Rubber Ducks

This past week we went to NJ to visit family. We had a wonderful Thanksgiving and Bubba really enjoyed playing with his cousins. I'm always amazed at how some young adults are so good with toddlers. Luckily, Bubba's cousins fall into that boat - they were great with him. 

Speaking of boats and falling...While we were in beautiful Mt Tabor, NJ (if we had the money for a second home, this place would be on the list) I happened to be flipping through my nephew's Earth Science textbook. Yes, I know that makes me a supergeek (maybe I should get a cool shirt made to look like Superman but with an S and a G for SuperGeek!?). There was this neat write up about 29,000 rubber ducks (and green frogs and some other stuff) that fell off a container ship in 1992 and how the ducks' voyages have helped scientists learn more about ocean currents. What a cool way to learn about oceans, continents and the earth as a whole.

Of course one of the first things I did when I got the chance was to Google it. Turns out there's a website dedicated to those little ducks (actually rubber ducks in general but close enough). Eric Carle (from The Hungry Caterpillar fame) even wrote a book about it. How cool is that? I thought it was this obscure write up in a text book and there is so much more to it. There is a good article about it from 2007 which you can read here.

http://www.lindasog.com/archives/2007/07/voyage_of_the_rubber_duckie.html

I could have spent hours flipping through my nephew's textbooks (the Earth Science one as well as a Literature textbook). When I was his age, I probably felt a bit as he does about homework. Who likes to read when it's an assignment? But reading just for the pure enjoyment of it? Just because it interests you and you are learning something new...that's the best!

Adventure Aquarium

We went to NJ this weekend to visit some friends. On Monday, Bubba and I went to Adventure Aquarium in Camden, NJ. We arrived about two hours before closing which turned out to be just about perfect. It was almost as if we had a private viewing. We only ran into about 15 other people, total. We didn't have to wait in line or peep around shoulders. Bubba was able to walk around and I didn't have to worry about him taking his time or getting in anyone's way. In other words, it turned out to be a very good experience.

I lived in NJ for two years and never once went to the aquarium. Strange because I love aquariums. I used to go to the one in Boston every chance I got. Actually, I didn't even know Camden had an aquarium until our NJ visit this weekend. All this time, it was just down the road from where I lived when I was there. On another note, I drove by my old apartments (I had two while there). I can't believe I remembered how to get there, probably only because I remembered I lived off of "Exit 5." Seems like everyone in certain parts of NJ give directions based on which Turnpike exit you take...

Anyway, the aquarium has these two HUGE hippos. They were kind of hard to see since the water was so dirty but we waited around so Bubba could see them from the under water window. I didn't get a good picture of their faces but you can see how big they are...out of all the stuffed animals they had in the gift shop, Bubba wanted the hippo. I love hearing him say "Hippo" - don't little kids have the cutest way of saying things?

The aquarium has a ton of things you can touch - sharks, stingrays, jelly fish, star fish, etc. Pretty neat. They even had baby (4 months old) sting rays for the little people to touch. Bubba almost touched one but stuck with just getting his hands wet for the most part. The aquarium also had Purell dispensers all over the place to keep everyone clean.

Of course they also had "Nemo" - lots and lots of Nemos...Bubba didn't want to leave them. Since at some point we did have to leave, he finally settled for looking at the pictures. Once we got into the shark tunnel he totally forgot about Nemo. There's this cool glass tunnel where you walk under the water in their giant shark tank. The sharks are literally swimming around you - pretty cool.

The only downside to the visit was I only had my cell phone to take pictures. I didn't get any good ones in the shark tunnel because it was too dark. I got plenty of pictures but with a good camera would have gotten even better ones.

Free Books Rock

What a fun, fabulous Friday! I opened the front door and there upon the stoop was a box with my name on it. I love getting mail. Getting packages is even better.

A while ago I got a tweet from Military OneSource (@Military1Source) saying they are ending their free paperback and audio books program. In the past there was a 10-book limit per year but now they're trying to get rid of everything so there's no limit. They have a lot of titles to choose from. I got 11 paperbacks and 3 audio books.  Now I just have to figure out where these books will fit into my "To Read" pile. The audio books will be good to listen to while I'm walking.

The first book I cracked open was "Incredible Edible Science." It retails (on Amazon) for $21. It's full of all kinds of experiments and activities for kids (though I think adults would enjoy them as well). There are activities in six categories: observing (further broken down into sight, smell, taste, touch and sound), classifying, communicating, measuring, inferring and predicting. It seems to be geared more towards a group of kids/classroom instead of just one child but everything can be adapted for one.

The audio books are really cool too. They come with everything you need - a strap to carry it, earphones, and a note to pass it on to another military family when done.

I'm not sure why they're suspending their library program but I'm happy I was able to take advantage of what they had to offer. I am looking forward to reading the books I got (and/or using them as reference materials as needed) and listening to my audio books. I will definitely pass them on when I've finished...

As of today, they are still filling orders. So, if you qualify (Active Duty, Reserves, National Guard, or family members) go over and see if they have any titles you might like...Happy reading!

SeaQuest

During my sophomore year in high school I, like most others, took Biology. I can’t remember my teacher’s name, but I remember how much I liked her. One of the reasons I liked her so much is because I loved biology. She made it interesting and made me want to learn more about it.

I especially loved learning about the ocean. I remember learning about red tides and how many of the things found in the ocean are older than most things found on land. My favorite outing when I was younger was going to the Boston Aquarium and the Science Museum.

I recently rediscovered SeaQuest DSV. Just hearing the tagline “Beneath the surface lies the future” gives me chills because of the way it fuels my imagination.

For as long as I can remember, I’ve loved science fiction. Shows like Star Trek, Stargate and more recently BSG and Firefly. All of these series fuel the imagination and make one look further than our regular every day lives.

One of the great things about SeaQuest is that while it’s sci fi, it's premise seems possible and attainable. The world’s population is growing by leaps and bounds. At some point we are going to outgrow the available landmass. What will we do? Where will we live?

SeaQuest shows what might or could happen if we started to populate earth’s oceans. Oceans cover about 70% of the earth’s surface. If we could figure out a way to live down there, literally a whole new world would be open to us. Not only that, but if we can find out more about our present and our future by learning from our past, what more can we learn by studying our oceans?

There is so much out there…it makes me wonder what kind of research is currently being done concerning our oceans. How much money are we spending, and is it enough? I imagine it’s hard to find money for such research when most people probably think money should be spent on cancer research or ways to fuel the world or even in the competing arena of space…

As much as I probably sound like a geek going on about science fiction and how much I love science, I don’t really care. I think it’s good to have something out there that makes you think beyond the present. Something that makes you wonder if there is more to life than just what we know. Something that drives you to study the past, through studying the stars, the oceans, or the earth, in order to learn more about how to improve our present or to make life better in the future…As they say on SeaQuest, beneath the surface lies the future…