Volcanoes

You probably didn’t notice, since nobody but me has bothered to point it out, but August 27 was the 103rd anniversary of the eruption of Krakatoa, an active (obviously) island volcano located in the Sunda Strait, south of Sumatra and west of Java. In 1883 it blew apart in the most violent explosion on Earth …

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Computer viruses

There’s a virus going around. In fact there’s more than one. But don’t worry; these viruses don’t infect people–they infect computers. Just a couple of weeks ago there was a flurry of excitement surrounding one such virus, a flurry that may be repeated in a few more days. This virus, called Hare, activates itself on …

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Sleep revisited

  “To sleep, perchance to dream…” So, did you sleep in over the long weekend? Chances are, you did. And maybe, if you’re like me, you felt guilty about it. After all, the summer’s almost over. We should all be outside enjoying the beautiful weather, or painting the house, or exercising, or spending time with …

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Car sound

One of my earliest childhood memories is of sitting in the front seat of my father’s Studebaker, listening to the Beatles. Since those early days in Lubbock, Texas, I’ve listened to a great deal more music in many more cars. In the Studebaker, and in the ’63 Plymouth that followed it, if you wanted to …

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Nausea

There’s a lot of traveling going on this time of a year via car, plane, train or boat, and somewhere this very second, a 10-year-old is looking up from the book she’s been reading in the back seat of her parents’ station wagon and speaking the words that, for many people, define the whole summer …

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Mountains

I may be a prairie boy now, but I didn’t start out that way. I was born in Silver City, New Mexico, and as a small child, whenever we went back to New Mexico, I always said we were going to “my mountains.” This time of year, lots of people go to the mountains, even …

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Mountains

I may be a prairie boy now, but I didn’t start out that way. I was born in Silver City, New Mexico, and as a small child, whenever we went back to New Mexico, I always said we were going to “my mountains.” This time of year, lots of people go to the mountains, even …

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Olympic technology 1996

At a speed-skating meet in Norway in the 1960s, Canadian Paul Enoch smashed a world record by three seconds. He did it wearing a pair of his wife’s skintight nylon stockings–in an age when most skaters still wore flapping woolen garments. A year later, the first skin-tight nylon racing suit was released on the market. …

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Spas

  Since ancient times, humans have been in hot water–literally. Soaking in hot, mineral-laden water has long been used to ease aches and pains and even touted as a cure for far more serious conditions. The Romans and Greeks built many spas in places where hot springs bubbled to the surface, and in Europe, many …

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Winemaking

The process of making wine begins, of course, with growing grapes and extracting their juice.  But then what happens? I’m here to elucidate (which is not a word you want to try saying after you’ve drunk a little too much wine, by the way). Once the juice is in the vat, it’s left to ferment. …

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Synchrotrons

  Saskatchewan could soon be home to Canada’s first synchrotron, and if your first reaction is, “So what?” then, dear reader, you must read on. Physicists are a lot like small boys: they like to see what makes things tick by smashing them up. In the case of small boys, those things may be clocks …

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Weeds

When I was a kid, I thought dandelions were cool, from their delightful yellow flowers that broke up the monotony of green lawns to their puffballs of parachute-wearing seeds which were so much fun to blow into the neighbor’s grass. Now that I’m grown up, however…well, actually, I still think dandelions are cool, but those …

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