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Let’s check…

Not that doomsday crackpots haven’t tried to stir up fear of black holes swallowing the Earth, and whatnot.

…literally. Or I was until Sunday night.

Surinam Toads—spectacularly fugly critters native to northeastern South America—have a rather odd means of reproduction. After mating, the male presses the eggs onto the female’s back. The eggs stick to her skin, which begins to grow over them. A few months later they emerge as toadlets, having already hatched and passed through the tadpole stage. Check it out, it’s equal parts gross and cool.

Well, damn.

I guess part of me thought he’d live forever, or at least long enough to see all the marvels he imagined or predicted. Hell, he saw geostationary satellites and global telecommunications become reality, why not space elevators or Martian colonies or deep-space travel as well?

I’m still partway through The Descent of Man (specifically, the 1882 edition, available online.) It’s slow reading because I want to be sure to absorb the science… and the occasional bon mots.

… and it wasn’t what I expected. Then again, I didn’t really know what to expect, since I’d never seen a lunar eclipse and wasn’t too clear on the actual mechanics. So the dark red moon, covered by a fuzzy circular shadow, took me a bit by surprise.

Check ‘em out.

To celebrate Darwin Day, I’ve decided to start reading The Descent of Man. I’ve already got The Origin of Species and The Voyage of the Beagle under my belt, and I’ve been meaning to read Descent for a long time.

Which reminds me. At that creation/evolution debate I went to a while ago a creationist audience member brought up Darwin’s alleged racism, quoting from Descent of Man:

Crows have got nothing on these guys…

They’re definitely on their own now. Since late last week, none of the juveniles have touched down on the roof for more than a few minutes, and haven’t even been fed by their parents. At least as far as I could see. Even the runt I worried about so much is flying like a pro, its flight strong, its gliding smooth as silk. It’s such a joy to watch them go after seeing them grow up. Funny to think just a couple of months ago they were still downy little chicks with useless wings and ravenous stomachs.

Holy cow, it’s flying!

And not just little Kitty Hawk laps around the roof, but soaring beautifully, higher even than my floor. It’s still got a lot to learn–it’s flapping too much, using up too much energy, and when it does try to glide its wings are all twitchy and hesitant; also, the landings need work–but damn that’s impressive. Just a week ago it was confined to the rooftop, and now… the sky’s the limit.

I was off for the first week of July. When I came back on the 9^th, I found the nest on the cathedral tower had ben abandoned. My theory—shared by my neighbour, who’d also been keeping an eye on the birdies—was that the metal surface on which the nest was built just got too hot, and the chicks cooked. (Yeah, it’s not always survival of the fittest. Sometimes it comes down to dumb luck.)

They’re here! They’re here! The eggs on the bell tower have hatched sometime last night, and the nest is now home to three adorable seagull chicks.

Bell tower? Yep: in the last couple of weeks I noticed another seagull nest, built on the southwest corner of the Cathedral’s taller bell tower. But since it’s almost exactly at eye level with my work, I couldn’t see the eggs.

Well, that answers that question.

A couple of weeks ago I wondered where the two gulls would settle down. Turns out they settled down right on the roof where they consummated their union. At least I assume it’s the same couple—not to sound speciesist or anything, but seagulls all kind of look alike to me.

Heh. Well, it’s that time of year. They were on a roof, across the street and a few storeys below my window. The male was sitting on top of the female for a couple of minutes after a co-worker pointed them out. Just… sitting there. Not moving, no bamp-chicka-bamp music. Then he flapped his wings a bit, and the female scooted out from under him. They hung around the roof for a couple of hours. Frankly I was a bit disappointed, but I assume they enjoyed it, and that’s what counts, right?

I just remembered it’s National Poetry Month. Last year I posted an old poem of mine, but this year I thought I’d showcase the works of real poets. Now, I read very little poetry, but there are few poems that have made a strong impression on me.

The first is The Old Astronomer To His Pupil, written by 19^th century poet Sarah Williams.

It’s March 14^th, and that means Pi Day. All the cool geeks are celebrating it. Although in Canada, March 14 is really 14/03 but since we don’t have an April 31^st, this’ll have to do.

Coolest-looking crab ever.

It lives near deep-sea hydrothermal vents in the Pacific. It’s different enough from known decapods (in both physiology and genetics) to rate its own genus and possibly its own family. And it’s fuzzy.

This is pretty neat.

Of course, there’s a lot of speculation as to what this stone snake was actually for. Was it indeed the site of religious rituals? What kind of religion did humans have 70,000 years ago? What did they believe, and how did they express it? How much of a language did they have, to tell each other stories?

I just finished reading Jules Verne’s 1886 novel Robur-le-Conquérant. Quite an enjoyable little book, though not really Verne’s best. I did appreciate all his exploration of the science behind the Albatross, Robur’s wondrous flying craft—Verne’s work is meant to educate as well as entertain, and I’m a sucker for a good science history lesson.

Last week I had friends visit from Ottawa (not just to see me, tho: they’ve gone on an Alaskan cruise) and we spent a few days in Tofino. I picked them up at the airport Monday evening, and we headed down to Tsawwassen to take the Victoria ferry. We spent most of Tuesday traveling across the island; we could have done it in a few hours, but why rush? There was so much to see on the way.

I’d put the Journey of Man DVD on my Xmas list, but it seems Santa didn’t think I was good enough last year. So I ordered it for myself and finally got around to watching it this cold, rainy Easter weekend.

In brief, this documentary describes an attempt to reconstruct the human family tree and trace the migrations of human populations as they left Africa fifty thousand years ago, using cutting-edge genetics—specifically, analyzing markers on the Y chromosome, taken from many thousands of men all over the planet, hence the title.

I’ve been reading up on the Deep Impact mission to study the comet Tempel 1. You know, this is the sort of thing that gives me hope for the future, since it shows that humankind can be good at something besides killing each other or watching The Real American Bachelor Nanny or whatever the hell is on these days.

I’ve got a new pet.

About a week ago, I noticed a big Orb Weaver spider had settled outside my living room window. It’s a beauty, a bit over 1cm long not counting the legs, with pretty patterns of brown and orange on its abdomen… and the impressive web itself, a couple of feet across, spun in the traditional spiral pattern that gives these beasties their name.

Every evening before dusk, I can see hundreds of crows flying past my workplace on their way to roost in Burnaby. They stream past, cawing to each other, either alone, in small groups, or in larger murders. (That’s the correct term, incidentally. A murder of crows, an unkindness of ravens, a parliament of rooks, a tiding of magpies—that last one probably referring to magpie counting rhymes. Damn, but Corvids have cool collective nouns.)