Tag: pennsylvania

AWEA06: by the river (or in it, nearly)

by a river at AWEA06

We’re not getting the best weather for the conference, but I hear that the coincidentally-running Three Rivers Arts Festival has had rain 18 out of the 20 years it has run, so noone’s surprised.

Conference hasn’t quite started yet, but the preliminary swag is quite promising; yoyos and balsa aircraft.

I spent the day in workshop run by KidWind, who have a school science kit for teaching the basics of wind turbine effectiveness. We got to build wind turbines, and test them. Here’s mine, big wean that I am:
stewart's kidwind turbine

I guess I got some losses near the hub there, but at least it worked. I was the only developer type there (there was a DoE person, and lots and lots of Pennsylvania teachers). I came away impressed, and hope I can work with Michael Arquin of KidWind to bring the project to Ontario.

(This post has the worst GPS location ever; could only get a fix to within 100m, so that’s why the map location appears to be in the river.)

Uncle Doug’s gift of a journey

Catherine’s Uncle Doug died suddenly last week at his home in central Pennsylvania. His nephew, Phil, was with him when he died. As we’re the nearest (geographical) family, Phil asked us to come down to help out with tidying up Doug’s house.

We drove down Saturday, and what an remarkable journey it was. The US immigration folks friendly and helpful at Buffalo; sure beats the grouchfest at YYZ. Once into Pennsylvania, the scenery was beautiful. Hills, valleys and forests running down to the Alleghenies. Didn’t think there could be such crinkly countryside so close to the flat plains around Lake Erie.

Doug’s house was entirely self-designed and built. It sits very well in the green countryside. The nearby town of Huntingdon is as nice a town as you could hope for, with a working main street that looks like it has escaped the ravages of Wal-Mart.

So, we’ll miss you very much, Doug, but thanks for the journey.