Cougars & Mustangs 

They say that people vacation to get away from it all. Far away from technology, underneath skies of cell phone reception-blocking treetops, biding time in quiet old cabins filled with mice. It’s the good life.

But all is not as it seems. In fact, our friends at the technologically advanced Cal Poly campus seem out to prove, however unintentionally, that a bit of number crunching and innovative design could lead to probably the best vacation ever.

For example: A common and much-beloved family vacation is the age-old tradition of visiting family members. Soaking up family history while making even newer memories to share is very culturally important and is also very emotionally enriching. But what if you decided that the account you have of where you came from could be even more complete? Cal Poly’s Technology Park, an on-campus area where technology-based businesses take space to collaborate with students toward development and application of technology, recently gained its newest tenant, Linkpendium, which formed after the merger of the popular genealogical websites RootsWeb and Ancestry.com. It helps trace family history and has already indexed more than 10 million sources of genealogical information. Perhaps the clues to some stunning piece of your family’s back-story lie in the increasingly developed indexes. It’s practically a road trip lurking in the shadows, waiting to happen!

When you find yourself at the shore of a great body of water, you will no doubt be tempted to go for an adventure. However, times can be tough, and cutting down trees to make a raft is generally frowned upon in national parks. Luckily for you, that cement you were going to use to build a parking lot where you were planning to cut down those trees can still be put to good use—and by good use I mean better than sticking your hands in outside of movie theaters to convince people you’re famous. A team of clever Mustangs has earned Cal Poly its third consecutive gold win at the National Concrete Canoe Championship, a prestigious event. Their canoe, Prospector, inspired by the California Gold Rush, won them first place in three of the event’s four categories and third place in a fourth. Video footage and other information can be found at asce.org/concretecanoe. Congrats, Mustangs!

As for me, I’m going to figure out how well Lasik eye surgery equipment works as a method of hot dog cooking. Yum!

Intern Chris White-Sanborn is aerodynamically trained. Ask him if he knows what those big words mean at [email protected].