Isn't it great to get more than you expected?

Just put a pile of money into my '83 Toyota Land Cruiser. This is one ugly truck - dented, rusted - in fact I bought it that way. I figured if I'm taking this up where I might bounce it off a rock or rub up against a tree, I would rather not be the first to dent it! That said, it runs, runs well, and gets me through deep snow and up mountain trails. My courage fails before it reaches it's limits. And it is fun to drive (my wife points out that opinions vary).

But you know politicians and bureaucrats. Vehicles with carburetors are bad, evil, planet destroying monsters. Never mind that I drive it fewer than 3000 miles per year, or that from an ecological standpoint it has a far smaller carbon footprint (factoring manufacturing costs, life of the vehicle, and ultimate disposal costs) than a Prius hybrid. No, old is bad, new is good. Easier to make blanket statements than to allow common sense or freedom to run amok in this country.

So, it is getting tougher to pass any carbureted vehicle through the local emissions test. Hence the rather substantial repair bill.

Now, the plus. The fellow who repairs my FJ-60 runs an independent shop here in Denver. I have never been disappointed in his work. After all the emissions work was taken care of and paid for, I find the extras: he's adjusted the clutch, lubed the door, even replaced my broken aerial. The truck runs better than it has in a long time. I find this even when I take it in for an oil change - the truck runs better than before. I appreciate the work he does, and the fact that he takes care of the small points as well as the big problems.

So, it may be a small chance that someone reading this blog is in the Denver area and owns a Toyota, but if you do, call Greg at The Toy Shop.

Superdogs

We attended the National Western Stock Show last night, and sat in on the Superdogs show. Tremendous fun, especially for our oldest, as she is helping her Grampa run his Golden Retriever through agility training. A highly recommended show, lots of fun for the family.

Volcano!

This image gallery is titled "Death by Volcano", and while not gory, may not be for the tenderhearted. For those kids interested in the natural sciences, and for those fascinated by the destruction that can be unleashed upon man, this is a nice tour of four volcano-caused disasters, and of the world-wide implications of the larger explosions.

My kids have two experiences with volcanoes. First and most direct, our family cabin is in Island Park, Idaho, which sits in a gigantic caldera, approximately 23 miles long and 18 miles wide. This is the Henry's Fork Caldera, which then sits inside an older and larger caldera that extends to Yellowstone. Each time we visit, we drive up the side of the caldera coming east from Ashton. Very impressive.

The second is our recollection of cleaning ash from Mt. Saint Helens' eruption. Yes, over 1000 miles away, we got a significant amount of ash. Pretty cool, when you aren't near the blast zone.

Field Trip

Took my oldest on a field trip today - Denver City and County Courts. We were able to watch about an hour of traffic court. I was surprised, but no major cases running on Friday afternoon. I guess that makes sense.

It was interesting, and peaked her interest in knowing more about the courts, and government in general.

Can Economics be Fun?

A very important subject, one which I think gets short shrift in modern curricula, and one which is increasingly important, is basic economics. Many people roll their glazed eyes at the thought of subjecting themselves (or their kids) to some boring economics lecture or book.

If you are younger than I (and many are) you may not know of Free to Choose, a wonderful book by Nobel Prize winning economist Milton Friedman. Dr. Friedman helps explain in clear language what markets are and how interactions between the players in markets affects all that we do.



Even better than the book is the PBS series that the book spawned. Better in that Dr. Friedman relays in a short video the basic principles of a chapter of his book, not by lecturing, but by traveling the world and demonstrating examples of those principles. Then the action shifts to a university setting, where an audience watches Dr. Friedman debate the merits of his arguments with a variety of opposing views. My wife and I used to watch this as often as possible when it first appeared in 1980.

I was thrilled to learn that The Idea Channel has the DVD set available for purchase, and also has streaming video of each segment on line at no charge! Please, take the time to view one or two if you haven't already seen this tremendous series. It is well worth the time, and is an easy way to impart basic economic principles to your students.

Disaster Averted

The sad crying of my little girl. Momma's voice: "Go show Daddy, maybe he can help." A disaster in the making...

On our recent vacation we forgot our camera. Rather than spend $10 - $15 each on a couple of disposables (plus $15+ per roll for developing and printing) I drove 40 miles to the nearest WalMart to buy an inexpensive digital camera.



I know, this is a link to Amazon, not WalMart, but this is the camera. And what a treat! This was a gift to our youngest, who was a bit jealous that big sister has a camera, Mommy has a camera, Daddy has a camera.... Well, big sister was given a camera for our second trip to China, so she got to take pictures of her new baby sister. This was updated to a Nikon digital camera within a few years. I think it is time baby sister gets her own camera - an inexpensive one, as she is like a bull in a china shop at times.

As I said, a treat. She documented our entire trip (and her inventory of the stuffed animals that came along), and was kind enough to let Momma use it from time to time. She got some great pictures.

But when we got home, we did not download the pictures to our computer hard drive. And at some point, when baby girl was trying to delete one picture, she deleted the entire flash drive. The absolute grief she displayed was something I had never seen from her before. Time for Daddy to put on his Superman cape and fly into action!

Actually, I did a relatively quick search and found a freeware solution to our problem. Free for individual users, easy to use, this software allowed us to recover all the deleted files. What a blessing! And we have one happy girl now.

The Sun - a great series of images

For astronomy buffs, this series of images are remarkable. It shows your students the sun using a variety of imaging technologies. Well worth a look.