YOU REMEMBER THE FEELING from when you were a kid: Just past the top of the highest point of the track, the roller-coaster car falls away, taking the pit of your stomach with it.
Sometimes honesty pays. Midway through his public-funding pitch to a committee of angel investors, Peter Hixson described his company as “a three-man baseball team,” then shrugged and said, “I have no experience with taking a company from $1 million to $5 million.”
AT THE CURRENT RATE of about 3,000 square nautical miles a year, it will take the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration more than 160 years to accurately survey the country’s 500,000 square nautical miles of vital commercial waters.
Despite a potentially devastating year for wine grape growing because of erratic weather, early word from Oregon vineyards is that the 2008 crop is shaping up to be better than expected.
On a windless morning this past September, Oregon State University researchers towed a prototype wave energy buoy off the coast of Newport and dropped anchor.