Zoo Boo!

Today we attended a Halloween celebration, called Zoo Boo, at Como Zoo. Micah went as a pumpkin. We went as the parents of a pumpkin. Sadly our camera's batteries died and we didn't get any photos. But I'll try to describe it to you. There were a great many volunteers, dressed in costumes ranging from tigers, monkeys and cats, to Darth Vader and Batman, stationed all throughout the zoo. As we moved through the zoo, we were given various treats (healthy as well as not-so-healthy). Micah had a great time. And I had a bearable time. However, the thing that amazed me was the fact that all the people in costumes were volunteers. That's something I love about Americans; their enthusiasm for festivity. I get the feeling it would be very hard to convince many Australians to participate in such an event for nothing.

My New Favourite Season

I like autumn in Minnesota. The name 'fall' seems quite appropriate over here. All the leaves change colour and start to fall; it's all very pretty. But it's more than just a pretty sight; supermarket shelves become laden with pumpkin-flavoured and caramel-coated delights; so far we have tried pumpkin pie yoghurt, pumpkin spice bagels, pumpkin bread and caramel apples. I'm still hoping to try the pumpkin spice latte from Starbucks. There are also numerous festivals around this time of year.

Yesterday one of my work colleagues and his wife took us on a fall-themed adventure. First we tried to go apple picking at an orchard. Apparently, this is a really popular fall activity in the mid-west. I was just expecting an apple orchard with a person selling bags to put your apples in; I had forgotten that this is America. It was a real event, including goats, hay-rides, toy tractors for kids to ride, a train pulled by a tractor and heaps of apple-themed products for sale. Here, we tried kettle corn for the first time. I was pleasantly surprised at how tasty it was.

Next we headed to Stillwater, a small town about 30 km (18.6 miles) from St Paul. This is a lovely town with all of Amy's favourite specialty shops: chocolate, spices, tea, and wool. There also happened to be an autumn festival underway when we visited. The over-sized vegetables are truly a sight to behold!

We also saw Wisconsin across the St Croix river.

We went to Nacho Mama for lunch and, since I had never had them before, I ordered the Baconated Jalapeno Poppers stuffed with cream cheese. They were one of the spiciest things I have ever eaten; but they were delicious.

 Our last stop before heading home was at one of the state parks. I forget which one. Unlike the national parks, the state parks are not affected by the non-functional Federal Government. We took a short walk around one of the lakes and it was beautiful. There's not much more I can say about it.

The Minnesota State Fair

A little over a month ago Amy, Micah and I attended the Minnesota state fair. It was huge. We were there for the whole day and there were still parts we didn't see. For my followers from Tassie, it was like a combination of Agfest, the Hobart Show and the Deloraine Craft Fair, except there were no show bags; that was probably a good thing though. We started our day viewing the old tractors (right).

Then we moved onto the Little Farm Hands Exhibit: an excellent exhibit designed to teach children about farming and where food comes from. After Micah had collected, among other things, a fake egg from the chicken coop, wool from the wooden sheep, a plastic apple from the wooden apple trees, and an empty milk carton from the cow, he took their 'produce' to 'market' and got 'paid' '$1' which he could then spend at the 'grocery store' on ice-cream, fruit juice, or a real apple. Micah chose the apple; although perhaps this was because the other items were too high up for him to see.









However, what the State Fair is really famous for, is its food. Most of it deep fried and on a stick. We tried deep fried cheese curds (see right), Big Fat Bacon (see below left), cannoli, snow cones, fudge, and a Hawiian Pretzel. We also took advantage of 'All the Milk You Can Drink for $1' (below right) and combined it with a cone of Sweet Martha's Cookies.

The most amusing thing we found was Australian Battered Potatoes. 'Authentically' served with sweet chilli and sour cream or ranch and cheese. Let it be known that I have never seen potato cakes served with ranch and cheese in Australia. Still, the proprietors had the Wiggles and Slim Dusty playing, which was authentic.

We also saw butter sculptures (left), a parade, complete with marching bands and giant cows (below), and Micah and I went up a tall tower and saw the fair from above.

Just before we left, we came across a stand called 'Walkabout Hats'. There was a sign encouraging people to drop in and say 'g'day'. So we did. We expected to find Americans selling hats made in China, so we were pleasantly surprised to find a South African man selling hats made in Australia and the US.

Jerry the Wise

My boss, Jerry, is a highly intelligent man. But he is also very practical. And, unlike so many other highly intelligent people, he is incredibly nice. He's a rare combination, and I just wanted to share something he has taught me recently.

There have been a number of annoying hurdles I've had to overcome during my time in the USA. The most recent was changing our visa status from J to H. What we didn't realise was, while our we have H status, we still have J visas. So, if we were to leave the country, we would have to apply and get H visas before re-entering the US. There has got to be a better system than this. Anyway, we'll probably do that when we visit Australia early next year. In my normal fashion, I started overthinking this situation and worrying about it; imagining the worse possible scenarios. But when I told Jerry, he barely bat an eye-lid. He told me that there are some things you just have to do in order to do the things you want to do, and stressing about it is not going to help. I wish I could have this attitude about all of my life.

Likes and Dislikes II

My previous 'Likes and Dislikes' post was after six weeks of living in Minnesota, so it seems appropriate that, after being in the Minnesota for nearly nearly six months, here a few more likes a dislikes.

Likes:

Right turn on red. This is an excellent law, and really helps keep traffic flowing. The law is that you can make a right turn on a red light, provided you come to a complete stop first and yield to any oncoming traffic.

S'mores (see right). These things are awesome. Graham crackers, marshmallows and chocolate.

Saint Paul Gym family swim day. Amy, Micah and I have been enjoying this for several weeks now. As a member of the gym, my family get free access on Sundays from 1 til 3 on Sundays. This has provided many good times.

Bird songs. Bird songs in Australia are, umm, unpleasant, to say the least. In contrast, the morning bird song in Minnesota is a joy to wake up to.










Lakes. Minnesota's tagline is '10,000 Lakes'. They're not kidding. Even in the cities, they are quite picturesque.

 

Really cheap grocery shopping. We got a whole roast chicken for free when doing our grocery shopping yesterday. What's not to love?






Dislikes:

Humidity. Really hot summer days are made even worse by humidity. It's not a nice feeling.

Mosquitoes. I think '10,000 Mosquitoes' would be a more accurate tagline for this state. They are not so bad in the cities, but even on my morning walk, if I don't wear insect repellent I will get bitten at least once.

Tropical storms. Fun when you're inside. Can be annoying if you get caught in them.

The 2nd International Conference on Duckweed Research and Applications: A Review

Sorry if this gets a little philosophical. I've been sitting on this one for a while because I was a little afraid of potential reactions to it. But, screw it, here it is anyway.

The second conference I attended last year was specifically on duckweed. Duckweed is very useful as a model species for a number of reasons that only a few members of my audience will care about, so I won't list them.

In addition to being a good model, duckweed is also useful for cleaning waste-water and producing biofuels. It's almost the perfect system. Duckweed grows on waste-water and absorbs contaminants, such as fertilizer run-off, and in doing so it absorbs carbon dioxide and produces oxygen. The duckweed can then be harvested and turned into biofuel, animal feed or even eaten by humans. It's actually pretty awesome.

However, possibly the weirdest part of the conference, was the 'spiritual fervor' surrounding duckweed. It's hard to describe; there were times when I felt I was being preached to by and evangelist, rather than lectured by a scientist (that's not to say that these two things never overlap). People really believe that this plant can save the world. Don't get me wrong, I think it can certainly help. But there are problems it won't solve.

There were also a number of talks on how this plant can help developing countries. There is a group of duckweed researchers who are trying to set up a duckweed farm in Bangladesh to help those living and working in rubbish dumps. It is clear that these people really care about the planet and future generations; they stand to gain nothing out of the programs they are trying to implement (except, I guess, the satisfaction of a job well done). They are model examples of compassion. But I cannot help wondering why. Why do they care? Why does it matter to them that people are sick, starving and dying? Why are they willing to put their time and effort into such programs, when they could be investigating far more interesting questions, and probably making a larger income? I can't help thinking everyone knows deep down they human beings are more than just rearranged pond scum. Most people believe that humans have intrinsic value. But from a purely naturalistic standpoint, this is illogical. I am sure many of the people at this conference are atheists, who claim to believe that humans are merely a product of time and chance. They believe that humans are just another species. And all individuals of a species have only one goal: passing on their genetic information. The logical conclusion of a naturalistic evolutionary worldview is selfishness. But, as exemplified at this conference, people's lifestyle and their choices betray them; they cannot live out their worldview; they are altruistic, even though they have no basis for it.

Las Vegas and Arizona

A couple of my mates from Australia decided to visit the States. Sadly they couldn't make it to Minnesota to visit us, so last Tuesday I flew to Las Vegas to hang out with them for a couple of days. We spent our first day exploring the Strip, entering as many hotels/casinos as we could find.

It's a very weird place. On the one hand, the buildings are huge and impressive - a testament to the ingenuity and intelligence of humans. But on the other hand these buildings are filled with people engaged in various forms of gambling which are a testament to the immense stupidity of humans. There are so many great shows playing at Las Vegas (e.g. Penn & Teller, David Copperfield, Chris Angel, etc.) but people choose to spend their money on gambling. My Aussie friends have a theory that gambling is a way of flaunting your immense wealth. I think they may be right.

As the day turned into night, the seedier side of Vegas came out. People standing in the street offering flyers for hookers, giant mobile billboards advertising 'Girls Direct to You in 20 Minutes', advertisements for 'Zumanity: the sensual side of Circ De Soleil' and shows described as 'Elegantly seductive; classically topless'. 'Classically topless'? What does that even mean? The female body is heavily exploited in Vegas. Sin City seems like a appropriate nickname.

There were two redeeming feature of Las Vegas at night. The first was the Bellagio fountain show. This is well worth seeing. It plays every 15 min from 7 PM til midnight. The fountain 'dances' in time with various pieces of music. The show we watched was to 'One' from A Chorus Line. This video gives you some idea of what it was like. The second was the collection of theme park rides on top of our hotel!

Our second day was spent visiting the Hoover Dam and the Grand Canyon. The Hoover Dam is one colossal structure and is even more impressive when you consider it was constructed in the 1920's. Many men lost their lives in the construction of this dam.

The part of the Grand Canyon we visited is on a Native American reservation. And they make plenty of money out of it. Nevertheless, it was an awe-inspiring site. One of the great marvels of God's creation.

My flight home left that night. At 12:10 AM. I thought I might be able to get some sleep. I was wrong. Spirit Airlines have somehow acquired a plane on which it is absolutely impossible to get comfortable. I will not be flying with them again. I don't care how cheap their flights are.