Greener on the Other Side

ArcGIS online

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We begin studying Latin America next week, and our first lesson has students analyzing the relationship between population density and terrain/landforms. I thought I'd try out ArcGIS online. I attended a training session about it at NCGE in Savannah this past September. Turns out it will work well, and I can even embed the map in my website. How cool is that!

Fear and Sanity in DC

Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear
Jon and Stephen - "I'm More American Than You"
www.comedycentral.com
Rally to Restore Sainty and/or Fear The Daily Show The Colbert Report

I have never been around so many people in my life. CBS estimates the crowd at 215,000. Sounds about right to me.
We saw LOTS of signs, but didn't carry any ourselves - we took a cat on the plane, instead. Really. Kelli carried a Siamese kitten from Austin to DC for the Austin Siamese Rescue folks, and we turned it over to her new owner in DC. Fortunately she was very well behaved.
Then Euni's carry-on bag got taken by mistake (but we found it). Karma works.
Saturday was such a beautiful day - perfect weather, great company. My favorite part of the rally (except for Cat Stevens/Yousef Islam and Jon's closing remarks) was the song in the clip above. We all sang along with the chorus, and other than 4Troops singing the National Anthem, and the O Jays, and everything else, it was my favorite part.
The only downer (except for the part where it took 45 minutes to go 1 block as we were leaving the Mall) was the plane ride home. 1 hour into the flight they decided we should turn around and go back to Dulles. I had been feeling a weird vibrating through the floor, and they announced that it wasn't supposed to be there, and we were heading back. So they got us a new plane and pilots from Rochester, and made it to Austin at 3 pm instead of 11 am. But we made it.
And it was fun.
Signs and pictures:

Been There, Seen That

via New York Times:

It has huge reserves of coal and natural gas, a fast-growing economy and a property market so sizzling hot that virtually every house put up for sale here is immediately snapped up.

There is just one thing largely missing in the city’s extravagant new central district: people.

Ordos proper has 1.5 million residents. But the tomorrowland version of Ordos — built from scratch on a huge plot of empty land 15 miles south of the old city — is all but deserted.

I was there in June - the new city was eerily quiet, but our guide was bubbling with praise for the buildings.
Lots of cranes and new buildings, but no traffic and few people.

Glad I'm Not in China Today!

NASA Image of the Day

In early October 2010, a high-pressure weather system settled in over eastern China, and air pollution began to accumulate locally for nearly a week. By October 9 and 10, China’s National Environmental Monitoring Center declared air quality “poor” to “hazardous” around Beijing and 11 eastern provinces. Citizens were advised to take measures to protect themselves, and visibility was reduced to 100 meters (330 feet) in some areas.

It sounds like it was even worse than when I was there, which I can't imagine. It was incredibly bad in June - all along the eastern part of China the smog was so thick all of my photos look like they were taken in the rain. This is supposed to be even worse.

Hummingbirds

I LOVE hummingbirds. I went out front to feed the fish a few minutes ago and a female black-chinned came up and hovered a foot in front of me. She turned away and fed on the Turk's Cap in the front flower bed, then came to look at me again before flying off.
Of course I didn't have my camera, but the pic above was from last weekend, when another female was guarding "her" backyard against invading migrants. I ran in to get the camera when I saw what I think was a Ruby-throated male, but she had run him off by the time I got back outside.

Squatty Potties

As part of my Fulbright-Hays scholarship, we had to create a "personal narrative" of our trip. Here's mine.

Back in Class

It's the start of the second week of school, and I am still alive and kicking! In fact, although I am worn out, I am pleased with my classes so far. I have 5 Pre-AP geography classes, and 1 regular World Geography class. The 5 PAP ones couldn't be more different. One is full of Gifted/Talented kids who ask a zillion questions, always want to talk about and discuss what's happening around the world, and are ready to learn something new every day. At the other end of the spectrum is a class where getting them to participate in discussions is like pulling teeth. The regular class has a few kids who would be fine in PAP class, so we are able to generate some enthusiasm for the subject in there.
My favorite part of this year so far is the "no zero" policy - if the kid doesn't do their daily work/homework, they are choosing to come after school to Academic Triage to do it. I had 8 students in one PAP class who didn't do the assigned outside reading, so they better show up tomorrow after school or their parents will be getting a call. Hopefully this will put an end to students who fail because they don't do the work (99% of my failing students last year).
If the rest of the year is as good as the first week, I'll be a happy camper.

Iraq, America and hired guns

Iraq, America and hired guns | Analysis & Opinion |

One of the consequences of shrinking our armed forces has been the rise of contractors. Americans don't seem to mind, since we no longer have to fear the draft board, but are citizens really aware of the numbers and costs associated with the rise of "private security"?

Their number is vast — 95,000 in Iraq and 112,000 in Afghanistan according to the latest Pentagon count. This means that there are more civilian contractors than American troops both in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Ground Zero Mosque an Issue

Republicans Seek to Make Ground Zero Mosque an Issue in November Elections - Bloomberg

“As a citizen, and as president, I believe that Muslims have the same right to practice their religion as everyone else in this country,” Obama said at the dinner. “That includes the right to build a place of worship and a community center on private property in lower Manhattan in accordance with local laws and ordinances.”

I agree, it's an important right for ALL Americans. But apparently some under-educated people don't think so:

Nationally, 68 percent of Americans said they opposed building the mosque two blocks from the target of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, in an Aug. 6-10 poll conducted for CNN.

Maybe they are not aware of this:

Representative Jerrold Nadler, a New York Democrat, said the federal government shouldn’t put any pressure on local officials regarding the mosque. There is a mosque in the Pentagon, also a target of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, which hasn’t drawn any criticism, Nadler said.

I worship as I please every Sunday. I want other people to be free to do the same, at whatever place they choose. It's not like only white Christian men were killed on 9/11, so why the opposition? Maybe because of this:

While Republicans may not mention the mosque in campaign ads, they likely will include it as part of a larger narrative that Obama is “outside the mainstream,” said John Feehery, a Republican strategist and president of the Feehery Group political consulting firm.

It's being used by fear-mongering Republicans to push their candidates. How ugly, how sad, and how disrespectful to the people who lost their lives that day.