Ugh, Jess.

Where is my family?? No one is home and my mother doesn't answer her cell. I guess I'll head over there anyway?

A-ha! They were at the grocery store, and not the hospital, which was, of course, what I was afraid of. Oh, actually, my grandmother probably is at the hospital -- Friday is her volunteering day. Heh.

I am glad no one (except your grandma who is meant to be there) is at the hospital, Jesse.

I wish I had not come to work today. We get out at 1 pm. I am hungry, and I am not working. I have lots of work, though.

Ooh! Did I tell you guys about the flashlight fish at the Gatlinburg aquarium? There was this display clearly for kids, where you had to crawl into this tunnel, which of course we did. And there were the flashlight fish, who have glowy bacteria like that in sacs below their eyes, but have a little lid so they can turn it on and off to confuse predators. It was so awesome. And of course it was displayed so that no adults would believe what their kids said they saw, ever.

Ooh! Did I tell you guys about the flashlight fish at the Gatlinburg aquarium? There was this display clearly for kids, where you had to crawl into this tunnel, which of course we did. And there were the flashlight fish, who have glowy bacteria like that in sacs below their eyes, but have a little lid so they can turn it on and off to confuse predators. It was so awesome. And of course it was displayed so that no adults would believe what their kids said they saw, ever.

Liese! Do you know a piano teacher in Cincinnati? For adults, for now. Kids maybe later. mr. flea has been working through the Alfred's Adult All-in-One book, but I think he also needs a teacher. He played drums in marching band but never learned to read music. It's very interesting; I can read music a little but I rely on my ear a lot, but he has very little "by ear" instinct.

I've got a stomach bug, too. I hope this is better by Sunday -- it took a lot of finagling to convince my family to go to a vegan Chinese restaurant on Christmas, and I don't want to have to just eat soup and rice.

Well, rats. I applied for a librarian job at the art museum that was advertized in early November. I never heard a peep after the "we got your application" form email from HR. Today the art museum library advertized two part-time, no-benefit, non-librarian jobs, neither of which I am that qualified for (I was pretty qualified for the way the original librarian posting was written.) I guess they changed their minds about what they needed/could afford. (One of the jobs is a library assistant job requiring only a BA for which they would prefer original cataloging experience. Good luck with that.)

Doggie!

Pet dog from 30,000 years ago

This is the skull of someone's pet dog from more than 30,000 years ago. Found in Czech Republic by archaeologist Mietje Germonpré of Belgium's Museum of Natural History and colleagues, it's one of three canid crania they discovered from the era. The skulls support other recent research suggesting that dogs were domesticated 15,000 years earlier than previously thought. This news is one of Archaeology magazine's "Top 10 Discoveries of 2011."

Ooh! I know this one! Hemoglobin! Right?

Righteo. Because it's made of iron, which is where it gets the red coloring (like in rust).

And all the iron in the whole universe came from the core of stars (not our sun, it's too small to support an iron core) that exploded in a supernova extravaganza, spread out through the universe, formed Earth, and now you have stardust pumping through your veins.

I love Sagan.