Aurora Borealis from Tromsø, Norway

Aurora Borealis timelapse HD - Tromsø 2010 from Tor Even Mathisen on Vimeo.

The rate of timelapse if evident when the shots include moving clouds. In fact, where the clouds are thicker, the effect is glowing and magical.

little cat feet

San Francisco's fog is a lively, fluid, beautiful thing that keeps our midsummer beautifully moderate.

Summer in San Francisco from Michael Winokur on Vimeo.

Michael Winokur has put together a video showing our fog illuminated by lights, by sun, from above, from below, and (my favorite thing ever), as it pours like cream over the ridges of the Peninsula and Marin Headlands.

I found this via Sutro Tower (no, really - the Bay Bridge also tweets, I love the internet) on Twitter.

shimmering emerald curtains

I've never seen the Aurora Borealis, just the Aurora Australis - and it looks exactly like this, just from below:


(European Space Agency pic)

I saw it from -32.7ish latitude in South Australia -- quite far north, for an aurora.

It was one of the most magical experiences of my life, and though I'd love to see another aurora, I'll take what I can get.

reduce reuse recycle

Ann Arbor, Michigan
Originally uploaded by NathanAndrewWinters.

These are amazing statistics.

I have bags that I keep in the house, and bags that I keep in the car, and even one hanging from my purse, but somehow, too often I end up at the store with only one bag. When we don't have enough, I use paper bags, because we use those for other things around the house, then I can compost or recycle them.

Night Lights

Night Lights
Originally uploaded by europeanspaceagency.

I'm very curious about the illuminated yellow ring here. Could that possibly be illuminated water vapor in the atmosphere, or is it more likely to be an optical effect from the window or camera, or even an artifact? It doesn't seem to be the latter, but I know little about how the various elements in this sort of photography combine. And it seems too even and too far south to have anything to do with auroras, but I could be wrong there, too.

Thin crescent moon and Mars setting behind Sugarloaf Mountain

Thin crescent moon and Mars setting behind Sugarloaf Mountain
Originally uploaded by Unstrung Photo

Lovely video taken tonight. I don't know which Sugarloaf Mountain this is, but the photographer is from eastern Tennessee.

Do you know what's ridiculous about this map?

California to Hawaii

Driving directions to Honolulu, HI
14 days 22 hours
I-5 N
3,748 mi

California
1. Head west on Terrace Ave toward Tivy Valley Rd 266 ft
2. Terrace Ave turns slightly left and becomes Tivy Valley Rd 0.5 mi
3. Turn right at N Piedra Rd 3.8 mi
4. Turn right at CA-180 W/E Kings Canyon Rd Continue to follow CA-180 W 19.7 mi
5. Take exit 57A to merge onto CA-99 N toward Sacramento 132 mi
6. Continue onto CA-12 E 1.0 mi
7. Continue onto CA-99 N 31.7 mi
8. Take the exit toward San Francisco/I-80 W/I-5 W/CA-99 W 1.2 mi
9. Merge onto CA-99 N/Interstate 305 W 1.3 mi
10. Take the exit onto I-5 N toward Redding
Passing through Oregon
Entering Washington 757 mi
11. Take exit 169 for NE 45th St 0.3 mi
12. Slight left at 7th Ave NE 262 ft
13. Take the 1st left onto NE 45th St 0.7 mi
14. Turn left at Wallingford Ave N 0.9 mi
15. Turn right at N 34th St 292 ft
16. Take the 1st left onto Densmore Ave N 436 ft
17. Turn right at N Northlake Way 285 ft
18. Kayak across the Pacific Ocean
Entering Hawaii
2,756 mi
19. Continue straight 0.1 mi
20. Turn left at Kuilima Dr 0.5 mi
21. Take the 3rd right onto HI-83 W 12.4 mi
22. Continue straight onto HI-99 S/Kamehameha Hwy 6.5 mi
23. Slight left at HI-80 S/Kamehameha Hwy
Continue to follow Kamehameha Hwy2.1 mi
24. Take the ramp onto I-H-2 S 8.1 mi
25. Merge onto I-H-1 E 4.7 mi
26. Take exit 13B toward Halawa Hts. Stadium 0.3 mi
27. Merge onto I-H-201 E 4.1 mi
28. Merge onto I-H-1 E 2.3 mi
29. Take exit 21A for Hawai 61 toward Pali Hwy 0.2 mi
30. Keep right at the fork, follow signs for HI-61 S/Downtown and merge onto HI-61 S/Pali Hwy
Continue to follow Pali Hwy 0.4 mi
31. Continue onto Bishop St 0.2 mi
32. Turn left at S King St 0.3 mi
33. Turn left at Likelike St 446 ft

Honolulu, HI

It's just silly. Why would you waste time and gas driving to Puget Sound only to have to kayak that much farther to Honolulu? Kayaks are available for rental all along Monterey Bay, which is nice and central within California, as well as north and south along the entire coast.

Sheesh.

first rickroll in space

I love video of uncontrolled helium balloon descents.

I had to look this up because I am a nerd.

Bridge abstract
Originally uploaded by raindog.

A friend of mine on Facebook asked whether it's true that, as she heard on today's Giants/Phillies broadcast, it's true that there's enough wire in the Golden Gate Bridge to go around the earth three times.

So I looked:

The Bridge's official site says:
Total length of galvanized steel wire used in both main cables: 80,000 mi = 129,000 km

Matt at geography.about.com says:
The circumference of the earth at the equator is 24,901.55 miles (40,075.16 kilometers).

Thus: Yes.

In other news. I've been slacking way off here, and I don't want to. I might ask friends to write guest posts, and I might just frontload like crazy out of my Delicio.us tags, or I might continue to make excuses. We eagerly await the birth of what is bound to be a very smart and cute baby, which is leaving me in a dreamy haze.

I will try, though, to make this blog more readable and comment-friendly.

-Mary

NASA GOES-13 Full Disk view of Earth September 24, 2010

NASA GOES-13 Full Disk view of Earth September 24, 2010
Originally uploaded by NASA Goddard Photo and Video.

How can I not want to work to protect this? Its shield is so fragile, and the space underneath that shield is getting so messy.

NASA GOES-13 Full Disk view of Earth September 24, 2010

NASA/NOAA GOES 13 satellite image showing earth on September 24, 2010 17:45 UTC.

Credit: NOAA/NASA GOES Project

US Map

US Map
Originally uploaded by Andrew Goldsmith.

so that's what tornado sirens sound like

This is from a couple of hours ago, as a tornado moved across Dallas, and everyone with a camera found a place to video from.

Christchurch earthquake pictures

Christchurch earthquake
Originally uploaded by johnstewartnz.

(way down at the bottom are quake preparedness commentary and a video)




(Look at that vertical displacement!)
(edit: A couple of friends have since reminded me that "displacement" is a specific geologic term with regard to quakes. This offset might not be ground displacement as much as separation due to liquefaction or localized sinking.)






(above photos by digitalsadhu








(above photos by John Stewart




(above photos by Brendan Gloistein


After I looked at these, I reminded my husband that we haven't replaced the attachment hardware for our bookshelves, so we'll do that this weekend.

We also need to re-inventory our quake kit and find out what we need to replace. My favorite list of supplies is sfgate.com.

Folks from Christchurch respond to last night's big quake:



The panicky woman couldn't have known then (and many folks don't know, in general) that the quake wasn't really big enough for a tsunami, especially given as it was centered under land. They're usually from bigger quakes centered under water, with specific seismological conditions. But when the ground has bounced you out of bed in the wee hours of a winter's morning, that's probably not your first thought.

there's a lot going on down there

It's not exactly as good as being on the ISS, but it's still amazing:



Timelapse of Earth from low orbit. The lights below, the aurorae, just lovely. I want to lie in the cupola and stare.

Earl: Now, in AQUAVISION

Oh, how neat is this? The blue shows water vapor, or as the caption states:

Aquavision False color image from GOES-E Satellite taken on September 2, 2010 0000 UTC.

RGB[IR4, IR2, WV] composite. In the image Category 4 Hurricane Earl moves northwest towards a frontal system draped across the North America that had deformed in to a straight wall. The blue water vapor outflow of Hurricane Earl swoops down to the SW, while the overall flow of the frontal system moves water vapor from the tropical system near Baha California up towards Greenland.

Image credits: EUMETSAT / NEODASS / DSRS / NASA / processing by Mike Malaksa

A beer company chimes in on saving the Colorado

And I find this just as a friend from New Mexico tells me of some rather horrible water conservation mayhem in her neck of the woods, so I'm going to get on top of some research -- oooh, content. This blog might have content!



(Note: On a scale of NSFWness, this is a 3 on a 1-10 scale, where 1 is Mister Rogers.)

Hurricane Earl from Space

Hurricane Earl from Space
Originally uploaded by NASA Goddard Photo and Video.

Hurricane Earl takes up a huge chunk of planet. Regardless of whether the eye makes landfall -- and it still seems likely that the track will curve to the north then east, and miss land -- this is going to make one heck of a stormy Labor Day Weekend on the east coast of North America.

Crescent Moon

Crescent Moon
Originally uploaded by lrargerich.

‎"The Church says that the earth is flat, but I know that it is round, for I have seen the shadow on the moon, and I have more faith in a shadow than in the Church." — Ferdinand Magellan

Cotopaxi volcano

What a lovely Milky Way, just rotating right over the top of it!

(Found via Lane Hartwell, a local photographer.)

Earth from the ISS, cloud shadows

"From space I saw Earth,
indescribably beautiful
and with the scars of national boundaries gone."
Muhammad Ahmad Faris, astronaut