AnimalPals update

OK, so the AnimalPals^TM editorial board has its standards, and has chosen not to feature Kitty and Rooster because, well, because it's just too weird. But maybe that's because it's Japanese. Japanese is always just too weird. Some members avoided the ethnic minefield issues and argued that roosters are never cute, and that AnimalPals^TM is all about cute. What seemed like a basis for compromise soon dissolved into a heated argument over whether Foghorn Leghorn was in fact cute, or just charming, or an embarrassment.

YouTube video (flash), about three minutes.

Picture

Here's another bunny.

Red-handed Jack

So Tootles explained prudently, "You see, sir, I don't think my mother would like me to be a pirate. Would your mother like you to be a pirate, Slightly?"

He winked at Slightly, who said mournfully, "I don't think so," as if he wished things had been otherwise. "Would your mother like you to be a pirate, Twin?"

"I don't think so," said the first twin, as clever as the other.

"Stow this gab," roared Hook, and the spokesmen were dragged back. "You, boy," he said, addressing John, "you look as if you had a little pluck in you. Dids't never want to be a pirate, my hearty?"

Now John had sometimes experienced this hankering at maths, and he was struck by Hook's picking him out.

"I once thought of calling myself Red-handed Jack," he said diffidently.

-J.M Barrie, Peter Pan.


(Props to the cast and crew in the illustration - it seems to have disappeared from the web so I can't give any specific credit.)

Silence

Today the Day of Silence is being observed at thousands of schools across America.



Arr!
Smartly, ye dogs and beauties!

Picture

Sad bunny.

Just learned that Koza the lion has died.

No Toys-4-U

Speaking of bananas, a bill in South Carolina would outlaw sex toys, following the lead of Alabama, Mississippi and Texas.

So risible on their face, these laws put one in mind of H.L. Mencken's remark about people who have "the haunting fear that someone, somewhere, may be happy."

What is it about these freaks and sex? Felony criminalization, and the problem being addressed is ...?

Having an attitude that is some combination of liberal-tolerant-nothing-shocks-me and pre-adolescent giggly-finds-all-sex-funny (well, it is), I'm mystified.

I Heart Google Images

.... because you can type in almost any damn fool thing like "bunny dinosaur" and you'll get some good hits.

Atheism refuted

This is not a parody. Kirk Cameron and Ray Comfort make evangelical videos and books. Watch this bit intended to refute atheism and do not think about anything but a banana, or the baby Jesus will be sad.



Quicktime video - about 1:30 minutes.
Quicktime 7 required.

(Watch first)

Little wonder that, in encounters with a banana, millions around the world gasp "Oh, my god!"

Oh, and it has "a point at the top for easy entry..." and "the contents don't squirt in your face."

Not if you do it right.

So:
This is a banana.
It's easy to eat.
Q.E.D.

Or:
This is a steer.
... (crickets chirping)
Shut up and sit down.


(Credit to One Good Move)

Picture

Here's some tigers.


(Dependable Renegade)

Pirate Bunny

Not gay

Not sissy!

Not, uhmm ...

Shocking, but still usable

From the St Petersburg Times - An interview with four fifth-graders, two boys, Andy and Allie, and two girls, Adeline and Hannah.
Mattel has recently announced that Barbie is getting back together with Ken after two years. The kids have their own take on the story.

Allie: I always sort of knew they would break up.

How'd you know that?

Allie: Ken always went to the beach. Barbie had to take care of Kelly.

Who's Kelly?

Allie: Their child.

Adeline: Wasn't Barbie married to Ken? I think they're divorced.

They were married? They had a baby? And now they're divorced?

Hannah: It's kind of shocking.

Where was Ken all this time?

Adeline: I think he was dating Barbie's best friend, Nadine, or something.

Hannah: She was the girl who went to bars and drank margaritas.

Somehow I forgot all about Ken. Are you glad he's back?

Allie: Maybe now he knows what Barbie wants.

...

Adeline: I think it's a bad example for Kelly for Barbie to get divorced, then have a new boyfriend, then break up.

Allie: Too many relationships.

Hannah: Wait till Kelly's older. She's like 4. She doesn't understand why guys come and go.

Andy: If I were Barbie, God forbid, I would lay off for a while till I figured out what I want.

Adeline: I have a Ken doll. My dog bit his hand off. But he's still usable.

Zoo News

Always on the lokout for new Animal Pals, I get daily Google News Alerts with the keyword "zoo."
No new pals, but there's been a flurry of stolen or missing animals lately around the world.

A red panda escaped from the Cincinnai Zoo and was later recovered from the back yard of a nearby home. Link.

Meanwhile, a Himalayan black bear has been missing from the New Dehli Zoo for two months. Link.

And a baby meerkat stolen from the Adelaide, Ausralia Zoo has been recovered safely. Link.

Australia seems to have something of a crime wave going on. A freshwater crocodile was stolen from the Rockhampton Zoo. Link.

Imagine

Quicktime audio from The Party Party.

In which we continue the theme of the day ...

Happy Easter

(Body paintings from Proceed At Your Own Risk - Well-titled: NSFW; don't click if your're not 18 or Jesus will be sad)

Easter Bunny

(Shakespear's Sister)

Pirate Bunny

Here's a pirate bunny.

Dinosaurs

Kids love dinosaurs. I know I did. Still do.

Through them I first learned of the ancient age of the earth, and about science and evolution. I worked through all the dino books in my 1960's small-town library. I was thrilled to see, one summer, the concrete dinosaurs at Rapid City, South Dakota.



Dinosaurs are a powerful wedge.

I recently noticed this: the Dark Side of religion and ignorance knows the power of monster-based science - Google "dinosaurs children evolution" and you'll see most of the first hundred or so hits lead to fundamentalist-bible-creationist crap intended to counter the acquistition of knowlege about the world we live in. Dinosaurs in the Garden of Eden, dinosaurs on Noah's Ark, disoaurs in Job and Isaiah.
It was depressing to see, but there are still libraries, some schools, and web sites like this that acknowlege reality.


Dinosaurs may be our nation's best hope. I'd like to think so.

More on Tiktaalik roseae

Here are some nice illutrations showing how Tiktaalik fits into the fins-to-feet scheme of things.


Panderichthys


Tiktaalik


Acanthostega


Tiktaalik has it's own web page.

Movie test

Richard Feynman on trying to understand nature using chess as an anology.





Update: Movie removed. Find it here.

Link field test

Pharygula

Link

Boys Making Noise

Google video (27 seconds).

Kitty litter cake

Yes, it's a real cake, sure to be a hit at any pre-teen birthday party.
Cake mix, topped with crumbled cookies and microwave-softened tootsie rolls.
Yum!





From KidsKuisine.com.

Picture

Here's a bunny with a pancake on his head.

Oh, dear.

Though it's cold and lonely in the deep dark night.
I can see paradise by the dashboard light.
Paradise by the dashboard light.

-Meatloaf







Coitus in an MRI tube. From Pharyngula: science porn.

I have to admit, though, that although it sounds like an experiment that was a great deal of fun, they didn't learn anything too surprising. They notice that the penis is more contorted than expected, although I had to wonder if that wasn't just a consequence of the difficulty of having sex in a narrow tube. Intromission didn't seem to do much to the female anatomy (no surprise, again), but one interesting observation was that the female reproductive tract does jigger itself around in curious ways during arousal and orgasm.

Peter Pan post

"But where do you live mostly now?"

"With the lost boys."

"Who are they?"

"They are the children who fall out of their perambulators when the nurse is looking the other way. If they are not claimed in seven days they are sent far away to the Neverland to defray expenses.
I'm captain."

-J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan

Peter

Peter was not quite like other boys; but he was afraid at last. A tremour ran through him, like a shudder passing over the sea; but on the sea one shudder follows another till there are hundreds of them, and Peter felt just the one. Next moment he was standing erect on the rock again, with that smile on his face and a drum beating within him. It was saying,
"To die will be an awfully big adventure."

-J.M. Barrie, Peter Pan.

Another test

Yet another test.

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit, sed diam nonummy nibh euismod tincidunt ut laoreet dolore magna aliquam erat volutpat.

Test Post

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit, sed diam nonummy nibh euismod tincidunt ut laoreet dolore magna aliquam erat volutpat.

This is kinda cool

I've played with blogging software on my web site. But Blogger is a whole 'nother deal.

I was able to build something in no time, and can customize as much as I want. While I play, it's free and on their own server. Later I can move the whole thing to my own host if I want.

For now I'm happy to use their bandwidth (and 300MB of image storage) to play around with.

Tiktaalik

The recently-discovered Tiktaalik roseae is an intermediate between a fish-like thing and a tetrapod-like thing, giving the fundies the vapors. Notice the lower picture - those are fins, but with wrists.

But what I really liked was this:

it demonstrates the predictive capacity of paleontology. The Nunavut field project had the express aim of finding an intermediate between Panderichthys and tetrapods, by searching in sediments from the most probable environment (rivers) and time (early Late Devonian).

A theory, in the scientific sense of "theory," not the colloquial that sense that people like to toss about, makes predictions. Most of these are already in the data - there are no rabbits in the Precambrian. But here we have the theory predicting that if you want to find fossils of a creature making the transition from aquatic to terrestrial, look in a place that had shallow running water and a period of complex vertebates before the true land animals.
Bingo.