Hobbit Houses and Tornadoes

I have wondered for some time why it is that in California there are these wonderful earthquake related building codes that have saved thousands of lives in major earthquakes -- but there are no tornado related building codes in places like Oklahoma and Kansas.

I lived for a while in Rochester, MN.   This community is the home of the Mayo Clinic.  That famed institution was formed after a huge tornado cut a swath of destruction a mile wide through the community and a clinic was needed to deal with the aftermath.

When I lived there I frequently cowered in the basement in fear when there were tornado watches and warnings. Even when the sky was clear, I thought about how a tornado could come out of it.

I've seen how well the building codes work in California.  They'll announce the magnitude of the earthquake and then they'll say there were some number less than 20 casualties.  Then I'll see a similar magnitude earthquake reported in Turkey or Iran, and there will be tens of thousands dead.  I've seen how natives of the Andes mountains made stone walls where the pieces were fitted together by crafting of the stones, so that they don't fall during earthquakes.

But I don't see where tornado prone states are making building codes to protect their residents.

I did read a story of an underground house surviving a tornado

Earth sheltered homes can survive tornadoes

Then I saw these cute modular homes that people can assemble themselves, and which are designed to be buried.  Wouldn't this be the perfect solution?

@uspshelp -- frustrations with computer sorting

Computer sorting of mail just does not work as well as humans.

Recently I sent a letter to a friend who happens to live near the border of several towns.  His legal residence is in one town in Vermont, while his mail is delivered by the post office in the adjacent town.

When I addressed the letter, I used his legal address, because that's the one I had used when finding his house using google maps.

The letter was returned to me as "no such street, unable to forward."

My friend reports that the human postal carriers were able to figure out such addressing, but the computer sorting facility cannot.

This is really annoying.  I sent the letter to the correct, legal address of my friend's house.   The fact that the postal service elects to deliver mail from the post office of the neighboring town is supposed to be for postal service convenience, not to inconvenience postal service customers. The computer should be programmed to figure such addresses rather than sending letters back to senders.

Even more annoying, when I went to usps.com, to try to send in an e-mail complaining of this situation, I found a bunch of options for complaining about mail service -- and none of the options applied to this situation.  They don't have a category for "other" complaints.  They can't imagine that someone might come up with a complaint that doesn't fall into the categories they have pre-selected.

Again a human being would be able to take a miscellaneous complaint that doesn't fit into other categories.

update on truth blog: 4th neutrino calls standard model into question

For my 25th college anniversary, I wrote this rather long document about my lifelong search for "truth:"

original truth blog

I think I was the only one who, in response to a question of what I had been doing since college, gave an intellectual history of myself, rather than an exclusively personal history.  Aspects of my personal life came into it, but the focus was intellect.

It was one of about 3 essays in the 25th reunion book that was as long as it was.  Most people confined themselves to a few paragraphs. I've often described myself as having diarrhea of the keyboard.  Still a couple of my friends read it and liked it.

I noticed, though, that I was also the only one who ever wrote in to our college newsletter with a review of a book that I was excited about that I thought my classmates might like, because the author was a late, well-known professor from our college.

Granted it's nice to learn about weddings, kids, job changes, and moves -- but didn't we meet by going to college together?  Wasn't that an intellectual endeavor? Didn't that make us feel like exchanging intellectual ideas?

Ok, nevermind.

Anyway, the truth essay was brought to mind to my mind today, because I read that a 4th neutrino had been tentatively identified, and that it was outside the Standard Model.  The Standard Model is a family of sub-sub-atomic particles that replaced the earlier neutron/proton/electron atomic model of the elements -- to oversimplify.

The Standard Model was just starting to coalesce when I was in college and it was only just fully confirmed in 2009 with a believable study of the Top Quark, aka "god particle."

But, now, back to the drawing board, apparently, only five years later.

One aspect of my truth essay was the concept that science was violating Occam's razor.  Science keeps getting more and more complex and elaborate.  It has to have more and more theories. Exceptions to those theories keep getting found.  It's never like we can get to a final theory and stop.  Just when the Standard Model seemed like the definitive answer, something that doesn't fit into it is found.

This was one of the things that caused me to lose faith in physics and not pursue it professionally as an adult.

*****

Here's another one of those -- physics is not complete issues 

http://www.cnn.com/2016/09/07/opinions/dark-matter-analysis-lincoln/

Why is the universe expanding? At least, astronomers believe it is expanding.  Studying astronomy was part of what made me lose faith in physics.  Trying to grasp the enormity of the universe, helped me see how very small we are in comparison.  The idea that we could really understand it seemed absurd.

Lady Sketch Lab 2016

I have been participating in the 2016 Lady Sketch Lab at the Magnet Theater.  This lab started out with 84 women.  By the end we were down to 50, which is still a huge group.  Most of us submitted sketches, with several drafts.  Then some sketches were selected for the show.

I was cast as Narrator in "Extraordinary Woman" and Passenger (an improv role) in "Love Train."

This show is scheduled to run March 14, 21, and 28 at 9pm at The Magnet Theater, 254 W 29th St (near 8th ave), NYC

List of sketches

ORDER OF THE SHOW

Love Train Part 1

Bouncer

Man Springs

Vous Tube

Vicki & Sue

The Art of Social Media

Love Train Part 2

You've Got Mail

Extraordinary Woman

Defense Dress

Baby Fat

Threesome

Yoga Farts

Hello

Love Train Part 3

Here's a cast photo of the Extraordinary Woman sketch

And here was the entire cast

Program for Murder on the Nile 3/10/16-3/12/16

I was in an Alpha NYC production of Murder on the Nile 3/10-12 -- team A.  Here is a copy of the program:

updates 160307

I have the following performances upcoming:

3/10, 11 &12 I will be playing Miss Ffoliot-ffoulkes at an AlphaNYC production of “Murder on the Nile” by Agatha Christie at the Producer’s Club

3/13 I will be again participating in the Cabaret showdown

3/14, 21 & 28 I will be participating in sketch shows at The Magnet Theater with the Lady Sketch Lab

3/18 Acting in sitcom The Cobblestone Corridor with Connecticut Public Broadcasting

3/22 I will again be participating in a charity fundraiser sponsored by The SetNYC at the Lovecraft Bar

I particularly want to tell you about these fundraisers.  Pim Shih has been doing a series .  Performers donate their times and some of the proceeds go to benefit deserving charities, especially to help the homeless.  Each show doesn’t generate all that much money, but it adds up over time, as Pim keeps doing more events.  March 22 is the third time I’m going to be doing a monologue.  

I think it would be nice if some casting directors and agents were to participate at these events, because it would raise the stakes and increase the amount that is raised.

Here’s a new voiceover demo:

https://soundcloud.com/anne-barschall/thriller-rap

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=50WujTK-v-4

Curriculum for a life skills course

This is a list of topics to be dealt with in high school curricula.  I originally wrote this back in 2007 or 2008, but I don't think I posted it publicly anywhere.  Some of these things may be taught in health classes, but not all of them.

·                        Personal & business ethics;

·                        Developmental psychology, so future citizens know how to raise our children without abusing them [e.g. we're constantly reading stories of parents who murder small children over toilet training issues or by shaking them when they're babies -- likely all due to ignorance of child development; and it would be good to learn to recognize learning and emotional issues such as those exhibited Asperger's Syndrome, dyslexia, ADD, mood disorders and the like and know how to address them proactively from the start;

·                        Relationship and negotiating skills, so future citizens know how to deal with spouses, other family members, co-workers (including supervisors, colleagues, and subordinates), competitors, neighbors, and friends;

·                        Time & money management;

·                        Career planning;

·                        What to expect physically and psychologically as you age;

·                        Basic first aid and recognizing dangerous health symptoms;

·                        Dealing with personal crises: family and personal illness, loss of job, loss or illness of family members; and

·                        Personal physical fitness and nutrition programs, for lifelong health in an aging body.

I became interested in this topic, partly because I served as a volunteer in my school district on the committees where decisions were made regarding programs for special needs kids.  I learned that life skills were taught to students with intellectual disabilities, but not to kids without disabilities.  Why?  I don't think kids normally absorb all the life skills they need, especially now that they're always glued to the computer.

Later, I got interested in these topics as a possible curriculum for a course to be taught in college.  I certainly didn't have a good grasp on these topics by the time I graduated.  I probably still don't.