L.E. Carmichael's Blog, page 58
April 19, 2014
Reason I Sometimes Miss the Arctic, #8
I lived in Yellowknife for a couple of years during junior high, right around the time I got old enough to babysit for people other than my parents. On more than one occasion, I’d sit in the warm car on […]
April 17, 2014
A Few Reasons Why Book Banning is Wackadoodle
The American Library Association has released its top 10 challenged books of 2013: 1) Captain Underpants (series) by Dav Pilkey 2) The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison 3) The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie 4) […]
April 14, 2014
Spelling Matters – Even in Science
When I was in grad school, I worked part time as a teaching assistant. One semester, I gave my lab students a vocabulary quiz in the form of a crossword puzzle; they responded with unanimous outrage. As one put it, […]
April 12, 2014
I Strongly Suspect That My Cat is a Hobbit in Disguise
It all started when we realized that one of our cats was getting a little tubby. We have two cats, who are also litter mates. Jagular is graceful and lithe, and was named after the mythical-but-actually-Tigger character in Winnie-the-Pooh that […]
April 10, 2014
My New Favourite Series of Nature “Documentaries”
Sooooo funny. Although parents of very young viewers should be warned there is one bad word and a story that’s probably not appropriate for the under-eight crowd. What about you? Fans of owls or nature shows? Or of narrators with […]
April 7, 2014
Fuzzy Forensics Has a Cover!
And it’s so pretty! This is the work of Michael Penman, who also designed Fox Talk. I can’t recommend him highly enough – he’s not only talented, but a pleasure to work with. My contribution was locating just the right […]
April 5, 2014
How Desperate Was the First Person Who Ever Ate a Lobster?
I mean, right? After all, they are basically the cockroaches of the sea. And they fight back. And then they LOOK at you while you’re eating them. What’s another delicious food you can’t believe someone actually ate for the first […]
April 3, 2014
Guest Post: Mary Cronk Farrell, author of Pure Grit
For today’s edition of Anything Can Happen Thursday, I’m welcoming award-winning children’s author, Mary Cronk Farrell. Mary’s passion is little-known heroines of American history, and her newest book is Pure Grit: How American World War II Nurses Survived Battle and […]
March 31, 2014
Mad Science in the Movies
By a strange twist of fate, I’ve been reading and watching a lot of stories that feature scientists lately, and I have determined that there are only two types of scientists in fiction: 1) The mostly-harmless/absent-minded professor/mad scientist type 2) […]
March 29, 2014
Prudence or Paranoia – When Did Men Become Villains?
My dad is a baby magnet. Kids absolutely love him. We’ll be out at a restaurant, and every child in the room will stare at him like he’s been dipped in sugar and covered in Tonka Trucks. Which is perfect, […]
