Curious Dale

I was busy reading an article on Star Stryder about the current economic trends in education. It’s an astronomy blog by Pamela Gay. I got half way through and decided to got to bed and finish it in the morning. When I can back to my trusty 20-foetsak mac mini the next morning it had crash on the page of the article…

I though that was an appropriate time to do so (having only happened maybe 3 times in it’s 6 years of faithful trouble free operation!)

Ag Shame!

I’ve refined my idea of what I’m trying to achieve with my astronomy posts.

I want to inspire awe, curiousity and child-like wonder!

Today I was reading about neutron stars. Now a neutron star is a dead star, thus doesn’t have any fuel to burn. It has about the mass of our sun and consists almost completely of neutrons! This means it has roughly the density of an atom nucleus = HUGE. So a neutron star with the mass of the sun but it’s only the 20km in diameter! whoa!
Continue reading Pulsars – Mind Boggling Beasties…..

My renewed interest in astronomy a couple of months ago was sparked when I started listening to some introductory lecutres available freely onine. I then found out about the public lectures given at the South African Astronomical Observatory. These are given to celebrate the International Year of Astronomy which marks 400 years since Galileo look through a telescope at the stars. After attending the lecture, the local amatuers setup their telescopes and let the assembled masses look at some obvious targets ie. Alpha Centauri, The Jewel Box, Jupiter.

Continue reading Super Astronomical Perspective and Software to Help!…..

Since rediscovering astronomy I’ve found some awesome resources for beginners that I have personally listened to and read.  Hope you enjoy!

Lectures

• Astronomy 161 An Introduction to Solar System Astronomy (OSU)
• Astronomy 162 An Introduction to Stars, Galaxies and the Universe (OSU)
• Silicon Valley Astronomy Lectures
• Astronomy 160 Frontiers and Controversies in Astrophysics

Podcasts

• Astronomy Cast
• Slacker Astronomy

Blogs

• Star Stryder – Pamela Gay
• Universe Today – Fraser Cain
• Slacker Astronomy

For those of you who don’t know who Paul Graham is, here’s a quick primer:

Classic Self-Referentialism

He’s is a coder and he started and sold a Internet Startup company during the .com bubble and sold it for a handsome sum.  He’s now a internet startup guru and the co-founder of Y Combinator , writer(Hackers and Painters), essayist and coder. Quick enough?
I’ve been an avid reader for 15 years now, enjoying mostly fiction (sci-fi, fantasy) and an odd smattering of non-fiction here and there (mainly science and related). To date I have yet to read a better essay writer than Paul Graham, although I must admit my experience is quite limited.  I haven’t read his book, “Hackers and Painters“, yet, but his essays are really fantastic.

Continue reading Why Paul Graham writes better than me!…..

I’ve always been interested in how things work and how they’re built which usually resulted in thinking up new ways to build things and the internet has channeled a lot of my creativity the last few years partly because building things online requires less physical recsources.  I’ve recently been toying with the idea to get some funding to help me build an idea or two of mine and I’ve been getting lots of my inspiration from This Week in Startups – TWiST.  It’s been running now for 13 episodes and is the brain child of the ultimate fan of the Entrepeneur – Jason Calacanis the Counder of Mahalo.com

Continue reading I’ve been diggin’ on TWiST…..

I’ve recentlty started listening to Astronomy Cast, an amazing podcast about astronomy.  It reminded me that space was my first remembered love!  I was always fascinated with planets, asteroids and stars.   One of my earliest dreams was to be the first person on Mars.  “A facts-based journey through the Cosmos helping you undersstand not only what we know but how we know what we know” is it’s intro and it delivers.  It’s hosted by Fraser Cain from Universe Today and Pamela Gay from Star Styder.

Continue reading Astronomy my old friend…..

I went walking above constantia and found these gems:

Continue reading Tenacity of Life!…..

I Love Afrikaans!

I went-a-walking in Table Mountain Reserve a week ago, above the Constantia Valley and came across this gem!

Innocent looking enough until you take a closer look!

Classic Afrikaans

For those who don’t know Afrikaans “Aambeibossie” translates to “haemorrhoid bush” but in the image it gives the English name as “Christmas Berry”!  That’s comedy!