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I AM
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JAZZTake the Transformers Quiz

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I am: Kurt Vonnegut For years, this unique creator of absurd and haunting tales denied that he had anything to do with science fiction. Which science fiction writer are you?

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What American accent do you have? Your Result: The Inland North   You may think you speak “Standard English straight out of the dictionary” but when you step away from the Great Lakes you get asked annoying questions like “Are you from Wisconsin?” or “Are you from Chicago?” Chances are you call carbonated drinks “pop.”
Philadelphia
The Northeast
The Midland
The South
The West
Boston
North Central
What American accent do you have? Quiz Created on GoToQuiz

Also, I do not refer to carbonated beverages as “pop”; naturally, all of the other information is 100% accurate.

Casper The Friendly Ghost - The Animal Square Dance

(via WFMU’s Beware of the Blog, where there are plenty more songs to listen to)

…can “see” with their chins.

(Image via Flickr. Story via ScienceBlog.)

If you don’t have time to pick up a copy of Jeff Goodell’s Big Coal, then you ought to at least take a read through his compact Washington Post article, King Coal: What It Costs Us.

Related: George Orwell writes about coal mining.

(via Gristmill)

Numbers can be stifling and boggling, but more amazing (and depressing) than the fact that 40% of deaths, worldwide, are related to pollution, is the statement that some 57% of the world population is malnourished. Which is shocking to me, but not. More shocking, however, is that in 1950, the percentage was 20.

(via EurekAlert: “Pollution causes 40 percent of deaths worldwide” [13 Aug 2007])

…we won’t need the advice of our friends for anything, and giant birds will terrorize shoppers everywhere.

Oh, wait–the future’s here now!

This is the last, best novel you will ever read. The last you will ever need to read; you could just read it over and over again, filled with the crushing immensity of its hope, despair, and comedy.

You will read other fiction, eventually. And then you will feel guilty.

“Life is sad. Here is someone.”

Anagrams shows futility better than anything else I have ever read, and it shows why that futility is irrelevant. Or might be.  I loved this book, maybe not from the first page, but definitely from the second.

If you read the first page, you must read through to the last page, or you will be totally and completely crushed.  You’re likely to be crushed anyway, but it’s a good feeling, when you finish: warm, and awkward, and embracing.

Read this now.

The NYTimes has a strangely compelling article on the topic of U.F.C. and its sudden rise in entertainment currency:

“Do you know why people die in boxing all the time?” he said. “Neurological damage. In boxing my goal is to hit you in the head and knock you out, or hit you in the head more times than you hit me in the head. That’s basically all there is. And with the boxing glove they have actually created a weapon for repeated brain trauma.”

He leaned over the aisle and make a quick, athletic flick of the shoulders. “You know what would happen if I punched you in the face right now?” he said. “Yes, it would hurt you, but since I’m not wearing a glove, I would probably break my hand. But in our sport there are 500 different ways I can win without hitting you in the head; boxing basically requires it.”

Ultimate Fighting Championship participants use light, fingerless gloves that are meant to protect the hand but not enlarge the striking area or increase the weight of a punch.

Another key difference relating to safety seems to be the culture of the two sports. A boxer who gives up before the referee stops the fight (as Roberto Duran is famously reported to have done, against Sugar Ray Leonard, in the 1980 “no mas” fight) is considered psychologically weak, if not a wimp. In the U.F.C. a fighter who submits, or “taps out,” generally seems to get credit among his peers for recognizing an impossible situation. (There are no female fighters in the U.F.C., though there are scantily clad “Octagon Girls.”)

(NYT: “Getting Your Kicks on Television,” by Seth Schiesel [1 Sept 2007])

Really, the headline says it all: “Scientist develops real-life Spiderman suit material.”

Though, admittedly, the body of the article does add some detail (and qualifiers).

(via ScienceBlog)

Me neither, but thanks to This to That, now I know the answer. (Answer: Hot glue.) And you can find lots more practical joinings, too.

(via LifeHacker)