Check out this  picture (click on it for a larger version) of a plane being struck by lightning while in flight.  You can see a quick video of the strike here.

Yikes.

For a science fair project I once helped my son Michael build several bridges of various designs with popsicle sticks, which we then loaded up with whatever amount of weight it took to break them.  I was duly impressed by the strength of those little sticks after breaking into a full-on sweat as I piled 50, 60, 70 and eventually 80+ pounds on those stupid things before they broke.

It ends up that we were definitely in the minor leagues when it comes to using those little sticks.  One Robert McDonald of Florida has built a full-sized replica of a Viking long ship using 15 million ice cream sticks. (The Reuters Photo: at left comes from Yahoo! News).

So I was doing a Google Image search on my last name (can’t even remember why), and I came across this picture on the left of Fr. Charles Lowder.  It seems that he was the founder of an Anglo-Catholic movement called the Society of the Holy Cross.

I don’t know much about my paternal genealogy (I plan on changing that soon), so I was a little curious to see whether or not he had emigrated to the U.S. and perhaps done some unpriestly things that might mean I could be a descendant. Technically we’re talking Episcopalian here, and I don’t know when the Episcopalians started allowing their priests to marry, so maybe it wouldn’t have been un-priestly after all. Anyway, there’s no mention of it in the brief history I found on the Society’s website, but there is the mention of a nephew so maybe there’s a distant relationship.

What really caught my eye though is the society’s motto: "in hoc signo vinces."  This happens to be the only Latin I know, because it is also the motto of my fraternity, Sigma Chi.  It means "in this sign, conquer!"  From the beer-addled memories of fraternity life I also remember that this had something to do with Constantine, but that’s really neither here nor there.

In reading the Society’s history I started flashing back to the Sigma Chi history that was pounded into our heads during pledge training.  There were lots of similarities, from the way in which the founders met in secret, to the number of founders (six for the Society, seven for Sigma Chi), to the feeling of moral fortitude relayed in each history.  Even the timing was the same: both were founded in 1855.

I know it sounds heretical comparing a church to a fraternity, but I was just a little taken aback by the similarities. That has to be some kind of sign that there’s a family connection, right?
 

The US Geological Survey has a neat little site that let’s you see Lewis & Clark’s journey from a satellite view.

Each satellite view has some information about that particular leg of the expedition.  For instance image #14 tells us this:

Image Name: Camp Fortunate, Montana
August 17, 1805 

Image Source: Landsat 7 and DEM

Image Date:October 7, 2002

Image Description: Lewis and Clark were reunited at
this site after parting company near the Big Hole and Jefferson Rivers.
Lewis arrived first and lodged with a band of Shoshone. When the
Indians began preparing to head east to their buffalo hunting grounds,
Lewis persuaded them to wait for Clark’s return. When at last Clark
arrived with Sacagawea, she recognized the leader of the Shoshone as
her brother. It was in part this fortunate twist of fate that led to
the Shoshone agreeing to help the expedition cross the Continental
Divide—and gave the camp its name.

Digital TIFF File Size:Approx 160 MB

This is the kind of stuff that makes me shake my head in wonder at what information technology hath wrought on our world.

Here’s a neat site called gCensus.com that combined Google Maps and Census data to make a cool way to get find basic census data. 

I was easily able to find that Forsyth County, NC (where I’ve lived for a year has:

Land: 409.6 sq. miles
Water: 3.3 sq. miles
Population: 306,067
Houses: 133,093

While my old home of Prince William County, VIrginia has:

Land: 337.8 sq. miles
Water: 10.6 sq. miles
Population: 280,813
Houses: 98,052

Kind of cool.

This article explains/describes Southern American English (SAE) in great detail.  Here’s the part that blew my mind:

Other grammatical features are less widely known but are no less important. SAE also modifies the English auxiliary system by allowing for the use of more than one modal in a verb phrase. For instance, for most Southerners “I might could leave work early today” is a grammatically acceptable sentence. It translates roughly as “I might be able to leave work early,” but might could conveys a greater sense of tentativeness than might be able does. The use of multiple modals provides Southerners with a politeness strategy not available in other regional dialects. Although no generally agreed upon list of acceptable multiple modals exists, the first modal in the sequence must be might or may, while the second is usually could, can, would, will,should, or oughta. In addition, SAE allows at least one triple modal option (might shouldoughta) and permits useta to precede a modal as well (e.g., “I useta could do that”).

Uh, I might could understand this if I’d paid better attention in 10th grade English.