Pumpkin Drop 2007, Part 2

New: ATTENTION! Purple Panda and Taiwan Hippo Fan’s mother is VERY eager to involve Musers in the Pumpkin Drop and would like to hear from other potentially interested parents. Details below.

There was a flurry of interest in this event at the Kokonvention.

The sponsor, West Virginia University, has finally posted information about the drop. As feared, it takes place on a Friday, which may limit Musers’ ability to take part. Anyone possibly interested can find out all about it here (remove spaces):

http:// www. mae.cemr.wvu.edu/ news/20pumpkindrop.php

Muse fielded a team a few years ago, with results recounted in the Koko Bomb Saga.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows — SPOILERS ALLOWED

Once you’ve read it, all bets are off. For the sake of anyone scanning the “Recent Comments” sidebar, however, please paste the following notice at the beginning of your messages:

SPOILER WARNING: “DEATHLY HALLOWS” SPOILER WARNING.

Make sure to include the period at the end.

That should do it.

Happy Equinox!

It’s on Friday or Saturday, depending on where you live.

Technically, autumn arrives in the Northern Hemisphere on Saturday, September 23, at 4:03 a.m. Universal Time (UT). That’s 5:03 in the morning British Summertime; three minutes after midnight U.S. Eastern Daylight Time; 11:03 p.m. on September 22 U.S. Central Daylight Time (=blog time); and 9:03 p.m. on September 22 on the American West Coast.

You’ll have to make adjustments if you’re in Arizona, which doesn’t observe Daylight Saving Time. And, of course, for New Zealand and the rest of the Southern Hemisphere, this is the spring equinox. Whew.

Robert’s Secret Identity

Though they’d much rather spend all their time approving posts and chilling with MuseBloggers, Robert and Rosanne do have “day jobs.” As a news editor at Science, Robert has just spent the past month or so masterminding the magazine’s annual Breakthrough of the Year section. Anyone curious about Herr Administrator’s alter ego can read the section online, see a video, or listen to a podcast featuring an interview with the man himself. Bill Nye, watch out!

While You Were Out

News you may have missed while basking in the summer sun:

News you may have missed while basking in the summer sun:

  • Baby giant pandas were born at the National Zoo in Washington, D.C. (July 9) and the San Diego Zoo in California (August 2).
  • Also on July 9, Lizzie turned 14.
  • On July 26, the space shuttle was launched for the first time since January 2003. The hull was damaged during liftoff, and now astronauts are working to make sure they can land safely.
  • On July 28, ChinTsu turned 13.
  • On July 29, three astronomers announced that they had discovered a ball of rock and ice slightly bigger than Pluto, orbiting farther from the sun. Astronomers disagree about whether to call the object a planet, or whether to lump both it and Pluto together with a swarm of thousands of rock-ice chunks found in the same chilly neighborhood.
  • On August 1, sound recordings from a wildlife refuge in Arkansas gave more evidence that the ivory-billed woodpecker was not extinct as scientists had feared for 60 years (see Muse, February 2005).
  • On August 3, after three years of nonstop work, biologists in South Korea announced that they had cloned an Afghan hound.
  • Coming up:

  • August 15: Happy birthday, Morbid! (Were all Musers born in the summer?!)
  • August 31: Deadline for the Muse contest
  • .