Hotter days: does our planet have a fever?

Solar flare composite image by NASA / JAXA

The world did not end in 2012. There was no magnetic pole reversal or solar flare catastrophe. But for one country at least, 2012 was a marked year of solar intensity and extreme weather. The United States (excluding Hawaii and Alaska) experienced its warmest year, by far, in 2012 since records began 118 years ago says the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency (NOAA). NOAA scientists also say the new record significantly sets itself apart from the rest of the data, breaking the last record set in 1998 by a full degree versus the much more typical fractions of a degree. Higher temperatures translate to extreme weather as both record years are also tagged as the United States’ two most extreme weather years.

Winds of change: my doomsday story

It’s January 2013 and I still report to my desk job the same as usual instead of somewhere underground sheltered from nuclear fallout or solar flares or other fantastic cataclysm (not that I have such an underground shelter to go to). December 21, 2012 came and went and the biggest headliner was about a looming fiscal cliff.

The declaration of the Higgs boson and what it means

This past Fourth of July was like most other Fourth of July holidays. It included getting up late, preparing an All-American meal (which turned out to be boiling some corn and cutting cubes of watermelon), swimming in the afternoon, and by late evening attending a fireworks show to commemorate the United States’ 236^th birthday. Little did I know, this fourth of July, in another part of the world a different historical event was taking place—the declaration of the Higgs Boson.

Larry Ellison buys an island in Hawaii

You probably haven’t been there before, to Lanai (pronounced La-nigh-ee). I myself have lived in Hawaii for 25 years now and I’ve never set foot on Lanai either. The island is and was privately owned for the last 100 years. Incidentally, the island of Niihau (pronounced knee-hee-ow) is also privately owned, first purchased from the Kingdom of Hawaii by Elizabeth Sinclair in 1864. Her descendants, the Robinson family, still own the island today. So it’s no surprise that I haven’t set foot on Niihau either.