Jan
and Melissa came down from CT and we hopped on the shiny new #2 train
down to the Natural History museum.
The
new Rose Center Planetarium is pretty incredible. The big ball on the
right is actually a couple of theaters, one for the planetarium show on
the ceiling of the dome, and another for the big bang which you watch
down in the bottom bowl of the ball.
The
planetarium show is run by half a dozen SGI computers and this ball
full of lasers.
Everything
is spherical, circular or spiral and you can easily spend a few hours
in just this one small section of the museum.
After
outerspace, Jan brought us back down to earth with a quick tour of Africa.
Look
at me, I'm a double helix. We couldn't figure out what realtime infrared
big screen movies of Sue had to do with the "genomic revolution" which
was the title of the museums fall special exhibit and our next stop.
A real
double helix model that was set up to do an interactive search for silent
and fatal mutations in the Drosophila genome.
We
were lucky to get into the museum laboratory where we did a hands on
experiment to isolate DNA from our spit. We felt a little bad taking
up spts at the lab bench since space was limited and we have about 20
years of molecular biology experience between us. But, Jan and Mel really
wanted to see the demo to see if it would be worth a class field trip
(they both teach).
It
was still a beautiful afternoon when we stepped out of the museum into
central park.
We
stopped at the ESPN Zone for dinner and giant beers.
When
the excitement of 32 screens of sports got to be too much for Jan we headed
outside to Times Square.
Jan's
holding the weight of the world, or at least a really big cup of noodles.
I really
wish I could remember the tall tale that Jan was telling because it looks
like it was hilarious
Melissa
wanted a physical momento of the night, so she had a street artist draw
her name in kaleidoscopic birds and flowers.
We
weren't sure what dissability Jan was trying to project, but he was convincing
enough that he didn't have to give up the seat on our way home.