The PW Camp

[Giant Communist Robot]

15 days, 16 hours, it says.

It only works for Honolulu. It won't give you the results for Hilo to Plano. Curious.

You can't get to Plano from Hilo.

[Shapley]

I was curious why they routed him from Honolulu to Plana via Washington State. Seems like a more direct route would be available. Is that the normal route for kayak traffic?

[Shapley]

You can't get to Plano from Hilo.

Obviously not, unless you go by way of Honolulu...

[dai bread]

Couldn't you kayak from Hilo? I'm intrigued that Google didn't mention cruise liners. There must be some from Hawaii to the U.S. west coast. Or even cargo ships, which still offer limited passenger accommodation as far as I know.

[Haggis@wk]

I don't know whether to laugh or cry

Playmobil Security Check Point

you have GOT to read some of the reviews, they are hilarious!!!!

[piqaboo]

bwahaha!

[Haggis@wk]

The future of food has arrived:
Scientists turn stem cells into pork

Call it pork in a petri dish – a technique to turn pig stem cells into strips of meat that scientists say could one day offer a green alternative to raising livestock, help alleviate world hunger, and save some pigs their bacon.

Dutch scientists have been growing pork in the laboratory since 2006, and while they admit they haven’t gotten the texture quite right or even tasted the engineered meat, they say the technology promises to have widespread implications for our food supply.

“If we took the stem cells from one pig and multiplied it by a factor of a million, we would need one million fewer pigs to get the same amount of meat,” said Mark Post, a biologist at Maastricht University involved in the In-vitro Meat Consortium, a network of publicly funded Dutch research institutions that is carrying out the experiments.

Post describes the texture of the meat as sort of like scallop, firm but a little squishy and moist. That’s because the lab meat has less protein content than conventional meat.

Anyone else feeling queasy?

[analog]

what'll they feed those stem cells?

Hmmmm

in Brave New World, when people turned sixty they went to the recycle center to have their phosphorous recovered....

a.

[dai bread]

Not to mention "Soylent Green", by Harry Harrison, (and a movie).

[Haggis@wk]

Not to mention "Soylent Green", by Harry Harrison, (and a movie).

Well, "loosely" based upon the novel "Make Room! Make Room!" by Harry Harrison. I really enjoyed (and enjoy, still read) The "Deathworld Series" and the "Stainless Steel Rat Series". He was a better writer of lighter subjects that darker, I believe.

[jamiebk]

I am not one of those against genetically engineered foods...The "no GMO" crowd was on the march out here a year or two ago with a ballot measure to outlaw the GM use in the wine industry. Most of the vines are cloned now...

Anyway, There is no way you are going to get me to eat that pork...meat...goo...stuff. Ugh. It's revolting.

[Schmeelkie]

From this article (btw from a great new website that send out daily emails with breaking science stories - futurity.com) - basically a side note that most GMO food is actually better for the environment (use less pesticides,etc) - how you describe the food affects what you select... http://futurity.org/society-culture/apple-picking-by-the-label/ - short version is this:

When asked to compare apples to apples, consumers said they would pay more for locally grown apples than genetically modified (GMO) apples. However, when described as having a “reduced environmental impact,” the GMO apples came out on top.

btw - on GMO - people have been doing genetic modification of plants and animals for centuries - it's called breeding....now it's just more high-tech.

[Haggis@wk]

people have been doing genetic modification of plants and animals for centuries - it's called breeding....now it's just more high-tech.

While I generally agree with you that GMOs improve our lives I had to take slight exception to your comparison. I'm pretty sure that Mendel's successors never conceived of putting bacterial genes into corn

[piqaboo]

pigs - weird choice to start with since you can pretty well fatten pigs on garbage. Cows now...

[Schmeelkie]

just celebrating the fact that I've now gone 3 days without having to report for jury duty, AND my 10 am meeting got canceled, so I can get caught up from yesterday when I came in late after taking Bella to the dentist, had 10 min to check email before running off to a meeting, then about an hour to eat lunch before going to class, then home. Didn't get much done...

[Haggis@wk]

just celebrating the fact that I've now gone 3 days without having to report for jury duty, AND my 10 am meeting got canceled, so I can get caught up from yesterday when I came in late after taking Bella to the dentist, had 10 min to check email before running off to a meeting, then about an hour to eat lunch before going to class, then home. Didn't get much done...

I've got jury duty next month. Third time in four years. I should be a slam dunk for getting off jury duty; former criminal investigator et al. Wrong, I've been on two jury trials; both civil including a world class litterer....he got slammed and because he couldn't pay the monumental fine he still went to jail.......the bleedin' heart Liberal in the jury wasn't aware of that fact

[Selma in Sandy Eggo]

... I've been on two jury trials; both civil including a world class litterer....he got slammed and because he couldn't pay the monumental fine he still went to jail.......the bleedin' heart Liberal in the jury wasn't aware of that fact

I have now got the refrain to Arlo Guthrie's "Alice's Restaurant" song, the 22 minute version, stuck in my head. Did they find the defendant's name on an envelope underneath the 3 VW busloads of garbage? Did the defendant have to go sit on the Group "W" bench? Were there eight-and-a-half-by-eleven glossy photos with circles and arrows and paragraphs on the back telling what each one was?

And she exits, humming...
You can get anything you want at Alice's Restaurant.
(Excepting Alice...)
You can get anything you want
At Alice's Restaurant.
Just walk right in,
It's around the back
'Bout a half a mile
from the railroad track.
Now, you can get anything you want
At Alice's Restaurant
ba dum pa dee dee dee dee dee
At Alice's Restaurant.

[Shapley]

...and did he have to sit next to the uglies, meanest, nastiest father-raper of all..

We walked in, sat down, Obie came in with the twenty seven eight-by-ten
colour glossy pictures with circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back
of each one, sat down. Man came in said, "All rise." We all stood up,
and Obie stood up with the twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy
pictures, and the judge walked in sat down with a seeing eye dog, and he
sat down, we sat down. Obie looked at the seeing eye dog, and then at the
twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy pictures with circles and arrows
and a paragraph on the back of each one, and looked at the seeing eye dog.
And then at twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy pictures with circles
and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each one and began to cry,
'cause Obie came to the realization that it was a typical case of American
blind justice, and there wasn't nothing he could do about it, and the
judge wasn't going to look at the twenty seven eight-by-ten colour glossy
pictures with the circles and arrows and a paragraph on the back of each
one explaining what each one was to be used as evidence against us. And
we was fined $50 and had to pick up the garbage in the snow, but thats not
what I came to tell you about.

[Haggis@wk]

... I've been on two jury trials; both civil including a world class litterer....he got slammed and because he couldn't pay the monumental fine he still went to jail.......the bleedin' heart Liberal in the jury wasn't aware of that fact

I have now got the refrain to Arlo Guthrie's "Alice's Restaurant" song, the 22 minute version, stuck in my head. Did they find the defendant's name on an envelope underneath the 3 VW busloads of garbage? Did the defendant have to go sit on the Group "W" bench? Were there eight-and-a-half-by-eleven glossy photos with circles and arrows and paragraphs on the back telling what each one was?

And she exits, humming...
You can get anything you want at Alice's Restaurant.
(Excepting Alice...)
You can get anything you want
At Alice's Restaurant.
Just walk right in,
It's around the back
'Bout a half a mile
from the railroad track.
Now, you can get anything you want
At Alice's Restaurant
ba dum pa dee dee dee dee dee
At Alice's Restaurant.

DAMN, DAMN, DAMN!!! WHY didn't I think of that at the time of the trial???? I STILL know all the words, I even saw the movie (hangs head in shame)

[jamiebk]

Every Thanksgiving our local radio station "The Crush" KRSH, plays Alice's restaurant long version at least 5-6 time throughout the day. I always try to find a way to tune in. You just gotta love it