CSIRO Discovery

Dot and I have travelled south to Canberra for two weeks over Easter to look after Max during the school holidays and we've had a good time so far. Max is a handful who needs constant stimulation, but in some senses that's easy in Canberra for much of the time. Last Thursday, for example, we took him to the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation's (CSIRO's) Discovery exhibition near the Australian National University (ANU - Emily's university). It's designed for kids of all ages and has lots of displays with knobs on or other things to do. So he can look through microscopes, touch and feel materials, look at jars containing deadly spiders, see short films or whatever.

At one point, all the kids were summoned to a theatre with cushions on the ground where they sat as attendants brought our some wildlife to hold or pat. The two pictures here show Max with a mouse and a turtle, but there were also stick insects to hold - just Max's cup of tea. He loved the mice, which were then put in a race (he put his hand up to 'win' a racing mouse, but lost out), and the long-necked turtles, which were also fast on their feet.

As for the stick insects, we asked nicely at reception to see if they had one to spare. And, yes (!), they gave Max an elderly gentleman stick insect, now called sticky, to take home in a plastic container. He's got instructions in how to keep it alive in a glass case. He has to feed it new eucalyptus (gum) leaves every couple of days and sprinkle water into the container. It's still going strong and quite impressive! I mentioned that if bits broke off the body (say a leg) he would need sticky tape to put it together again, but Max couldn't see the joke. At what age do kids understand puns?

AS