Auriga is one of the 48 constellations listed by the 2nd-century astronomer Ptolemy and
remains one of the 88 modern constellations. Located north of the celestial
equator, its name is the Latin word for "charioteer",
associating it with various mythological charioteers including Erichthonius and Myrtilus. Auriga is most prominent during winter
evenings in the Northern Hemisphere, along with the five other constellations
that have stars in the Winter Hexagon asterism. Because of its northern declination,
Auriga is only visible as far as 34° south; for observers farther south it lies
partially or fully below the horizon. Its
brightest star, Capella, is an unusual multiple star system among the brightest stars
in the night sky. In Chinese mythology,
Auriga's stars were incorporated into several constellations, including the
celestial emperors' chariots, made up of the modern constellation's brightest
stars. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auriga_(constellation)
Playing for Pizza by John Grisham extract from a scene in Parma, Italy
With a casual wave at the
cheese he said, "Of course you know the greatest cheese of all.
Parmigiano-Reggiano. You say Parmesan. The king of cheese, and made right here. Only real parmigiano comes from our little town.
"Next," he said, pointing to
the first loop, "is the world-famous prosciutto. You say Parma ham. Made only here, from special pigs raised on
barley and oats and the milk left over from making the parmigiano. Our prosciutto is never cooked," he said gravely,
wagging a finger for a second in disapproval. "But cured with salt, fresh air, and lots
of love. Eighteen months it's
cured." "And then we have
culatello, from the pig's leg, pulled off the bone, only the best parts, then
covered in salt, white wine, garlic, lots of herbs, and rubbed by hand for many
hours before stuffed into a pig's bladder and cured for fourteen months. The summer air dries it, the wet winters keep
it tender." "These are the
best pigs, for the culatello," he said, with another frown. "Small black pigs with a few red patches,
carefully selected and fed only natural foods. Never locked up, no. These pigs roam free and eat acorns and
chestnuts." http://fuyuhoshikim.files.wordpress.com/2012/09/john-grisham-2007-playing-for-pizza.pdf
Anolini is a stuffed pasta from
Parma,
where it is served in broth during the holiday season. The first recipe for anolini, a direct descendent of
ravioli, was published in a book written by Bartolomeo Scappi at the beginning of the 16th
century. Naturally, it contains parmigiana
reggiano. Find recipe at: http://www.academiabarilla.com/italian-recipes/emilia-romagna/anolini.aspx
Playing for Pizza is a novel about the Parma Panthers, an Italian football team. There is a real team called the Parma
Panthers, and they won their fourth consecutive IFL league title by beating the
Milano Seamen 51-28 in the Italian Super Bowl XXXIIII in 2013. Read about it at: http://www.americanfootballinternational.com/tag/italian-super-bowl/
Element 115
– which has a temporary name of ununpentium – was first created in 2003 in
Russia by scientists from the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna and
collaborators from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California. That team produced four atoms of ununpentium,
which quickly lost two neutrons and decayed into element 113. A committee from the International
Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry will study the Lund report and decide
whether to grant element 115 official status on the periodic table of elements. If that happens, the element will get a new
name. (The folks at Lawrence Livermore
noted that element 106 was discovered in 1974 but didn’t get its official name
of seaborgium until 23 years later.) Both
of ununpentium’s neighbors on the periodic table have completed this
vetting process. Element 114
was discovered in 1998 (also at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research) and
named Flerovium in 2012 in honor of the institute’s Flerov Laboratory of
Nuclear Reactions. Element 116 was first
created in 2000 and named Livermorium, in honor of the Lawrence Livermore
National Laboratory, in 2012. Scientists
create these unstable, super-heavy elements because they can – they want to see
if there’s a fundamental limit to the periodic table. But they also expect that as they synthesize
heavier and heavier atoms, they’ll reach what they call the “island of
stability” – a group of elements that can last for entire seconds or even
minutes before their nuclei break apart and they decay into other
elements. Karen Kaplan http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-element-115-ununpentium-confirmed-20130827,0,2224471.story
One of the biggest canyons in the world has been found beneath the ice sheet that smothers most of
Greenland. The canyon - which is 800km
long and up to 800m deep - was carved out by a great river more than four
million years ago, before the ice arrived.
It was discovered by accident as scientists researching climate change
mapped Greenland’s bedrock by radar. The British Antarctic
Survey said it was remarkable to find so huge a geographical feature previously
unseen. The hidden valley is longer than
the Grand Canyon in Arizona. It snakes
its way from the centre of Greenland up to the northern coastline and before
the ice sheet was formed it would have contained a river gushing into the
Arctic Ocean. Now it is packed with ice. The ice sheet, up to 3km
(2 miles) thick, is now so heavy that it makes the island sag in the middle
(central Greenland was previously about 500m above sea level, now it is 200m
below sea level).
Seamus Heaney, one of the world’s best-known poets and
winner of the 1995 Nobel Prize for literature, has died aged 74 after a short
illness, his family said on August 30, 2013.
Northern Ireland-born Heaney was one of the world’s foremost poets
writing in English whose works include his 1966 debut “Death of a Naturalist”,
“The Spirit Level” and “District and Circle”.
Heaney was a rarity among poets, having
won acclaim from critics while producing best-sellers. It once took him three
hours to walk down Dublin’s main street as autograph hunters pursued him. http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/nobel-prize-winning-irish-poet-seamus-heaney-dies-at-74/article14036308/
Find a list of books by
Seamus Heaney divided by poetry, prose, translator (for instance, Beowulf) and editor
at: http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/seamus-heaney. The bibliography is followed by a list of
books about Heaney.
Find "Remarks by the
President at the "Let Freedom Ring" Ceremony Commemorating the 50th
Anniversary of the March on Washington" at: http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2013/08/28/remarks-president-let-freedom-ring-ceremony-commemorating-50th-anniversa The speech took close to thirty minutes, but
you can read it in much less time.
