Brief Update on Life in General

Hello all:

Yes, I'm probably one of the worst bloggers in history. I remember when I first started using Xanga back in college, I didn't think I could make it through the day without hitting the keyboard and punching out another log in the life of me. It felt like Captain Picard... except with more hair.

Anyway, I decided that since I had a quiet afternoon at home this weekend that I would type a little note and get you all up to date on what I'm doing.

When I was in high school, I wrote a 400+ page novel called Intelligence Quotient that was my first (and certainly not my last) foray into political science-fiction. I've decided to revisit the old book and rewrite. The rewrites have taken me in an amazing direction that involves this book being split into four separate novels. Currently, I'm on the second one. I'm a little stuck with a writer's cramp at the moment. It's not an all out block persay, it's just a cramp. That's okay, though, cause it allowed me to get caught up on a lot of other work that I had been putting off.

Meanwhilst... I have been reading a lot of Manga. For those in the know, I'm up to Naruto #40, Fullmetal Alchemist #17, and Deathnote #6. I'm fantastically irritated about how slowly they are releasing Hikaru no Go.

This school year has been awesome, and I think I can boast that this semester has my best students yet. I know that I say that about every semester, but this group is awesome. I'm really gonna miss them once the year is over.

Well, I'm gonna hop off of here and pop in some Anime. The Deathnote box set is calling to me, so there we go. Have a great day all!

Pax Christi,

David

Happy Turkey Day!

Hello all! Thought that I would drop a little line to all of you and say hi. I have actually managed to post this message from my Amazon Kindle, so I can't post a long message. Hope you and yours have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

溫 故 知 新 - Wengu Zhixin

In doing a little bit of research concerning Confucius for class, I ran across this website.

溫 故 知 新 - Wengu Zhixin

This website has a WEALTH of really great stuff to read and study. It is the classics of Chinese philosophy, including the Analects, the Dao De Jing, and the Art of War, with side-by-side versions of the Chinese and English. (If your computer doesn't support Chinese text, you can either update it accordingly, or just shut off the Chinese entirely.)

But, the neatest feature of this site, in my opinion, is the fact that the Chinese text has mouse-over translations of each of the Hanzi characters. I find that I already am starting to recognize close to two dozen Chinese characters just by studying the first part of this. It's amazing!!

Scuba Go?

Found this picture online and thought it was hilarious. I love Go, but it could be taking it to an extreme:

Polar Crown Prominences

Okay, the video below, in my opinion, is staggeringly beautiful. Because the sun is so bright, without the proper equipment, we really can't see what's going on from Earth. I remember being a little kid outside with dad, using a tripod and a rifle scope to project an image of the sun on a piece of paper. At first, you think that it's just bright light shining through on the page until you see little tiny black dots, and you suddenly realize that they are sunspots, and that you have seen an incredible thing. Something like that gets you hooked on Solar matters for life.

NASA has given us a video from the surface of the Sun of a "Polar Crown Prominence," which is a "wall of 10,000^o plasma about 90,000 km long and 30,000 km tall." To give you an idea of this, NASA says that yo could stack three of the Earth on top of each other and BARELY reach the top.

All I can say... is wow.

Click here for the link to the original article.

A neat little project

Good morning all!

God has shined down upon me a wonderful little project to get my brain going this morning. After battling a terrible sore throat, fever, aches, pains and the like, this was a welcome start to my day.

Cliff Wolodkin, a co-worker, brought for me to see a little treasure of his grandfather's. Although I don't know its worth monetarily now, the intrinsic value of this is fantastic as a history buff. He brought in a 1928 monetary note from Algeria, of 20 franc face value for me to translate. My Arabic is terrible (read: "entirely nonexistant"), but luckily I speak French.

Below are scanned copies of the ACTUAL Algerian bills, now 80 years old. Feel free to click to see larger images.




The obverse roughly reads:

_____
Bank of Algeria
20 Francs
Payable by bearer on sight
20 Francs (in Arabic)

Head of Treasury (lit. "Chief Cash-Clerk")
(Signature)

The Secretary-General
(Signature)

Article 139 of the Penal Code punishes the
counterfeiter with perpetual forced labor.
_____

I don't know who the portrait in the lower right is, but I'll find out. In the meantime, the reverse is totally in Arabic, and I am at a loss. I'm gonna get into contact with an old professor of mine who is fluent in Arabic to see what he can tell me. I'll let you know.

David

UPDATE: Dr. Mills wrote me back. The phrase on the reverse means "In the name of God the most merciful, the most compassionate; woe to the stingy."

The Merry Family Winery

Friends,

A little gem in the Ohio River Valley is the Merry Family Winery in Gallipolis, OH. Home to several varieties of grapevines and more than a dozen different wines, it is tucked into the countryside outside of Gallipolis. On my Facebook, I have an entire album of pictures from this little excursion. That link is HERE. Note: You don't have to be a Facebook member to use that link. Just mouse-over the pictures for a caption about each one.

I think back to my little pot-bound vines in the backyard and the handful of grapes that I've managed, regardless of the fact that we apartment dwellers can't plant in the ground. I would love to achieve HALF of what these guys have in viniculture one day.

Enjoy the photos!

David