Monthly Archive for September, 2007

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Shorebirds that are the boss of you

Published by plover on September 18, 2007 in Animal Crackers. 6 Comments

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Having proven their air superiority, the bar-tailed godwits will no doubt be taking over any day now:

A female bar-tailed godwit, a large, streamlined shorebird, has touched down in New Zealand following an epic, 18,000-mile-long (29,000 km) series of flights tracked by satellite, including the longest non-stop flight recorded for a land bird.

The bird is called “E7″ by researchers. (Trends show this is likely to replace “Emily” as the most popular girl’s name by 2008.)

E7′s itinerary:

  • March 17: Depart Miranda, New Zealand.
  • March 25: Arrive Yalu Jiang, China. 6300 miles nonstop.
  • 5 week layover. Dim sum.
  • May 1: Depart China.
  • May 6: Arrive Yukon-Kuskokwim River Delta, Alaska. 4500 miles nonstop.
  • Spend summer in sunny Alaska, making way to Yukon Delta. Cavort with møøse.
  • August 29: Depart Alaska.
  • September 7: Arrive New Zealand. 7200 miles nonstop.

The last leg of E7′s journey is the most extraordinary, entailing a non-stop flight of more than eight days and a distance of 7,200 miles, the equivalent of making a roundtrip flight between New York and San Francisco, and then flying back again to San Francisco without ever touching down.

Since they are land birds, godwits like E7 can’t stop to eat or drink while flying over open-ocean. The constant flight speeds at which E7 was tracked by satellite indicate that she did not stop on land.

Godwits do not become adults until their 3rd or 4th year and many live beyond 20 years of age. If 18,000 miles is an average annual flight distance, then an adult godwit would fly some 288,000 miles in a lifetime.

There is some speculation that red-footed boobies bring godwits packets of peanuts when they pass over Hawaii. There are also rumors of negotiations to convince a pod of humpback whales to serve as a carrier battle group.

Several lawsuits have been filed by møøse seeking to suppress embarrassing photos.

Defining “Celebrity” Down

Published by Pinko Punko on September 17, 2007 in Blog Nemeses. 3 Comments

Starring super star super me, superintendent of super, stars! A Wes Anderson-esque Celebrity Dream Cameo from AIF (only if we all worked out some wistful family stuffs during our Indian Ocean swim). Also BG ate some cookies less that 30 minutes before our swim race, so she has ZERO chance of winning.

Dear Universe of Emptiness

Published by Pinko Punko on September 16, 2007 in Cobags and Incivility. 24 Comments

No one will hear my awesome story in the forest where no one is.

Oh well. Something like this just happened to Fulsome and myself. Except this one ended in unequivocal victory for the backer-inners. I shat you not, after our first sortie of “HEYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!” was rebuffed with “you missed your chance and I swooped in,” a very stout “get the F*** out of our parking space!!!!!!” from Fulliepants led to a staredown, and then finally victory town after maybe some more eff-bombs. Also, I had just previously beeped someone trying do the racearound and backer-inner. WTF?

Lest I be neglectful, the parting shot from the cobags was “hey, why don’t you give your boyfriend some head!” I don’t bat that way, but what I would have given for Res or teh to have transported onto the scene at that point with some Navy sailor and a “well TWIST MY ARM!” and then a BOW CHICKA WOW WOW!

HOLY EFFIN CRAPPYPANTS MCGOO!!!!

Published by Pinko Punko on September 13, 2007 in Pork Snorkel. 10 Comments

It’s BoM Day!

Buh Ay Kuh Uhn Uh Teh Muh Un Th! (It is the Apple Dapple this month-eroni)

BLTs tomorrowpants, plus the selected recipe the next day. Delish and Disgust next week. Heart attack the week after.

Snipers are posted to bar the approach of the Snagwagon.

I wish this blog would post itself and I had a comment generating robot servant that would flit about the i-tubes so I could soak in my bacon bath.

I know it is very stereotypical and blasé to be all “pork pork pork pork pork.” I recognize and reject the appropriate stereotype. I’m really civilized and sophisticated underneath the bacon fetish.

Also, listen to Song of the Day, peeps, it really is great.

Should you choose to accept it

Published by plover on September 12, 2007 in Conundrums. 13 Comments

The Ultimate Mission to Israel

Experience a dynamic and intensive eight day exploration of Israel’s struggle for survival and security in the Middle East today: “a military, humanitarian, historical, judicial, religious, and political reality check.”

Includes:

  • Briefings by Mossad officials and commanders of the Shin Bet.
  • Briefing by officers in the IDF Intelligence and Operations branches.
  • Inside tour of the IAF unit who carries out targeted killings.
  • Live exhabition of penetration raids in Arab territory.
  • Observe a trial of Hamas terrorists in an IDF military court.
  • First hand tours of the Lebanese front-line military positions and the Gaza border check-points.
  • Inside tour of the controversial Security Fence and secret intelligence bases.
  • Meeting Israel’s Arab agents who infiltrate the terrorist groups and provide real-time intelligence.
  • Briefing by Israel’s war heros who saved the country.
  • Meetings with senior Cabinet Ministers and other key policymakers.
  • Small airplane tour of the Galilee, Jeep rides in the Golan hights, water activities on Lake Kinneret, a cook-out barbecue and a Shabbat enjoying the rich religious and historic wonders of Jerusalem’s Old City.

Continue reading ‘Should you choose to accept it’

Happy Birthday to Adorable Girlfriend

Published by The Uncanny Canadian on September 10, 2007 in *BOOP* and Birfday. 15 Comments

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We interrupt the usual chunderhoisery, to announce that today, September the 11th, is the birthday of long-time 3 Bulls! provocateur Adorable Girlfriend. She has a lovely alphabetic post at Republic of Puppies detailing many of the amusing travails we had in a wondrous and New Jerseylicious birthday weekend, so head over there and give her some birthday comment love. Happy birthday, sweetheart!!!

Three B is in the Toilet

Published by Pinko Punko on September 10, 2007 in *BOOP*. 9 Comments

Or is the toilet in the 3B? Something very similar to this BMW Vixen 21TD is parked out in front of our place.

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It seems the kind of thing that Gavin M. or a little cat would drive. I wonder if EuroPirate hippies use it as the turbo diesel version of the black spot or something? Anyway, such an occurrence forbodeds our return to the blog upon our return to our abode.

What we really want for Christmas this year is for UC to go to this. It is this week, and it will be terrible. Your conscience demands that you dress up as a giant can of play-doh (mdhatter can be the bacon). If you don’t know what I am talking about, try Google. It is like a scavenger hunt!

Bulls in Dogs’ Clothing

Published by plover on September 10, 2007 in Didn't we smite this yesterday?, In the News, Naive Melody and Serious Pants. 13 Comments

Given that Republic of Dogs seems to be asleep at the switch on these things, or, at least, given that we’re willing to say they are, it is left up to Three Bulls! to point to two recent interesting statements by liberal religious leaders here in the US.

Continue reading ‘Bulls in Dogs’ Clothing’

Watching the Detectives

Published by plover on September 6, 2007 in Games Empiricists Play, In the News and Science Thursday. 11 Comments

Roundup of sciencey links cuz ScienceDaily wuz bein’ cool today:

  • Moray eels have a second set of “pharyngeal” jaws at the back of their throat which can extend into their mouth to drag the prey they’ve chomped on down their gullet. Yeah, kind of like in Alien.
  • Adaptive optics combined with a high-speed “lucky camera” is allowing astronomers to capture images from ground based telescopes which are sharper than Hubble images. Basically, if you take a bunch images, the atmosphere will distort each one a little differently and a composite least-distorted image can be constructed from the image set.
  • There are sequences of DNA that are “ultraconserved” between humans and mice; these are segments of the genome that remain unchanged since the last common ancestor of humans and mice 80 million years ago. It was suspected that any change to such sequences would produce either non-viable or reproductively sterile organisms, i.e. that the evolutionary selection pressure keeping these sequences from mutating was of the strongest order. However, scientists have bred mice with several of these sequences removed, and, surprisingly, there are no obvious deleterious effects from the removal. (Cue creationist munchloaf: “Hah! See — evolution doesn’t work! Preach the controversy!”)
  • Researchers are speculating that sonar in toothed whales (i.e. non-baleen whales, including dolphins) was developed in order to follow migrating cephalopods. Many squid spend the daylight hours at significant depths — 500 to 1000 meters or more down — but come much closer to the surface at night. In both cases, being able to find them with sound is handy.
  • Honeybees have been devasted this year by a phenomenon called “colony collapse disorder” (CCD) where honeybee colonies mysteriously lose all their workers. Researchers (using new-fangled rapid DNA sequencing equipment) have sorted through the genetic material found in CCD and non-CCD bee colonies and found that a bee paralysis virus discovered a few years earlier in Israel is, if not the culprit, at least a nearly universally significant marker for colonies at risk of CCD.

More Metaphors About Buildings And Food

Published by plover on September 4, 2007 in Games Empiricists Play and Serious Pants. 4 Comments

??? recently recommenced our earlier discussion on metaphor and scientific thinking. I thought I might put my current response in a new post in the hope that others might be convinced to join the conversation. After all, what Three Bulls! reader doesn’t have a secret love of arcane discussions of scientific epistemology? Feel the wonkage!

Continue reading ‘More Metaphors About Buildings And Food’