Twelve Mile Circle – An Appreciation of Unusual Places

Category: Event

  • Batten Down the Hatches

    I’ve been familiar with the phrase “Batten Down the Hatches” for so long that I can’t even recall when I first heard it. I’ve always understood it to derive from a nautical origin. However, in current usage it seems to mean a more general effort to prepare for the worst. One would want to cover…

  • Odds and Ends 5

    It’s been a long time since I’ve posted an “Odds and Ends” compilation. That’s where I combine lots of minor yet noteworthy topics that don’t provide enough material to stand on their own into one completely disjointed article. Frankly a lot of these miscellaneous topics have been going onto my social media sites lately so…

  • How Invasive

    I had a conversation recently with my friend the birder. He pointed out various bird species that happened to fly within line-of-site of our gathering, while noting which ones were native species and which ones were transplants. That led to discussions of various invasive animals introduced into North America either by accident or by design,…

  • Mainly Marathons

    I always have some kind of weird geography-related scheme bubbling in the back of my mind. I’m constantly on the search for creative ideas for new places to visit. So I have one brewing at the moment — don’t know if it will actually happen — although the potential is there and I’m considering the…

  • My Craziest Geo-Oddity Adventure Ever

    The adventure will have ended by the time you read this. I’m writing this several days ahead of time since I will be returning home when my WordPress software automatically posts this. I suspect I’ll also be dog-tired. The Auction This whole crazy thing started almost exactly a year ago. Steve Wood, the author of…

  • We Interrupt our Regularly Scheduled Programming

    Those 12MC readers expecting to see the results of Mexican foreshadowing will have to wait a little longer. It’s been a rather wild ride in the Washington, DC area over the last couple of days. The thermometer hit 104° Fahrenheit (40° c.) on Friday afternoon. That not only shattered a temperature extreme for the date,…

  • Space Shuttle Discovery Flyover

    We had a moment of excitement this morning when the Space Shuttle “Discovery” set atop a modified 747 jet airline flew right past my office window. Please excuse the low-quality photograph. I had only the camera on my mobile phone at the time and this was the best I could manage. Seeing it live with…

  • No Water Necessary

    The Henley Royal Regatta is perhaps the most famous boat race in the world. It takes takes place each year along a particularly straight segment of the River Thames at Henley-on-Thames, England (map). This huge sporting event features world-class competition and serves as a primary attraction in the summer social season. The regatta revels in…

  • Bad Boys Revisited

    Everybody sing along! “Bad boys, bad boys / Watcha gonna do / Watcha gonna do when they come for you?” That’s right, if I’m quoting lyrics from Inner Circle then I must be talking about the long-running television show COPS again. Apparently more 12MC readers are fans of COPS than I ever imagined when I…

  • Biggest Losers

    I’ve been playing around with the 2010 United States Census results by county again. This time I compared them to the previous decennial census conducted in 2000. This allows one to observe population shifts taking place over the prior decade. I tend to find more interest in the larger shifts, which is true I suppose…