Not only are these sea eels creepier than snakes, but they seem even more sinister now that we know they can use their electricity to remotely control the muscles of their prey.
The BBC article above describes how researchers at Vanderbilt University in Nashville discovered that eel current can cause hidden prey to involuntarily ‘jump’, thus revealing their position. You can guess what happens next.
But why were scientists from land-locked Music City so interested in the effect eels can have on the oh-so-correctly-named “unfortunate fish”?
Perhaps it’s really research into the strange power bands have over dancers, especially with the energy of an electric guitar at the front and brass as a conductor.
To soothe you and provide some parting affirmations for the turkeys (treasure each moment as a gift!), here’s Bob Franke singing his signature Thanksgiving song more than 200 feet underground in a cold war bunker ordered built by Stalin – Bunker 42 in Moscow.
Now that humans have successfully landed on a comet, excitement is building about the previously strange notion of Asteroid Mining.
Lots of new technology will have to be developed to make this work.
Not to mention a boatload of re-written classic mining songs.
There was never an Asteroid made outta mud. They’re stone and copper and a whole buncha crud. A whole buncha crud that’s a-flyin’ around, That’ll never stop and it won’t come down.
You mine asteroids and what do you get? A ride on a rocket and a load of regret. St. Peter did you see me as I flew by? I’m digging holes in the clear blue sky!
I was born around minerals, buried and old there was coal and palladium and iron and gold. But we took it all and we filled our cup Then the straw boss said “Let’s dig way, way up”
You mine asteroids and what do you get? A ride on a rocket and a load of regret. St. Peter did you see me as I flew by? I’m digging holes in the clear blue sky!
When I got to space then I started to drill. I dug down and down in that airless chill. Then I got so deep the whole hole just spun, so I kept on digging up towards the sun.
You mine asteroids and what do you get? A ride on a rocket and a load of regret. St. Peter did you see me as I flew by? I’m digging holes in the clear blue sky!
If you’re out in space you better let me pass I will take your metals. I will steal your gas. And I’ll make tear the end off your flying stone ‘Til it’s as brittle and hollow as an ice cream cone.”
You mine asteroids and what do you get? A ride on a rocket and a load of regret. St. Peter did you see me as I flew by? I’m digging holes in the clear blue sky.
What’s the most physically demanding job you’ve ever held?
I loved the post from Clyde yesterday, along with the conversation that ensued. I was especially tickled by this comment from Renee in North Dakota.
That is a beguiling image – a would-be farmer, forsaking his chores for art. It got me to thinking about old fiddle tunes, including Stephen Foster’s “Camptown Races”.
Uncle Albert had a barn,
Doo-dah, Doo-dah.
Often he’d relate this yarn,
Oh, do doo-dah day.
All them cows produced for sure,
Doo-dah, Doo-dah
Tons and tons of ripe manure
Oh, de doo-dah day.
Piling up all night.
Piling up all day.
When the cattle tried to leave
Guess what was blocking the way?
Albert got his fiddle strung
Doo dah, doo dah
On a hillock made of dung.
Oh, de doo-dah day.
Never did a bloomin’ chore,
Doo Dah, Doo Dah.
Sat beside a fragrant door,
Oh de doo-dah day.
While he played he never frowned,
Doo Dah, Doo Dah,
Watching bovines turn around
All de doo-dah day.
He would just recline,
Looking at the birds.
Now and then Albert would say,
“Man, what a mountain of turds!”
Early tomorrow (Wednesday) morning the European Space Agency’s Rosetta spacecraft currently orbiting Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko will deploy a lander called Philae. This one-chance-only attempt will be the culmination of a ten year mission to do something that has never been done or even attempted before – to put a piece of human-made machinery on the face of a speeding comet as it hurtles towards the sun.
There is so much that intrigues me about this – not the least of which is the method of landing – described in this New York Times article..
Because Comet 67P is so small, its gravitational pull is slight and the familiar mechanics of landing on a moon or a distant planet are turned upside down. Mission planners didn’t have to worry so much about breaking the lander’s fall because Philae will be released and will drift towards 67P, pulled in gently at what is described as “a walking pace.”
How fast is that? I’m not sure, but I’ll bet it could comfortably approximate the pace of this classic 1959 song by the Fleetwoods.
As the lander meanders towards the comet, planners will watch nervously to see if they are able to connect in a sympathetic and constructive way, or if a stray boulder causes the lander to flip over or a spot of shade renders its solar collectors useless.
Not to indulge in too much space-vehicle anthropomorphism here, but if Philae is able to kiss the surface of this elusive, enigmatic space traveler, it will be a brief, unlikely, and historic romance. The lander will run out of battery power in 62 hours and will fall silent, but not until it has had enough close contact to send back a treasure trove of data.
And what is in this for 67P? Perhaps nothing, though one must wonder if even a lonely, speeding comet has an innate desire to be known. And yes, this Earthling may bring just the sort of longed-for intimacy that has been missing during all the years that 67P has been orbiting the sun.
But in case The Fleetwoods have you thinking of this rendezvous as a perfect extraterrestrial romance, consider this one additional aspect – shortly after Philae and 67P gently touch, the lander will cement their new relationship by shooting a harpoon into the comets surface.
Today is the birthday of famous movie cowboy Roy Rogers, who we think of as a fixture of the wide open western expanse even though he actually entered the world at Cincinnati, Ohio.
Though it’s hard to imagine two forms of entertainment that are more out of fashion today than musicals and westerns, Rogers excelled at both. His work with the ensemble Sons of the Pioneers is a source of fond musical memories for me, although I don’t have many warm feelings towards hay, saddles, guns or cactus.
Born Leonard Slye, Rogers was a Hollywood creation, although he did seem to play well with horses. In this video clip, Trigger steals the show and Roy lets him, which strikes me as both kind-hearted and practical.
Though I didn’t think this was allowed, you can watch full Roy Rogers movies on Youtube, where there’s something for everyone. In “Sunset in the West”, Roy and Trigger deal with a hijacked train that’s full of guns, which ought to have equal appeal to those rail-loving new urbanists and the N.R.A., though for different reasons.
There aren’t many celebrities today with the kind of broad appeal that can span the political, musical, sartorial and behavioral boundaries we draw around ourselves. Roy Rogers had that quality, though I’m sure his solid relationship with Trigger helped.
It appears there is nothing in the news this weekend except Ebola.
The name of the virus itself is actually quite lovely to the ear. But actual conditions on the ground in West Africa have robbed it of whatever beauty it may have had.
Even so, certain voices can’t stop saying it. Why? Because with an election less than two weeks away, a single threatening word that suggests disorganization, incompetence and panic is like music to some ears.
Under different circumstances, perhaps there would have been a lovesick song dedicated to our girl … Ebola.
(sings)
The most riveting name I ever heard:
Ebola, Ebola, Ebola, Ebola …
A campaign that can work in a single word!
Ebola, Ebola, Ebola, Ebola …
Ebola!
The midterms will hinge on Ebola!
Although it’s hard to catch
I’m sure I’ve got a batch
in me.
Ebola!
On Fox News they’re crying Ebola!
Just listen that spiel
they hardly can conceal
their glee!
Ebola!
Say it loud and the children scatter.
Say it soft – it’s electoral patter.
Ebola!
They’ll never stop saying Ebola!
In the past on this page we have discussed where we are from and where we’ve lived. Baboons can be both wanderers and stay-at-homes. It can be a surprisingly tough mental exercise to walk back through your biography to list the places you’ve lived in the proper sequence, and for how long at each stop.
Likewise, each state of the union has a specific history of who happens to live there and from whence they came. Only demographers and other numbers geeks can find much enjoyment in looking over the columns of figures that tell those stories.
For the rest of us the info-graphics experts at the New York Times have developed 50 fascinating charts that display the data as strata – a cross section cut from each state’s census showing the last century’s changes in where residents were born.
Based on your personal history, you can get a sense for how common (or uncommon) you are in your current environment when birthplace is the sole yardstick. Back in the 1970’s I was part of a sliver (3%) of Illinoisans born in the Northeast. Now in Minnesota, my kind are still a rarity at a mere 2%. Rare as hen’s teeth. Precious as gold.
Sometimes we have to go out of our way to feel special.
After looking at this I’m left with the impression that people accumulate in specific places based on a variety of economic forces that drive them there. Because certain individuals may be rooted in place while others are entirely footloose, there is a variable and distinct human geology that defines each state.
I love a good study of something that can’t be measured, which is why I fell immediately for some sparkling new research I saw yesterday about jealousy in dogs. It is even more wonderful than another obscure bit of science that I used to love about contagious canine yawning.
It’s not that I’m fickle, but after caring so much about what dogs must think when I yawn at them, I do need something fresh to occupy my mind and keep the excitement alive.
Researchers emotionally provoked thirty six dogs by having the owners, in the presence of their pets, give attention to three different things – a book, a moving, barking toy dog, and a pumpkin-shaped Halloween candy bucket.
The book was read aloud. The toy dog and the bucket were talked to and petted like they were real animals.
The actual dogs were not interested in their human’s interaction with the book, but had a negative reaction when their owners coddled the fake canine.
A certain amount of butt-sniffing was done with regard to that toy dog. There was no similar behavior around the Jack-O-Lantern bucket because neither dogs nor science can tell us where a pumpkin’s butt is located. Is it on the bottom or at the stem? Time to fund another study.
At any rate, the canines showed a significant amount of alarm when it seemed like there was a new (phony) dog on the scene.
The conclusion: Dogs get jealous.
An alternate conclusion: Dogs get embarrassed for you when you act like a plastic bucket and a scentless stuffed dog are really alive.
But if dogs do get jealous, they will need songs to soothe them through their pain. My nomination: Marvin Gaye’s “Heard It Through the Grapevine.”
No one loves you like I do
You’re my man, and I’m “Old Blue”
But then you picked up a new dog at the store
Between me and that pup
You know I loved you more.
So it took me by surprise when I snuffed
and found out your new pet was stuffed
Don’t you know that no turd means it’s not canine?
Fundamental to the design.
Let me tell you no turd means that’s no canine!
That’s the news that comes from behind.
Honey Honey, yeah.
On this Fourth of July in our nation’s capitol, thousands will celebrate the American Way of Life and look to the sky in wonder. But they would be just as awestruck if they could see what’s going on beneath their feet, where a massive project is underway to dig a drainage tunnel that will help clean up Washington D.C.’s rivers, the Potomac and the Anacostia.
The capitol city is separating its storm and sanitary sewer systems, a $ 2.6 billion twenty year project to prevent the overflow of raw sewage into the rivers – something the Twin Cities achieved in 1995 but a calamity that still happens regularly in our federal city to the tune of about 3 billion gallons each year.
When I think about the privileges we share as Americans, I recognize that much of it comes from the founders and the military and the sacred documents and all the other things we regularly celebrate on the Fourth.
But a lot of it also has to do with infrastructure.
A country left festering in its own sewage cannot advance the health and welfare of its citizens, so when we’re being grateful for our peace and prosperity let’s remember to thank the people who keep our own poop out of the streets.
Just as Francis Scott Key swiped an old drinking tune and wrote new words to celebrate an icon of freedom that was partially obscured by darkness, I propose we sing an ode to this completely invisible but oh-so-necessary subterranean tunnel project.
It’s not that weird. Key’s original lyrics feature three extra verses that we never use, and one of them already includes the word “pollution.”
Down where no one can see, out of mind out of sight,
excess leakage is bailed from the rivulets streaming.
It’s as airless as Mars, and with even less light.
But we’re digging our way to a future that’s gleaming.
In the laser’s red glare, tunnel builders know where
they are heading tonight, although we’re unaware.
Oh say does that underground excavator still pave
through the sand of under D.C., and the loam of the brave?
Trail Baboon 