Category: science

  • Upcoming CDC Advisory Committee Meeting in September 2025-Or Not?

    Upcoming CDC Advisory Committee Meeting in September 2025-Or Not?

    I’ve been checking the Centers for Advisory Committee schedule on their website for weeks and the only way I found out there is an upcoming meeting is on the Federal Register schedule. Sena found it in a news outlet story. As of this morning around 9 a.m., there was no announcement on the CDC website…

  • Svengoolie Show: “The Curse of Frankenstein” No Laughing Matter

    Svengoolie Show: “The Curse of Frankenstein” No Laughing Matter

    The Svengoolie show last night was the 1957 Hammer production “The Curse of Frankenstein” starring the 3 stooges. Actually, this film was no laughing matter and this was my first time (and last time) seeing it. That’s not saying it’s a “bad” movie. It’s just tough to come up with anything comical to say about…

  • Mourning Dove Toe Deformities Revisited

    Mourning Dove Toe Deformities Revisited

    I recently got my first and only comment on a blog post I posted on March 30, 2019 about toeless mourning doves which were visiting our backyard deck of a house in which we lived previously. I also found an article published about the issue later that year in December of 2019, which is about…

  • Patio Tomatoes Did Not Turn Red!

    Patio Tomatoes Did Not Turn Red!

    OK, so Sena picked all the patio tomatoes and most of them didn’t turn red, especially the slicers. She’s done with growing vegetables. I saw an article about why tomatoes don’t turn red and it makes sense. The featured image shows the patio tomatoes in the plastic bucket for comparison with the red store-bought tomatoes.…

  • A Small Update to a Pseudo-Rap YouTube Video and a Big Tribute to Dr. Robert G. Robinson

    A Small Update to a Pseudo-Rap YouTube Video and a Big Tribute to Dr. Robert G. Robinson

    I just noticed something about one of my YouTube videos that I made sort of as a combination gag and educational piece about pseudobulbar affect. It needed a couple of updates—one of which is minor and which I should have noticed 10 years ago when I made it. It’s a pseudo-rap performance (badly done, I…

  • Spotting Venus in the Eastern Sky

    Spotting Venus in the Eastern Sky

    I was watching a television show last night about UFOs and had to chuckle about some of the segments in which there was a lot of speculation about underground and underwater bases where extraterrestrials typically are thought to hide from us while they work on whatever it is they work on. There was the usual…

  • The Big Mo Pod Show: “In the Pocket”

    The Big Mo Pod Show: “In the Pocket”

    Here’s something fun, try to explain what the phrase “in the pocket” means. The song selections in the pod show led up to a short discussion of what it means—which I didn’t get at all. I don’t think it matters for the ordinary listeners, although former music teachers like Big Mo obviously know what the…

  • Svengoolie Movie: “Invaders from Mars” and Zippers are Large!

    Svengoolie Movie: “Invaders from Mars” and Zippers are Large!

    I watched the Svengoolie movie “Invaders from Mars” last night. I saw this 1953 science fiction film last year but didn’t notice the extraterrestrials wore pretty obvious green velour body suits which zipped up the back. Anyway, the movie was directed by William Cameron Menzies and starred Jimmy Hunt as the boy, David MacLean, who…

  • Thoughts on Long Covid

    Thoughts on Long Covid

    I read Dr. Ron Pies, MD’s essay today, “What Long COVID Can Teach Psychiatry—and Its Critics.” As usual, he made thought- provoking points about the disease concept in psychiatry. What I also found interesting was the connection he made with Long Covid, a debilitating illness. He cited someone else I know who was involved with…

  • Sena + Prune Juice = Space Trip?

    Sena + Prune Juice = Space Trip?

    Sena has been drinking her prune juice and I presume she’s regular. Besides that, she could be an excellent astronaut.  There was a small study by scientists that seemed to show that mice who ate prunes could be protected from space radiation. I think you’d have to eat a lot of prunes for that. Being…