Blue Planet Journey

  Hunter education student taking shooting test. I may be unique in the world for having taught more non-hunters the basics of hunting than anyone else. Let me explain. For years, I taught a course titled "Living With Wildlife" at Utah State University. Obviously, and especially in Utah, one of the ways people interact with wildlife is by shooting and eating them. It was a large class, averaging about 100 students from a variety of majors. I wanted all students to understand the education requirements for hunters in the state, so I made all students, hunters and non-hunters alike, take this course. Yes, even the hunters, who had already gone through hunter education (HE) and may have had years of hunting experience. The only ways to opt out of this were to demonstrate that you had taken HE within the past year (happened once), a judge said you couldn't be around firearms (once), you were ethically opposed to touching firearms (usually one student per semester), or firearm...

  I pick up my grandkid from pre-school camp 2-4 days a week. The camp is at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science. After camp, we go for a snack, then roam the exhibits for an hour. It probably goes without saying that I know the exhibits pretty well by now! We've watched every Infinity (IMax) movie! Many exhibits are a kaleidoscope of colors! ↙ Infrared! One of the reasons I wear a hat is that my head (and nose) and fingers are always cold!! There are 9 or so gnomes hidden in the museum, some the "signatures" of diorama painters. Can you find this one? Below is a close-up. Here's another gnome, on the back of a dinosaur! I won't tell where! The dioramas have eye-popping detail. Note the "dust" being raised by these running antelope. The best view of downtown Denver and the Front Range, from the 4th floor of the Museum. There are also lectures available to the public. Some are... a bit technical. Other lectures are designed for a general audience Note...

Playing our ukuleles on the intact Renaissance-era city wall surrounding Lucca, Italy.   Ci ty wall surrounding Lucca , Italy. One of the joys in playing the ukulele is that, because of its size, you can take it with you when you travel. So far, airlines have been good about allowing us to bring our ukuleles on board, placing them in the overhead compartments. We use soft cases, so the space used is a bit more flexible than when using a hard case, although we have to be careful that they don't get smashed when a heavy roll-away is thrown in the same compartment. Caroline started playing the ukulele soon after the Covid-19 pandemic shut everything down in 2020.  I started playing the guitar again, to accompany her, but a few months later I picked up her uke and I was hooked. Wesley started soon after, followed by Mignon. Caroline begins to play the uke, March 2020. Initially, I accompanied Caroline on the rhythm guitar. By December, Caroline, Wesley, and I were all playing. In ...