Like anyone who writes for the internet, Ralph Jones receives a lot of email from public relations people. On a lark, he decided to answer those messages saying “I love you” for a month. Most of the time it was in the sign-off, but sometimes it would even be in the body of the email. Some ignored it, some stopped contacting him, but a few responded in kind. Those were either folks who took it as a mistake, a friendly (if strange) custom, or as the joke it was intended.
One played along for quite some time, giving us a wonderful string of emails you can read at Hexjam. Bonus (or warning): sex toys, with an explanation for the blue one. -via Marilyn Bellamy
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A couple of newspapers in Colorado already have marijuana reviews. Now a newspaper in Oregon is launching a column to review strains of marijuana and other cannabis products and to track pot trends. The Oregonian/OregonLive is looking for a marijuana critique to write the reviews.
The candidate should be an experienced cannabis consumer with deep knowledge about the variety of strains and products available on the Oregon market. The items would appear 2-4 times a month on OregonLive and/or The Oregonian.
Oh yeah, and the reviewer has to be a medical marijuana patient, because that's the only way you can legally purchase it in Oregon until October first. Otherwise, it would be assumed that the writer is breaking the law to get the experience required. Find out how to apply at Oregon Live. -via Time
(Image credit: Bogdan)
The following article is from The Annals of Improbable Research.
by Charles Seim
El Cerrito, California
[Editor’s note: This was written in February 2007, a few days after Charles Seim gave his first public lecture about Stress Analysis of a Strapless Evening Gown.]
I wrote “Stress Analysis of a Strapless Evening Gown” in my senior year in Civil Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. At the time I was the Associate Editor of the Cal Engineer, a monthly magazine produced by students in the College of Engineering.
The editor of the Cal Engineer had seen a short article in an engineering magazine from another university on the topic and he showed it to me, asking if I could write a better essay. I replied, “Sure I can!”
The Research
I spent many more hours developing the engineering (it is a legitimate analysis) and writing the article than I ever dreamed it would take; the writing of the article definitely cut into my homework time (engineering students at that time were given 4 to 5 hours of homework every night!).
When the Cal Engineer published my essay, that issue sold out immediately! The essay was the talk of the engineering campus, and every one seemed to appreciate and enjoy the article.
During the time I was writing, I kept wondering if the article was too risqué. By today’s standards, it is merely “lukewarm” and doesn’t even come close to being “risqué.” How times have changed in 55 years!
Is “data” singular or plural? That’s a word that sounds wrong when you use it correctly. It is supposed to be plural, with the singular being datum. I try to avoid writing “data is” or “data are,” but other phrases bring up the same question. “The data tells us” should really be “The data tell us,” but that just sounds odd in English. This is the latest from Jorge Cham at PHD Comics. Oh, by the way, one data point is a datum.
The Maritime Museum of the Atlantic in Haifax, Nova Scotia, is throwing a retirement party for a cat. But this isn’t just any cat. Rodent Control Officer Erik the Red has been serving faithfully aboard the CSS Acadia since 1998.
"He came aboard as a stowaway," said Steven Read, shipkeeper for CSS Acadia.
The 102-year-old ship is permanently moored outside the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic in Halifax. While it doesn't leave the shore, it has the same problem with rodent visitors as many ships.
Erik's passion for the hunt was perfectly timed. His arrival was around the same time a building was being torn down near the ship. Read says there was a surge in the number of field mice and rats that jumped on board, but they quickly learned their mistake.
Erik is very popular with the crew of the Acadia and the museum staff as well as visitors. But at age 18, he has trouble with winters aboard ship. In retirement, he will live further inland at Read’s home. If you can attend the party, all the particulars are posted at Facebook. -via Arbroath
(Image credit: Maritime Museum of the Atlantic)
Cheese straight from the refrigerator is pretty good, but cheese melted over a hamburger, hot dog, pizza, or inside a grilled cheese is awesome. That is, if it melts correctly. Some cheeses just don’t, or the results aren’t what you expected. Serious Eats explains melting cheese in detail, starting with the chemical bonds that make cheese what it is, followed by the chemistry of cheese falling apart in your favorite recipe.
Technically speaking, cheese is an emulsion of dairy fat and water, held together by a network of proteins. In cooler temperatures, that dairy fat remains a solid; let it warm to around 90°F and the fat reaches a liquid state and the cheese becomes more pliable—you may even notice some cheeses begin to bead with "sweat" if they're left out at room temperature. Raise the temperature by another 40 to 90 degrees and all the bonds that joined your caseins together start to break, allowing the entire protein structure to sag and stretch into an increasingly loosey goosey, lava-like puddle.
What determines a good melting cheese from a bad one has a lot to do with how well it can maintain its emulsion when that protein network begins to collapse, which in turn has to do with the ratio of water to fat, as well as the strength of that protein network.
The easiest way to make sure your cheese melts perfectly is to select the right cheese. But there are ways to make some poorly-melting cheeses work for you, too. When you understand how it all works, you can go crazy creating your own cheese recipes. -via the Presurfer
(Image credit: Vicky Wasik)
This groom surprised his bride with a dance performance that including all the groomsmen. You've seen that sort of thing before, but this one is really quite good.
Okay, while the wedding and the surprise performance for the bride are real, the “surprise” quality of the dance is not. The groom and most of his groomsmen are professional dancers. As is the bride- she is a ballerina with the Richmond Ballet. You can tell which five of the guys are pros, and which four are not. I’m looking at the one with the beard. He did his best in an intimidating environment. -via Viral Viral Videos
The following is an article from the book Uncle John's Canoramic Bathroom Reader.
(Image credit: Cacophony)
Simon Benson has been dead for more than 70 years, but if you ever get the chance to visit the Pacific Northwest, you can still have a drink on him.
WATERWORKS
Very few big cities have public drinking fountains. One that does is Portland, Oregon. If you’ve ever walked around the downtown area, you’ve probably seen the many unique fountains that dot the city’s sidewalks. There are two varieties: a four-bowled version and a single-bowled version. Each four-bowled fountain has a stout cast-bronze trunk, somewhat reminiscent of a fire hydrant. From the top of the trunk, four thick arms (also bronze) sprout like the arms of a candelabra. Each arm curves upward and ends in a shiny brass bowl about 11 inches in diameter. From the center of each bowl is a spout, from which water gently bubbles, allowing any passerby— and three of his friends— to get a drink. (The single-bowl version is very similar, but simply has one bowl, rather than four.) These are Portland’s “Benson Bubblers,” named for Simon Benson, the man who donated them to the city in 1912.
BUBBLER HISTORY
Benson was born in Norway in 1851, emigrated to Wisconsin with his family in 1867, worked a series of odd jobs across the country, finally ending up in the logging business in Portland, Oregon, in the 1880s. There, over the next three decades, he became one of the wealthiest “timber barons” in the Northwest. In 1912 Benson, by this time one of Portland’s best-known civic leaders, donated $10,000 to the city (about $240,000 today) for the installation of 20 drinking fountains, or bubblers, around the city. (Drinking fountains are still known as “bubblers” in some parts of the U.S., especially around the Great Lakes.)
Where did he get the idea to install public drinking fountains around the city? Nobody knows for sure, but several legends persist.
The website A Practical Wedding received a letter for their advice column “Ask APW” in which a bride wants to know what to do about a bridesmaid who didn’t give a wedding gift.
Q: Since returning home from our wedding and honeymoon, my husband and I have been reliving our wedding day high from writing personal thank you notes to our guests. One issue has been killing my high… one of our guests did not give us a wedding card or gift. It wouldn’t bother me so much except that she is my best friend from growing up, a bridesmaid in our small wedding party, and she brought her boyfriend to our wedding. Maybe she thought that she didn’t have to give us a wedding gift because she was a bridesmaid?
I know I should confront her but I don’t know where to begin. Even a majority of friends who could not make the wedding sent us a congratulatory note and/or gift. If she were in dire financial circumstances, I would totally understand but she just returned from a European vacation. I don’t want to impose any societal etiquette on her. Maybe I just need to adjust my own expectations?
-Newlywed
The answer at the column covers several bases. First, “I don’t want to impose any societal etiquette on her.” It turns out that old-fashioned society etiquette does not require members of the wedding party to give a gift. And “…there could be any number of reasons she didn’t bring a gift.” True, and you have no business speculating on those reasons. But worst of all is the word “confront.” Don’t do it.
It was a good answer, but they went pretty easy on the bride. Not so at I Thee Dread, an offshoot of Jezebel. Or at Metafilter, although that discussion is somewhat sympathetic to brides who have trouble balancing their wishes against family expectations.
I was a bridesmaid only once, when I was 17. I threw a wedding shower for the bride, gave a shower gift, and made my own dress. I don’t even recall if I gave an additional wedding gift, but I think I did enough. My duties then were simple compared to the duties of a bridesmaid at the bigger weddings you hear about today. But that is all beside the point. The meaning of the word “gift” for this usage is "2: something voluntarily transferred by one person to another without compensation." Gift-giving is completely voluntary, and is not a tradeoff for a wedding invitation. Or even a birthday party. If it is an obligation, then it is not a gift.
But all that pales beside the idea of confronting anyone about not giving a gift. Where does anyone get the notion that that would ever be okay?
(Image credit: Flickr user Lindley Ashline)
August 17th is Black Cat Appreciation Day! Black cats often get passed over for adoption, possibly because it’s hard to see their sweet expressions. I will have to give my cat Gogo some extra TLC which she is entitled to at 16 years old.
You are invited to post pictures of your black cat here in the comments, at the Black Cat Appreciation Page at Facebook, and at Furball Fables, the folks who made the above video.
The ring bearer enters the wedding procession with the flower girl. Her job is more fun than his, so he joins in scattering flower petals, with the aim of emptying the basket as quickly and efficiently as possible. He considers it a competition.
Success! All the petals are gone and we’re only half way there! He knows how to celebrate, too, with a jump and holler and a few high fives for strangers in the crowd. -via Daily Picks and Flicks
The dance sequence is from Laurel and Hardy’s 1935 film Bonnie Scotland. Stan and Ollie break out of jail, travel to Scotland, and accidentally join a Scottish regiment of the British Army which ships them off to India, where they pick up trash. It’s no wonder they can’t get no satisfaction. -via Bits and Pieces
The most important thing in getting and keeping an entry-level unskilled job is to show up every day. I know too many people who can’t even do that much. For a skilled position like a mechanic, you have to have a little more. This employer is pretty specific about what it will take to be hired. That last requirement is a real doozy. -via Bad Newspaper
The Judean date palm tree thrived in Israel and was mentioned in the Bible quite a few times. But thousands of years of war destroyed the date palm groves and the palm became extinct by 500 CE. We tend to believe that when a species goes extinct, it is never coming back. But that belief doesn’t take into account how long seeds can remain dormant and stay viable.
During excavations at the site of Herod the Great's palace in Israel in the early 1960's, archeologists unearthed a small stockpile of seeds stowed in a clay jar dating back 2,000 years. For the next four decades, the ancient seeds were kept in a drawer at Tel Aviv's Bar-Ilan University. But then, in 2005, botanical researcher Elaine Solowey decided to plant one and see what, if anything, would sprout.
"I assumed the food in the seed would be no good after all that time. How could it be?" said Solowey. She was soon proven wrong.
The resulting tree is named Methuselah. Ten years later, it is not only thriving, it has produced pollen, which has been used to germinate seeds on a wild date palm. Read more about the ancient tree growing in Israel at Treehugger. -via Nag on the Lake
(Image credit: Dr. Avishai Teicher)
There is a myth that medical science did not progress during the Middle Ages. Maybe it was because the early Middle Ages were sometimes called the Dark Ages, although that was really more about our lack of information about the period between the fall of the Roman Empire and the Renaissance than it was about its history and culture. Anyway, some believe that medieval physicians only relied on ancient knowledge passed down from Galen, but in reality, they were experimenting with medical treatments, testing drugs, and studying human bodies through dissection.
Dissection was still rare in the Middle Ages, as few people would be willing to have their deceased family members used as a cadaver. The most likely source of bodies came from condemned criminals. The Byzantine historian Theophanes (752–818) records how “an apostate from the Christian faith and leader of the Scamari, was captured. They cut off his hands and feet on the Mole of St Thomas, brought in physicians, and dissected him from his pubic region to his chest while he was alive. This they did with a view to understanding the structure of man. In this condition they gave him over to the flames.”
Meanwhile, in 1319 four medical students at Bologna were caught trying to exhume the grave of a criminal who was executed earlier that day so they could perform a dissection on him.By the later Middle Ages, those interested in anatomy would also look for the poor and elderly who had no family to give them a burial. Leonardo da Vinci himself performed more than 30 dissections, including that of a 100-year-old man he had met a Florentine hospital and befriended.
While many of the cures that medieval doctors came up were terrifying and often useless, it was the best they could do with what they had. Medical knowledge did advance in some ways. Read more about the medical experiments of the Middle Ages at Medievalist. -via Everlasting Blort
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