An adventure

Date: 05 August 2011 12:46:57

So it appears that I have been a bit of a failure in the blogging department lately. Oh well. I am currently having a spot of annual leave. It's not that I don't like work, but I am so looking forward to retirement. Today I went on an adventure to The Powerhouse Museum with a teacher friend who has Fridays off. We actually visited the Powerhouse a few weeks ago but ran out of time that day and missed a few things. And there are a few new exhibits since then anyway. So. Of note today (not an exhaustive list): 1. The very large tower in the photo above. It is not a part of, or at all related to the museum apart from being on the way there from the station. I looked at it from all angles and was none the wiser. On google maps it appears to be hollow. A friend finally informed me this evening that it's a smoke stack!. So there you go. 2. The magical grand piano with a floppy disc drive that records what you play and plays it back - not as a recording, it moves its own keys. I actually saw this on a school excursion ~12 years ago and at that time it was pretty amazing. We're talking about the days when 2Mb was the inbox limit for most web-based mail, no-one had digital cameras and mp3 players were rare and primitive. So I was pretty excited that it's still there, although it's not giving demonstrations anymore. 3. Behold! A double flageolot! (on the right)

In other news, I bought a Xaphoon a few months ago. It is a fun instrument. 4. Space

The space exhibit is pretty cool. It has a zero gravity simulator which is a little trippy, lots of replica satellites and whatnot, some bits of space ships or launching things or something... space suits, an emergency pod thing (basically a metal ball that falls in the if things go wrong...), space food, videos where astronauts say stuff about astronauting.... 5. Love Lace is part of the big design dealie they have going at the moment. It appears that lace has been redefined to mean "anything with holes in it". Anyway, there are some interesting pieces there. The female urinary and reproductive systems made out of human hair was perhaps the most interesting... There were many other notable things to see but I don't want to overdo this blogging lark.