humor
oracknows | March 16, 2010Apparently someone at a British hospital thought that this was a good idea.
I beg to differ. Words fail me. It's rare, I know, but occasionally it does happen.
omnibrain | March 16, 2010It seems that if you eat on a full brain you are more likely to make poor eating decisions.
So here's the schtick via Weighty Matters:
Simple experimental design. Take 165 undergraduate students and enroll them in a study you tell them is about memory and where as part of their reward for inclusion, they'll be given a snack. Ask half of them to memorize a 2 digit number and the other half a 7 digit number and once they've memorized their numbers ask them to go into a second room where they are faced with their snack choice - either a piece of chocolate cake or a cup of fruit salad. Track…
omnibrain | March 16, 2010I've been fascinated by chatroulette since news of it has been floating around the internet for the last month or so. Not fascinated enough to actually go on it... but fascinated anyway. This is by far the coolest thing I've seen coming from it so far.
Twitter on the other hand... what a honking piece of crap - what's the point?!?!?!?
grrlscientist | March 16, 2010tags: Bill and Coo, Tour of Chirpendale, film, movies, silly, funny, humor, fucking hilarious, animal training, birds, parrots, streaming video
I have never seen nor heard of Bill and Coo (1948), but it's a real treat. It features an all-bird cast (trained by George Burton) acting out a story involving Taxi Driver Bill Singer wooing his beloved Coo whilst fighting off a parakeet-devouring crow! This clip features a tour of the town of Chirpendale and its inhabitants. Oddly enough, the film won a special Academy award "In which artistry and patience blended in a novel and entertaining use of…
grrlscientist | March 15, 2010tags: British humor, cricket, sports, The Full Monty, silly, satire, parody, funny, humor, fucking hilarious, cultural observation, streaming video
I am not sure which form of torture would be most likely to make me crack first: being forced to watch paint dry, being forced to watch golf or being forced to watch a cricket match. This British film trailer parody is an amusing look at one of the world's most boring and inane sports.
I had to share this here since the person whom I share a flat with happens to be obsessed with this lameass sport.
sastyk | March 14, 2010After all that work, you'll want to plant good seeds. Glenn Beck approved seeds, ideally. Well, Stephen Colbert is right on board, aware that in a disaster, we'll all want raddichio. He's even started his own crisis herb garden, because, "I may be ready for a world where the streets run with blood, and zombies rule the night and feast on human flesh. But I refuse to live in a world where I can't garnish."
The Colbert Report
Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Survival Seed Bank
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes
Political Humor
Health Care reform
Sharon
oracknows | March 14, 2010...about the internecine warfare that breaks out from time to time around ScienceBlogs. At times we do appear to be a lot like professional wrestling.
Can you find Orac in there?
pharyngula | March 13, 2010One of the fun surprises of the Global Atheist Convention is that, after a long day of shrill talks from rabidly militant atheists (…and a few accommodationists, shock horror), the evening sessions are all about the humor. So last night we got The Chasers, and I also got to meet Nonstampcollector, who showed this video to the group.
In case you're wondering what he looks like, it's kind of amazing: Nonstampcollector has a face that is a perfect circle, two tiny eyes, and only two expressions. So don't knock the crude animation style, that's simply an accurate rendition of his people.
Oh,…
pharyngula | March 13, 2010I predict this cartoon will be appearing all over the place here today.
I quite like Bob O'Hara's equivalent portrait of Nature Network, too.
grrlscientist | March 13, 2010tags: art, humor, cartoon
Some of you might be aware that the roughhousing at ScienceBlogs has been noted and cartooned by the extremely talented Joseph Hewitt. Unfortunately, I was overlooked in the cartoon so I made a comment on his blog, Ataraxia Theatre, about sending my flock of attack parrots after him. My parrots caught up with him early this morning (the middle of the night, Joseph's time) and so you can see the result. He did not finish his cartoon of me in time to stave off their chomping beaks of death, so his blood was split before I managed to call them all off. His poor well-…
mikethemadbiologist | March 13, 2010Admittedly, that would be a great name for a band, but, by way of Yves Smith, I came across this hysterical video of zebra finches (it gets really good past the one minute mark):
grrlscientist | March 13, 2010tags: photography, sports, futbol, professional soccer, cultural observation, acting lessons, humor, funny, television, streaming video
I love futbol, but OMG, these boyz are such crybabies and drama queens! These soccer/futbol players demonstrate the reasons why I think they all are in desperate need of acting lessons: their ridiculous overblown theatrics.
sastyk | March 12, 2010First of all, I present to you, the cover for my new book (not yet finished, but it will be really soon) forthcoming this fall. I didn't think it was possible that they could come up with something prettier than the cover for Independence Days (which you can see on the sidebar), but I think they did.
I admit, I'm pretty impressed by it! Plus it fulfills the maxim that all my covers must have food on them, whether the books are about food or not.
Second of all, if you want to see someone's impression of me headlocking a fellow science blogger in a free-for-all, I'm in panel three of this…
grrlscientist | March 12, 2010tags: Captain Kirk Deals with a Strange Alien Culture, Encounter over Planet Trololololo, Star Trek, parody, funny, humor, fucking hilarious, television, streaming video
I've been watching the Trolololololo man video several times during the past week or two with a mixture of fascination, repulsion and horror -- sort of like being the first person to come upon a traffic accident late at night where you make the unsettling discovery that the driver has been decapitated. I am getting a head start on Saturday silliness videos by showing this video today, where Captain Kirk comes across an alien…
tsaunders | March 11, 2010Something to help Friday morning pass a little quicker...
"Piled
Higher and Deeper" by Jorge Cham
www.phdcomics.com
Apologies for the small size - click here for the full sized version. Hat tip to fellow uOttawa grad student Jonathan Gravel for sending me link.
Travis
sastyk | March 11, 2010I'm back from my northeast travels - I had a great time at both NOFA and NESEA, and am slowly recovering from a glazed state of sleep deprivation to something sort of coherent enough to finish the book (3 weeks to go!). But I'm still sleepy and tired, so to remind you that Pi day is coming, I include my classic (ok, if I have any classics ;-)) essay on why the world can be saved with Pie. If you are inspired to follow up with a submission to the Pi-day contest, that would be awesome.
The other day I got embroiled in one of those endless discussions/debates/headbangings about what the best…
ddobbs | March 11, 2010Chicago Tribune recently banned (sensibly, it seems) the use of 119 cliched words or phrases in Tribune story. NPR blogger Ian Chillag, who apparently either did not get or badly misread the memo, promptly set about using all 119 in a single sentence . Jump the break ('read more") to revel in the whole thing:
In other news, stay tuned, because in our top story tonight, some really good (or bad) news: as expected, in a surprise move yesterday, informed sources say, a world class icon, diva, mother of all motorists, and famed undocumented alien, lauded for putting area residents at risk and…
grrlscientist | March 11, 2010tags: Department of Motor Vehicles, DMV, driver's license, prank, funny, humor, offbeat, odd, streaming video
The Department of Motor Vehicles has sure changed since when I lived the US. For example, I once had a cast on my foot and was told to wait to renew my driver's license until after the cast had been removed. When I see what these two guys managed to do, I admit I feel somewhat put out because after all, DMV wasn't photographing my foot!
Part 2:
A news report about this prank:
grrlscientist | March 10, 2010tags: cycles, Invasion of the Teddy Bears, music, animation, Cyriak, offbeat, odd, streaming video
Here's a truly peculiar video for you to watch featuring infinite teddy bears invading a beach. Music and animations by Cyriak, who has quite a following, apparently.
No teddy bears were harmed in the making of this video (not sure about the pigeon's health, though). The software used was adobe after effects.