Category: Miscellaneous
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Longest Place Names in Canada
Geographers have an unusual sense of humor that they like to slip it into official online publications. Previously I reviewed an instance of that provided by the government of Australia. Now I would like to focus on Canada. So let’s talk about Natural Resources Canada. It’s a government organization that maintains a database of Canadian…
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San Francisco Chronicle Geography Quiz
I’ve been holding this one in reserve for awhile in case I needed an “easy” topic, and I really need one today for reasons I’ll explain later. The San Francisco Chronicle has been holding a geography quiz for several years. There aren’t any prizes, just matters of pride, and it’s a lot of fun figuring…
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Where in the World?
UPDATE: Google purchased Picasa in 2004 and discontinued it in 2016. Unfortunately the website and this game are no longer available. This article remains here for historical purposes. I’ve come across another addictive geography game that’s occupied way too much of my time lately. I found it on the Picasa website and they call it…
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Charlottesville Beer Trail
EDITOR’S UPDATE: THIS ARTICLE WAS WRITTEN IN 2009. THE LOCAL BEER SCENE HAS GROWN AND CHANGED CONSIDERABLY SINCE THAT TIME. Email traffic began to pick up late last summer on the DC-Beer Listserv. Another brewpub was about to open in the rolling hills west of Charlottesville. Of course, Breweries and brewpubs had been sprouting up…
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Center of the Universe
Colonel William R. Wallace built a pioneering homestead within a narrow valley in the northern Idaho panhandle. However, he probably didn’t realize he’d settled at the Center of the Universe. We can forgive that. In 1884 he couldn’t possibly have know he was sitting atop a billion ounces of silver either, or next to what…
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Shirts Around the World
This odd geography fixation of mine is nothing new. It’s been pretty much a lifelong commitment. I was leafing through a photo shoebox a few days ago and I stumbled across a faded envelope that I hadn’t given much thought to in several years. It contained an interesting collection of photos from the early 1990’s…
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Bad Signs
I spent most of the day preparing my Federal income taxes so I’m not in much of a mood to think of anything profound. I swear the tax code gets more complicated every year. My brain has nothing left to give. Come back in a couple of days and I promise I’ll have a topic…
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Need a Time Waster?
I come across all sorts of interesting resources and reference tools as I flesh-out my story ideas. Some are useful or stimulating, or simply entertaining. I wade through a lot of trash, too but I toss those aside. Fortunately that’s not the case today. Here are a couple of sites that are — dare I…
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Junk Drawer
This isn’t a real entry. I have some random topics that I need to empty from the junk drawer. None of these would be sufficient to stand alone but you may find the collected results somewhat interesting. Statue of Freedom Did you ever wonder about the statue at the top of the United States Capitol…
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Dear Wasilla
An Open Letter to an Anonymous reader. Dear Wasilla, Few people from Alaska visit Twelve Mile Circle. When an Alaska visitor lands here she’s usually landing from Juneau, no doubt because a bunch of pages on my travel site focus there. So I take notice with when a non-Juneau Alaska visitor drops by. Regular readers…