Hello Dolly!

Yes, I know I won't be the first or last person to say that in regard to the new tropical storm that formed just east of the Yucatan peninsula. The storm is expected to move into the Gulf of Mexico in the next couple of days. Right now the track takes it into Texas at the Mexico border as a tropical storm.

The reasons for this little bit of weather-blogging are 1) I'm a weather junkie and 2) I was born in the Rio Grande Valley of Texas and lived there and in Houston for the first 8 years of my life, so keeping an eye on tropical weather was something I got from an early age. Even now, living in central Texas, we still have to deal with tropical weather, and not just from the stuff that comes in from the Gulf. We sometimes get the remnants of Pacific storms coming in from Mexico and dumping lots of rain on us.

Since we're having a pretty hot and dry summer here this year, a nice soak from a minimal tropical storm wouldn't necessarily be a bad thing. Right now the forecast doesn't take Dolly to hurricane strength, so maybe she'll turn out to be one of those helpful storms. But of course, we all know how quickly the forecasts for the path and strength of a storm can change!

Update 7-25-08



Well, Dolly has now come and gone, leaving a lot of rain in the Rio Grande Valley. We got some here in Central Texas (see the view from my back porch on Wednesday evening), but not as much as I had hoped. It looks like the Valley took a fairly bad hit, but so far I haven't heard anything of deaths or serious injuries, so that's good.

The trend is pointing towards an active season, although I can't imagine that we will see anything like the historic 2005 season. Only time will tell, but let's hope that if it is a repeat of the 2005 activity, it isn't also a repeat of the failures of that hurricane season.

Won't somebody please think of the produce?

Well, I wasn't expecting to get started on pointing to and laughing at religious nuts so quickly in this blog's life, but sometimes these things just fall into your lap. First there was Ray Comfort and the bananas (I'm linking to a rebuttal video) and now there is this guy electrocuting pickles (spotted via boingboing):



I think this is fruit and vegetable abuse.

Science education in Texas and hearing bloggers speak on creationism

I think "the good, the bad and the ugly" would also sum up the evening. The "good" was the round of applause for Chris Comer and her upcoming lawsuit and hearing some ScienceBloggers speak, "the bad" was hearing more about the big fight that will be coming over the revision of the science standards here in Texas, and "the ugly" is how the upcoming fight is probably going to be.

The two folks from ScienceBlogs were Ed Brayton from Dispatches from the Culture Wars and Josh Rosenau of Thoughts from Kansas. The third speaker was Steve Schafersman of Texas Citizens for Science. Josh wrote up a post about the evening, with photos.

Just a few notes and thoughts from the evening:

The travesty of a law supporting "academic freedom" signed by Gov. Jindal in Louisiana is probably going to show up in Texas in January when our legislature meets again. The only way I can see this being derailed would be if a lawsuit has been filed and lost in La. before ours debuts, but I don't think there would be enough time for that.

Another thing we'll have to watch for is another round of fighting over the mention of evolution in our state science education standards. This is the current version that caused some discussion last time:

(3) Scientific processes. The student uses critical thinking and scientific problem solving to make informed decisions. The student is expected to:

(A) analyze, review, and critique scientific explanations, including hypotheses and theories, as to their strengths and weaknesses using scientific evidence and information;

So, we have the "strengths and weaknesses", but at least there is the "using scientific evidence and information" as a caveat.

The section that specifically mentions evolution is this:

(7) Science concepts. The student knows the theory of biological evolution. The student is expected to:

(A) identify evidence of change in species using fossils, DNA sequences, anatomical similarities, physiological similarities, and embryology; and

(B) illustrate the results of natural selection in speciation, diversity, phylogeny, adaptation, behavior, and extinction.

So, it will be interesting to see how this "evolves" in the "creation" of the new standards. (Sorry, sometimes just can't help myself!)

The other thing that will be interesting to watch in the near future is Chris Comer's suit against the Texas Board of Education for having to resign for not remaining "neutral" on the topic of evolution, which you can read about at the Wikipedia link up above.

These are all things that I'll be trying to follow and blog about over the upcoming months.

A small celebration

I paid off another credit card today! Well, sort of. Actually, I balance transferred the remaining amount on one card to the card that I paid off with my $600 economic stimulus check. There were two reasons I decided to do it. The first was that the offer was 6.99% for a year with no transfer fee and the second was that it meant that was one less credit card I have with Chase. I know many people have various banks/cards they dislike with a passion, and mine is Chase for the simple reason that they treated me like crap. Unfortunately I still have one card with them, but that one is next on the chopping block and then it will join its two previous siblings in the confetti pile.

It all started a couple of years ago when Chase, over a few months’ time, raised the rates on all three cards I had with them to the default rate, which was 29.99%. Was I late with a payment? No. Was I late with another card or my car loan? Nope. Did I go over my credit limit with them or another card? Again, no. The SOLE reason that they decided to essentially double my interest rates on the cards was that I had too much debt. So, in their computer, that made me a “risk”. Note that I always made more than the minimum payments on all my credit cards (not by much sometimes, but still always greater than the minimum) and by raising my rates they made it all that much harder to make the payments. So I really wasn’t at risk of not being able to pay the cards until THEY put me at risk by raising my rates (and therefore my minimum payments). Please explain the logic of that to me??? Yeah, I know, that’s just the way credit cards work. My Discover card did something similar, but not quite as high as the Chase rates. (Discover, though, will be next on the chopping block after the Chase cards go!) Meanwhile the rates on my Citibank cards have dropped and they raised my limit on one of them. Go figure.

The funny part is that I was going to have that Chase card paid off in about three or four months anyway, so I’m not really saving a whole lot by transferring (about $50 over the remainder of the time to pay it off), but boy did it feel good. I’ve been trying very hard to pay off my debts over the past year or two and I’m starting to make some headway, which feels good. I don’t care if anyone reads this blog post, it just felt good to write it! I’ve been reading some personal finance blogs lately and I’m inspired by some of the stories of people who have been able to eliminate debt in their lives. Hopefully I’ll be joining them in the next couple of years!

Picture of the Week #1

Dome of the 2.7-meter (107-inch) Harlan J. Smith Telescope on at McDonald Observatory, near Fort Davis, Texas. December 2003.

While I am working on some real content posts, I thought I would go ahead and start my Picture of the Week series. I mainly plan to use my own photos to start, but I might slip in a NASA image or something from time to time.

This week is the dome of the 2.7-meter (107-inch) telescope at McDonald Observatory, constructed in the 1960s. The telescope was re-dedicated in 1995 in honor of Harlan Smith, the late Chairman of the Department of Astronomy and Director of McDonald Observatory.

Is it fall yet?

Ugh, I know I'm a native Texan and all, but this summer has already been really annoying. I'm sure most of it has to do with how wet and relatively cool last summer was, making this hot and dry one extra bothersome. We've been having some spotty showers for the past week or so, but they've all managed to not rain on Elgin. I got a brief shower one day on my drive home, but it was just enough to coat the car in a thin layer of dust-mud. But, on the upside, the distant showers have left us with some cool sunsets. I'll have some new ones posted on my Flickr pages soon.

See girls CAN do science!

... and do it quite well, thank you very much!

Spotted first at Skepchick: Girls Doing Science, Kicking Ass

Not only were all three top winners girls, but 47% of the entrants this year were girls. Woo-hoo! After just finishing the audiobook of Susan Jacoby's "The Age of American Unreason" this was just the little pick-me-up I needed. Now if more Americans could locate Iraq on a map... but I digress.

This is one of those news stories that at first glance, I'm very happy to hear, but then upon further thought, I wish it actually wasn't a big deal.

As part of my job doing astronomy outreach, I was leading a group of girls on a tour of our department and we were talking about how just a couple of days before - for the first time ever - when the commanders of the space shuttle and the International Space Station greeted each other after docking, it was two women shaking hands and hugging. And one of the girls, probably about 12 years old, said "It will be great when that doesn't have to be big news", or something close to that. I could have hugged her! Not only was she right, but if more girls her age have that attitude it won't be a big deal someday.

By the way, some of the bonus prize that some of the various winners (there are actually around a thousand prizes given out) get are a trip to the Nobel Prize ceremonies and naming rights for asteroids. How cool is that?!

Here's a round-up from Science News

Photos from Scarborough Renaissance Festival

After what I think was a 10-year absence, I finally went back to the Scarborough Renaissance Festival up near Dallas. I had forgotten how delightful this faire is! It's smaller (although expanded since the last time I visited) than the big Texas Renaissance Festival near Houston and has kept a less-commercial feel. Part of the charm is the creek and wooded area that runs through the middle of the faire, as well as the big leafy trees (as opposed to the pine trees at RenFest).

Click on the joust above to go to my Flickr photo set.

New bird photos

I've updated my Flickr bird set with some new hummingbird photos, as well as some of a male cardinal, a house sparrow and a white-crowned sparrow. Click on the hummer above to go to the set (the new photos are at the bottom of the set).

This means something

If you don't get the reference... here's a hint. And here is another.

I know, it isn't mashed potatoes, but I still thought it was funny. And yes, it is actually a hay bale that has been munched down by some cows.