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What train route would advise you to pack a large white cloth, 24 hours worth of food, and to be familiar with how to behave in bear country? Alaska Railroad's Hurricane Turn train is a flag stop train, designed to serve folks living or venturing out in the wilderness. Traveling 55 miles north from Talkeetna, in the shadow of Mount McKinley, to Hurricane Gulch, the two-car diesel train operates from from mid-May to mid-September. Flag the train down with your white cloth (or a t-shirt or your arms) and enjoy the scenery. There's no food or beverage service, but you can bring your own. The conductor carries handcuffs in case anyone gets too rowdy.
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The Queen Mary 2 will arrive in San Francisco on Sunday, an event that is expected to draw a number of gawkers. Fireboats will spray their fountain-like greetings and tour boats will be full of passengers eager to see "the most magnificent ocean liner ever built." The ship is on an around-the world-in-81-days voyage (cheapest ticket $21,185). The Queen Elizabeth 2 arrived in San Francisco a couple weeks ago with press fanfare focused on its recent bout with norovirus. The Queen Mary 2 is scheduled to pass under the Golden Gate bridge at around 3pm but tides will not allow it to dock at Pier 27 until 8pm.
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Friday, January 26, 2007
Comet McNaught is making a brilliant showing in New Zealand. The "mcnaught" flickr tag turns up some amazing shots like this one from Australia.
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The US Figure Skating Championships have begun in Spokane, WA and Michelle Kwan is thousands of miles away, across the Pacific Ocean. In her new role as America's first "public diplomacy envoy," Kwan is on a two-week trip to Beijing, Guangzhou and Hong Kong. A conversation with Condoleezza Rice at last year's White House state dinner in for Chinese President Hu Jintao sparked Kwan's assignment. She has not officially retired from skating but she's focused on her studies at the University of Denver, including classes in Mandarin and political science.
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Thursday, January 25, 2007
Normal Room - "See how people live across the world! Explore the variety of lifestyles and cultural peculiarities! Normal Room shows you interior design and home furniture from all around the globe. Search our image database and explore the differences and similarities in architecture and home decoration between people in different countries." (via xBlog)
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Browsing through the jewelry on Etsy, I discovered a bracelet made out of a cello D-string. The creator, Samantha, is a college student studying cello (of course). She takes custom work so I'm wondering if I have old violin strings bundled away in my case that can be turned into something interesting. Xavior sells jewelry at Strings and a dare made from many stringed instruments, guitars and pianos included.
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Wednesday, January 24, 2007
The Radical Lace & Subversive Knitting exhibit opens tomorrow at New York's Museum of Arts & Design. The NY Times notes that Katja Gruijters will be exhibiting her lovely lace tiles. They are made out of "white, milk and dark chocolate; sugar; fruit paste; brownies; and shortbread each six inches square and stamped with an intricate floral pattern." She'll be hosting "An Edible Lace High Tea" on Monday where guests can consume her tiles. culiblog has some close-ups of her work.
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Tuesday, January 23, 2007
A condition called "transfusion-related acute lung injury," or TRALI, has been linked to plasma from blood donated by women. A few hundred people a year develop TRALI after a plasma transfusion. It is believed to be a result of the recipient's white blood cells clashing with antibodies which previously pregnant donors produced in reaction to their fetus' foreign cells. Britain began separating out blood donations by gender three years ago. Only plasma from men was used for transfusions and the TRALI cases dropped. The women's blood was still used to manufacture blood products such as clotting factors (three quarters of donated plasma goes to the manufacture these products normally, so this was a change in allocation not quantity). American blood banks are now considering separating blood by gender. This news should not discourage any women from giving blood. Your donation will still save lives.
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In Mark Bittmann's "How to Cook Everything" (a super handy cookbook!) I found a practically hidden recipe for making your own coconut milk. It's tucked into the fish section and I haven't cooked seafood for a long time so I only stumbled upon it as I was idly paging through (p291 in my copy). It sounds easy, you just blend dried shredded coconut with boiling water (2c:2c) then strain it. You can add 1-2c more water and strain again. Coconut milk freezes indefinitely. I've been using a little bit from a can to flavor a curry-like dish, then freezing the rest in an ice cube tray or muffin tins, turning them out into Ziplock bags for next time. I'll be looking for unsweetened shredded coconut on my next supermarket trip.
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Monday, January 22, 2007
We're always amazed when our 2 year old remembers things from months ago. Of course his mind is a lot less cluttered than his parents'. I often wonder what his first memory will be when he gets older and hope that it won't be a painful one. Infantile amnesia, the term for that profound lack of memory we have for our first few years of life, could be either a storage or retrieval problem. Evidence supports that retrieval, not immaturity of our brain's storage, is at the root of our inability to recall our early years. Babies have demonstrated memory more than a year later for experiences they had at both 8 weeks and 6 months. As we learn language and our brains are "pruned" for a different form of memory and recall, it may be that we just don't know how to access early memories anymore. The indexing system is lost.
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I hadn't realized that Barbara Morgan, backup Teacher in Space for Christa McAuliffe, has remained active in the astronaut program for all these years. After continuing with her Teacher in Space duties, she entered NASA's Educator Astronaut program in 1998 and is scheduled for a shuttle mission in June. Meanwhile, Eileen Collins, the first woman pilot in the space shuttle program, retired last May, and lamented the lack of women following the shuttle pilot path. Pam Melroy is the remaining women pilot in the program. None have been selected since 1995. Collins claims it's a flexible career which allowed her to have two children and fly four missions "without too much heartache."
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Friday, January 19, 2007
Flashback Friday (WARNING: for 80s nuts only)
Mining YouTube for five music videos you probably didn't want to see again (don't say I didn't warn you):
And, what I was actually looking for, five music videos I did want to see again:
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Thursday, January 18, 2007
Tiffany's launched a new engagement ring in Japan that is sparkling into the US next month, ready for Valentine's Day proposals. Called the Tiffany Novo, it features a 57-facet cushion-cut diamond set in four prongs on a platinum band with bead set diamonds. Of course there's a matching wedding band.
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The lab-grown diamond market is poised to heat up, as the Wall Street Journal has taken notice of this shiny thorn poking at DeBeers' side. Created stones from Gemesis, Apollo, and Chatham are now available in jewelry stores, albeit not (and perhaps never) a place like Tiffany's. The Gemological Institute of America has finally consented to grade created diamonds, though of course clearly noting their manmade origins. The publicity around "conflict diamonds" has also benefited these companies. Actor Terrence Howard has plans to wear, and talk about, created diamonds when he presents at the Oscars. But will "cultured diamonds" reach the same level of acceptance as cultured pearls? DeBeers will fight against this possibility with all their might.
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Wednesday, January 17, 2007
Pepsi is adapting to a new generation accustomed to dynamic images and rapidly paced media by redesigning their packaging to be...always redesigned. The Pepsi globe and lettering will remain constant but every few weeks the Pepsi-Cola background graphics will change. Unique web addresses on each design will provide access to exclusive online content. I get the sense that if it were cost-effective to make cans and bottles out of LCD panels or electronic paper they'd do it.
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I don't read Wired Magazine very thoroughly anymore, but as I paged through the January issue the words "Michael Nesmith" caught my eye (because, you know, The Monkees, oh and, well yes that "invented MTV" thing too). Using a database of over 3,000 organ tones, Nesmith has created Calvin (computer-aided live venue instrument) out of a Dell computer, six JBL speakers, and a subwoofer. Nesmith programs Calvin to perform complex pieces that are out of reach for the usual two handed, two footed organist. The organ sounds were recorded by a Hungarian company in Budapest cathedrals, stone wall reverb and all. Nesmith doesn't mean for Calvin's virtual pipe organ capabilities to put musicians out of work. He's just wants to create inspirational music.
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Monday, January 15, 2007
The Hollywood Foreign Press Association has followed the lead of the Academy Awards in ditching those hefty presenter gift baskets and coughing up back taxes to the IRS for years past (except 2006). Celebs needn't worry about missing out. They can still load up on freebies at "gifting suites" where vendors typically pay thousands of dollars (plus the cost of merchandise) for a table, hoping to score a photo of a celebrity with their product.
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Rumblings of a remake of The Prisoner have turned into solid news with UK's Granada International and Sky One partnering with AMC in the US for a committed January 2008 premiere date. Further details are sparse.
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Want a chandelier made out of Bic ballpoint pens? It's $1000 in clear or orange pens. (via shiny shiny)
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Friday, January 12, 2007
When our son first started talking I dutifully wrote down all the words he learned. I gave up soon after when I'd written down about fifty and he had started asking me the words for items. I could not keep up. Now that he's in the stage of dealing with toddler emotions, I've thought about keeping track of which emotions he understands and can verbalize to us. This has got to be a more tractable task than potentially cataloging Webster's sans definitions. Well, if you get to all the nuances of even the (disputed) basic list (e.g. liking a friend is different from loving mom) this may not be as simple as it seems. I think I'll scale back to keeping a list of what vegetables he'll eat.
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The AT&T logo rises once again on Monday when the Cingular brand goes the way of SBC in a marketing campaign with an undisclosed budget (an estimated $1 billion was spent on SBC's changeover to AT&T last year). In 2004, AT&T Wireless (originally McCaw, bought and then spun off by the original AT&T) was bought by Cingular, owned by SBC and BellSouth. Then SBC merged with AT&T and bought BellSouth. SBC took the name AT&T and then completed its BellSouth acquisition on December 29th, becoming the full owner of Cingular which is now taking the AT&T name too. Confused? Don't bother figuring it all out; it's too complicated to turn up as a trivia question anywhere. (NY Times, Seattle Times)
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Thursday, January 11, 2007
It's hard to drum up much sympathy for Steve Jobs right now (he's having a killer MacWorld), but he's lost his appeal to tear down the Jackling mansion in Woodside. A preservation group has been trying to save the historic home, built in 1925 for copper baron Daniel Jackling. Jobs can't be ordered to restore it, but the court ruled that he can't demolish it to build a new house. He was not able to convince the court that renovation was impractical and demolition the only alternative. Jobs actually wants a smaller home than the 30 rooms, 14 bedrooms and 13.5 bathrooms in the 17,000-square-foot mansion. And he's willing to help pay expenses for someone to relocate it.
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Most of us over here in Seattle have been busy watching white stuff fall from the sky, but there's a comet to catch tonight instead. Comet McNaught, discovered in August 2006, will make a bright appearance in the west at sunset. The timing isn't ideal but you can try to catch a glimpse of it at the horizon right after the sun disappears.
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Wednesday, January 10, 2007
Leave it to the folks at Shiny Shiny to seek out all the pink gadgets at CES. Like this pink Taser gun. Yes, a pink Taser.
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China from the Inside, a new miniseries, starts today on many PBS stations. It's a joint production from KQED (San Francisco's PBS station) and Granada Television (Britain) and consists of four one-hour episodes. Reviews are glowing and emphasize that this is not a run-of-the-mill documentary on the Great Wall, Forbidden City, name any other Chinese tourist destination. The series doesn't shy away from the tough issues facing China today: the environment, government corruption, religious freedom, suicide among women (China is unfortunately unique in being the only country where the female suicide rate is higher than that of males). British director Jonathan Lewis was up front with the Chinese government about the subject matter he filmed but was given surprisingly free access to sites and citizens. The crew was assigned minders who sometimes made themselves conveniently scarce. We know China can't be ignored and perhaps China is realizing it can't ignore itself either. (SF Chronicle review, Seattle Times review)
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Tuesday, January 09, 2007
Seattle jewelry designer Jody Warwick makes beautiful little purses with jeweled handles that convert into bracelets and necklaces. It's a clever gift idea for bridal parties. Warwick uses 14 carat gold, genuine stones and cultured pearls for her handles so this is real jewelry with prices to match.
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They deemed The Last Supper menu "a little too sacred to touch," but Rev. Rayner Hesse Jr. and Anthony Chiffolo, authors of "Cooking with the Bible: Biblical Food, Feasts, and Lore," found plenty of material in the Scriptures to recreate recipes for modern times. There's stewed ox meat, dried fig cake, barley-apricot salad, baked sardines with sesame sauce, cheese and honey pie, even a version of manna from heaven. The manna, with ingredients of matzo flour, coriander leaves and sesame oil, "tastes like cardboard" but the authors point out it's not supposed to taste very good and let's you "see why they were complaining."
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Monday, January 08, 2007
It's the oddest cordless phone I've ever seen. This vintage-style phone from Pottery Barn slaps new-fangled cordless technology into a retro handset (with visible antenna poking out) and base. (Its 900 mhz analog technology is also rather retro.)
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The rumor mill is churning out the latest about Hayao Miyazaki's possible next film. It may be an adaptation of the Chinese novella I Lost my Little Boy, a book that may have actually been inspired by Miyazaki and reportedly contains a reference to Totoro. And it may be done in 2008. To sum up the facts: Studio Ghibli plans to release a Miyazaki film in 2008 but they have not yet announced the title.
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Friday, January 05, 2007
Favorite music headline of the day: Vatican priest composes rockin', religious Dante opera. Also in the running: "Hell the musical comes to Vatican", "Vatican plans punk version of Divine Comedy", and "Pope invited to musical hell". Not surprisingly, one section of hell is a rave dance party.
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One of the early skyscrapers, Seattle's Smith Tower rises 42 floors and is topped by a pyramid shaped Gothic cap. Completed in 1914, the building's steel frame is wrapped in white terra cotta, with granite on the 1st and 2nd floors. Smith Tower is primarily an office building (with an observation room and deck), but there is actually someone residing under that Gothic cap. There 37th floor was originally a caretaker's apartment and a 10,000 gallon water tank sat above it. Now that pyramid of space is occupied by a very lucky tenant who has a spectacular view. (revelation via Redfin)
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Thursday, January 04, 2007
Steuben Glass is featuring a selection of pre-1933 art glass and tableware for sale. Currently offered online is a selection of Green Jade glass and Rosaline glass. This lovely rose quartz glass vase is a favorite of mine.
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Personalize a set of spatulas at Williams-Sonoma or just have fun creating images online with their personalization tool. You can customize a message of up to 24 characters on the regular sized spatulas and 17 on the minis.
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Wednesday, January 03, 2007
Bill Amend is scaling FoxTrot back to Sundays only (leaving more time for World of Warcraft, though he claims he'll be doing stuff outside of the house) and will be greatly missed. I was going to do an exhaustive round-up of comics page changes from various newspapers (most publish an explanation picked up by Google news search). Editor & Publisher already did the legwork though (which is nice since I'd rather someone got paid to do this sort of thing). Several papers are testing out new strips before giving them a permanent home. "Lio" by Mark Tatulli of Universal (surreally good) and "Pearls Before Swine" by Stephan Pastis of United Media (also good!) are two of the big winners. The Seattle Times is making numerous changes and keeping "Lio" on permanently is one of them.
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If you're in the mood for some musical nostalgia this week, Stanford's radio station, KZSU, will be celebrating its 60th anniversary by dedicating one hour for each decade. The fun begins noon this Thursday with 1947 and keeps rolling until Saturday. Internet streams are available.
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Tuesday, January 02, 2007
Waltz your way to health in Viennese 3/4 time. There are two kinds of waltz, American and Viennese. American, the slower of the two, is "great for toning and strengthening muscles." But for a real aerobic workout, Viennese style will challenge most athletes with 56 to 61 bars per minute and a step for every beat, faster than the jitterbug. There's scientific research backing up the dance studio owners' claims of health benefits: 110 heart-failure patients who waltzed three times a week for eight weeks demonstrated comparable cardiopulmonary function to others who rode a bike or walked on a treadmill.
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The Metropolitan Opera kicked off their live opera broadcasts in movie theaters on Saturday with a trimmed down, English version of The Magic Flute. The NY Times reports on a number of sold out theaters in the U.S., Canada, Great Britain and Norway. Applause and tubs of popcorn ruled the day. Some brought along their kids, similar to the audience in person at the Met as this production was designed to lure a younger crowd with its short format and Julie Taymor direction. Although the performance was not shown in the Seattle area, upcoming ones are scheduled at Bella Bottega cinema in Redmond, WA.
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Monday, January 01, 2007
A happy, safe and healthy 2007 to you and yours!
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I confess I'm still not used to seeing color photographs in the print edition of the New York Times (it doesn't seem to help that I primarily read it online in color anyway). On Tuesday morning readers of the Wall Street Journal may be in for a shock when the paper unveils a complete redesign. The width is going from 60 to 48 inches and the smaller size means "shorter stories, bullet points, and infographics." However there will also be more "in-depth, analysis-type stories," as breaking news is left to the online version. A smaller redesign in 2002 was viewed by some as a sacrilege. Publisher L. Gordon Crovitz claims he's ready for old-timer reactions, saying he's "girded for the letters of complaints written with quills on parchment." Newspaper designer Mario Garcia likened the project to having been asked to "repaint the Sistine Chapel." (via Romenesko)
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