The Smell of Rain

 

The rich aroma of earth and rain.  

Thanks to Amedeo Modigliani for the nose of The Man with the wine glass (L'uomo con il bicchiere di vino), 1919.   It just happens to be Modigliani's 127th birthday.  Unfortunately, he was only alive for 35 of them.

Update - 2004 IG Report Cleared USAF Academy Officials Including UA President Gamble

When General Gamble was an applicant for the UA President's position, I'd found that he'd been head of the US Air Force Academy in between two national reports on sexual assault and harassment at the US military academies.  The second report said that things had gotten worse.  I raised a question, given his stated management style - whether his style at the Academy hadn't worked in regard to this issue or whether it hadn't bee one of his priorities.

When I talked to him after he spoke to the UAA Faculty Senate about how he'd appointed General Case to be UAA's Chancellor, he told me that he'd been cleared or any wrongdoing by an investigatory board.  He said he'd send me the information.  I never heard from him.

Until recently.  I don't use my UAA office often.  I share it with another emeritus faculty member who makes good use of it.  But when I stopped in recently, there was a big manila envelope on my desk.  In it was a note, dated Feb 21, 2011, from President Gamble and a copy of the Cover of a Department of Defense Inspector General's report entitled, "Evaluation of Sexual Assault, Reprisal, and Related Leadership Challenges at the United States Air Force Academy."

There was a second page which said:

Our evaluation found that the below officials were not responsible for, and did not contribute to or abide, sexual assault problems at USAFA.  When informed of problems, they took appropriate action.  For current (2003-2004) leadership, they took aggressive action from the time of the January 2003 notification of the problems.  Recent evidence, that some senior officials may have been notified of sexual assault issues as early as July 2002, is still being assessed and could affect the conclusions regarding one or more of the individuals below.  Of course, those ongoing investigative activities could also turn up new evidence concerning any other officer, whether in the civil service or uniformed service, associated with the Air Force's response to sexual assault problems at the United States Air Force Academy.  However, we do not anticipate the ongoing activity will affect the systemic findings or recommendations in the report. 

This is followed by a list of 21 names including:

MajGen Patrick K. Gamble (Commandant of Cadets, Jun. 1993-Nov. 1994)

Given that the caveat suggests any changes might come from an ongoing study, and this report is dated Dec. 2004, and Gamble headed the USAFA from 1993-94, I'm confident that  his name remained on the cleared list.

I think the questions I raised were legitimate ones to be raised by a selection committee about someone being considered for an important position.  And I'm glad that the Inspector General found nothing to be concerned about in President Gamble's case.

I am sorry that it took so long for me to get this correction up.  While I was expecting an email response since I was traveling a lot at the time, it's perfectly understandable that he sent the response to my University office.

Why Powerline Pass is Named Powerline Pass

This shot,  from 'the other side' looking back toward the trail toward the south along the pass, doesn't answer the question.

 

Nor does this one, also from the other side, this time looking west toward Flattop and the Glen Alps parking lot.  

And here's the reason for the name.  I tried to find some history online, but found nothing that really said too much.  Mostly it was hiking and biking sites.  There was a little bit about fiber optic cable that had been laid along the trail around 2005, but nothing too specific, and, of course, that was well after the powerline poles were put in.  

I also learned this was 'world-famous' as a place to see moose.  I knew that moose were out there, particularly in the evening, but I didn't know it was a favorite with photographers from around the world. From ADN piece  Powerline Pass famous for viewing moose:

High above Alaska's largest city, fall has sparked an annual mating congregation of majestic bull moose. Thousand-pound animals sporting antlers as wide as a man is tall, they gather along Campbell Creek to joust for mates. The area, once something of a secret among wildlife viewers but now increasingly well-known, offers some of the best moose viewing Alaska has to offer within an easy, half-hour drive from downtown Anchorage.

Photographer Stefan Meyers came all the way from Germany to witness and photograph these animals. . .

A professional photographer in Germany, Meyers said that among photographers in that country there is widespread knowledge of Powerline moose.

Do you think photographers go to Moose Pass to shoot the powerlines?

After lot had emptied a bit, about 11pm

What I do know is that parking has gotten bad.  I've seen it a couple times on summer weekends where cars were parked down the road.   Wednesday night, last week, when we visited,  cars lined the road next to the "Fire Lane - No Parking" signs.  Maybe 60 or 70 cars.  (We luckily found someone just pulling out of a space in the parking lot.)  There was publicity about all those cars getting tickets one night last August.   I guess there's been a truce.

And I've never seen so many people roaming around - and this was a weeknight!

This year legislation was passed to enlarge the parking lot and the governor didn't veto it.  It originally sounded like the parking lot was going to be put in where the trail goes to Powerline Pass - a long time favorite trail passed miniature trees that my kids loved to play in when they were little.  As I read the plans, they could well take out this field of lupine that was at it's perfect moment Wednesday night.

I don't think there is a perfect answer.  And I'm still not sure why the Governor signed this bill and vetoed the bill to purchase the Waldron land south of Tudor.  That's beauftiful green land that is accessible to far more people right in the middle of town.   It's certainly not the same kind of land.  And you can see that I too, fell into comparing one park land bill to another instead of comparing it to a road project or other expenditures in the operating budget that once spent are gone.  Whereas the money for Waldron will save that precious spot for future generations. 

Waldron Lake from prior post

Why some people hate cottonwood

[UPDATE June 8, 2020: There was a picture of seeds flying but it's no longer working, so I took it down.  I'll see if I can get another in July this year when this is happening again.]






They make summer snow.














Eventualy, the whole seed pod drops down to litter.

But I don't hate cottonwoods.  They're the biggest trees we have in the Anchorage area, they provide lots of green, noise muffling, air cleaning leaves.  Everything good comes with a cost.  Cars get us places fast, but endanger us - quickly through collisions and gradually  through pollution.  Chocolate makes our pants tighter.  The companionship of pets, requires care in exchange.

And I believe there is great potential in cottonwood cotton, the right person just hasn't focused on how to make it profitable.  Here's an earlier post exploring what people have already  done with cottonwood cotton and catkins. 

It all depends if you see a problem or a potential.

The First Space Shuttle Launch April 12, 1981

I had a one year fellowship in Washington DC and we'd planned a trip down the east coast to Disneyworld for the kids for spring break.  My son and I had taken a parent-child workshop for about seven weeks at the Air and Space Museum which had us building a space station.  It was a great class.  Even though J1 was just under their cutoff age, since he wouldn't get another chance the next year, they let us in.

I still remember that first day.  Maybe 15-20 pairs - mostly dads and sons, but a few daughters.  We were in a small museum classroom before opening hours.  The instructor was asking the kids what you would need if you were going into space.  As the kids answered, he made a list on the board.   Then we went downstairs into the museum itself and looked at the display cabinet to see the actual items taken in the first trips to space.  Pretty heady stuff.

By the last session we'd all created model space stations - fortunately I had my son to help me with that since even at that age he understood those things better than I did. 

The very first shuttle launch was originally scheduled for spring 1981.  I don't remember the exact date, but it was early enough that I never considered scheduling our trip to catch it.   But I did joke that if it got delayed enough, we might. 

And then I realized that if we boogied down south a day early, we might just make it.  We drove all night and got to Titusville about 5 am.  It was a carnival atmosphere.  People were all over the place.  We need a word in English to describe the sort of event where lots of people - strangers - are out, together, communally enjoying some great event.  Sort of like going to a college football game, or watching fire works on New Years Eve community celebration.  That's what it was like. 

There was the launch pad, out across the water, as we mingled with the crowd. 

It's that vague box to the right of the reflected rising sun. 


And then came the disappointing announcement echoed over thousands of car and portable radios.  The launch was scrubbed.

Should we stick around or go off to our reservations at Disneyworld?  With two young kids, we drove the short distance to Orlando to visit Mickey and his friends.  But, the next morning (I think, hey, it was 30 years ago - and the NASA site doesn't mention the delays) we were up at dawn, on the balcony, and watched the white streak in the distance as the Columbia made its first successful launch. 

J1 and M on the right

A few days later we were back at Cape Canaveral as it was then known, to tour the Space Center.  This time we were able to get closer to the launch pad. 


So, when the last space shuttle launch took place yesterday, I couldn't help but think of those days in Florida 30 years ago. 



From the NASA website today:

Shuttle Crew Completes Inspection, Prepares for Docking

Sat, 09 Jul 2011 01:49:54 PM PST

Space shuttle Atlantis’ crew is wrapping up a busy day filled with preparations for Sunday’s docking to the International Space Station and a detailed survey of the shuttle’s heat shield. Video from the survey, which used the Orbiter Boom Sensor System attached to the shuttle robotic arm, has been down linked to Mission Control in Houston, where imagery experts will review it to determine whether the heat shield sustained any damage during Friday’s ascent. Atlantis’ crew goes to sleep at 7:29 p.m. EDT.

Flight Day 3 begins with crew wake up at 3:29 a.m. Sunday.

Still Don't Know After 5 Years - Blog Retrospective Part 1

My first post was on July 9, 2006.  It was short.  But as I look back, there was some hint of what was to come.  It was about spittle bugs.  And I'd googled enough to figure out what they were and gave some short background. I didn't have a digital camera so there were no pictures.  I didn't know how to make links so there were no links.  There were two posts that month.

This blog has covered a lot of ground in five years - in terms of geography, media, and content.  I've met a lot of people through blogging.  People I blogged about.  People I met while blogging (at the political corruption trials, the Anchorage International Film Festival, for example).  I met people who commented on my blog, and other bloggers.

While blogging has been around a lot longer than five years, when I started few people had a clear idea of what a blog was.  Since then, lots of people have started blogs.  Other Alaska bloggers have supported each other as our world exploded in August 2008 and we tried to figure out what we should be doing.  Thanks for you kindnesses to me.

Anniversaries are good times to take stock, to rethink, to make changes.  But one of the consequences of blogging is that a lot of things I should do, don't get done.  ('Should' there is, of course, relative.)  So, the serious analysis of blogging is on a pile of other unfinished things to do.

Therefore, I'm treating this like a birthday of sorts.  I shouldn't have to work, I can just sit back and chit chat with friends.  And maybe I can use these ramblings later for something more profound.  But I have to do some heavier thinking this week, because fellow blogger Peter Dunlap-Shohl has invited me to a Hometown Alaska show he's hosting about Social Media, as he put it in a reminder email, "2:00 on July 13 also known as 'Next Wednesday.'"  That's on KSKA, and those of you outside of Alaska can probably find it online eventually.

Well, I've tried to create an appropriate post here but there's just too much to say.  I had to trash most of it.  So I'll do a series of retrospective posts looking at different topics - including the struggle to discover what blogging is.  (Of course, once we 'nail' it, then we stop learning, while blogging will continue on its merry way escaping our labels.)

So for now, I'm going to settle for identifying a few favorite and, I hope, representative posts from the first year.

My 'manage posts' page says I have 3025 published posts.  Even remembering them all is hard.  I get reminded of older posts as I watch where sitemeter takes people.   And what makes something a favorite post?

Sometimes because it reminds me of a really good day, like when we visited Swe's Karen village outside of Chiangmai. 

Sometimes because I thought the topic was interesting, profound, or off-the-wall. The key ingredient was always that it rearranged my brain cells a bit so I saw the world a little differently. 

Here are a few from the first year of What Do I Know?:

India Road Motto: Blow Horn and companion post Awazdo - The creative signs on Indian trucks and the culture of blowing horns.

Blind Colors - What Food is Like Blue?  - this is one I want to repost now that there are more readers and I might get more comments. 

How Did Carnival Cruise Lines Get US Taxpayers to Buy them a $28 million Railway Depot?  - This was one of my earlier crossovers from blogging to something like journalism.  (I don't claim to do journalism here, but that's another long topic.)  There are links to two follow up posts.

The Sierra Leone Refugee All Star Band Rolls Anchorage - This was coverage of a concert as I struggled to interpret the changing rules for video and copyrights in the age of Youtube, and how to use my tiny digital camera to take document events.  I ended up editing what I had into short vignettes of different songs.  But their music triumphs even my poor equipment and editing. This video has gotten almost 15,000 hits on YouTube, which for me is a lot. And because Anchorage is not too big, we got to meet the band members after the show.

Beyond the Headlines - Covering the Tom Anderson trial was my first intense immersion into one topic.  Mostly I had to report what I saw going on, because I really didn't know enough to intelligently comment.  But this post was a chance to reflect, just before the verdict was announced, on how it all might be impacting the various players involved. [Wow.  I just reread this and it cries for an update now that we know what has happened for many of these players.  While I didn't have a clue where things would go, at least I left things open ended enough to allow for what has since happened.  Anderson has a few weeks more of home detention at his parents' place and then he's free and has work lined up with a family related business.  I think he's going to be ok.  The prosecutors had their days of glory in the three Alaska trials only to have it all come crashing down after the Stevens trial.  Marsh committed suicide and Bottini and FBI agent Keppler are still subject to an ongoing investigation.]

Cow Parsnip - Heracleum - The blog gives me a chance to combine pictures and some research to show and tell about things I come across.  This post continues to get hits and led to me to the Southeast Alaska Science Fair, where David Mendivil did a science project on Cow Parsnip and used (after asking for permission) some photos from this post.

Why I Live Here - Birding at Elmendorf Air Force Base -   Out with an expert birder friend on an evening so beautiful you couldn't take a bad picture.

Blogging is Like Fishing - After a year of blogging, I had some reflections.  How little I understood things then.  And still today.

I want to do more retrospective posts.  Linking to old favorites is the easy part, but I also want to explore what all this blogging means, how it affects my life, and how I can clean up the clutter that has accumulated as I've tried out widgets to make things accessible.  Some worked better than others and some definitely need to go. 

And thanks for dropping by now and then.  Without you, this would simply be my private journal - which isn't a bad thing.  But without you, I surely wouldn't be so faithful to the blog.

"If the mayor and complete council were wiped out..."

I was in the UAA/APU Consortium Library Archives the other day looking something up and got to reading the Anchorage Charter Commission minutes of March 2, 1959. They had a consultant from Lansing, Michigan - George R. Sidwell - and over several evenings of four hour meetings they discussed everything from collecting taxes to magistrates to the powers of the city council.

On page 13 of the March 2 meeting, they had a discussion on succession in case something happened to the mayor.

Shannon:  Mr. Sidwell, I would like to bring up a new concept that has been brought out by the office of the Defense Mobilization, which now has a civil defense responsibility, and because of the type of warfare we are now looking forward to, they are very anxious to get a liberal or broad succession of government.

Sidwell:  We have it very much in our state.  .  .  This is the only answer I have figured out.  If something happens to the mayor, members of the council, according to seniority would take over.  Now, if mayor and complete council were wiped out, you would have another situation like Galveston.

You can read more of the context below.   Click it to make it clearer.

From Frank Reed Sr. Collection at UAA/APU Consortium Library Archives

The 1950s was the height of the Cold War and the fear of nuclear attack by both the Soviet Union and the United States.  People who could afford it built bomb shelters in their back yards.

But reading this now, after 9/11 and all the security based limits on people's freedom, one can't help but think that in every age, there is a part of the population, that exploits security threats for their own purposes.  I don't even doubt that some of the people believe the threat is as great is they profess.  But the rest of us have to stand up for reasonable assessment of risks and reactions.  Making 95 year old wheel chair bound passengers take off their incontinence pads before they can get through airport security is a reminder of how extreme some security proponents become.

In this case, no one seemed too concerned, but the mention reminds us that this is nothing new.  And I don't recall any city councils getting wiped out by nuclear attack. 






What happened in Galveston?  I'm not sure.  There was a hurricane in 1900 that killed between 6,000 and 12,000, but that was 60 years earlier.  "The deadliest industrial accident in U.S. history" occurred in the nearby port at Texas City in 1947 and killed close to 600 people, but I find no mention in either case of the death of a mayor. 

By the way, the Archives are on the third floor of the Consortium library.  The staff was extremely helpful.  They have lots of rules, such as:

• On site use only
• No pens allowed (only pencils) and for some items, gloves
• Not food or drink
• Photography only with permission 
• Be careful of copyright, literary, and cultural rights 
• [The stuff I was looking at was all public documents, so no problem]
• Be sure to cite the archives when you publish something

Why Don't Woodpeckers Get Brain Damage?

Clipart courtesy FCIT 

I found myself pondering this question this morning.  Is there something we can learn from woodpeckers that might help us prevent human brain damage?  I don't know how this got into my head (my own form of brain damage?).  I checked on BirdNotes to see if they talked about woodpeckers this morning, but, no, it was orioles.

In any case, a quick internet search found that I was definitely not the first person to ask this question.  There are lots of good responses.

Tetrapod Zoology (This post is delightfully detailed.  Did you know woodpeckers  "have an incredibly long, protrusible tongue anchored to hypertrophied hyoid bones that have grown backwards around the skull base and then up and over the skull roof"?  And just because his blog is called Tetrapod his interests wanders well beyond.)

How are woodpeckers able to withstand rapid, repeated percussion without sustaining brain injury? This was looked at by Gibson (2006), and the rather disappointing conclusions were that the small size of the brain and short duration of the impacts helped the brain withstand high deceleration, as did the shape of the brain (it's longest axis is arranged dorsoventrally rather than anteroposteriorly). I say that these conclusions were 'disappointing' as I imagined that woodpeckers had evolved some sort of unique, shock-absorbing, brain-cushioning specialisations. It has in fact been suggested that the muscles at the tongue base might serve this function, but this can't be true as these muscles wrap around the back and top of the skull and don't have any contact with the brain itself.

Chris, at The Naked Scientists gives another good, overlapping explanation in answer to someone's question.  Citing a 1979 study by Philip May, Joaquin Fuster, Jochen Haber and Ada Hirschman, he gives a number of interesting facts:

• the impact deceleration when a woodpecker's beak slams into a surface can exceed one thousand times the force of gravity (1200g). 
• a tame acorn woodpecker, did take the precaution of closing his eyes prior to each strike !
• woodpeckers have relatively small brains which, in contrast to a human, are packed fairly tightly inside their skull cavity. This prevents the excessive movement of the brain inside the skull which causes so-called 'contre-coup' injuries (literally brain bruising) in humans. These occur when the brain bashes into the skull following a knock on the head. In other words the head stops, but the brain keeps on moving.
• because the brain is small it has a high surface area to weight ratio, meaning that the impact force is spread over a much larger area, relatively speaking, compared with a human. Again, this minimises the applied trauma.
• Finally, the woodpecker always ensures that he strikes his target in a dead straight line. This approach avoids placing rotational or sheering stresses on the nerve fibres in the brain. Humans involved in car accidents frequently develop the symptoms of 'diffuse axonal injury' where sudden deceleration coupled with rotation literally twists the different parts of the brain off each other like a lid coming off a jar. By hammering in a dead straight line woody woodpecker avoids giving himself DAI, further minimising the risk of brain damage. Such an approach may have implications for the design of protective head gear - such as crash helmets - which could be modified to prevent rotational injuries.  

Even the Wikipedia entry talks about this, and adds to why they close their eyes:

Many of the foraging, breeding and signaling behaviors of woodpeckers involve drumming and hammering using the bill.[4] To prevent brain damage from the rapid and repeated decelerations, woodpeckers have evolved a number of adaptations to protect the brain. These include small brain size, the orientation of the brain within the skull (which maximises the area of contact between the brain and the skull) and the short duration of contact. The millisecond before contact with wood a thickened nictitating membrane closes, protecting the eye from flying debris.[5] The nostrils are also protected; they are often slit-like and have special feathers to cover them.

Chris at The Naked Scientists warned that humans don't have these adaptations, so don't bang your head against the wall.


A Post Script:  The Tetrapod Zoology writer, Darren Naish, had an wonderfully informative and detailed post, and I just wanted to note his varied interests (which fascinated me, if not you), so I'm adding here his bio:

Darren Naish is a science writer, technical editor and palaeozoologist (affiliated with the University of Portsmouth, UK) who mostly works on Cretaceous dinosaurs and pterosaurs. He also studies such things as the swimming abilities of giraffes and fossil marine reptiles. An avid interest in modern wildlife and conservation has resulted in many adventures in lizard-chasing, bird-watching and litter-collecting. I've been blogging since 2006 and a compilation of early Tet Zoo articles is now available in book form as Tetrapod Zoology Book One. Additional recent books include The Great Dinosaur Discoveries and Dinosaurs Life Size. For more biographical info go here. I can be contacted intermittently at eotyrannus (at) gmail dot com.

Post Post Script:  I tried to get permission from another blogger to use a picture of a woodpecker skull, but didn't know how long I'd have to wait to hear back, so I made this video from a youtube video called The Tree Medic.  [As I wrote this I got back the permission.  Well, I should have looked more carefully because the blogger had given credit to the Florida Educational Technology Clearinghouse. But since the video is already embedded I'll leave it too.  And I thought this would be a ten minute post.  Dream on.]

What Anchorage Sports Facility is Named After a Former City Clerk?

I was in the Alaskana room at the UAA-APU Consortium library and came across some old City of Anchorage Annual Reports which give some perspective on today.

This one was 1959 and had a picture of downtown on the cover.

The City Council was pretty male and everyone, at least for these pictures, wore a coat and tie.  The Loussac Library they mention was downtown. 


Now, here's 1964.  It was published in 1965 so it's the year of the earthquake.

I thought this picture and caption were a bit quaint.

What caught my attention in this picture of Goose Lake ('popular in July') was all the snow on the mountains.  There's barely a white spot up there now - July 5.  Now, it's possible the picture wasn't taken in July, but I seem to recall that 30 years ago, we had a fair amount of snow on the mountains into August. 

[UPDATE July 6:  I took a picture at Goose Lake today for a comparison.  I didn't check at the time and the focus is awful, but it does show the contrast to the snow in the 1964 Year Book.   I'll try for a better shot when there aren't any clouds.]

And here's a little bit about a man most of us know about only because his name is on a building.

Click to enlarge

He did everything from elections to dog licenses - hired high school kids to go door to door for the dog licenses - business licenses, and polling Mt. View residents about liquor licenses in the area.  [UPDATE:  for non-Anchorage folks here's a link to the Ben Boeke facility.

The Consortium library - the basically cool building with the ugly neon green tower on top on the UAA campus - allows people with Municipal library cards to check things out.  I'll do some more on this section.

Bear Tooth - and other businesses - Get Bike Racks We Can Use

We  went to Bear Tooth this evening and saw a very thought provoking movie by Werner Herzog - Cave of Forgotten Dreams - on cave paintings in France.  Too much for me to process quickly - but think: 40,000 year old paintings.

Bear Tooth had new bike racks - at least since we biked there last.  BUT - they're awful. 

WHY?  There's a little place to slip in your tire.  If you have a short lock, you can only lock that one tire to the rack.









But even if you have a longer type lock, you can't get both tires locked, and I couldn't stretch mine to get the front tire and the frame without disconnecting where I've got my lock attached to the bike on the seat.

Here's J, holding the two ends of my lock, but unable to make them meet.  Since we had two locks and two bikes, I just attached my lock to her bike.  And, in hindsight, I could have parked it with the back wheel in the rack.

But there are so many much better racks on the market.  Sturdy racks, with strong metal and placed so it's easy to reach the key parts you want to lock.

I'm sure when the person ordered this rack, he (or she) was thinking how much do each of these cost per bike and picked this one cause it's a lot of bikes for a low cost.

But that's short term thinking.  Every bike is one less parking space. (Well, maybe not, we would have only used one car between us, but you get the idea.)

I know this isn't easy, but here's a site with ideas for employers who want to encourage employees to bike to work.  It has a long list of companies that supply bike racks.

Here's just one company - creative pipe - with lots of products.  

I bet there are even metal workers in Anchorage who could custom design some bike racks so they wouldn't have to be shipped up here. 

Businesses:

1. When you order bike racks, get someone who rides a bike to help out.
2. Look at the employer commuting guide at SFBike (or other online sources) for ideas about bike racks.   
3. Check with some local pipe and/or metal shops to see what they can do for you.  
4. Find a local bike organization and ask them to help out.  In Anchorage we have Bicycle Commuters of Anchorage who I'm sure would help.

This blue rack at Providence Hospital is MUCH better for example.