My Science Fair Project Was Better Than Yours

By: | July 13, 2016

shutterstock_416354974I remember my 7th grade science fair project pretty clearly. You may think you aren’t interested in what it was, but you should be—because it was fabulous. It was truly unique. I didn’t grow plants under different colored lights and I didn’t build a lame volcano using paper maché and some sticky baking soda and Sprite mixture (or whatever). I’m talking actual, useful science. I’m talking intelligent and intriguing experiment with totally cool results—physical results you could hold in your hand.

For my 7th grade project, I grew bone.

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The Brooklyn Squirrel War of 2016

By: | July 12, 2016

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There is currently a war raging in my yard. For the past week a handful of squirrels (I can’t honestly say how many since I can’t tell them apart) have been fighting. And not just the regular squibble squabble squirrel fight. A full on, screaming, bloody, vicious battle.

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The Last Word

By: | July 9, 2016

IMG_8778July 4 – 8, 2016

What do you do when, as usual in America, people get shot? Only this time you’re first on the scene? And you’re in charge? And years afterward, you still see the scene, over and over? Craig’s friend tells stories to little kids, over and over.

Michelle writes about little kids too, but these are drawing their ideas of Nature.  Their charming pictures — which you should click on so you can see the ultra-charming detail — play out the tension between civilization and Nature and we shouldn’t forget this for a minute.

Helen’s walks to work are adding up to an epic.  A milkweed patch she’d been keeping her eye on for a good year was attacked by energetic and virtuous gardeners who wanted it to be a vegetable patch.  The milkweed won.

Once again, Cassie calls bull honkey.  When she did this before, the guy was shunned for life.  This time, it’s about a TV show called Zoo and it’s such a flaming disaster that shunning would be too good for it.

Let’s say you’re preparing for a zombie or religious or social or whatever Apocalypse, and let’s say you have a pet.  What do you do? Prepare to let it die? to feed it? to eat it?  Rose interviews the most unusual people.

Preppers and Pets

By: | July 8, 2016

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I’ve recently added a bit to my awkward beginning-of-interview spiel. I do the standard “here’s what my story is about, here’s why I wanted to talk to you” thing. But I also now usually say something like “oh, and if you hear any weird sounds, there are squirrels fighting in my back yard and my dog would really like me to let her out there to go investigate.” It’s not a lie, there has been a squirrel war raging in my yard for the past few weeks (a post for another time) but it also tends to serve as a nice ice breaker. “Oh! What kind of dog?” they often ask. I tell them, I ask if they have any pets, we banter. I hear great dog stories. Rapport is built. Then we actually start the interview. Continue reading →

The Appeal of Crackpot Television

By: | July 7, 2016

lionLast summer, my husband and I began watching what we believed to be one of the worst shows on television. The series, Zoo, is based on a novel by James Patterson and Michael Ledwidge. Here’s the premise: The world’s animal population has turned against humanity. Lions are killing tourists, wolves are murdering prison inmates, even bats are flinging their tiny bodies against planes to bring them crashing down. An intrepid team — a zoologist, a veterinary pathologist, an intelligence analyst, a journalist, and a safari guide — must figure out why all the animals have gone crazy and how to stop them.

On Tuesday night, my husband and I were channel surfing when we stumbled across some familiar faces. “Dear god! It’s that show,” my husband said. “Zoo!” I screeched. “It’s back!” Continue reading →

Milkweed In Summer

By: | July 6, 2016

bare groundBack in April, somebody at the community garden got ambitious.

Weeds usually grow pretty profusely around the edges of the garden. But on one Thursday in April, when I walked by on my way to work, the weeds in the corner I pass every day had been completely turned over, in preparation for vegetables.

I was sad. That was the corner with the milkweed. Continue reading →

The Last Word

By: | July 2, 2016

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It was everyone’s favorite week of the year here at LWON. Yay, Snark Week! We, the People of LWON, absolutely love to snark about nature’s weirdest, silliest, tallest, most evil, or most benign creatures, and we think we do it pretty well. Read for yourself if you haven’t already:

Start with a guest post from Mitchell Leslie warning us to stop embracing sloths, with their funky fur and disemboweling claws. Seriously, if you encounter one, just turn and walk away at your leisure.

Then, warns LWON’s Sarah G., you better duck and swat or risk a rather intimate interaction with a very affectionate owl. Who knew that’s what the bird namers meant by “horned”?

Continue Snark Week by hating on Chihuahuas with Jenny. Jenny has issues with these non-dogs and their stupid little heads.

Next comes Eric and the ball-attacking monkeys. Long-tailed macaques are little monsters that will steal your pancakes and grab your privates. Oh, and sometimes monkeys kill people. Yikes.

And we ended the week with a warning from Cameron: Don’t get too close to giraffes. You’ll be horrified by all the reasons why.

 

Snark Week: The Tallest Terror

By: | July 1, 2016

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I did not know this when I moved here, but Santa Barbara is the giraffe equivalent of a rabbit nest. In the last four years, five giraffes have been born at the small zoo here. One more is due this summer.

At one point, I thought this was adorable. I rallied my children to the zoo to ooh and ahh over the latest six-foot-tall newborn. But this summer, Betty Lou will receive no baby shower gifts from me, even though she’s been pregnant for nearly 15 months.  Now that I know what I know about giraffes, I will knit no more blue or pink hats for young giraffes, with little holes for the ossicones they’re born with. (They’re one of the few animals that comes out of the womb with horns. Maybe that should have been a clue to their nefarious ways.) Continue reading →