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Found Objects

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No need to get overly excited, but the Mars Science Laboratory has uncovered something shiny and bright in the red Martian sand.

No doubt we’ll get many guesses and lots of speculation on this. Public interest will be whipped to a frenzy and Geraldo Rivera may be calling Space-X right now to see how soon they can get him on an outbound rocket. This find presents a marketable mystery on the same scale as Al Capone’s Vaults.

What IS that thing? NASA has determined the object is of Martian origin and not something that just fell off the rover. But … what?

My guess? Donald Trump’s cufflink.
Not of Martian origin? Think again!

Before they ruin our fun with science, identify the strange shiny object in the Martian dust!

99 thoughts on “Found Objects”

  1. Good morning. I’m hoping Dale’s guess is wrong. Donald Trump might be an alien from outer space, but I hope he hasn’t been mucking around on Mars. Trump is not one of my favorite persons. He is a real-estate developer. Has he been to Mars to corner the real-estate market there? I think that would not be good.

    If that shiny object is part of some manufactured object let’s hope it is from some advanced and highly intelligent person or people, not Trump. I hope it is the first evidence of a great civilization of wonderful Martians that are very different from Trump. It is probably just a bit of shiny rock, maybe a rock crystal or a bit of mica. I think it would be good if it is a completely unknown mineral that we don’t need so that no one will start making plans to dig big holes in Mars to extract this mineral.

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    1. I think it would be good if it were mica or some other relatively nonvaluable material, which might possibly(?) tell them something about geologic processes but would not inspire any sort of gold rush.

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      1. Okay, now we are getting some place. Steve is sure it is Amelia’s earring, but Clyde think it’s the Judge’s watch chain fob and then we have a Trump cufflink if Dale is right. I hadn’t heard of Judge Crater and found out he is a famous missing person. Amelia was a great pilot, but I don’t think she could make it to Mars. I don’t want it to be Trump. I think Clyde could be right. Someone didn’t like the Judge and sent him to a place he couldn’t be found up to now. I don’t know how they did it. He was never found and might have been given a very big send off by someone.

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        3. If Trump kidnaped the judge that might explain how the judge made it to Mars. Now that we suspect that Trump is an alien, it is possible he has a space craft he could use to transport the Judge to Mars.

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  4. Cap’n Billy’s gold tooth. He was silent there for quite a stretch, and had muscled someone into trying a pirate ship to that “Shiny Red Planet out there”. (The details are a little hazy.)

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  5. Perhaps it is a Martian art museum, a teeny tiny Weisman, for micro-sized Martian travelers. Martian transportation is based on tunnels rather than surface roads, you see, because of the terrain.

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    1. love the image. are there tunnells betwen all the silver shiny things or do they come up under the brown lumps also. im thinking those may be condos.

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  6. To me it looks like the Mars soil is not soil at all. I wouldn’t be surprised to discover that it’s actually brown sugar and those shiny dots are actually butter. If you look closely at the photo you’ll see some darker lumps, I think those might be small Sultana raisins.

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      1. Ironically, I’m one of the few baboons who really doesn’t care for sweets! But to answer your question, Steve, no I already had my breakfast: one round of Swedish crisp bread with cheese and a cup of coffee.

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  7. i think the truth will be kept form usu untile the deeds can be drawn up and the claims put in place that allow the gold rush to begin. i was hoping they wouldnt tell you about all the other pieces but it was obvious to me upon first sight that this is a huge pure gold nugget. the size of a ping pong ball. the fact that there is no water on mars has made the nuggets just sit on the surface without fear of beeing washed away. all you have to do is pick em and put em in your pocket we will name this field the paw paw patch. all we have to do is get there to stake our claim and those dag nab nasa guys arent selling any tickets. me and susie want to go.

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  8. OT – Public service announcement that may interest some baboons:
    Book sale this weekend sponsored by the Friends of the Golden Valley Library. Most books are 50 cents to $1.00. Address is 830 Winnetka Avenue North (next to McDonald’s). Hours today are 10:00 AM to 5:00 PM, Sunday noon to 3:00 PM.

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        3. Thanks for this tim. That guy is pretty amazing. I keep buying stringed instruments because they make it look so easy.

          Heard a joke last night: With the orchestra’s on strike in the twin cities, they are talking about bringing in the second strings………………….

          And another:
          A: Knock Knock
          Q: Who’s there
          A: Control freak. Now You say Control Freak who.

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      2. The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain has a number of videos…bunches of fun (wish they would tour here – I looked them up a while back, they were on tour, but closest date in the US was Michigan, as I recall).

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        1. Bought myself a Ukulele last year (based on Anna’s pink recommendation) and have been plunking on it. It’s right there– next to my banjo. And I have the tuner App for both on my phone.

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        2. That’s about all I have done with the pink uke – I plunk on it from time to time. But it’s nice to have it to plunk on.

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    2. These guys are great and possibly an inspiration. My son gave me a uke a couple of years ago and I almost learned 2-3 chords before my brain and fingers gave out.
      Today a couple of friends and i went on an interesting walking tour of the West Bank (sponsored by the Historical Society) where the featured time period was the 60s and 70s, of course. We stopped at the West Bank School of music and the director gave us brochures and a discount coupon toward a lesson. They have a couple of ukulele teachers. Did anyone go to the ukulele fest that Dale and Jim Ed hosted a few years ago? It was wonderful.

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      1. to study uke lisa simply go to you tube and they have all the lessons oyu need right there. lessons are good for structure and if you need a scheduled goal but you tube make it possible to do it all from your laptop as fast or slow s you want to and if the teacher turns out to be so so switch with a click

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  10. This is way out there, very Martian and related to the topic, sort of:
    For reasons I won’t now explain I just searched the topic “The Seal in the Bedroom” which is the name of a Thurber book containing that famous cartoon. But, what else came up very early in the search list? Go ahead. Guess I leave some blank space while you guess.

    Ossama Bin Lauden.
    Is there a theme here. Close your eyes and picture it. Trump . . . Elvis . . . Ossama.

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  13. im thinking it may be happiness. no one knows where happiness comes from and it appears likely that it comes from mars. we need more happiness here on earth and they appear to have more than they need on mars. its laying all over the surface of the planet. the discovery will send out mining teams to all corners of the universe to seek out other valuable unknowns like the true meaning of life, onces of prevention, the fountain of youth, this is the begining of the real payoff of the space program. lets tell the people who want to cut the programs that support stuff that makes the world a better place that they dont get any its all for us who pursue the dream. those who pursue the tightening of the purse strings get disconnected from the transmissions to nasa headquarters , dont even tell em what were all getting.
    look is that a bluebird in that crater

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  15. it’s that earring I lost years ago when I forgot to take it out before taking off my sweater. It went flying across the room and I never did find it, even when I was moving out and the room was cleared of furniture and everything else (including the dust bunny colonies I had been harboring). I’m guessing other shiny things might be other lost earrings (I can count at least 4 that I have inexplicably lost in tightly controlled environments). There is likely another spot on Mars where the stuff sticking out will be fuzzier and less shiny – that would be the Sea of Lost Socks. Just beyond the Sea of Lost Socks is the Valley if Misplaced Keys and over the hill beyond that is the Forest of Floated Away Balloons and Forgotten Sand Shovels.

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        2. There is a newer version that I think was done by one of the Japanese animators who did “Spirited Away” called “The Secret Life of Arriety,” Carol Burnett is one of the English Language voices. It’s enjoyable.

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  16. Wonders of the age. I bet some of you know of such things, but first I have heard of this: my son’s apartment building, where they will sign a lease tomorrow, has laundry lounges. You get a card to swipe and they bill you. And the machines call you they are done.

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    2. is it run by humans or do you put the card instead of the quarters in the machine? can you order your shirts on a hanger or boxed? good idea? laundrymats have always been a good idea form a business point of view, laundry lounge sounds like a logical step
      and you dont kill yourself unloading all those quarters

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      1. Lounge so you can stay there if you want, but one laundry lounge is across the hall from them. It has ironing board; they could easily iron there, but their age group does little ironing, which my wife does little of now that I do the laundry.
        No working humans present. The card locks the machine, only the card unlocks it. And the card is a charge card. You are billed each month. When your wash and drying is done (I am assume it is a dual machine), it phones your cell phone.

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  17. got it. thanks
    there is an opportunity for that ironing person.
    rereading fulghums homage to an iron , it seems a bit much but i do refer to the meditation qualities of ironing when i get to it. its usually done while watching a good movie witht e board set in a good spot.
    have your son give me the name of the machine he puts his ard in. the machine not the service company. i have an idea for an application.
    anyone want to partner on on baboon laundry services llc?

    The steps how to iron a shirt correctly
    The text from Robert Fulghum`s book Maybe yes, maybe no.
    First of all it is the real shirts that are going to be discussed here – from white cotton- otherwise you waste your time. Make sure that the pockets are empty and shake the shirts off so that they do not keep any clots or motes. Make sure that all the buttons are all right and on the right place. Then it is necessary to wash them. White laundry is to be washed separately – never mix the coloured and white laundry. Take a little bit of the bleach and starch so that the shirts would come up in the colour of white frost. Hang the shirts up to the sun and let it dry out there. Wrap them into a clean wet white towel and put them into the fridge.
    Then prepare your ironing board and make sure that the linen on it is clean and tight. Put the ironing board on the right place – somewhere where you feel good and comfortable. Take a bottle with the sprayer and fill it with cold water. Prepare a hanger. Take the stream iron – the good and solid one – and make sure that it is clean from the lower part. Turn it on and put it on maximum. Take a rest for a while and enjoy your coffee. Do not be in hurry. Take the shirts out from the fridge one by one. You are supposed to know just from the beginning that every shirt is to be ironed three times. Firstly you smooth the wrinkled places out and you make the shirt partially ready. Now spray with water those places which are not wet yet. After the second ironing the shirt must be wet and smooth. At the third ironing the details are being made perfect and the cuffs are being made fixed.
    All times it is necessary to do it in this order: the cuffs (from both sides), the sleeves, the collar, (from both sides, first at the underside, we pass with iron from the sides to the centre), then buttoning (first at the underside, from the upper part to the lower part, we try to stretch the shirt), then from the front part to the back part and carefully around the buttons.
    Copyright © ZehlenieNaja.sk

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    1. Steps to ironing a shirt.
      Take it out of the dryer slightly damp.
      Hang on a thick plastic hanger in the open (iron rail across the foot of our bed).
      When dry, hang in closet.
      When wearing it a) wear a sweater over it or b0 don’t give tinker’s toot about a few wrinkles.

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      2. If I can’t smooth out the wrinkles with a bit of water from a spray bottle and my hands to smooth the wrinkles, it mostly doesn’t get worn. Unless it is a special occasion or I am bored.

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    2. TIm’s description sounds like the way I did it when I learned when young. Before perma-prest or anything else. Shirts looked horrible if they weren’t ironed and I was good enough so I could even iron my dad’s work shirts. (He was a chemist.)
      But I like Clyde’s way best, now.

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    3. I am far too young to have voted for him when he ran for president, but he was one of the politicians I learned about early as being “one of the good guys.” Wish we had a few more like him now.

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    4. He was the first a lot of people voted for – somewhere between 1968 and 1972, the voting age was lowered to 18. Around 1974 or 1975, my family realized that everyone in my family who was old enough to vote had voted for McGovern, even our previously Republican parents. My dad said Nixon was just getting too used to the job. Remember the bumper stickers, “Don’t blame me, I voted for McGovern”?
      Rest in peace, indeed.

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  19. OT–
    I just discovered I *have* the CD of Traffic and ‘John Barleycorn Must Die’. I forgot to remember that… Yay! Listening now while I build pillars for the play.
    (I’ve always said, I really do theater so I can listen to music. Don’t have any ukulele music but not sure that would be the right music for my mind today.
    And way OT, after Traffic will then be an audio recording of the entire soundtrack of the movie ‘All That Jazz’ which is standard operating proceedure for me at this part of the play process…)

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      1. Ha– you all make me laugh; thanks for that.
        Anna, is it possible to be in all at once?? I’m probably still in bargaining and hopefully won’t get to depression.
        BIR– Before I put the sound track in ,the CD changer included Trampled by Turtles, Steely Dan, Pink Floyd, Dean Martin and Maynard Ferguson.
        tim, just the part of where he’s singing in the hospital basement with the old guy…

        It was a good day. Got a lot done and came home still whistling so it must be OK. 🙂

        Last night I dreamed my neighbors had an alligator in their field and it was chasing me. Is that a problem?

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        1. It’s only a problem if the alligator wasn’t chasing you to offer you chocolate chip cookies or ask you to dance and he/she caught up…

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