"Godzilla vs. King Kong" by Tankor89
The best thing about working at a university is that you get to hang around professors. You get invited to their houses for parties, cook-outs, etc. etc. Last night I ate dinner with a geologist, a retired anatomy professor, an economist, a biologist, a seminary student, and a physical science professor. I learned that women of child-bearing age (who are still producing significant amounts of estrogen) may not find Tylenol a very effective pain killer. The estrogen somehow affects the body's ability to break down the drug, and the result is a very quick drug metabolism.
(You don't want painkillers to metabolize quickly; that means the pain comes back faster.)
I never buy Tylenol when I buy painkillers. I always get Exedrin or Motrin for my headaches and various cramping issues.
Today, walking down the hallway of the science building, our botany professor and I started talking about snakes. He claims that mammals have an innate hatred for all reptiles. "Think about it," he said. "We've been battling for 200 million years or so. If that asteroid hadn't come around, we'd be.... (out of luck.)" He was referring to the asteroid impact that has been linked to the decimation of the dinosaurs, of course. That particular impact, estimated to have happened around 65 million years ago, is why mammals were able to evolve from small, lemur-like creatures into larger, top-level predators. We are currently in the "Age of Mammals," or the Cenozoic Era, which started right after that massive, cruel, and blessed (for us, at least) asteroid hit Earth.
I always thought people hated snakes because of the Biblical implications. Little kids don't seem to be afraid of snakes unless their parents tell them to be fearful.
The botany professor disagreed with me. "No," he said, "it's innate." I thought for a minute, then yelled, "Godzilla versus King Kong!" Reptiles fighting mammals is certainly not a new concept.
When the fight begins, who do YOU want to win???
I'm home from the races. I spent all day at Oaklawn Park in Hot Springs, Arkansas, watching some of the most beautiful creatures that have ever graced the planet.
Today was also the day for the Arkansas Derby, which included a one million dollar purse. My horse of choice, Dublin, came in third. I won more money back than I bet. But my money is not my concern.
My concern is that I saw another horse "break down" on the race track. The jockey made quite a heroic leap, high off of the foundering horse's back, over the inner fence and into the bushes near the track. I watched that poor horse try to keep running. It may have broken both of its front legs, for all I could tell. It is an awful, sickening thing to see.
I love horses. I LOVE horses! It crossed my mind again today that maybe I should boycott horse races. I listened to what people were saying while the ambulance drove onto the race track. "Number seven broke down." "I hope that man is okay?" "How much money did I win?!"
Is this a cruel sport? Are these animals mistreated? The flow of cash into this sport is the very reason these horses are bred. They wouldn't be here if people like me didn't come to the race track to place bets, drink cold beer and eat delicious corned beef sandwiches. (I know the corned beef sounds disgusting, but it is really really good!)
I asked several employees at Oaklawn if they euthanized the injured horse. An EMT slowly shook his head yes. "The reason they do that is because a horse is so heavy, he can't stay on just three of his legs. The other legs get diseased if he takes the weight off one of them."
He didn't make me feel any better. It seems like we should be able to do more than just kill a horse when it breaks a leg.
Kudos to British comic book artist Philip J. Bond for his artistic take on some of the world's female astronauts!
My favorite one is shown here: the first female astronaut (cosmonaut), Valentina Tereshkova.
Click the link below to see the rest of Mr. Bond's work:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/planetbond/sets/72157612379863486/
P.S. I want to see Eileen Collins, Mr. Bond! She was the first female Shuttle pilot, and the first female Shuttle Commander.
Look at the expression in his eyes. This is what a gentle giant looks like. (He is 16.2 hands tall.)
When I go to the field, Prince knows who I am and he walks over to check all my pockets. He knows I have raspberry alfalfa treats for him.
You don't need a shrink for real therapy; you only need a good horse!
The Boy Scout Troop in Dover, Arkansas, has an interesting fundraiser every year. They host a chili dinner, titled "Chili Extravaganza," where they serve an entire line of chili made from different animals. This year, there was chili made from beaver, deer, elk, raccoon, buffalo, bear, squirrel, antelope, and beef.
They also served cake and lemonade, which made for quite a tasty and economical meal for $5, considering you could eat as much as you want.
I asked someone why they didn't serve Girl Scout cookies for dessert, and I was told that the Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts "are big rivals here. They don't get along."
(???)
***Note the haircut on this woman. I have known three crazy bitches with this same, black-colored, straight-"I-have-absolutely-no sense-of-style" bangs. It must be a sign, so beware!***
Today, a female professor at the University of Alabama in Huntsville shot six of her co-workers, murdering three of them on the spot. (One of them had been my former anatomy and physiology professor.) For a while, the media was emphasizing how distraught Dr. Bishop must've been to get denied tenure. But she was denied tenure nearly a year ago. This could not have been a crime of passion. And, she sat through a faculty meeting for at least 30 minutes before opening fire on her unarmed co-workers. How insane is that?!
Did the victims know that this woman was crazy? No one knew (until now) that she had shot her own brother in the chest with a shotgun in 1986. Her mother helped convince local police that it was an accident, so the young Dr. Bishop never went to court for what she did. Holy crap! How does a U.S. citizen shoot and kill a family member without ever paying a price? Where's the justice here?
UAH is currently missing 6 biology professors. Three were shot dead, one is in critical care, one is receiving medical treatment, and one is in jail. The campus will be closed for a week. As a former student from UAH and as a current biology instructor, I send out my heartfelt sympathy.
T-minus 10 minutes to lift off! Here I am standing on the shore at Cape Canaveral, just minutes before the launch of Space Shuttle Discovery and my diatom payload.
I was 22-years-old when I flew my first experiment on the Space Shuttle. The mission was STS-95, which just so happened to be the John Glenn-return-to-space flight. AND, if that wasn't exciting enough, he was the astronaut trained to operate the hardware for my experiment!
I was an undergraduate at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, which is a Space Grant University. I had decided to go to school there because of all the exciting space activity associated with the University.
In 1997, I traveled with a group of engineering students to the NASA Johnson Space Center, where we spent two weeks training to fly ourselves and an experiment on NASA's KC-135, aka the "Vomit Comet." The following year, I flew with another experiment on the KC-135. During October of that same year, 1998, I flew a biological experiment with diatoms (golden-brown algae) on the Shuttle Discovery (although I did not get to fly with them, sadly!)
My experiences as an undergraduate were incredible; my mentors at UAH gave me the invaluable opportunity to work with three separate microgravity experiments prior to graduating from college. I am sincerely grateful to Dr. Douglas Feikema for allowing me to participate in the KC-135 program for two years in a row. I am humbled and thankful to Dr. Charles Lundquist for his guidance and the opportunity to design and fly my own experiment on the Space Shuttle. And I am grateful to Dr. Marian Lewis for her science advice, and for allowing me to use her lab space and equipment.
