bushwells
Posts by this author
July 2, 2007
A friend visited from Boston this past weekend, so we took a jaunt into The City on Saturday. Our prime destination was the American Museum of Natural History where Mythic Creatures: Dragons, Unicorns and Mermaids is now playing as a special exhibition.
The imaginary bestiary was entertaining and…
July 2, 2007
To the approximately half-dozen or so of my regular readers:
The Refuge has been very active recently thanks to the capers of the young males of the troop. As a consequence, those few entries I offer are likley to be buried quickly. Should you have a burning desire to read my blathering…
June 14, 2007
Following up on the wacky tobaccy post, the FDA advisory panel voted 14-0 against recommendation of rimonabant to move forward as a treatment for obesity, citing the need for further safety studies. As noted, the primary concerns are psychiatric/neurological issues.
I really can't resist a "No…
June 13, 2007
Today, the FDA's Endocrinologic and Metabologic Advisory Committee reviews rimonabant, the cannabinoid receptor antagonist developed by Sanofi-Aventis, for recommendations, or lack thereof, as an anti-obesity medication. Rimonabant was approved in Europe for limited cohorts of obese patients, but…
June 8, 2007
An e-droog recently waxed poetic about a single malt Scotch that she gave to a friend on the occasion of his thirtieth birthday. If I recall correctly, this was an especially rugged Islay beast, and stronger than the infamous Laphroaig. The subject of single malts triggered an avalanche of…
June 8, 2007
Today's offering is a departure from the usual floral genitalia.
I found this specimen at Marquand Park in Princeton. This park sports a variety of ornamental trees. I believe this is a leaf of Fagus sylvatica, the European beech, likely the atropunicea variety, the same species as the "copper…
June 7, 2007
So the notion that human semen may act as an antidepressant is rearing its semi-flaccid head again.
Broadsheet from Salon.com (May, 2007) asks are you addicted to semen?
Someday they'll have a patch for that. Dr. Gordon G. Gallup theorizes (via Feministing) that women have a "chemical dependency…
June 5, 2007
Three pant-hoots and a grooming session to my very favorite cheeky pharma-insider monkey over at PharmaGossip (see the Chimp Refuge Blogroll) for the following, Can Peter Rost be silenced? including the link therein which led me to...
...the reprint of the article on Peter Rost in Fortune Magazine…
June 4, 2007
Orac clearly knows too much. For an accurate look at a Big Pharma board room, check out The pharma conspiracy acts against a threat. Orac, with his delightful and respectful insolence, reveals why Dan Olmsted, Thimerosal-Conspiracy- Crusader Extraordinaire, is actually Pharma's Best Friend.…
June 2, 2007
"Your children, like or not, are attracted in their weaker years to the occult..."
Sit in on an actual gaming session with the Dead Alewives' Watchtower and see for yourself!
8-bit D&D from Cyber Moon Studios.
Sent to me by my delightfully nerdsome son, a D&D aficionado, who sports a…
June 1, 2007
What's that hanging out of the Dutchman's trousers?
A Dicentra spectabilis specimen displays its cash and prizes near the Princeton campus.
May 30, 2007
Nigh on two weeks ago, O my brothers and sisters, your Faithful Narrator went under the microtome and the laser beam so that my starry glazzes might viddy the cruel, cruel world dobby-like. Grazhny contact lenses are no longer in my present day; cally remembrances of the far, far distant past,…
May 28, 2007
But he don't pay no mind to no intelligent design. He'll tell you how it's absurd.
He's evolution's top banana and he's married to Romana and that kinda makes him king of the nerds!
Check out Mitch Benn's (indie UK musician) "Richard Dawkins" number. It's in the downloads box on the right…
May 27, 2007
My Saturday night exercises in TV viewing resemble Mystery Science Theater 3000 as my spawn and I hoot at bad sci-fi offerings. On occasion, I seek these out in the interest of seeing how poorly scientists and science are portrayed in the pop cultural milieu. Last night's trawling of the cable…
May 19, 2007
As much as it pains me (1) to honor the request (2) by Dave of The World's Fair, I'll play:
1. Can you show us your coffee cup?
Here's my work-a-day mug at my desk flanked by its friends (see answer to item 3). This photo, taken with the marginal little camera in my PDA, is in violation of DOPI (…
May 18, 2007
Aching, congested and heavy, but not a bee of relief in sight.
Fortunately, there were no blue laws prohibiting this porn shoot near the Princeton campus.
May 15, 2007
Deep in my heart, I knew you'd leave. They said you'd never stay. But I couldn't come to grips with it. I convinced myself that you'd be with us forever. The mournful winds across the sere landscape of downtown Princeton say otherwise.
Like Writer's Block before it (see Tasha O'Neil's…
May 3, 2007
Check out Blake Stacey's My First Embedded Video, a hilarious presentation. I will not embed the video here because I want you to go visit Science After Sunclipse for the full effect of the blag.
in lieu of "chicken," I would have used Roo-roo.
May 1, 2007
When I encounter horrific articles like Hope for sex-boosting slimming pill , I would just as soon take a pencil and shove it in my ear because that would be more gratifying than giving such journalistic shattery any kind of serious consideration. But what the hey, this is the Chimp Refuge, where…
April 25, 2007
How many oratorios begin with a song celebrating biogenesis and conclude with an epilogue advising us to be good caretakers of our four billion year old home? As far as I know, only one and that would be Lifetime: Songs of Life and Evolution by David Haines. Lifetime had its North American…
April 20, 2007
...until Movable Type will allow me to embed one of my own images, and that nasty Forbidden message stops taunting me.
Or I'll take that as one more hint that this Friday feature's entertainment value is minimal at best.
April 18, 2007
This is entirely unscientific, unless one wishes to calculate to trajectory of the flying pizza wedge, but entirely hootworthy. It had me hooting partly because I can just imagine how the Sox fans drenched in beer sounded, but mostly because the announcers for the New England Sports Network…
April 17, 2007
If it's about spiders and sex, it's gotta be Live Science!
Well, to be accurate, the critters are not spiders, but mites from the family Crotoniidae. These mites reproduce sexually, which is not much of an eyebrow raiser until one considers that their close relatives, the Camisiidae, reproduce by…
April 16, 2007
I freely admit it. I routinely destroy my neoencephalon by watching all manner of crap on television. I am not one of those overweening snobs who daintily curl an upper lip as I sneer, "I never watch television." I love popular culture, and frankly, find a dose of mindless television to be…
April 5, 2007
Dear Mr. Luskin:
In the interest of full disclosure, I have not fully engaged in the uproarious brouhaha surrounding Michael Egnor, and have been relatively silent here at the Refuge because I have concentrated on, well, my daily life in science rather than the blog. I'm one of those scientists…
April 2, 2007
For your perusal: Christian warriors fighting immodesty one guilt-inducing erection at a time
The Feministe blog adroitly unzips, strips, and de-wingtips the Modest Survey from the "Rebelution," a Christian teenage rebellion against low expectations. The take home message of the survey is that…
March 21, 2007
Just as a toddler who persisently pokes the light socket with a fork, looking for the forbidden jolt, so I invariably open spider links on Live Science. This latest salacious spidey-bit did not disappoint. I'm beginning to think that spider sex on Live Science is equiavlent to the cheesecake…
March 19, 2007
...but on life support.
Sadly, the Frinksters and their fearsome pants-armadillos are entubated and awaiting a court order.
Frink Tank filled a much needed niche in the science blogs arena, and in fact they were part of this cozy community until they were sent packing into exile for something…
March 18, 2007
Shelley at Retrospectacle tagged the Chimp Refuge for a Thinking Blogger Award Hey, thanks, Shelley, but when you mention "scathing wit," we know you're talking about Kev and Jim because women just aren't funny.
Anyway, the rules for the tag you're it blogger game are to be found here at The…
March 16, 2007
When I was a little kid, I frequently snuck into my older brother's room and read his collection of science fiction books and pulp magazines (see previous post on SF&F books). My mother, who was (and is) a big fan of The Princess and the Goblin by George MacDonald (a lovely book and…