I Had No Idea

image via this article

I'm not sure why or what it is I'm feeling, but when I look at this recent image of a new star cluster from NASA, my heart beats faster in my chest and my eyes begin to sting from tears. Hubble has got to be one of my favourite inventions ever.

Image via this article

The next picture, of the far side of the moon,  catches my breath, too. I don't know why, there's just such an undeniability about it.  You look at it and you realise, wow, we really are surrounded by cold. vast. space.  The bright star at the top is Venus.

Thanks to the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), NASA is now getting more clear, detailed images of the moon than ever before. According to this article in Space.com they can now see individual boulders; rilles (sinuous channels that look like river beds or lava tubes.  Umm...Tremors anyone?);

Rilles

they've discovered the lost Russian robotic rover Lunokhod 1, missing since 1970 (! Can you believe it?! The whole idea just captures the imagination! I hope it's been collecting data all this time!); and they can even see where the astronauts walked (sorry conspiracy theorists.... oh wait, maybe they faked these photos.... but they would've known we would think that, so therefore we cannot....wait a min....they only think we guessed wrong, that's what's so funny!.....never go against a Sicilian when death is on the line!)

What's even more cool, is now that they've amassed all this fresh information, they could use the public's help in analyzing the photos and counting boulders, etc.  How fun is that?!  I'm so going to do that.

Keeping an Ion...

Some people wear their true love's photo in a locket around their neck.  I think it would be more honest if I wore this necklace by raven of Molecular Muse - it's the molecule for chocolate.

 

Speaking of chocolate (and when are we not?) In Praise of Sardines' Brett Emerson explains step by step how you can actually whip chocolate - the way one whips cream to make whipping cream or butter.  Chocolate has enough fat in it that it can literally be whipped into fluffy mounds.  All by itself, nothing added. Discovered by those crafty Molecular Gastronomers. That's gotta be good.  If that whets your appetite, Think Geek has a Molecular Gastronomy starter kit - just looking at the cola caviar makes my mouth salivate, I can just imagine that burst of flavour.  I envision them being like little, juicy mandarin orange beads - I hope they're not corn starch globs. How disappointing that would be! Go here for a recap of My Last Bite's fruit caviar adventure, which seemed to turn out much more fun and promising than Julie's Kitchen.

When you're done with your culinary amazingness, It would be very apropos to display it all in a nice Bucky Bowl, named in honour of Buckminister Fuller,  inventor/discoverer of the geodesic dome and buckey balls.

Unavoidably Detained

Be back as soon as I can get away. . .

Cloud Watching

I can't believe no one's commented on my floaty word cloud thingie! It took forever to find the perfect one. Isn't it beautiful? (Though sometimes it reminds me of a swarm of mosquitoes) What I love is how dynamic it is; it's poetry in motion - literally. So expressive. Don't you just want to play with it forever? Dragging your cursor thru, in, around and beside, twirling it, stretching it... Like silver thread thoughts from Dumbledore's mind.

image via art via

May 3, 2010 Update:  Blogumous mysteriously quit working much to my disappointment :(

I don't know why I keep posting pictures of destruction. I'm sure it's something psychological that I really don't want to know about myself. The first time I saw this first photo my mouth dropped open for about fifteen minutes. I thought it must've been a mock up or some sort of photography trick. For some reason it's a lot more scary to see a fat tornado than a skinny winding funnel.

Maybe I look at these images for the same reason I look at the night sky. It reminds me

of how small and puny we are. Which is good to think about sometimes when you need a dose of humility, but not so healthy to dwell on.

The very last photo is of the largest man made tornado ever created. Mercedes Benz

built it. Those clever Germans. I'm amazed we ever even built one, I had no idea! It was 113' tall.

But you know what? Amazing as that is, we still have a long ways to go.

[1] Orchard Iowa Tornado Photo via

[2] Nature At Its Wildest via

[3] Mercedes Benz Artificial tornado via

Tongan Undersea Volcano Erupts

Cat's Eye

This is a straight on edge view of a galaxy. I know it's two years old but I've been saving it in case I ever blogged. The image says it all; I'm totally speechless. I feel the same reverence for the Hubble as I do for large old trees.