Forgotten English -- Uts!

First, a modern occurrence of Uts! -- it is one of the sounds I make when being awakened from a dead sleep by a profound cramp in my Psoas muscle (which I have complained about before). I make the sound to deal with the sensations I'm having (searing pain), while trying desperately to get out of bed in a timely fashion to stretch out the affected area, but not wake up The Wife. Hopping around half naked, huffing and puffing, most of the sounds are right out of old Batman fight scenes: Oof! Biff! Poosh! Kshawwwwww!

The real definition of Uts! -- "A term of encouragement to dogs, generally to incite them to fight."

[From: Jeffrey Kacirk Forgotten English 2008 Calendar: A Calendar of Vanishing Vocabulary and Folklore]

Enjoy words that are also simply sounds, and require exclamation marks as part of the proper spelling,

Bp

Charlie Brown quote

"Sometimes I lie awake at night, and I ask, "Where have I gone wrong?" Then a voice says to me, "This is going to take more than one night."

- Charlie Brown, Peanuts, Charles Schulz

World's biggest particle collider may be delayed in court

There are fears that the Large Hadron Collider, near completion on the Swiss/French border, may not be safe. The safety concerns, which this article calls "Doomsday Fears," center around 3 main situations that are potentially possible at the collider: runaway black holes, Stragelets, and magnetic monopoles.

Yes, runaway black holes -- how rad is that.

Thanks to Trappin' Pat for heads up on this article -- a little early-morning science awesomeness for ya'll.

Enjoy the possibilities of ramming minute things together at unfathomable speeds,

Bp

[photo credit in second linked article]

Ya gotta love The Onion

Instructions: click on picture -- read fine print.

What more can you say, The Onion rocks,

Bp

Crop diversity and the Seed Vault

Despite the dramatic subtitle, "Around the world, scientists are risking their lives to retrieve seeds destined for a massive vault near the North Pole. Their work just might save mankind" this article on the Seed Vault and the folks working on it is well written and fascinating.

"[Loss of crop species genetic diversity] is the only world problem we know we can solve at this point in history," says Cary Fowler, the man behind the seed vault.

Enjoy global thinking, even if it tends towards the apocalyptic,

Bp

[article thanks to Yuri, photo credit in linked article]

American Drug War documentary

In case you had any questions about the connection between the U.S. Government and the illegal drug trade, here is a documentary for you.

In case you believe our government doesn't aid, abet, or outright control the illegal drug trade -- brace yourself, set aside a couple hours, and watch this video. It's not wingnut, it sticks to reputable sources, and covers over 30 years of the rise of the drug trade in the U.S.

It also makes very cogent points about drug laws, prohibition, the prison industry, class war, and "post 9/11" terrorism policy and spin.

I know it's a tall order for folks, but believe me the story is absolutely intriguing, even just taken as a narrative.

There is some seriously historic footage in here as well -- like Mike Ruppert directly challenging the head of the CIA in a public meeting in California.



Enjoy the stretch and strain associated with opening ones eyes,

Bp

Hot Chocolate: You Sexy Thing

What to say about this video -- it defies simple description.



Enjoy one-hit wonders,

Bp

Car that runs on compressed air

Looks like a truly innovative car is finally going to hit the market. The Air Car should hit markets in europe and India by next summer. It, of course, won't be sold in the U.S. Ostensibly, the reason is that the car doesn't meet safety requirements. I would like to see this company take the route some other ultra-light alternative car designs have taken and just remove a wheel and register it as a motorcycle, which have much lower safety requirements.

Now it's not quite right to call compressed air a new fuel for cars, because electric cars already exist and more than likely the fuel used to compress the air will be electricity. The technology will be a huge boon to emissions, however. This design will truly reduce emissions in India where small city vehicles are most often fueled by two-stroke diesel engines, which are atrocious from an air pollution standpoint.

Also, this style of fuel as well as the vehicle itself is very economical, which will encourage its use. I'd like to see this thing take off, and show some serious improvements in air quality in its wake. Time will tell.



Enjoy the beginnings of diversification in basic needs technologies,

Bp

UPDATE: Just barely posted this and already I've found an update that suggests within 2 years or so there will be an air car design available in the U.S. with a possible 1,000-mile range. It's still being developed, and uses a dual-fuel system but promises extreme increases in fuel efficiency and range over standard internal combustion cars.

Off to the Palouse to work on hives

I'm headed out to The Palouse Diary headquarters to visit Uncle Fester and finish up my bee hives so they'll be ready when my sets come in next month.

Today, as I have been many times this winter, I am thankful we sucked it up (with the help of Va Momma and John) and replaced our Outback with an Outback. I've driven on tons of crappy road and felt safe, slept in the car, and today loaded up all 3 hives with room to spare. Awesome.

Ya'll have fun, I intend to.

Soon,

Bp

Awesomeness personified: Jackie Chan stunt tribute

Having just watched a fantastically horrible movie this weekend with Doc Ock and Tony, I am good on cheesy movies again. For a minute. It's been a long, long time since I saw a movie that was so bad it was good -- but that's beside the point.

I ran across this Jackie Chan stunt tribute today, and thought I'd post it. This guy is like a Bruce Lee version of Jackass, I swear. I knew he did his own stunts, but I didn't know how little safety equipment was involved. Crazy stuff -- and out of fantastically horrible movies to boot.



Enjoy your crazy masochistic stunt heroes,

Bp

Good spam: Toyota and Ford canoe race

Received this from a few people via email, and I wanted to repost here.

It's too true, way too true -- spam or no.

_________

A Japanese company (Toyota) and an American company (Ford) decided to have a canoe race on the Missouri River Both teams practiced long and hard to reach their peak performance before the race.

On the big day, the Japanese won by a mile.

The Americans, very discouraged and depressed, decided to investigate the reason for the crushing defeat. A management team made up of senior management was formed to investigate and recommend appropriate action.

Their conclusion was the Japanese had 8 people rowing and 1 person steering, while the American team had 8 people steering and 1 person rowing.

Feeling a deeper study was in order, American management hired a consulting company and paid them a large amount of money for a second opinion.

They advised, of course, that too many people were steering the boat, while not enough people were rowing.

Not sure of how to utilize that information, but wanting to prevent another loss to the Japanese, the rowing team's management structure was totally reorganized to 4 steering supervisors, 3 area steering superintendents and 1 assistant superintendent steering manager.

They also implemented a new performance system that would give the 1 person rowing the boat greater incentive to work harder. It was called the 'Rowing Team Quality First Program,' with meetings, dinners and free pens for the rower. There was discussion of getting new paddles, canoes and other equipment, extra vacation days for practices and bonuses.

The next year the Japanese won by two miles.

Humiliated, the American management laid off the rower for poor performance, halted development of a new canoe, sold the paddles, and canceled all capital investments for new equipment. The money saved was distributed to the Senior Executives as bonuses and the next year's racing team was out-sourced to India .

Sadly, The End.

Here's something else to think about: Ford has spent the last thirty years moving all its factories out of the US , claiming they can't make money paying American wages.

TOYOTA has spent the last thirty years building more than a dozen plants inside the US The last quarter's results:

TOYOTA makes 4 billion in profits while Ford racked up 9 billion in losses.

Ford folks are still scratching their heads.

IF THIS WEREN'T SO TRUE IT MIGHT BE FUNNY!!!

-----------

Enjoy the wisdom available at the level of bathroom grafitti a-la-intarweb,

Bp

How to hack RFID credit cards

RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) technology freaks a lot of people out. It is, of course, being billed as making things easier and more secure -- and of course, can easily be seen as a means by which to further centralize power and eliminate privacy.

In my ongoing campaign to (for the purposes of humor and irony only) encourage people to hack ridiculously insecure systems such as voting machines, here is a video discussing how radically insecure RFID enabled credit cards are. It takes, apparently, a little bit of technical know how and an $8 ebay purchase to grab card info from anyone you can get close to. With the right antennae, maybe anyone within 40 feet.

Check it out [I apologize for the ad in the middle of the video, I figure the info is worth the interruption].



Enjoy knowing the true loopholes in "secure and convenient" systems,

Bp

Resonant frequencies used to create images

Little explanation is given in this video, but in general when something like this is created, there is a tightly stretched medium -- skin or rubber or plastic, then particles on top of it (in this case rice), into which sound is played.

I've always loved to see what forms arise, and to compare them with religious and sacred symbolism from around the world like the flower of life, mandalas, and other forms of sacred geometry.

They did a good job on this video, hit some serious shapes.

Thanks yet again to my Canukistani operative Yuri for sending this my way:



Enjoy repeated patterns that point to something unifying,

Bp

Earthworms non-native, introduced by European colonists

I couldn't believe this when I heard it -- there were no big fat earthworms in North America before the Europeans arrived. At least, not what we would think of as earthworms. I should know things like this!

Apparently, their introduction changed the N.E. forests forever, and although farmers and gardeners generally love them not all of the impacts of the non-native worms are good. Something else I never would have imagined -- how could worms be bad?

Thanks to Chaz at the Jasmine Pearl Tea Merchants for pointing this out to me.

[photo credit in "earthworm" link above]

Beekeeping Class in Portland, April 5 at Livingscape Nursery!

It's almost Bee Time -- most of the bee orders will be filled this time next month.

Anyone interested in beekeeping in or near Portland should consider This Class with local urban beekeeper and organic gardening educator extordinaire Glen Andresen. The classes will be held from 10 - 2 at the very cool Livingscape Nursery,3926 N. Vancouver Avenue(between Shaver and Fremont)503.248.0104.

For gear and information and bees, know about Ruhl Bee Supply -- a long-time staple N.W. business. The people are educated and helpful, and they'll have whatever you need to get set up.

I'm thinking that after the backyard chicken craze, Portland's next urban self sufficiency/food production movement is going to be bees. That couldn't make me happier.

I found out about this class from the lovely and talented Naomi at Concentrates agriculture supply, where we buy all our soil amendments, chicken food, and other knickknacks that we need (that come in 50 lb increments). Thanks Naomi.

Enjoy grassroots means to sweetness,

Bp

[photo credit in linked article about Glen]

Rubberband Man -- The Spinners

Some more awesome stepping -- and silver shoes!

[Personal note: survived finals, I'll be back to posting now]



Enjoy the original performance of songs that have since been devoured and shat back out by corporate culture,

Bp

Label Clarification -- Walrus dancing to Michael Jackson = totally random

Just to be clear -- the "Awesome" label is different from the "Total Randomness" label in this blog. Some examples: Stevie Wonder performing on Sesame Street is Awesome, this photo of my own uncle in the 70's (handlebar mustache and aviator glasses flyin') is Awesome; whereas this video of a walrus busting a move to a Michael Jackson song is totally random. You feelin' me here?

[Technical note: I'll be fixing labels in the blog archives to accurately represent this clarification of philosophy, but not until after finals are over. Check the labels in a week or so if you are interested in how it shakes down]



Enjoy your blog clarifications,

Bp

Ps: Brick House synched to Star Wars Scenes is both Awesome and Totally Random -- to further clarify.

Awesome -- Japanese orchestra covers "smoke on the water"

Ok, I guess it's the week of creating new labels. This video of a Japanese orchestra covering Deep Purple's Smoke on the Water demands the label "Awesome."

There used to be a blog called Your Daily Awesome that I checked all the time. I didn't want to steal his schtick. But -- that blog is down, and I think he'd be proud to have some resonance of the meme floating around in the blogosphere.

Day one of the "Awesome" label:



Enjoy bizarre covers,

Bp

[thanks Estu for the link]

More info on those Blue Ice photos

Yuri (of Canukistan) has dug up a bit more information on those ice pictures I posted below.

Snopes.com did a little piece on it, exposing the misnomer "frozen waves."

Here is a post talking about blue ice and how it is formed, with some great shots from Southern Patagonia. Included in the bottom of the post are the photos in question. The photographer is named as Tony, and there is a link to his Antarctic photoset, named "Dome C."

Therefore, it seems reasonable to assume that the photos are from the location in Antarctica called Dome C. To finish off the intarweb research, here is the obligatory wiki entry for the location as well.

This may provide Trappin' Pat more information with which he can further explain the ice formations -- though he did a pretty amazing job already in the comments below.

Enjoy the white tips of your personal celestial sphere,

Bp

[photo source: linked UADDIT blog]

Army Sponsors 'Bring your Daughter to War' day

"Ya Gotta Love The Onion" (I'll be stealing this label title from Estu -- it's too good to pass up).


Army Holds Annual 'Bring Your Daughter To War' Day

Enjoy black humor, some days it's the only kind that really shines,

Bp