New Card - The Netherlands

On the same day as my card from Poland arrived, I was surprised to find yet another card in my mailbox! This one's from The Netherlands. The front of the card reads, "Want to get some fresh air? Yes, No?"

New Card - Poland

This card from Michael in Poland arrived on Mom's birthday, 4/27/10.

New Card - Finland

I received a new card last night, 4/26/10, from Terhi in Finland. She described how two boats sunk in a nearby town from cracking under pressure from the surrounding ice. Sure am glad Tahoe doesn't freeze over!

Post Crossing

Another card! I received this one on April 24, from Beijing, China. The young man who sent it states in his online "About You" blurb that he's 27, and happens to be the most prolific Post Crossing card sender from China! According to the Post Crossing website, who keeps track of these things, he has been a member for approximately three years, and has sent 814 postcards! In return, he's received nearly as many. How cool!

Post Crossing - First Card Received!

I received my first postcard via Post Crossing on April 20, 2010, from Spain.

California Academy of Sciences

My mom and I visited the Cal Academy yesterday; I had secured tickets for a talk given by a herpetologist about Sao Tome, an equatorial oceanic island off the west coast of Africa. It is known for its unique biodiversity, as was exemplified by the wonderful pictures in the PowerPoint presentation.

We arrived shortly before noon, only to find a drastic parking situation (we took a small but pleasant hike to get to the Academy), and a building evacuated because of a fire alarm. As it was "Free Wednesday," there were TONS of people there, and it was drizzling. Not conducive to "no pushing, take your time..." We got inside and after scoping out postcards at the gift shop, headed upstairs for the talk. Our talk (by Dr. Bob Drewes and Roberta Ayres) will be posted in the near future online for all to see, courtesy of Fora.TV, a website (Fora TV). They host the video of many Cal Academy talks, of which there are more than 200 on their site already. Check it out!

After the talk we grabbed a bite to eat and visited the white alligator and his giant turtle buddies. We headed downstairs, hung out with the crazy cool seahorses, and pet some starfish. We headed upstairs, jumped in the super short line for the rainforest dome, and finally got to see the inside! The line has always been too long before. There were beautiful birds and butterflies, and lots of humidity. We then dashed off to spend the last ten minutes of their open hours in the Extreme Mammals exhibit upstairs. The creatures that inhabited this earth before us were GNARLY! They had teeth and tusks protruding at the oddest angles!

After we were tossed out at closing, we headed over to the Disney Museum in the Presidio, in search of cool Mickey postcards. We found them, thanks to Christina Toy and a great heads up! They too then closed, so we headed off to Pier 39, to visit the Parks Conservancy store. I'd been waiting to visit with great anticipation, since this store sells lenticular postcards of the various Parks locations (Muir Woods, Alcatraz, etc.). When we arrived, THEY WERE CLOSED! Even though their hours stated 8pm, they were locked up tight. I was super bummed, but while my mom had run off to chat with the sea lions nearby, the dude showed back up, saying that he left for a bite to eat. Thanks for sub-par use of the "Back in 10 minutes" sign, dork. In any case, they had awesome postcards, and pretty cool books/art/etc., so we hung out there for a while and then drifted across the walk to the Marine Mammal Store, which also carried some pretty cute postcards.

Hopefully sometime soon I can come back with more time and hang out on the pier a little more.

Picnic Day 2010 - UC Davis Fire Department

April 17, 2010 was Picnic Day on the UC Davis campus. The Fire Department opens its doors to visitors, and allows kids and adults alike to tour our station, climb on our rigs, and get a cute plastic fire helmet. Not surprisingly, they are very popular with all ages! I didn't work the event (budget cuts), but I did show up for the BBQ and stuck around for a while handing out plastic helmets.

UC Davis Fire Department Apparatus (without Truck 34)

My coworker Kim, passing out hats and Frisbees. We went through nearly 2,000 fire helmets!

Some kid, checking out the shiny red fire engine! (with Firefighter Gary)

Post Crossing

While not directly travel related, I have come across a cool website that promotes worldwide communication, one postcard at a time! And while I may not be able to visit every country on earth, I may be able to get a postcard from a great deal of them. The concept is simple:

1. request an address from the website
2. mail the postcard to the address
3. wait to receive a postcard
4. register the received postcard in the system

Why would someone do this, you might ask? The Post Crossing website sums it up nicely, "The element of surprise of receiving postcards from different places in the world (many of which you probably have never heard of) can turn your mailbox into a box of surprises - and who wouldn't like that?"

If I can receive mail that doesn't include a payment envelope inside, on a regular basis, I'm all for it! After all, isn't that why our grandmothers subscribed to all those quaint catalogs?

When you start out, you're limited to sending five postcards at a time. That way if you fail to send any, you aren't stringing along more than 5 people into thinking that they'll be receiving a card. After all, it used to suck as a kid to participate in a chain letter amongst your friends only to find out that no one else participated!

So far, I've sent five postcards. My recipients include a family in Croatia, university student in Taiwan, a website content manager in Moscow, a young stamp collector in India, and a female government retiree in Rhode Island who enjoys gardening and travelling (she's touring Switzerland and Italy this month). How exciting that I could learn about their interests and hobbies through a postcard.

I realize a postcard is a rather restrictive format in which to forge new bonds with other humans on our planet, but maybe that's to our benefit. After all, who wants to pen their life story for some random person far far away? (Probably the same crazies who keep a blog about their travels, stupid!)

In any case, I find the process cool, and have already begun to admire the postcards of others. The university guy in India is into FDCs. I had no clue what that was, other than an acronym for a fire department connection, and I figured that wasn't what he was into. First Day Covers are envelopes upon which postage stamps have been cancelled on their first day of issue. He keeps a blog, similar to mine, where he scans and uploads the images of letters (FDCs) mailed to him by other collectors. I was amazed at the different styles of envelopes, stamps, and cancellation marks from the various countries. Some were postcards from the US, sent from places I'd never seen or heard of.

I post all this in hopes that I will be able to share some of the cool cards I receive. I also hope that mentioning this cool website may offer a neat opportunity for my friends and family with kids in the home. I recall as a kid that receiving mail and packages from my older cousins and aunt and uncles was the greatest thing ever. According to the scrolling list of recently received postcard fronts (backs are never shown to keep addresses confidential), many participants are groups rather than individuals. It appears as though elementary school classes are participating, as evidenced by "Mrs. Smith's 4th Period Class" as a user name. This would be an awesome tool for school-aged kids to learn world geography!

If you're interested in reading more about Post Crossing, their website is: www.postcrossing.com