EDIT BERCES


so this morning i ran in the run through redlands, and i was looking up race times and records and things for fun afterwards. i was trying to find the fastest time recorded for a 5k on the guinness site when i came across this lovely lady. she's an ultramarathon runner from hungary, and she holds the world record for longest distance covered on a treadmill over a span of 24 hours.
between march 8 and march 9 of 2004, edit ran 153.6 miles on a treadmill. THAT IS SO MANY MILES - especially to run all in a row. i did the calculations for it, and even though obviously she didn't run at the exact same speed for the whole day that puts her at a pace of 9 minutes and 23 seconds per mile. that's insane. know why that's insane? because she must've taken a few breaks here and there, which means she ran even faster than that to make up for lost time. that is a solid pace to keep up for that long.
not only does she hold this record and the record for 24 hours on a track, she has also won hungary's top ultramarathon race, the five-day Vienna–Bratislava–Budapest Supermarathon, and the European 24-hour championship. baaaaasically, she RULES.

brief hiatus

EARTHSHIPS!




i asked my mom what i should write about today and she said "earthships! nothing better!"
earthships are homes made of natural and recycled materials. they are primarily found in taos, new mexico, which just happens to be where my parents are planning on moving to when they retire. i'm kinda stoked she asked me to look them up because they're right up my alley and also, i should probably know about the super sweet house my parents are going to be living in in a couple of years.
the homes are constructed with materials such as recycled bottles and rubber tires (which are filled with earthy substances to naturally regulate indoor temperature). they're specially made to utilize the available local resources, like energy from the sun. they face the sun to trap heat in the cold months, but the dense earth-filled walls also insulate against heat in summer. rain water is also collected and reused. this idea of utilizing local resources is awesome. it creates a way of sustainable living that rejects our modern systems - we drink bottled water that might as well be filled a quarter of the way with oil because of the distance it travels, we demand out-of-season foods that have to either be grown in climates far from ours or created with unnatural methods, etc. the more people become interested in living locally, the better for the earth (and our future relationship with it) on a global scale.

DORIS "GRANNY D" HADDOCK




i read about doris "granny d" haddock in a recent issue of good magazine. she was featured in an article that talks about people who have walked across the united states, so naturally she caught my attention (carynn and i have been talking about doing a crazy walking tour forever, she even stocked up on clif bars.....). oh, did i mention she was 88 years old when she started the walk? yeah. she's awesome. anyway, that's not all she's accomplished by any means.
some notable facts about granny d:
-she attended emerson college for three years before she married jim haddock. she wanted to continue her education, but they didn't allow married women to attend college (because finding a man is the ultimate achievement for a woman, right? pfffff) so she was kicked out and awarded an honorary degree instead.
-she and her husband successfully campaigned against testing of the hydrogen bomb in 1960 in alaska. their efforts saved both the local people and wildlife in point hope.
- on january 1,1999 (at 88 years old) she began a 14 month walking journey across the united states to raise awareness about campaign finance reform (ie: the shady shit that goes on with money in politics). she walked from pasadena, ca to washington dc and several members of congress joined her on her final day of walking.
- at age 94 (during the 2004 election), she was the democratic candidate for senate in new hampshire. she lost to republican judd gregg but not before making history as one of the oldest candidates ever.
- a documentary was made about her 3200 mile walk across america for HBO in 2007. it's called run granny run, and i haven't seen it yet but i'm definitely planning on it.

SIPHONOPHORES
i really like these creatures. i guess this is kind of cheating because i didn't learn about them today but they're just really really cool and will make a good first subject to post, so i'm going to write about them anyway.
siphonophores are these sea creatures (i have been way into sea creatures lately!) that belong to the Cnidaria group, a group of animals that includes the corals, hydroids, and true jellyfish. they are a colonial animal, which means that they are actually composed of tinier organisms called zooids. different species of siphonophores are categorized by the types of zooids present and their organization within the colony. each zooid has a different function - some serve to help the colony move, some to give it nourishment. each is dependent on the other to do what it can't do for itself.

"Siphonophores challenge us to think about what we mean when we call something an individual, a concept that we usually think of as being quite straightforward. Is a single zooid or an entire colony the siphonophore 'individual'?"

i found that section on siphonophores.org and it's kind of an interesting question. it's a smaller scale version of the idea that we are all parts of one huge organism, rather than separate beings that have no effect on one another. i'm all about being an individual but at the same time there is something about that idea that makes sense. anyway, here are some siphonophores!







some of them coil like this when they are fishing. it makes it easier for the tentacles to trap food.