Well. i was reading the other day and references were made to 'pikelets' as a breakfast food. Researching this a little, it turns out that these are what they call a sort of fat pancake/crumpet dating to Victorian times, and still currently prepared in New Zealand and Australia. Also, wikipedia has a remarkably complex page for pancakes, possibly due to that be a food found in some form in pretty much every culture. Other bits of interest from that page are Pancake Syndrome (Simultaneous oral mite anaphylaxis), which occurs after people have eaten pancakes made from flour infested
with particular mites which have survived cooking at the lower temps
necessary for pancakes. Also, there is a Pancake day, frequently occurring on Fat Tuesday/Mardi Gras, right before the Catholic season of Lent, to use up all of fat or lard in a household before Lenten fasting, though some places celebrate with a race; "in a "pancake race" each participant carries a pancake in a frying pan.
All runners must toss their pancakes as they run and catch them in the
frying pan. This event is said to have originated in Olney, England in 1445 when a housewife was still busy frying pancakes to eat before the Lenten fast when she heard the bells of St Peter and St Paul's Church calling her to the Shriving
Service. Eager to get to church, she ran out of her house still holding
the frying pan complete with pancake, tossing it to prevent it from
burning, and still wearing her apron and headscarf"(further referenced here). Huh.
As the Holiday season is upon us, i was skimming BBC News last week and came across and article with the intriguing title "Fairy lights could 'slow' wi-fi speeds warns Ofcom". Apparently, strings of twinkling lights (which we call 'Christmas lights' or 'Holiday lights' in the US) are referred to as 'Fairy lights' in the UK, and apparently, they might slow down wi-fi, though a reason was not specified outside of simply being a electrical device.
Something i was reading the other day referenced the 1920s slogan 'banana oil'. My training predicated me to think of isoamyl acetate, an ester that we made in undergrad o. chem lab, which is a source of the common artificial banana flavoring. That definition didn't make sense in the context. Urban dictionary to the (somewhat accurate) rescue, "insincere or ridiculous talk. Like “horse feathers,” there's no such substance as banana oil. Also like “horse feathers,” the phrase Described something utterly preposterous. It has been attributed to Milt Gross, a cartoonist who first used the expression in his comic strips during the 1920s". To correct that definition, isoamyl-acetate-as-banana-oil is used as a flavoring, as well as a solvent for paint varnishes and as a honey bee pheromone/attractant.
One of my favorite Andrew Bird songs (full disclose, i have quite a few favorites by him, but this one is very clever) is "Fake Palindromes". It ends with a reference to trepanation, specifically as a result of a date, and as noted in the Paste Magazine series "Secretly Horrifying Song Lyrics", might strike someone as somewhat creepy while listening to the lyrics. The song happens to be the result the evolution/culmination of two of Mr. Bird's earlier songs, one of which specifically written about dating, called 'Trepanation'. Unfortunately, i cannot find a copy of the song itself, but here are the lyrics, which include "If you're a clean living like-minded soul
Wanna meet nice people with cranial holes
And touch upon the truth that lies inside" Delightfully disturbing, and this is another illustration as to why i'm single - dating is scary.
Sidetanget, i seem to have an affinity for songs with secretly horrifying lyrics (reference DCFC here); a labmate noted a few years ago that it might be seen as a bit weird that i love howling Regina Spektor's brilliant Genius Next Door while late in lab at night by myself - it didn't seem weird until she pointed out, though.
i was looking up lab equipment the other day online and getting annoyed by the buzzwords "multiplex" and "high throughput", mentally assigning bonus annoyance points to products featuring both. These terms are only slightly redundant. Multiplex is one of those words for which one never sees the singular, and indicates that a machine can handle multiple analyses during a single assay/run. "High Throughput" seems to indicate that the processes are automated to facilitate handling a lot of samples at once. Bonus round, there is a DC comics Supervillian with the name Multiplex,"he gains the ability to split himself into identical duplicates, though
those duplicates are smaller than the original, and get smaller the more
he splits." This seems to be a reverse of the experimental process outlined above.
Jack linked this really interesting imgur video of snakes moving between boards with gaps of various widths, and, as noted in the comments, it seems like there are better widths than others for snake locomotion.
Finally, James ET was kind enough to mention the 'monkey balls' seedpods produced by Sweet Gum trees (liquidambar styraciflua) in response to the rambutans i mentioned last post. While similar looking, these do not contain soft fruits, and instead produce seeds that are enjoyed by birds and a variety of small mammals. The name refers to the sweet smelling sap, which produces a pleasant scent upon burning it. That turned into a research arc that turned up ambergris, also something that smells sweet upon aging and was formerly used as a fixative in perfume manufacture, but is actually the product of the bilious tract of Sperm whales; " scientists have theorised that the substance is produced by the whale's
gastrointestinal tract to ease the passage of hard, sharp objects that
the whale might have eaten. The sperm whale usually vomits these, but if
one travels further down the gut, it will be covered in ambergris", according to the wiki article. That article also notes that ambergris was used as a flavoring in the past, "A serving of eggs and ambergris was reportedly King Charles II of England's favorite dish ". No offense, but eww.
Sunday, December 6, 2015
Saturday, November 28, 2015
soapfruits, jelly apples, Christmas antibodies, etc
Just a brief update...
Some dear friends have moved to Florida, and now have easy access to exotic fruits. The last time i was in town, they introduced me to rambutans, which look like small, particularly hairy alien eggs, and once peeled, remind a person very much of a grape that tastes like combination of cherry and peach (complete with tiny pit). Apparently, rambutans belong to the curiously-named family of soapfruits (sapindaceae), so called because sometimes the roots/foliage contain saponins and latex. (The threat 'to have ones mouth washed out with soap' would be much less terrible if the soap in question was actually rambutans.) Longans and lychees also belong to this family. Also, maples and buckeyes belong in this family, though those, of course, are known for other products.
Jack and Leslie, here is a clip to the 'I Like Bananas (Because They Have No Bones)' song that i kept singing on that shopping expedition.
Since we're on the subject of fruit, i came across an ad the other day for 'jelly apples' This did not reference apples used to make jelly, but rather a product similar to candy apples, only with a softer coating akin to caramel. Apparently, " Jelly apples became popular at Coney Island as a seaside treat many years ago and are well known in New York and on the East Coast of the United States ", as stated by a jelly apple manufacturer. Can any East Coast folks confirm this?
A common phrase 'the whole shebang' typically refers to the entirety of something, but what is a 'shebang'? Looking further into this, the exact origins are somewhat obscure, but the earliest reference is in a 1920s poem by Walt Whitman.
'Christmas factor' is a term i came across the other day while doing some (science) research. Apparently, it's a coagulation factor that was discovered as lacking in a man named Stephen Christmas, who was (thusly) a hemophiliac, with the specific form (B) called 'Christmas Disease'. Anyway, this caught my attention mostly because i read of an antibody made against it, for further research, meaning that somewhere there is a tube labeled 'anti-christmas'.
My brother texted me today to ask about some plush toys from our youth, Popples, which turned into a ball-shaped plush via folding into a pocket (his turned into a soccer ball, and mine ended up as a teal-and-white striped ball). He said he had just seen an infomercial for something called Pop Out Pets, a similar type plush that flips into three separate animals (reference this, but warning, there is a video clip that starts automatically). Anyway, i was minorly relived that they weren't billed as 'vintage' or 'retro', as i'm not yet ready to feel that old.
Here is a really interesting fact page regarding various facts about the Atlanta airport, including the fact that they average 230,000 passengers daily, and that there are 30,000 parking spaces (of which i'm pretty sure i got one of the last 10 free spaces available on Thanksgiving morning).
One of the webcomics i have read every morning (okay, every Monday, Wednesday and Friday morning) for the past decade is xkcd. i have been pleased to lately read that it's getting more popular as the STEM fields become "cooler", and there have been three different interviews with Randall Munro appearing recently to promote his new book, one at the NYTimes, another in the Wall Street Journal ( i was delighted by his mention of Calvin and Hobbes comics), and a different one with the awesome astronaut Chris Hadfield.
Something amusing that i tripped over the other day was this analysis of the hazards James Bond faces in his line of work, as set forth in a CDC blog post. (Another CDC awesome blog post is their zombies attack emergency prep sheet from a few years back, and a more recent 'teachable moments' update featuring Walking Dead shots, which includes the awesome line "Being true zombie fans, we love The Walking Dead on AMC, so much so that we’ve looked past the fact that they blew us up at the end of the first season and we assure you that our work here at the CDC continues").
Some dear friends have moved to Florida, and now have easy access to exotic fruits. The last time i was in town, they introduced me to rambutans, which look like small, particularly hairy alien eggs, and once peeled, remind a person very much of a grape that tastes like combination of cherry and peach (complete with tiny pit). Apparently, rambutans belong to the curiously-named family of soapfruits (sapindaceae), so called because sometimes the roots/foliage contain saponins and latex. (The threat 'to have ones mouth washed out with soap' would be much less terrible if the soap in question was actually rambutans.) Longans and lychees also belong to this family. Also, maples and buckeyes belong in this family, though those, of course, are known for other products.
Jack and Leslie, here is a clip to the 'I Like Bananas (Because They Have No Bones)' song that i kept singing on that shopping expedition.
Since we're on the subject of fruit, i came across an ad the other day for 'jelly apples' This did not reference apples used to make jelly, but rather a product similar to candy apples, only with a softer coating akin to caramel. Apparently, " Jelly apples became popular at Coney Island as a seaside treat many years ago and are well known in New York and on the East Coast of the United States ", as stated by a jelly apple manufacturer. Can any East Coast folks confirm this?
A common phrase 'the whole shebang' typically refers to the entirety of something, but what is a 'shebang'? Looking further into this, the exact origins are somewhat obscure, but the earliest reference is in a 1920s poem by Walt Whitman.
'Christmas factor' is a term i came across the other day while doing some (science) research. Apparently, it's a coagulation factor that was discovered as lacking in a man named Stephen Christmas, who was (thusly) a hemophiliac, with the specific form (B) called 'Christmas Disease'. Anyway, this caught my attention mostly because i read of an antibody made against it, for further research, meaning that somewhere there is a tube labeled 'anti-christmas'.
My brother texted me today to ask about some plush toys from our youth, Popples, which turned into a ball-shaped plush via folding into a pocket (his turned into a soccer ball, and mine ended up as a teal-and-white striped ball). He said he had just seen an infomercial for something called Pop Out Pets, a similar type plush that flips into three separate animals (reference this, but warning, there is a video clip that starts automatically). Anyway, i was minorly relived that they weren't billed as 'vintage' or 'retro', as i'm not yet ready to feel that old.
Here is a really interesting fact page regarding various facts about the Atlanta airport, including the fact that they average 230,000 passengers daily, and that there are 30,000 parking spaces (of which i'm pretty sure i got one of the last 10 free spaces available on Thanksgiving morning).
One of the webcomics i have read every morning (okay, every Monday, Wednesday and Friday morning) for the past decade is xkcd. i have been pleased to lately read that it's getting more popular as the STEM fields become "cooler", and there have been three different interviews with Randall Munro appearing recently to promote his new book, one at the NYTimes, another in the Wall Street Journal ( i was delighted by his mention of Calvin and Hobbes comics), and a different one with the awesome astronaut Chris Hadfield.
Something amusing that i tripped over the other day was this analysis of the hazards James Bond faces in his line of work, as set forth in a CDC blog post. (Another CDC awesome blog post is their zombies attack emergency prep sheet from a few years back, and a more recent 'teachable moments' update featuring Walking Dead shots, which includes the awesome line "Being true zombie fans, we love The Walking Dead on AMC, so much so that we’ve looked past the fact that they blew us up at the end of the first season and we assure you that our work here at the CDC continues").
Sunday, November 8, 2015
SATX treats, V/R, auroras, World Polio Day, space beer
In other news, a Dutch neuroscientist has determined the most upbeat playlist (featuring mostly '80s hits, due to their fast tempos).
While i was home, i made sure to enjoy local confections; my faves usually include either pecans or coconut. However, something local is chamoy, a topping consisting of fruit stewed with acid, salt and chilies, "Mexican chamoy is prepared by first packing the fruit in either dry salt or a brine. Occasionally, this brine is acidulated with vinegar. This draws out the natural moisture of the fruit by osmosis. When the fruit has been sufficiently dried, it is separated from the brine and is sold as a snack known as saladitos, literally 'little salty things.'
Meanwhile, the salted fruit brine created in this process is seasoned to taste with chile powder, becoming chamoy. This liquid may be further reduced, or thickened with pureed fruit, to achieve a variety of consistencies.", from the wikipedia article. It also comes as a powder, made with citric acid, and eaten either as a seasoning or straight up (licked from one's fingers or palm). Either version of chamoy are frequently served on a variety of things, including other fruit, on various frozen desserts, and in the street snack tostilocos, which consists of chips (tostitos, doritos, etc) covered with a variety of things (sort of like a even-more-terrible-for-you frito pie), including " cueritos, cucumber, jícama, lime juice, Valentina hot sauce, chamoy, tajín chile powder, salt, and "Japanese peanuts" " (reference here). All of those are snack foods in their own right. Cueritos are fried pork skins. Japanese peanuts are peanuts which have a crunchy, sweet and spicy covering made mainly of wheat or soy flour, and are pretty addicting.
The start of the school year reminded me how popular Lisa Frank items were in middle school, and it turns out, she is an actual person who runs her company out of Tuscon, Arizona.
Been doing a fair amount of corresponding with folks who are military lately, and noticed that their closing salutation is occasionally 'V/R,' followed by their name. Looking further into it, it seems that this stands for 'Very Respectfully', and apparently there is a whole chain of command thing built into this closing. The most comprehensive internet answer that i was able to track down reports that " the abbreviation V/r (and the "r" is generally lowercase although I've seen it both ways) is drawn from military usage. It is very common in Navy email communications. If the sender is junior to the receiver, the proper closing is V/r. If the sender is senior to the receiver, the proper closing is just /r. Also, military emails to civilians often use /r (but you might get a V/r if you're lucky!). "
In all my time in WI, i never did see the Northern Lights - usually the cloud cover was too bad on the nights where we were expected to have a strong chance of seeing them (side note, there is a site that will tell you the probability of seeing the aurora borealis in North America, forecast-style). Recently, the family T was taking in the stars, as they are wont to do, and caught the 'Lights. Kelly AT apparently found this Slate article describing a resort in Finland that features glass igloos wherein one can view the 'Lights while remaining unfrozen.
Recently (Oct. 24th), it was World Polio Day. The Gates Foundation is a strong supporter of the efforts to completely eradicate polio (so close!!), and as such, put up a marvelous post to his blog detailing efforts, etc. Even better, the xkcd webcomic artist Randall Munroe did a spot-on comic for the event, which i'm probably going to have to use for lab meeting in the near future.
Finally, because this is getting to be a really long post (i've been saving stuff up for, like, a month, but moving and lack-of-ample-home-internet have been hindrances), a recent conversation about the call for new US astronauts.
While i was home, i made sure to enjoy local confections; my faves usually include either pecans or coconut. However, something local is chamoy, a topping consisting of fruit stewed with acid, salt and chilies, "Mexican chamoy is prepared by first packing the fruit in either dry salt or a brine. Occasionally, this brine is acidulated with vinegar. This draws out the natural moisture of the fruit by osmosis. When the fruit has been sufficiently dried, it is separated from the brine and is sold as a snack known as saladitos, literally 'little salty things.'
Meanwhile, the salted fruit brine created in this process is seasoned to taste with chile powder, becoming chamoy. This liquid may be further reduced, or thickened with pureed fruit, to achieve a variety of consistencies.", from the wikipedia article. It also comes as a powder, made with citric acid, and eaten either as a seasoning or straight up (licked from one's fingers or palm). Either version of chamoy are frequently served on a variety of things, including other fruit, on various frozen desserts, and in the street snack tostilocos, which consists of chips (tostitos, doritos, etc) covered with a variety of things (sort of like a even-more-terrible-for-you frito pie), including " cueritos, cucumber, jícama, lime juice, Valentina hot sauce, chamoy, tajín chile powder, salt, and "Japanese peanuts" " (reference here). All of those are snack foods in their own right. Cueritos are fried pork skins. Japanese peanuts are peanuts which have a crunchy, sweet and spicy covering made mainly of wheat or soy flour, and are pretty addicting.
The start of the school year reminded me how popular Lisa Frank items were in middle school, and it turns out, she is an actual person who runs her company out of Tuscon, Arizona.
Been doing a fair amount of corresponding with folks who are military lately, and noticed that their closing salutation is occasionally 'V/R,' followed by their name. Looking further into it, it seems that this stands for 'Very Respectfully', and apparently there is a whole chain of command thing built into this closing. The most comprehensive internet answer that i was able to track down reports that " the abbreviation V/r (and the "r" is generally lowercase although I've seen it both ways) is drawn from military usage. It is very common in Navy email communications. If the sender is junior to the receiver, the proper closing is V/r. If the sender is senior to the receiver, the proper closing is just /r. Also, military emails to civilians often use /r (but you might get a V/r if you're lucky!). "
In all my time in WI, i never did see the Northern Lights - usually the cloud cover was too bad on the nights where we were expected to have a strong chance of seeing them (side note, there is a site that will tell you the probability of seeing the aurora borealis in North America, forecast-style). Recently, the family T was taking in the stars, as they are wont to do, and caught the 'Lights. Kelly AT apparently found this Slate article describing a resort in Finland that features glass igloos wherein one can view the 'Lights while remaining unfrozen.
Recently (Oct. 24th), it was World Polio Day. The Gates Foundation is a strong supporter of the efforts to completely eradicate polio (so close!!), and as such, put up a marvelous post to his blog detailing efforts, etc. Even better, the xkcd webcomic artist Randall Munroe did a spot-on comic for the event, which i'm probably going to have to use for lab meeting in the near future.
Finally, because this is getting to be a really long post (i've been saving stuff up for, like, a month, but moving and lack-of-ample-home-internet have been hindrances), a recent conversation about the call for new US astronauts.
Bryan: i saw
it's tempting
me: gosh
advanced degree in biology and all that
Bryan: i don't have 20/20 sight
it is correctable to 20/20 though
me: lasik
yup
you're a triple threat, too: plants, yeast AND virology
Bryan: gs-11 though gs-14
gs-11 is $51,298, not too shabby
me: but, if you lived in space, think of how much you could save in rent?
Bryan: tons
and on food
and on beer
pretty minimal space expenses
me: you could develop space beer!
Bryan: i don't see why it wouldn't work
me: (nods enthusiastically)
2013, will have to search for the follow-up
me: why did an 11yo develop a beer assay?
Bryan: i don't know
Thursday, September 24, 2015
gorilla dental, belt sander racing, parquetry/marquetry, science and politics, kvetch etc, beans
The NYTimes has a rather entertaining set of 'How to' articles called 'Tip', including 'How to sculpt with a Chainsaw' and 'How to brush a Gorilla's teeth'. For that last one, i appreciate that the person wielding the toothbrush also used a similar technique when training her own children.
i went fishing last week down to the Gulf, and passed an area bar that hosted bi-weekly belt-sander races. As a friend and i had to explain to her grandma, belt sanders are power tools wherein a belt of sandpaper rotates, to sand items; this rotating belt can also provide a locomotive force to move the rest of the tool. The bar in question had a rather extensive race course (table?) lined up, and so i tweeted a picture. James T requested an explanation, and so i further researched it, kicking up this article from the San Antonio Express News about that particular bar, "Depending on the motor, Gaff owner Kip Shannon said, a belt sander can cover 75 feet in anywhere from 3 to 5 seconds". The article also states that sander racing may have originated in Boston, and a NYTimes article mentions that it's also popular in Washington state. Anyhow, here is an instructable about how to build your own, and here is a (defunct?) blog devoted to the subject. Given the number of dead links present in my google search, it seems as though the sport may be experiencing a bit of a decline in places-other-than-south-Texas.
Parquetry refers to the use of pieces of wood to form a geometric patterned floor. This is not to be confused with marquetry, which is the decoration of something-not-a-floor using veneers, or adhering decorative panels; "The veneers used are primarily woods, but may include bone, ivory, turtle-shell (conventionally called "tortoiseshell"), mother-of-pearl, pewter, brass or fine metals. Marquetry using colored straw was a specialty of some European spa resorts from the end of the 18th century. Many exotic woods as well as common European varieties can be employed, from the near-white of boxwood to the near-black of ebony, with veneers that retain stains well, like sycamore, dyed to provide colors not found in nature. "
It might be worthwhile to read this discussion of politics and deflection/distraction of topics, as manifest through 'bright shiny objects' (here, a certain D. Trump). Since we're on the topic of the GOP, Kelly AT recently linked this article by Dan Rather called "Ignoring science isn't just a Republican problem. It's an American problem." Any writer who can work words like 'balkanization' into articles has my respect, but the erroneous address of scientific topics by politicians is something that i've kvetched about to Kelly before (and likely will again), so the article was refreshing. It contained a link to a wikipedia article for the phrase, "I'm not a scientist", which linked to this similarly-titled NYTimes article.
The word 'kvetch' is Yiddish, btw, meaning to complain. Another word that occasionally comes up to 'cavil', meaning to complain about petty issues, followed by the related word 'pettifog', or quibbling over trivial matters, from the word 'pettyfogger', apparently a combination of 'petty' and 'fog', as in "state of mind characterized by lethargy and confusion". That got complicated fast.
Again, i am a definite fan of Pope Frances, and particularly appreciated this article which highlights his pragmatic approach to leading the Church. To celebrate the papal visit to the United States, this Pennsylvania priest created a model of the Vatican using legos.
For those Harry Potter fans out there, i came across this older article regarding how she crafted the Prologue to the series.
Random bit of information regarding the preparation of beans in Tex-Mex cooking (this is from an somewhat complicated discussion with my mother), From the Spanish word for 'horseman', Charro beans refer to the cookery of pinto beans with garlic, tomatoes, onions and bacon, forming something like a bean soup. Borracho beans seems to be a similar prep method with the addition of beer ('borracho' meaning 'drunk'). When done well, these are certainly worth the effort and differentiation.
i went fishing last week down to the Gulf, and passed an area bar that hosted bi-weekly belt-sander races. As a friend and i had to explain to her grandma, belt sanders are power tools wherein a belt of sandpaper rotates, to sand items; this rotating belt can also provide a locomotive force to move the rest of the tool. The bar in question had a rather extensive race course (table?) lined up, and so i tweeted a picture. James T requested an explanation, and so i further researched it, kicking up this article from the San Antonio Express News about that particular bar, "Depending on the motor, Gaff owner Kip Shannon said, a belt sander can cover 75 feet in anywhere from 3 to 5 seconds". The article also states that sander racing may have originated in Boston, and a NYTimes article mentions that it's also popular in Washington state. Anyhow, here is an instructable about how to build your own, and here is a (defunct?) blog devoted to the subject. Given the number of dead links present in my google search, it seems as though the sport may be experiencing a bit of a decline in places-other-than-south-Texas.
Parquetry refers to the use of pieces of wood to form a geometric patterned floor. This is not to be confused with marquetry, which is the decoration of something-not-a-floor using veneers, or adhering decorative panels; "The veneers used are primarily woods, but may include bone, ivory, turtle-shell (conventionally called "tortoiseshell"), mother-of-pearl, pewter, brass or fine metals. Marquetry using colored straw was a specialty of some European spa resorts from the end of the 18th century. Many exotic woods as well as common European varieties can be employed, from the near-white of boxwood to the near-black of ebony, with veneers that retain stains well, like sycamore, dyed to provide colors not found in nature. "
It might be worthwhile to read this discussion of politics and deflection/distraction of topics, as manifest through 'bright shiny objects' (here, a certain D. Trump). Since we're on the topic of the GOP, Kelly AT recently linked this article by Dan Rather called "Ignoring science isn't just a Republican problem. It's an American problem." Any writer who can work words like 'balkanization' into articles has my respect, but the erroneous address of scientific topics by politicians is something that i've kvetched about to Kelly before (and likely will again), so the article was refreshing. It contained a link to a wikipedia article for the phrase, "I'm not a scientist", which linked to this similarly-titled NYTimes article.
The word 'kvetch' is Yiddish, btw, meaning to complain. Another word that occasionally comes up to 'cavil', meaning to complain about petty issues, followed by the related word 'pettifog', or quibbling over trivial matters, from the word 'pettyfogger', apparently a combination of 'petty' and 'fog', as in "state of mind characterized by lethargy and confusion". That got complicated fast.
Again, i am a definite fan of Pope Frances, and particularly appreciated this article which highlights his pragmatic approach to leading the Church. To celebrate the papal visit to the United States, this Pennsylvania priest created a model of the Vatican using legos.
For those Harry Potter fans out there, i came across this older article regarding how she crafted the Prologue to the series.
Random bit of information regarding the preparation of beans in Tex-Mex cooking (this is from an somewhat complicated discussion with my mother), From the Spanish word for 'horseman', Charro beans refer to the cookery of pinto beans with garlic, tomatoes, onions and bacon, forming something like a bean soup. Borracho beans seems to be a similar prep method with the addition of beer ('borracho' meaning 'drunk'). When done well, these are certainly worth the effort and differentiation.
Sunday, August 30, 2015
'Wow', Persian cats, pet food edibility, cow chips, burritos, poohsticks, Stone Mountain, Madden quantization
Curiously, the word 'wow' has been around since the early 1500s, originating possibly in Scottish English (reference here). i honestly thought it was way more recent than that.
Really been enjoying the NewYorker's coverage of the 2015 World Track and Field Championships as a back-and-forth conversation between Malcolm Gladwell and Nicholas Thompson. They've been particularly sensitive to the current doping scandals plaguing the sport.
i've recently been cat-sitting a very fluffy Persian cat, whose nose does not protrude at all from his face. Turns out, that is a selected trait, "The Persian breed standard is, by its nature, somewhat open-ended and focused on a rounded head, large, wide-spaced round eyes with the top of the nose leather placed no lower than the bottom of the eyes ". This also means that he snores, poor baby. While i haven't tried this myself, it turns out that many people have asked if a person can eat pet food. Short answer, FDA regulations require that pet food be free of pathogens, but most pet foods are made from scraps, offal and filler (like ash), so maybe stick to the more expensive pet foods? Research also turned up this account of a woman who vowed to eat pet food for 30 days to promote her pet store.
Wisconsin has an official Cow Chip Throwing contest, occurring in Sauk City each year. Some friends and i were passing through in route from a state park when we saw a fully booked hotel sign, welcoming participants. This raised a few questions, including the origin/aging of the chips in question. Looking into it, there are official rules posted, "Contestants must select their chips from the wagon-load provided by the officialMeadow Muffin Committee. To alter, or shape in any way, chips selected from the wagon (except in rare instances where a loose fragment may be removed, provided the removal does not render the chip less than 6 inches in diameter) subjects the contestant to a 25-foot penalty. Decision of the Chip Judge will be final " That same website also provides lyrics to song parodies highlighting the chips in question. Fun fact, the record chip throw is 248 feet, by a gentleman from Sauk Prairie in 1991 (though, he has won the event 11 total years). Wow.
While on that same drive, we heard a song on the radio referencing 'burritos' in a manner that made it seem unrelated to the tortilla-wrapped food. The question at hand became, 'Does the food name mean 'little donkey', and the answer is yes. As for as the origin of the food itself, i've noted that while you can find them in the San Antonio-proximal area where i grew up, they're more of a gringo item there. Wikipedia agrees that the origins of this foodstuff have been lost in the mists of time, but most seem to involve California; "The precise origin of the modern burrito is not known. It may have originated with vaqueros in northern Mexico in the nineteenth century farmworkers in the fields of California's Central Valley, in Fresno and Stockton the Southwestern United States or with northern Sonoran miners of the 19th century". Alternately, "another creation story comes from 1940s Ciudad Juárez, where a street food vendor created the tortilla-wrapped food to sell to poor children at a state-run middle school. The vendor would call the children his burritos, as burro is a colloquial term for dunce or dullard. Eventually, the derogatory or endearing term for the children was transferred to the food they ate," along with other creation stories.
While looking around online the other day, i came across a mention of a game called "Poohsticks", which apparently was first mentioned in the childrens' classic book The House on Pooh Corner, and requires sticks and a bridge over a flowing stream. It's played by having a group of competitors line up along a stream, each dropping a stick into the water, then racing downstream via bridge to see whose stick comes out from under the bridge first.
Stone Mountain is a theme park in GA that semi-masquerades as a nature park. The place is named for quartz monzanite dome rising 1686 feet. Surprisingly, it also features the largest bas-relief carving (3 acres!) in the world, unfortunately of the Confederates Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson and Jefferson Davis, carved beginning in 1916 and finished at the surprisingly late date of 1972. When i was last in Atlanta, someone had mentioned that it had excellent hiking (and nothing else), and upon driving out to investigate, i was distressed to note both the theme park and the carving.
Kicked up a series of really interesting photography tricks via COOPH's youtube channel, including 'funky tips' and 'simple hacks'.
Given the upcoming start to fantasy football season (ach, Jordy Nelson), i really liked this fivethirtyeight post on how Madden scores are generated, by a single dude in a cubicle at a video game company, and how much goes into one of these scores, " Each player in the game is graded in 43 categories — many of which were added when Madden transitioned from the sixth generation of consoles to the seventh. There are also nearly 20 new player-tendency tags, known as “traits,” that control specific player behaviors ". It opens with this amusing anecdote, "Carolina Panthers quarterback Cam Newton, for instance, was upset. “I want to talk about my speed,” Moore remembers Newton saying as he clambered into Moore’s cubicle last April.
Despite leading all NFL quarterbacks in rushing yards in 2013, Newton ranked as only the ninth-fastest QB in the league, according to Moore — hence Newton’s unhappiness. But as Moore wheeled around from his den of screens, he was confronted by not only Newton, but also an enormous boot on Newton’s foot, the result of recent ankle surgery.
“Yeah,” Moore said as Newton hobbled toward him, “let’s talk about your speed.”
Eventually, Newton was pleading with Moore to not make him slower. "
Really been enjoying the NewYorker's coverage of the 2015 World Track and Field Championships as a back-and-forth conversation between Malcolm Gladwell and Nicholas Thompson. They've been particularly sensitive to the current doping scandals plaguing the sport.
i've recently been cat-sitting a very fluffy Persian cat, whose nose does not protrude at all from his face. Turns out, that is a selected trait, "The Persian breed standard is, by its nature, somewhat open-ended and focused on a rounded head, large, wide-spaced round eyes with the top of the nose leather placed no lower than the bottom of the eyes ". This also means that he snores, poor baby. While i haven't tried this myself, it turns out that many people have asked if a person can eat pet food. Short answer, FDA regulations require that pet food be free of pathogens, but most pet foods are made from scraps, offal and filler (like ash), so maybe stick to the more expensive pet foods? Research also turned up this account of a woman who vowed to eat pet food for 30 days to promote her pet store.
Wisconsin has an official Cow Chip Throwing contest, occurring in Sauk City each year. Some friends and i were passing through in route from a state park when we saw a fully booked hotel sign, welcoming participants. This raised a few questions, including the origin/aging of the chips in question. Looking into it, there are official rules posted, "Contestants must select their chips from the wagon-load provided by the officialMeadow Muffin Committee. To alter, or shape in any way, chips selected from the wagon (except in rare instances where a loose fragment may be removed, provided the removal does not render the chip less than 6 inches in diameter) subjects the contestant to a 25-foot penalty. Decision of the Chip Judge will be final " That same website also provides lyrics to song parodies highlighting the chips in question. Fun fact, the record chip throw is 248 feet, by a gentleman from Sauk Prairie in 1991 (though, he has won the event 11 total years). Wow.
While on that same drive, we heard a song on the radio referencing 'burritos' in a manner that made it seem unrelated to the tortilla-wrapped food. The question at hand became, 'Does the food name mean 'little donkey', and the answer is yes. As for as the origin of the food itself, i've noted that while you can find them in the San Antonio-proximal area where i grew up, they're more of a gringo item there. Wikipedia agrees that the origins of this foodstuff have been lost in the mists of time, but most seem to involve California; "The precise origin of the modern burrito is not known. It may have originated with vaqueros in northern Mexico in the nineteenth century farmworkers in the fields of California's Central Valley, in Fresno and Stockton the Southwestern United States or with northern Sonoran miners of the 19th century". Alternately, "another creation story comes from 1940s Ciudad Juárez, where a street food vendor created the tortilla-wrapped food to sell to poor children at a state-run middle school. The vendor would call the children his burritos, as burro is a colloquial term for dunce or dullard. Eventually, the derogatory or endearing term for the children was transferred to the food they ate," along with other creation stories.
While looking around online the other day, i came across a mention of a game called "Poohsticks", which apparently was first mentioned in the childrens' classic book The House on Pooh Corner, and requires sticks and a bridge over a flowing stream. It's played by having a group of competitors line up along a stream, each dropping a stick into the water, then racing downstream via bridge to see whose stick comes out from under the bridge first.
Stone Mountain is a theme park in GA that semi-masquerades as a nature park. The place is named for quartz monzanite dome rising 1686 feet. Surprisingly, it also features the largest bas-relief carving (3 acres!) in the world, unfortunately of the Confederates Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson and Jefferson Davis, carved beginning in 1916 and finished at the surprisingly late date of 1972. When i was last in Atlanta, someone had mentioned that it had excellent hiking (and nothing else), and upon driving out to investigate, i was distressed to note both the theme park and the carving.
Kicked up a series of really interesting photography tricks via COOPH's youtube channel, including 'funky tips' and 'simple hacks'.
Given the upcoming start to fantasy football season (ach, Jordy Nelson), i really liked this fivethirtyeight post on how Madden scores are generated, by a single dude in a cubicle at a video game company, and how much goes into one of these scores, " Each player in the game is graded in 43 categories — many of which were added when Madden transitioned from the sixth generation of consoles to the seventh. There are also nearly 20 new player-tendency tags, known as “traits,” that control specific player behaviors ". It opens with this amusing anecdote, "Carolina Panthers quarterback Cam Newton, for instance, was upset. “I want to talk about my speed,” Moore remembers Newton saying as he clambered into Moore’s cubicle last April.
Despite leading all NFL quarterbacks in rushing yards in 2013, Newton ranked as only the ninth-fastest QB in the league, according to Moore — hence Newton’s unhappiness. But as Moore wheeled around from his den of screens, he was confronted by not only Newton, but also an enormous boot on Newton’s foot, the result of recent ankle surgery.
“Yeah,” Moore said as Newton hobbled toward him, “let’s talk about your speed.”
Eventually, Newton was pleading with Moore to not make him slower. "
Thursday, August 20, 2015
dissertation v/s thesis, thickskinned, zimbabwean dollar, music vocabularies, cattycorner
There doesn't seem to be much of a distinction made between the terms 'thesis' ("a proposition stated or put forward for consideration, especially one to be discussed and proved or to be maintained against objections" ) and 'dissertation' ("a written essay, treatise, or thesis, especially one written by a candidate for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy."). Even wikipedia isn't much help here: "A thesis or dissertation is a document submitted in support of candidature for an academic degree or professional qualification presenting the author's research and findings. In some contexts, the word "thesis" or a cognate is used for part of a bachelor's or master's course, while "dissertation" is normally applied to a doctorate, while in other contexts, the reverse is true", though it notes that in the US, at least, a thesis generally refers to a MS and a dissertation refers to a PhD.
Had a bit of a debate with a (male) friend about the thickness of human dermal tissue as related to being male or female (ie, whether men are literally thicker-skinned). Turns out, he was correct, at least in mice: " In fact, the major difference is that the dermis in the male is much thicker than in the female whereas the epidermis and hypodermis are thicker in the female, thus resulting in total skin that is 40% thicker in the male ", somewhat attributed to the effects of the hormone androgen. Dermis refers to basal, inner layer of skin cells, and epidermis is the outermost layer (see here).
We were sitting around a reading the other night when Patricia noted in a magazine article about the Zimbabwe dollar inflation at 79.6 billion percent in mid-Novermber of 2008. This was met with googling, to determine if that was indeed the case -turns out, yes. Further, from the Zimbabwean dollar wiki article, "In the Guardian, on 18 July 2008, a report on Zimbabwe's inflation, said that an egg costs Z$50 billion (GBP 0.17, USD 0.32), and it showed adverts for prizes of Z$100 trillion in a Zimbabwean derby and Z$1.2 quadrillion ($1,200,000,000,000,000.00: approx. £2,100; $4,200) in a lottery.". As of 2009, the currency was devalued, and Zimbabwe now employs foreign currency, including US and Australian dollars, South African Rand, UK pounds sterling, Botswana pula, Indian Rupee, euro, Chinese yuan and Japanese yen.
Having noted on several occasions the simplistic language used in most top 40 hits, i was happy to see this recent study concerning working vocabularies of musicians. It looked at the 100 most lyric-dense songs of 93 musicians. Unsurprisingly, hip-hop artists and rappers top the list, with Eminem having a vocabulary of 8818 words, followed by JayZ at 6899 words. As far as non-rap goes. Bob Dylan came in at 4883 words. On the opposite end was Kenny G, with 809 words.
Apparently, the Queen of England was a notable breeder of Corgi dogs.
i was hanging out at the Farmers' Market a few weeks ago when fierce chickens came up in conversation. i referenced the Russian folk tale figure Baba Yaga and her chicken-legged house. In short, old world fairy tales are terrifying.
A friend recently linked this Madison police report of someone being arrested for slapping a police horse (also featuring Madison's tradition of 'Hippie Christmas'). Why would a person ever think that would end well? Other things the probably won't end well: here is a petapixel article titled "This new shotgun shell is for shooting down drones", and includes the note, "As you might expect, this new ammo is generating quite a bit of controversy. Over atAmmoLand, which published the press release, many commenters are pointing out that it’s a felony to shoot down drones, even if it’s hovering over your property". Yikes.
This NYTimes article covers known health risks of sugar versus artificial sweeteners. In short, sugar fuels lots of maladies including the obesity epidemic, but there aren't a lot of known caveats to using artificial sweeteners outside of phenylketonuria. The questions seem to arise when studies are based on various rat and mouse models, which are predisposed to things like bladder cancer and some correlative-but-not-causitive cases with brain tumors.
Was reading an article a little while ago that used the word 'cattycorner' (meaning something in a diagonal), when i mentally noted what a strange word it is, and wondered over the difference between it and 'kittycorner'. Looking into it, these are regional dialects for the word 'catercorner', the origins of which have been lost to time but much speculated upon. From the wikitionary, " cater- + corner, where cater- is of disputed origin. Liberman argues that this is a prefix meaning “crooked, angled, clumsy”, of North Germanic origin; compare cater-cousin. The verb cater (“move diagonally, place diagonally, cut diagonally”) is attested from 1577 (Liberman proposes this as a backformation from cater-), and in 19th century Lancashire dialect, cater-cornered refers both to stone blocks that are out of square, and people who walk twisted (with one side in front of the other), especially if partially paralyzed. Further awkward and clumsy are of Scandinavian origin, and Old Irish cittach (“left-handed, awkward”) is cognate to cater-words, also suggesting a Scandinavian origin. ". Also of interest is this article which further describes cat-derived words, including cattywompus (when something is crooked, etc).
Had a bit of a debate with a (male) friend about the thickness of human dermal tissue as related to being male or female (ie, whether men are literally thicker-skinned). Turns out, he was correct, at least in mice: " In fact, the major difference is that the dermis in the male is much thicker than in the female whereas the epidermis and hypodermis are thicker in the female, thus resulting in total skin that is 40% thicker in the male ", somewhat attributed to the effects of the hormone androgen. Dermis refers to basal, inner layer of skin cells, and epidermis is the outermost layer (see here).
We were sitting around a reading the other night when Patricia noted in a magazine article about the Zimbabwe dollar inflation at 79.6 billion percent in mid-Novermber of 2008. This was met with googling, to determine if that was indeed the case -turns out, yes. Further, from the Zimbabwean dollar wiki article, "In the Guardian, on 18 July 2008, a report on Zimbabwe's inflation, said that an egg costs Z$50 billion (GBP 0.17, USD 0.32), and it showed adverts for prizes of Z$100 trillion in a Zimbabwean derby and Z$1.2 quadrillion ($1,200,000,000,000,000.00: approx. £2,100; $4,200) in a lottery.". As of 2009, the currency was devalued, and Zimbabwe now employs foreign currency, including US and Australian dollars, South African Rand, UK pounds sterling, Botswana pula, Indian Rupee, euro, Chinese yuan and Japanese yen.
Having noted on several occasions the simplistic language used in most top 40 hits, i was happy to see this recent study concerning working vocabularies of musicians. It looked at the 100 most lyric-dense songs of 93 musicians. Unsurprisingly, hip-hop artists and rappers top the list, with Eminem having a vocabulary of 8818 words, followed by JayZ at 6899 words. As far as non-rap goes. Bob Dylan came in at 4883 words. On the opposite end was Kenny G, with 809 words.
Apparently, the Queen of England was a notable breeder of Corgi dogs.
i was hanging out at the Farmers' Market a few weeks ago when fierce chickens came up in conversation. i referenced the Russian folk tale figure Baba Yaga and her chicken-legged house. In short, old world fairy tales are terrifying.
A friend recently linked this Madison police report of someone being arrested for slapping a police horse (also featuring Madison's tradition of 'Hippie Christmas'). Why would a person ever think that would end well? Other things the probably won't end well: here is a petapixel article titled "This new shotgun shell is for shooting down drones", and includes the note, "As you might expect, this new ammo is generating quite a bit of controversy. Over atAmmoLand, which published the press release, many commenters are pointing out that it’s a felony to shoot down drones, even if it’s hovering over your property". Yikes.
This NYTimes article covers known health risks of sugar versus artificial sweeteners. In short, sugar fuels lots of maladies including the obesity epidemic, but there aren't a lot of known caveats to using artificial sweeteners outside of phenylketonuria. The questions seem to arise when studies are based on various rat and mouse models, which are predisposed to things like bladder cancer and some correlative-but-not-causitive cases with brain tumors.
Was reading an article a little while ago that used the word 'cattycorner' (meaning something in a diagonal), when i mentally noted what a strange word it is, and wondered over the difference between it and 'kittycorner'. Looking into it, these are regional dialects for the word 'catercorner', the origins of which have been lost to time but much speculated upon. From the wikitionary, " cater- + corner, where cater- is of disputed origin. Liberman argues that this is a prefix meaning “crooked, angled, clumsy”, of North Germanic origin; compare cater-cousin. The verb cater (“move diagonally, place diagonally, cut diagonally”) is attested from 1577 (Liberman proposes this as a backformation from cater-), and in 19th century Lancashire dialect, cater-cornered refers both to stone blocks that are out of square, and people who walk twisted (with one side in front of the other), especially if partially paralyzed. Further awkward and clumsy are of Scandinavian origin, and Old Irish cittach (“left-handed, awkward”) is cognate to cater-words, also suggesting a Scandinavian origin. ". Also of interest is this article which further describes cat-derived words, including cattywompus (when something is crooked, etc).
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