Today I was grateful I didn’t have a nine-to-five job. It meant I was able to go to the Ontario Science Centre with Ryland, a friend from Australia. He’s heading west on Saturday to begin working in Banff for the ski season so today was one of the last days we could meet up.
I haven’t got a handle on dressing weather-appropriate yet. It got to about 9 degrees today, with a beautiful clear blue sky. I resisted wearing my fluffy jacket that Glen loves so much because it didn’t look that cold outside. I wore a thinner jacket instead and regretted it once I started walking to the train station. But then again, in the subway it’s warm, as it was on the bus and in the Science Centre so really I was dressed fine.
We arrived at exactly the same time, which was handy, and then headed in. I’ve been to the Science Centre before but that was just to check out the video game exhibition and nothing else. This time we got to explore everything.
I love the forest growing around the building that you see out the window as you walk across the walkway or descend the escalators. Fall is well and truly here with the trees’ leaves having turned a vibrant yellow.
We played with the hands-on activities (a pretty big area for all this), making paper planes, a short stop-motion film of a plane crashing into a tower and killing the dinosaurs, and then Ryland and one of the demonstrators had a bit of a jam session on a keyboard that was connected to a black thing that showed you the vibrating sound. Very cool.
We were shown how to make paper and then checked out a planetarium show. Ryland talked to the operator because he wanted to compare their system and programs to the ones he did for Scitech outreach. After that we tried out the Chinese water bowl (you wet your hands and rub the handles of the metal bowl to match its vibrations, make sound and watch the water shimmer). A lot of fun.
Quick bite to eat then a look at the living exhibits and through an outdoor/indoor rainforest. Humidity in there was something else. My glasses fogged instantly.
More hands-on stuff before checking out the last exhibition about scientific bias and points of view. Impressive exhibition that I felt discussed some of the darker side of scientific studies and how bias (or prejudices) have been justified with scientific (or pseudo-scientific) research. I also found out that of 92,428 people who took a physical characteristics test (eye/hair colour, ability to smell freesia or roll your tongue), only 27 others were like me.
Oh, and in another section I learned that the more alluring you find a potential mate’s smell, the more dissimilar that person’s DNA is to your own. Isn’t that amazing?
We finished up about 3:30, caught a bus and train home (The bus driver asked if we were tourists because I put my arm out to signal the bus. Apparently people here don’t do that.) and said our goodbyes. With any luck, Glen and I will head over to Banff sometime in the next seven months to see Ryland and go skiing.
A great day.
Travels with Dan 
What do you say, eh?