Bah Humbug

...is the correct expression for anyone living in a house of disorder, which ours is by the way. So Bah humbug.

We had our bedroom plastered, the last room in the house to be done after three years of living here. So the entire contents of the bedroom are distributed about the house, we are sleeping in the front room until the room is ready to move back in (spent tonight applying a coat of paint) and much of the house has that annoyingly fine layer of pinkish dust that inevitably follows a plastering job.

On the upside, we've replaced all the radiators with nice modern efficient ones to match the nice modern green boiler (it's white, but you get the idea) so the house has never been warmer, and the chickens are all laying daily, so we have three eggs a day to deal with - see earlier post about 100 things to do with an egg.

Which doesn't link to anything I've stumbled on lately, so here for your enjoyment is an oddly addictive challenge - How Fast Can You Type The Alphabet? I have managed a sluggish 6.06 seconds, Girl has done 8.17, which has led me to believe I need to curtail her computer time as this is disgustingly fast for a ten year old. Wifey plodded to a risible 13.5 seconds, but will be the first to confess she can't type. Girl and I were second and third.

http://playfreeonlinegames.eu/playonline/typethealphabet.html

One of my all time science heroes was Stephen Jay Gould, a professor of palaeontology at Harvard, and so much more to those who were touched by his incredible life. Gould was a huge influence in my young zoological career, and the man who really turned me on to evolution theory through his essays and papers (On The Origin of Species may well be the "bible" for evolution theory, but makes a very dull read).

The real reason he is my hero though is that whilst being one of the most prolific science writers of his generation, he made time to respond to the childish letter sent by a Nottingham undergraduate asking him why men had nipples. The thoughtful and uncritical note he sent back remains one of my most treasured possessions.

However what first switched me on to SJG was the titles he generated for his books and writings. Whilst most scientists would publish "A study of arthropod timelines in the cambrian to precambrian fossil record" (feel the eyelids drooping?), the first SJG paper I read revelled in the title "The spandrels of San Marco and the Panglossian paradigm: A critique of the adaptationist programme". And the content matched the title, using the shapes in a cathedral roof and the ranting optimism of a Voltaire character to form a well reasoned argument about pre-adaptation in evolution theory.

SJG died in 2002, but he lives on in his work. I have a shelf of his books (actually, a box in the loft since we moved) but stumbling across this website has prompted me to dig them out and re-read the lot.

And yes, he even made it onto the Simpsons.

http://www.stephenjaygould.org/

Chicken Farming

Technically not a Stumbleupon posting, but had to share that we have now enjoyed our third egg from the chooks, not bad for less than a week's work. Our initial purism of only giving them mixed corn and layer pellets lasted about half an hour, and they now enjoy lots of scraps - even less waste to put in the bin! Another enjoyable aspect of having the hens is that Seamus now has Cat TV - little brainless ginger furball sits for hours at a time plotting how to get through the wire - bless.

All of which makes me think, is this the real life? And how tenuous a link is that to the excellent Sporcle site which has some challenging and fun games - so, can you type out the lyrics to Bohemian Rhapsody inside ten minutes? Or are you just a poor boy?

Enjoy.

http://www.sporcle.com/games/bmo1616/bohemianrhapsody

Chookie Chooks!!!

We got chickens! We all jumped in the car and risked our lives going out to a farm up in the hills near Buxton (ice, thick fog) and came home with three Warrens, lovely natured hens with a reputation as good layers. It was supposed to take a week for them to get used to their new home, but just two days into their new adventure, one of our girls has produced a beautiful egg.

Ok, its not the biggest thing you'll have ever seen, but it was probably her first ever, so a good effort (its the one on the left - the one on the right is a local large free range for comparison. We fried it gently in some butter, great colour and rich creamy tasting yolk.

And yes, we're sure there will soon be plenty to share.

Anyway, this blog is supposed to be about gems that Stumbleupon serves up for me, so here is a recent egg-related one (there's an egg in the recipe - it was as close as I could find, ok?). Instructables seems to be an amateur-led site to post your favourite ways to do things. The one that stumbled up for me was the 5-Minute Chocolate Cake. I made it in a mug as suggested here, microwaved for two and a half minutes, and Ta-Da! A really lovely chocolate cake. Nobody more shocked than me at the ease and success of this recipe, so if you fancy a quick cakey snack - go for it!

Enjoy!

http://www.instructables.com/id/5_minute_Chocolate_Cake/

Rip Off Great Britain

I spent most of Monday sounding like a tabloid headline. I took wifey and the nippers to London for a few days. We stayed at my Uncle's flat (still washing the fag smoke out of the clothes) and tubed in to the centre each day to see the sights. My headline here refers to the cost of lunch on Sunday. To be fair, it was on Whitehall at a place called Churchills, you could see Horseguards Parade to one side and Westminster to the other. But is that ANY excuse to charge £4 for bowl of chips???? Probably.

And then Stumbleupon gave me this - a wiki posting of hundreds of mad playable card decks. I spent a number of years playing a card game called Magic: The Gathering (they're still going strong) so find myself drawn to this sort of thing. My current favourite here (out of the quarter I've been through) is Mornington Crescent, and how I smiled each day this week as we went through that station and heard it being announced.

Enjoy!

http://www.dvorakgame.co.uk/index.php/Category:Playable_decks

Further Proof!!!

Remember the "Iamawesome" website? How many of these wonderful sitea re there out in cyberspace?

Enjoy!

http://www.isnickelbacktheworstbandever.com/

Head Case

I love social psychology experiments, and this is one of the many really good ones. What a mixed bag of neuroses us herd animals are!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xTOwE3hnEWk

Enjoy.