Interesting Pictures, I'm using the blue one as wallpaper

I love to see pictures of natural light shows. Actually, I like to see real ones, too, but they're a lot scarier.







Edited 1/22/10: Bah! to hotlinks and its disappearing pictures. These were pictures of lightening over water, etc.

I've noticed that there are two kinds of people in this world. There are those who are fascinated by the natural world, and those who have no interest in it. Obviously, I think of myself as being a member of the first group.

When I worked as a secretary for a research scientist at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, my boss let me use his powerful microscope to look at the creatures in a drop of water that I'd taken from a vase of flowers. I found an unbelievable swarm of life! All kinds -- worms and blobs and things swimming around in that little bit of water. I kept getting new drops of water from that vase every day, until one of the lab technicians threw out the flowers and cleaned the vase.

But the sight that took my breath away and still does whenever I see it, is a photograph taken by the Hubble telescope (I believe that's the telescope.) They aimed it at one small, dark spot in space and let the camera eye pick up all the light it could see. There was a fold-out page in the National Geographic of the result--thousands of galaxies. Many were like ours.

Found a link (I think) Deep Space

Go outside on a clear night, look up at the stars, and try to imagine all the wonders that are out there. You won't be able to because it's too big. It's too big for any of us to grasp the possibilities.

Then, *sigh*, there is the other kind of person, the kind with both feet firmly planted on solid ground, the kind that never looks up, or down, or beyond the near horizon. For them, there is no life in a drop of water or in the light from a distant galaxy. Their interests revolve entirely around human things...human cities or music or commerce or history or religion. I suppose I am grateful that there are such people and that they are passionate about what they do with their lives. They are (for the most part) productive and hardworking, kind hearted and earnest.

But to me, they are blind.

Wow, those pictures are really amazing. I like the last lightning picture and the one of the galaxies.

It's really hard to imagine that there are thousands of galaxies like our own out there in space. It's kind of intimidating to think about it actually. I don't think I ignore what is around me, but I don't really have time to stop and think about all the possibilities of life in everything. I love looking at nature though. It's amazing.

It's enormously intimidating. Almost frightening.


I hope you never lose that fascination with the natural world. I think all people start out fascinated when they are young, but lose it some where along the way. Don't know why. Just the effort of surviving day to day, I guess. Humans demand a lot of each other.