From the Cal Academy of Sciences

Megatooth shark
Carcharodon megalodon
Miocene-Pleistocene (18 to 1.6 million years ago)

This is the largest predatory shark to have ever lived.  It may have grown up to 15 meters (50 feet) long and is thought to have fed on whales and other large marine mammals.  Some researchers believe that the megatooth shark went extinct due to the cooling of the oceans.  This model is based on the jaws of modern white sharks.  Since shark skeletons are made of cartilage, which decomposes quickly relative to bone, fossil jaws do not exist.  But teeth of this species have been found all over the world.  

- from a placard at the Cal Academy of Sciences, 

San Francisco

It's Thursday

and this place was empty.

Birthdayness Cuteness

Loves Taylor Swift = cowboy boots and a hot pink guitar for her birthday.  Lessons next!

Moment

From the Tate Modern

 Salvador Dali's Forgotten Horizon (1936, oil on wood)

"Dali's disturbing, imaginary landscapes often contain references to his own life.  Forgotten Horizon is a typical example, drawing upon memories of childhood holidays on the beach at Rosas on the Costa Brava.  The striding woman in the distance is his cousin, Carolinetta, while the dancing figures in the foreground were inspired by a picture on a postcard.  Dali intended the effect to be hallucinatory, with the figures appearing as if project onto a prepared background or theatrical set."  

-Tate Modern Museum description placard

Clocks (at the British Museum)

Moment

Bradfield, England, in the Post Office/ market/ coffee shop/ gathering place for locals.  

Free and free

London has free museums.  Pretty much all of the big ones -- both Tates, the Natural History Museum, the Victoria and Albert Museum -- are free, free, free.  They ask for a donation, sure, and I bet most people give something -- but talk about an amazing concept.  FREE museums, which equates to free activity for citizens and tourists alike, to spending money they would have spent on entrance in the gift shops, and, most importantly, easy access to art and interactive education.  As I have wandered around these brilliant places, I see tons of school groups and the occasional artist, practicing drawing or painting some artifact or sculpture.

Even the small places, like the Serpentine Gallery in Kensington Park, are free.  And when I was there, surrounded by this uber-feminist, anti-war art, there was a mother and daughter (she couldn't have been more than seven) sitting on the floor in the main gallery, paper in front of them and pastels next to them.  Drawing.  And coloring.

I have been wondering how England funds their museums, whether it's by private donation, tax, etc.  I found this from the London Art Network:

"Presently, 7 pence in every £100 is contributed from the public purse to Arts and Heritage. This already seems a small price to pay, given the benefits both economic and culturally that the Arts and Heritage return. What is needed is not a specific settlement of a figure but an open debate on the value we place on culture and the arts and how we are prepared to pay for this. There will always be a need for public/private support for UK museums."

Sounds good to me.

English word of the day

Sarah has been giving me English lessons.  English lessons you say?  Yes.  Apparently, I've got it all wrong.


Word of the day: 
Numpty:  A bit of an idiot. 


It's also in the Urban Dictionary:

• Someone who (sometimes unwittingly) by speech or action demonstrates a lack of knowledge or misconception of a particular subject or situation to the amusement of others. 
• A good humoured admonition, a term of endearment 

Use it well.  In trade, I told her what a dingleberry is. 

Moment.