Let's grab some giggles ...
Oct2018, Page2
Can I believe this? Inspired by Deb, I bought a coloring book (Dr.Who). I can't say that it relaxes me, but it's interesting to work at. You're looking at about an hour's work here !
progress ...?
Everyone's DNA sequence is unique. But for those who wish to maintain their genetic privacy, it may not be unique enough.
A new study argues that more than half of Americans
[who have NOT entered their DNA into the database] could be identified by name if all you had to start with was a sample of their DNA and a few basic facts, such as the region where they live and about how old they might be.
. . . . once 3 million Americans have uploaded their genomes to public genealogy websites, nearly everyone in the U.S. would be identifiable by their DNA alone and just a few additional clues.
More than 1 million Americans have already published their genetic information, and dozens more do so every day.
Here's an interesting fact: virtually all of Europe's vinyards are grafted onto vine roots from North America.
In the late 19th century the phylloxera epidemic destroyed most of the vineyards for wine grapes in Europe, most notably in France. Phylloxera was introduced to Europe when avid botanists in Victorian England collected specimens of American vines in the 1850s. Because phylloxera is native to North America, the native grape species are at least partially resistant. By contrast, the European wine grape Vitis vinifera is very susceptible to the insect. The epidemic devastated vineyards in Britain and then moved to the European mainland, destroying most of the European grape growing industry. In 1863, the first vines began to deteriorate inexplicably in the southern Rhône region of France. The problem spread rapidly across the continent. In France alone, total wine production fell from 84.5 million hectolitres in 1875 to only 23.4 million hectolitres in 1889. Some estimates hold that between two-thirds and nine-tenths of all European vineyards were destroyed.
The solution was to import vines from North America (that were inherently immune to phylloxera) and graft European vines (the top part, or "scion") onto those roots. I saw an estimate that 95% of all European vineyards today are growing on North American vine roots.
Watchng a travel series ("Dream of Italy") on Roku/Amazon, I got intriqued by truffles. The Itallian villagers hunted up some, using sniffer dogs, and served them up and chatted. One commented that the truffle they just ate would sell for $500 down in town. For one mushroom!!!
So I did some fact checking, and sure enough, truffles sell for absurdly high auction prices. Most bidders are world-renown chefs and restaurant owners.
Keep in mind that these are mushrooms that neeed to be eaten within 7 days of being dug up.
Here's the countdown of the 5 most expensive ever.
Doing the math, the #1 truffle went for about $110,000 / pound
- for a mushroom !!!
Doctor is sending me to a gastro-guy to figure out why my stomach hurts two days a week. But when you look at that picture, it's kind of a wonder why it doesn't always hurt !!
Twenty feet of twisted, winding sausage casing that food is trying to get through.
Who designed this?
Stumbling through videos, I found a few on the art of paper mache ("cartapesta" in Italian) in the Puglia region of Italy.
I remembered papermache as a kid and it was crude, rough, sloppy stuff. But some artists have perfected the craft over hundreds of years and their output is really impressive. This is a very time consuming and labor intensive craft!
During the 17th and 18th centuries, both cartapesta and Baroque were embraced and flourished in this region, especially in Lecce. This resulted in requests to provide religious statues for local churches and monuments within a rather short time frame. Not having access to the preferred (and more expensive) materials, e.g., marble and bronze, or the tools to work with them, artisans were compelled to find a new method. Cartapesta was the perfect solution and became the artistic medium of choice.
Working with old rags, straw, paper, etc. they could easily fold, manipulate and sculpt the papier-mache into exquisite statues of saints and religious figures that looked like marble and bronze but were less expensive, faster to produce, and easier to transport and carry in processions.
Every year near Halloween, I try to catch up on "horror" movies and every year I relearn the same thing. I can't handle movies made from maybe the 1970's to date. They are too jumpy ("BOOO") scary (a cheap trick) or too organ-gushing disgusting.
So I turn out the lights and settle back into the "classics", like (last night) The Ghost of Frankenstein.
By default, tonight has to be one of the classic Dracula or Wolfman episodes. Though I haven't watched "The Invisible Man" (Claude Rains, 1933) in about 50 years, so I may have a shot of espresso & eggnog and watch that.
Back in 1960's Southern California, we were all going to grow our own food in the backyard, fertilized by the household garbage we were going to bury back there.
And we would all homebrew some kind of fruit wine. I chose banana-raisin wine and had a 5gal bucket of the stuff perpetually fermenting in the bathtub of our apartment.
Sugar, yeast and water - all you need to create wine of any kind, and bananas and raisin were cheap, available and flavorful.
Can't recall how this came up yesterday, but it did jog my memory and thought to post it here, for general interest. It seems that people are still brewing this, as recorded on Youtube and personal recipe pages.
As the caravan of 7000+ migrants move north from Guatemala toward the US border, videos and rumors are emerging as to who is funding this "flash mob" along their journey and why? Certainly it is a major migrantion of people and it's being supported with $$$ and food and shelters along the way. But who??
Well, turns out that both US political parties are supporting this migration, hoping to force a border confrontation.
A large block of Republicans are secretly supporting the migration to dramatize the "very real need" for a physical wall at our border with Mexico. There is no way that border guards alone could catch all of 7000 people scrambling across at the same time.
A large block of Democrats are also secretly supporting the migration to dramatize (by photos and videos of all 7000 being blocked and starving and stranded at the US border) that "the current administration has abandoned the idea of America, Land of the Opportunity".
Ironic, I think.
Jim and I go back to 1987(GE), and the four of us go back almost as far. We spent the afternoon at their house; as always, it was super.
They are rare people in that you can talk about anything, disagree and no one takes it personally - they respect diverging opinions, even if they feel strongly about theirs. Very rare these days.
Jim was also "nice enough" to give me a "homework" problem. Actually he's been working on this for a long while and it's not as easy as he hoped. so I get to dust off my cobwebs and think !!
Mike's pushing me to work this in Python ..... I'll take a look at that.
Tonight is Halloween, and I have been binge-watching classic scary movies.
You always new that some seriously bad sh#t was going down when the nice peasant lady did this ......
