Sunday, October 15, 2006

Is there any such thing as sheep bacon?

According to the popular website Bacon Unwrapped, there is a restaurant in Washington, DC called the Equinox/ whose guest chef once included "lamb bacon" on the menu.

The review:

"The bacon was cut from lamb underbelly and cured to give it that delicious salty 'bacon' taste. I likened the texture to corned beef, which probably seems kind of weird but there was just something about it texture-wise (not the way it tasted) that reminded me of corned beef. My dining companion thought it was similar to pancetta. His comparison is probably more accurate. Either way it was delicious. And for those who don't eat pork bacon for religious or other reasons, it's another way to enjoy the 'candy of meats.'"
I have to say, the author of "Bacon Unwrapped" is quite . . . thorough in his/her love of this salty treat.

(Make sure you check out the "Baconvision" clip on the July 24 entry . . .)

Thursday, May 04, 2006

Follow-up on the Big Boom theory

A comment:



I question you're response to Joan in regard to atomic fuel. It seems the department of Homeland Security is watching for suitcases that might contain "smart bombs". are these not portable and stable enough to be hand carried to airports,etc.? Is a bomb any more safe than fuel for transportation?

I think the DHS is actually looking for "dirty bombs", but the question is valid.

Yes, in theory, a nuclear device can be made small enough to fit in a reasonable carry-on bag.
Here are the frightening details from the reassuringly-named National Terror Alert.

My initial thought was that the plutonium necessary for this kind of bomb would be prohibitively heavy -- it's one of the heaviest substances on earth, which is part of what makes it so boom-y if you remember that heavy=mass-y and mass is one of the key parts of this little beauty. But, no, according to the National Terror Alert, it would only take about 25 pounds of the stuff to make it a really bad day for a lot of people.

That being said, I think a major hurdle to overcome would be the whole conversion-of-the-big-boom-into-jet-propulsion thing. I'll try to address that later.


Note: You may also want to check out the Apostrophe Protection Society to learn the difference between "your" and "you're".

Monday, May 01, 2006

More with Attila . . .

Patrik asks:
Where is Attila von Somogyi top model of the 80s?

Another Attila von Somogyi question. I should just change the name of this blog to All-About-Attila.com.

Interestingly, I've come across a new lead for Attila . . including - possibly - his e-mail address.
I've just written him, and got this auto-reply:

hi all.. it's monday may 1 and out of office with the flu.. i'm not checking
voicemail or email so please try [content deleted] or or telephone her at [content deleted].

thanks,A>


When I get a real answer from "A", I'll let you know!

* I took the name, e-mail, and phone number he referred to out of this post, in case it's the wrong person, and I don't want to pester her. I'll let you know if it's the right guy when I hear back from him.

Friday, April 28, 2006

Project Promethius

A question from Joan:
i was watchiing pbs on global warming and it occurred to me we send a LOT of pollutants into our air when we blast off a rocket or fly an airplane--why do it we not use atomic fuel to power these especially the space flights.

Good, scary question Joan!

The best answer is that it's really hard to make atomic fuel safe for use. Bad things tend to happen (see here or here), and it's not really portable.

Of course, it's been discussed. Here's an interesting article from 2000 that says it's "being investigated" . . . but a lot has changed (not really for the good) in the world since 2000.

In 2003, Our Valiant Leader George "Shrub" Bush proposed the Nuclear Space Initaitive called "Project Promethius". (Of course, he would have called it a "Nucular Space Initiative".)

Like all good ideas, that's been scaled back to virtual nothingness, with $90 million of its $100 million 2006 budget being earmarked to pay out cancelled contracts to agencies originally hired to research this.

These guys seem to think there's still hope, but they're wrong.

The Jet Propulsion Laboratory (this is more fun if you pronounce it in the crazy, science-fiction/Frankenstein way of "Luh-BORE-a-tor-y") would be the place to go, but when you click on the Promethius Link on the JPL.nasa.gov website, you get THIS nice message:
This computer is funded by the United States Government and operated by the California Institute of Technology in support of ongoing U.S. Government programs and activities. If you are not authorized to access this system, disconnect now. Users of this system have no expectation of privacy. By continuing, you consent to your keystrokes and data content being monitored.

So, you know, I'd rather not.

NASA took a big hit after the Columbia disaster in 2003, and my guess is they're just trying to stay afloat. Of course, the Shuttles themselves are beyond their projected life, so it's time for something new. Bush did hint at a trip to Mars in the future, and the best way to go about that would be via your idea (nuclear fuel, in case I lost you.)

I think he's more interested in huntin' down the bad guys right now (and protecting his deep-pocket oil buddies), so let's wait a few years until we get a new cap'n of the ship and see where we're headed.

And, in the big picture, most of the CFCs (chloroflurocarbons, the bad things from emissions) are from big SUVs, not from airplanes and certainly not from rockets. It's all fairly depressing.

Weren't we supposed to have flyin' cars by the year 2000?

Tuesday, April 25, 2006

BZZZZZZZZZZ

From Mike:

Here's a funny thing I always wondered: how much caffeine is in a typical Starbucks Frappucino in comparison to a cup of coffee, or a shot of espresso? I WORKED for Starbucks, and I couldn't find any info on it (although I honestly didn't look very hard).
Well, Mike. Here's what I've found:

Typical caffeine content of various foods
(Caffeine in tea & coffee will vary widely depending on brewing, etc)

Product Size (ounces) / Caffeine (mg)
Starbucks Coffee, grande (16) / 500
Starbucks Coffee, tall (12) / 375
Starbucks Coffee, short (8) / 250
7-Eleven Big Gulp cola (64) / 190
Coffee, brewed (non-gourmet) (8) / 120-180
Starbucks Coffee Frappuccino (9.5) / 98
Coffee, instant (8) / 80
Starbucks Caffe Latte or Cappuccino, grande (16) / 70
Starbucks Espresso, double (2) / 70
Mountain Dew (12) / 55
Maxwell House Cappuccino (8) / 45-65
Diet Coke (12) / 46
Pepsi-Cola (12) / 40
Coke Classic (12) / 36
Sunkist Orange Soda (12) / 34
Vanilla Coke (12) / 32
Coffee, decaffeinated (8) / 3

These numbers come from a couple of different sources (www.kellymom.com/health/lifestyle/caffeine.html, www.cspinet.org/nah/caffeine/caffeine_corner.htm), and seem to match up pretty well.

There's also this disclaimer from Starbucks itself (www.napa.ufl.edu/2003news/caffeinecontent.htm):

The caffeine content of Starbucks coffee varies, according to a written statement provided by spokeswoman Lara Wyss in Seattle in response to a request for comment on the UF study.
Quoting from the statement: “We emphasize that any absolute numbers reported on caffeine levels in Starbucks coffee do not reflect what a customer would receive in every cup of Starbucks coffee. There are many variables that contribute to caffeine content from cup to cup,” including the type of bean, roasting and brewing methods, and grind.

Starbucks regular drip coffees contain an average of 200 milligrams of caffeine per 8-ounce serving; their decaffeinated drip coffees contain an average of 5 milligrams to 11 milligrams of caffeine per 8-ounce serving, according to the statement. A “frequently asked questions” feature on the Starbucks Web site indicated that the company intends to add caffeine-content information to the site in a future upgrade.

So, there's that.
(Note, http://www.starbucks.com does have nutritional information listed for all of its beverages, but that is limited to: serving size, calories, fat calories, total fat, saturated fat, cholesterol, sodium, total carbohydrates, fiber, sugars, protein.

Do yourself a favor: don't look here if you drink a lot of Starbucks.)

Tuesday, April 18, 2006

Mind Games

From Jamie:

Why does your brain do what it does with this thing? What is going on there?
Now, if you're who I think you are, you're smarter than all of us, and know full well what is going on there. But I'll be glad to play along.

What is going on there is a good ole' fashioned optical illusion: more specifically, your brain trying to fill in the missing pieces.

When you think about how a brain works, it's kinda scary how much data it processes almost instantaneously very second just to keep you functioning and communicating and not getting run over by rickshaws.

And, truth is, you don't observe as much as you think you do. There are big gaps in our observation, due to our senses being inferior to pretty much everything. Birds have better sight, bats have better hearing, dogs have better smell . . . et cetera.

What is going on specifically in the illusion above is your brain is compensating for what it expects to see -- a symmetrical circle of evenly-sized, evenly-spaced dots of a uniform color. The movement of the dots and the speed of the movement don't give your brain enough time to accurately process the information.
If this were a stationary circle of pink dots, with one missing, you'd see it as such. But in the fraction of a second that each image is there, your brain tries to complete it.

But why is the dot green?
That has to do with the rods and/or cones in your eye. (Biology, like auto mechanics, is not my strong suit.)
But I did study theatrical lighting design (did you know that color mixes with lights are different than pigments? That'll mess you up when you're trying to do a lighting plot) and I know a thing or two about the:












Color Wheel!
(Color wheel courtesy of www.prosperity.com/myers/artlessons/graphics/colorwhel.jpg)

If you find the magenta-ish color (around M) that is similar (or as David Letterman says, simular) to the dots in the illusion, look directly across the color wheel and you'll find the green-ish color of the phantom dot (around G). The rods and/or cones in your eye see the "inverse" of the missing pink dot: a green dot.

Interesting fact: This is the precice reason that hospital scrubs and OR walls are greenish-blue. When surgeons would look up from a bloody gash against a brightly-lit white wall, they'd see the inverse of the image -- a big greenish bloody gash on the wall. Blech.
So they started making such things greenish-blue, the inverse of fresh human blood . . . mwa ha ha ha!

Helpful?

(By the way, this optical illusion and many others be located at: University of Maryland Physics Dept.)

UPDATE:
I've been starting at the floating pink dots for about 2 hours now (no, not really).
But here's an answer to the second half of the puzzle (which I hadn't scrolled down to see before): Why do the pink dots eventually disappear?

Once again, your mind starts seeing the "moving object" -- in this case the imaginary green dot, which is not really there (whoa) -- as the focal point. Once again, your mind knows (even if your brain does not) that magenta is the complimentary color for green. As one of its methods for not completely melting down due to overstimulation, your brain filters out needless information.

If you look quickly at a green dot and then look away, you'll see the faint pink "shadow" (see operating room, above). Your brain knows this, and starts compensating for it. After seeing the green dot move around the circle a couple of times, it senses the regular pattern and speed. Focusing on just the green dot, your brain perceives the pink as this "shadow" and starts disregarding it as irrelevant information. Obviously, a green dot is going to leave a pink shadow. But the pink shadow is not important, so your brain cuts it out of your sense so it doesn't get in the way.

Freaky.

UPDATE 2:
I have to say, it's a good thing you didn't ask me about these, because then you'd totally have me stumped.

FINAL NOTE:
This all seems to be variations on the Troxler Effect, or Troxler's Fading.
As Susan Sarandon's character Annie says at the end of Bull Durham, "You can look it up!"

Monday, April 17, 2006

Setting the timing on a 1991 Pontiac Sunbird

The question (from Mike):

I drive a 1991 Pontiac Sunbird with a 4-Cylinder, Overhead Cam, Throttle-Body-Injection engine. Something I've noticed in the past is that when the car is working, the Timing Belt Marks on my camshaft and crankshaft aren't aligned the way the manuals tell you they should be for proper timing (yet the car an for at last 15000 miles like that - hey I just bought it that way).

Recently I lost a Timing Belt Tensioner, which threw my timing all out of whack, and when I returned it to it's proper timing the way the manual suggests (by lining up the timing marks with the marks on the rear Timing Belt Covers), I find that the vehicle won't start; it just stutters and backfires.

My question is: how can I get my car back into timing if I can't use the timing marks for reference?

Yikes. An automotive question.
Huh.
Mike, I'm going to have to really research this. As Austin Powers would say, "it's not my bag, baby."

But I'll dig around and see what I can find for you!

UPDATE #2:
Okay, Mike. As I said, I'm not a car guy. And I never purported to KNOW the answers to everything, just FIND them.

So, here's what an expert says about your situation:

You have to make sure the you have TDC on the correct cylinder, or the timing will be WAY off. The timing maks must line up correctly, but also at the proper time, which is why they are called timing marks.

For instance, the TDC mark will line up when the #1 cylinder is at TDC, and also when the #3 cylinder is at TDC, but the valve timing will be completely different at those two times, becuase one cylinder will be at the of its compression stroke, and the other will be at the end of its exhaust stroke.


I really have no idea what any of that means.
But it sounds good to me!

Please let me know if this helps at all.
I'm still consulting my resources . . . I'll see if anyone else has anything to say.