personal
jstemwedel | June 2, 2009"It's never going to rain again."
-- Dr. Free-Ride's better half, contemplating cloudy skies over the last month or so
"Oh yeah?"
-- The weather in the vicinity of Casa Free-Ride, at approximately 4:45 AM today
It was not a torrential downpour, but there was a good, hard rain for 15 to 20 minutes early this morning, and from the looks of things there might have been a drizzle for some time after that.
You can guess what this did for this morning's gastropod foray.
Strikingly, the serious slug and snail action was not in the garden beds where the initial infestation was so horrific. Rather…
clock | June 2, 2009Caryn Shechtman, one of the two bloggers at the New York blog and manager of the New York City Hub at Nature Network, called me up last week and interviewed me for the blog. The interview - on a range of topics, but mostly about blogging - is now published and you can read it here.
jstemwedel | June 1, 2009On Saturday, the Free-Ride family went to the Maker Faire.
The place was abuzz with things to do and see and hear (and taste and feel), so we'll just give you the snapshot.
There were fabulous arty and tech-y (and arty/tech-y) items on display, including a giant assembly of 2 liter soda bottles, spinning bike wheels onto which our drawings were projected in lights, and the obligatory giant Lego castle/cake thingy:
We also saw and heard a beautiful automated music-playing dealie created by Ranjit Bhatnagar, a friend of mine from geek camp years ago.
And, there was a cool Wimshurst machine (…
drorzel | June 1, 2009Before there was such a thing as Uncertain Principles, let alone Thursday Baby Blogging, there was this:
Still the best call I ever made, seven years on.
jstemwedel | June 1, 2009This morning's conditions were more of the same -- overcast and dry.
There were no gastropods in evidence.
Maybe this speaks to the success of our weed-clearing and morning snail- and slug-picking. Maybe there's a pocket of them I haven't located yet, busily breeding and plotting their revenge.
Or maybe the other yards suddenly look more attractive to the gastropods than mine does. Although given the free exchange of birds, squirrels, cats, and ants across property lines, I can't imagine that gastropods would be respectful of such boundaries.
Today's take: no slugs or snails. However, I…
pharyngula | June 1, 2009I've been invited to the 68th Annual Conference of the American Humanist Association, along with Barbara Forrest and Neil deGrasse Tyson and a few other luminaries whose presence make me feel overweening, so we're flying off on Thursday. Now often on these trips, I try to make some time for some informal get together at some point, but this one has a very busy schedule, and I'm not sure when I'm going to be able to escape. About the only time it looks like I'll be able to get away, assuming the plane isn't late, is Thursday evening after we arrive.
So here's the deal: I'm planning to show up…
clock | June 1, 2009Later this month, I'll be attending the 59th Meeting of Nobel Laureates in Lindau, Germany. The list of Nobel Laureates (about 20 of them) and the list of about 600 young researchers from 66 countries are very impressive. Of course, not being a chemist, I'll have to do some homework before I go, learning what these people did to get the prizes.
The program certainly looks interesting - there is a lot of "meta" stuff beyond pure chemistry, so I will always find interesting sessions to attend and blog from. Yes, I am going to be there as a blog-reporter. I understand that PZ will also be there…
jstemwedel | May 31, 2009Another overcast, cool, and dry morning today.
The pickings were extremely slim. However, it also bears mentioning that the amount of visible gastropod damage to my plants -- especially my food crops -- is greatly reduced since I began my snail eradication campaign less then a month ago.
I'm going to count that as a victory.
The last few weeks has also seen a significant clearing of weeds and tall grass. In part this is because we were trying specifically to reduce slug and snail hiding places. But part of it is just that if you're out every morning poking around in search of gastropods,…
jstemwedel | May 30, 2009This morning was overcast, cool, and dry.
But, as it wasn't a school day, I was determined to get some gastropod action.
This wasn't easy, as the snails and slugs didn't seem to be in any of their reliable hang-outs. Not even a single slug on the watering can.
My strawberries have still been nibbled, so I thought I should have a closer look at their immediate environment. The ground right around the strawberry plants was visibly more moist than the surrounding ground (because I watered the strawberry plants yesterday evening). I got down on my hands and knees and probed the soil just below…
drorzel | May 30, 2009I don't intend to turn this entirely over to Video Baby Blogging, but SteelyKid has been adding new tricks at an amazing rate, and I have the camera... Here, she showcases her newfound mobility, and her inherited taste in entertainment:
The odd one-leg-under crawling style seems to be a local maximum-- she can get up on all fours in the classic crawling posture, but she doesn't have the mechanics entirely worked out, and makes faster progress with her left leg folded under. In the tradition of her experimentalist father, she doesn't see an immediate need to fix what's basically working.
The…
jstemwedel | May 29, 2009This morning was dry and cool and overcast, so the pickings were slim.
I went right to the places where gastropods have been found hiding on mornings like this and came up empty.
Actually, since I cleared some weeds (and some piles of previously whacked weeds and tall grass) yesterday, I figured that maybe there were just fewer hiding places left. It's even possible that when the piles of weeds and tall grass went into the green bin to go to the municipal composting, some slugs and snails went with their hiding places to be composted.
So, despite the lack of snails and slugs to pick, I felt…
drorzel | May 29, 2009SteelyKid's day care is closed today for a Jewish holiday, so she's spending the day at home with her grandmother. It was a real struggle to get my mother to come up for the day...
Something I'm sure is on the agenda is playing with her shape sorter box, which she was good enough to demonstrate on video:
Note the highly advanced technique-- if it's not quite working, pound on it. She gets that from me.
I cheated a tiny bit with the video, arranging it so the round hole was closest to her, and handing her one of the round objects. She hasn't really grasped the idea of the different shapes, yet…
jstemwedel | May 28, 2009Another morning, another gastropod foray.
Conditions in the yard were a little odd this morning, owing to the fact that our wee patch of lawn was watered last night. This means that conditions were moist in the vicinity of the lawn but fairly dry otherwise.
Strangely, the lawn itself was not hosting many slugs or snails, unlike yesterday morning. Maybe the amount of water put out by the sprinklers was too much for them. Right on the edges of the lawn area, though, there were plenty of slugs.
So, I could feel that my time was well spent.
In the regions of the yard farther from the wee patch…
jstemwedel | May 27, 2009The happy news and the wistful news concern separate matters, though.
First, the happy news:
Science fair projects were completed well before dinnertime the day before they were due -- and this despite the fact that the Walgreen's photo-printing kiosk was not "while you shop" but "come back in an hour".
The elder Free-Ride offspring (who was required, as were all fourth graders in the school, to submit a project) received a very high grade for the project. The younger Free-Ride project (whose participation, as a second grader, was optional) was awarded the third place ribbon for the grade…
jstemwedel | May 27, 2009This morning, like yesterday morning, was sunny and dewy, and just a little bit chilly.
Good snailing weather.
Actually, though, given recent gastropod ratios during my morning forays, it might be more accurate to call it slugging rather than snailing. Except that slugging already has a meaning.
Anyway, in the 30 minutes I had to clear gastropods from the back yard, I formed the impressing that slightly damp blades of grass on even a very small lawn can host indefinitely many slugs. Some of those blades of grass had two or three slugs each.
I'm pretty ambivalent about lawns. I suppose it's…
clock | May 26, 2009Last year in May, when I visited Belgrade, I gave interviews with Radio Belgrade, talking about science publishing, Open Access, science communication and science blogging. The podcasts of these interviews - yes, they are in Serbian! - are now up:
Part 1
Part 2
I know that this blog has some ex-Yugoslavs in its regular audience, people who can understand the language. I hope you enjoy the interviews and spread the word if you like them.
jstemwedel | May 26, 2009Finally, a morning that dawned clear, cool, and moist.
Tired of being holed up wherever it is they hole up during the dry weather, the gastropods came out to play.
They were not, as it turns out, waiting in the new gastropod shelters we put up Sunday. Instead, they seemed quite content frolicking among our "ground cover" plants -- the lemon thyme, the violets, and the edges of our wee patch of lawn.
It's actually somewhat frustrating, living in the land of perpetual drought (and yeah, I know it's not so much that there's less water than normal as that there are too many people using too much…
jstemwedel | May 25, 2009This morning, once again, was dry and overcast, although not as cold as it has been.
Because I know this is low-yield gastropod-picking weather, I went right to the most likely locations: the bottom of the watering can and the new snail and slug shelters.
Nothing.
I thought about watering near the shelters, going inside for a cup of tea, and coming back out to check for gastropods. But instead, I decided to use the snailing time to clear more weeds, especially from between the raised garden beds.
This means, long pants, long sleeves, and socks notwithstanding, I'm covered with angry welts…
jstemwedel | May 24, 2009Science fair projects are due Tuesday morning. Can you guess what we're doing today?
The elder Free-Ride offspring tried to argue that preliminary experiments (growing crystals from solutions four different solids) had to be omitted from the project write-up. Why? Well, because the elder Free-Ride offspring had originally planned to use solutions of two additional solids in this experiment. It's unthinkable that anything was learned from growing four kinds of crystals rather than six! And reporting on unfinished experiments is just not done!
Or, the Free-Ride parental units hypothesized…
jstemwedel | May 24, 2009Another slow morning for snail picking.
It was cold and dry, so most of the gastropods were probably hunkered down wherever it is they hunker down.
I'm hopeful, however, that after yesterday's significant weed-clearing operation there are fewer slug and snail safe-houses.
While I wasn't picking handfuls of gastropods, I was clearing a few more weeds and setting up some "safe"-houses of my own. The hardware store didn't have unglazed tiles, so we ended up getting unglazed terra cotta saucers to balance on bricks as nice, moist shelters from the sun and wind. At the moment, there are six of…