Word: grassed
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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...just what is meant by an "individual"? A patch of grass that spread from a single seed may be considered an individual organism. The same is true with fungi, which, incidentally, are now looked upon as a kingdom separate from plants and animals. Complicating matters is the fact that pieces of the A. bulbosa may have broken off over the millenniums. If so, do the pieces count as one organism or many? There's no agreed upon answer, says Clive Brasier, a British botanist. Insisting on a yes or no, he says, "gets to be a Guinness Book of Records...
With ILM at the console, who needs reality? "We have conquered the physical properties of nature," Williams declares. "We can do tree bark; we can do grass blowing and water rippling. But we have only begun with computer- generated humans." At the moment, special-effects experts have trouble making the skin look authentic, and, as Williams notes, "hair is hard." Not to worry; just to wait. "A real human being -- I think we'll get it," he says. "Not much is impossible...
...good on paper. But then they built the glass dome and a little too much light began to shine on the project. Players taking batting practice under the dome were so blinded by the glare that four glass panels had to be painted white. That, in turn, killed the grass. The grounds keeping compromise that artificially grew out of this crisis--Astroturf--haunts the national pastime to this...
...when the purists have finished gazing longingly at the historic red brick building, they can fix their eyes on the grass (home grown, one Oriole official reminded me, in Salisbury on Maryland's Eastern Shore) in right-center field, where the parents of legendary Yankees' slugger Babe Ruth once reportedly ran a tavern...
Even joining a grass-roots movement won't make any difference. When I asked a press officer in the Santa Monica, Calif. office of Jerry Brown about the new stadium, he scornfully replied that the former California governor has more important things to worry about...