Turns out you can plop yourself amongst over 200 times the average level of background radiation for as long as you’d like, it’s probably not going to hurt you all that much. Despite popular thought that any radiation exposure increases the likelihood of cancer, new studies are showing that simply isn’t the case for prolonged low doses.

On the most recent Weird Things podcast the boys discussed what levels of radiation exposure were safe to work around with Brian landing on the right side of the research. As for Justin’s insistence that he would eat a bag of popcorn cooked by way of an radioactive reaction, he’s still an idiot.

[Medical Xpress]

A corporate jet pilot nearly collided with what he said looked like a remote controlled vehicle over Denver Monday evening. But no one will take credit for the mysterious airborne menace.

Law enforcement says their were no drones in the air. The local RC club says that members are forbidden from flying craft that high as they would otherwise cause this kind of commotion.

The pilot is heard telling air traffic control: “A remote controlled aircraft, or what? Something just went by the other way … About 20 to 30 seconds ago. It was like a large remote-controlled aircraft.

The corporate jet, a Cessna Citation 525 CJ1, was flying at 8,000 feet above sea level over Cherry Creek when the mystery object came close enough to make any pilot nervous.

What else could it be? UFO? Pterodactyl?

In our mind, there is only one culprit. Drogon is loose from the pits of Meereen!

[9News]

The revolution is here. The machines have risen. And they can juggle.

Chiba University presented the following this week at 2012 IEE International Conference on Robotics and Automatiion.

The robot is equipped with a three-fingered hand, each with 2 or 3 degrees of motion, and an arm with 7 degrees of motion. These pieces are coupled with a high-speed vision system (500 frames per second) that allows a controller to plan for catches and throws, the IEEE Automation Blog explains.

Next they’ll spin plates…

[MSNBC]

Gaydar, it’s not just a one liner from sassy friends in romantic comedies anymore. It’s science fact.

A University of Washington study flashed faces for less than a blink of an eye and asked respondents to determine if the person was gay or straight. Not only did results come more accurate than chance, they also tracked accurate when displayed upside down.

Here are the parameters of the study:

In the study, 129 college students viewed 96 photos each of young adult men and women who identified themselves as gay or straight. Concerned that facial hair, glasses, makeup and piercings might provide easy clues, the researchers only used photos of people who did not have such embellishments. They cropped the grayscale photos so that only faces, not hairstyles, were visible.

By the numbers, women had more “gaydar readable” faces. Participants were 65 percent in choosing sexual orientation when the faces were right side up. 61 when upside down. Sorting the men proved harder, participants had 57 percent accuracy right side up and 53 upside down.

[Science Daily]

George Lucas wants to build a studio on some ranch property he owns. Sound familiar? It should, because he did it with Skywalker Ranch in the 1970s. Back then neighbors hemmed and hawed about how he would ruin property values by attracting tour buses and helicopters.

Nothing awful happened. Well, some things. Either way, peace was retained in the ‘hood and Ranch folk become happy members of the community.

His property at Grady Ranch however, won’t have the option to do the same. Neighbors have successfully soured the permit process enough for Lucas to pull his studio plan entirely.

Instead, he wants to build low-income housing. You know, like for Ewoks.

“The level of bitterness and anger expressed by the homeowners in Lucas Valley has convinced us that, even if we were to spend more time and acquire the necessary approvals, we would not be able to maintain a constructive relationship with our neighbors,” Lucasfilm said in its statement.

…It may seem as if the affordable housing project is a way for Lucas to stick it to his opposition, but Tom Peters, the CEO of the Marin County Foundation disagrees. “I know Lucas and checked with him on that point personally and directly. It was essential that I was convinced that it was not done out of spite. I would not have accepted the project if I thought it was,” he said.

Build or do not, there is no spite.

[CNN Money]

Alright, it’s a little easier when someone puts a tiny circle around it. What you are seeing is China’s Tiangong-1 space station transiting the Sun. This is the handiwork of Astrophotographer Thierry Legault who had to time this perfectly to snap this picture since since the station zoomed through this shot in only .09 seconds.

Notice how the massive sun spot completely dwarves the Tiangong-1 meager size which is only 10.3 x 3.3 meters.

Check out the close up shots at the link below.

[Universe Today] via Bri G

Fight! An epic battle ensues when Brian wonders aloud if everyone would be okay with sending a willing volunteer on a one way trip to Mars. Is it a bold, necessary step toward brining humanity beyond the stars? Or a gruesome galactic human sacrifice with no real value? Meanwhile! A secret is unearthed underneath the Kodak building in Rochester. Can Justin resist the temptation to cook a bag of popcorn on it and eat the tainted, yet delicious, results?

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It’s asteroid fever! Catch it.

Folks are trying to mine ‘em and now NASA is talking about landing on one. The Telegraph reveals today that the US space agency will reveal their plan next month. The mission will including the first British astronaut Major Tim Peake.

A manned mission will aim to rendezvous with an asteroid up to three million miles from the Earth, taking around a year to make the entire round trip. The astronauts could stay on the asteroid for up to 30 days.

The officials will say that such missions to asteroids could help test technology for future human missions to other planets including Mars.

Nasa hopes that such missions will provide new scientific information about the early universe while also providing valuable information for ways of defending Earth from collisions with asteroids.

The paper says a mission could happen by the next decade. Twenty years to land on a tiny rock? Really NASA? JFK is frowning.

[Telegraph]

There are a lot of bad ways an affair with your friend’s wife can end. Some, like death or violent maiming, could be a little more permanent. But few are weirder than what went down in Kenya last week.

A man cheating with his friends wife found himself stuck inside his adulterous lover by way of an alleged black magic spell. The husband, who suspected shenanigans, visited a witch doctor who placed the spell.

The next time the scandalous pair got together for some down low dirty time, they didn’t come apart.

Authorities were called in and things only ended after the lover paid a ransom of $240 to the cuckold husband and a priest was called in to remove the hex.

[UK Zambians] via Tony Ley

Are exploding supernovae guiding life on Earth? If a new ground breaking theory is to be believed, the answer is yes.

According to the study by Henrik Svensmark published by the Royal Astronomy Society in London the explosions of stars relatively close to Earth has proven itself to be the variable for life on our planet.

In short, according to the Watts Up With That blog, this is as big of a claim as the theory of plate tectonics was for geology.

Here is the short, short, short, short version:

Here are the main results:

• The long-term diversity of life in the sea depends on the sea-level set by plate tectonics and the local supernova rate set by the astrophysics, and on virtually nothing else.

• The long-term primary productivity of life in the sea – the net growth of photosynthetic microbes – depends on the supernova rate, and on virtually nothing else.

• Exceptionally close supernovae account for short-lived falls in sea-level during the past 500 million years, long-known to geophysicists but never convincingly explained..

• As the geological and astronomical records converge, the match between climate and supernova rates gets better and better, with high rates bringing icy times.

The implications here are massive. Not only for our understanding of the natural world but even politically charged debates like climate change.

But this theory easily encapsulates the reason we write this blog. One day you can wake up and the world is radically different then when you went to sleep. Amazing.

[Watts Up With That]

Oh hell yeah.

The most powerful Naval force in the history of the world is about to add the most coveted weapon in science fiction. Laser cannons.

Although they won’t fire pulse blasts that explode enemy targets, the weaponized lasers can do severe damage to small vessels that might aim to do harm to U.S. ships.

That’s right, the Office of Naval Research is moving forward with a plan to arm ships with solid state lasers capable of taking out small enemy vessels that could be used in swarming attacks or suicide bombing mission against American warships.

“We believe it’s time to move forward with solid-state lasers and shift the focus from limited demonstrations to weapon prototype development and related technology advancement,” said Peter Morrison, program officer of the Solid-State Laser Technology Maturation program in a May 8 press release announcing the effort.

Check out the link below to find a video of a test laser totally engulfing a boat’s engine in flame.

[Defense Tech]

A sentient bed sheet.

That’s pretty much the only descriptor that comes to mind when looking at this video. In reality, this blob caught on a deep sea drilling camera off the coast of the UK is a massive jellyfish.

Steven Haddock, a scientist for the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute in Moss Landing, Calif., says that the mysterious creature is a Deepstaria enigmatica jellyfish, much to the chagrin of some Reddit users who thought it was a whale placenta.

“This bag-like jelly is not that rare, but is large, so rarely seen intact,” Haddock said on his “JellyWatch” Facebook page. “In the video, the swirling from the sub makes the medusa appear to undulate and it even turns inside-out.”

It’s kind of hypnotic. Just makes you want to submit to our jellyfish overlords and walk into the ocean to bask in their omnipotent glory.

[CBS Tampa]

I’ve never been attacked by an alligator while fishing in the traquil marsh lands of central Florida, but if I was, it’s probably sound something like this.

Thomas Swiader Jr. found himself on the business end of an angry gator who leapt from the water, jostling the fisherman in his kayak. What follows is a string of fairly hilarious obscenities. THE VIDEO BELOW CONTAINS THESE OBSCENITIES, PLEASE BE AWARE.

[Fox News]

Santino is sick of your gawking and he’s determined to gain sweet revenge by tagging your forehead with a rock.

Santino is a chimp at Sweden’s Furuvik Zoo. He’d gained a reputation for throwing projectiles at particularly annoying visitors so one researcher decided to track his pattern. He discovered a evolving strategy that showed signs of forethought and improvisation.

Here is one of his plots…

“After a visitor group had left the compound area, Santino went inside the enclosure and brought a good-sized heap of hay that he placed near the visitor’s section, and immediately after that he put stones under it,” Osvath said.

“He also appeared to have placed projectiles behind, just before he went in after the hay. After this, he sat down beside the hay and waited. When the visitors came back, he waited until they were close by and, without any preceding display, he threw stones at the crowd.”

How much longer until he starts getting mail order packages from ACME?

[Fox News]

It’s called the Hugvie. You put your cell phone inside of it and then talk to whomever you might like to chat with. The vibrations from the voice simulate a heart beat so you can clutch your Hugvie to you like an inanimate baby while feeling the life pulses from your call.

This seems fine if you are having a really calm conversation with a long distance loved one. It would not be ideal for the following chats:

• Confronting a significant other with proof that they are screwing around with their personal trainer
• Negotiating a good wholesale price on red beans
• Complaining to Comcast customer service that your internet is out and you’ve already reset the modem and the router

But other than those, it would be WAY less creepy.

[YouTube] via Tony Ley

So you are just minding your own business in Moscow. Walking along with your daughter when WHAP! Everyone starts shrieking, you reach up to scratch the sudden itch on your neck when you realize that someone shot you right through the neck with a freaking arrow.

Doctors removed the weapon and he should be fine but an inch to the left or right could have spelt big trouble.

The archery from whence the arrow was allegedly fired, has been shut down.

[The Blaze] via Ken Cowan

GUEST: Tom Merritt

Brian and special guest Tom find themselves covered in meat after it rains from sky. Justin wonders aloud if the characters in Avengers are the mythic Gods of our modern era… except for Thor, who is kind of a God in both. Also, a marine biologist attaches a laser beam to the fin of one of the ocean’s most dangerous species. Is it awesome or the worst idea ever?

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Can you legally shoot Bigfoot right in his Bigfoot-y face while in the Lone Start State? One Oregon Sasquatch seeker thought to ask an expert at the Texas Parks and Wildlife department for a clarification on the rules.

He received a very dry and clear cut email basically stating that if the hunter could prove that Bigfoot was indigenous to Texas, it’s fair game. But now, that is under dispute…

But Sinclair told FoxNews.com his response has been taken wildly out of context.

“This guy never really alluded to Bigfoot, though it seems maybe he said something about Sasquatch,” Sinclair told FoxNews.com. “He took my statement and said that it was safe to hunt an ‘indigenous cryptid,’ whatever that is. He misquoted me.”

Meanwhile, this has sparked a mini-firestorm in the Bigfoot community that wonders if the announcement of Open Season on the big guy will mean the as-yet-unfound cryptid could go extinct. That is, if they could prove he’s real first. Which would probably require the scientific study of a corpse. Which would call for killing.

My head hurts.

[Fox News] via Ken Cowan

His name is Dr. Rev. His work is painting using only his own blood.

Is this:

1) A bold artistic statement
2) An interesting concept

3) The creepiest thing on the planet

Check out his gallery below.

[Blood Painting] via Tony Ley

A new round of Hitler memorabilia is about to hit the auction block and among the items for sale is Adolf’s medical journals. One of them was compiled from interviews with six of Hitler’s chief doctors and the other comes from only one of those doctor’s notes.

Here are the highlights as learned by the Washington Examiner:

Cocaine: The longer report from Giesing noted Hitler’s cocaine use to clear his sinuses and that the doctor had to cut the dosage because the father of the “Final Solution” craved it because it made him happy.

Alternative remedies to sexual dysfunction: …it quotes Hitler doctor Theodore Morrell confirming that Hitler and Braun had sex though they slept in separate beds and that he was injected with semen from young bulls to spark his libido.

Farts: Panagopulos said the report also notes that Hitler “suffered from uncontrollable flatulence” due to his veggie diet, something the German leader took pills for.

All these secrets and more can be yours at auction on May 7th at Alexander Historical Auctions. You might want to find a young bull before you bid… you know… to get your courage up.

[Washington Examiner]

Is the picture above an unidentified space ship? Or simply a collection of cosmic rays that have formed an unusual grouping?

Our hope: both.

You know what happens then…

A pair of fraud Romanian fortune tellers have been busted for the oldest tricks in the rankable page index: Googling information on their clients.

The two made a living allegedly selling “the future” to customers by pearing into a crystal ball. Their claims were only bolstered by the fact that they seemed to know so many other facts about the lives of those that called upon them. Police exposed their antics after an accomplice attempted to bribe an officer to make the whole affair go away.

Although the pair are shut down now, it did not come soon enough for one poor woman who was parted with a large sum of cash in one of the most awesome scams ever.

One woman told how she had believed the two Roma women were genuine mystics, and had been persuaded to take tens of thousands of pounds and go to a nearby lake for a midnight ritual. She had been told that she had to release herself from the burden of her money and throw it all in the lake – but when she hesitated a demon like figure had emerged from the water and in a panic – she had thrown the money into the water and run away.

But police discovered that the water devil was in fact a pal of the pair who had put on diving gear and a mask to terrify the unsuspecting victim.

The Old Water Demon Running Out Of The Lake graft. What a rube.

[Austrian Times]

Seriously, nature wants you and your whole family dead. Remember that the next time you’re thinking about saving the planet. It really hates you.

[CNN]

It was a lonely day in Northeast Kentucky, when all of a sudden out of the blue blazes… meat rained from the sky.

In 1876 a shower of three-inch chunks of meat rained down from a clear sky over Olympian Springs, Kentucky. The Louisville Commercial reported that “two gentlemen, who tasted the meat, express the opinion that it was either mutton or venison.” A scientist at the Royal Microscopical Society of Great Britain theorized that buzzards had feasted on dead horses, flown over the town, and vomited.

This comes from a list of strange things that have randomly dropped from the heavens. Also on the list, a 2009 rain of frogs in Japan and a squid that clunked a dude on the head so hard in 1997 that he spend two days in a coma.

[PopSci]

As you might have heard Adam Yauch died today, a victim of cancer. He was 47 and is survived by his wife and child.

Arguably the best of the Beastie Boys deep videography, Intergalactic is easily the most Weird Things of the bunch. Godzilla-inspired war between robot and sea creature gives way to Japanese subway rapping.

RIP MCA.

A man named Luke Tipple, marine biologist most recognizably known for his work on the Discovery Channel, attached a laser beam to a shark. It was temporary. The laser was the lowest powered model produced by Wicked Lasers, which promoted the feat. The lemon shark was unharmed.

There was even a bit of scientific value, Tipple experimented with a new kind of clap that could be used in future tracking research.

Awesome right? Not so much, for some critics who found the stunt disrespectful to the animal.

“Is there a point of it? It has to have an objective,” Neil Hammerschlag, an assistant professor with the Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science, told Wired.

“I would say the attachment process sounds non-invasive,” Hammerschlag said. “I don’t think it’s going to cause any damage to the shark. It’s temporary. In terms of the goal, without knowing the specific scientific or educational application, it’s hard to say. But if this is just to respond to a scene in the Austin Powers movie, I don’t see value. You’re just causing unnecessary stress on the animal. It’s not respectful.”

This is why we can’t have anything nice. Like sharks. With frickin laser beams. On their head.

[Wired]

Are you ready to terrorize a small medieval village? How about set fire to your enemies? Threaten the slave city of Astapor?

Is this the RC toy for you!

It flies. It breathes fire. It looks like a dragon.

Named “Mythical Beast” this bad motherhuncher is designed by Rick Hamel. Get some more of the technical deets at the Jalopnik link below. In the meantime, check out the video of Beast in action.

[Jalopnik] via Matt Marsh

The whiz kids at io9 have put together a compilation of research that explains why we see imaginary, monstrous faces when we look in the mirror for an elongated period of time. This is the very basis for sleepover games like Bloody Mary, designed to spook kids into wetting themselves while surrounded by their jerkwad friends.

Ah, youth.

Here’s the jist:

The brain, when faced with a lot of stimulation, only some of which is considered relevant, will tune out the non-relevant parts, filling in what it can from the general area. It’s a little like how the blind spot works, except this is a dynamic process. The brain will zoom in on a desired area, and the rest of the space will fade away. This is called the Troxler Effect, or Troxler Fading.

The post goes on to discuss a study where respondents looked in a mirror for 10 minutes and reported all manner of horrors staring back at them by the end of it. 10% explained seeing dead parents with key elements of their face rearranged.

[io9]

You are involved in horrible car accident. Paramedics buzz around to make sure you make it to the hospital alive. You’re losing blood. If you don’t get more of the right time in you soon, things could take a turn for the worse.

But the on-the-scene help is panicked. Many are new. They have to determine your blood type in the field, a life or death decision.

Which is where Harry Potter comes in.

A brand new invention, inspired by the young wizard’s tales. It’s a piece of paper that which reveals what blood type it has come in contact with. Instant, easy to decipher and creepy as all get out.

The device consists of a sensor made from a tiny piece of paper, coated with a hydrophobic, water-repellent, layer, but four “windows” are left without it, making them prone to absorb liquid.

Each area is shaped differently; for instance, one has the shape of the letter A, another – the shape of the letter B.

These areas are filled with antibodies that interact with red blood cells, making them clump together, or agglutinate, depending on the blood type.

Not to be a picky muggle, I think they mean the inspiration for this would be Tom Riddle’s diary from Chamber of Secret, which wrote back to someone writing in it or possibly the Marauder’s Map which laid invisible until the right unlocking spell was cast.

[BBC]

He lived. He ate deer meat. He took an arrow to the shoulder and died.

That was roughly 5,300 years ago for the corpse they call Ötzi. Hikers found his body in the Alps in 1991. But only now did scientists realize he brought us an amazing gift: the world’s oldest recovered completed blood cells.

To confirm the finding, the researchers used a technique called Ramen spectroscopy, which uses light-scattering patterns to determine which molecules are present in a sample. The suspected blood cells had all the markers of true red blood cells, including hemoglobin, the protein that carries oxygen in the blood.

While other researchers have attempted to identify blood on older stone tools, this is the oldest definite confirmation of blood, Zink said. The find may help advance forensic science, because current crime-scene technology has trouble differentiating between old and new blood, he said.

Ötzi. If only all 45-year-old murder victims could be so ambitious.

[MSNBC]

Blue Origin, the space exploration company founded by Amazon billionaire Jeff Bezos is ready for it’s close up. Although notoriously secretive in comparison to companies like SpaceX, May is a huge month for Blue and now they’re ready to talk about it.

Not only have wind-tunnel tests come back positive for their Space Vehicle unit, but they are going to begin testing on the rocketry phase of their plan.

Alexander said the resulting spacecraft design “will be officially blessed” at a system requirements review in May. Also during May, Blue Origin expects to begin testing of the thrust chamber assembly for its BE-3 rocket engine at NASA’s Stennis Space Center in Mississippi, Alexander said.

The company, based in Kent, Wash., is receiving $22 million from NASA during the current phase of the space agency’s program to help commercial ventures develop space taxis for the post-shuttle era. The SV isn’t nearly as big as the space shuttle, of course, but it should be capable of transporting up to seven passengers to and from the International Space Station.

The MSNBC post brings up a very interesting issues. Although NASA is currently offering money to four companies Boeing Co., Sierra Nevada Corp., SpaceX and Blue Origin, many believe that list will shrink with the next round of funding. Many in congress would like to see the space agency pick one horse this early in the game.

No matter who NASA sprinkles with coin, the bang for the buck on such an investment could really pay dividends in cheaper, reliable options for ambitious research. Very interesting.

[MSNBC]

His name is Red Velvet. He is sick of the antics of Phoenix Jones, Seattle’s real life super hero who recently was forced to unmask under threat after a legal snafu.

It’s not quite clear what Velvet wants, but the video is awesome.

[YouTube] via WT reader Brock

They meet at school.

Singularity University to be exact. A who’s who of future makers with a collected resume that would make Alexander the Great offer to bus tables in their presence.

Musk. Page. Aldrin. Cerf. Valley start-up billionaires. Hollywood big wigs. Those who have shattered scientific barriers. And Ashton Kutcher and will.i.am and Lady Gaga’s PR strategist.

But hell, even the Avengers could make use of Ant Man.

Together they hold blue sky brainstorming sessions that could change the world. United under the vision of X Prize founder (and recently announced Asteroid Miner) Peter Diamandis, the match an unprecedented amount of human computing power with the money and ambition to tackle nearly any problem.

The Observer’s Carole Cadwalladr was lucky enough to sit in on a session and wrote a fantastic piece about it.

But first, the co-founder of the Singularity University, Peter Diamandis, gives us our instructions for the day. Your task, he says, is to pick one of the “grand challenges of humanity” – the lack of clean drinking water, say. And then come up with an idea that “can positively impact the lives of a billion people”.

It’s 9.30 in the morning. Some of us haven’t even had coffee yet. There’s about 50 of us present and the room has been divided up into tables, one for education, another for poverty, another for water, and I’m not sure where I should sit. Diane Murphy, the university’s PR executive, hesitates for a moment and then directs me over to the table marked “food”. “Tell you what,” she says. “Why don’t you take Ashton Kutcher’s chair over there. He’s not coming until later.” (When he does arrive, he pulls up a chair at the next table over. What can I say? If Ashton Kutcher fails to solve global hunger, it will be my fault.)

Avengers assemble.

[Guardian]

GUEST: Scott Sigler

Brian and Scott are approached by a wizened trucker who offers them a deadly new opportunity on reality television. A frantic scientist in the ancient civilization of Atlantis opens up a hole in space and time to warn anyone who will listen that the volcano that will bury him is ready to blow again in the modern day. A crusty old sea captain is convinced that he needs to add heavy artillery to his roof in an effort to stave off a murky threat.

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In many apartment buildings throughout big cities around the world, roof access is off limits. But only in London this summer, will it be because they might be firing a missile off of it to destroy an airborne terrorist attack.

The British Ministry of Defense is considering building surface to air missile launchers on residential buildings during the Olympic Games.

An east London estate, where 700 people live, has received leaflets saying a “Higher Velocity Missile system” could be placed on a water tower.

A spokesman said the MoD had not yet decided whether to deploy ground based air defence systems during the event.

But estate resident Brian Whelan said firing the missiles “would shower debris across the east end of London”.

How else are you going to shoot down a wayward Nazi pilot who became caught in a time vortex during a bombing raid on London during World War II only be spit out in 2012?

[BBC]

The future seems closer today than it did yesterday.

People are talking about mining asteroids that contain more platinum than we’ve ever dug up on Earth and finding water that could be the key to permanent space habitation and long distance voyages. In a few weeks, a private company is about to launch a vehicle that will dock with the International Space Station. If successful, it will be a huge step toward a cheaper, safer and more efficient passage to low Earth orbit.

To me, this is amazing.

I’ve had more conversations about the future of the human race as a multi-planet species in the last three years than ever before. It seems like we are living in an age of exploration. Of true horizon shattering adventure.

I have no formal education in engineering. I will likely never have my name on a research paper. The wonders of space are a mystery to me beyond the most elementary of facts. Among them: once you are there, no one can hear you scream.

But according to Neil deGrasse Tyson, no one is thinking about the future. I’m not. You aren’t. Planetary Resources isn’t. Nor is Elon Musk and SpaceX. America has stopped reaching for the stars.

Why? Because we stopped giving money to NASA. Because no one can create the future until a group of politicians do it for us. After all, they decided they were responsible 60 years ago.

The National Aeronautics and Space Act of 1958 makes NASA responsible for advancing the space frontier. And since low Earth orbit is no longer a space frontier, NASA must move to the next step.

America fell in love with space because NASA shattered boundaries. They did previously unimaginable things. Impossible became possible.

Other companies are now doing what NASA did decades ago. Spurring imaginations by minting a new reality. Creating new data sets for the smartest minds on the planet to process. And again, they are doing it from American soil.

The United States is on it’s way to claiming our destiny as the gateway to the stars. Unlocking the Earth’s ultimate achievement: leaving Earth.

Maybe we have stopped dreaming about the future because we decided tomorrow is today.

Or at least that’s what I would say if I were dreaming of the future.

SpaceX founder and CEO, Elon Musk talks to WIRED magazine’s Jason Paur about the upcoming mission to the International Space Station.

(Thanks to Daniel Connors for the link)

Okay, that’s a deliberately provocative headline, I apologize.

But after all I’ve read pushing back on the popularity of the Hunger Games film and book series while citing the 1999 novel and 2000 film Battle Royale as the originator of the reality television kill show concept, it’s worth mentioning that either invented the idea.

Even The Running Man, penned by a scrappy author named Richard Bachman (Stephen King’s pseudonym), published in 1985 comes decades after the grand daddy of them all… Richard Sheckley’s The Prize of Peril, originally written in 1958.

It follows Jim Reader, a poor young truck driver’s assistant who takes on a career as a professional reality show contestant. The shows that pay the most are ones where you risk your life and where you could be forced to take the lives of other contestants.

He finds himself on the biggest of them all, The Prize of Peril.

A quick read, Peril deals with a lot of similar themes to Hunger Games (contestant as public inspiration, help from viewers, game manipulation) and just goes to show that as long as television game shows have existed, we’ve dreamed of killing each other on them.

Link to story at Arthur’s Classic Novels

The volcano that, by legend, damned the civilization of Atlantis to a watery grave could be reawakening.

Investigators had installed a GPS monitoring system in the area in 2006. These sensors keep track of their location in space, and can thus shed light on when the Earth is moving.

The scientists found that by June 2011, the 22 GPS stations had been pushed 0.2 to 1.3 inches (5 to 32 millimeters) farther from the caldera than they had been just six months earlier. The researchers then improved the existing GPS stations and installed two more GPS stations, and data from September 2011 to January 2012 showed the land near the volcano was swelling at an accelerating rate, reaching 7 inches (180 mm) of growth per year.

Which Mediterranean nation should watch their back? Will they get an animated feature featuring the voice of a Michael J. Fox equivalent several hundred years from now? We will have to wait and see…

[Fox News]

Still confused about all that asteroid mining talk yesterday? Here is a really simple explanation on the whole announcement from the folks making it happen.

[Planetary Resources]

You are the United States military. Your intelligence unit is preparing to capture the most notorious war criminal in the history of modern civilization. But Adolf Hitler’s infamous, iconic, look could also lead to tremendous confusion should he hope to go into hiding by altering it.

How do you prepare?

One way is to have a New York make-up artist create various portraits of Hitler with drastically different “looks”. This way, soldiers would be prepared for any disguised ol’ AH threw at them.

Above, we have the “Jesse Ventura”. Below, the “John Waters”.

The photos have been released in the larger resolution formats by the U.S. National Archives. A few more can be found at The Blaze link.

[The Blaze] via Ken Cowen

Andrew is fresh off a plane from Italy and still loopy, what better time to discuss the future of mining asteroids?! The boys chat about the team of modern superheroes uniting to bring trillions of dollars to the global economy while redefining the concept of natural resources in the most awesome way possible. A nefarious plot once used by the Ewoks is sniffed out on a woodland trail in Utah. Mayne tells a harrowing tale of the legendary Italian Were-Hookers.

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One average asteroid, half the size of the conference room they made their announcement in, can contain enough resources to power every space flight in the history of the NASA space program

When asked during Q and A how many resources can be mined out of one astroid, that was the response from Peter Diamandis. They key is identifying the right ones and developing the right kind of tech to mine them.

Private industry can iterate faster and take bigger risks that are inappropriate for government

One investor made the point that if his neighbor was mortgaging his house to invest in Planetary Resources, it would be inappropriate. Which is why a private company and not a government underwater in trillions of dollars in debt is the right agent to make this kind of progress.

Much was said about the assembly line mentality, where no model or build of a Planetary Resources spacecraft will be revered beyond a necessary step to the right solution, better than the last but inferior to the next.

As we saw with the nostalgia and reverence we have for our public spaceflight tech, that is very rarely the case with NASA projects.

Finding resources like water are key to life support in space and refueling for longer journeys

Water is a tremendously expensive resources to get into space. But if one were to find the elements to create it amongst the stars and create it in orbit, it fundamentally changes the game.

The cost and complication of life support and long distance travel is changed forever, the closer this comes to reality.

The immediate future is identifying asteroids with prospecting spacecraft

The first Arkyd 100 spacecraft should launch sometime within 12 to 24 months. The goal will be to provide intelligent data on Earth bound asteroids and what they might contain.

Mining spacecraft is a priority in the next 10 years

Arkyd 200 and 300 units will focus on making contact with and the mining of the asteroids. Although the panel was loathe to give hard timetables, 10 years was mentioned as point by which they hope to mine and return resources.

Their team will be kept very small and move very fast

One of the few reasons Planetary Resources went public today was because they are currently trying to add engineering talent to their small Bellevue, WA based staff but couldn’t hope to do it quietly. They are very conscious of staff bloat.

Robots, not humans, are the future of asteroid mining for now

Humans are too expensive and not particularly necessary for the kind of prospecting they are looking to do. So any fear that we are getting into an Outland situation can be put on ice for a decade or so.

BONUS: Bad Astronomer Phil Plait spoke with Chief Engineer Chris Lewicki and has a great breakdown of the technical deets.

Also, just because this is the most excited anyone has been about prospecting since the gold rush, here is Will Ferrell’s legendary unaired Gus Chiggins sketch.

Peter Thiel has long been a heavy hitter in Silicon Valley. He was a co-founder and CEO of PayPal and made an early stage development in Facebook, even earning himself the “honor” of being portrayed in The Social Network film about the site’s founding.

But Thiel has bigger fish to fry. Fish like the creation of antimatter-based fuel. Or minting of artificial protein therapeutics. Of even the advancement of human cell reengineering.

All projects that are far too radical (as in improbable) to garner much money for serious research. Except for Thiel, who finds them much too radical (as in awesome) to not toss cash at.

His fund will be called Breakout Labs and it awarded six grants of $350,000 to the following companies.

3Scan: development of 3-D digital reconstruction of brain issue.
Arigos Biomedical: advanced organ cooling for long term storage
Immusoft: re-programming of immune cells
Inspirotec: identification and collection of any airborne toxin
Longevity Biotec: creation of therapeutic artificial protein technology
Positron Dynamics: production and collection of positron, could be used as fuel for space travel

The best part, the application process is open at Breakout. They will continue to award good money to insane causes until the future gets here.

[Kurzweil AI]

Professor of Management Ian Yeoman and sexologist Michelle Mars have laid out their vision of the future in their paper “Robots, Men And Sex Tourism” published in the journal Futures. They predict that in the year 2050 $12,672 and a ticket to Amsterdam will net you some alone time with an android. They use a fictional club named Yub-yum to paint the picture:

Sexual tourists will pay about 10,000 Euro ($12,672) for an all-inclusive service from massages and lap dances to intercourse from the scantily-clad sexbots parading around.

In an increasingly youth and beauty-fixated society, Yub-yum would provide a range “of sexual gods and goddesses of different ethnicities, body shapes, ages, languages and sexual features”.

…

Clients could feel guilt free as they actually have not had sex with a real person and would not have to lie to their partner.

The androids would be made of bacteria resistant fibre and would be flushed for human fluids, therefore guaranteeing no STIs are transferred between consumers.

The rise of sex bots doesn’t just benefit their johns:

“Amsterdam’s tourist industry is built on an image of sex and drugs. The council was worried that if the red light district were to close, it would have a detrimental effect on the city’s brand and tourism industry.”

[Sydney Morning Herald]

Space blog superstar Phil “Bad Astronomer” Plait has a prediction about a news conference set to take place next Tuesday. It will feature Peter Diamandis, leading commercial space entrepreneur Eric Anderson, former NASA Mars mission manager Chris Lewicki and planetary scientist & veteran NASA astronaut Tom Jones.

It promises an announcement nothing short of “a mission to help ensure humanity’s prosperity.”

Plait says that means the mining of asteroids.

The big clue comes from the press release.

the company will overlay two critical sectors – space exploration and natural resources – to add trillions of dollars to the global GDP. This innovative start-up will create a new industry and a new definition of ‘natural resources’.

Plait breaks it down…

If I were being optimistic, I might say something like this could get off the ground in 20 years or so, depending on several variables, and maybe sooner. Let me be frank: I don’t think this is a crazy idea.

This’ll take a lot of money… but he seems to have some fairly wealthy people — billionaires, and more than one — affiliated with this. So whatever idea he’s got, he’s being backed very seriously for it.

Will it be “Drill baby drill!” on Tuesday? We will have to wait and see but the concept is something truly mind blowing. For all the nostalgic handwringing surrounding the Discovery’s assisted flight around Washington D.C. this week, the dawn of a bold new space age is upon us.

Except this time, we aren’t visiting. We are annexing. We are occupying. We are moving in.

[Bad Astronomy]

Three lovely young ladies are patrolling Arizona with murder on their minds. Who are they trying to kill and how do they plan on doing it? Andrew blows Brian’s mind with the concept of a blimp to space. But does the new hotness spell doom for Brushwood’s beloved space elevator? The boys bicker about which celebrity they would most (or least) like to see resurrected in hologram form, Tupac style.

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Say, can I borrow that recipe?

File that under things you don’t want to say if you ever find yourself living next to a Brazilian cannibal couple accused of cooking human flesh empanada and selling the savory treats to their neighbors.

A man, his wife and their mistress were part of a sect which followed a “voice” that gave them orders to murder “evil women” and eat them in a purification ritual. Their deeds were discovered after the husband wrote and published a memoir about his activities.

All three are now detained.

As for the neighbors that got sold the tricksy munchies? According to authorities they burned down the suspect’s house.

[Fox News] via Tony Ley

Long the unmatched standard for artificial intelligence, it looks like the Turing Test might be ready to crack.

According to a new essay in the April 12th edition of Science, a cognitive scientist at the French National Center for Scientific Research says that two major breakthroughs could finally push an AI over the top.

“The first is the ready availability of vast amounts of raw data — from video feeds to complete sound environments, and from casual conversations to technical documents on every conceivable subject. The second is the advent of sophisticated techniques for collecting, organizing, and processing this rich collection of data.

Is it possible to recreate something similar to the subcognitive low-level association network that we have? That’s experiencing largely what we’re experiencing? Would that be so impossible?”

In detailing the long history of the Turing Test, Wired asks the ultimate question: why?

Just because we can beat the Turing Test, what does it serve humanity?

In the meantime, check out this quick video of two AIs bickering amongst each other.

[Wired]

His name is Dracorex and he looks like a dragon.

Seriously, compare the skull you see above to the massive dragon skulls found in the subterranean pathways of King’s Landing in HBO’s Game of Thrones.

While it is inconclusive that Dracorex ever consorted with the House Targaryen or reduced cities and armies alike to smoldering ash, what is clear is how much the shape this herbivore bares a resemblance to our common understanding of a fictional dragon. The skull was first donated for study in 2004 and was formally described first in 2006.

Meanwhile, the beast has a more permanent connection to yet another popular fantasy franchise. The official name for Dracorex is Dracorex hogwartsia. This was inspired by young visitors to the Children’s Museum of Indianapolis, where it was official donated, who kept referring to it as the dragon from the book and subsequent 2005 film adaptation Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.

This thrilled author J.K. Rowling…

“I am absolutely thrilled to think that Hogwarts has made a small (claw?) mark upon the fascinating world of dinosaurs. I happen to know more on the subject of paleontology than many might credit, because my eldest daughter was Utahraptor-obsessed and I am now living with a passionate Tyrannosaurus rex-lover, aged three. My credibility has soared within my science-loving family, and I am very much looking forward to reading Dr. Bakker’s paper describing ‘my’ dinosaur, which I can’t help visualising as a slightly less pyromaniac Hungarian Horntail.”

But the question remains, is Dracorex really even its own species?

All around dinosaur badass authority and HPIC (Head Paleontologist In Charge) of our hearts Jack Horner says the beast is probably just a juvenile version of the well documented dino Pachycephalosaurus which looks decidedly less dragon-esqe.

In fact, he has an awesome TEDx talk going into the phenomenon of misclassification and our misunderstanding of “shape shifting” dinosaurs.

So what came first? Our modern dragon myth that looks like Dracorex? Or did Dracorex shape the myth? Is Dracorex even really Dracorex?

No matter what, we now know something that Daenerys Targaryen, Jack Horner and Harry Potter have in common. Which is pretty awesome.

Is this a 2001: A Space Odyssey style monolith plopped on the surface of Mars? Kind of. Maybe. Not really. But it still looks awesome.

[Yahoo]

You watch a massive glowing object fall into a lake. What could it be? UFO? Fat ghost? A plane make entirely out of glow-in-the-dark plastic?

Whatever it is, we are going to keep guessing because a search of the lake is plummeted into hasn’t turned up anything.

The Republican-American of Waterbury reports that a person driving in Litchfield at about 2 a.m. Tuesday reported that an object the size of a whale fell from the sky and crashed into Bantam Lake. Officials say that at about the same time, a state trooper 10 miles away in Warren called dispatchers to report that something fell out of the sky and landed near Bantam or Morris.

Morris fighters made several passes up and down the lake in a boat looking for a possible plane crash, but didn’t find any debris.

Authorities called off the search, leaving the mystery unsolved.

Astronomers might have the answer, they say a meteor shower occurred that evening. It still doesn’t answers why it was glowing as if it just got out from a rave.

[Fox News]

As you may have heard, North Korea tried to launch a long-range rocket today and the results were not so hot.

But while the truth of what happened is being reported world wide, the question remains, how will North Korea’s famously stringent state-run broadcasters break the bad news to the locals?

Short answer: they won’t.

What you see above is footage broadcast by North Korean state television in 2009 depicting the fate of a rocket launch. The problem? In reality, it was a total failure according to Washington Post East Asia correspondent Chico Harlan on Twitter.

That didn’t stop the DRPK from getting their CGI on and creating this gem to show all the boys and girls back home that Glorious Leader had lead them to the stars. Strike up the band.

[Twitter]

Check out this video from our good buddy Tony Ley. It purports to show a UFO from the point of view of an airplane. Whatever it is seems to be zooming through the sky pretty fast.

What do you think?

The big rock from the sky that crashed into Earth and proved an extinction level event for our dinosaur pals could also seed life on a far off planet. The meteorites launched into space by the impact carrying the ingredients for life itself have since spread across our solar system and far beyond.

A new table estimating the trajectories of the rocks provides many surprises, according to Ray Kurzweil’s blog. For example, it would take a trillion years for the Earth ejecta to spread the size of the Milky Way.

But most awesomely…

The probability is almost 1 (close to certain) that our solar system is visited by microorganisms that originated outside our solar system.

To tie this together with a post yesterday, this means that our ejecta could bring life to other planets and some point there might be a scientist there warning of our fearsome existence. Yes, my friends, WE ARE THE SUPER GENIUS SPACE DINOSAURS!

[KurzweilAI Blog]

We aren’t quite sure how this was the conclusion he reached but Ronald Breslow, Ph.D has a theory. In a new report he tries to shed light on the age-old mystery of why terrestrial amino acids (the very building blocks of life) exist in only one shape.

He posits that the kind of protein brought to earth millions of years ago could be evidence that another forms exists on other planets. The kind of proteins that create…

SUPER GENIUS SPACE DINOSAURS!

Quote Doctor Breslow:

An implication from this work is that elsewhere in the universe there could be life forms based on D-amino acids and L-sugars. Such life forms could well be advanced versions of dinosaurs, if mammals did not have the good fortune to have the dinosaurs wiped out by an asteroidal collision, as on Earth. We would be better off not meeting them.

That is, unless you’re really in the mood to get devoured by a SUPER GENIUS SPACE DINOSAUR. In that case, meet away.

[Science Daily]

In front of security cameras, a tourist vanishes from the top of the Empire State Building and mysteriously falls to her death moments later in Times Square.

A young girl dies crawling out of her own grave after having been declared dead a year earlier.

On a Fort Lauderdale beach, a missing World War II airman and his aircraft show up as if he died only hours before.

They call the mysterious man behind these unnatural events the Warlock. To some he’s the messenger of a modern age of miracles.

To Jessica Blackwood, FBI agent and daughter of a legendary magic family, the Warlock is a trickster and a murderer and she’s the only one who can see through his deceptions.

—

Andrew Mayne, the author of Public Enemy Zero and The Chronological Man series brings you an edge-of-your-seat ebook triller that only he could write.

BUY IT NOW FOR ONLY 99¢

The stars at night are big and bright CLICK HERE deep in the heart of Texas. So where better to launch vehicles to get closer to them.

SpaceX has begun preliminary paperwork to establish a launching facility in South Texas, near the Mexican border. The move accomplishes several goals for the ambitious private spaceflight firm.

Price: the facility is closer to the SpaceX testing facility in McGregor, Texas. Also, a launch space they don’t have to share (which will never be the case in Cape Canaveral) would mean they could have more flexibility with schedule and could continue to bring launch prices down to the ultimate goal of $1000 per pound.

Politics: Texas is home of the largest congressional opponents to commercial spaceflight. By putting a massive facility right in their backyard, it could stem some of the animosity.

Innovation: launching the rockets from west of Florida means they could possibly keep their Sunshine State facilities as landing areas for the rockets. This is a key part of founder Elon Musk’s dream of legitimate rocket reusability.

Read the full notice below, or check out what Ars Technica makes of the news.

[SpaceX Filing]

[Ars Technica]

You just got pelted with dark matter. Don’t worry, it’ll happen again in a couple of seconds. Should you be worried? Probably not, it’s been happening your whole life, at least according to a new study by a few theoretical physicists.

A dark matter particle smacks into an average person’s body about once a minute, and careens off oxygen and hydrogen nuclei in your cells, according to theoretical physicists. Dark matter is streaming through you as you read this, most of it unimpeded.

If you’d like to read up on this mysterious (nefariously named) substance the is estimated to comprise 83% of all matter in the universe, check out Wikipedia. I know I had to.

[Popular Science]

There are just some videos that you watch and realize, the future is not coming, it’s here. This is was one of those videos to me. Please, take a look at the Hover Bike. The full model an provide life of up to 10,000 feet.

A prototype will cost you just over $82,000 US dollars.

The video below features an RC Scale Model. It’s absolutely insane.

The best part of the website is that on the right sidebar it lists “applications” for the Hover Bike. They include Aerial Cattle mustering, Search and Rescue, Aerial Survey, Wildlife and Parks and other mundane tasks. As if you need a reason to have a Hover Bike. IT’S A FLIPPIN’ HOVER BIKE! The only applications they should list are: Being Awesome and Amazing Entrance To Random First Dates, Family Reunions & Proms.

[Hover Bike]

Something strange is going on in the schools and nurses of a small village, can Justin and Brian deduce the romping menace? Bonnie joins the show to discuss the horrendous actions of the wild child Brushwood daughter who may or may not have committed an oceanic atrocity. Andrew offers the services of off-shore behavioral specialist Olaf.

Also, we reveal the new plan to do the show weekly and record live!

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A new study debunks the long held myth that urine is sterile. The results, which appear in the April issue of the Journal of Clinical Microbiology was conducted at Loyola University Chicago Stritch School of Medicine. If found evidence of bacteria in the bladders of healthy women.

“Doctors have been trained to believe that urine is germ-free,” said Linda Brubaker, MD, MS, dean, SSOM. “However, these findings challenge this notion, so this research may have positive implications for how we treat patients with urinary tract conditions in the future.”

The myth has long been a contributing factor to the survival strategy of drinking one’s own liquid waste. The idea being that 95% of urine is water and sterile so to combat loss of water in the body it would help to recycle the excrement.

Somebody please inform Bear Grylls.

[Science Daily]

It’s very rare that I like to use this space for anything other than what you came here for: news of the weird and the occasional genre pop culture breakdown. However, I need to ask a favor of you.

You see, I also do a few podcasts outside of Weird Things. One of them was Game On, a video game show I wrote and was hosted by the supernova that is Veronica Belmont and Weird Things podcast host Brian Brushwood. It was very silly and despite some early episode woes, we really found our feet.

Unfortunately, due to low download numbers over the first 10 episodes, our network announced they were canceling the show. Sunday was our last episode.

Which is when something amazing happened. Our viewers went berserk.

In fact, they protested so loudly that the head of our network, Leo Laporte, said that if the last episode got 50,000 views and downloads than he’d bring it back.

Which brings me back to that favor.

Every YouTube view or download counts to the total. If you dig video games, you’ll like it. If you are more of a casual player on you iPad or iPhone, you’ll like it too. If you wouldn’t mind giving this episode a chance, we would all greatly appreciate it.

SUBSCRIBE ON iTUNES HERE

SUBSCRIBE ON YOUTUBE HERE

We got a gander of World Scott over at io9 today where he blew up a firecracker inside of a balloon with a laser. Digging through the rest of his YouTube channel, here are two other videos will worth seeing that demonstrate the supreme awesomeness of lasers.

Above, watch in awe as the majestic blue laser creates the savory champion of movie treats: popcorn. Each kernel exploding with the knowledge that it was born thanks to an awesome beam of awesomeness.

Below, start your morning off right with a cup of joe… headed by GD laser! The best part of waking up is knowing a powerful ray of light brought this brew to an appropriate temperature in your cup.

Check out the rest of his channel here.

[YouTube]

A man has lost his valiant fight to keep the government out of his front yard… where he buried his wife. James E. Davis buried his wife Patsy there after she died in 2009. What followed was a three year battle with the city after his permit to legally declare his front yard a private cemetery was rejected.

…the Stevenson City Council voted to deny Davis’ application, citing concerns of the perpetual care of the cemetery, location and size of the small lot, impact of the cemetery on property values and citizens’ complaints with the location of the cemetery. There were also concerns about future liability of the city to maintain the cemetery.

Davis has 30 days to appeal and was ordered to pay court costs.

[The Daily Sentinel] via Tony Ley

We were alerted by a reader to this Kickstarter for The Remee, a sleep mask that claims to trigger lucid dreaming. It’s already far past full funding, netting over $91k at this time of this writing. The initial ask was for $35k.

An $80 pledge (plus $15 shipping and handling) earns you a Remee when they are completed.

But, is the concept of triggering lucid dreaming real? Or does the difficult to verify nature of the concept obscure the fact that it might be impossible?

On the Kickstarter page, the men behind the mask at Brooklyn’s Bitbanger Labs link to a Radiolab episode about lucid dreaming and a link to a book by Stanford researcher Dr. Stephen LaBerge detailing his work on the subject.

If real, it’s an intriguing concept. We spend so much time asleep or dreaming, why not get the most out of it?

[Kickstarter] via Zach Scott

Boeing tested it’s CST-100 capsule by dropping it from 11,000 feet in the air from a helicopter into the desert.

According to reports, the test seemed to go fine, but what’s interesting is who footed part of the bill for the testing:

Bigelow Aerospace paid for some of the testing, according to Boeing, punctuating the space destination company’s interest in using the CST-100 to get to orbit. Bigelow, the brainchild of hotelier/motelier Robert Bigelow, envisions using inflatable space stations as orbiting labs or other destinations, but the company doesn’t have a rocket, so it will need a partner like Boeing.

Robert Bigelow is the owner of Budget Suites of America. Just think, children born now could be gossiping with each other in 18 years about who got a room in an inflatable space structure for after prom.

[PopSci]

A shockingly well preserved Wooly Mammoth has been found in the far flung regions of Siberia and it could lead to the future resurrection of the species. The six-month old animal died over 10,000 years ago. It’s eyes and trunk are were found preserved in the permafrost.

But back to the main question, how does this lead to us bringing back the fuzzy beasts of yore?

Some scientists hold out hope that well preserved sperm or other cells containing viable DNA could be used to resurrect the mammoth lineage.

Despite the inherent difficulties, Dr Agenbroad remains optimistic about the potential for cloning.

“When we got the Jarkov mammoth [found frozen in Taimyr, Siberia, in 1997], the geneticists told me: ‘if you can get us good DNA, we’ll have a baby mammoth for you in 22 months’,” he told BBC News.

The beast did not initially yield a sufficient DNA sample but is being sent to Japan for further study. Meanwhile, scientists fret that further finds could be tainted by a burgeoning new black market trade. Siberian scavengers, who used to simply sell the recovered from the ice have since begun selling mammoth parts found in the permafrost online. For example, mammoth hair sells for $50 an inch.

In other news, does anyone have $50.

[BBC]

GOOGLE PROJECT GLASS LOOKS AS PROMISING AS MICROSOFT’S VISION OF THE TABLET PC IN 2001…

Google has only released one video and little else on their project for bringing augmented reality to the masses, so it’s hard to cast aspersions on what’s the most vapory of vaporware. That said, I’ll pick apart the video; in that even with the use of After Effects and the potential to show us anything, their vision of the future seems rather timid.

Like the silly Nintendo Power Glove in Minority Report (far less impressive than Microsoft’s Kinect and ideas in the labs when the movie was made), we get a vision of the future that feels dated before it happens.

The future is not run on Nintendo Power Gloves...

Google’s glasses appear to just be a screen in front of your face with eye tracking. And I don’t mean that in the ‘iPhone is just a screen you touch’, way. It feels like Microsoft’s attempt at tablets in the early 2000’s. They figured your finger would just be a pointing device for Windows. Substitute ‘eye’ for ‘finger’ here and you get a shortsighted vision of the potential for this technology.

Google’s Glass doesn’t do anything different than what we do now. The screen is just in a different place. Think of how the iPad changed the way we interact with software or how Microsoft’s Kinect changed gaming. Augmented Reality could be bigger than all of this.

Touch interfaces took off when you realized that the medium had changed. Google’s Glass doesn’t feel that way. I don’t think they get their medium. My first case in point is the map feature:

How does Google envision using augmented reality to show us a map? They just float a regular map in front of you. Why not lay the map over on your field of view and actually show you a path to follow?

Second, let’s look at the trip to the book store. Obviously, Google doesn’t want to scare off brick and mortar partners with flashing deals to buy the book elsewhere. But why not use their already solid image recognition technology to hover reviews of the book or show us augmented publisher information. The same for the concert poster. Make the thing move. Show us what a connected world looks like.

Third, the apps were disappointing. When the girlfriend calls, why not make it look like she’s on the top of the building with him? Don’t just overlay reality, blend it. Why not create artificial elements in real space?

Fourth, show us virtual objects. What’s a virtual ebook look like to read or a magazine? I’d love to see what Google thinks the future of virtual items will be like with augmented reality. I have to image it’s more than a transparent screen.

That said, I’m excited that Google is taking the initiative on this. I’ll leave them with the words of Tom Hardy’s Eames in Inception, “You mustn’t be afraid to dream a little bigger, darling.”

For good time’s sake:

James Cameron heads down to the bottom of the ocean and the boys squee with delight. Justin hits rock bottom while living with Brian only to purchase and lose a winning MegaMillions lotto ticket. Andrew describes a mysterious abandoned LA mansion built with plenty of room for goose stepping. Spiro and The Fudge return to solve the case of a crop circles in Australia.

Support the show by purchasing Andrew’s BRAND NEW BOOK Angel Killer just click on the image below.

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Justin:

Angel Killer

What is there not to love about this report from KSAX-TV News? A reporter is dispatched to take a look at a mysterious bit of road kill found by a local woman. Pictures of the hairless creature sparked an intense Facebook debate as to what the creature could be.

The local who found the questionable carrion pointed out what looked like human features on the beast and wondered aloud about secret government testing on animals.

Our favorite moment of the clip? A little girl who is shown a photo of the beast during a “man on the street” segment. He answers, “I think it’s a dog.” When pressed for reasons why? “Because it is.”

From the mouth of babes…

[KSAX] via Scott Johnson

In front of security cameras, a tourist vanishes from the top of the Empire State Building and mysteriously falls to her death moments later in Times Square…

A young girl dies crawling out of her own grave after having been declared dead a year earlier…

On a Fort Lauderdale beach, a missing World War II airman and his aircraft show up as if he died only hours before…

They call the mysterious man behind these unnatural events the Warlock. To some he’s the messenger of a modern age of miracles.

To Jessica Blackwood, FBI agent and daughter of a legendary magic family, the Warlock is a trickster and a murderer and she’s the only one who can see through his deceptions.

—

Andrew Mayne, the author of Public Enemy Zero and The Chronological Man series brings you an edge-of-your-seat triller that only he could write.

BUY IT NOW FOR ONLY 99¢

Necessity is the mother of invention.

For blind California resident Steve Mahan, he absolutely needed to get a taco. But how to get there? He could walk, call a cab or get picked up from a friend.

He relied on a trusty friend from Mountain View named Google.

And so Steve headed to the Bell, driven by one of Google’s new self-driving cars. Science and technology had finally advanced it’s most challenging rubric, getting a blind man to a chalupa as fast and easy as possible.

According to the Google’s own Google+ page, since Mahan doesn’t have a driver’s license he had to get special permission from local law enforcement to sit in the front seat. A police official even sat in on the ride. But we’re pretty sure it was just so he could get one of the new Dorito shell hard tacos.

[Google's Google+]

I am fond of saying that all politicians are lizard people. Vaguely humanoid creatures drawn to the warmth of public office and the uniquely bizarre responsibilities and customs that go with it.

But that’s just a metaphor. A way to illustrate a healthy distrust for anyone campaigning.

It certainly isn’t true about Councillor Simon Parkes of the UK, who was elected only last month. He isn’t a lizard person. No, according to a confessional vlog on YouTube he’s one half green alien.

He said: “Two green stick things came in. I was aware of some movement over my head. I thought, ‘they’re not mummy’s hands, mummy’s hands are pink’.”

He added: “I was looking straight into its face. It enters my mind through my eyes and it sends a message down my optic nerve into my brain.

“It says ‘I am your real mother, I am your more important mother’.”

He later confesses that his alien background did not come up during his recent campaigning. Furthermore, his extraterrestrial lineage is far more aware of the world around him than the local government he was elected to serve on.

“I get more common sense out of the aliens than out of Scarborough Town Hall. The aliens are far more aware of stuff. People in the Town Hall seem not to be aware of the needs of Whitby.”

You’ve cracked us Councillor Parkes… you’ve earned my endorsement for the next public office you seek. Because, if he’s willing to confess he was raised by a green alien, what could he possibly be hiding?

[The Northern Record] via mxyzplx on Twitter

One week ago today, several residents of Clintonville, WI heard a series of big booms throughout the town. Beginning at 2 a.m. and continuing until 8 p.m. Monday many residents initially called in reports ranging from a car crashing into a house to ice falling off a roof, only to find no physical evidence.

Yet the booms kept coming.

They’ve since received an official explanation. An extremely rare 1.5 magnitude earthquake shook the town shortly after 5 a.m. Tuesday, concluded the United States Geological Service.

But that doesn’t quite explain what the noises were Monday.

I have a theory…

[Fox 11]

Lost in the massive confusion and destruction of the 2011 Japanese tsunami, a fishing vessel has shockingly been found afloat off the western coast of Canada.

The ship is the largest piece of debris found yet from the natural disaster and is being monitored as debris as of now. It will hit landfall in roughly two months if not stopped at sea.

Meanwhile, the boat could just be an eerie harbinger for even more random Japanese stuff. Is is estimated roughly two tons of debris washed off shore and the main mass of that should start hitting North America in two years time.

[BBC] via WT reader Jeff

It’s really hard to judge the first new footage from the upcoming season of Doctor Who. We get a suitably intimidating villain, an interesting locale and of course all the usual smiling faces we’ve come to know and love.

But something feels… missing.

We don’t really get enough of the premise of the episode to have that mean much to us. There are no hints as to how the Doctor reunites with the Ponds, which should be the most interesting mythological beat in the first 10 minutes of episode one. And as intimidating as our cyborg gunslinger seems to be he’s just… well… a robotic Buford “Mad Dog” Tannen.

Which isn’t bad. It’s just not uniquely grabbing in the grand pantheon of Whovian foes.

What do you guys think? Are you more or less pumped for having seen it?

It’s go time.

The man who directed the most successful film in movie history twice is about to embark on his greatest adventure yet. James Cameron will begin his descent into the Pacific Ocean, weather permitting, sometime this weekend.

His mission is to make it to the bottom of Challenger Deep, the lowest known point in the ocean. His submarine, a revolutionary vertical design, will attempt to sink to the bottom as fast as possible so he can spend six hours investigating. He will be the first ever human to see the depths with his own eyes, the only previous crew (aboard the Trieste in 1960) to make it that deep hit the bottom to hard and caused a silt storm bringing visibility down to zero.

Cameron will also bring along 3D cameras to make a documentary of his voyage.

Godspeed James.

[Nat Geo]

Nokia has applied for a patent which amounts to tattoo which would accommodate customizable buzzing for your phone.

Here is how it would work:

The patent application describes “a material attachable to skin, the material capable of detecting a magnetic field and transferring a perceivable stimulus to the skin, wherein the perceivable stimulus relates to the magnetic field.” The material would react to magnetic signals emitted by a nearby electronic device, such as a smartphone. It would offer some sort of micro vibration, and could be set to certain vibrating patterns. The idea is to provide you with a more direct way to notice when you’re receiving some sort of incoming device alert, whether it be a phone call, email, or text message.

Congratulations I Didn’t Feel The Vibration Through My Pants Excuse Practitioners and welcome to Screwsville.

In reality though, this is something that could be used for far more than smart phones. Imagine how many “alerts” we get everyday. Our phone, our car, our appliances and anything else you can think of. What if we had a way to prioritize some to directly interact with our body.

It’s a pretty cool idea at least.

[Information Week] via @Lockridge_Lisa

Dissecting the Stephen Moffat Doctor Who press conference today.

How many episodes?

We will get six this year including a blockbuster Christmas special (MUCH more on that in a bit) and then eight more to round out this season in 2013.

When are Amy and Rory off the TARDIS for good?

Episode five. Which means we have five episodes for them to reconnect with the Doctor whom they’ve just realized is still alive. I sincerely hope that this season comes with a bit of reinvestment for the Ponds. The possible pregnancy / Amy’s going crazy angle last season felt tacked on. In fact, Amy’s storyline has felt a bit stalled since the end of her first season. She got on the TARDIS to put off getting married to Rory, she then rediscovered her love for him, bada bing bang boom we’re dun-zo.

If it’s simply, “Hey! The Doctor is back!” I’ll be a little bummed.

Will one of them die?

Moffat says not everyone will survive the fifth episode. But… c’mon, you wouldn’t send Amy off a widow, would you? Or kill off a beloved companion? Stuck in an alternate time stream is bad enough.

Anywho… their final nemesis will be the Weeping Angels.

Who is the new companion?

Jenna-Louise Coleman. Her biggest credits to date came from the ITV soap opera Emmerdale. Let’s go to a clip…

She also played one half of the silent double date put together for Steve Rogers by his pal Bucky at the World’s Fair in Captain America.

We will soon see her in the upcoming Titanic miniseries penned by the folks behind Downton Abbey.

Why is she the new companion?

Moffat says she won him over in an audition with Matt Smith where the motor-mouthed rambler played catch up with JLC’s energy.

Also, as The Internet has already noticed. She’s pretty. Reading between the lines of Moffat’s answers, they seem to be positioning her as an Amy Pond-level spitfire with Rose Tyler looks.

Raise you hand if you think that’s a bad idea? I thought not.

She does look tiny. Next to the stretchy Smith she might look even smaller.

How does she meet the Doctor?

No firm details beyond that she’s not a “conventional” character. So I guess we can rule out the Doctor arriving in modern day London and solving a crisis surrounding a smoking hot chick in her early 20s before inviting her on his space ship to enjoy platonic adventures?

What we do know is that it will take place during the Christmas special. This creates the highest stakes incarnation of that particular episode since David Tennant had his “Hello, World” turn in The Christmas Invasion, which began season two.

Once Rory and Amy are gone, have we seen the last of River Song?

Quoth Moffat: “No, not necessarily.”

It can’t all be good news, sweetie.

A South African man claims he has been to heaven four times and has drawn a map.

Self-styled prophet Mthembu says there are 11 heavens, so nuts to you if you had seven in the office pool. He made his first journey to one of them in 1998, took a little breather until 2004 when he returned. He also made a long weekend of heavenly vacays in 2006 and 2008.

He described those first several minutes in heaven.

“An angel, whom I later realised was Gabriel, who was in his early 20s, appeared at my house and led me by the hand to the Mandeni River where he baptised me and he returned to heaven,” Mthembu told the newspaper.

He said the same angel arrived in 1998 and this time took him along to heaven. Mthembu said he had seen God, Jesus and angels during his journeys.

Mthembuuuuuu do you know what that’s worth? Who knew heaven was a place on Earth?

[News24]

Elon Musk got his close-up beauty shot last night on CBS’ venerable newsmagazine 60 Minutes. His company SpaceX was the subject. Here was our favorite impression.

The biggest geeks about SpaceX work at SpaceX.

Every employee interviewed shared the same Big Sky optimism. They are doing what they are doing because this is a pivotal moment in the history of space and… well… they’d like to go to space and this is the best way to do it.

Which is why we root for them.

The organization really has a dot com start-up vibe to it. Not a shock considering Musk’s background but it is awesome to see in action.

The money quote from Garrett Reiseman, an engineer and astronaut who spent time on the International Space Station now working with SpaceX as a consultant.

“If you had a chance to go back in time and work with Howard Hughes when he was creating TWA. If you had a chance to be there at that moment when it was the dawn of a brand new era, wouldn’t you want to do that?”

Watch the full segment above.

A season comes to a close with the cast a little lighter, many bullets fired and a few lessons learned.

This might not be a democracy but it is the final Dissection of the year so you might as well click through a read it.

Zombies!

Kirkman’s first rule of zombie physics: a horde in motion tends to stay in motion. The pack o’ walkers that descended on the farm at the end of last week’s episode hit early and often.

The one element of this series that hasn’t suffered in this extremely uneven season as been the action beats. Even when the storytelling in lacking, the runnin’ and shootin’ sequences have always felt tight and suspenseful. Since this dominates a full half of the episode this week, there is really little to criticize.

Sure, some of the rules seem a little fuzzy to me. If it’s feasible for the group to hide in cars on the highway while a horde staggers by, why couldn’t they just turn off the lights and stay in the house? Daryl dismisses this by saying that the walkers would just tear through the house. But I think that’s just because he saw the intro where the pack of zombies breaks through a wooden barricade.

Anywho… it doesn’t really matter if their choices are dumb or not. You can chalk it up to panic and the fact that Rick isn’t there to lend is steady hand since he’s trapped between the house and a hard place with Carl.

We get what we came for. Wholesale zombie slaughter.

T-Dog

So T-Dog escapes with Lori and The Youngest Daughter Who Tried To Commit Suicide In That One Episode. He says it’s pointless to look for them and they have to hit the coast. Lori, who is now without her husband and son protests and demands he either turn around or let her out.

Which is when it hits me, has ANYONE EVER ASKED WHAT T-DOG’S REAL NAME IS? Seriously? What if this entire time he’s been waiting for someone to bring it up. And what would his reasoning be for keeping it a secret? Is it embarrassing?

Okay, while trying to find a good T-Dog picture I am reminded that T-Dog’s real name is Theodore and he reveled it in the episode Bloodletting this season.

Bottom line, if you want to nab two chicks and take them hundreds of miles away from their families, you better have a more familiar name than T-Dog.

Reunion

I can’t be the only one who had the slow “we found each other” theme from Lost playing in his head as all the cars pulled into frame.

Infection!

We get the “big” reveal which has been teased since the final episode of last season. We are all infected. More specifically, you don’t have to get bitten to turn into a zombie.

It’s obvious that Kirkman is very proud of this and he should be. It’s easily his biggest original contribution to the zombie genre. A defining element of this franchise.

But that being said, I am not really sure this piece of information warranted the kind of build up it got.

It really doesn’t matter to our characters. No one is particularly worried about dying of natural causes. Murder is always going to be a sticky issue everyone has opinions on. So, really, what’s the big deal about the infection? How does it really affect the plot or the motivations of the survivors?

As much as I despise the BUT IN THE COMICS! arguments, I thought the revelation of suicide turned zombie was a pretty brilliant way to illustrate this.

A Stranger In The Woods

Andrea gets separated from the group and stranded in the woods. Low on ammo and down to her last breath, a walker twice her size falls on her and it looks like curtains. Until the swipe of a kitana launches the zombie’s head into the air. We see a cloaked figure holding chains connected to a pair of armless walkers.

Those who read the comic know it’s Michonne, a weaponized woman who has found her own, shall we say unique, way through the apocalypse.

We don’t see her face because up until right after the show, there was no announcement on casting. Creator and Executive Producer Robert Kirkman revealed on the Talking Dead that she will be played by Danai Gurira. As with most of the casting, she looks quite a bit like her comic alter ego. Apparently she’s on HBO’s Treme, any viewers of that show can chime in on if she’d particularly suited for this role.

I’m interested to see how she mixes into the show. Her addition, along with The Governor represent a larger than life element to what has been more of a human drama this season.

But… there is just something nagging at me about this… it probably has something to do with the other reveal…

Hard Times Ahead

The final shot of season two is a slow revelation of a prison.

This foreshadows our survivors next home as foretold in the source material.

Here is my thing: if you never read the books, which 95% of all the viewers have not, what does this shot mean to you?

It’s not particularly visible. Rick and company don’t take refuge in it. It’s just a dark prison. At least Michonne is an interesting (and at this point ambiguous) physical specimen and intersects with a main character by the end.

I just wonder what the expected reaction is.

In Summation

Once I have a little more time to think about this season I’ll do a recap/look ahead. In the meanwhile, the show continued a trend of strong episodes that almost made me forget how frustrated I once was with this series.

Almost.

We finally have a date.

SpaceX announced they will send the first commercial spacecaft to spacestation into orbit on April 30th. If successful, the unmanned Dragon capsule will dock with the International Space Station representing a major step for space exploration in the Post Dreams era.

Here is how the mission will go down.

As the Dragon capsule approaches the station, astronauts onboard the outpost will grab onto it using the space station’s robotic arm. The capsule will then be attached to the Earth-facing side of the station’s Harmony node. This process is similar to how the unmanned Japanese cargo freighters are manually docked to the space station.

So, who is down for a April 30th meet up?

[Fox News]

First, for a moment, let’s assume the rumors are true and Sophia Myles will return to the Doctor Who franchise as a companion in the post-Amy Pond era.

Many keen eyes will remember Myles as Madame de Pompadour in the superlative season two episode The Girl in the Fireplace, written by current Who boss Steven Moffat. To date, this is my favorite stand alone episodes for a couple of reasons.

• The Doctor got to solve an awesome problem. Self-contained time travel whilst interacting with a real world historical figures whilst trying to decipher an escalating problem whilst not getting killed by murderous robots. Compelling plot, check.

• The Doctor sacrifices himself. If all you do is travel time and space getting in the middle of all sorts of issues, you’re going to have one or two times when the Doctor resigns himself to death. This happens.

But most important to us now.

• The Doctor falls in love. For someone as care free and empathetic as Tennant’s Doctor is this relationship set a crucial touchstone in the character. Of course this dude falls in love with random awesome chicks! Madam de Pompadour is portrayed as the most badass lady to ever live. Of course they fall in love with each other!

There is real, crackling chemistry in these scenes. Unsurprisingly, the actors began a two-year relationship afterward.

So assuming Sophia is back, we have three ways to look at it.

The actress is playing a companion completely unconnected to her former role. Unlikely considering DW’s gleeful habit of splashing around in it’s own history.

The Madam de Pompadour we’ve met returns to the Doctor’s side for adventures. Possible, but I would suspect less likely than my third hypothesis.

Sophia returns as a new character that is somehow connected to the Pompadour we met. Think along the lines of some genetic linage of insanely awesome women. Almost as if she’s a gender double for the Doctor himself. Pompadour is portrayed as The Doctor’s equal in Fireplace, why wouldn’t this new character?

Remember the scene in Fireplace when the Doctor is reading her memories only to realize that she is using the connection to read his? That’s pretty much all you need to retcon a new race of super ladies that happen to look a smoking hot as Sophia.

No matter what, I am pumped. Something I haven’t said about DW in a while.

During the great changing of the guard between Moffat and his predecessor Russell T. Davies if I were to have made a list of Moffat characters that I would like to see revisited in more depth both The Angels and Pompadour would occupy the top. Certainly far ahead of some characters who’ve gotten nothing but screen time in the intervening two seasons. Sweetie.

Besides, a sex super nova character coupled with the current, asexual incarnation of the Doctor? Geronimo.

I think he might have some sort of vitamin deficiency. Second fox related post of the month for those keeping track.

[Animal Oddities]

“Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the water.”

What a malarky sentence. It’s never safe. Ever. Stop thinking that people. There will always be something in there to kill you.

Take this brand new sea snake discovered off the coast of Australia. It’s venomous and coated in spikes, just in case that first part wasn’t enough.

Though some other sea snakes have spiky scales on their bellies, “no other [known] sea snake has this curious feature,” study leader Kanishka Ukuwela, an ecologist at the University of Adelaide, said by email.

Normally snakes have smooth scales, but each of the newly named Hydrophis donaldi’s scales has a spiny projection, he said.

Scientists cruising shallow seagrass beds in the Gulf of Carpentaria (map) recently captured nine of the rough-scaled reptiles.

Seriously, the ocean is a soup of terror. I will never feel at ease until James Cameron personally murders all of these horrifying little goblins and any others we haven’t accidentally run across.

From here on out, I live my life by the SALTY LANGUAGE PLEASE DON’T CLICK UNLESS YOU WANT TO HEAR CURSE WORDS code of Chris Cooper in Adaptation.

[National Geographic]

There has been a lot to criticize about this season. A lot.

But one thing that’s been beyond reproach for The Walking Dead. They know how to reach a destination, no matter how convoluted the path there might be. Sunday’s episode marked one key thematic shift in the series which to this point had been sorely lacking, events had real consequences and changed the dynamics of the characters.

Finger cuffed by death, let’s talk about the most satisfying episode of The Walking Dead…

Dale’s Shadow

One of my favorite elements of the HBO series Deadwood was how a certain main character died early but was never really forgotten. The characters orbited him, until suddenly they had nothing to orbit. Through the subsequent two and a half seasons, his presence lingered.

TWD did a great job of leaving a Dale-sized hole in the dynamic of the group. Every character was appropriately affected.

For a show that often has the characters shift motivations like a race car driver, this was an appropriate catalyst. Even the random nature of Dale’s death seemed more interesting in hindsight.

Also, Rick mentioned The Dale Face. Amazing.

What Do You Mean “PC Load Letter”?

Did anyone else think of the Office Space printer beat down scene during the opening when T-Dog, Andrea, Shane and Daryl found/murdered the four walkers?

The Chatty Prisoner

Here is my one bitch about the episode and really it’s just an extension of my gripes about the Randal character. Has anyone really just tried talking to this kid for like five seconds? Shane takes him out to the woods and says like three words about wanting to leave camp and join up with Randal’s Pack O’ Rapists and in two seconds the kid is like “Oh hellz yeah! Let’s go, we are up by the highway and we got some mother effing S’mores! By the way, you are really going to like my friend James, he’s so cool. By the way, has anyone told you that your bruising looks like Mike Tyson’s face tattoo? Have you ever seen the Hangover? Me and James talk about it all the time.”

This kid didn’t seem like a particularly hard nut to crack, basic interrogation could have yielded a lot of great information. Oh well, Shane kills him and then power rams his GD head into a tree so he can pretend the snot got away.

Which leads us to our big reveal.

The Fall Of Shane

Shane uses the hunt for Randal as a pretext to get Rick into a picturesque clearing for an well shot showdown between our two alpha males.

They expose some dramatic monologue and finally Rick lures Shane to let his guard down with a cease fire agreement and then knifes him in the belly until he dies.

Although I found Shane’s transformation into Murderer of his Best Friend a little sudden, I’m fine with it because of the performances by the actors. It was compelling, dramatic and evoked some of the key notes that we’ve built through the entirety of the show.

Most importantly, we get a good turn the corner moment for Rick. Finally.

He saw a threat and physically eliminated it. Now, we the group has two dead role models to evaluate. The Man of Peace in Dale, who would let a hostage run free to protect his own humanity at the risk of his own safety. And Man of War Shane who would mortgage his own morals to protect the lives of those around him.

Cool stuff.

Furthermore, Lori came up to Shane earlier in the episode and delivered a tearful monologue about how sorry she was about everything. This kind of stuff always happens in TV shows right before a character dies. I swear, if all of my friends randomly start making peace with me for lingering issues one morning I am locking myself in my room and going to sleep immediately. It’s the only way to stay safe.

Also, Stuff Happened!

Characters open dealing with consequences from previous episode. Set a plan (take Randal out to the road and drop him off) and then have it complicated (can Shane be trusted alone? Does Rick need to have a man to man talk with Carl?) only to have one final complication enacted by a main character who makes a massive decision radically reshape the story and lead to ultimate consequences. THEN! We get a zombie hoard coming to the farm house, setting up next week’s finale!

STUFF! PLOT! THINGS! HUZZAH!

In The Comics!

So finally, Shane is dead, just like he was in the comics. Kirkman and Company give a nod to the funny books by having Carl randomly show (seriously, Lori is the worst mother) up in the field after Shane is dead and Rick is waiting for him to zombify. Carl draws the gun his father gave him and pops on in Shane’s head.

Is it just me or now that we know that the CDC Man’s secret is the fact that we are all infected and that you don’t need to be bitten to become a zombie a little past due for revelation?

Finale

Under siege. Out of ammo. Wouldn’t it be really cool is a rescue squad of “can they be trusted” strangers from Woodbury showed up?

Who’s excited for reams and reams of new stories that are likely gloomy, brutal and horrifying only for them to be whitewashed into super child-friendly parables and then re-darkened into adult action-adventure yarns?

Well today is your lucky day!

Over 500 new fairy tales have been discovered in Germany.

Many of the stories in Von Schonwerth’s collection are found nowhere else. The tales include stories for adults as well as children. There are stories about magical animals, princesses, evil witches, farmers and more. In one of the stories a young woman escapes a witch by turning herself into a pond. The witch then drinks the pond and swallows the woman along with it. The woman then escapes by cutting herself out of the witch with a knife.

Pond changing? Witch knifing?

Get Tim Burton on the phone. I’m seeing Abigail Breslin as the young woman. Johnny Depp as a helpful frog who lives in the pond. And for the witch… who would be a good fit?

[Writers Write]

Yup, that’s it. Inside that piece of machinery will be James Cameron as he conquers the freaking ocean. For those unaware, in the next week or so, Cameron will descend for three and a half hours until he settles at the bottom of Challenger Deep, the lowest known point in the ocean.

The mission hasn’t come without a price.

He said the deaths early last month of his two crew members, Mike deGruy and Andrew Wight — both celebrated filmmakers who specialized in carrying viewers into the sea’s depths — initially prompted him to want to scrap the expedition. The two were preparing to film a sea trial of the Deepsea Challenger when their helicopter went down shortly after takeoff from an airstrip south of Sydney, Australia.

“It was a horrible day,” Mr. Cameron recalled. “We felt sick at heart. It caused us to question risk and the meaning of life. I personally did not want to continue at that point, but the team rallied.”

While incredibly sad that part of his crew lost their lives during the process, it’s awesome that Cameron will honor their memory by completing the task they worked so hard on.

[New York Times]

“Despite making attempts to escape, the fox persisted and carried out a sustained attack on the food he had just bought from Tesco.

Eventually, Mr Baker claims, he resorted to offering the animal his loaf of garlic bread and the fox scampered off.”

Everybody knows foxes love garlic bread. However, wildlife experts do not think you should give in and give food to foxes, but should try and frighten them away. Perhaps with a weapon of some kind?

“The best thing to use is a water pistol.”

Ah. OK.

[The Telegraph]

An episode of long deliberations and a shocking conclusion.

We debate the shocking end of this week’s Walking Dead AFTER THE JUMP…

Why can’t that kid be interesting?

I wondered aloud two weeks ago about our hostage Randal hopefully being a little smarter than he looks. After all, he saved himself last week with a cleverly timed line. Would it be too much to ask that it was premeditated on some level and not just random stuff said by a random dude at a random moment which happened to save his life?

Guess not.

He’s just a dude in a barn.

Why do none of our characters ever evolve?

This episode is literally designed around Dale banging everyone’s sounding board to see how they’ve changed. Shockingly… Everyone is exactly who they thought the were.

- Daryl is a loner. He even said it.

- Shane is a jerk but shockingly amiable to respecting Dale’s right to free speech

- Andrea disagrees but secretly knows he’s probably right

- Rick is indecisive to the point of negligence

There is no journey. No winding path. They say the shortest path between two points is a straight line, on The Walking Dead it’s just one dot. We end where we start.

Carl’s zombie dance party

Carl dials up the creep in this ep. Wandering around, getting into weird conversations, infuriating grieving mothers, stumbling upon executions and loudly voicing support.

He his big moment came when he persuaded a stationary zombie, stuck in the patented Herschel River Bed, to perform Chubby Checkers “The Twist” until he got free. This would just be nonsense… except…

Dale died from a random zombie opening up his chest

Like. Really died. Not a car flip fake out

My biggest question is… why?

What did we learn? Are any of his survivors going to change their behavior going forward.

In a world of zombies, getting eaten is like being hit by a falling tree. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate it keeping us off balance. Now we are given our biggest lesson ever that anyone can die at any time.

But… why?

It’s not like he died at the hands of a marauder. That would have illustrated that he was wrong about the need to keep humanity as a priority over security. Maybe he could have tried to help Randal escape and just as they are on the outskirts of the farm Randal kills him.

It just seems pointless.

Now, let’s talk for a second about the comic. Shane is a character that got to shine a lot more in the series by the benefit of not dying as early as he did in the book. We now know that Dale got the opposite treatment and I think it leaves a lot of really interesting drama on the table.

If you haven’t read the book, I am only going to talk comic from here on out so you can stop reading…

…okay?

…cool?

The relationship between Dale and Andrea represented a very interesting dramatic theme for me: the evolution of love and personal security in this zombie wasteland. The social taboos that we inherently react to (May/December romance) are tossed aside because Dale and Andrea are make each other happy. This gives us an hard example as to how things have changed.

So far, we’ve seen very little of that in the TV show.

Also, we won’t get to see Dale scream “TAINTED MEAT!” whilst making The Dale Face.

Too bad.

In one corner we have serial entrepreneur, self-admitted wife swapper and daredevil explorer Richard Branson. In the other, the man who leap frogged his own film as the high grossing in box office history, James Cameron.

Their shared mission, to make it to Challenger Deep. The lowest point in the Mariana Trench. Deeper into the ocean than Mount Everest is tall.

Only once has a manned vessel briefly touched the sea bed. But the 1960 exploration only lasted 15 minutes before beginning the ascent back to the surface.

Now, two of the world’s most visible men are ready to return to the bottom of the ocean.

And it looks like Cameron is going to win. Which is freaking awesome.

Not like, kind of cool. Amazing. To use a cliche, it’s so awesome if we saw it in a movie, we’d think it was too cliche. That’s how awesome this is.

What’s more, he’s going to go it alone. In a one man submersible. Since the 1960 mission kicked up such a silt storm it brought visibility down to zero, if successful, he will become the first person to see the Challenger Deep.

Allow me to rephrase that, the director of Terminator 2 will likely become the only person in the entire history of humanity to see this. Hundreds of people have seen our Earth from space. Challenger Deep? The guy who directed Aquaman on Entourage.

I cannot put into words how happy this makes me. It’s the triumph of creativity and will. The world is better for James Cameron being in it.

He plans to spend six hours on the floor, collecting samples before coming back to the surface. Also, he is equipping several 3D cameras for the adventure the footage for which he hopes to burn on national television while he laughs in our faces turn into a feature film.

Awesome.

[CNN]

Is this final proof of the dire Mayan 2012 prophecy? Most likely not.

But it is a totally sweet light beam shooting out of the top of the Mayan city of Chichen Itza. It was taken by a tourist who was trying to capture a lightning strike in the distance. Two picture were fine, the third, is what you see in the video.

Experts say it’s clearly an artifact in the picture. Which is probably right. And boring.

[Yahoo!]

Listeners of the Weird Things podcast may only know Andrew Mayne as the learned, science loving host of a funny audio program. But many others now know him for his fiction writing. His debut novel Public Enemy Zero has lived in the Top 10 in it’s Science Fiction category with a 5 star average from readers.

So what is is about?

The world is out to kill Mitchell Roberts. A strange virus is on the loose sending everyone he comes in contact with into a homicidal rage. From narrowly avoiding getting murdered at his ex-girlfriend’s front door, to a crowded shopping mall turned one-man zombie apocalypse, he’s got to stay a step ahead of everyone around him if he doesn’t want to get ripped apart alive.

He’ll need to use every resource he has, from the advice of a paranoid late night radio host, to his Twitter account and find out why he’s become Public Enemy Zero.

A full-length 90,000 word novel.

Give it a try for only 99¢ at the Amazon Kindle store. You can download and read it on your desktop, Kindle or any smartphone using the Kindle app including iPhone, Android, Blackberry and Windows 7. Tablets including iPads are also supported.

[BUY IT HERE]

Seriously guys. Don’t panic.

The space rock, which is called 2011 AG5, is about 460 feet (140 meters) wide. It may come close enough to Earth in 2040 that some researchers are calling for a discussion about how to deflect it.

Time to talk to some oil drillers who don’t want to pay taxes again… ever.

[MSNBC]

It’s one of our favorite phenomenons. An etherial happening that captures the hearts and minds of those who see it.

Are the Brown Mountain Lights alien? A reflection? A natural gas formation radiating ambient echoes from the world around it?

Take your pick.

If verifiable science ever pins down an explanation for the orbs which have becomes a fixture of the North Carolina area, it’s going to be awesome. Which is just how we like it.

And we are not alone.

Earlier this month, a sellout crowd of 120 paid $20 a head to attend a symposium on the lights at Morganton City Hall, and there was a crowd outside the door hoping to get in at the last minute.
“It’s a good problem to have,” Phillips said. “I could have sold 500 tickets.”

Our favorite part about this is that eye witnesses to the phenomenon are very reticent to call it anything other than a very unique site to see.

“I didn’t feel anything spooky or look around for Martians or anything like that,” Woody said. “It was just a unique situation. It’s just as vivid now as when I was 12 years old.”

An unexplained happening that reminds you of fond childhood memories. This might be the most heart warming Fortean occurrence in history.

[Associated Press]

There is a flaw with AMC’s The Walking Dead. It’s an unfortunate one.

Consistency.

With a lot of shows, this isn’t all that important. Comedy, episodic drama or stories that take regular time jumps of weeks or months between installments (a la Mad Men) can sometimes stretch things.

Characters don’t have to carry every little wound with them.

The problem with The Walking Dead is that it’s central theme is about a new, suffocating reality that all of our characters have to adjust to. The sum total of their changes matters. Consistence in the action and decisions of each character create human decisions we either agree or disagree with.

This is how we decide to root for or agains the characters.

What’s disappointing is that even in an episode that is supposed to bring back into play decisions certain characters have made in the past, it rings hollow. They’ve changed their minds so many times, why should we think that this time it holds any weight?

Full review AFTER THE JUMP…I hate the middle of the story at the beginning thing

This isn’t specific to TWD, but I just really don’t like the strategy of randomly jamming an action sequence into the beginning of the story and then skipping back to tell us how we go there. I hate it so much I don’t know what its called.

If the scene is super cool, it would have been super cool when we got to it. It demonstrates a lack of confidence in your first act. Which is troubling since our first scene gives us a Rick and Shane discussion that we’ve theoretically been building to since… I don’t know… the PILOT!

It’s particularly stupid in this episode since the action scene we see isn’t all that crazy. Whoa! Rick and Shane got caught up in a situation where they were being attacked by zombies? Weird! I wonder how that happens? It’s not like they’d hijacked World War I biplanes and were trying to dogfight with a zombie Red Baron.

If that was the first scene, I’d be like “Yes! I want to see how they get into this situation. Awesome goggles Shane!”

Instead you spoil what would otherwise have been a suspenseful moment when Shane caber tosses his massive novelty wrench through the school window and Zs start pouring out.

Suicide girls

I really just didn’t feel connected to the ladies subplot. This is what I was getting at in the beginning. Lori has spent a sizable amount of season two talking about killing herself and Carl. Debating with Rick about how livable this world is. Now she’s running the teen suicide prevention hotline with Maggie?

Sure, she could have changed her mind, but let’s see that evolution. What if she was really honest with Beth (whose random awakening we will deal with in a second) about her fears the frightened young girl took it as a sign that no one could offer stability. So she pulls the light wrist slash move in the middle of the episode.

Then we can have Andrea, Maggie and Lori attempt to clean her up and dissect what was happening in her head. Meanwhile, we have a running plot on if the three non-doctors helped clean her up right or if they have to go get Herschel.

Eventually, Andrea has the same conversation she had with her in the episode and Beth tries to kill herself again. Herschel is finally called out of necessity.

Or, I don’t know, something.

Why should we care about anything interesting?

Two episodes ago, Beth fainting was the reason for Rick and Glenn rescue Herschel who was reenacting the Heartbroken Doc Brown bar scene from Back to the Future III. In this episode, she’s awake! No reasoning! I guess she just caught a case of the plot devices.

Same with the hostage. The group has found someone else, someone who comes from a group of people that tried to kill them. Shouldn’t you ask him a few questions before dumping him off? Wouldn’t that be interesting? I guess next episode they are going to deal with this, but still.

Why should we care about anything if the next episode we just aren’t going to deal with it?

Rick should have made Shane put on the glasses

You got two choices. Promise not to kill that boy or start eating that trash can.

So, what now?

We are going to interrogate the kid.

Shane and Andrea are going to plot.

Dale will make a million Dale Faces.

Nothing interesting is going to happen.

Amen.