On Sunday night, The Simpsons begins its 20th season. The show has won seven Environmental Media Awards for episodes like “The Bonfire of the Manatees” and “On a Clear Day I Can’t See My Sister.” And since National Geographic cares about the environment just as much as the Simpsons do, the time seemed right to interview a spokescharacter. The show runners offered up Lisa. True, she is a cartoon, with yellow skin and improbably spiked hair. But who could resist a chance to pose questions to the tree-huggingest Simpson of them all?

What is your family doing to “go green?”
Well, my Dad said his bald spot is “a solar panel for a love machine.”  I don’t know what that means, but I’m looking into whether we can hook it into the grid and get carbon credits.

What is your favorite (or least favorite) endangered animal?
I love all creatures, great and small... but if one had to go, I’d say mosquitoes.  I mean, they can really ruin an Earth Day.  Oh, now I feel so guilty.

Have you been able to convince your Dad to recycle his Duff beer cans?
Yes.  Though he was upset about having to dismantle his 80-foot “Beer-amid” as well as his “Duff Lite-House of Alexandria” and his “Colossus of Suds.”

Since nuclear power has low carbon emissions, do you now respect Mr. Burns?
You know what has really low carbon emissions and releases no radiation?  Wind power!  Sorry I lost my cool... you know what else is losing its cool?  THE EARTH!

Will the Simpsons ever become eco-tourists?
I don’t know.  My Dad loves to be a tourist, but hates anything eco.  So it could go either way.   

Does Maggie use disposable diapers?
Yes, and so does my Grampa.

Has Springfield been affected by climate change?
Yes, the most powerful greenhouse gases are escaping from me, Lisa Simpson.  Bart!  Get away from my computer!  Sorry about that.

Does your family subscribe to National Geographic?
No, but we’d read it in the library, if we ever went to the library, which we don’t because crazy homeless people hang out there, like my Grampa.

-Marc Silver

Faster than a speeding dogsled, the town of Wasilla, Alaska, has rocketed into the pop culture vernacular. Town officials didn’t return our calls, but that didn’t stop us from gathering up some useful information from sources like the U.S. census and the official Wasilla web site to help you prepare for the inevitable release of Trivial Pursuit: Wasilla Edition.

Namesake:
The town is named after Dena'ina Athabascan Indian Chief Wasilla. There’s debate among as to the origin of the word “Wasilla” itself, but prominent theories peg its meaning as "breath of air" in the Dena'ina Athabascan language. An alternative theory: It’s the Russian version of “William.”

Previously known as:
Knik (in 1917 the settlement of Knik became part of present-day Wasilla).

Current Population:
7,028

Median Age:
29.7

Median family income:
$53,792

Average home selling price:
$151,082 (a steal compared to $221,148 in Anchorage, an hour’s drive)

Largest Employer:
Wal-Mart (341 residents employed)

Most popular crime:
Larceny (318 incidents in 2007)

Reason you may have heard of Wasilla before last month:
Until things warmed up in 2002, the town was the official starting point of the Iditarod dogsled race.

Cost of a movie ticket:
$9.22

Cost of a sled dog ride at the town’s Iditarod Headquarters: $5

-Winona Dimeo-Ediger

Winona Dimeo-Ediger is an intern at National Geographic magazine. She is a fashion blogger.

The Large Hadron Collider, a giant new particle accelerator near Geneva, is set to be switched on for the first time next week. It's the world's largest particle accelerator; it will smash beams of protons into each other at really, really high speeds and look at the bits and pieces that come out of the collision.

Physicists hope to find the Higgs boson, a particle that theorists thought up in the 1960s but no machine has been able to detect. Until now. To learn more about the Higgs boson and the Large Hadron Collider, you could read "The God Particle," from the March 2008 issue of National Geographic.

Or you could watch this video. Because nothing goes together like hip-hop and particle physics.

— Helen Fields