Entries associated with the tag "Nature Museum":

The Notebaert Nature Museum is looking for artists to present, perform, or otherwise communicate something about lawns. "What does the lawn mean to you?" writes strategic projects manager Shane DuBow. "Tyranny of the suburbs? Nostalgic recollections of the lawn-mowing business you started in your youth? A metaphor for.... what? We're open to any and all of your inspirations and we've also included some ideas we're looking to assign." Read the whole request for proposals here or here (both PDF).

If you're too literal-minded or too lazy to make their October 31 deadline, you might still enjoy peeking in the new book Lawn People: How Grass, Weeds, and Chemicals Make Us Who We Are by former midwesterner Paul Robbins, now associate professor of geography at the University of Arizona in Tucson. I haven't seen the book, but Robbins's website (scroll down) mentions a counterintuitive finding:

"This research explores the social and economic motivation of lawn owners. Initial conclusions suggest that wealthy well educated people use chemicals most frequently and that people who claim concern for the environment are disproportionately likely to use chemical inputs."

Why did a baby-boomer emeritus prof tell the Illinois Times that the reason students at the University of Illinois at Springfield don't protest the war much is lack of faculty leadership?

How could the Notebaert Nature Museum design a comfortable, spacious lecture hall without curtains -- so that no one can see slides or PowerPoint presentations on sunny days?  [This one's been answered by spokesperson Heidi Kise. Most of the events in the South Gallery are in the evening, she says; Saturday was the first daytime lecture usage, and they'll need to devise a fix for future daytime events.]

(After having belatedly viewed An Inconvenient Truth) How do you suppose George W. Bush would have spent the last six years if he had lost the closest presidential election in American history?

If low taxes go with more liberty, how is it that the slaveholding South had lower taxes than the free-labor North? (Historian Robin Einhorn has some ideas.)

What does Lynn Becker know that you don't, and why is he warning about "the effective end of landmark protection in the city of Chicago"?

If the Republicans are the party of ideas, why are they running more than 90 percent negative ads, most attacking opponents' character, rather than advocating privatizing Social Security and sending more troops to Iraq?

Why did the Tribune's otherwise admirable Thursday editorial, "If the bosses get away with this," fail to mention Richard M. Daley? Do the editors imagine that Cook County dauphin Todd Stroger was crowned against Daley's will?