Category: learning curve

Tight timetable

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Despite being the second city of Norway, Bergen is actually pretty small. But it seems like there are still loads of things to do there. The thing is, you might not have ever so much time. We don’t, so I was delighted to find a blog post entitled:

Explore Bergen In 1 Day – The Complete Guide

Thing is, I’m now just a bit unsure exactly how long 1 Bergen day is. Because the blogger in question managed to fit: 1 funicular ride to a scenic viewpoint, 1 historical UNESCO heritage site, a market, an aquarium, a castle, 4 museums and 2 hours of shopping into his one day in Bergen.

Blimey.

I can’t imagine that Parichay Mehta (for it is he) saw any of these places in great detail. Allowing for a reasonable amount of travel time between them, we’re looking at about half an hour per visit. Still, it has at least given us a bit of a heads up as to what’s on offer, given that we have… wait for it… a whole 1 AND A HALF days in Bergen.
Which of course means 45 minutes per attraction. And given that tourism is very much our secondary reason for visiting, that seems more than reasonable.

Oh, and we’re going to do one of these as well, because you don’t go to Bergen and not do The Sognefjord (apparently). Cannot wait.

(Obviously, when we go, I’ll do a more sensible ‘Bergen in a limited amount of time’ post.)

Options

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Hate your job?

Obviously, being a research scientist [only ever so slightly back from being] right on the cutting edge of science, this isn’t a problem that I face on a daily basis. Because mundane stuff like malfunctioning incubators, staff on long-term sick leave and a soul-destroyingly meagre paycheck never make you feel like work is a struggle and that you would have been far better off as an astronaut or a train driver like you wanted to be when you were 5. Those things don’t apply to cutting edge research science. Oh no.

Still, it’s nice to know that there are options, should you, you know, ever feel that way.

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That advice (as you can probably see) supplied to us by @Michael1979, whose timeline makes it look like he’s never faced these sort of issues.

This is the best paper on feminist glaciology I have ever read

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Seriously. What an analysis.
But why would such a paper be required. I mean, what’s the benefit here?

Merging feminist postcolonial science studies and feminist political ecology, the feminist glaciology framework generates robust analysis of gender, power, and epistemologies in dynamic social-ecological systems, thereby leading to more just and equitable science and human-ice interactions.

But ice is just ice, right?

Ha! No!

Many armchair glaciologists make this assumption, creating and perpetuating the oversimplification and misinterpretation of ice as frozen water. And yet, St. Germain, LeGuin, Khan, and many others – from Roni Horn (2009) to Pauline Couture (2005) – approach glaciers from distant and varied disciplinary and artistic spaces compared with glaciologists or even anthropologists studying human-glacier interactions:

…their voices should not simply be disregarded, overshadowed by Western science, or, worse, relegated from policy contexts where, in fact, the human experience with ice matters greatly.
These alternative representations from the visual and literary arts do more than simply offer cross-disciplinary perspectives on the cryosphere. Instead, they reveal entirely different approaches, interactions, relationships, perceptions, values, emotions, knowledges, and ways of knowing and interacting with dynamic environments.
They decenter the natural sciences, disrupt masculinity, deconstruct embedded power structures, depart from homogenous and masculinist narratives about glaciers, and empower and incorporate different ways of seeing, interacting, and representing glaciers – all key goals of feminist glaciology.

Indeed.

The full paper Glaciers, gender, and science: A feminist glaciology framework for global environmental change research by Carey et al. is here for you to read and enjoy.

So, we now know that ice isn’t just ice: that’s just “the way in which colonial, military, and geopolitical domination co-constitute glaciological knowledge”. Well done.

Meanwhile, NIH funding for bioscience research is lower than it was back in 2001.
Just saying.

Finnished…

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I learned a new word today. It’s not a word that I’m going to use very often, because it’s a Finnish word and Finland is a long, long way from here. But it is a great word, and it may come in useful for times when you have a few hours alone. This actually makes it even less likely for me to be using it, given that “a few hours alone” is  generally an alien concept to most parents of young children.

Still, it’s a word worth knowing, just in case.

The word is kalsarikännit. Say it with me:

Kalsarikännit

And it means “getting drunk alone at home, while wearing your underwear”.

Mitä aiot tehdä perjantai?
Luultavasti vain saada kalsarikännit.

Well, obviously. Friday’s going to be the main night for this sort of thing to happen.

Look, I have no plans to go to Finland anytime soon, but I can already tell you what I’ll be doing for at least one evening of my stay, should I ever end up in Helsinki or Jyväskylä.

The opportunity to practice at some point in the near future would be much appreciated too.

ISS pass tonight

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My ISS Detector app has detected that the ISS will be passing over tonight. Over Cape Town, that is.
It’ll be passing over a lot of the rest of the world as well of course, but it’s the Cape Town bit that I’m going to be looking out for.

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Here’s a quick screenshot from my phone, showing a few details.

As you will note, the pass begins near Uranus just before… I’m sorry? Is there something you find amusing about that? Honestly, grow up.
Anyway, you’ll need to look North West towards Uranus at… STOP SNIGGERING AT THE BACK!

You’ll need to look North West at 7:58 this evening, and you should see a bright white dot racing South East across the sky. You won’t need a telescope, binoculars or a magnifying glass. You won’t miss it: it’ll be the brightest object up there. And the only one that’s moving at 8km/second.
Take your kids out and show them before bedtime, and let’s hold thumbs for a cloudless evening.

For the nerds out there, I use RunaR’s ISS Detector app (actually, I have the Pro version at R29, but the free version does most everything you need), and it’s really good for alerting you to interesting stuff in the sky.