Thursday, February 09, 2006

L o n g W o r d s

One word you have heard of, nine more that you will probably never ever need to see or know for the rest of your life.

1. Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious - a nonsense word meaning fantastic.
2. Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis - a factitious word alleged to mean 'a lung disease caused by the inhalation of very fine silica dust.'
3. Pseudopseudohypoparathyroidism - a familial disorder in which the skeletal and developmental abnormalities of pseudohypoparathyroidism are present without the biochemical abnormalities common to hypoparathyroidism and pseudohypoparathyroidism.
4. Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch - a village in Wales.
5. Antidisestablishmentarianism - opposition to the disestablishment of the Church of England.
6. Floccinaucinihilipilification - an act or instance of judging something to be worthless or trivial.
7. Honorificabilitudinitatibus - the state of being able to achieve honors.
8. Formaldehydetetramethylamidofluorimum- a chemical.
9. Hepaticocholangiocholecystenterostomies -surgical creation of a connection between the gall bladder and a hepatic duct and between the intestine and the gall bladder.
10. Znadseepsodemineraalwatersteenstralen - Dutch word meaning, "to 'take a hike.'

Wednesday, February 08, 2006

Natural History Museum

I took all my kids to the Natural History Musem in Los Angeles. It's about 7.5 miles from my apartment. It's been about 6 years since the last time I was there. We also visited the California Science Center since we were in that part of town (they are next door to each other).

They have a good collection of stuff there, and it's fairly famous. One of the nice things is there are a lot of hands-on activities for kids. I think that's a big plus to get them interested in science and the natural world.


Clark can say that his artwork is "on display" at the museum. They had a small art alcove with colored pencils and paper. The person overseeing everything asked if Clark wanted his artwork (ok, my artwork, his scribbles) pined ont eh wall, and he said yes.

Clark was pretty terrified of all the large dinosaur models and skeletons. He never turned his back on a single one, so I don't have any photos of that. I can relate though. When I was about 6 my parents to me to Gatorland Zoo, and my father made me sit on a concrete alligator. I was soo scared that it would come alive and bite my hands off. Though Clark might have been scared at the museum, he was very excited that morning to go.

All in all it was a great day, even though I didn't take a lot of pictures of Garbielle or Nakoma. It was also hard to get any photos of Clark. And yes, that is a small on Nakoma's face. I can see it. That's a whale skeleton behind him in that photo.