Yes, this was a really wonderful discovery for me. The biggest trick is to make sure all the noodles have sauce over them -- otherwise any bits left sticking out naked will be baked dry. Sometimes I end up adding a little water before I put it in the oven if my sauce seems a little too sludgy.

Preach it! The water molecules in microwaved water are moving at various rates -- some are actually still cold, some are quite hot. You can find little animations online showing this, and compare them to the little animations of water coming to a proper boil where the molecules are forming convection currents. Science!

Well, duh, they obviously KNEW it was a good spot because their psychic told them. Get with the program! You obviously need a few good palm readings to sort out your confusion!

:party: Woohoo, living the dream! It's always nice to hear it's an attainable dream, especially for those times we all wonder about that.

I had the bank itself misread a check resulting in a similar mistake. Yikes, it can shake you up when that happens.

The most fun year of science was CPO Earth Science, but I added a ton of stuff. I seem to have deleted a lot of the bookmarks, but I remember doing quite a bit with earthquakes since we live in an earthquake-prone area, using ideas from the Arkansas Geological Society to learn how to triangulate an earthquake epicenter, for example. - We made "lava" out of cake batter and took about a thousand pictures of it flowing while we measured it (that was from space grant.hawaii.edu, which also had more volcano activities and a bunch of other "planetary" activities -- http://www.spacegrant.hawaii.edu/class_acts/index.html ) -We made a plate tectonic map using old tennis balls - volcanoes.usgs.gov has a pdf entitled This Dynamic Planet that explains this. - Kept "moon phase" notebooks. - Got some dry ice and made a comet - Virtual lab about tides http://www.glencoe.com/sites/common_assets/science/virtual_labs/ES17/ES17.html - Streams and watersheds in the midwest -- http://mostreamteam.org/activity_guide/contents.htm - Somewhere I came up with activity tables that went through the water cycle that involved rolling dice for your water droplet to advance ... and there was something involving incense smoke in a plastic salad container that showed us something or other (maybe clouds? I'm pretty sure this was out of the CPO book. Arghh! I don't remember! Red squirrel blogged about the stuff they did with CPO, but I forget the name of her blog). - Write advertisements for your favorite planet. Film them if desired, or make a brochure for tourists.

Even though 1999 is from the 80s I'd still include it because, after all, you're gonna party like it's 1999.

Do you mean which National Tours are coming through locally? We've got Beautiful: the Carole King Musical, If/Then, Bridges of Madison County, Ragtime, Sound of Music, and Jersey Boys coming through this spring/early summer (aside: I looked these up on Broadwayworld.com, and noticed that the equity shows are going to the Fox and the non-equity are going to Peabody Opera House-- is this a thing? is it always like that?). Plus we have a boatload of locally produced shows at Stages and the Muny, plus other places like Lindenwood, the Rep, Webster Univ., Kirkwood Theatre Guild, and on and on. Musical theater is very popular around here.

That looks amazing. Thanks for linking the information.

The Ballet Companion by Eliza Gaynor Minden Dance Anatomy by Jacqui Haas (my dd is fascinated by physiology and biomechanics -- she got this for Christmas at about that age) Lisa Howell's various blogs, youtube videos http://www.theballetblog.com/blog/ Inside Ballet Technique by Valerie Grieg ("Separating Anatomical Fact from Fiction in the Ballet Class")(again with the biomechanics) Edited to Add: Dancers Among Us by Jordan Matter

Whoa, totally normcore! One of my favorite trends!

A friend said that planting daffodils in the beds around her house worked. The deer avoid the beds even after the flowers fade. However, these were just regular foundation planting, and not a vegetable garden -- I assume a vegetable garden would be more appealing to the deer and more worth crossing something unappealing. It would depend on the relative stupidity of the individual deer plus how available other food is in someone else's yard.

I love to nap! I did when I was young, I did a LOT while pregnant, and I still do it now. About 20 minutes is optimum for me. I have a vivid memory of starting to doze off during soil science class in college -- it was right after lunch, and I desperately tried to do things to stay engaged in the class, like sit in the very front row. Speaking of pregnancy, maybe it's a hormonal thing for you? Does perimenopause lead to more napping? Your grandparents probably did it because they didn't sleep as well at night. As we age our brains and bodies often change in ways that make our sleep more fragmented -- we spend less time in REM, we wake up (or sort of wake up) dozens more times per night.

We've been on a steampunk kick lately, and I thought the same thing ....

Eh, some people don't own the equipment and are clueless about where to start.

Hah, sort of like the old saying about "if you teach a man to fish" -- if you teach a 14yo to hem pants, she can learn to do her own alterations for the rest of her life. Our neighbor is more the sort to say she might give us a call if she can't figure it out herself. She's a former preschool teacher, so the idea of "hey, let's learn how to do something new today!" permeates her life.

I remember the day years ago when older dd suddenly realized that Rapunzel was taken away from her mother. She was horrified. We stopped mid-story, I tried to interest her in coming up with new endings for the story (she wasn't interested), and we simply led a Rapunzel-free life for several years.

:lurk5: We've been discussing this same card. I hope someone chimes in.

My first thought, also.

Pets teach us a lot about grace. Some pets are much more effective teachers than a host of televangelists (not that that's setting the bar very high). I must admit, I'm sorry I missed the original post. Sounds like a doozy. Although deep in my heart I'm betting we could match or beat it here.

Many happy returns of the day to your dd! And that cake is fabulous!

So, I was just at Webster and they were having their on-campus auditions for their conservatory programs in acting and musical theater (side note: kids were obviously coached on being nice to EVERYONE while on campus because it all counts -- they were smiling at and talking to me when I was just a random person hanging out in the hallway reading ktgrok's latest book). And I was eavesdropping like crazy, of course, while the kids were talking about where they were from and where all they were auditioning. We could pretend that it was research for everyone here, but, really, I'm just nosy like that. One girl noted that the 3 high schools in her school district had a unified "season" of 15 shows that everyone from all 3 high schools auditioned for at once -- about 300 students in all. She said it was a really great program. I think she was from Wisconsin. On the other hand, a girl from Houston noted that her very large high school had very little to offer insofar as theater, and the teachers/staff didn't even really "get" why she was going all over auditioning to get into schools because it was so foreign to the school culture. However, she said Houston itself has some really good programs that aren't associated with the public schools. It really pointed up the huge variety of experiences one can have with theater in the public schools.

Our favorite way to eat collard greens is as a side -- caramelize onion, then stir in chopped fresh greens. Cover with pan lid to let them steam a bit in the water that was left on them from washing. So much better than kale, trust me. Serve any leftovers with eggs the next morning, as LucyStoner reminded me.

Our area has several options for youth community theatre. It's possible to be in several musicals and plays year round just using that option. They (the youth community theatre programs) tend to draw the kids that are really, really interested in theatre and who also participate in their schools' programs. As far as school productions, the private schools have some of the better productions around here. The boys-only schools have openings for girls to be in their shows, and vice versa with girls' schools looking for guys. Again, that draws in the students from all over the metropolitan area who are really, really interested in performing arts. The local community theatre scene is pretty vibrant overall. Aside from established groups that have been around for years and years, there's a new group that focusses on giving opportunities to college-age and mid-twenties for directing, choreography, lighting, etc. Most of their roles go to college kids, but younger dd snagged a couple of roles in the past few months, including one that she didn't audition for -- they contacted her and asked if she could take the role. Overall she's been in 4 musicals in the past 9 months, plus one ballet. I'm enjoying the break right now where we aren't involved in any shows!