Huntington Gardens

Enter the Children's Garden through the little blue door.

I

I have a magnetic personality.

Looking at carnivorous plants

I think these flowers are Black-Eyed Susans.

In the Chinese gardens. 

Waiting for Chinese food.

Inside a waterfall 

Carmen Sandiego  was here

listening to NASA's satellites. 

About a week ago, I went to Huntington Gardens with my uncle Shane and his girlfriend Leah. We split up because we only had 2 hours and they were interested in seeing different things. Mom, Dalia and I set out to find the Children's Garden and Uncle Shane and Leah headed to the dessert.

The Children's Garden was really cool.There was a place full of  mist and a giant magnet that had iron filings in a bowl so that you could sprinkle them on top of the magnet, which made them stand up straight.

In the Cloud Forest we discovered carnivorous plants -  plants that drink blood. Yuck!

We then headed to the Chinese garden, which did not really look like a garden, but more like a mini version of China, with buildings, a waterfall, a giant pond and cliffs to climb.

I really enjoyed my visit to Huntington Gardens and I can't wait to go back. This time, I plan to see the dessert and more of the art.

A Wounded Hero

I recently read a story about Beowulf and summarized it.

Once upon a time, a dragon lived in cave greedily guarding treasure. One day, a runaway slave came to the cave and stole a golden goblet. The angry monster, with fire spewing from his nostrils, ran after the slave. The angry monster searched  through the towns terrorizing the people. King Beowulf, who had to stop the dragon, called him to fight. The monster's steps shook the ground as he walked toward Beowulf. Beowulf and the monster fought fiercely. Beowulf brandished his sword, but then the monster grabbed it and  broke it, then the monster seized Beowulf by the neck. A youngster climbed up the monster's back, and  stabbed the monster's neck until the monster let go of Beowulf's neck. Together they stabbed the dragon until he died. The town was safe, but Beowulf
was wounded badly.

MAKE YOUR VERY OWN SCENTED ERASER

On Sunday, I made Japanese erasers. Step one is to spray the molds so that the clay comes out easier. Step two, mix the colors together so that  you have more colors with which to make the erasers.  After you finish putting the clay in the mold, carefully take out the parts of your ice cream parfait and put them in hot water for 5 minutes. Then put them in cold water for 6 minutes. Voila! homemade erasers to erase away your cares.

Making Erasers (my mom's trying to save money)

The kit came in this box, which you use to microwave the clay once you shape it in the mold.

These are the three colors. They smell of strawberry, vanilla and I don't know what but sweet-smelling. I combined them to make other colors too.

I got the "Parfait" molds. It makes erasers that look like ice cream treats. Yum!

My mom says I need to talk about the science behind erasers. I'm going to save that for another day, except to say that people used moistened breadcrumbs until rubber was accidentally discovered to be more effective.  I also know that erasers work because graphite is more attracted to the eraser than the paper. That is why an eraser can lift the pencil marks off of your paper. Neat!

Nim's island

Nim's Island is about a girl who lives on an island. She is very brave. For example, when she was alone and there was a storm, instead of freaking-out the way I did when the power went out, even though my dad was in the next room, she grabbed the cover for her dad's computer and put it on. I like how brave, strong at heart, and friendly she is. I also liked how she was able to teach herself simply through books. She reads and learns from her animal friends.

Your Heart Stops Beating...

I am a member of a Speakers' League and this was my speech this week:

I wore a lab coat and used lots of cool images with my speech.

Your heart stops beating.

Your body cools down from 98.6  to  room temperature.  

This is called algor mortis. 

In Latin, “algor” means coldness  and   “mortis”  means  of death.  So, Algor Mortis  is known as “THE DEATH CHILL”.

The next stage is Rigor Mortis.   Because your heart is no longer moving your blood through your body, your blood changes from liquid to semi-solid.  This is called coagulation.

Your  blood has thickened in your veins, arteries and capillaries.  So, your whole body stiffens.  That is why dead bodies are nicknamed  “STIFFS”.  

Your will experience rigor mortis, 2 to 6 hours after you die.

Gravity causes your blood to drain to the lowest part of your body. Since you died here, in this room, sitting up, your legs and feet and hips are the lowest parts of your body.  The blood in your torso drains and settles around your hips.  And, the blood in your legs drains to your feet.

Your hips, legs and feet will turn blueish purple. This stage is called  “Liver Mortis”.  In Latin, Liver Mortis means blueish color.  

Lividity is observed 2 to 4 hours after death.

Next, your body  PUTREFIES.

Your stomach turns green.

Bacteria in your digestive tract eat the protein that make up your body.

The bacteria releases gases, which smell similar to rotten eggs. The gas builds inside you causing you to expand like a balloon.

This causes your eyes to bulge out of their sockets.

And your tongue is forced out of your mouth.

A week passes.

Your skin blisters so much that if someone touches you -- Your skin falls off.

A month later, your hair falls out.

Your nails fall out.

Your organs liquefy.

The bacteria inside you continue to feast. They excrete more and more gas until 

-         POP!  -   You burst open.

The rotting gases in King Henry the VIII’s  gut caused his coffin to burst open. 

In a coffin birth, built-up gas pressure within the putrefied body of a dead pregnant woman can force the dead fetus to burst from the body of the mother.

Instead of letting your body decompose until bacteria feed on your rotting corpse, leaving nothing behind but your skeleton, maybe you want to donate your organs to people who need them.

You can donate tissues such as your corneas, skin, bone marrow, and even heart valves even 15 hours after your last breath.

Or maybe you want to donate your body to science? 

The best way for a doctor to learn is by using a real body, also known as a CADAVER.

Leonardo da Vinci dissected dead bodies stolen from freshly dug graves. 

He would draw what he saw. He identified not only muscles and bones, but also their functions in the body.

Today, doctors can use your body to learn how to perform surgeries.

Different parts of your body will be sent to different doctors.

While your headless body might be in one room with a doctor learning how to crack open a rib cage to perform heart surgery.  Your head might be in another room with a plastic surgeon.  Maybe you’re getting a face lift or a nose job.

Another way scientists’ can use your body is at a body farm.

At the University of Tennessee Medical Center, scientists study how bodies decay.

They do this to help the science of  Forensics.

If a dead body is found, police are called to the crime scene.

FORENSICS  experts examine the body to discover how the person died.  The University of Tennessee’s body farm puts different cadavers in different situations.

For example, they put Body #1 in the Sun, they bury Body  # 2  in a pond and they put Body #3 in a plastic bag.

The bodies all decay differently and these experiments help solve crimes.

A man who claimed his wife died of an epileptic seizure was arrested for her murder when Forensic scientists determined she actually died of hypothermia.

He had trapped her in freezing cold water knowing that an epileptic seizure creates the same effect as shivering in icy water.

Your brain and heart need a constant core temperature to function. 

As the brain detects a fall in blood temperature, it automatically protects itself by shutting down the blood supply to the hands and feet.

You lose feeling. 

If you keep losing heat, the brain shuts down blood circulation over a larger and larger area of your skin.  

Your brain has now shut down circulation to your hands and feet, your skin, and then organ by organ until your brain must choose between blood for itself and blood for the heart.

Your heart stops beating. 

Beach

Yesterday,  I went to the beach. It is so interesting how the ocean works. For example, I put my rocks high up the beach and 15 minutes later when I came back they seemed to have moved. I know the beach didn't move. It was the tide. Gravity from the moon pulls the water making it rise and fall. I think the reason the moon doesn't pull us away with the water is because of the earth's gravity.

Am I right about this?  

Yesterday, I went to the Pixar exhibit at the Science Center. Pixar creates most of the animated Disney movies. The exhibit was about the process of making a film. I learned that once there is a story idea for a film, like Inside Out - one of my favorite animated movies - the first step of the process is drawing the pictures. Next, they make the character out of modeling clay and also as a computer image. The character then has to be programmed to be able to move like a puppet but instead of a puppet on strings, it's a puppet on a computer program.  The next step is to add color, and lights to every scene - a very big job. In one scene there can be as many as 250 lights!

In the short movie that they showed  before we saw the exhibit, it they said that the movie Inside Out was really hard to make because they had to figure out how to make Joy, the main character, glow. They ended up using points of light to create her character, which had never been done before and that in every single movie there is something new created. In the movie Cars, they created shine on cars and in Finding Nemo, they had to create water, which is very complicated. The hardest thing is making something computery that doesn't look computery - if you know what I mean.  Everything has to look real.

 I liked the exhibit because there were many computer programs to use and touch and also some physical things to make such as model robots. The downside of the exhibit was that there wasn't a way to make a short video with all of the parts. Instead, you could only explore bits and pieces of programs.