Local shortages of Baking Soda, Vinegar, Suggest Science Fair Season

It is Science Fair season in our affluent suburb, and it seems like only yesterday I was shouting at my children to focus and finish their projects only hours before last year’s fair was to begin. Each year, the children decide at the last minute that they would like to participate in the fair, but they can’t come up with anything cool that they can do in the next 10 days (last year’s mummified chicken wasn’t done the night before the fair!).  Then they talk with their friends about doing a project together. Yay!  Then the other parent calls you, being kinda pushy about it, and declaring how her child only has two hours available to do the fair, so are they on or what? We have to figure out if we have to get a poster board!  Huh?  Can’t we just teach the children a lesson in planning ahead, and say “you know what, you kids won’t have enough time to get together to do your best work on this, so we can either do something individually, or just not do it this year”.  I hate to be a downer, but slamming something crappy together seems worse than not participating, right? Children at this age haven’t learned the hideous nature of group projects.  To them, the group project is simply an opportunity to play and horse around, and take part in the mayhem that is the Science Fair. So now we are on the hook for a group project.  The fair is in six days, and the team has spent 40 minutes working on their idea (cue the blank stare as to what there is still left to do).  It is no wonder that the frazzled, baking-soda dappled parents look really fatigued on the night of the fair.  I reckon the PTO would make a boatload of money replacing the bake sale with a cash bar.

Duh – any Mom will tell you use wipes to clean up spills!

Popular Science reports on technology from Texas Tech University that could be helpful in the fight to clean up all that pesky oil in the Gulf of Mexico. It’s a cotton/charcoal product that can absorb and detox oil. The only trouble is, these guys are not Nobel Prize winners, not from Harvard, and don’t have a personal friend in the current administration, or at BP.  Chances are, the government won’t want them to make a buck on their cool product, either.  Here’s the summary:

BREAKING: New Element Discovered

A major research institution has just announced the discovery of the densest element yet known to science.  The new element has been named Pelosium.  Pelosium has one neutron, 12 assistant neutrons, 75 deputy neutrons, and 224 assistant deputy neutrons, giving it an atomic mass of 311.

These particles are held together by dark forces called morons, which are surrounded by vast quantities of lepton-like particles called peons.

The symbol of Pelosium is PU.

Pelosium’s mass actually increases over time, as morons randomly interact with various elements in the atmosphere and become assistant deputy neutrons within the Pelosium molecule, leading to the formation of isodopes.

This characteristic of moron-promotion leads some scientist to believe that Pelosium is formed whenever morons reach a certain quantity in concentration.  This hypothetical quantity is referred to as Critical Morass.

When catalyzed with money, Pelosium activates CNNadnausium, an element that radiates orders of magnitude more energy, albeit as incoherent noise, since it has half as many peons but twice as many morons as Pelosium

Astronauts leave space station; must forfeit cleaning deposit

KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, FLORIDA:  After returning safely to Florida this week, the six-member crew of the shuttle Endeavour was shocked to learn that they must forfeit their cleaning deposit.  Cleaning crews report that the space station, with its 12,000 square feet of space, looked like “there was a freaking frat party in there”.  Cleaning crews expect it will take most of the week to return the station to its pristine condition, and will barely be finished before the next crew visits.  “They are SO not getting their deposit back,” said Facilities Manager Alfonso Martin, “thank goodness we take credit card imprints when they get here”.  Martin wouldn’t provide more details about the type of mess left by the astronauts, but suggested that there was “a lot of activity around that fancy machine that turns urine into water”.  The astronauts could not be reached for individual comments.  NASA officials would only comment that the agency sub-contracts cleaning services, and that they respect the parameters outlined in that service agreement. They also added that no other crew has had to forfeit its cleaning deposit.

By the same scientific methods….

Science is EASY!

….as those used and endorsed by the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit in the U.K., I have proven that: I achieved a 3.975 cumulative grade point average in college, that I can run an average 4.35 minute mile, and that my personal body weight is less than one perfect standard deviation from the norm!  I proved I am a genius, worthy of taking your tax dollars to tell everyone how smart I am.*

*(1. analysis does not include grades for any classes that were held at 8am, or classes from second semester of senior year, or any hard classes from freshman year 2. data includes timed one-mile runs of individuals similar in personality and body type to mine, and excludes any personal mile times of greater than 12 minutes, includes an extrapolated time equivalent to Usain Bolt’s theoretical best one-mile run  3. eliminating body weight during the college years of 1986-1990, and then again for pregnancy in 1991 and 1992, near perfect results can be achieved, but alas, never re-created.

Endeavour astronauts help build a deck; admit permit problems

This week, the astronauts on the space shuttle Endeavor’s crew attached a 4.1-ton  porch (experiment platform) to the Japanese Kibo laboratory module of the International Space Station.  The operation was made difficult due to communication problems, as well as the fact that NASA did not apply for the appropriate permit to add such a deck to the module.  Decks over 4 tons must be granted special variances, and the crew did not have one.  The deck puts the space station too close to its property line, and must be moved, or reduced in size.  This comes as a big disappointment to the astronauts, who had a $235 million grill and refrigeration unit specially made for the new deck.  NASA assured the media that the space station will get a variance, and will not suffer any fines. The variance hearing will be held next month.

This Slug’s for you, Buzz Aldrin

To celebrate the 40th anniversary of the moon landing, we hearken back to 2002, when 75-year-old Buzz Aldrin unleashes a big fist the gob of some punk-ass kid calling him “a coward and a liar and a..” POW! RIGHT IN THE KISSER!

Those British doctors are top notch!

This week the British Medicine Journal Online reported that researchers have devised a simple, six-question verbal test to administer that will help physicians detect those patients most likely to develop dementia.  The test supposedly doubles the current chances of early detection.  The test takes only 5 minutes to administer, with sample questions of:

Test Your Memory sample questions

Who is the Prime Minister?

Why is a carrot like a potato?

Why is a lion like a wolf?

In what year did WW1 start?

Please list four creatures beginning with ‘S’ eg. shark

Sums: 20-4=   16+17=     8X6=   4+15-17=

A low score could indicate that the patient should receive further assessment, and has been closely linked to Alzheimer’s sufferers.  It could also highlight other issues such as malnutrition, eye problems, or even dyslexia.  The answers to a set of questions like these would lead us to believe that Joseph Biden, Vice President of the United States of America, is right on track for dementia of some kind, or just really not overburdened with common knowledge.

First the worms, now the lambs…

In March, Fox News reported that burping earthworms were hideous offenders in the battle to save earth (they emit nitrous oxide – laughing gas- which is 300x more powerful than carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas). 

Today, the Times (of London) reports that the government is developing food menus that reduce the content of ‘high carbon’ animals.  The biggest offender per pound:  lamb!  Close behind lamb are tomatoes and alcohol – VERY bad for the environment!  To which I say:

But wait, there’s more:

The Carbon Trust, a government-funded firm, is working with food and drink companies to calculate the “carbon footprints” of products – sometimes with surprising results.

Coca-Cola, for example, generates only about half the greenhouse gas emissions of Innocent’s “smoothies”. Cadbury’s chocolate generates about 4½lb for every 2.2lb eaten – less than half that from theof CO2 same weight of chicken.

Check out the Carbon Trust’s  new labeling available to show your (British) consumers the carbon footprint of your services (the surprise is that an on-line bank account has a carbon footprint of 200 grams of CO2 per account, which is mor than for a serving of organic potatoes! Oh, the HORROR!). 

Happy Spring!

A little ‘Extreme Shepherding’ is in order. This is quite a display.