RenoVous

 Some local artists put together a Haunted Mini Golf! My friend's fireplace. And the pumpkins we made at my sister's house. Of course, I also have to mention Nevada Day.  ^_^ Open Thread as I'll be off tomorrow!!

 On this day in 1938, Orson Welles terrified the public with his dramatization of The War of the Worlds. It was Sunday evening, prime time in the golden age of radio, and millions of Americans were listening in.  But many missed the introduction. Welles employed sophisticated sound effects as well as top notch actors - it's really no wonder people mistook the tale as an actual report.  As "Martian cylinders" landed in Chicago and St. Louis, real life panic was setting in. Welles was just 23 at the time, and the broadcast helped him land a Hollywood contract. Happy Halloween Eve!

 A friend's dog had puppies about 5 months ago, so we picked one up over the weekend. He's a Golden Retriever and Alaskan Klee Kai mix. He's definitely watching Mighty and learning the ropes. Home Sweet Home

  Lana Del Rey Chrissy Teigen Zoe Saldana Selena Gomez Olivia Rodrigo I can really only give you 5... But I'm curious what you think of this one.

  Ghosts have haunted humanity wherever they have settled across the planet.  Every age and every culture has its own type of ghosts and ghost stories. Emeritus Professor Chris French believes there is an evolutionary element to these beliefs. For most of our evolutionary history, there were real threats from predators and from enemies.  As our brains are hardwired to be on the lookout for potential threats, it has produced certain cognitive biases.  One of these, according to French, is "believing that when something happens in the world around us, it happens because something or someone with intentions towards us made it happen." So unrelated events and random natural phenomena can be confused with the supernatural.  It's the same bias that may have led people in the past to blame failing crops on the wrath of God or witchcraft. Further, there are two important psychological factors that contribute to someone having a ghostly experience.  Context and prio...

 The red kangaroo is the largest marsupial in the world, but they only live in Australia. There are also eastern and western grey kangaroos, the antilopine (northern), and a couple tree kangaroos that are also found in New Guinea. Lumholtz's tree-kangaroo. The tree kangaroos are most threatened by hunting and deforestation, while the other populations are considered stable. There are about 50 smaller macropods closely related to kangaroos, such as wallabies. The word kangaroo comes from the Guugu Yimidhirr language, gangurru.  This may have more specifically referred to the Eastern Grey, but James Cook applied it et al. Many aboriginal people consider the kangaroo to be a totem, and of course different groups had different names for it.  The Eora called them patagorang  and the Arrernte referred to kere aherre. One suggestion for celebrating kangaroos today is to watch an old Australian TV show.

  We're getting a little political today as we're nearing the election.  Sure, women have the right to vote, but if you've been paying attention, our rights are still questioned. On this day in 1850, the first National Women's Rights Convention was held in Worcester, Massachusetts. Planned by members of the Anti-Slavery Society, more than 1,000 delegates showed up from 11 states. Activist Lucy Stone was a lead speaker that day, stating "We want that women should attain to the development of her nature and womanhood."  And we have come a long way.  A woman may become president.  But did you know that women do not have equal constitutional rights? The Equal Rights Amendment, first proposed in 1923, was not officially ratified.  Congress stipulated a deadline, and many states did not do so by 1979.  Nevada only ratified in 2017!  Florida still hasn't, but enough have to meet the requirements.  While scholars may believe that effectively makes it...

 Cher Dave Matthews Band Foreigner Peter Frampton Ozzy "If I hadn't met Randy Rhoads, I don't think I'd be sitting here now." On the R&B side. Mary J. Blige Kool & the Gang A Tribe Called Quest  Musical Influence Award Alexis Korner, John Mayall, Big Mama Thornton Share your favorites!

  Cynthia Erivo Demi Moore Joey King Da'Vine Joy Randolph Anna Sawai Hannah Einbender Kirsten Dunst Greta Lee Selena Gomez Ava Duvernay

 We attended a lecture last night at the Desert Research Institute and learned a bit about local activity. First up was a geoarcheologist whose work is focused on documenting the many Basque arborglyphs in Nevada.  She referred to a Summer Camp in the Black Rock Desert that we've driven past, but did not stop to look at the trees. And then we heard from a geochronologist, focusing on the volcanic activity in the Nevada area.  In her frame of thought, the "recent" explosions in Fallon are not ancient history. I feel like we may have touched on the Soda Lakes before, where maar craters remain after magma came into contact with groundwater. She showed us a graphic of how the plate tectonics have stretched the land that is now Nevada over the years, so the continental crust is somewhat thin.  I wondered if this explained our many hot springs as well. She went on to discuss the Luminescence Lab, and luminescence as a geochronometer. Simply put, the amount of light emitted...

  Cascade Lake. Forest Fungi. Mighty Might. And some super fog last night.

On this day in 1923, Walt and Roy Disney opened their Cartoon Studio in Hollywood, CA. Walt had worked with a film ad company in Kansas City, where he had launched his Laugh-O-Gram Studio.  After it went bankrupt, he moved to Los Angeles where his brother was recovering from tuberculosis. There, Walt was able to sell one of his Laugh-O-Gram short films, Alice's Wonderland. With a contract to make six more, the Disney Bros founded their company and asked their collaborator, Ub Iwerks, as well their Alice, Virginia Davis, to join them in California. Disney also launched a series based on a character named Oswald the Lucky Rabbit. But it was 1928 when the real winner was released, and forged the path for one of the most recognizable cartoon characters in history. Mickey Mouse shorts were so successful for the studio that Walt believed in a feature film.  Starting in 1934, the project went well over budget, but when Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs  was released in 1937, it wa...

  Physics John Hopfield and Geoffrey Hinton: "For foundational discoveries and inventions that enable machine learning with artificial neural networks." They used physics to find patterns in information . Chemistry David Baker: "For computational protein design." Demis Hassabis and John Jumper: "For protein structure prediction." They cracked the code for proteins' amazing structures . Physiology or Medicine Victor Ambrose and Gary Ruvkun: "For the discovery of microRNA and its role in post-transcriptional gene regulation." Tiny RNAs with profound physiological importance . Literature Han Kang: "For her immense poetic prose that confronts historical traumas and exposes the fragility of human life." Biobibliography Peace Nihon Hidankyo: "For its efforts to achieve a world free of nuclear weapons and for demonstrating through witness testimony that nuclear weapons must never be used again." The grassroots movement of atomic ...

  Sabrina Carpenter Amiah Miller Beyoncé Ashley Park Demi Lovato Brooke Shields Zoe Saldana Some maybes: Taraji P. Henson Andra Day Lupita Nyong'o Certainly a choice to wear the scarf piece as more of a front panel....