I'm in love with a muon detector

Something exists on our planet, that "spends its time "silently counting cosmic flotsam called muons" – ghost particles that ceaselessly rain down from space".

This thought is very soothing right now. And not only that, but this silent muon counter is branching out beyond its principle astrophysics specialism. When repurposed, muon counters can see inside thick stone, can discern intricacies of structure inside an archaeological ruin that has long been reclaimed by the rainforest. So they're using it as a non-invasive archaeological tool to pick out detail of the interiors of mayan ruins that currently lie beneath thick green mounds throughout the Amazon rainforest, without tearing them apart. They just sit the muon detector by the side of the mound, and it quietly goes about listening, counting and mapping. Far out.

Oh this year I'm off to sunny Spain

Interesting story here about drought in Spain, and the revelation of a medieval village from the dry depths of an erstwhile reservoir. It's interesting to me because when I was in Spain in the last couple of weeks, I made a trip to Tortosa, a smallish town of 30,000 a couple of hours on the train south of Barcelona. There, I heard that their local reservoir was threatened with being pumped out north to Barcelona, to hydrate the city, leaving the Tortosans dry. The local community were up in arms, particularly when they heard that some of the designated uses were for a waterland theme park and hotel.

When I spent a couple of weeks at a renewable energy plant in west Denmark a few years ago, one of the engineers joked to me over dinner one evening that Ireland was soon going to be making a lot of money from exporting its rivers and lakes to countries that are drying up fast. We still complain endlessly about the rain here, and take to sunny Spain in droves, seeking heat, seeking sun.