your inner child
grrlscientist | March 6, 2010tags: children, religion, cults, mind control, television, silly, offbeat, beliefs, funny, education, streaming video
This amusing video is from a British TV show, Outnumbered. In this clip, young Ben asks the vicar some awkward questions about Jesus -- questions that most religious people have been asked at one time or another.
grrlscientist | March 6, 2010tags: Star Trek: How It Should Have Ended, Star Trek, Star Wars, comedy, humor, parody, satire, silly, fucking hilarious, streaming video
Space: the Final Frontier. These are the voyages of the Starship Enterprise, to seek out new worlds and new civilizations, to boldly go where no man has gone before ... this is how Star Trek should have ended!
grrlscientist | March 5, 2010tags: Beware the Ninja Chemistry Professor, college chemistry, comedy, humor, silly, fucking hilarious, streaming video
This risky and hilarious college prank was done as part of a student's fund raising efforts for a Dance Marathon. The prank is funny, but the chemistry professor's reaction is priceless.
ChemistryBlog says Professor Owen Priest of Northwestern University, is the scary ninja professor taking down that chicken.
grrlscientist | March 4, 2010tags: Two Girls and One Giant Piano, Johann Sebastian Bach, Toccata et fugue, piano, organ music, music video, streaming video
Two women play Johann Sebastian Bach's Toccata et fugue on a giant piano -- with their feet. This amazing performance looks like dancing as much as piano playing.
grrlscientist | March 4, 2010Okay, this quiz is silly, but I took it and was amused. Except I am less-than-amused by who I was determined to be.
Why? I've never heard of him before. Also, I am unemployed, which means I'd have to get a job in science before I could become the writer I am supposed to be. Although, the real Greg Benford took this quiz, and it told him that he was Arthur C. Clarke. So .. does that mean I'll be dead before I realize my inner SciFi writer?
I am:
Gregory Benford
A master literary stylist who is also a working scientist.
Which science fiction writer are you?
grrlscientist | March 3, 2010tags: neuroscience, happiness, experience, memory, colonoscopy, vacation, well-being, income, Daniel Kahneman, TEDTalks, streaming video
Using examples from vacations to colonoscopies, Nobel laureate and founder of behavioral economics Daniel Kahneman reveals how our "experiencing selves" and our "remembering selves" perceive happiness differently. This new insight has profound implications for economics, public policy -- and our own self-awareness.
TEDTalks is a daily video podcast of the best talks and performances from the TED Conference, where the world's leading thinkers and doers…
grrlscientist | March 2, 2010tags: five million, sitemeter
Many thanks to everyone who has visited my blog, it has been a pleasure writing for you.
I was watching sitemeter as it passed the five millionth visitor just now, so (amazingly), I know who it was. This person was from Chapel Hill, North Carolina, and was popping in from behind-the-scenes, so I'll give you one guess as to who it was.
Contrary to a certain someone's accounts on twitter, the four millionth, nine-hundred and ninety-nine thousandth, nine-hundred and ninety-ninth visitor was from Memphis, Tennessee and the five millionth and first visitor was…
grrlscientist | March 1, 2010tags: The Dork Anthem, funny, humor, comedy, fucking hilarious, iTunes, Dave and Brian, music video, streaming video
This video is a musical tribute to the miserable lives led by high school guys with talent in the sciences, and yes, it's actually funny. I wish that us grrls would do something like this, though, except I'm thinking we're all too busy struggling to pay rent while searching for tenure-track positions and taking care of kids.
Produced by FocalPoint Cinematic & Dave and Brian. You can purchase this tune on iTunes.
grrlscientist | February 27, 2010tags: comedy, humor, funny, fucking hilarious, birds, streaming video
This particular exhibit is a living art piece made up of 40 zebra finches jamming on electric guitars and cymbals at the Barbican, in London. The artist, Boursier-Mougenot creates a walk-though aviary for a flock of zebra finches, furnished with electric guitars and other musical instruments. As the birds go about their routine activities, perching on or feeding from the various pieces of equipment, they create a captivating, live soundscape.
This video is cute, because it shows a female zebra finch, building a nest on the…
grrlscientist | February 26, 2010tags: comedy, humor, funny, fucking hilarious, elderly couple pay piano, streaming video
An elderly couple walked into the lobby of the Mayo Clinic for a checkup and spotted a piano. They've been married for 62 years and he'll be 90 this year. Check out this impromptu performance. We are only as old as we feel, it's all attitude. Enjoy! They certainly do.
My spouse and I want to grow up to be like these two!
grrlscientist | February 26, 2010tags: comedy, humor, funny, fucking hilarious, information technology, IT, Isilon, magician, Scott Tokar, streaming video
The moral of this short video is this: never bring a magician on a tour through your facilities. Or, if you do, don't curse on camera when this magician destroys something you've spent hours setting up.
Okay, here's the link: i.
grrlscientist | February 25, 2010tags: Tilikum, Tillikum, Tilly, Orcinus orca, Killer Whale, SeaWorld, Sea World, Orlando, Florida, whales, animals, news, behavior, streaming video
The latest word is that Tilikum will not be euthanized in retaliation for being associated with his third human death. Of course, if the SeaWorld officials did decide to euthanize him, this raises several problems, not the least of which are the publicity and the mechanics of carrying out this animal's demise.
This realist (me) has decided that SeaWorld avoided the "euthanization problem" in the case of Tilikum due to two reasons, and two…
grrlscientist | February 22, 2010tags: Queasy Bake Oven, Easy Bake Oven, kid's toys, funny, spoof, humor, Ronald Howes Sr, streaming video
The Easy-Bake Oven was the invention of Ronald Howes Sr, who died 20 February at age 83. I never got one, although I sure would have loved one to experiment with ... According to his obituary, Howes sounds like a very fun person to be around.
"He always had the coolest stuff on earth that I could mess around with," such as phosphorescent powder he was testing for various glow-in-the-dark applications, his son said.
But Mr. Howes always realized that the Easy-Bake Oven was, in his son's…
grrlscientist | February 19, 2010tags: How to Swear Like a Brit, humor, funny, comedy, culture, British culture, cursing, swearing, language, streaming video
My spouse, who I was told was a "shy and nerdly British scientist" is anything but that! He is teaching me, a shy and nerdly American scientist, how to swear like a Brit, something that inspired me to share this video with you.
grrlscientist | February 19, 2010tags: Sonic Boom Meets Sun Dog, amazing science, sonic boom, Atlas V, rocket launch, amazing, beautiful, atmosphere, physics, astronomy, streaming video
This amateur video is absolutely amazing: recording the precise moment when a rocket goes supersonic, which coincides with the moment it passes through a layer of ice crystals in the atmosphere, creating a rippled effect that is just astonishing to see.
Solar Dynamics Observatory Launch, Feb 11, 2010: A sun dog is a prismatic bright spot in the sky caused by sun shining through ice crystals. The Atlas V rocket exceeded the speed of sound in…
grrlscientist | February 16, 2010tags: dog eating, funny, offbeat, silly, humor, pets, pranks, fucking hilarious, streaming video
This video shows what happens when a guy and his dog have too much time (and a video camera) on their hands.
grrlscientist | February 13, 2010tags: Mormonism, religion, cults, mind control, magic underwear, moron, offbeat, beliefs, insanity, education, streaming video
In some denominations of the Latter Day Saint cult, the temple garment (also referred to as "garments", or "Mormon underwear") is worn beneath the clothing of those who have taken part in the Endowment ceremony. Mormon underwear are worn both day and night and are required for any previously endowed adult to enter a church temple.The undergarments are viewed as a symbolic reminder of the sacred covenants made in temple ceremonies, and are viewed as an either symbolic…
grrlscientist | February 13, 2010tags: Look Around You: Ghosts!, supernatural, documentary, science, BBC, satire, parody, humor, comedy, fucking hilarious, streaming video
Ghosts is part of the hilarious British comedy "Look Around You", series. The episodes are a satire/homage of 1970s and early 1980s educational videos and schools programs, with a different scientific subject being discussed in each episode, or "modules" as they are referred to in the series.
grrlscientist | February 12, 2010tags: Beaker's Ballad, humor, funny, silly, weird, Beaker, The Muppets, streaming video
I can't help it, I've been bitten by the Beaker Bug! Besides, I need some silliness in my life right now since I've been suffering from wacky brain chemistry this week and I am faced with a weekend where I have to spend a large portion of time unpacking boxes. So you'll just have to suffer alongside me and watch this video;
grrlscientist | February 11, 2010tags: NASA Scientists Plan To Approach Girl By 2018, scientists, geeks, nerds, pencilheads, ONN, Onion News Network, comedy, humor, satire, fucking hilarious, streaming video
President Obama recently increased funding to all science organizations, including NASA. According to this news report, it appears that NASA has already budgeted their share of the money to support their plan to approach a girl at the laundromat by 2018. This amusing video is a commentary on male scientists, geeks, nerds and other types of pencilheads. It actually looks to be rather close to the truth.