Audio Caffiene: Gossip Folks (Fatboy Slim Remix) Music Video

Woke up 10 minutes ago, my ride will be here in 5. I need to wake up -- here is my choice for audio caffeine. When I mentioned to my cool cousin and his girlfriend (they are captured here, a rare picture of the gaming couple) that I like Missy Elliot, they looked at me like I was insane, and possibly contagious. Being uncool is so... cool.

I dig the dancing in this video, especially the two little girls absolutely busting out. They are in a few of Missy's videos, and absolutely kill it every time. Very cute.

Ps: Stingite I think you will like this remix, despite some of the language.

Enjoy your anachronistic tastelessness,

Bp

Sambucol V. Bird Flu

So The Wife is sick. Not horrible, just a normal head cold. I went to get some immune boosters of some sort, and ended up buying some Sambucol. It was an impulse buy. There's something about using elderberry extract to fight viruses and bacteria that just appeals to me. It was developed by a woman, which is cool. And, it's been around for a long time. Oh, and it tastes pretty much like kid's cough syrup, so you KNOW it's gotta work. It is working dandily to keep me from getting the bug The Wife has, as well as helping her heal quickly.

I looked Sambucol up to write about it, because I thought it was kind of retro and cool and whatnot. What did I find? It seems that it may fight the bird flu, in addition to being a comfy throwback for those who were raised by hippies in the '70's. Go figure.

Enjoy the small discoveries,

Bp

James Brown - Rare Vintage Clips, Bootie Shaking

Check out James's moves. This video has lots of different clips from different eras, a great overview of his stuff. Seemed about time for some serious bootie shaking on this blog.

Enjoy what God gave ya,

Bp

Too damn much print media -- time to clean it up

This house is full of readers, it is also full of magazine subscriptions. The current list of periodicals is: National Geographic, The Onion (America's finest news source), Harper's, The New Yorker, The Economist, Vanity Fair, Primitive Archer, NW Flyfishing, and Rolling Stone.

I think that there was some cheapo offer of multiple magazine subscriptions involved in this long a list of subscriptions. T. has been saying he's not going to re-up any subscriptions except The Economist on his end of things. The Economist is a brit publication, and the information that it provides is refreshingly frank and has an obvious, overwhelming, and reasonable bias. It's about the money, stupid. If anything is "anti business" then it gets the stinkeye. Simple enough to sort out for us. It turns out to be a really great source of international news, providing info on stories that would never hit U.S. publications.

For The Wife, The New Yorker is going to stay for sure. Hell, that magazine is worth it just for the comics. There are always loads of interesting feature pieces and good book and movie reviews. Plus, it's just a tradition for her. Harper's seems pretty much like more of the same, so will be nixed methinks.

For The House, The Onion will stay. It's just too funny to let go. There are free teasers online, but having full issues laying around is really great. National Geographic, however, is under debate at the moment. Mostly we appreciate the magazine, but it seems that the quality of the articles has been steadily, slowly, but inexorably dropping over the last decade or so. The videos for sure just absolutely suck now. The court is out as to whether we'll keep that.

For me, Primitive Archer stays. Dorky as it is, there are techniques published there that exist nowhere else and I want to archive them. I don't make a ton of bows, or right now even target practice much, but having a full library of these magazines seems like a good idea to me despite these facts. Too much nearly-lost information gets published there to give up. It is like having a full set of Foxfire Book Series, an archive for future generations. As for my Northwest Flyfishing -- well -- it's a guilty pleasure. It's fish porn, and especially now that my best fishing buddy has been out of state for so long, and I'm in school, and so busy in the summers -- I just haven't gotten out like I used to. Having fish porn around can be good in these circumstances and bad. It can be a horrible taunt about the things I'm NOT doing in my life, but it can be a nice arm-chair escape as well. Jury is out on that publication, I just can't make up my mind yet.

Not much I like better than slimming things down in life -- whether it is gathering up unused clothes for goodwill, giving boxes of old computer gear to FreeGeek to reuse and sell, or quitting less-used subscriptions. Just feels good.

Enjoy your random domestic decisions,

Bp

Quick check on the 10 steps -- tortured logic

The Daily Show addresses, in its way, the situation around torture with this current administration. I kept trying to choose one of these videos over the other, but in sequence is where they have the strongest effect. Video 1. sets up the situation and shows some deranged white house reaction. Video 2. shows the ludicrousness of the arguments being used to suspend the rule of law -- or just erase law itself. Which, if you didn't see the article before, is step #10 in the process for taking a democracy into fascism. Destroying logic in public discourse aught to be #11, it seems:

Luddite wedding photos: Motley crew, showing off a ribbon shirt

Couple of pictures from The Luddite's wedding that don't involve a latrine. So the first picture is, from the left: The Luddite, Shady Kate (of the Canukistani Crew), The Wife, T., Tony, Bp, Jmichaell.

Second picture: The Wife and I posing as prompted by the photographer to "be romantic." Just can't take a statement like that seriously. I chose this picture specifically because it shows off the beautiful work The Wife did on the ribbon shirt I'm wearing. The shirt is sewn from scratch, and I believe is the first one she ever did. Not a simple design. If you didn't follow the link, the short explanation of a ribbon shirt is Native American Formalwear -- normally a clean pair of jeans, cowboy boots and a ribbon shirt.

Enjoy your formal occasions,

Bp

Amber is Forever: The Making of a Death Trap

Discovery channel news sure knows how to write a headline eh? This article outlines a study in which researchers hypothesized and then created a process by which aquatic animals could get caught in tree resin. This has long been a mystery to scientists who studied amber -- how did aquatic animals end up inside a resin dripping off a tree? Their method (tree near water drops resin into water, aquatic animals get caught in water-borne resin) was simple enough. It also worked like a charm, trapping many if not most of the small aquatic life in the waterways they tested.

Enjoy your serendipitous time-capsules,

Bp

Two weekends off take their toll -- quiz becomes rectal exam

Oh yeah, completely failed a quiz today in organic chemistry. One weekend out of town in the beginning of the semester was doable (Luddite Wedding), this second weekend (Cousin Wedding) got me where it hurts -- just too much time off. Luckily you can drop one quiz grade every term (semester, term, quarter... whatever they are here), so that will be my one.

Failing is kind of like breaking a leg or getting a rectal exam -- before it happens you are all freaked out, but after the experience the worst part was really the anticipation. After that, it's a short sharp shock and then just time to heal. No big.

Enjoy your life endeavors,

Bp

Big 'ol Family Wedding

So The Wife and I went to a wedding this weekend. It was big and fancy schmancy, and despite that was very fun and touching. My cousin Ali was in the most beautiful wedding dress I think I've ever seen. My uncle Tom did the one-time wedding that any citizen can do with the right paperwork. There were rolling hills and big oak trees behind the couple as they said their vows at sunset. The food rocked.

I feel very blessed that I don't cringe when I receive invitations to family events. My family is huge, and fun and kind. Folks get along and there is always lots of laughter. This wedding was no exception.

First photo: The bride and her two sisters. Left Sister sang a gorgeous acapella piece of At Last for their exit walk. Right sister made all the family men cry with her toast speech. We're a bunch of woosies anyhow.

There are only pre-wedding photos available so far, which is why I don't have one of the couple together yet.

Second photo is the groom, in full regalia, psyched. Congradulations again Ali and Kevin.





Enjoy your blood relatives,

Bp

ZeFrank show: League of Awesomeness Olympics

Just got back from a fantastic family wedding. Congratulations Ali and Kevin.

I'll have more to say when I've slept off this sugar hangover (yes, actually a sugar hangover I was the designated driver).

Enjoy a bizarro Zefrank episode in the meanwhile:

Fantastic Crapper post 2: instructions and diagram

The Luddite's parents did lots of educational outreach inside the crapper. Here is a diagram of the basics of the design and a few of the instructions.

There are other schools of thought about how to deal with Humanure, such as the method espoused in The Humanure Handbook. But they are much more hands-on. I think the right decision was made to use the most aesthetically pleasing method of composting in this situation. We mustn't forget, this is a toilet for a wedding, after all.

Enjoy your widening horizons,

Bp

Fantastic crapper -- home made composting toilet portrait

It is strange that during the preparations for a friend's wedding, during the wedding itself, and after the wedding, the main topic of conversation was the crapper. I like the term crapper, in deference to Thomas Crapper who didn't, it turns out, actually invent the inside toilet. But it's a good story, regardless.

Back to the composting toilet pictured above.

It gathers its own rainwater for handwashing, it doesn't smell, it doesn't poison the groundwater below it, it fertilizes directly and then provides compost for use year after year.

I have like 3 minutes -- I'll make another post about it today, but in short The Luddite's parents built it, used his eco-friendly Land Ark Northwest wood treatment on it, and put in snazzy things like a naturally-curved (I believe Alder) limb as part of the door. It's just too cool for school, and was the talk of the town at the wedding.

I'll post more pictures and descriptions soon.

Enjoy your calls from nature,

Bp

Where shooting stars come from.... Astronaut Latrines?

Soon, you will be hearing about a fabulous crapper I encountered recently. Before I write up that post, I figured I'd share this one my Mother sent me.

My mother sent me a potty joke video.

I'm just letting this sink in for a minute...

...

Enjoy your family relationships,

Bp

Normal day on the range, T.'s self improvement programme, and the incredible Oarfish

Normal day on the farm -- a long day at school, Qi Gong class at night, go to a friends' business to literally sniff at a hot smell and postulate what might be causing it (it's almost never electrical, but I get the call anyway), and come home to hear T.'s stories of First Aid class.

Did you know if you puncture or cut one of the "big" arteries (Carotid, Femoral) you have approximately 2 1/2 minutes before you are in steep steep trouble, maybe 5 minutes after that before you are expired? All those scenes from action movies with studs running around with arterial bleeding pumping out of wounds didn't ever look real... but will look even less real now.

T. has taken to "improving himself" lately. Not that he isn't always doing that, and hasn't been doing that ever since he reached adulthood, to my knowledge. I can't go into details because he's Mr. Private, but he is not exactly a slacker in the self improvement department. He's more on the super hero side of things, actually.

He's decided not only to become versed in classical music and opera (taking an audio lecture series and everything), but to become disaster-prepared. He read a disaster preparedness book, which has lead to good conversations and plans. It is a total trip to think about, actually think about, if things get seriously effed up. What you do, what you don't do, what you need in the house, who you let in who you don't. It feels very adult and responsible and sane to be thinking over this stuff -- some of the answers are quite a surprise.

There are culinary benefits to thinking about disaster preparedness. For instance, there may be a hand-crank grain mill in the works. Anything that helps with food and isn't electric needs to be considered. I'm excited about this particular item because of the prospect of fantastic home-baked, freshly-milled breads.

T. has also taken a First Aid class. Despite being woozey through most of the class, he learned a ton and now we plan to get this same instructor to teach us and our friends in a Cpr/First Aid workshop. It's cheap, and the guy loves teaching voluntary classes (as opposed to company-mandated classes). We are going to get a hold of 20 - 40 of our closest friends and run a full class (or classes, depending) for CPR and First Aid certification. I did it when I was in The Union, because it is required for Electricians -- but it's been a few years now so a refresher is in order.

Oh and I almost forgot to mention, the picture at the top there is an Oarfish. It is possibly the longest of all fishes, and to my eyes, a real looker. No, it doesn't have anything to do with anything -- I just thought it was pretty. There is an older picture at the same website I got that one which shows a much much bigger specimen.
[clicking a few google ads when you go to the fish site could keep this blog in good karma, since I just grabbed the photo gratuitously -- it was shiny, I couldn't help myself]

Enjoy your strange juxtapositions,

Bp

Little Dudes: Larch Mountain Salamander

[picture source: Washington Herp Atlas]

Finally, in the senior year of my degree in Organismal Biology, I'm studying Little Dudes directly. Anything that moves (especially if it is vertebrate but even if it's not) and can be seen by my naked eye is what I consider a "Little Dude." I went into Biology not only to teach high school kids, but to study Little Dudes too. I've had years and years of pre-req's like physics, general chemistry, Cellular Biology -- years of minutiae and numbers and abstractly small things -- years without Little Dudes. It's very nice to finally be studying something more tangible, alive and non-human.

In my Vertebrate Zoology lab we are working on identifying Oregon vertebrates. Today we covered amphibians, including the local little guy pictured above. Did you know that many, if not most, of the salamanders in Oregon (family Plethodontidae) are lung-less? They breathe exclusively through their skin.

I picked this little dude to mention today because it is named after one of my favorite near-town hikes, Larch Mountain. Maybe 45 minutes away and offering hikes,views (you can see Hickman Butte lookout with binoculars from there) and lots of big second-growth timber. One of the many reasons I love living in Portland.

Enjoy your local wildlife,

Bp

Backyard beekeepers as warriors against a plague

[New York Times photo, from below article]

My in-laws sent me this great article on backyard beekeeping from the New York Times. It points out that backyard beekeeping can be an important source of protection against some of the problems facing the domestic bee populations. Basically, the genetic stock in domestic bees is looking really thin, so that (predictably) when new strains are put on the populations, like the newly introduced Varroa Destructor Mite
from Asia, the populations collapse.

Right now, bees are under a multi-point plague situation. The Varroa mites are attacking hives left and right, and that opens the bees up to other infections that they might otherwise be able to fend off. Asian bees have grooming behaviors to protect them from the mites, but the ultra-specific modern commercial bee stock in the U.S. doesn't display this behavior.

From this new information, my plan as an urban beekeeper is looking better and better. What I wanted to do was buy only one starter colony of bees commercially, and then learn and begin to collect swarms as they occur in the area for my other two hives. There are many reasons why this is beneficial: 1. the bees are free 2. a colony swarms when it is doing so well that it decides to split off 3. colonies that swarm are therefore healthy and most probably better adapted to local conditions, carrying genetics that you would want to encourage.

Years ago, when I first got the idea to start keeping bees, I approached Glen Andresen and talked to him about possibly mentoring me in the endeavor. It's been many moons now (3-4 years) but I do believe I'll be going back to talk to him about beekeeping, and most especially about gathering wild local swarms.

Enjoy your honey and insect-pollinated plants,

Bp

Had to -- xkcd comic: love and randomness

[just click on it for a bigger version]

The Shirt I'm buying for myself for a birthday present

Rarely, occasionally, I feel compelled to buy t-shirts with text on them (yes, that's a Cicada, and yes the text is "*tastes like chicken"). This was so up my alley I had to get it, from a very cool company called OneHorseShy.

And here's some literature to back up the whole "eating cicadas" idea. From what I read, they taste more like shrimp, especially the soft shelled ones.

Enjoy your small indulgences,

Bp

New Zealand inviting Natives back

The Luddites got married this weekend. There will be pictures and stories when I glean digital media from other people because I was an idjit and forgot a camera. They are honeymooning in New Zealand to check it out for expating to --

And there's the tie in to this article, from which the awesome picture came.

Enjoy your home country,

Bp

Happy Birthday to me

Kinda self-explanatory video this morning.

Enjoy the little things,

Bp