Biomes Blog

Entry #960

Trivia answer from yesterday: It's fossilized Ichthyosaur vomit.

Movie Rating: The Alamo.
I seem to remember this being panned when it first came out, but I thought it was pretty well done.  Billy Bob Thornton as Davey Crockett was especially good. 3.7 starfish out of 5.

The Rapture Index, checked daily by the truly religiously insane. The record high occured during the Bush 9/11 intelligence failure and the record low occured, of course, during the reign of the best President of your lifetime.

Dept. of Educashun: The Battle of the Somme. Sheesh, what a nightmare.

I missed this, but the administration has named Matthew Hogan as director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. This steward of the land, and courageous American, is the former head lobbyist of the Safari Club International.  Members of SCI goals inclued:

“To complete all 29 award categories, a hunter must kill a minimum of 322 separate species and sub-species - enough to populate a large zoo. This is an extremely expensive and lengthy task, and many SCI members take the quick and easy route to see their names in the record books. They shoot captive animals in canned hunts, both in the United States and overseas, and some engage in other unethical conduct like shooting animals over bait, from vehicles, with spotlights, or on the periphery of national parks.”

Read more about SCI here, if you can stomach it.

Fur bikinis are just wrong.

I’d probably end up leaving this million dollar cell phone on a restaurant table or something.  I’ll pass.

Entry #959

This week's water tower is found in New Athens, OH.

Meta: When I do my weekly marine life series for DailyKos I need to crosspost it here so I can host my own images (I don't like Imageshack or any of those other free hosting services).  However, since out of 450 or so hits yesterday only about a dozen people clicked through to actually read it here, I'll go back to a regular format on Saturdays and put the entire essay beneath the fold.  I'll include the Kos link to them so you can go there and follow/join the discussion if you feel like it. Those essays take a lot more time and effort than the normal daily posts so hopefully this will make better use of them.

And yeah, I could use this support group.

The Road to Guantanamo.  Watch the trailer.

Praying mantids are definitely one of the cooler insects around, but if I saw one of them eating a hummingbird at one of my feeders I wouldn’t be too happy about it.

Cool Site of the Week: Sternest Meanings.  Enter anything and it will respond with an anagram.

The Pork Producers Association explains why we don’t drink pig’s milk, even though, apparently, it would taste terrific.  (The letter is a gag, but the response is sincere.)

Trivia (15 Biomes points): What is this a fossil of?  If anyone even comes close they get some points.

[Update: By request, here's the picture enlarged. Lost some clarity but tried to play with it a bit.]

Entry #958

Marine Life Series: Catadromous Eels

Crossposted to Daily Kos.  Other diaries in this series can be found here.

Most of you are familiar with the life cycle of Salmon in the Pacific Northwest. Born in rivers and streams far inland, the newly hatched young float downstream toward the ocean where they live out most of their lives in salt water.  Each year a mass migration occurs where adults battle their way upstream and over waterfalls back to their fresh water nursery grounds where they spawn, die and become bear food.  Fish that do this are called anadromous.

Here in my New England backyard lives another species of fish, the American Eel (Anguilla rostrata), which does the opposite. Known as catadromous fish, they are born in salt water, spend their lives in freshwater rivers and lakes and then return to the ocean to spawn.

Entry #957

The Ugly Truth, by Cenk Uygar.

Timewaster of the Week: Chuck Norris facts.

USB Teddy.

Trying to cancel AOL.  I went through this a few years ago with the boy’s account.

New Orleans’ Mayor Ray Nagin, on the radio.  Gore used some of this dialog in his movie and it was very powerful.  I posted this here last August, but here’s the whole thing again.

Fifteen year old Ava’s latest.  I hear there’s an open cell in the Hague, Mr. pResident.

Movie Rating: Coogan’s Bluff (1968)
Clint plays an Arizona sheriff who ventures into the strange world of the the Big Apple to collect a prisoner. A country boy in the big city; never saw a plot like that before. Anyway, I’ve never been a fan of Arnold or Sly, but I can’t think of a single Eastwood movie, up until now, that I didn’t thoroughly enjoy.  This one was simply painful.  2.0 starfish out of 5. (As an aside, checking his filmography, this was the only one of his movies I’d never seen.  That kind of surprised me.)

iPod Shuffle:

1. Truck Stop Girl (Little Feat)
2. Serenade (Steve Miller Band)
3. Shinin' Brightly (Bob Seger)
4. Tougher Than The Rest (Bruce Springsteen)
5. She's A Rainbow (Rolling Stones)
6. Ghost Town (Cat Stevens)
7. Mexico (James Taylor)
8. Brown Eyed Girl (Van Morrison)
9. Dangerous Man (Dwight Yoakum)
10. Ring of Fire (Johnny Cash)

Entry #956

Ten questions for Morgan “Super-size Me” Spurlock.  He’s like Michael Moore except he looks like a republican (but obviously isn’t).

Advice column you should read: Ask “Squiggles” the hamster.

So what is up with Dubya’s head-rubbing fetish anyway?

This blog explains each day’s Marmaduke comic in 500 words or less.

Entry #955

Trivia answer from yesterday: The question was which big-name stars were asked to play Superman in 1978 before it was given to Christopher Reeve. The answers are Robert Redford (who asked for too much money), Clint Eastwood (who turned it down) and James Caan (who said he wouldn't be caught dead wearing those blue tights).  5 points to both Shayera and James D.

Prius update: I’ve been carefully calculating the mileage and gas costs of the new Prius compared to my old piece of junk Pontiac Transport mini-van.  It comes out to around $325 per month in savings.  But this is based on my old driving habits with gas at around $1.80 per gallon.  Right now I’m looking at at least $550 per month in my pocket.  Granted, I drive a lot for my business, but it looks like purchasing this car was a shrewd move, if I do say so myself.  My last fillup cost me $27 and I went 574 miles before filling up again.

Cenk Uygur on America’s most vile human being.

  The Green Hummer Project.

I’m a 67 percent Machiavellian.  Check your score out here. The guy’s bio from Wiki is pretty interesting.

Ebert’s ten best movies lists by year.

Stuff You Should Know: Why Rice Krispies make noise.

This article, about why on-line debate is useless, is pretty spot on.  I made this clear in the early days of this site when I was criticized for stifling debate in the extremely rare comments I would get.  Notice, that a year and a half later the winger’s claim has been proven to be 100% wrong, and at the time, no amount of debate could have changed her mind.  It’s just not worth the time.

Why Clinton’s economy was better.

Entry #954

If you ever feel like you just have too many functioning brain cells in your head, you could always join the Family Research Council. You’ll feel much better afterwards. I promise.

Send a message to George and fill out a form for the Presidential Prayer Team, who don’t know the difference between “Democrat” and “Democratic”.  Via Blah3.

The “excuse me belt” gets people out of your way on city streets. And may get you punched.

Trivia (5 Biomes points for each one): Before casting Christopher Reeve as Superman, director Richard Donner approached these three big-name actors for the role.

Housekeeping: The RSS feeds for this blog (link located way down at the bottom of the sidebar) now include full posts.

Buy your transparent toaster here.

Entry #953

"I was a Republican - until they lost their minds." --Charles Barkley

Mmmm-peach mint tea.  (via Bad Attitudes)

In 1942 the defense department issued a comic book called “How To Spot A Jap”.  Reading this embarrassing piece of work is like watching a train wreck.

Welcome to The Chicken Store.

Morford: George W. Bush Is Dead To Me.

I moved into my home almost exactly one year ago and because of the insane house prices around here my mortgage guy spent a lot of time helping me figure out how not to make my whopping monthly payment any more whoppinger.  One suggestion he had was to apply for an interest free mortgage, which I wisely, I think, didn’t go for.  So this piece interested me a bit.  Here’s my house, in case you’re interested.

Albino Monday: Newt.

Entry #952

I planted some bee balm outside my office window this spring to attract the hummingbirds that insist on hanging around the front yard’s Rose-of Sharon bushes where I can’t see them.  Now every few hours I can see one of them with my peripheral vision buzzing just a foot away from the window.  But when I turn to look at them they swing their little heads towards me and zip off.  It’s really quite annoying.  Oh, and I discovered I have snakes living under my back deck which I’m really pretty psyched about, but it creeps the boy out a bit.

Meet Sammy the Stem Cell.

In an effort to more accurately reflect the priorities of the Bush administration's views on things like climate change and the militarization of space, the phrase “...to understand and protect our home planet” has been quietly deleted from NASA’s official mission statement.  We need a change in Washington and we need it yesterday.

  The Banana and Shrimp Show.

This is my cat, Sammy. He lives at my Biomes Marine Biology Center. Play with him here.

Trivia (10 Biomes points): What happened?

Entry #951

The Incredible Mr. and/or Mrs. Limpet

Crossposted to DailyKos. Other diaries in this series can be found here.

The Slipper Limpet (Crepidula fornicata) is an odd type of snail that is extremely common on the Atlantic coast.  Unlike most snails, this animal lacks the typical spiral shape of its shell and is instead more conical with only the slightest hint of a shell twist.  To start off, I’ll help get your mind out of the gutter (don’t worry, we’ll be diving right back in below) and explain that the species name fornicata is Latin for “vaulted”, which describes the convex shell shape quite nicely, and the name was given by none other than Carl von Linne (aka Linnaeus) himself.

Entry #950

Fuzzy Zoeller’s amazing hole-in-one.  I actually aced a hole when I was thirteen.  It was a par three that went over a pond and since I always lost a ball on that hole I used the most beat up one I had.  Titleist mounted it on a trophy for me, which was pretty funny.  I’m not at all a packrat, but I still have the newspaper clipping (but not the trophy). I crossed out “14” when I was a kid because they got my age wrong.

Buy your child’s gas hood here.

50 weight loss tips.

  The Switch Zoo.

Now we’re cookin’: Sauce dispensing chopsticks.

This article from Media Matters is a must read.  Sure, it’s got nothing in it that those of us who have been paying attention these past 15 years haven’t known, but it’s all laid out extremely well.

Movie Rating: Phone Booth.
This was a really great thriller, featuring one of my favorite actors, Forest Whitaker.  If I had noticed that it was directed by Joel “I nearly killed the Batman franchise” Schumacher I might have passed on it.  4.2 starfish out of 5.

Happy Birthday Mom.  Not sure how many 41 year old guys would admit this, but I have the greatest mother on the planet.  Love ya.

[Afternoon Update: Bah. Forgot Friday's iPod shuffle so I'll put it under the fold.]

Entry #949

Via Bad Attitudes, we need more people like Lester Miller, please. I’d love to shake this guy’s hand.

Auto.cart: Coming soon to a sprawling suburb near you.  What have we become?  Apparently you drive up to a computer terminal and order anything you want: Car parts, groceries, medication, a DVD rental, diapers, a six pack, ready cooked dinners, a potted plant, a pair of jeans, etc. and it is delivered by conveyor belt in 18 minutes or less.

Morford: Bush Gropes, Planet Cringes.

Al Gore and Jon Stewart, two of my favorite people in the world. Now I’ve seen a bunch of interviews with Gore on this movie and I have to say that, once again, Jon gives this a unique perspective.  And check out the reception from the audience.  And again, if you haven’t seen Gore’s doc yet, you really need to.

The biggest page on the internets. Scroll down.  Forever.

Cool insect close-ups.

Entry #948

Animal of the Week: Hi, I’m a nematode.  Here are some nematode basics from Buglopedia.

Our president, loaded with class as usual as he sneaks up behind the German Chancellor and gives her a shoulder rub. Of coarse the media and wingnut blogs are downplaying this incident with two lies:  That Merkel didn’t know that it was Bush at first, which is why she jumped, and that afterwards she “smiled”.  Really? Well, let’s go to the film shall we? First, she turns around and clearly sees him approaching and second, that ain't no happy smile at the end.  What a creep.

Thanks to a head’s up from Jim D, I am so going to New York City this summer.

The second annual “failed states” index came out.  Heckuvajob George.

Why tunafish is so cheap.

Entry #947

Cure your arachibutyrophobia, the fear of peanut butter sticking to the roof of your mouth.

Bookmark worthy: PETA.

I’m 20% Calvin and 80% Hobbes. Take the quiz.

"You've got elements of both Calvin and Hobbes, but over all, your sensible side wins out over your wild streak, and you tend toward the tiger. As the picture above indicates, the head is the first place that people usually turn to the darkside (i.e. Calvin): symptoms include irresponsible behavior and crazy ideas. You're liable to both. But beneath that you have a heart, a sensitive side, and this more often than not carries the day."

Incredible machines videos.

  The idiot-in-chief explains Tribal Sovereignty.

I’m a total rube when it comes to economics, which is why I love it when someone cuts through the nonsense and gives me the info in terms I can understand.

Good thing hell doesn’t exist because if it did I’d be headed there for posting this.

Entry #946

An Inconvenient Truth gets a 92% approval rating from Rotten Tomatoes.

"In 39 years, I have never written these words in a movie review, but here they are: You owe it to yourself to see this film. If you do not, and you have grandchildren, you should explain to them why you decided not to." --Roger Ebert

When I was in college I went to see Warren Zevon when he played at the UNH student union building.  It was just him and his piano and it was one of the best shows I’ve ever seen.  Via Avedon, here he is on Letterman in 1989 singing “Splendid Isolation”.

Redneck technology.

Jon gives a lesson on how to make Bush’s insane tax cuts for the rich funny.  Actually most of the credit goes to dry as toast John Hodgman.  Watch it here.

Dear Leader’s Daily Thought.

Trivia Update: Shayera reached 100 Biomes points and chose Nick Lampson's (D-Not a slug) campaign for my donation.  $25 was sent yesterday.  Nick’s running for the typically corrupt Republican Tom Delay’s seat in the 22nd district of Texas.  If you’d like to help out, here’s his website. Matching donations earn you 15 Biomes points, by the way.  (Like I said before, this is like Calvinball.  We just make the rules up as we go.) Shayera starts back at zero but everyone else keeps their points.

And here’s proof that I’m not a Bush-like liar: 

Payment Information:
================================
Transaction ID: 1546.... (ed. some #’s deleted for security reasons.)
Date: July 16, 2006
Time: 3:28pm (ET)
Payment Amount: $25.00
Campaign: Contribute | Nick Lampson for Congress
Name: Mark Hall

Robert Newman’s History of Oil.  I posted this google video not long ago but I doubt anyone actually sat through it.  I’ll throw it out there again hoping you’ll bookmark it and watch it sometime when you have nothing better to do.  If nothing else you’ll love his voice.  Trust me on this one.