Category: Technology

Thanks, Anna

Chris Brogan wished his wife a happy birthday in a beautiful post on his blog today.

Following in his footsteps, I just wanted to give a quick “Thank you and I love you” to my wife. It has certainly been one heck of a year, but she impresses me more and more everyday with her skills as a physician, friend, wife and (now) mother…

Here’s to the next 50 holiday seasons!

Celebrating Five Years of Blogging: SkyHawkScience Still my Fav

Robert Scoble has started a fun trip down memory lane for all of us with his post “Celebrating Seven Years of Blogging.”

I formally started blogging in 2002 with Digital Moses then the relaunched ReveNews (my pal Jim Kukral was publisher of ReveNews at the time and has been blogging since 2000 or so). But the blogging that I’m most proud of was the class blog I started while I was teaching 8th Grade Physical Science at Hammond School in Columbia, SC. The blog was called SkyHawkScience and was a tremendous experience. I still tear up when I look at the archive on Internet Archive (took the site down because after I left teaching I didn’t want the blog to forever dominate my students’ Google indexes since it did gain popularity).

I still miss that blog. I’ve gone on to blog at CostPerNews, ReveNews again, HarrelsonReligion (my college class blog) and here (first on wordpress.com then as a hosted WordPress blog). I still like the SkyHawkScience blog the best, though.

Super Roman Glue

First concrete, now superglue… is there anything the Romans didn’t engineer?

I’m sure the location that this glue concoction was recovered had something to do with its makeup (much as Roman concrete varies from place to place based on location of origin in the Empire). However, this is still pretty amazing considering the time gap:

Analysis shows that the Roman glue was made of bitumen, beef tallow and pitch. But researchers said they had failed so far to recreate the adhesive and that sawdust, soot or sand might have to be added to complete the process.

“When we finally manage to remake the superglue, it will easily compete with its modern equivalents,” Mr Willer said. “After all, which of today’s glues stick for 2,000 years?”

Glue Used by the Romans Has Stuck Around for 2,000 Years – The Independent

Medieval Archaeology Journal Online For Free

Not for everyone, but if you’re a history nerd like I am, this is a great opportunity:

An early Christmas present from the Society for Medieval Archaeology:

Good news from the Society for Medieval Archaeology and the wizards at the Archaaeology Data Service. The first fifty (50) issues of Medieval Archaeology are available for free online. Its not quite open access, because the issues can’t be archived elsewhere, but that’s no real problem as long as the ADS stays funded.

The Society exists to ‘further the study of the period from the 5th to the 16th century A.D. by publishing a journal of international standing dealing primarily with the archaeological evidence, and by other means such as by holding regular meetings and arranging conferences.’ It’s clear making the journal freely accessible is going to do a lot for their work, but even so when you also have to balance the financial needs of the Society it’s still a courageous step in a field where most publications are subscription-only.

But the real reason to celebrate is that the journal is very good. There is plenty of stuff in it that deserves a wide audience. For instance Pictish symbol stones are a bit of a mystery. However I can read about them in the article Investing in Sculpture: Power in Early-historic Scotland by Meggen Gondek, which is available as a PDF from Volume 50 of Medieval Archaeology.

(Via Alun: Ancient Science and the Science of Ancient Things.)