Monthly Archives: August 2017

Just Talking About…Britain Giving Up Coal For A Day

August 27, 2017.  A noteworthy moment in the history of the planet occurred with few of my countrymen noticing.  On Friday, April 21, 2017, the United Kingdom got all its energy needs without burning an ounce of coal.  Coal, as … Continue reading

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Just Talking About…A Walnut Eclipse

August 25, 2017.  My wife took this picture last Monday in our back yard:  the naturally-occuring “pinhole camera” effect that happens when the partially-eclipsed sun shines through tiny spaces between the leaves.  For a moment, the ground was shining with … Continue reading

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Just Talking About…Harry Nelson and the Riffle Beetles

August 15, 2017.  This past month I was in Chicago and had a chance to visit one of my favorite institutions, the Field Museum of Natural History.  I was especially eager to visit an exhibit entitled “Specimens,” a fascinating overview … Continue reading

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Just Talking About…The Illusion of Rural Character

August 13, 2017.  A couple years before the housing market imploded, I was asked to design a residential neighborhood in a way that would protect one of the largest wildlife preserves in the Twin Cities region.  The development bumped up … Continue reading

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Just Talking About…The March For Science, Part 2

August 5, 2017.  It seems eons ago that I and ten thousand others walked from the St. Paul Cathedral to our state’s capital in St. Paul.  It was Earth Day, 2017, and a massive slice of the Twin Cities elite … Continue reading

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Just Talking About…The March For Science, Part 1

[I wrote this a month after Earth Day, 2017, forgot I’d written it, and wrote another essay on the same topic, which follows this one.  The first is an essay, the next seems more like a poem.  Interesting, the way … Continue reading

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