Peabody Museum, etc.

Friday I went with friends to the Peabody Museum and Harvard's Natural History Museum, which were open and free for the day (independence from museum fees, I suppose :-). Strangely, only the latter museum was air-conditioned, despite them being in connecting buildings, and the former having reasonably fragile pieces, such as textiles. It was especially noticeable in the sticky heat we were having.

We weren't exhaustive (merely, perhaps, exhausted, by the end. Or at least, foot-sore and somewhat weary.) in exploring the museums. I hadn't been there before, despite over a decade of living in the area. My bad.

In the Peabody Museum, we saw lots of pieces from Central and South America, including huge stone columns/slabs, intricately worked embroideries, pieces made from feathers, and lots of black and white pottery from a vanished civilization. The gallery had a wood floor that creaks even more than my floors do; it felt like some little local place that had happened to get a great collection together. I still don't understand why Harvard isn't air-conditioning this museum, though.

Next we passed through a wide doorway and were suddenly in the Natural History museum. First we saw rocks, lots of rocks (none of which said "moo".). There were displays of meteorites, and slices thereof, which showed the incredible variety of materials, and some beautiful patterns. Next was a large display about tourmalines, which are gorgeous. I hadn't realized that Maine had the world's largest find of tourmalines, nor that they'd been used in testing The Bomb in WWII (using tourmalines smuggled out of Nazi-controlled Europe). There were beautiful pink and green stones, polished in all sorts of ways. What was completely unexpected was seeing how some cross-sections of tourmaline were all nested triangles. Geometry appears in the strangest places... The next room had all sorts of rocks found in Massachusetts, which included some that were quite pretty (I tend to think of the rocks around here as "just rocks", not at all interesting....). The last rock room we looked at was a large one, with cases upon cases of gorgeous rocks displayed. Not just the usual gems and glittery rocks, but ones that looked like foam, or fuzzy snow cacti, or graceful swooping white horns, or metallic sand dollars, or ferns etched in stone, or... they seemed endlessly varied, and with so many different colors, seeming the most perfect blue, or green, or purple, the intensity blazing out. Wow. Many exclamations of "look at this one!"

After rocking, there was rolling, as one person's legs were not up to more museum fatigue. Fortunately, there was a wheelchair waiting to be used in the corner of the next exhibit, which was the Glass Flowers. They are impressive, and a bit creepy at the same time. One person thought they were plastic at first, since they reflect light in that particular way. Also, all the greens seemed to be the same shade, which is so far from the truth... Still, it was impressive to see glass made into such botanically-correct forms, not only the plants themselves, but also roots, pistils, stamens, cross-sections of stems, etc, all with the precise magnification of the piece. It makes me wonder just how the idea crossed the glassblower's mind, and makes me impressed with what one (talented) person can do when dedicated to an idea.

We went to a couple more rooms, checking out a variety of bird's nests, and dinosaur eggs. My knees were bothering me a bit more by then, so I wasn't focusing as much as I would've liked. There are whole exhibits we never saw... I may have to go back some other day to see the rest.

User info page

I just noticed that there's something new on user info pages: after people's interests, there's a link, "modify yours", which lets you change your own interests to match that person's more (or less). On one's own page, there's a link to "remove some", a more direct way to delete some interests.
Potential coolness.

More weekend highlights

I went to a birthday picnic on a hot day that turned out to be perfectly lovely. The park was at the top of a hill, getting many breezes, and there were trees enough to shade well, too. Congratulations to the birthday person, kudos to the picnic organizer, and waves at everyone I got a chance to talk with (even more waves to those I didn't; let's remedy that soon :-). Not only was there lots of food (much of which I could eat, even; thanks!), there was a lot of frisbee-izing (happily not decapitating anyone), and the much-anticipated debut of the huge portable labyrinth (tape on tarp, a 30 foot square one). I was particularly pleased about this since I'd gotten the chance to help make it, and was glad it was getting used.

After the picnic, some of us retired to air-conditioned splendor for game playing (thanks to the householder for opening her home), another event in honor of the birthday celebrator. I was too muzzy from the walk over to join in any of the first round of games, but it was nice to hang out and make comments as the first Catan game was played. Eventually I ended up playing some Lost Cities (which is pretty close to a brainless game for me by now, easy to do while chatting), and taught Quiddler, which was surprisingly *not* appreciated. It's a first, I believe. Ah, well. As usual with gaming events, I wished for a Harriet-notebook, for all the bizarre lines that came up.

I was surprised and pleased to have company walking home. I hadn't expected that at all, and having conversation companions for the walk made it fly by much faster. Of course, the day having waned enough to not have the sunlight beating down on us made things significantly better, too.

After Shabbat, I went to a small girls-only sleepover. I met a couple of new people, and got the chance to know a couple of others better, while catching up with those I already knew. I had a great time, staying up far too late, wishing there were more hours in the day (or I needed less sleep). The biggest highlight for me was just getting to sit around talking frankly with some lovely women. Of course, any event that includes both ice cream and banana pancakes is going to be a good thing by me :-).

I stayed later than I'd planned, which meant that I got the chance to play some croquet (I got the equivalent of a hole-in-one, which was very pleasing, and came close to winning a game), watch Grosse Point Blank, and enjoy the fanned coolness of large rooms with air circulation (my apartment is not quite so well-designed for hot weather.

The good, the bad, and the ugly

Or perhaps that should be "the interesting, the bizarre, and the monster".

''People are not molecules,'' said Tomer Toledo, a research associate at the ITS lab (quote from this Globe article). Apparently, this lab at MIT models traffic, including tailgaters, slow drivers, the works. It sounds like they're trying to get to a point where there could be traffic reports that predict the bad spots for the next few hours, or other ways to avoid/ameliorate the horrible traffic... Wow.

From today's Houston Chronicle, there's a story about pet accessories. We're not just talking plaid overcoats for dogs, or pearl-studded collars (for when they're invited to a wedding, don'tcha know), but little cars for hamsters to zoom around the house in, chicken and beef flavored toothpaste (also doggy breath mints) to avoid dog breath and dental decay, and *home-pet spas* which "can be outfitted with soothing 'pet tunes,' aromatherapy sprays, catnip tea bags, bacon- and barbecue-scented bubbles and drinking fountains."
Oy.

And then there's the monstera, a fruit I saw for the first time Friday, in the newly renovated Broadway Market. This is an interestingly-shaped fruit, to say the least. There is a very interesting technical description and photo, which includes such information as the fruit tasts of banana and pineapple, eating an unripe one can cause mouth and throat irritation, and it is a multiple fruit (like blackberries, for instance). Of course, this is not what we noticed first. No, we noticed that the surface is covered in a pattern of hexagons, and looks remarkably dildo-shaped (er, "textured for her pleasure"?). I almost burst out laughing today when one site describe it as having the shape of an ear of corn; that's a much more acceptable description, I suppose.

( really short takes )