Trick Your Brain (ya know, for fun!)

Ever wanted to have the effects of a drugged out hallucination without the drugs? Well if so, you are not alone. Apparently, sending your mind into fits of giddy paroxysm is scientific and also fun. So go ahead. Wig out... the natural way.

Leap Second??

Marvel at the ingenuity of modern man. This year will be one second longer than last year. What are you gonna do with your extra second on December 31st? I think I'm gonna go for a longer new Year's kiss. Awh, Yaah!

Happy Birthday, Voyager I

Guess who else turned 30 this year? Voyager I, and it's still out there sending us pictures. Imagine this, it's 9.5 billion miles away and takes 13 hours to send its signal (at light speed) to earth. That puppy wandered far! Keep up the good work, little space Voyager! (Get this, they even included a record of "earth sounds" for extraterrestrials to listen to to get to know our planet. Wasn't that thoughtful?

If I've told you once, I've told you a thousand times...

Nagging doesn't work.

Happy Pi Day

Pi Day

Feel like celebrating the mystical union between a circle's circumference and its diameter? Then today is the day for you! Have a piece of pi, or something...

(stolen from Andrew on Multiply)

Crunchy Critters = Entomophagy

The study of bugs as lunch is called entomophagy. The study covers all human and non-human aspects of insects gettin' et up. I am directing you to a wikipedia page, but if you are fragile, do not read the section entitled "unintentional entomophagy." You have been warned.

You learned something new today I bet! : )

Monday Mayhem

Weird. You ever wake up and find things have moved around you without you having any recollection of moving them? This morning when I finally awoke, my bedside table clock was on the covers beside me and the lid on my chapstick was off and the chapstick was standing vertically on the table. I don't remember completing any of those actions.

Not as good, apparently, as a co-worker who on Friday woke up wearing a completely different outfit than the one she went to bed in.

Has this ever happened to you? Are these the early stages of sleep walking?

I'll take the Hybrid...

So, finally, concept cars with fuel cell capability are becoming less of a "concept" and more of a "car." I have been waiting for something realistic and approachable (although price-wise, I'm sure it is anything but approachable) to appear on the car and driver scene. Ford unveiled its Edge with HySeries Drive (registered trademark). I don't care what a car looks like so long as it can drive up to 400 miles with zero emissions! Don't act like you are not impressed! Just go ahead and wish you had one.

No doubt there are drawbacks, like running out of electricity on the side of the road, or ending up someplace where you have to plug it in for four hours before you can drive again (is that really true? how annoying!), but, still, gasoline is such a brutal taskmaster that I'd love to see the human race get out from under its thumb.

Mmmm, efficiency!

Cold Eeze and the Smells We Love

OK, now I'm worried...

I better get my smell back after this cold dies down!

Clever Octopus

One for the "how do they do that?" file.
(click pic)

Spittle

At what temperature does spittle freeze as it flies through the air to the ground from a height of twenty feet? This question is not important scientifically. Nor will it (probably) ever matter in our lifetimes (although there could be an instance in which someone will need to hit a target across a freezing torture chamber of spit/ice that will release a secret lever and allow one of my blog readers to escape with their life and consequently save the life of countless others... although I doubt it). However, let the geniuses of the internet sort out the details. Spit first, ask questions later.

IMAGINATION STATION

Close your eyes for a moment (well, not right now. Wait till you've read the whole paragraph) and imagine this: a ball of fire in a vast empty space. Spend at least ten seconds picturing this ball of fire. (Now close your eyes)

Done?

Good!


I used to do these stupid self-analyzation games with my family, but this isn't one of them. It's just a simple exercise to appreciate how people imagine things differently. Realistically, we all spin around the same ball of fire on a yearly basis. It's sort of our point of reference, but there is no indication that we will all recreate that same ball of fire in our minds when given the freedom.
Now answer these three questions for yourself and the fireball in your own head: What color was it? How big (relatively) was it? How high were the flames or eruptions, if there were any?

Huh?

One for the "what is it?" file:

Pop Quiz!

What is the "mineral" in mineral oil?

"I know better now..."

...But when I was a kid, my sister told me that lightning bugs kept lightbulbs lit and when the bulbs went out it was because the bug had died. She had me feeling bad for lightbulbs for over two years.

Found a lovely website with countless similar stories from people all over the world. you can browse and read or add your own. Here's a couple of my faves:

"I used to believe that once you got out of Pre-school you instantly went to work and worked in the same profession as your father. On the day we had a little pre-school graduation thing I went up to my father and started crying telling him I was a failure and would have to be homeless because I didn't know how to be an accountant." ~Nick

"When I was about 4 years old I thought it was such an amazing coincidence that all singers could actually sing." ~Andrea

"When I was younger I used to believe that the sparkly sidewalks, instead of having something added to the concrete to make them sparkly, was actually millions of tiny ant paparazzi. I would hide my face as I walked over it." ~Jason

Spacial

It's Friday and I'm in the mood to just space out. Here's something pretty to play with while we're all waiting for brain cells to grow (which of course, we all know they don't [or do they?]). Fun.

Every Woman's Nightmare

I squirmed reading this. Another great reason for multi-party government.

Better Baby Bottle Builder

Fascinated by this baby bottle that apparently keeps air out of the baby's tummy. Unlike most others. Dr. Brown's are a swear-by from people who use them. Their babies don't spit up all over everything.

Of course, they're also a pain to clean!

You can be my baby

...it don't matter if you're Black or White.

Zoological Fact of the Day

The average adult porcupine has 30,000 quills.