Interesting Fact 24: Whistle

Humphrey Bogart is buried with a whistle.  He'd given to Lauren Bacall during the filming of To Have and Have Not, their first movie together.  She dropped it into his casket right before he was buried.  It's inscribed, "If you want anything, just whistle."

A Serious Conversation

Today, I had to leave work to buy some parts for my automobile.  As I left, I stopped a co-worker, and this is what was said, in a very serious tone:
Me:   Hey, do you want to get your tools out of the car?
Him: Why?
Me:   You might need them.
Him: Oh, yeah, you might not come back.  You're probably not coming back.  And what if the world ends,    
         and zombies take over.  I'll need my tools.
Me:   Yeah, well, either way, without your tools, I think there are guns in the shop and bullets in the      
          cabinet.
Him:  yeah, I saw those there.
Me:    Either way, if the zombie apocalypse happens while I'm gone, I'll come back for the guns, and pick  
          you up and then we'll go back to my place for my Gloc and bullets.
Him:  Oh, wait, let me grab some duct tape.  You always need that.
Me:    Okay, I'll be back.  And don't forget, aim for the head.

Interesting Fact 23: Birth Pains

In some primitive societies, it was believed that a father endured as much birthing pain as a mother.  Therefore, to discover the paternity of a baby born out of wedlock, all a village had to do was see which man groaned in pain when the mother started giving birth.

Sharing is Caring 10: John Dies at the End by David Wong

Here are a few of my favorite lines from this great novel.

"And watch out for Molly.  See if she does anything unusual.  There's something I don't trust about the way she exploded and then came back from the dead like that."

"And then the Jamaican guy pulls out the sauce.  'It be opening doors to other worlds, mon,' he says.  We made him do it first, saw that he didn't die.  It seemed to make him pretty happy and then - Dave, the guy I know, didn't really see this, but the guy shrunk himself, made himself three feet tall.  We all laughed our asses off, then he was back to normal again."
"And you still tried that shit?"
Are you kidding?  How could I not?"


"Son, the greatest trick the Devil pulled was convincing the world there was only one of him."

"At this point two elderly security guards in parkas, the guys who normally work the front desk at the plant, asked John to step behind the tape. John claims that here he told the guards that he could not speak English and when that failed to persuade them, he faked a violent seizure. I am unclear as to the purpose of this part of his plan. John flung himself down and began rolling around in the snow, thrashing his limbs about and screaming “EL SEIZURE!!! NO ES BUENO!!!” in a Mexican accent."

Sharing is Caring 9: The Emperor of Ice Cream

Call the roller of big cigars,
The muscular one, and bid him whip
In kitchen cups concupiscent curds.
Let the wenches dawdle in such dress
As they are used to wear, and let the boys
Bring flowers in last month's newspapers.
Let be be finale of seem.
The only emperor is the emperor of ice cream.

Take from the dresser of deal,
Lacking the three glass knobs, that sheet
On which she embroidered three fantails once
And spread it so as to cover her face.
If her horny feet protrude, they come
To show how cold she is, and dumb.
Let the lamp affix its beam.
The only emperor is the emperor of ice cream.

Wallace Stevens

Interesting Fact 21: Fantastical Sun

10,000
Temperature, in degrees Fahrenheit, at the sun's surface.  The core, a giant nuclear reactor, operates at 27 million degrees.  Strangely, the corona, the sun's outer atmosphere, is much  hotter than its surface, surpassing 1 million degrees.  A study published in January offered a possible explanation, showing that jets shooting out from the sun's surface contain gas that is even hotter than previously realized.

600 Million
Amount of hydrogen fuel, in tons, that the sun converts to helium and energy through nuclear fusion every second.  That is the equivalent to the weight of all the coal burned in the United States in seven months.  At 4.5 billion years old, the sun has burned through nearly half its hydrogen fuel supply.

4X10 the 23rd power
Total power output of the sun, in kilowatts.  In 2009 researchers at NASA estimated that 45 percent of theta solar energy reaching Earth is absorbed or reflected by our atmosphere.  Earth's surface absorbs or reflects the rest.

11
Duration, in years, of a typical solar cycle, natural variations in the number of sunspots and flares that affect solar irradiance levels on Earth.  Sunspots, marked by dark areas on the sun, indicate a strong magnetic field.  Solar flares are powerful explosions at the star's surface.  The current cycle began in 2008, and a NOAA panel predicts it will peak in May 2013.  In past, large solar flares have caused blackouts and disrupted communications on Earth.

1,000,000
Speed, in miles per hour, of the solar wind, a stream of charged particles flowing from the sun in all directions.  A mission called Solar Probe Plus, slated to launch before 2018, will dive into the sun's atmosphere to study how the wind achieves its astonishing speed.  In September NASA selected the instruments, including a telescope and a particle counter, that will make the unprecedented journey.

by Jeremy Jacquot
Discover

Sharing is Caring 8: Horribly Ineffective Pick-Up Lines

Horribly Ineffective Pick-Up Lines

* How'd you like to gain 165 pounds for about six minutes?

*Is your father an astronaut because I sure am horny.

* Drunk yet?

*I may not be the best looking guy in here, but I'm the only one talking to you.

*They just called last call, and I'm out of options.

*My apartment is being fumigated.  We should screw.

*Quick while my wife's back is turned!

*Your name must be Daisy because I sure am horny.

*So, are you the fat friend or what?

*Anybody else live here with their parents?

*Personally, I found The Fountainhead to be a bit pedestrian.

*I designed Bruce Campbell's website.

"Make Love!*
*the bruce campbell way"

-by Bruce Campbell