Keeping Rabbits - part 3

The first part of this series is here, and the second part is here.

House rabbits eat three things: hay, rabbit pellets and fresh fruits and veggies. Let's look at them one at a time.

Hay - Rabbits need plenty of fresh hay to stay healthy, it provides much needed roughage. Timothy hay is best, and should always be given instead of alfalfa. I'm starting to sound like a broken record about this, but your local rabbit rescue will be the best source for hay and pellets. You can buy hay at the pet store, but it'll be expensive and you have no idea how long it's been sitting on the shelf or in the warehouse before you bought it. We get a great deal from our local source, paying a dollar a pound for fresh hay.

Pellets - this concentrated food provides essential vitamins and minerals to your bunny's diet. Developed by breeders to make meat rabbits grow quickly, house rabbits should be getting most of their nutrition from fresh food. No more than a quarter-cup per five pounds of rabbit should be given each day. Again, we pay about a buck a pound for pellets, which is a very good price.

Fresh Fruits and Veggies - Once a day we give our bunnies fresh food. Give your rabbits a variety every day and they'll be happy and healthy. Here's a list of what ours like:
Lettuce (anything but iceberg, which is nutritionally null)
Kale
Spinach
celery (including the leafy tops)
carrot greens
cilantro
parsley
snow peas
dandelion greens
broccoli
cabbage

The last two should be given in moderation, because just like with people, they cause gas. Unlike people, rabbits have no gag or vomit reflex and burping is uncommon. Excess gas passes through the other end, and too much can be uncomfortable for the bunny.

Other rabbits eat the following (but ours don't care for them):
radish greens
mustard greens
zuchini
green pepper

Stay away from starches and carbs. Your rabbit doesn't need them and it's not good for them.

Anything else, including carrots, should be considered treats and given sparingly. Rabbits have a big sweet-tooth. The reason that carrots are on list list is because carrots turn into sugar quickly when eaten, so it's just like eating candy to a rabbit.

Treats:
Carrot (not a whole one!)
slices of apples or pears
banana
dried papaya or pineapple (organic, no sulphur!)
raisins

There is one other thing that rabbits eat, called cecotropes. Because rabbits eat so much plant fiber, they have a special pouch in their digestive system where the toughest material goes through extra processing. It is then passed through the system and excreted as soft oblong pellets. The rabbit knows when cecotropes are being excreted and immediately eats them again. This extra pass through the digestive system allows his body to get the maximum amount of nutrition from what he eats. You'll almost never see cecotropes, because the bunny eats them right away. Regular rabbit poop is shaped like small, hard balls.

So there you go. Unlimited fresh water. Unlimited fresh timothy hay. Fresh veggies and the occasional treat, and your rabbit will be loving life.

Any questions? Please leave them in the comments. Next time, I'll show you how to build a quick and easy cage for your house rabbits.

Just 25?

A while back, Victor posted this quote:

A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.- Robert A. Heinlein

In that same vein, Popular Mechanics has listed 25 skills that every man (and in my opinion every woman) should be able to do. I can do all except CPR and clean a bolt-action rifle. The October issue tells you how to do each one - should you not know.

Personally, I think that Heinlein's list is more comprehensive (with some of JenLars's corrections.

Keeping Rabbits - part 2

This time around, I'll talk a little bit about how rabbits behave and how you can read some of their body language. Part 1 of "Keeping Rabbits" is here.

This is going to sound obvious, but rabbits are not cats and dogs. Cats are natural predators and dogs are natural scavengers, but rabbits are natural prey. Rabbits react completely differently to the world than the two animals that we're most familiar with because almost everything else in the world considers it food.

When a rabbit appears sick, it's a certainty that it's vet time, because rabbits will instinctively hide physical problems as long as possible. They know that the weakest ones get preyed on first.

Reaching down to pet a bunny can really stress the little beastie because to him, your hand is swooping down from above like an owl or hawk. This is especially true before your rabbit gets used to you.

Building trust with your house rabbit can be a long process, and trust is what it's all about. Get down on the floor and let him (or her, I'll just be using "him" from now on) run around and check things out. They like to feel protected, so don't be surprised if they find a spot behind something or under a piece of furniture and make it their home base. Eventually your rabbit will come around to see what you're doing. Do this regularly and over time he'll get to where he will climb up on you, or snuggle in for petting.

This goes for dogs and cats too! Our rabbits and dogs get along wonderfully. Monitor their interactions carefully until they get used to each other, and realize that sometimes animals just won't get along because personalities clash. Here's what I wrote when we first got Ozzie:

He wasn't too sure about the dogs at first, which was driving Trix crazy. Trix loves the rabbits even though they don't act like dogs, I believe that he thinks they're retarded puppies. Because Ozzie was so skittish, tonight was the first night that they've been in close contact. We expanded the pen so there was some running -around room, then Trix and I went in and lay down and waited quietly. Before long Ozzie came up to us to check things out, and he and Trix sniffed each other a bit. Trix mostly stayed on his belly, dragging himself around by his front legs so that he was on the same level as Ozzie. I've never seen anything like it. Within an hour Trix and Ozzie were laying side by side on the floor, just chillin'.

Watch your rabbit while he's exploring! Rabbits, especially younger ones, will chew things! Bunny-proof your room by wrapping cords in conduit or putting them up out of reach. In my wife's sewing room (where the bunnies live), we put cardboard in front of the walls to hide the cords. If a piece gets chewed on, we replace it. Keep a squirt bottle of water handy and don't be afraid to give the bunny a spritz to let him know that he's not to be chewing on something. A rabbit will almost immediately stop to groom and wash their face after you spray them. "No!" in a firm voice helps too, they'll learn. So will a thump.

Rabbits "thump" when they're unhappy with a situation. They'll stamp on the ground with a back leg to let you know that they disapprove of what just happened. Thump at them and they'll know that what they were doing is a no-no.

Give your bunny things to do and play with so he won't get bored and gnaw on your furniture or electrical cords. They'll chew on and throw around tubes from toilet paper and paper towels. Wicker is a favorite chew toy, just make sure that it's unfinished so they're not chewing paint or chemical stains. Put small boxes around and your rabbit will jump up on top of them or push them around from place to place. If one end is open, he'll crawl inside and explore. Those heavy-cardboard concrete form tubes you can get at the hardware store are loved! Cut it down to a two-foot section and watch your bunny spend a long happy time just running back and forth through it.

You may see your rabbit "chinning" things. Bunnies have a scent gland under their chin that they rub on stuff to mark it as theirs. Toys, furniture, you, eventually they'll chin most everything in sight. It's hilarious to watch ours run around and re-chin everything that the others did while they were out last. You can almost see the little thought balloons over their heads, "*this* is mine... so is *this*... *this* is too... and *this*..."

Rabbits, especially young males, will sometimes pee to mark territory. Get 'em fixed to solve that problem.

It's easy to tell when a rabbit feels happy and content. When a rabbit is tense, he'll be hunched up like a volkswagon and his eyes will be wide. If he's sprawled out on his belly or side, he feels safe enough to let his guard down a bit. You may see your rabbit do a little side-kick with his back legs as he hops around. This means he's feeling really good and having fun!

Got questions? Ask in the comments, and I'll get to them. Coming up soon is how to put together a simple and inexpensive cage and what to feed your rabbit. And if you're looking for a rabbit of your own, check out your local rabbit rescue organization. Bunny Lu Adoptions is the one we use here in Northern Virginia. You can follow that link, then click on the "Petfinder" link in the middle of their page, then scroll down and on the left you'll see a rescue organization finder to help you locate pet people in your area.

Keeping Rabbits

We love animals. We have two dogs and three house rabbits. Most everyone knows how to care for a dog or a cat (or thinks they do), but rabbits are probably a bit of a mystery. I know they were to us a couple of years ago, before we started keeping them as pets. Our dogs and rabbits get along fine, and even take cues from each other. If the rabbits are getting a treat (raisins), then the dogs figure that they should get a biscuit too. That works in reverse too, in that the bunnies will come looking for a goody when they hear the lid of the doggy treat jar lifted.

I’m going to do a series of these posts, going over different aspects about keeping house rabbits. Some of what you’re going to hear may surprise you. Some of what you’ll need to know I can’t tell you, because we haven’t had to deal with it yet (such as medical issues, our bunnies have been completely healthy so far).

In case you didn’t know, rabbits aren’t rodents. They are related, but there are many important differences, the most obvious one being that rodents can and will eat meat, whereas rabbits are strictly herbivores. I’ll go into feeding and what rabbits eat in the near future.

Rabbits will live up to about twelve years.

You may also not know that rabbits can be trained to use a litterbox. All of ours were trained at a young age and are very good about using them.

Now, I’ll introduce you to our rabbits, and tell you a little about each of them. Then I’ll recommend a couple of good books and online resources to learn more about them.


This is Fred, our first rabbit. He’s about three years old and weighs 4 pounds (he’s a little guy). Fred was rescued from near the Severn River and originally named Severn. The people that found him knew he wasn’t a wild rabbit because of his ears. Rabbits with ears that point down like that are called “Lops” and they don’t happen in the wild. A lop is aways a domesticated rabbit. Fred probably was abandoned by someone who didn’t want him anymore, and he probably would not have lived through his first winter if he hadn’t have been rescued. At the bunny shelter, they renamed him Fast Freddie because of his pinball-like speed and ability to change direction instantly. When we adopted him, we shortened it to just Fred.


After we had Fred for a while, we thought it would be nice to get him a girlfriend. Rabbits pair for life, so choosing a companion isn’t always an easy thing. At the bunny rescue, they had a young lady named Java. We brought Java home and paired her with Fred. I’ll talk about that in another post, because it can be a long and drawn out process to pair up bunnies. Java is a little larger than Fred, and she’s about a year and a half old now. She’s an escape artist!


Once Fred and Java were a bonded pair and living together, we had an extra cage. We agreed to take another bunny for foster care from the rescue shelter. Our first foster bunny was Ozzie. He’s an albino, and another lop, and goes through life as if he’s had way too much caffeine! He startles easily, but is also the most affectionate of our three. Yes, we did wind up falling in love with Ozzie and adopted him for our own. At some point we may get him a girlfriend as well, but the rescue had tried before and his personality makes it difficult to match him with a partner.

Each of our rabbits has been fixed to prevent little baby bunnies. They’ve also been microchipped, so that if we get separated for whatever reason (for instance, during a natural disaster), we can find them again afterwards if they are brought to an emergency pet shelter.

As for recommended books, there is one that stands above the rest, called “The House Rabbit Handbook”. Your local rabbit rescue will probably have copies that you can buy, or check your library. “Rabbits for Dummies” is also pretty good. Like anything else regarding pets, do your research beforehand and learn what you can before you jump into it.

I really, really recommend contacting a local rabbit rescue if you want your own bunny. These people are wonderful resources, full of advice and knowledge and willing to help. Visiting one will also give you a chance to see many different sizes and types of rabbits all in one place. Out local rescue is called Bunny Lu Adoptions, and your local animal shelter or pet stores can put you in touch with ones in your area.

Leave a comment and let me know if there's any interest in my continuing this series. If there is, then I'll do future posts on things like: What rabbits eat. Build an easy cage. Bonding pairs. Rabbit toys and other things you'll need. Plus all kinds of other stuff as I think of it.

What's in your lunch box?

Ok, I hope nobody's lunch is dangerous, and I wouldn't expect lunch to even be described as daring. But then I had a conversation with some friends over lunch at work.

It began when one of them said that she had eaten a tuna salad sandwich for lunch every day from first through eighth grade. I didn't believe her. Nobody can be that picky, I said.

Another friend had no problem accepting that the tuna-a-day habit was not an exaggeration, because she had eaten peanut butter and jelly every single day of grade school.

Well, what did you take for lunch? they asked me.

Ah, my school lunches. I had a plastic lunch box that looked like Snoopy's doghouse, and in it my mom often packed a sandwich, though certainly not the same thing every day. I liked ham, bologna, and I was a huge fan of pickle and pimento loaf. One of my favorites was corned beef and swiss cheese with mustard, on rye or pumpernickel bread.

You ate pumpernickel bread in grade school?

The only kind of bread we didn't eat was square white bread. I admit, I was embarrassed that my sandwiches didn't fit nicely into little baggies like my classmates' sandwiches did, but I appreciated the variety, like wheat, oatmeal, and Challah. And my mom used different cheeses, too. I particularly liked the one I called monster; I think I was ten before I found out it was muenster.

Half the time, though, I didn't even get a sandwich. I had a wide-mouth thermos, and mom gave me soup, stew, macaroni and cheese, or spaghetti. Sometimes I had leftovers from a previous night's dinner.

At this point, my friend started to laugh, and pointed to my lunch (leftovers). My lunches haven't changed much in over 30 years, though I no longer have a Snoopy lunch box.

So, now I have a question for all of you: What is your favorite lunch? (And do you eat it every single day?)

Measurement Resources

Some printable paper rulers - Inches and centimeters, of various types, including some without markings to see if you really understand the measurements you're using.

Three printable protractors - Three kinds of markings, for three different types of measurement.

A decimeter box - "The idea: Having a 10 cm cube helps you get to know how big millimeters and centimeters are. Here are pages you can print out, cut out, fold and tape, to make your own 10 centimeter box."

More kinds of graph paper than you can shake a stick at - Wow. Seriously, wow.

Thanks to Friedbeef Tech for these.

How People Lived: The Dial Telephone

Several years ago, I used to babysit my old roommate's son, Matt. He and I always got along well and I was happy to do so. One day, I was babysitting him and he had to contact his mom, so I showed him my telephone.

It was an old, wall-mounted rotary dial telephone that had conveyed with my condo. As Matt was six or seven at the time, he had never seen a dial phone before and he looked at it as if it were ancient technology...which, of course, it was. Fortunately, my girlfriend was with us, and she let him borrow her cell phone, which he dialed as if he had been using one all his life.

Which, of course, he had.

It wasn't always like that. I'm sure you've seen the old movies/tv shows where someone holds an earpiece to their ear, turns a crank several times, and yells into the wall-mounted microphone, "Operator! Get me..." and they'd give a number...or probably a city, which would connect you to a party line and the fun would really start.

In the 1920's, the phone company started to do away with the crank phones and introduced dial phones...but like Matt, no one knew how to use one.

At midnight on Saturday, May 28, 1927, the city of Fresno was converting to dial telephones, so the phone company released this public service announcement to the local theaters, to teach people how to use that brand-new piece of equipment...the dial telephone.

The Value of Books

As a kid, the absolute best gift I could receive was a book. I was a bookworm for sure, but early on I also recognized the power of a good reference book. I still have most of those books today, still in excellent condition, and I still reread them occasionally.

My uncle Art always surprised and delighted us with books. We used to visit him and his "library", which was a good sized bookcase full of interesting titles. He even owned a copy of an unabridged baseball encyclopedia, which listed the complete known statistics of every player ever to play in the major leagues. I spent hours looking up my favorite current players and reading about the legends of the game, following up on interesting details that caught my fancy.

What inspired this particular post is an old friend that I've recently picked up again, the Moon Flight Atlas. Written for pre-teens, it's full of wonderful pictures and diagrams describing a wide range of topics related to mankind's efforts to reach the moon and Mars beyond. It was published soon after Apollo 11 landed on the moon, and the enthusiasm and optimism towards the future of man in space is sad when viewed in hindsight. Still, this book and many others fired my imagination and interests in science, interests that continue to this day.

The inscription on the inside front cover reads: "To Ted, from Uncle Art - Christmas, 1969".

Thanks, Uncle Art. Thank you.

C & O Canal

Construction on the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal began in 1828 in Washington, D.C., although the idea for a navigable waterway from the Potomac to the Ohio Valley was envisioned as early as George Washington's time. The 184.5 mile canal was completed in 1850, ending in Cumberland, Maryland, and for nearly 75 years it was a major route for moving coal (850,000 tons in 1871). Flooding was always an issue, however, and since the railroad had moved in by then, in 1924 the canal ceased operations following another flood.

In the 1930's, restoring the lower section of the canal was a Civilian Conservation Corps project, in anticipation of the canal becoming a national park. The canal itself only survived because of Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas, however. In the 1950's the plan was to turn the canal into a parkway to allow motor access through the park, and Justice Douglas, an avid hiker, wrote a letter to the Washington Post
arguing for preserving the canal:

One who walked the canal its full length could plead that cause with the eloquence of a John Muir. He would get to know muskrats, badgers, and fox; he would hear the roar of wind in thickets; He would see strange islands and promontories through the fantasy of fog; he would discover the glory there is in the first flower of spring, the glory there is even in a blade of grass; the whistling wings of ducks would make silence have new values for him. Certain it is that he could never acquire that understanding going 60, or even 25, miles an hour.

He even organized a hike of editors and conservationists, sucessfully swaying public opinion away from the road and back to nature. Time reported on April 5, 1954:

By the time he was ten miles from the city, Douglas had 50 followers, and was being paralleled in the canal by canoeists bearing such signs as SAVE THE CANAL and LESS CARS-MORE CANOES !

The long walk ended at an old canal lock a quarter of a mile farther along. A National Park Service sightseeing barge, drawn by two mules, awaited the hikers. They climbed aboard to ride the last five miles to Georgetown. Their triumphal entry into the city, however, was just beginning. As the barge sloshed down the canal, hundreds of men, women & children hustled along the banks exchanging greetings with the expedition. Other well-wishers called greetings from overhead bridges. The escorting fleet of canoes grew. Automobiles jammed up along a parallel roadway.

The 12,000 acres, including the canal and towpath rather than a paved road, became a national park in 1971.

Here are a few pictures from the section of towpath closest to where I live:


This may be a reproduction, or perhaps a replacement, lockhouse. On the other side of the canal you can see the stone foundation of another building.


The canal at Lock 26.


The store at White's Ferry records the high water marks after the Potomac River floods. (This is the second story of the building.)


The Monocacy Aqueduct

Quote

"Forgive all who have offended you, not for them, but for yourself." -- Harriet Nelson

More How to Books

If you like the book, "The Dangerous Book for Boys" (Conn Iggulden, Hal Iggulden), and I assume you might since you're here on the Dangerous and Daring Blog for Boys and Girls, there are two other books you might want to check out.

The Boys Book: How To Be The Best At Everything.

How to do almost anything in one handy book. Found yourself in a sticky situation? Inside you'll learn how to escape quicksand (p. 40), build a raft (p.41), start a survival fire (p.99), or fly a helicopter (p. 11). Want to impress your friends? Now you can rip a phonebook in half (p. 35), hypnotize a chicken (p. 56), or read their minds (p. 73). Boring Saturday afternoon? Not anymore when you find out how to make a waterbomb (p. 79), a boomerang (p. 95), or a volcano (p. 88). And loads of other keen things you need to know how to do!

And The Girls Book: How To Be The Best At Everything

How to do almost anything in one handy little book! Want to be known for your unique style? Inside you'll learn how to design your own clothes (p. 35), do the perfect manicure (p. 82), or make your own lip gloss (p. 11). Feel like impressing your friends? Show them how you can make a crystal (p. 16), juggle one-handed (p. 33), or deal with a bully (p. 42). Bored and need something to do? Not anymore when you find out how to keep a secret diary (p. 88), make a scrapbook (p. 9), or put together a dance routine (p. 24). And tons of other neat-o things you need to know how to do!

Of course by telling you about these books I may have just deprived myself and all the other contributers here a wealth of post topics! Sorry everyone.

(Hat Tip: Instapundit)

Science at home: Build your own nanotechnology lab

Some of the problems with pursuing modern science at home - or in a school - (particularly electronics or the study of matter at the atomic scale) is that the equipment to be able to see the effects of that scale can cost so much!

Well, here are instructions on making two pieces of equipment used in modern science.
First, the oscilloscope (with a nice history of oscilloscopes to boot):

The oscilloscope is still one of the most important measurement tools of the electronic engineer. With the advent of the often very reasonably priced USB scopes, such an instrument is now within reach of every body.

Second, once you have the oscilloscope, you can build your own scanning tunneling microscope (a key tool in nanotechnology) that is able to resolve atoms:

The goal of this project is to build a simple STM that can resolve atoms, with a cost of materials less than $100.00 excluding oscilloscope. My real goal here is to provide a base of information so experimenters and students could build a simple STM. Typical piezo tubes used in tube scanners of commercial scanning probe microscopes cost in the range of $200 - $800 and operate with several hundred volts applied to the scanner. This design uses a unimorph disk scanner to reduce the cost and avoid using any high voltage. The Piezo element is commonly available and this particular one costs $1.80. The control voltages are so low that two 9-volt batteries can power the control electronics.

Simple Rubberband Guns

As kids, we used to make these as needed every summer, although occasionally someone would fashion a more elaborate one and keep it from year to year.

And no, none of us ever put an eye out with one of these. Then again, we were bright enough not to intentionally aim at the face. We also did a lot of target shooting with 'em. That's what I recommend: target shooting at cans or flies or plastic army men.

Materials
Wood - length of broomstick or dowel, or a 1"x2" or even a 2"x4". Whatever you use, you need a piece about 12" long (more for a 2"x4" rifle).
Clothespins - tradition says to use the wooden spring type, but the plastic ones will work just fine. The simplest gun uses one, we usually used at least two. They come in bags of 100 or more, so borrow from a neighbor if you don't have your own. Or make lots of guns, you politically incorrect brute.
Rubberbands - in our house, we kept rubberbands around the doorknob on the furnace closet, and had plenty because you got one with every newspaper delivered. They're cheap, so don't go mugging the paperboy for his.

How To
Take sandpaper and round off any sharp edges to eliminate wood splinters. Use a file to cut a shallow "V" notch in the end of the wood. Use one rubber band to fasten a clothespin to the wood on the opposite end of the wood from the notch. That's it!
Here's a picture of a fancy store-bought model that works exactly this way. It's a good view of the clothespin and notch setup.

To Use
Hook a rubber band around the end of the wood so it's in the notch. Stretch it back with one hand, use the other to open the clothespin and catch the rubberband. When ready to shoot, press on the clothespin and zing!

You can cut out pistol or rifle shapes from the wood, mount multiple clothespins (and make extra notches), and do all kinds of custom coolness with the basic design. Often we'd grab a piece of scrap wood, use a rock to gouge out the notch, grab a clothespin from the clothesline out back and a handfull of rubberbands from the doorknob. Within minutes you had something that worked, and sometimes the ugliest thing was the straightest shooter (my best was a piece of old yellow broomstick with two clothespins attached). Showing up with a store-bought rubberband gun was tolerated - barely - mainly because we'd closely examine it to see how they managed multiple shots if it worked that way.

Bernard Smith: An Amazing Life

Bernard Smith was born in 1910 in New York City. By age 22, he had dropped out of high school, working odd jobs and spending most of his time at the libraries and museums of the city.

One night, he attended a meeting of the American Rocket Society and while looking over one of their failed rockets, made some suggestions on how to improve the device. The president of the Society, Edward Pendray, handed him the pieces of the rocket and invited him to create the next version.

According to Smith, his motivation was simple. America was in the midst of the Great Depression, and "It was a lousy planet. The rocket ship was the only way to get off it."

After making major modifications to the original rocket design, including several weight-saving changes, the new rocket was ready to fly in early 1933. It wasn't entirely successful, but proved that the basic concepts were sound.

Bernard Smith never did graduate from high school, but he did earn a degree in Physics. In fact, after World War II he started his career working for the US Navy, eventually heading up the Weapons Development Department at the Naval Ordinance Test Station. Among the projects that he worked on or managed are the ASROC, Sidewinder and Shrike. He also spearheaded Project Pilot, which placed at least one small satellite into orbit via air-launched rockets in 1958.

So that's the "rocket" side of Bernard Smith. But there's more, for there's the "sailboat" side of Bernard Smith.

Smith also spent over 40 years pursuing his dream of creating the perfect sailboat. He tried many unconventional designs and met some notable successes. In fact, one of his early efforts, the Aerohydrofoil, could make 20 knots in a 12 knot wind. He also designed craft he called Monomarans, Fliptackers, and experimented with a concept called the Sailloon, which was a gas-filled sail that would help provide lift, and thus speed, to a sailboat.

Follow that link above for a fascinating look at the creations of a mind who saw radically different, and sometimes better, ways to accomplish his goals, both through the air and on the water.

Flags of the World: Bhutan

You can learn a lot about people by looking at the symbols they use to represent themselves.

About 2 million people call the country of Bhutan home. Over 90% of these people make their livings with agricultural pursuits. Bhutan is a constitutional monarchy located between India and China.

Around 75% of Bhutan's residents are Buddhists, and the rest are Hindus. Religion is very important in Bhutan, and that is reflected in the nation's flag.


Half of the flag is orange to symbolize the Buddhist religion. (After all, when you think of a Buddhist monk, isn't he usually wearing orange robes?) The other half of the flag is yellow to represent the fruit of the king's leadership.

The dragon has a snarling mouth to indicate the strength of Bhutan's protective gods, and the jewels the dragon clutches symbolize the riches and perfection of the nation. The dragon is the color white to represent purity and loyalty, and the dragon as a whole represents Bhutan as a whole. Bhutan's name in the local language means "land of the dragon", which is at least partly named for the thunderstorms that form over the Himalayan Mountains to the north. The thunder produced by those storms is said to be the dragon's roar.

The Sky is Falling! The Sky is Falling!

This weekend is a treat for skywatchers and amateur astronomers. The annual Perseid meteor shower should be beautiful because it arrives while a new moon is in the sky. As many as 60 meteors per hour may be visible, with larger ones leaving a streak across the night sky as they burn up in our atmosphere.

As a bonus, the planet Mars will be visible as a bright red dot in the sky to the northeast.

Unlike most astronomical events, meteor watching is done best without telescope or binoculars. Get comfortable, pick out a patch of black sky away from light pollution, and watch patiently. The closer towards dawn, the more meteors you might see. The peak number should be Sunday night into Monday morning, but they'll be visible for several nights afterwards too.

Every August at this time the Perseid shower occurs. Named for the constellation Perseus - because that's where the meteors appear to come from - their real origin is the comet Swift-Tuttle. When Earth crosses the path of the comet, debris from the comet's passing enters our atmosphere and gives us a light show.

Some of the most worthwhile ways to spend 5 minutes

A very excellent website where Popular Science is taking its HOW 2.0 projects and turning them into quick 5 minute videos. Up right now are a use for old, died out hard drives, how to make a coffee can cellphone antenna, and making a bottle cap tripod.

Enjoy!

A Planetarium on your Desktop

Have you ever stood outside on a cold, clear night, looking at the stars?

If you can get out into the country, away from city lights, you can see thousands of stars...and once in a while, the quick streak of a meteor.

There's no denying the beauty of the night skies. When you look at the stars, you are looking at the last, greatest unexplored frontier, a frontier into which Mankind has taken its most halting baby steps. Moon landings and probes sent skittering through the solar system, out into the Oort Cloud...and in a few hundred years, who knows where we will have traveled to?

Men and women have been gazing at the stars since time began. There are those who misguidedly believe that the stars influence our lives: these are the kind of people who take horoscopes seriously and who really care whether you're a Libra or a Sagittarius. Where I come from, we call them "nuts." But anyone with a speck of imagination will look at the skies and see the ghostly patterns formed by the stars.

These patterns - constellations - all have names, names that are unique to each human culture. And now you can look at the skies and see all of those constellations and planets without leaving your house.

Check out Stellarium, a wonderful open-source computer program that turns your computer into a planetarium! You can download it at no charge: just click on the link. Once you've downloaded and installed the program (ask your parents for permission first, before installing any software), it will show the skies in real time. All you have to do is tell it where you are, and it will display the a picture of the sky, day or night. Just drag with your mouse to look in any direction...and you can zoom in to look at planets and nebulae more closely. Click on any star, planet, or galaxy, and detailed information will appear at the top left corner of your screen.


[Click on image to expand.]

Thanks to Joan of Argghh! for the link!

Quote

"I've done everything I know how to do, so if this doesn't work, we're going to learn something." -- Doug Pratt

Ghost Story: Drip Drop

This story was told and retold around the campfire last week by the 10-and-under crowd:

A teenage girl was left home alone for the weekend by her parents. She was very responsible and didn't have any friends over. She just made herself dinner and went upstairs to her room to read before bedtime. She read for a little while with her dog lying on the floor beside the bed, then she turned out the light and went to sleep.

In the middle of the night, the girl woke up because of a strange noise. She listened to the still darkness all around her, unable to figure out what had disturbed her. Then she faintly heard something from the bathroom...drip...drop...drip...drop.

"There must be a leak," she thought to herself. She felt a little nervous in the house all alone. It was so dark and quiet. She put her hand down to feel for her dog. He licked her hand, and feeling safe, she fell back asleep.

In the morning, the girl got up and went into the bathroom. There, her dog was hanging from the shower rod with his throat slit. His blood was slowly dripping onto the tile floor...drip...drop...drip...drop. Written on the mirror in blood was the message: "Aren't you glad you didn't look under the bed?"

If you have a ghost/scary story you'd like to contribute, please e-mail it to jenlarson@gmail.com.