Magical thinking

I feel great about my hands and other unexpected joys of aging

Each book has a secret

The mystery of metamorphosis

Amazon review

Sand hoppers use their visual cues in calculating the tide occurence.

Did dolphins learn sponging from Sponge crab ?

Mollusc and human eyes

Radial symmetry evolution

Larva and starfish - Luidia arsi

Cephalopods have three hearts and blue blood

Francis Balfour

Octopus mom cares for her young and dies. Penguin parents have to travel far to fed themselves.

Reflections on a summer sea

The great peacock moth
The Life of the caterpillar

Great hall of Beijing 2005 -pg 25

A tea pot in a saucer
A cup next to it
for every political adviser
in each of the red velvet chairs
in rows of wooden tables.

A woman in red
stocks them one by one
In the empty hall
of name tags.

The penguin and the leviathan
review

Idea hunter

What is more likely to hold us back as individuals - a lack of things or a lack of ideas? - Andy Boynton.

Authors blog

When older people dont eat well

Yoga for women.

Our fathers, ourselves

How much should a local phone call cost?

There are many cases where people have been charged exorbitantly for local calls.
ILD Telecommunications has a D+ rating.

TMobile connects and charges calls to Mexico and Canada, even though you disable international calls.
TMobile does not disable international calls for the phones added o family plan. When the billing is taken care of by the primary account holder, shouldnt the settings be default from that account.

Nightmare

I became a mother
when I feared for
your life
a genetic imperfection
between us

The woman who swallowed her cat
Now why am I reading 'gruesome' tales while even birthing videos make me cry.

Is marriage for white people?

Vet tales

All my patients kick and bite

The author begins the book with a mishap. In the first chapter, he begins with a caveat- 'no friends pets' that might be translated to any vocation dealing with the health of a person.

Lamas need toenail care
Horses cant throw up
Impaction
Prolapsed uterus in cow
Prolapsed uterus
Hysterectomy

I was curious about how a caesarian is performed few weeks ago. I didnt know that the uterus could be sewn too. I didnt know that hysterectomy has risks of prolapse.
A pregnant mother reflex. To hold belly while sneezing.

Always on
Trism
iShoot
Pocket god

The dolphin in the mirror
On saving Humphrey
Beaching
oikomi
sonars effect on dolphins
Diana Reiss
The author points that we would never slaughter chimps then why dolphins?
Dolphin giving a timeout. Imagine the beautiful rings that it can make in water and starting over again to make perfect ones like erasing a slate.
On Diane rehm show
dolphins sponging - tool use
cooperative feeding
The Cove
If there is magic

I wonder how 'Dolphin Diaries' book is.

Happy Chaos
Punky brewster

review
Author's interview
Another interview

The author says that nobody told her about the granny panties after delivery. A child birth preparation class is to prepare you for such things. At first I thought it was a joke when the instructor showed the pads. If not for the author, I wouldnt know that you need ice pack after delivery. If the author had read Anne Lamott's Operating Instructions book, she would know of the possibility of a poop during the labour.

It gets better

It gets better

This I believe

This I believe on fatherhood

My 'This I believe' essay Inspirations to Write

Quick look at climate

Climate solutions
Looking at pg.39, states lacking climate action plans (Sep 2007) are just the states which had higher temperatures than normal in July 2006 (pg. 19 Earth the biography)

Aug 23, 2009

Top of the stack

Best American magazine writing 2007
He Knew he was Right - Ian parker. I began reading thinking its the same as the movie, not that I am dissapointed that it isnt. Very enjoyable read. A good example for profile writing. I hope to get to read more such.

Murdering the Impossible - Caroline Alexander. Having seen a documentary on Messner, I really appreciated this essay.

May 24,2010

Real time

Looking at an ad in which many young men and women sing and dance in coordination at a shopping mall. It has to be the nth time after rehearsal.
Theatrical plays.

French word a day

The Neighborhood project
NYT review

Tomatoes

I heard of Tomatoland on npr.
As kids my sister and I helped my grandparents pick tomatoes on their farm. At the end of the day, when it was time to pack them off to the market, we looked for odd shaped ones to keep and eat.
NYT review
review

Its dark knowing the horror stories of pickers who work on the tomatoland.

I picked up Milk, to see if I can find an explanation behind antibiotics role in damaging the bacteria adults need to digest milk. I heard from my colleague that he became lactose intolerant after a dose of antibiotics.
This is not a first book on the history of milk. Milk: the surprising story of milk through ages.

Crash's law

Try this - traveling the globe without leaning the table. While flipping through the pages, I found the words 'Rachel Ray' and picked it.
Long time ago, I was trying to recall Paneer Lababdar, after having had it on a flight.
Authors site
The author while talking about British cuisine says that beer is the third most popluar beverae. I was curious to know what were the top two - water, tea, coffee. I chanced upon A History of the world in six glasses.
Soup dumplings, where the aspic inside melts into soup.
Mapo tofu
Lechon Asado
Arroz moro
Tostones
fufu - caribbean. The author says that cuban cuisine uses plantains like Americans use potatoes. But there are potato dishes like Papas rellenos in Cuban cuisine. A menu revealed Tostones rellenos. Are there any other kind of rellenos? Please stand up.
Pollo Manigua
I saw a video by Sanjay Thumma on how to make Rasmalai. The kneading and heating part of it sounds similar to the process explained by the author about making Mozzarella.
The author explains the emergence of american sushi like California roll and Philadelphia roll.
Robatayaki
perfection - sushi can be made to have the rice grains all in one direction
wagashi
The author explains that the reason for having around 150 banchan- side dishes in Korean food is to balance the hot,cols, spicy, sour,sweet according to yin-yang philosophy.

Illuminations, a translation of Rimbaud's poetry by John Ashberry

I was taken by Finding Everett Ruess, right when I saw it on Amazon's Vine newsletter.

Authors interview
Chris Mccandles and Into the wild

I am reading Night of the Republic. A review said its accessible poems but I find them untenable, even though they are of common places and everyday situations like scenes from a department store. The poet does have his style of bringing out a pattern in the endless routine arrangement of commodities, cans or shoes stacked high into the ceiling.I am looking for lines with influence like Say I starved from Ruess's 'Wilderness song'.

Journals and Diaries

I picked up Alfred kazin's journals without knowing who Alfred kazin. There's something about diaries and journals that we want to read them to know life and times of yours or others.
NYT article
Slate article
Washington times article

I was dissuaded to not read Tina's Mouth - An existential comic diary after the 'high school' got drilled into my head.

Food and preachers

After reading The Boy in the Moon, I wanted to know if Megans secrets will show the parent of a disabled child with different learning. I realise that I picked this book from Christian section. I am a bit apprehensive if it gets too preachy. I have a similar feeling about Love, God and the art of French cooking. Its coincidental that the
Authors blog has a title picture of chips and guacamole.

The Digital mom handbook

How to bring out the artist in the photographer?

My friend while reading through the pages of Photographing Childhood - The Image and the Memory found an answer to her photographer friends question of how to get natural photos of children who begin to pose as soon as they are in front of the camera. This from the explaining subtexts accompanying the photos. Even a casual reader can learn by comparing the pictures to how they would have taken them.
Since the subject is child and 'childhood' is the most favorite phase of life for many, nostalgia cannot escape from the scrutiny of the author. The author explains her projects of photography, the inspiration, conception and execution of them. She then moves on to the timeline, history and work of photographers from the past who have captured childhood. The conversation is continued with introduction to work of contemporary photographers and the voices in their work.
There is some technical knowledge about the different terms involved in the equipment. The book has a pull-out which puts information in a matrix form as to what to expect from your child in terms of taking their photos as they add those years. The importance of light in the book will make you start imagining how different a picture might be from different sites.
I cant help thinking how robotic I have been in taking pictures all while.

Making Illusions

Who is not wowed by cinema, animation, special effects? And like at a magic show where a magician reveals all his tricks, the readers of 'Filming the Fantastic' - A Guide to Visual Effects Cinematography by Mark Sawicki will find themselves being welcomed into the 'hall of effects' with all the know-how not to just understand how its accomplished but to bring them about by yourself at an affordable price.
The book balances history of techniques, camera equipment,motion creation process, technical information of concepts involved and the most up to date technology used in the industry today. The techniques - zone method, depth of lens charts used by professionals in gauging if their pictures meet the exposure, focus requirement covered show how science has to work with art for a believable effect.
If you are a newbie to the effects, you will enjoy the book a lot. I heard of 'green screen' talk after 300 movie. The picture sequences in the book illustrate the concepts in action. The author starts with simple effects and then explains the combination of those. As you learn about how to use matte effects, dynamation, you really do enter the world of the fantastic not as an enthralled viewer but as a person exploding with ideas on 'image making'.

Smoking ears and Screaming teeth

a review

Mandrake
Another review

chocolate lovers have sweeter babies?
Jena Pincott
Microchimerism

The author of Early Spring has written another book Finding higher ground

Medicines Sans Frontieres

Hope in Hell
MSF in Haiti

When Kouchner, a gastroentologist claims that he was born 'too late to stop for the Holocaust', I wonder how we would have all reacted if it happened during our times.
Albert Schweitzer's story made another doctor to choose medicine. We too learnt of him as kids. He feels that working for MSF requires him to practise his profession like McGyver.

Looking at the picture of tents next to each other, each with a tight rope tied to stakes in a line, the stakes seem like people and the tents - megaliths.
Plumpynut
Bracelet of life

After earthquakes or to solve AIDS, when people look to MSF, we just need more such organizations with different skills.
A strong message in the book - Doctors cannot cure genocide.
Logisticians role.
MSf staff have faced abduction.

Beauty is truth?

The truth is in the flaw.

A card reader to exit the building is on the left.
On the left door is a sign
Use
Other door
Had the reader rightly been on the right side
it wouldnt need a correction sign.
May be the right door is too close to the corner.

In flaws, is certainty.

Beneath the sands of Egypt
mummyless coffins
The pictures in the book evoke the mysteries hidden.
After the description of rediscovery of KV60, the author writes down the path to his becoming an explorer.He then explains how the different courses equipped him with skills for archaelogy - identification bones - human and animal. In 'First Impressions' he observes that 'the pyramids are no longer the smooth-sided models of geometrical virtue that they once were'. He compares his impressions of the place with that of other people.
aish baladi
yardang
Koshari like Kichdi
Lighthouse of Alexandria
ancient library of Alexandria
Gebel Musa monastery
Elephantine island
Soknopaiou Nesos
Birket Qarun Lake
In the nineteenth century, tourists could buy mummies and coffins.
A new theory about how the pyramids were built. Did you see the ropes being used? The author talks of the importance of cordage study in understanding how ropes were used to haul the stones into the pyramids. He dispels the curse related with the tombs.
Hogarth
Asyut
An article

Books I like to read some day

subject to writing style appeal
Book lust

The Long Walk
Full tilt
French Revolutions: Cycling the tour de France
Miles from Nowhere: A Round thw world bicycle adventure
Where the pavement ends
Two wheels north
Ultimate High
Two wheels in the dust
Catfish and Mandala

When I came across the title Solomon's Daughter, I was interested in knowing the mythical story. I wonder if we need time to play out life or if we can guess what is inevitable. Like evil balances good, does fate balance the certain,wished way of life?

Skywater

Few days ago, I picked a book Metamaus from the library. I am reading of it again in this book.

A different Zen book

Zen in the art of writing by Ray Bradbury
His writing does come across as something that results from the way he wakes up with a thought explosion in his head each morning.
Reading about how he wrote many of his stories shows how he learnt his skill and how he enjoyed doing that. His way of writing doesnt associate with isolation or tiredness or block. In this sense its a different Zen.
He writes down all the situations that he found inspiring and leaves the reader there to start off writing.
11.17.2006

Excellent choice of words

The Life of skies by Jonathan Rosen
Right from the word go i.e the title, every word adds meaning to the experience had by Jonathan Rosen as a bird watcher. This is the first prologue that I didnt look for to end, as it already seemed like the book.

The book is divided into two parts :
PartI - Backyard Birds
PartII- Birds of Paradise.

Through the experiences of Audubon with his pet parrot and the killer monkey, Whitman's with mocking birds and the resultant poetry, Roosevelt's contribution to preservation of wildlife and his own from a decade of birdwatching, the author tries to get to the core of what this act means to him.

Looking at the evolution of his answers, looks like he will find many more spokes out of it other than the ones hes already meditated on. One tough nut is the instinct of hunting Vs conservation of birds. Theres a bit of history of land as it relates to migration, borders from his experience birdwatching in Palestine.

He blends fictional stories like 'The Bear' by Faulkner with non fictional acounts of bird sightings to bring across his point to the reader. Solomon stories, conference of birds, DH Lawrence, Thomas Hardy - everyone's welcome to the bounty.

The first essay 'the Ghost Bird' is about the history of Ivory Bill's extinction or man's desperate attempt at falsifying it by spotting one. This concern carries into other chapters and winds up the book too.

Illustrations make the book even more interesting.
p232. Stork with spear is very touching

Initially the book leaned more towards extinct birds
like passenger pigeons(it took me a while to imagine their number when present and believe that they are none now), carolina parakeets, eventually it did rake up my interest in putting the bird guide book to use.

If you decide to go birdwatching and its the first time, its better to go on a guided bird walk.

Whats bioblitz? Be open to know lots of such new things...

5/5. 5.9.2009

Good Old oly

The Living Shore by Jacob Rowensen
Olympia Oysters. They were once abundant like many other that went off the face of the earth. In this book, you will know how the see-saw tipped.
The first chapter of Brian Kingzett's survey of British Columbia coastline at the rate of 12 beaches per four-hours of low tide is an adventure even in concept.
There are interesting facts to know about food chains of (human)-otters-sea urchins-kelp from the journeys of Brian Kingzett and the author. If you see one too many of a kind, you can tell who is not on duty. The Chesapeake scene is reviewed in terms of the failure of oyster population restoration. Just like people volunteering for rearing dogs for blind, there are people who raise oyster gardens.
In the subsequent chapters, the author moves on to raincoast dwellers and their fish traps and clam gardens. Then you are taken to Clovis times. Thats 13 thousands of years ago. Its hard to imagine that ancient humans have crossed miles of ocean, but really then the ocean was hundred of feet less deep.
Next a chapter on all the good in oysters needed for human brain development. Role of iodine in IQ.
Moken sea nomads
Geomorphology

5/5. 12.17.2009

Like a candy to a kid

Periodic tales - a cultural history of the elements from Arsenic to zinc.
'Culture' is the word for me.

This book starts with gold. The most known precious metal. In the prologue, his experiment to collect the elements so that he can relate to them better, is a good project to try it for kids.
The author has shown references to metals in the works of Shakespeare and other writers and explored if they had chemist background. Who thought that Mark Twain was a prospecter once.

I liked the story of Candide, (I first heard of Voltaire in a lesson called 'Voltaire and Frederick'. That is where I learnt the idiom 'a bag of bones'.)

An article on understanding idioms

A Lab in the ocean

Sex, Drugs and sea slime
Interview with the author
I have read that coral reef is alive but never understood how until I read the above npr article.

For a well informed citizen

The ultimate mystery of inheritance
Epigenetics
Dutch famine
Agouti gene
Sewall Wright
X inactivation
Driesch - sea urchin - for heir big sixe, and less yolk - more transparency to study fertilization and cell divisions.
DFTD cancer - gruesome.
fruit flies for genetics
The Deer Hunter
pitcher plant mosquitoes
Jose Canseco

The way of the Panda

Armand David, as a naturalist has found many plants and classified them. The author describes the hard times David faced in China, when foreigners were few there. His expeditions included the quest of Panda. With information like the number of chromosomes in a bear Vs Panda to show that they are different, author grasps the reader.

The Authentic Animal

When a calf dies, the farmer or the milkman makes a replica of it, so that the cow still produces milk.

Reading of Carl Akeley reminds me of Audubon. His humble beginnings as a taxidermist are recreated by the author as a raconteur. Freeze drying is a technique modernly used for taxidermy.