Yeah! Listen, gotta dash. Things happening. Well… four things. Well, four things and a lizard.
EEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!: “Take a deep breath, science buffs – and get ready to be blown away.” The main construction on the new Academy is done!! Man, check out the photos! It is going to be soo amazing – I can’t wait. And I like how they kept the feel of some of the older halls.
“The entire top of the museum, with the exception of the piazza’s glass ceiling, consists of the biggest sustainable roof in the world. It is essentially a planted garden stretching to all four walls, supporting 1.7 million plants, including California poppies and strawberries. Counting the tops of the two domes – Morrison Planetarium and the living rain forest – the roof sports a total of seven soil hills, mimicking the seven hills of San Francisco.” There will also be a California and climate change wing; “The entire west end of this hall will highlight the wonders of the Golden State through exhibits ranging from Sierra Nevada gold and the skeleton of a long-extinct saber-toothed cat to a 75-foot-long blue whale hanging from the ceiling. The hall will also be home to the stuffed remains of Monarch, the famed grizzly bear who served as the model for the bear on the California state flag. The rest of the hall will feature video footage, models and other displays designed to generate discussion of California’s wildfires, shrinking snowpack and other natural events that are marks of global climate change.” I hope they keep the wild California video…
Also in bay area science-y news; the best bay walks and tide pools. Yup, visited most of these as a child. Ooh – but I still have never taken the cruise out to the Farallon islands. I need to do that at some point – I want to see a Great White!!
Oh my god – I LOVE these film award categories. How have I never heard of this group before? Highlights; Actress most in need of a new agent, Movies you wanted to love and just couldn’t, Sequel that shouldn’t have been made, and Most egregious age difference between the leading man and the love interest (in addition to best film and all that).
The 7 funniest horror films. I still need to see Black Sheep! And I love that they included one on here for the commentary track by Joe Bob Briggs. I used to love reading his column as a kid. Joe Bob says check it out.
Box Office top 10: I picked all 10 movies!! I got a couple switched around (I mixed up the Game Plan and Why did I get married, and I had Nightmare before Xmas in 3-d as 7th, when it was 10th, but everything else was right! It’ll be a couple of days before the results come in, but I knew my picks were good this week!
Lost season 3 came in (the morning I went to return Heroes – how serendipitous!) I saw the mini season last year (are they doing that again this year?), so so far I’ve only seen 2 new episodes. Luckily, one of them was a Desmond ep. There really should be more long-haired Scotsman on tv. Speaking of tv seasons (and I’ve heard good things about Lost 3 – then again, I enjoyed Lost 2), both of my co-workers are absolutely raving about Heroes season 2, so maybe it isn’t as bad as I’ve been hearing?
Oh – and the new Doctor Who last night was awesome. It was another one by Stephen Moffat, who has got to be one of the best tv writers around. It was funny and freaky, and a brilliant story idea for a show without the Heroes special effects budget. Plus, since I guess there is about 1 episode each season where the main characters aren’t really around (limited shooting time and all that) I thought this one was heaps better than the season 2 Love and Monsters one.
(Aside from today’s title, other great quotes from the episode include; “Look, sorry, I’ve got a bit of a complex life. Things don’t always happen to me in quite the right order. It gets a bit confusing at times, especially at weddings. I’m rubbish at weddings. Especially my own” and “Tracked you down with this. This is my timey-wimey detector. Goes ding when there’s stuff. Also, it can boil an egg at 30 paces. Whether you want it to or not, actually, so I’ve learned to stay away from hens. It’s not pretty when they blow.” and finally;
Billy: Well, it’s a special kind of phone box for policemen. They used to have them all over, but this isn’t a real one. The phone is just a dummy and the windows are the wrong size. Can’t even get in here. Ordinary yale lock, but nothing fits. But, that’s not the big question. See, you’re missing the Big Question.
Sally: Okay, what’s the big question?
Billy: Will you have a drink with me?
Sally: Aren’t you on duty, Detective Inspector Shipton?
Billy: No. Knocked off before I left. Told them I had a family crisis.
Sally: Why?
Billy: Because life is short and you are hot. Drink?
Work is far less stressful than it was last week, thank god. So today I’m catching up on anything that got put off from last week (a first, btw). Unfortunately, since I left the house at 6:30am today (I’m on cup of caffeine #5), I forgot my credit card and my banking information on my desk at home, so I can neither buy my bus pass nor pay my credit card today. Ah well – I’ll get to them both tomorrow, but that is really annoying. Super yummy veggie sushi for lunch today. And that’s… about it. What can I say? I’m saving money. My life is boring.
musica: doomsday – doctor who (which I really need to STOP listening to as it is making me tear up), La Rejouissance – Handel, violin concerto No. 8 – Allegro – Vivaldi, Gloria in D Major – SFGC
Tags: Travel
jwdmeow
Kimball Natural History Museum? What the F happened to the California Academy of Sciences? Surely an old and revered name? How much money did the Kimballs put up, and is EVERYTHING for sale? And who the F are the Kimballs, anyway?
Grrrrrr…..
Who the f was Steinhart? It’ll still be called the Academy of Sciences, just the natural history museum section will have a name like the aquarium wing does.
Also – SF just voted not to allow advertising on the golden gate walk ways, despite the fact that I guess the bridge is running a deficit or something.
As for the Kimballs, I swear that name is familiar. Maybe a kid at Burkes or Cathedral? There’s a restaurant called Kimballs on Grove. And the CEO of Qube learning is named Kimball. Charles P Kimball was an early pioneer who moved to SF in 1849. There was a major bay area philanthropist named William Kimball, founder of Kimball Manufacturing Corp, who served on the boards of Stanford, Levis, and clorox. Oh – it looks like him – in addition to being a board member for the Fine Arts Museum of SF, SFMOMA, ACT, the Symphony, the Marine Mammal Centre (yay!), he was chairman emeritus of the CA Academy of Science’s board of trustees. There are 4 endowed professorships bearing his name at Stanford. His grandfather was involved in the building of the Hoover dam and the bay bridge. Yup – the hall is named after him: http://news-service.stanford.edu/pr/2005/pr-kimball-obit-071305.html He died in 2005.
OK, as long as it’s a) someone worthy; and b) wasn’t just sold, cynically, like Jim Lazarus did with Candlestick; and c) it’s not the whole Academy. I thought they were re-naming the entire Academy.
The worthiest person would have been that woman who saved all the exhibits when it was burning down. Now that’s a heroine!
Alice Eastwood. I think she was a character in the California Pageant every year. Cool lady, though not quite as cool as Julia Morgan.
Besides, practically every baseball stadium is sold these days. Only a couple of really old ones have kept their names, I think. Although I still think of candlestick as candlestick.