Wacky things I heard this week

When studying American history, one usually starts off the school year learning about all the explorers who... you know, explored. I myself remember having a bit of trouble matching up the explorer to the accomplishment. My daughter, however, has taken the cake. While eating dinner at our map-covered table, I thought I'd take an impromptu moment to review with her. Tracing the route from Portugal, around Africa, all the way to the Indian Ocean with my finger, I asked her, "Which explorer is famous for finding this route?" Her reply, "Carmen Sandiego!"

Here's a great place to see how those crazy explorers found their ways around.
European Voyages of Exploration It illustrates quite clearly how these wonderful discoveries came about. When you look at these maps, it seems like these discoveries were building on one another, and bound to happen sooner or later, but isn't that the way of so many advances in technology and science?