18.2.21

Throwing the bone

b1-66er: "End of Neanderthals linked to flip of Earth's magnetic poles, study suggests"

D4rw1n--
Humans: okay we've got the magnetoimmune mutation rolled out, and the pole switch up and running. Reverse polarity. 
Neanderthals: aaaaarrrrggggghhhh

The EZ baked lives of 60s children

b1-66er: (from Special K) Predictions by Criswell from 1968.

b1-67er:  Maybe the aphrodisiac part explains the sixties. Wacky!
He predicted Denver would get hit by a ray from space that turned all metal elastic!

66: YOU DON'T REMEMBER THAT?

D4rw1n: His science is dubious 

66: My brother's a Super Elastic Bubble Plastic denier.

67: Super elastic bubble plastic was pretty cool.

66: It was.
I think it may've given me MS. (And mom SAID it wasn't bubble gum.)

67: Really a psychedelic you.

66: It did have its bad points, though.

D4: Yeah. It wasn't elastic 
It was more bubble plastic
It smelled like death 
When you blew it up you were as likely to pop a lung as inflate the bubble 
I would not be surprised if it was the MS vector 
Or worse 

67: it smelled like possibility

D4: Yes. Possibly killing you from the inside out 
A Wham-O product, Says Wikipedia
Polyvinyl acetate, acetone, ethyl acetate acetate

67: Part of the glory days of industrial toys. Creepy crawlers.  Erector sets. Super elastic bubble plastic. We were oh so close to flying cars.

D4: Apparently, the smell of "possibility" consists of (CH3)2 CO off-gassing into your sinuses 
Man, knowing now that that smell was acetone evaporating. I'm a little bit bummed we did not try to make incendiary devices with it

67: I don't remember any flame component, we must have tried. We combined fireworks with most toys at some point.

66: NOTHING sez "Hello!" like a slinky with a string of lit blackcats lomping toward you on the stairs.

D4: Here's a challenge I wish I'd issued us in 1980:
From this list of products ...
... How many can we combine with fireworks?

67: If you look at their canon of toys, it's pretty damn good.  And I would say most are fire/firework compatible.

D4: That was my initial assessment exactly 
With your apt amendment of adding "fire/"

13.2.21

You better not be pointin' at me

Special K: "San Jose couple, married 67 years, getting vaccinations together on Valentine's Day"

b1-66er: SWEET!
(👈 I'm with Vaxxy)

10.2.21

McCoo U.

b1-66er: "Scientists Are Pretty Sure They Found a Portal to the Fifth Dimension"

Special K: Let the sunshine in. 

9.2.21

In the words of our four fathers...

b1-66er: "My name is Leo and I am 8 years old. I listen to All Things Considered in the car with mom. I listen a lot.
I never hear much about nature or dinosaurs or things like that. Maybe you should call your show Newsy things Considered, since I don't get to hear about all the things. Or please talk more about dinosaurs and cool things.
Sincerely,
Leo"

Dad 1: Ha ha. Awesome
Kids got a point

Dad 2: Kid has a point!

Dad 3: That's awesome! 

Old dad 4: Everybody's a critic. 

Now ... bite my dynamite

b1-66er: "If I Have Sex the Way I Really Like, I'm Afraid My Neighbors Will Call the Cops"

Special K: Try to cut down on the explosives, sir.

5.2.21

Cockamamie fight!

b1-66er: "Three countries are due to reach Mars in the next two weeks"

Special K: Good deal.

b1-67er: So there are four possible wins:us lander, china orbiter, china lander, UAE orbiter.  How many wins do you think there will be?

66: That's a good question.
And part of it will depend on the definition of a "win"...
...e.g. Mr. Musk thinks blowing his rockets to smithereens on landing is a "success"...
... There's an added complication in that both espionage and falsified data are possible here...
But I'll go with 2...
... The US and 1 of the Chinese.
Which, I guess, means you can color the UAE entry as "doomed" in my eyes.

67: Win is orbiter operating for thirty days.  Rover has to land (not space x style) and drive for one day.

D4rw1n: I say any confirmed landing is a win because it means the lander was not destroyed on impact. I've got a rooting interest in the US lander, because i'm always rooting for USA. And my client made a lot of the components. But I'm guessing one in four wins.

67: US has pretty good ability to do imagery of Mars surface.  Fraud here would be detected I think.

66: Land not SpaceX style, is a laugh out loud funny expression.

D4:  I wonder if the Chinese could ever get away with falsifying data. You'd think they'd be motivated to, but I'm not aware of any evidence they've done it before with regard to space exploration

67: I was going to go with 3.  Most likely fail is UAE orbiter with Chinese rover not far behind.

D4: I laughed at "space X style" too
This is great. We have votes for one, two, and three. But we have different definitions of a win
Oddly my definition is easiest, but my prediction is lowest

67: US lander has good chances although I think the lowering on cables concept is cockamamie.

D4: Although I guess my definition doesn't work, because the  UAE orbiter never has to land 
That cable thing looks really awkward
But, to be fair, no more awkward than the bouncing balloon ball we had a few years ago

67: Oh no way.  The bouncing ball is a great design.  Pretty failsafe. 

66: My favorite of all these kinds of extraterrestrial motions was the jumping Japanese shoebox. 
(On an asteroid!)

67: Also a great, great design.  I wouldn't have come up with it. Brutally simple. Not external moving parts.  Awesome.