Quick Hits

Detroit parents want teachers, school officials jailed over low student test scores

The good teams play good teams. The middlin' teams play middlin' teams. And the Redskins play the Raiders. It's the week 14 NFL discussion thread

December is the darkest month of the year, but it isn't the coldest. Here's why, and not because Warmers faked the historical data on that too

North Korean cargo jet forced to land in Thailand; 35 tons of weapons onboard. The plane's destination? Pakistan's tribal areas. This should end well

10 dimensions Christmas gift

According to string theory, space-time is not four-dimensional as you might expect, but actually 10-dimensional. The extra six dimensions are believed to be compactified or rolled up into such a small space that they are unobservable at human scales of sight. Their size and six dimensions make Calabi-Yau spaces difficult to draw. But, this model shows a three-dimensional cross-section of this likely space to reveal its structure and shape. - Scientifics Online

Snow in Australia? Video is good.

Canada freezes as 'one of the worst snow storms on record' strands thousands...
Snowy dusting in Australia's summer...

Climategate: The video everyone should see 

http://theautopsy.wordpress.com/2009/12/11/more-fallout-from-climategate/

Jupiter impact packs a whallop

The object that hit Jupiter last weekend released thousands of times more energy than the massive Tunguska blast in Siberia in 1908, say astronomers.

From mountaintop observatories on Earth to the Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers are eagerly tracking the evolution of a collision that appeared on Jupiter last weekend.

For planetary scientists who chronicled a comet's collision with Jupiter 15 years ago, the latest impact is an unexpected gift.

"It's an exciting time," says University of California at Berkeley astronomer Michael Wong. Dr. Wong and his colleagues pulled an all-nighter to capture and process images of the scar using the Hubble Space Telescope.

Initial estimates put the size of Jupiter's assailant at a few hundred yards across. When it hit Jupiter's upper atmosphere and exploded, it released thousands of times more energy than the oft-cited Tunguska explosion in Siberia in 1908, says Keith Noll, an astronomer at the Hubble Space Telescope Institute in Baltimore.

Recent estimates place the punch from the cosmic object that exploded over Tunguska at between 3 million and 5 million tons of TNT. That puts Jupiter's impactor into the continent-buster class.

It's not clear yet where the impactor came from. One likely source is the pool of short-period comets – icy objects that once resided beyond Neptune, but got pulled in toward the gas giants, notes Michael A'Hearn, a researcher at the University of Maryland.

http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2009/0725/p02s19-stss.html

Bring a Sci-fi vibe to your wrist...from Paris

Remember when I promised never to speak about gadgets or gizmos (I'd let Bill cover those for you)? I lied.

This is too cool not to share.

A watch containing the world's first 3G video conference phone, touch screen, built in camera, built in speaker, Bluetooth, voice recognition, (need I go on?)

Maxwell Smart and James Bond would be proud.

The Winner is…

AP – Gibraltar's Kaiane Aldorino reacts after winning the Miss World pageant in Johannesburg, South Africa, …

• JOHANNESBURG – Kaiane Aldorino from Gibraltar was named the new Miss World at a glittering two-hour pageant that put South Africa in the spotlight .

Pictures of the Week

An eerie turquoise light spotted over Norway has sparked a mystery, with suggestions it could be a missile test. The light was photographed by Jan Petter Jorgensen while he was on his way to work at a salmon factory

A Hubble false-colour image of glowing gas and dark dust clouds in IC 1795, a star-forming region in the constellation Cassiopeia. Located just over 6,000 light-years away, the complex sprawls along the Perseus spiral arm of our Milky Way galaxy

Li Jianping is hoping to enter the Guinness Book of World Records in 2010 - with a little help from the fingernails on his left hand. The 45-year-old man says he lost his clippers 17 years ago and his gnarly nails have been growing ever since...

Professional surfer Mark Healy wipes out on a 40-foot plus wave at Waimea Bay during the Eddie Aikau Big Wave Invitational surf contest on the North Shore of Oahu in Haleiwa, Hawaii

An old story continues

30,000 protestors in Copenhagen. Who Paid?

Earlier today, thousands of protesters turned out in Copenhagen to demonstrate in favor of an economy-wrecking climate deal. This is how they looked:

Note the identical, professionally printed, color-coordinated yellow and black signs. This is what Astroturf--fake grass roots--looks like. The signs use the same colors as the International ANSWER signs that are ubiquitous at far-left rallies here in the U.S., but carry no identifier. It would be interesting to know who paid for the signs, and whether the same organization that bought the signs also paid for the demonstrators.

‘Welcome to Obamaville’ Sign Marks Colorado Homeless Tent City

The perverts that regulates guns

ATF Gun Licensing Director Russell Vanderwerf Arrested

Initially being investigated for disabling the fire alarm systems in his hotel room, due to shower steam, he claimed, it was discovered he had replaced the hotel room door with a piece of plywood. The plywood contained a circular padded hole believed to be used for sexual acts. See gloryhole. Yes, it was facing the hotel hallway. It would seem he was interested in inspecting more than firearms. h/t BJ in email. And, no, I'm not making that up, either.

He serves as the director of industry operations for ATF's Houston field office. The industry operations division is the regulatory arm of the agency, responsible for overseeing the inspection of all federal gun and explosives licensees, said ATF spokesman Drew Wade. He confirmed that Vanderwerf was in the New Orleans area on official business.

"We are aware of the arrest by the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office," said Wade, who added that he could not discuss anything that could be connected to a continuing investigation.

But the staffers and a deputy sheriff also discovered that someone had removed the bedroom door from its hinges and replaced it with a 5-by-4-foot piece of plywood affixed to the frame and the drywall with hinges and screws, the arrest report said. The door had two locks attached from the bedroom side and a circular hole padded with duct tape. The deputy noted in the arrest report that the hole appeared to be used "in some sort of sexual act."

Texas: Open to all conservatives

Houston becomes first major city to elect gay mayor — a fiscal conservative

Parker neither proclaimed nor sought to hide her sexual orientation and ran on a platform of firm fiscal conservatism and her long experience in urban financial matters.

A Prince is Passed

PRINCE WILLIAM TO SHARE QUEEN'S DUTIES

BURUNDANGA – From Dr. John

There sure are some sicko people out there --
A man came over and offered his services as a painter to a female putting gas in her car and left his card. She said no, but accepted his card out of kindness and got in the car. The man then got into a car driven by another gentleman. As the lady left the service station, she saw the men following her out of the station at the same time. Almost immediately, she started to feel dizzy and could not catch her breath.
She tried to open the window and realized that the odor was on her hand; the same hand which accepted the card from the gentleman at the gas station.
She then noticed the men were immediately behind her and she felt she needed to do something at that moment. She drove into the first driveway and began to honk her horn repeatedly to ask for help.  The men drove away but the lady still felt pretty bad for several minutes after she could finally catch her breath.  Apparently, there was a substance on the card that could have seriously injured her.
This drug is called 'BURUNDANGA' and it is used by people who wish to incapacitate a victim in order to steal from or take advantage of them.
This drug is four times dangerous than the date rape drug and is transferable on simple cards.  So take heed and make sure you don't accept cards at any given time you are alone or from someone on the streets. This applies to those making house calls and slipping you a card when they offer their services.