‘Geek’ with the library at the Delaware Arts Festival

T he Delaware Arts Fes­ti­val is only a few days away, and I hope you are plan­ning to attend. Stop by the “Geek the Library” booth to let us know what you “geek” (are pas­sion­ate about.) The libraries of Sun­bury, Ash­ley and Delaware have col­lab­o­rated on the “Geek the Library” cam­paign, and we hope you’ll become a part of it. Telling us what you “geek” is fun and you’ll be sur­prised at what fel­low Delaware Coun­tians “geek,” too!

As you are admir­ing the tal­ents of the rep­re­sented artists at the Arts Fes­ti­val, and hope­fully adding some beau­ti­ful pieces of art to your own col­lec­tion, please plan a visit to the Delaware County Dis­trict Library’s Main Branch at 84 E. Win­ter St., to enhance your Arts Fes­ti­val experience.

The library will be filled from floor to ceil­ing with art projects from the community’s best and bright­est high school art stu­dents. The festival’s juried art show has been dis­played at the library for dozens of years, and each year, the qual­ity of the projects seems to only get bet­ter. From rings and bracelets to por­traits and pho­tog­ra­phy, the show has some­thing for every­one to “ooh” and “ahh” over.

When you’re at the library, drop by the Friends of the Library’s mas­sive Bar­gain Book Fair in the garages on the south side of the Library. Thou­sands of hard­cover and paper­back books for teens, chil­dren and adults, as well as mag­a­zines, DVDs and video­cas­settes are priced to sell. You’ll find trea­sures galore at rock bot­tom prices. The bar­gain book fair is open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sat­ur­day, May 19, and and from noon to 3 p.m. Sun­day, May 20.

The Delaware Arts Fes­ti­val week­end is always a grand time. I hope to see you there.

Are all clown fish born male?

Clown­fish, like Nemo in “Find­ing Nemo” are sequen­tial her­maph­ro­dites, mean­ing that they develop into males first, and when they mature, they become females, accord­ing to The Fresh and Salt Water Fishes of the World. If the female clown­fish is removed from the group, such as by death, one of the largest and most dom­i­nant males will become a female. The remain­ing males will move up a rank in the hier­ar­chy. In a group of clown­fish, there is a strict dom­i­nance hier­ar­chy. The largest and most aggres­sive female is found at the top. Only two clown­fish, a male and a female, in a group repro­duce through exter­nal fer­til­iza­tion. Clown­fish lay eggs on any flat sur­face close to their host anemones. In the wild, clown­fish spawn around the time of the full moon. Depend­ing on the species, clown­fish can lay hun­dreds or thou­sands of eggs. The male par­ent guards the eggs until they hatch about six to 10 days later, typ­i­cally two hours after dusk.

What is the dif­fer­ence between a cau­cus and a primary?

In pres­i­den­tial cam­paigns, a cau­cus is a sys­tem of local gath­er­ings where vot­ers decide which can­di­date to sup­port and select del­e­gates for nom­i­nat­ing con­ven­tions. A pri­mary is a statewide vot­ing process in which vot­ers cast secret bal­lots for their pre­ferred can­di­dates. The Annen­berg Pub­lic Pol­icy Cen­ter pro­vided this information.

How does an Etch-A-Sketch work?

When you turn the Etch-A-Sketch upside down and shake it, the inside sur­face of the screen gets coated with alu­minum pow­der, which will stick to almost any­thing (mixed in with the pow­der are small poly­styrene beads, which help it flow evenly and keep it from cak­ing). Also inside are hor­i­zon­tal and ver­ti­cal bars con­nected by thin steel wires to the knobs on the face of the toy. A sty­lus is mounted where the two bars cross, so when you turn a knob, it moves its bar and the bar moves the sty­lus. As described in Weird and Wacky Inven­tions, when the sty­lus moves across the inside sur­face of the screen, it scrapes off the alu­minum pow­der and cre­ates a dark line on the light gray screen, which is just the dark­ness of the toy’s inte­rior set against the lighter alu­minum powder.

If you have a ques­tion that you would like to see answered in this col­umn, mail it to Mary Jane San­tos, Delaware County Dis­trict Library, 84 E. Win­ter St., Delaware, OH 43015, or call us at 740–362-3861. You can also email your ques­tions by vis­it­ing the library’s web site at delawarelibrary.org or directly to Mary Jane at mjsantos@delawarelibrary.org . No mat­ter how you con­tact us, we’re always glad you asked!

Posted by Mary Santos on May 11 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Comments can be made below.