http://larae.net/sweetyummyreality Bonbons of science and skepticism Tue, 26 Aug 2008 03:10:19 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Fragment of the Nakhla meteorite that fell to Earth in 1911. American Museum of Natural History, August 2006 This meteorite is one of the SNCs, or "snicks", a class of meteorite that has one very interesting thing in common - they are all from Mars. This wasn't the first time I ... http://larae.net/sweetyummyreality/2008/08/26/picture-of-the-week-7/ Space Shuttle Enterprise at National Air and Space Museum Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center. September 2006. One of the coolest parts of visiting the new Air and Space center was a chance to see the Space Shuttle Enterprise. And of course, one of the coolest things about the Enterprise is that ... http://larae.net/sweetyummyreality/2008/08/18/picture-of-the-week-6/ Section of the K-T boundary. American Museum of Natural History, August 2006 The arrow points to the iridium layer that lies between the Cretaceous (below) and Tertiary (above) layers this cross section. This is, of course, the famous layer that led the Alvarezes to hypothesize that large extraterrestrial impact occurred at ... http://larae.net/sweetyummyreality/2008/08/12/picture-of-the-week-5/ Happy 80th trip around the sun to James "The Amazing" Randi! I can't remember the first time he came to my attention, but I know the first time I read some of his works on skepticism was in the Pseudoscience and the Paranormal class that I took in college in ... http://larae.net/sweetyummyreality/2008/08/07/happy-amazing-birthday-to-james-randi/ Venus and the crescent moon, May 2007 Not a lot of extra info on this one. I took this photo with my telescopic lens zoomed in and no tripod, so I'm kind of amazed that it actually came out. http://larae.net/sweetyummyreality/2008/08/04/picture-of-the-week-4/ Central peak of the Sierra Madera impact crater in Pecos county, Texas. December 2003. In the fall of 2003 I took a class on the geology of Texas with my Staff Education Benefit, which was very fun and informative. As part of the course, we had to do a research paper ... http://larae.net/sweetyummyreality/2008/07/28/picture-of-the-week-3/ I meant to write about this shortly after the talk so I wouldn't forget stuff, but of course here I am over two months later trying to remember all the mind-bending (and space-time bending) things he discussed. Kip gave a lecture at UT back when I was a student (c. 1993?), ... http://larae.net/sweetyummyreality/2008/07/22/kip/ In honor of yesterday's anniversary of the first Apollo moon landing, here is a photo from the National Air and Space Museum Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center of the Apollo Boilerplate Command Module. I visited the center in September 2006, which was my first visit to the new facility, which ... http://larae.net/sweetyummyreality/2008/07/21/picture-of-the-week-2/ Yes, I know I won't be the first or last person to say that in regard to the new tropical storm that formed just east of the Yucatan peninsula. The storm is expected to move into the Gulf of Mexico in the next couple of days. Right now the track ... http://larae.net/sweetyummyreality/2008/07/20/hello-dolly/ Well, I wasn't expecting to get started on pointing to and laughing at religious nuts so quickly in this blog's life, but sometimes these things just fall into your lap. First there was Ray Comfort and the bananas (I'm linking to a rebuttal video) and now there is this guy ... http://larae.net/sweetyummyreality/2008/07/18/wont-somebody-please-think-of-the-produce/