able to expand into numerous areas or media and entertainment that can truly withstand the test of time. After all, my stories are envisioning and often predicting the future! </span></div>
</blockquote>
Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-55120387877650993022012-08-16T09:20:00.001-07:002012-08-19T18:05:03.874-07:00Are You Tone Deaf?<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhA9CddsBN6Fe5vD7uuy8k0W3Ehbtyf0dQ6Qq1P8xQpYNyBKKTJSyS37XpaxqXXcf8NdeST0AGpeAL3-kzG4Htn9PTQBJPcnxAsCP6rdaGGNxUkuamjZPMb3n6Sg_BUyikOuufCClpuRVg/s1600/broken+note.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhA9CddsBN6Fe5vD7uuy8k0W3Ehbtyf0dQ6Qq1P8xQpYNyBKKTJSyS37XpaxqXXcf8NdeST0AGpeAL3-kzG4Htn9PTQBJPcnxAsCP6rdaGGNxUkuamjZPMb3n6Sg_BUyikOuufCClpuRVg/s320/broken+note.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">a broken and fallen note</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Are some people truly tone deaf? Sure, there are plenty of people who can't carry a tune. I'm one of them. But what is tone deafness, and is it real?<br />
<br />
According to scientists who study tone deafness, about 5% of people have a significant handicap in hearing and learning music. The root disability appears to be a difficulty in distinguishing different pitches. The smallest step of the Western scale is the half step, one-twelfth of an octave. (Indian music uses smaller units of pitch change.) People with amusia have difficulty distinguishing differences as small as that half-step, although they may hear much larger pitch differences accurately, sort of like being able to see the largest letters on an eye chart.<br />
<br />
Perhaps about half of those with tone deafness also have difficulty hearing rhythm in music. They're lousy dancers and even falter in tapping along in time to the music. They also have impaired memory for music. They are only half as good as other people in naming a familiar tune. Often they recognize a song by its lyrics instead of its melody. Even when they try to memorize a stretch of music, they have difficulty recognizing it when an examiner later plays it back to them. Although most tone deaf people can tell if a piece of music is meant to be happy or sad, many don't particularly enjoy music, and some find hearing it actually painful.<br />
<br />
Interestingly, the disability in amusia appears limited to music. Tone deaf people have little difficulty recognizing intonation in speech. For example, the difference between a question and a statement is often only a difference in pitch at the end of a sentence. (Think of "You're coming," versus "You're coming?") These differences are large enough that most tone deaf people have no difficulty with them. (However, I'm not aware of any research on how well tone deaf people learn tonal languages such as Chinese.)<br />
<br />
In my latest fantasy novel, <b><a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Ice-Castle-Adventure-Music/dp/0983021961/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1345142178&sr=8-1&keywords=ice+castle+noyce">THE ICE CASTLE: An Adventure in Music</a></b>, tone deaf people are relegated to the lowest ranks of society. Ivan, one of the protagonists, difficulty distinguishing musical pitches, but through careful and attentive listening, he gradually improves over the course of the story. Such improvement may not happen with the most severely tone deaf, who even after growing up in a music-rich environment or taking music lessons in childhood show no improvement.<br />
<br />
I'm fascinated by tone deafness because I fall pretty clearly into that range myself. My elementary school singing teacher urged me to sing softly or only mouth the words in school performances, but it wasn't just a matter of not singing well. My father told me that when I was young, if he played two notes on the piano and asked me which was higher, I couldn't tell the answer. I remember lying in bed on Wednesday nights listening to his madrigal group sing, trying to figure out from the beat whether the song might be one I "knew," like "Yankee Doodle" (a song which, I later learned, madrigal groups sing very rarely). <br />
<br />
Gradually, as I got older, the condition's severity lessened. I took piano lessons for a couple of years, and in high school, where I played the clarinet, I finally learned enough to be able to tell when I hit a wrong note. <br />
<br />
Around high school I realized that one reason it was difficult for me to appreciate orchestral music is that I couldn't grasp the idea of musical "theme." I could never remember previous phrases well enough to notice when they returned with variations. In listening to unfamiliar music, I was condemned to a perpetual present. It was like trying to read a novel when the characters are always someone you just met.<br />
<br />
I did learn, however, that with careful listening, I can more or less blend in with other singers. With lots and lots of repetition, I can even carry a few phrases of a simple tune on my own. Even as young children, my kids, all of whom grew up to be fine singers, sometimes asked me to stop singing. I still can't hear when a song on the radio changes key, and I often can't identify a familiar song until the lyrics start. If I lived in a society where musical intelligence mattered as much as verbal and logical intelligence, I'd be classified as subnormal. Exploring such a world, where tone deafness is an unsurmountable social handicap, furnished a big part of my motivation for writing THE ICE CASTLE.Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-91607069227254711502012-08-12T16:49:00.000-07:002012-08-12T16:49:24.873-07:00Why so few lobster boats?<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiCAGAVpVhCgbG6WFhFNDyDJabaHAVazLLXcvK4Booxh3KXy2PB-94s1f83jV7pBxPI71aCAEI4HU4Ut5p-uGg2XAUPV_-buDKAt7AWuFdcArsCYF5zKJ5Unu0yK80RURcq49JJDXuLh0/s1600/buoys+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgiCAGAVpVhCgbG6WFhFNDyDJabaHAVazLLXcvK4Booxh3KXy2PB-94s1f83jV7pBxPI71aCAEI4HU4Ut5p-uGg2XAUPV_-buDKAt7AWuFdcArsCYF5zKJ5Unu0yK80RURcq49JJDXuLh0/s1600/buoys+2.jpg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">lobster buoys on a calm morning</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Come July and August, somewhere between six and seven a.m., the growl of lobster boats revving and calming as they move from trap to trap wafts in our windows on Muscongus Bay. A confetti of lobster buoys dots the water of the sound, and when going out ourselves, we have to keep a sharp eye out to avoid fouling our boat propellor in the rope that leads from each buoy to a trap on the bottom.<br />
<br />
That's most years.<br />
<br />
This year, buoys are scarce in the shallow waters near Hockomock Point. Early mornings are quiet. Even the gulls hush their raucous cries without the attraction of stinky bait being scooped into nets and tied into lobster traps. And this is in a year when a glut of lobsters has driven prices paid to lobstermen down to a forty-year low. What's going on?<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiF14nyWVgYvpBJ_uf040J9UQvf5ICaIrBNBTgRmit9Q-Ck_ZZGuzY94l9t1Z7bemGkach47Id5LmNy1BxH4EPIhtYxaq72F1xLGhRmmrcsG4KIoPeU2yzfrlt2Jge1BotAt34x_RtgIRI/s1600/eggs1.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiF14nyWVgYvpBJ_uf040J9UQvf5ICaIrBNBTgRmit9Q-Ck_ZZGuzY94l9t1Z7bemGkach47Id5LmNy1BxH4EPIhtYxaq72F1xLGhRmmrcsG4KIoPeU2yzfrlt2Jge1BotAt34x_RtgIRI/s1600/eggs1.jpeg" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">eggs on the tail of a female lobster</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
First, the lobster glut. Lobster landings have been rising steadily for the past ten years, but this is the biggest year yet. Why? Most fishermen and scientists believe that lobstering in the Gulf of Maine is a well-managed fishery. Lobster licenses are limited. Only lobsters of a certain size--between three and five inches from behind the eye to the end of the back--may be kept. The others must be thrown back, the smaller ones to grow more and the larger ones to serve as (presumably robust) breeding stock.<br />
Any egger--a female with 10,000 eggs clinging to her tail--must not only be thrown back, but her tail must be notched so that every fisherman forever knows that as a breeding female, she's off limits.<br />
<br />
Another factor in the recent rise in lobster catches may be the decline in the population of groundfish, the major predators of young post-larval lobsters. Only now, after years of vigorous management, is the population of cod beginning to rebound. As for how cod affect young lobsters, I can vouch for that: this weekend we landed four cod, more than in decades, and three of the four had young, three-inch lobsters in their throats.<br />
<br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; margin-left: 1em; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxQwJPP-jBb3DqL-65w886LOKNgtzxHyH_CBFDJZu6hpXOEaKyPlksrrHuKylfQJIkU78fbMMmizUWPOal_60VmkqiECoz6KhoABWawgWoOJc9qZhPvk877HmJGrhJktMr3n0qsh8hTy0/s1600/codfish.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="252" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxQwJPP-jBb3DqL-65w886LOKNgtzxHyH_CBFDJZu6hpXOEaKyPlksrrHuKylfQJIkU78fbMMmizUWPOal_60VmkqiECoz6KhoABWawgWoOJc9qZhPvk877HmJGrhJktMr3n0qsh8hTy0/s320/codfish.jpeg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">cod</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
In theory, a third factor is found by looking at lobster fishing as a great, opportunistic aquaculture project. Most lobsters have moved in and out of traps, eating bait fish, many times before they're finally large enough not to fit out the special escape hatches built into each trap. Most have probably been caught and thrown back many times before they're large enough to catch and keep. Lobsters have even been filmed moving in and out of unbaited traps to check the kitchen. Maybe we have so many lobsters because we're feeding them well.<br />
<br />
But why the special glut this year? The reason seems to be an especially warm winter. One effect was an earlier and more productive lobster fishing season in the Canadian part of the Gulf of Maine. Coupled with that, plentiful shedders or soft-shell lobsters, those that come closer inshore to molt, arrived in Maine waters about six weeks earlier than usual, at a time when the Canadian processing plants, which take about 50% of Maine lobsters, were still full with the large Canadian take. Soft shell lobsters, which are the usual summer variety, are difficult to ship long distances in the shell, so the local market is full, and lobstermen are getting only around $2 per pound.<br />
<br />
Why then, are lobster boats so scarce in Muscongus Sound? I can offer a couple of hypotheses. One reason may be an unofficial lobster strike. Up and down the coast, lobstermen have organized hasty protests by staying in, not going fishing, in hopes that prices will go up. It hasn't worked yet.<br />
<br />
The problem with this hypothesis is that none of the lobster strikes have lasted more than a week. Besides, in the next bay east, or farther out in deeper water, pot buoys are still numerous.<br />
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">idle lobster traps with growing weeds</td></tr>
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So my second hypothesis is that lobsters have moved offshore or Downeast to cooler waters. I can't remember a year when jumping off our dock at Hockomock Point has been less chilling than this year. Swimming off the dock used to be so cold that the only reason to do it would be to feel good when you got out. This year it's just a pleasant cool-down on hot, muggy days.<br />
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So maybe the same warm waters that brought the lobsters in to shed early has now driven them farther north and east to escape waters that have become unseasonably warm. Meanwhile, another lobster season is about to open in New Brunswick, and the Canadian lobstermen are already grumbling about the glut of Maine lobster driving down the market.<br />
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At a time when it's hard to keep up with what fish it's "green" to eat, which species are well-managed and which are in decline, it's good to know that this summer, at least, eating lobster as fast as we can may be a patriotic act.<br />
<br />Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-67110586073582512512012-08-10T15:54:00.000-07:002012-08-12T16:49:54.507-07:00Making series characters grow over timeDid the comic strip and cartoon characters of your childhood grow up or stay forever the same? Archie and Veronica never left high school; Pebbles and Bam-bam never got older. Charlie Brown and his friends had baby brothers and sisters who grew into childhood, but no one ever advanced beyond that. The same is true today of many characters in kids' books today. Zack of <i>The Zack Files</i> is always ten years old. Andrew of the <i>Andrew Lost</i> adventures stays a child. But the Harry Potter series brought us heroes and heroines who grew older, turned into adolescents, and faced more complex challenges, external and internal, than just battling the bad guys.<br />
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When I started writing <i>LOST IN LEXICON, </i>I thought it would be a stand-alone book like <i>The Phantom Tollbooth. </i> I planned an adventure with a full arc of the hero's journey, even including a visit to the underworld of electronic addiction. Because of that, I didn't hold back any new tricks with words or numbers for a second visit, a decision that I think made Lexicon's Land of Morning rich and layered. <br />
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Originally, I thought Ivan and Daphne might visit all four quadrants of Lexicon on their only visit to the magical land. But as the pages pounded out of my printer, I realized my characters would only have time to visit two quadrants. At once the notion of a sequel skulked in the near distance. As the two kids climb up inside the hollow mountain to find their friend the Astronomer, they come to a narrow, windowed room from which they can see all four quadrants of the country. The glimpse of lands they'd like to visit, "Maybe someday," becomes a promise to young readers of more to come.<br />
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Once an author decides to write a sequel, the questions of growth and change need answers. For young characters, that means not only deciding whether their age and grade have changed, but also thinking about the world they live in. LOST IN LEXICON is a book about innocence, about two young adolescents entering a fantasy world to search for lost children and return them to their home. At the same time, the protagonists regain some of their own childlike wonder, and even as they take on more responsibility they turn away from the commercially-driven rush to false early consumerist adolescence that seems to dominate our world.<br />
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But in ICE CASTLE, Ivan and Daphne are older. Only three months older, it's true, but as I wrote, it seemed to me time to give them more depth and let them differentiate more. I let them inhabit a darker and more problematic world, both on "our" side and on the Lexicon side of the barn cupola. Aunt Adelaide is very ill, perhaps dying, and in the quadrant of Lexicon they enter, the Land of Winter, harshness and oppression vie with beauty. I provide another, younger cousin, Lila, who still moves with the unconscious acceptance of her surroundings that characterizes childhood, and I made Daphne resentful of her. While she sails along accepting adulation and privilege, Daphne and Ivan question, argue, take stands, and suffer for their beliefs. Daphne even quietly falls in love for the first time.<br />
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Adolescence is also a time when kids differentiate. I allowed ( and the plot required) Ivan and Daphne to separate. For long periods of time the main characters can't reach one another. LOST IN LEXICON alternated chapters between Daphne's and Ivan's points of view, but they traveled through the book together. In ICE CASTLE, three main characters have to face dangers and solve problems alone, with communication between them only fragmented and incomplete.<br />
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Thus I found that not only did my characters change, but so did the challenges they faced and even the world they inhabited. That resonates with the way I experienced the world as a young teenager. I wanted to feel the same inside, but the world around me kept changing.<br />
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Now I'm working on the third Lexicon book, THE FLOATING HARBOR, and Ivan and Daphne are changing again. Entering the fourth quadrant of Lexicon, they come up against death and the hidden stories of people's lives. Everything the encounter, even the nature of Lexicon itself, is more complex and fragile than it once seemed. While I hope to fill THE FLOATING HARBOR with some of the same whimsy and magic as the first two books, ultimately it will be more about psychological growth than about playing with words, numbers, music and art.Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-23722933961186792312012-08-06T06:12:00.002-07:002012-08-06T06:12:13.666-07:00Boy singers and an earlier voice changeWe all know that boys' voices change during adolescence. Now we're learning that the embarrassing tendency to squeak when speaking may be occurring ever earlier. Currently, a boy's voice starts to change around age thirteen, and a boy is likely to speak in his adult male voice by age fifteen.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Franz Hals - Two Boys Singing</td></tr>
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But the voice change hasn't always come so early, as the Washington Post<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/leipzigs-st-thomas-boys-choir-deals-with-change/2012/04/07/gIQAYaXC2S_story_1.html"> reports</a>. Records from Liepzig's St. Thomas Boys Choir, which is 800 years old, suggest that in the first half of the 1700's, when J.S. Bach led the choir, most boys' voice change began at age 17 or 18. Moreover, during wartime, when hunger was common in the city, the voice change began even later. So maybe better nutrition accounts for today's falling age of male voice change.<br />
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On average, the pitch of a male's speaking voice falls by about one octave as he passes through adolescence. Singing teachers have assured me, however, that a boy's adult singing range cannot be predicted from his childhood range. You can't assume that an alto will become a bass while a soprano will become a tenor.<br />
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Voice change can be a challenge for all chorus directors, not just those in an elite boys' choir like Liepzig's. As boys' voices become less predictable, they also lose some ability to sing on pitch and sing intervals correctly. Their vocal range may also simply contract for a while. Boys may become discouraged and drop out of a choir or school chorus. Directors of a middle school musical may find their male lead suddenly unable to sing the part. Girls may have to fill boys' roles because too few boys are willing to risk singing.<br />
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To me it's telling that we talk about boys' voices "breaking," not just changing. Maybe the term reflects our unconscious sense that our sons' adolescence is a loss -- loss of innocence, loss of closeness, loss of beauty and loveableness.<br />
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In the Land of Winter, the imaginary setting for my middle grade fantasy<a href="http://www.indiebound.org/book/9780983021964"> THE ICE CASTLE: AN ADVENTURE IN MUSIC</a>, singing ability is each person's defining characteristic, determining social class and educational opportunity. Although I don't directly address how this society handles boys' voice change, I doubt that it does so with any great compassion. After all, there is no place in society for the visitor Ivan, who sings badly. And when Fort, a talented singer, finds his voice ruined by a botched throat surgery, his adoptive family throws him out of the house.<br />
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In some ways, <a href="http://www.theicecastle.net/">THE ICE CASTLE</a> is a parable of the passage through adolescence, where voice change is only one of many troublesome changes. Other signs of passage touched on in the book include increasing independence from parental control, learning to see beyond one's own excessive self-regard, and learning to delight in creativity and invention.<br />
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In reality, most chorus directors and singing teachers nowadays encourage boys to keep singing through the voice change. They allow boys to change parts or select music with a narrower range and less challenging intervals. Even if they decide to let the boys take a break, they assure them of their place in the chorus and welcome them when they return. <br />
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The choir directors of St. Thomas may rush to fill boys' heads and voices with as much musical knowledge as possible between ages 9 and 12, but that doesn't always work even with music. Most parents and teachers know that adolescence comes upon our kids before we or even they are ready for it. All we can do is hold their place, keep teaching, and work to assure them that adolescence is a continuation of growth, not a sudden break from childhood.<br />
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<br />Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-55829831841182279112012-08-05T05:55:00.004-07:002012-08-05T06:19:15.918-07:00THE ICE CASTLE launches<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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THE ICE CASTLE: AN ADVENTURE IN MUSIC, second in the Lexicon Adventure series, officially launches this week, and I'm truly excited. It's a beautifully printed book, and I'm attached to the story and the characters.<br />
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The book opens in December. Aunt Adelaide is ill, and the family gathers, including Daphne and Ivan's younger cousin Lila, a gifted singer. Lila stumbles into Ivan and Daphne's secret land of Lexicon, and in an attempt to rescue her, they follow her into the snowy Land of Winter. Kidnapped by nomads, they are delivered to the town of Capella, where they learn that all that matters for social status and opportunity is how well a person sings. <br />
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Lila is celebrated and elevated, while Daphne starts off a schoolgirl and becomes a servant, and Ivan, who is tone deaf, is relegated to life as a laborer, until his rebellious nature gets him sent off to work in the silver mines. <br />
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I had a lot of fun writing this book, not least in creating the <a href="http://www.lostinlexicon.com/meet-the-characters/">supporting characters</a>. There's Fort, adopted child of a high-status family who is disinherited after a botched throat operation ruins his voice. He becomes a charismatic Dissonant leader, a romantic figure who dazzles Daphne. There's Kanzat, the nomad chief whose love of fancy words leads him into delicious malapropisms. There's the grubby and irascible Hermit of the Mine, to whom Ivan apprentices himself to forge a path to freedom. And there's the glorious and exacting Diva, ruler of the Land of Winter, who each year must summon the spring by singing her way free of a castle built of ice.<br />
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I tell the three cousins' stories in alternating chapters that weave apart and together as each follows his or her own story arc. Lila finds independence and courage to escape from under the thumb of a domineering mother. Daphne moves beyond envy and resentment to embrace loyalty and humble open-mindedness while protecting Lila from a hidden enemy. Ivan embarks on a journey of creativity as he invents his way out of captivity. Each plays a role in bringing greater justice to the Land of Winter. Orchestrating their movements and roles was half the fun of writing THE ICE CASTLE.<br />
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Now comes the next step, presenting the book. As with Lost in Lexicon, I've developed an Ice Castle activity fair to use in schools or with groups of readers. Scarletta Press has produced a short <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3xYImkQzCc">movie</a> introducing some of these activities with ice, melting, and music. I'll run two of these fairs soon at the Discovery Museum in Acton, MA, <a href="http://events.r20.constantcontact.com/register/event?oeidk=a07e63pbei2e75c611d&llr=et6xwncab">first for a group of kid readers</a> and then again at the book's launch party September 23, 2012, to which you're all invited.<br />
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We've also updated the<a href="http://www.theicecastle.net/"> Lexicon website</a>, adding new characters, new stops on<a href="http://www.lostinlexicon.com/journey-to-lexicon/"> the map</a>, and two new, <a href="http://www.lostinlexicon.com/games-and-activities/">musical games</a>.<br />
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I truly hope some of you will join the fun of THE ICE CASTLE launch by visiting the website and buying the book. Sometimes people ask whether it's better to buy from the website, <a href="http://www.indiebound.org/book/9780983021964">their local bookstore</a>, or from an online groups like Amazon or Barnes & Noble. The truth is, any one is great. When you request the book from your local independent bookseller, you support local business and diversity, and you encourage them to stock the book. If you buy from <a href="http://www.lostinlexicon.com/games-and-activities/">Amazon</a> or <a href="http://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/the-ice-castle-pendred-noyce/1110914226?ean=">B&N</a> (and even if you don't), you can make a great contribution by writing a short review or even more easily by "tagging" the book with categories that will help other readers searching for good books that, say, combine fantasy with music. And of course if you order from the website, you can get your book autographed. So please cool off in this hot month of August with a visit to the musical wonders and snowy landscapes of THE ICE CASTLE. Let us know what you find!<br />
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<br />Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-36534945848210888532012-07-16T21:06:00.003-07:002012-07-18T11:45:50.434-07:00Trayvon, Zimmerman, guns, and safetyAs time has passed since the Trayvon Martin tragedy, it has become only more apparent what a tragedy it truly was. Whatever else George Zimmerman may have been--a wannabe cop, a man willing to shave the truth in front of a judge, maybe even man who as a boy<a href="http://thegrio.com/2012/07/16/zimmerman-relative-witness-9-alleges-sexual-misconduct/"> abused a female relative-</a>-he does not appear to have been motivated by a racist grudge against African-Americans. Instead he appears to be a man who felt threatened in his role as protector. First he was threatened by a serious of local burglaries. Then he was threatened by the presence of a black man in a hoodie. <span style="background-color: white;">Then, if we believe him, he felt threatened and afraid of Trayvon Martin--enough so that he shot him.</span><br />
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But there's something strange about Zimmerman's fear of Trayvon. Why did Zimmerman follow a man he feared, <i>when the police dispatcher had specifically asked him not to do so</i>? The answer, I believe, is that he had a gun. The gun made him feel safe. I don't know if he had clearly thought out how he would use a gun during an encounter, but the gun gave him a sense of security.<br />
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Then, later, according to Zimmerman's own account, Trayvon attacked him. Zimmerman was larger, and he could probably have fended off the attack, if such it was, with his fists alone. But then, says Zimmerman, <i>Trayvon Martin reached for his (Zimmerman's) gun</i>. The gun that had made Zimmerman feel safe now all at once made him feel that his life was in danger; so he grabbed the gun first and shot.<br />
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Here's the irony: Without the gun, Zimmerman would probably have stayed in his car. The police, responding to his call, would have confronted Trayvon Martin, questioned him, and found that he had a legitimate reason for being where he was and that he posed no threat. The police would have allowed both young men to go on their way. Even if Zimmerman had followed Martin without a gun, without a gun for Martin to grab he would never have feared that he was about to be killed. Without a gun in the picture, there would have been no "Stand Your Ground." Trayvon Martin would be alive, and George Zimmerman would be free.<br />
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I believe that the Second Amendment gives law-abiding Americans the right to own guns, but it certainly doesn't take away the risk guns pose to their owners or innocent bystanders. People talk about owning guns for safety. Usually, when this goes wrong it goes wrong at home, as in the case this week of <a href="http://www.wistv.com/story/19025894/police-3-year-old-shot-father?hpt=us_bn9">a three-year-old accidentally shooting his fathe</a>r to death. But the Trayvon Martin case shows how even in the heroic narrative of men using guns to protect life and property from criminals, the gun can do its owner more harm than good. If I lived in a neighborhood with a high crime rate, I would welcome a neighborhood watch group. But I would feel much, much safer if I knew that members of that group were unarmed.<br />
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<span style="color: #c27ba0;">See my past post on this topic, <a href="http://windowviewblog.blogspot.com/2012/03/trayvon-martin-and-hoodie.html">Trayvon Martin and the Hoodie</a>.</span>Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-82358137234128717942012-07-14T02:34:00.001-07:002012-07-19T13:46:53.273-07:0048-hour film project<span style="background-color: white; color: blue;"><b>Friday, 7pm</b></span> <span style="background-color: white;"> This weekend, my son and his friends, all age fourteen, are participating in the Providence </span><a href="http://www.48hourfilm.com/" style="background-color: white;"> 48-hour film project</a><span style="background-color: white;">. The challenge: make a complete 5 to 7-minute film in just 48 hours. They've done this before, through school, with a group of young, cool teachers writing the script. This time the kids are on their own. They've named their film company</span><span style="background-color: white; color: purple;"> </span><b><span style="background-color: white; color: purple;">Release the Kraken.</span></b><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;">8 pm </span> Two members of the team return with the parameters they picked up from the project organizers in Providence. (These two had told everyone pickup would be at 8, so they've been brainstorming by themselves for 45 minutes. Everyone else is indignant that they didn't call at once when they knew the parameters. ) The team's assigned genre, <b><span style="color: purple;">romance</span></b>, is perfect for a group of almost ninth graders. Their assigned character is<span style="color: purple;"> </span><b><span style="color: purple;">Albert or Alice the advice columnist</span>.</b> Required prop: <b><span style="color: purple;">a car part</span></b>. The required line: <b><span style="color: purple;">"We need to get going."</span></b></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>10:40 pm</b> </span> Pie break. Six kids (five boys, one girl) have been brainstorming plot lines for almost three hours. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;">Plot suggestions have included:</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"> - a romance between two spark plugs;</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"> - a guy writing for romantic advice because he's in love with his car;</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"> - a guy impersonating a female advice columnist (and a lot of guys who write for advice fall in love with "her")</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"> - etcetera. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;">They've settled on a dweeby guy named Ogden taking bad (tongue-in-cheek) romantic advice and having it all turn out well in the end anyway. Scenes involve anaphylaxis and an interrupted robbery. The car part is a tire swing. </span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;">At this point they've planned the sequence of scenes. Owen sits at the keyboard with headphones on composing the score. The others are splitting into teams to work on the script of individual scenes.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><b><span style="color: blue;">11:30 pm</span> </b> Four of the kids are typing on their laptops on a shared google doc. Damian is now composing while Owen bounces around. Much concern<b>:</b> is the script too short? Too cheesy? Their current plan is to finish the script and go to sleep by 2 am.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: blue;"><b>Saturday</b></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>12:30 am</b> </span> They have finished a first draft, and now they're mostly arguing. Owen took over Damian's song and "fixed" it. They've done the casting, including for friends who will arrive in the morning, and Cally is drafting a costume list. I drive the director, Ryan, home to sleep in his own bed. Everybody else plans to camp out at our house. As I go to bed, a now-calmer group sits around refining the script.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>5:30 am</b></span> Strangely, the kids have waked up to go for a "nature walk." They went to bed at 3:30.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>8:00 am</b></span> The director arrives. Damian makes pancakes for his friends. Then, as Albert the Tongue-in-Cheek Romantic Advice columnist, he types on an actual typewriter a parent brought over for a prop.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>Noon </b></span> Two are here working on music. The others are out scouting locations<b>:</b> playground and restaurant. They've already filmed and uploaded most of the scenes they could do at home.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>3 pm</b></span> Back out with picnic gear to film the restaurant scene at outdoor tables of a small, currently closed, restaurant. When the hero falls down in (simulated) anaphylaxis, the kids' cries of "Call 911!" attract attention.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>5 pm</b></span><b> </b> The kids decide the tire swing in the park was not the right kind. They rig a tire swinging from a chain in the back yard, but the light is wrong for filming. Filming ends for the day. Editing and composing continue.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><br /></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>6 pm</b> </span>The leading lady, Cally, sprains her ankle jumping on the trampoline. Rest, Ice, Compression, Elevation. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>7 pm</b></span> Our older kids, their significant others, and a guest also come for dinner. Leo cooks a 4-course Asian meal for 19. The male lead, Andrew, who is allergic to nuts, points out a nut in a dish I assured him was safe. I give him Benadryl. Life does not imitate art. No anaphylaxis ensues.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>8:30</b></span><span style="color: blue;"><b> pm</b> </span> I clean up after dinner for 19. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>9:30 pm to midnight</b></span> Some people go home for the night or go upstairs to sleep for a few hours. Three kids compete to write the final song the leading man sings to his love, while the director tells them there won't be room for a final song.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white; color: blue;"><b>Sunday</b></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white; color: blue;"><b>7:00 am</b></span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;">The four boys working at the computer now averaged 5 hours of sleep, much better than Friday night. Status update: two scenes need to be re-shot. No decision has been made about music for the final scene and credits. Otherwise, editing is coming along well. </span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>7:30 am</b> </span> Decision: the movie will be called <b><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQT5aSMHas4">OGDEN</a></b> after the main character.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>8 am</b> </span>Cally is on crutches. There will be no re-make of the tire swing scene.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>8:50 am</b></span> Endless re-takes of a 15-second scene. Can Tynan stop mumbling?</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>11 am</b> </span> Will the final scene be a song or Ogden reading a poem with a musical background? Much discussion. The girls work on the love poem; the boys work on the song.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>12:40 pm</b></span> Decision: The final poem has become a heartfelt speech with music in the background.</span><br />
<span style="background-color: white;">Much of the last hour has been spent perfecting a scream.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>2 pm</b></span> Mostly editing now. Title and credits are ready. Some of the actors have headed for home. I'm recruiting others to be in a small movie demonstrating activities for my novel THE ICE CASTLE.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>3:40</b></span>
The kids are in the home stretch, splicing in sound effects. The girls have wandered off. One last, desperate argument<b>:</b> poison or anaphylaxis? The film is currently 6 minutes, 30 seconds long.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>3:50</b> </span> Damian brings in Cally as backup. She convinces the editing team<b>:</b> It's anaphylaxis.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>4:30</b></span> Really just clean-up details left now -- making sure everybody has signed releases, adding or subtracting a second here or there, and fitting chord progressions to the cuts in the video stream. Damian on the music track says, "I am <i>so close</i>."</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>5:06 pm</b> </span> All the gathered kids and parents finally get to crowd around and see a run-through of the film. People laughed at the right parts, and the music worked really well. Now there's about half an hour for final tweaks and exporting the entire movie.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>5:15</b></span> Consternation. Is the time limit7 minutes <i>with </i>credits or <i>without</i> credits? Can they run the credits fast enough to fit within 7 minutes? Quick check of the rules online. Phew. The credits aren't counted toward the 7 minutes.</span><br />
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<b><span style="color: blue;">5:53</span></b> Panic. The formatted film is suddenly square and squished instead of being in a 4 to 3 ratio. Quick, make another copy.<br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: blue;"><b>6:12</b></span> The car has left! 78 minutes to get the film to Providence.</span><br />
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<span style="background-color: white;"><b><span style="color: blue;">7:18 pm</span></b> They made it! OGDEN is in.</span>Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6455145421524100556.post-18161227036968935592012-05-30T16:10:00.001-07:002012-05-30T16:11:18.588-07:00Alewives on the Damariscotta RiverOver Memorial Day weekend, Damariscotta Mills, Maine, held an alewife festival to help raise money for restoring the fish ladder that leads from the Damariscotta River to Damariscotta Lake. I've heard about the alewife run for years, but this is the first time the family has ever attended. <br />
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Alewives are herring, and they are anadromous, meaning they spend part of their lives in fresh water and part in salt water. Born in lakes, they spend several years at sea and return to their native rivers and streams to spawn. Unlike salmon, who spawn and die, alewives can make the run to their mating ground as many as eight times, as long as they can avoid seabirds, fishermen, and exhaustion. Gulls, ospreys, and great blue herons feast on them, while fish that die of exhaustion feed scavengers like raccoons and bald eagles.<br />
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[These photos came from a blog by A. Phillippi http://www.unity.edu/facultypages/aphillippi/alwife.htm]<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtxl4HZxBtCSR_WM4Yk3JDIncoxUuQEFiEHt5XfZuXpWHJW3_3TsEiJq6nr7aPe51ZIB143EErq1Gs1hzOfYD8itJKzFL3fDwgzy76QxsC136bfNB8xhNbvSZvnhzLCT8Ck05AlozB1rY/s1600/alewifepool.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtxl4HZxBtCSR_WM4Yk3JDIncoxUuQEFiEHt5XfZuXpWHJW3_3TsEiJq6nr7aPe51ZIB143EErq1Gs1hzOfYD8itJKzFL3fDwgzy76QxsC136bfNB8xhNbvSZvnhzLCT8Ck05AlozB1rY/s320/alewifepool.JPG" width="320" /></a></div>
The fish ladder at Damariscotta Mills eases a 42-foot climb around a dam from river to lake. It consists of a series of rockbound pools separated by small water runs about a foot high. The pools wind through a wooded dell like the decorative stream of a miniature golf course. The difference is that these pools and the runs between them are clogged with fish, resting and then swimming madly upstream. The adult fish make the migration in late May, and around October or November, the fry let themselves return to the river, tail-first (I suppose they're swimming in place to keep themselves oriented correctly.)<br />
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In colonial times, villagers could scoop up enough fish in the two-week run to feed the village for the winter. Alewives were preserved by smoking, and there is still a small, surprisingly sweet-smelling smokehouse. Today, alewives serve as bait for Maine's lobster industry, which brings in close to one million pounds of lobster in a good year.<br />
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To count the alewives, volunteers stand with a clicker at the narrow top chute into the lake. For the first ten minutes of each hour, a volunteer counts the fish as they shoot through the last opening. Standing nearby, I counted 30 fish in one minute. A fish every two seconds for two weeks would be just over 600,000 fish, but the actual estimate for this year is about 350,000.<br />
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Maine has long cold winters and rocky soil, but seeing the alewife run gave me an insight into the marine riches and steady protein source that might have made the midcoast an attractive place for colonists to settle.Pennyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17645834949716719099noreply@blogger.com0