In a year and a half as a full-time freelancer, writing articles all the time, this is the third piece I’ve had come out in print. I mean, actual paper that you can hold in your hands. (The others were in AAA Living magazine and The Chronicle of Higher Education.) Everything else has been online only. That says a lot about the changing media world, doesn’t it? Unfortunately, that means it’s a little inconvenient to read this one – you need to find a paper copy of the June 25 issue of Science, or, if you’re a subscriber, you can read it here.

Photo: Patrick Giraud

You know what? Thanks, random advertiser, but I can find my own experts. I wonder if there are reporters who use services like this? I find google gets me a long way.

Many more Maru videos here. And thanks to CuteOverload (who else?) for introducing me to Maru.

Of course, as a science writer, I was excited about this…and I spent way too long crafting my explanatory message to the building listserv. It was like writing a consumer health story! I told everyone: Here’s the situation, here’s what it means to you, here’s what you should do if you have this problem.

I thought I’d share it here, too, so it doesn’t go to waste.

A super-competent Verizon technician was just here fixing my phone line, and he explained what the heck is going on!

The basic problem is that the box that brings in the phone lines from outside is this funky kind of box that Verizon was thinking about switching over to a few years ago – presumably about the time this building was built. Verizon decided not to go that way, but we already had one. (If you ever happen to be in the Telcom room, it’s the pair of gray boxes all the way on the right, “Krone” brand.)

The box requires a special tool to punch a line in. He said what’s probably happening is, a tech comes out here and doesn’t have the correct tool, so he jams the wire in there some other way. The wire is making contact, so there’s a dial tone, but the connection is loose. Then if somebody else comes and works in the box – like happened Monday, when they connected [neighbor]’s line – and they jostle it a little, my wire will fall out again. (No worries, [neighbor], it would’ve happened sooner or later anyway.)

My connection is now so messed up from the techs forcing it, there’s no way to get the wire to stay in. He fixed my problem by hard-wiring my phone line to the outside line. Now, it’s possible that your phone went out as a result of his working in there. If that happens, I have his cell phone number.

So the immediate problem is that some techs are coming out without the correct tool. But the more basic problem is that we have a stupid Krone box. The tech is going to tell his supervisor that we should get a different box…but he says we shouldn’t hold our breaths. He was talking to [building manager] about this when I left.

Useful tip: If you’re calling the Verizon tech support line and the computer voice is insisting she can solve your problems just as well as a human can, and you do not wish to waste your time in such a manner, I think the magic word is “representative.” (But shouting and swearing works, too.)

Summary of epic Verizon problems: Every time they send a technician to my building to do anything in the telecom closet, they disconnect my phone (and, by extension, my internet). Monday morning my phone went out. Tuesday evening a technician came out and fixed my phone. Wednesday afternoon a technician came to fix some other problems. (Possibly caused by the guy who came Tuesday.) And guess what: my phone got disconnected.

Yeah, I’m pretty frustrated.

Here’s my favorite shot:

I like the stumpy tree, valiantly blooming.

Hey Helen, would you please write a blog explaining how geologists can tell where an earthquake’s epicenter is? Are there things stuck in the ground all over the earth? How did they get there? Are they always watching? It kinda weirds me out to think about it.

I took a stab at explaining it on Facebook, based on my foggy memories of 10th grade earth science, then asked friend and fellow science writer Naomi Lubick, who actually has a degree in geology, if she could handle this one. And she did! Here’s her blog post: How to find an earthquake.

The short version: The earthquake sends out waves in all directions, and seismometers measure the waves. If you know when the waves arrive at each place, you can calculate where they came from. But go read Naomi’s post for more about earthquakes, like pretty maps and links and stuff.

I grew up on Tom Lehrer records. Of course, the kids of today, or at least the ones with cool parents, are growing up on the songs of They Might Be Giants. So, here’s a new song about elements – which, I have to admit, is a lot more educational than the Tom Lehrer one.

Fun with science!

She goes through the whole history, from Hildegard von Bingen, who wrote down about 1,000 words of a language called “Lingua Ignota,” through a 17th-century English guy who thought he could cut away the ambiguity of English by organizing everything, on to the guy who invented Esperanto in the late 19th century and the language fans today who develop their own languages and share them on the internet just for the heck of it. It’s a great read – lots of fun, with human stories and plenty of fun language facts.

Being a language nerd herself, she also decided she had to get her first-level certification in Klingon, which turns out to be a really difficult language. It’s got crazy word order and is agglutinative, which means you glom suffixes and prefixes onto roots to make big long words that can be whole phrases. (“If it’s in your way, knock it down” is two words.) Even the linguist who invented Klingon doesn’t speak it very well. When he introduces new words and phrases, he has to be careful not to make mistakes, because the real Klingon speakers will catch them. He’s gotten good at explaining them away. (Ah, well, see, when Klingons make formal toasts, they’re using an obsolete word order.)

She mentioned, without explaining, “ergativity” as something some languages have. I looked it up and found this blog post. Um…I’m still confused. I mean, Japanese was tough and all, but at least it’s not ergative.

So. Good book. And sooner or later I’ll get back to my own language nerdiness and bring the Dictionary of the Week back from hiatus.