FREE RICE AGAIN!

Those of you who frequent the Crow's Voice more than the Crow does may remember that about this time last year I was promoting Free Rice, a website vocabulary game that donated rice to the UN World Food Program. If you haven't been there in a while, now's a good time to visit again. The vocabulary game is still there, but there's now a grammar component, a geography option, and games for chemistry, math, French, German, Italian and Spanish AND (my personal favorite) Art History.

You only donate 10 grains of rice per correct answer now, due to global economic pressures, so it's important to play even more and promote the game to your freinds and family. Just click on the picture above to link to Free Rice.

While you're on the site take a look at the totals Free Rice has generated so far and see how your country ranks in its commitment to end world hunger. (The US is pretty pathetic so far. You can click on a link to print off a letter urging Obama to make it a goal.)

Unscrew America

This website for Unscrew America is one of the most animated sites I've seen since Aardman's homepage. It's full of wacky interactive creatures and drawings that guide you from the dark recesses of regular incandesant bulbs into the true light of LEDs and compact florescents. If only we could unscrew the rest of America as easily as we unscrew a lightbulb. Visit the link. http://unscrewamerica.org/It feels good. No kidding!

NIU Memorial

Anyone who attended NIU in the last thirty-some years knows the room where last week's shootings occurred. I took my GREs in that room. My husband took his advance placement tests there. The film club screened free foreign and classic movies there on a weekly basis throughout the 1980s.

I had several classes in Cole Hall, and for six years the hallway that ran through Cole was a convenient daily short cut to buildings where I had classes and offices in DuSable and Reavis.

I have dozens of friends who still work and teach there, some of whom now have children who attend NIU. The events of 2/14 did not touch them directly. They were not in Jamison auditorium when the gunman opened fire. But true community has no boundaries in time or distance. I remember the places where I thought and laughed, studied and daydreamed, and feel desperately sad.

The Art of Edward F. Scott

New at the Crow's Nest: Three pages featuring the glass and wire
sculptures of long-time Evanston resident, Edward F. Scott.

Here's just a sample of what you'll find...

Art in Airports: Chicago's Millennium Chandeliers

When you’re travelling with the Tao even long layovers at one of the nation’s busiest airports can yield sublime discoveries, thanks to After School Matters, a non-profit partnership with Chicago area schools, parks, libraries and organizations that gives Chicago area teens a chance to gain valuable hands-on experience that can lead to career opportunities. To see more pictures and read more about ASM's Gallery37 collaboration with Chihuly Studio, visit The Crow's Nest (link at right) the companion website for this blog.

Small Acts: Free Rice

I don't usually post this sort of thing, but an email from my friend Trish with the subject heading "Free Rice" came into my inbox the other day. I checked it out pretty carefully and it is not a hoax, but a Real Thing, so I wanted to pass it on. Here's the Email:

Here is a site I hope you will check out. http://www.freerice.com/index.php
It is a fun vocab game and a great cause. For each word you get right
while playing 20 grains of rice is donated to the United Nations
World Food Program. 20 may not seem like a lot, but it adds up
quick. I just played for about 5 minutes and accumulated 500
grains of rice. Have fun and pass it on. --Trish


Now 20 grains isn't much...it takes about 700 grains to make one Tablespoon, based on long grain organic brown rice (go ahead, ask me how I know...) and 5600 to make 1/2 cup. BUT 1/2 cup of rice cooks up to about 1 1/2 cup, about a meal for a child, and points add up quickly. The game is FREE, lots of fun, and kind of addictive. And you get something out of it too. (A painless way to study for SAT and GRE tests and improve your reading ability.) When you think about how much time you probably spend playing solitaire or mahjong on computer, this seems like a useful alternative.

New Orleans Voodoo Altars

I'm just back from a trip to New Orleans, and of course I had to bring some Magic back...These are pictures of altars in Voodoo Authentica Cultural Center and Collection on Dumaine Street, a shop that also sells Voodoo and Santeria paraphenalia and imported gift items from Africa, Haiti and Mexico. The owner was very welcoming and allowed these consecrated altars to be photographed, which many practitioners are hesitant to do. Her idea was that if the spirits didn't want to be photographed, the pictures simply wouldn't come out. And it seems she was right.















Several altars, like the Yemaya and Oshun altar in three levels shown here came out beautifully. (Top level, above; second and third level below.)














Others pictures came out blurred, as if the saints were only allowing me to see part of who they were. (Or maybe it's becuase I didn't use a flash.)

But the weird thing is, I took one picture (I don't recall which altar) that didn't come out at all, and I can't account for it. I got an "Incompatible Image Error" something I'd never had on this camera except when I used the wrong camera card. That certainly wasn't the case, as all the other pictures came out. Hmmm....

To visit Voodoo Authentica for yourself, you can look in on their website http://www.voodooshop.com/

And to see lots more pictures (including pictures of St. Louis Cemetery #1) and read about my experiences in New Orleans, visit the companion webpage for this blog, The Crow's Nest

The Crow's Nest