Sailors Make the News.... as Zombies!

Margie Stolsig from S/V Hoptoad

Fran Hartman from S/V Cape St. James

http://www.king5.com/video/index.html?nvid=296765

Thrill The World 2008 explodes worldwide!
26th Oct, 2008 at 11:00 AM

With a staggering 93 officially registered events worldwide (and an unknown number of unofficial events), Thrill The World 2008 has exploded around the world for what has been it’s biggest event ever!

With events throughout the world, everywhere from Austin to Hong Kong, from Brisbane to Dublin we’ve stomped all previous events to the ground! As of 6:14pm EST on October 25th we had 3,738 dancers worldwide! That’s double the record from last year!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DyS93a1EZqc

View the full dance

Pumpkin Science

Scientific Discovery and Investigation with Pumpkins


Sink or Float:
Divide students into small groups. Provide a water-filled container large enough to hold pumpkins, a pumpkin or the students’ individual pumpkins, paper towels, crayons or markers, and pencils. Ask students to turn to a blank page in their pumpkin journals and answer the following questions: Do you think a pumpkin will sink or float in water? Why? Next have them rest their pumpkins on top of the water while holding onto the stems. On the count of 3, have them release their pumpkins. Discuss the results of the experiment as a class. Then ask each student to remove his/her pumpkin from the water and dry it off. Then have each child summarize and illustrate the activity in the remaining space on his/her journal page.

Pumpkin questions to Investigate

1. Predict how much your pumpkin weighs. Then weigh it on a bathroom scales.
2. Name the properties of the pumpkin.
3. How does the pumpkin feel?
4. How does the pumpkin smell?
5. How does the pumpkin taste?
6. What does the pumpkin look like on the inside?
7. Does the pumpkin have seeds?
8. To get inside the pumpkin, cut off the top.
9. Does a pumpkin grow underground--or on top?
10. Does a pumpkin grow on a vine, a bush, or where?
11. Are all seeds inside a pumpkin the same size?
12. Will a small pumpkin have small seeds in it as compared to a large pumpkin?
13. What could you do with the insides of a pumpkin?
14. What could you do with the seeds?
15. Predict how many seeds are in your pumpkin. Count your seeds. How close did you come?
16. Now cook your seeds. Be sure to taste the seeds before you cook them, then taste them after you cook them. Is there any difference in taste? [Cook the seeds in a popcorn popper with butter or oil.]
17. Plant your seeds. Plant some of the cooked seeds to see what will happen. Are the seeds scattered randomly within a pumpkin or arranged in some sort of pattern?
18. Do big pumpkins have larger seeds than small pumpkins?
19. Is there anything in a pumpkin which lines up with the creases on the outside?
20. What does a pumpkin seed weigh?
21. How many seeds does a pumpkin contain?
22. Do all pumpkins have the same number of seeds?
23. Can you tell which side of a pumpkin was against the ground? How? Does the stem help you figure it out?
24. Will pumpkins float in water? If they do, do they float stem up, stem down, or stem sideways?
25. Can pumpkin seeds be sorted into groups?
26. How thick is the skin of a pumpkin? How far in is the meat?
27. Place an empty wastebasket in a dishpan. Fill the wastebasket to the rim with water. Place a pumpkin into the water. Measure the volume of water displaced. This will be the volume of the pumpkin. Find the volume of several pumpkins. What relationship is there between weight and volume?
28. Do birds eat pumpkin seeds?
29. Make a list of the properties of a pumpkin and give it to someone. Can they guess what the object is?
30. Will pumpkin seeds grow if planted right away?
31. What folklore can you find about pumpkins?
32. Where did pumpkins come from originally?
33. What other plants do we eat which are related to pumpkins?
34. What is a pepo?
35. If every seed in a pumpkin grew into a plant which produced one pumpkin and each of the seeds produced a plant which did the same, how many seeds would be produced?
36. What other pumpkin investigations can you think up?

Physical science: Investigation and experimentation: sink/float, color, shapes, sizes, textures, # seeds, line up with ribs? and much more.

President!!!

There's an effort to elect an unknown random person as President... and it's someone we know!


Watch this online video about the surprising new nominee:
http://www.tsgnet.com/pres.php?id=52383&altf=Gsbo&altl=Ibsunbo

How to Download from YouTube & Google Video

This tutorial will help you download YouTube and Google Video and put them on a thumb drive or CD.

Most of the on-line video sites want you to view the videos from their websites (hence viewing their advertising on the page) and do not show you the actual URL of the video you are viewing. There are now websites that will reveal the actual URL of the video file and assist you in downloading it to your hard drive.

First, locate the video you want to download. Copy the URL.
Opent he video you want to download in your browser, select the URL in the addressbar,
right click and choose copyf rom the popup menu. Now you’ll need to browse to a website that will reveal the actual URL of the video and allow you to download it to your hard drive. Click the following URL to get started: http://www.videodl.org/
A page will open up that looks similar to the following:
Follow these steps to download your video:
Paste the URL you copied above into this line (use CTRL-V to paste, or right click in the box and paste. )
Click the Get It! Button. This will find the actual URL of your video.
Click “download link” to start the download to your hard drive.
A dialog box will open. Click the Save button to continue.
When prompted, select the location you want to save the file.
In looking at the file you’ve just downloaded, you’ll notice that it ends with .flv, which is a Flash Video File. You won’t be able to play it until you download and install a Flash Video player. VLC Media Player seems to work well. Using the URL on the right, download and install this player on the computer on which you’ll show the video to your class. Once you’ve installed the VLC Player, you can just double click on the video to open it and show it.
http://www.videolan.org/


Or try this site.
http://keepvid.com/

Getting Closer!!

We are actually making progress toward our departure. The "List," page after page of "things to do" is now down to one page.

I spent the morning with my doctor who was a great help with updating our medical kit. When we set sail in 1997 both Jim and I had taken first aide classes, stocked the medical kit on board and created a notebook filled with disease information on countries we thought we might visit. Today Dr. Coles and I revisited the medical supplies. In the process she gave me this web site as a travel resource. Worth checking out.

http://wwwn.cdc.gov/travel/default.aspx

S/V Illawong

Jim and I had the privilege of meeting Phil and Julia on our circumnavigation. We first met in Richards Bay, South Africa, we became fast friends. Although we had lost track of each other for many years a recent Internet search put us back in contact.

It was a pleasure having them aboard Cape St. James again.
They have been out cruising for 16 years.

See a few, very few of their stunning photos.

Cheers Illawong, we hope our paths cross soon.

Tips and Tricks I used sailing around the world.

It's that time of year when boats are getting ready to sail offshore. I'm often asked for last minute advice. These are the top tips and tricks I found useful during our circumnavigation. I'm sure another sailor would have different ideas to add to these.

Smooth sailing Scott, Mary, Timothy and Finn Malone of s/v Whisper, I hope you find something useful here.

• Before setting sail, think about grab and go food. Cheese and crackers, peanut butter and crackers, anything so the cook does not have to be depended on. I get sea sick and it takes about 3-5 days before I feel like cooking. I often will cook a big roast, or something that can be used for quick sandwiches. I have everything in baggie ready to grab.
  
• Take US stamps, I wrote letters put stamps on them and handed them to tourist from the US to mail for me when they got home. Cheaper, and faster. People loved mailing them for me.

• We took $500 in ones and 5's stashed away. The debit card is the best!! It is taken in every small country- better than American Express(which we had and paid for- many countries would not even take it) In addition we had a Visa and Master Card. But debit was the one used most. We would pull into a country and go to the machine- get what we thought would be just enough to get us through, countries will not take back their money unless it's a big amount and you never get what you paid for it and they don't take back any coins.
  
• Get a boat stamp! Some officials want you to have one. Cheap and easy to have made.
  
• Guest book, many boats have a scrape book/guest book for others they meet to write a message or sign in .It's great fun. Many Yacht clubs will ask you to fill out a page as well, great art project for the kids to get involved.
  
• Boat cards, everyone exchanges them, cruisers will know you by your boat name, not your name and will want to keep in contact. I bought a card holder and as we meet boats put the cards in order and wrote on the back when we meet- we are still in contact with most of them. Blogs make that much easier now.
  
• Free boat cards at Vista.com- you can pay a little more and get your boat photo on it- the cards we liked the best had the type of boat on them.
  
• Don't worry about the pressure cooker- if you aren't using it now you won't use it sailing- you will cook just like you do now. Do you need to save fuel now- it's cheap, you can get it in all countries.
  
• I did not label, varnish, oil, Vaseline any cans of food. I did buy 6 months of extra food- on board at all times, just in case something happened. Every inch of the boat had stores of food. Food is easy to get here, cheap and better to carry than once you leave because you have a car.
  
• REMOVE ALL CARDBOARD FROM PACKAGES IN OTHER COUNTRIES!!!!! Do this at the store!!!!!!! People will look at you funny-- DO IT!!!!!
  
• GET ROACH KILLER STUFF NOW- gross as it is you will get them, so be ready to act fast.
  
• Stainless welding rod on board, 6 or so, a must-- many countries can weld but don't have the rods.
  
• Nylons shorts for everyone- they wear nicely, wash quickly. You will be hotter than ever before, and the cost of laundry is unreal- I did it in the cockpit, nylon washes with little water dries quickly.
  
• Spare parts- lots of, you'll never get them cheaper than here and they are easy to get.
  Take email addresses for all major part suppliers- much cheaper than the phone call home for the spare part and I assure you you will be calling home for parts.
  When buying parts now, see if the part has any substitutes, or other part numbers. Many countries do not use our part number system but have the same item- just under another number.
  
• Extra long swage-less rigging terminals- would be great but we don't have them for all of our rigging.
  
  Crew Morale
  
• Don’t forget the crew, its fun to have surprise packages for all on board. Simple finger puzzles, a candy bar, jokes, cartoons, a book about birds- wrapped & given for a special occasions- first rainy day at sea, crossing the equator, stuck in the doldrums, have fun, be creative.
  
• MP3 player- I have the SanDisk because it uses an AAA battery which was important to me.
  
• Wildlife books. We enjoy keeping a record of what we see on the water and in the air. It was wonderful having resources to identify the creatures.