Dec
31
2007
I can only begin to imagine the chaos that this species of birds can cause if it is found in your neighbourhood. Skip to the second half of this video to hear the sounds of camera shutters clicking, car alarm ringing and operating chainsaws.
A Lyrebird is either of two species of ground-dwelling Australian birds, most notable for their extraordinary ability to mimic natural and artificial sounds from their environment. Lyrebirds render with great fidelity the individual songs of other birds and the chatter of flocks of birds, and also mimic other animals, human noises, machinery of all kinds, explosions, and musical instruments. The lyrebird is capable of imitating almost any sound — from a mill whistle to a cross-cut saw, and, not uncommonly, sounds as diverse as chainsaws, car engines and car alarms, fire alarms, rifle-shots, camera shutters, dogs barking and crying babies.
Video: Google Video
Source: Wikipedia
Tags: Lyebird | Mimic | Bird | Sound
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Dec
21
2007
Does our hair and fingernails keep growing after we die? Do we only use 10% of our brains? Researchers from the Indiana University School of Medicine debunked a collection of medical myths that are familiar to all of us, even though there’s no scientific evidence to support the claim. They published their results in the current issue of the scientific journal BMJ. From the paper: Physicians understand that practicing good medicine requires the constant acquisition of new knowledge, though they often assume their existing medical beliefs do not need re-examination. These medical myths are a light hearted reminder that we can be wrong and need to question what other falsehoods we unwittingly propagate as we practice medicine. We generated a list of common medical or medicine related beliefs espoused by physicians and the general public, based on statements we had heard endorsed on multiple occasions and thought were true or might be true. We selected seven for critical review: • People should drink at least eight glasses of water a day • We use only 10% of our brains • Hair and fingernails continue to grow after death • Shaving hair causes it to grow back faster, darker, or coarser • Reading in dim light ruins your eyesight • Eating turkey makes people especially drowsy • Mobile phones create considerable electromagnetic interference in hospitals. Link…
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Dec
20
2007
Johnny says: The Lakota Indians, who gave the world legendary warriors Sitting Bull and Crazy Horse, have withdrawn from treaties with the United States, leaders said Wednesday. Lakota country includes parts of the states of Nebraska, South Dakota, North Dakota, Montana and Wyoming. The new country would issue its own passports and driving licenses, and living there would be tax-free — provided residents renounce their US citizenship. Excerpt: “We are no longer citizens of the United States of America and all those who live in the five-state area that encompasses our country are free to join us,” long-time Indian rights activist Russell Means told a handful of reporters and a delegation from the Bolivian embassy, gathered in a church in a run-down neighborhood of Washington for a news conference. A delegation of Lakota leaders delivered a message to the State Department on Monday, announcing they were unilaterally withdrawing from treaties they signed with the federal government of the United States, some of them more than 150 years old. They also visited the Bolivian, Chilean, South African and Venezuelan embassies, and will continue on their diplomatic mission and take it overseas in the coming weeks and months, they told the news conference. Link…
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Dec
20
2007
Simplify Media, the mother of all iTunes plugins, lets you share your iTunes collection over the net, and now works with iPhones and Linux: The Simplify Media Mobile alpha enables you to access your entire music collection on your iPhone or iPod Touch wherever you have WiFi. You can also listen to the libraries of friends you are connected to. Because Simplify Media is the only remote music option that doesn’t use Safari, you can browse the web while listening to music in the background. You can also listen to entire playlists without having to go back and re-select each song. Link See also: SimplifyMedia: share iTunes with anyone, anywhere…
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Dec
19
2007
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Dec
14
2007
Check out this powerful Snow Plow Train get stuck. At first I thought it would keep going but as massive as they are, mother nature has her way.
Link: Youtube
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Dec
13
2007
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Dec
12
2007
Cops in Rockdale, Georgia are putting helpful yellow stickers on the windows of cars that have packages in plain sight so that crooks know which cars to break into. Officers with the Conyers Police Department will be on foot patrol in the parking lots of major shopping areas in the city over the next couple of weeks. They will place yellow tickets on vehicles with packages or boxes of merchandise that are visible on the seats or floorboards of cars; in other words, vehicles that are easy targets for thieves. Conyers Police Chief David Cathcart said the yellow ticket program is part of an overall crime prevention program to help remind people to be careful with regard to their Christmas packages. Link (via Schneier)…
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Dec
11
2007
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Dec
10
2007
Alex Goldberg, 14-yo urban hustler, has parleyed his chutzpah into free clothes, celebrity friends, and courtside Knicks seats.
Next up: Jamie Foxx. The actor was near the bar, giving a woman a massage, and saw the crowd now gathered around Alex. Foxx offered to buy him a drink. What do you want, little boy? “A pina colada,” Alex said. The crowd laughed, and he got one, virgin.
Alex’s adventure ended hours later, at Nobu, where the pool crowd had migrated to feast on junket sushi. He had been chatting up Venus and Serena Williams at a nearby table, and mugging for cameras with a cigar hanging from his lips while eating a bowl of ice cream. Then the faces at his table went blank. Alex looked up and saw what they saw. His mother.
(link)
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Dec
9
2007
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Dec
7
2007
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Dec
6
2007
The truth, as revealed by Sean Bonner, who is, incidentally, kickin’ it in Vienna this month with the freaks from monochrom. Here’s a post he did today about a presentation by Scott Blake on Barcode Art….
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Dec
6
2007
A Louisiana man and his wife were sentenced prison for scamming their friends and family into giving him over $989,898 with a crazy story about scanning their bodies with a satellites and curing their ailments while they slept. Stacey Finley, 34, persuaded her targets — described by federal prosecutors as “solid, middle-class, educated citizens” — that she was a CIA agent and could use her agency contacts to have medical scans conducted by satellite. Finley said the scans would reveal hidden medical problems, prosecutors said, and that CIA agents would then enter their homes and administer secret medications while they slept. Those treatments would supposedly prevent serious health problems and hereditary diseases. Stacey Finley is not associated with the spy agency, prosecutors said. Link (Via Nothing to do with Arbroath)…
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Dec
6
2007
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Dec
5
2007
Doctors in China admit they are baffled after a man began to perspire green sweat.
Cheng Shunguo, 52, of Wuhan city, says his sweat turned green in the middle of November.
“I noticed that my underwear and bed sheets were all green, and even the water in the shower,” he said.
Cheng says he feels no discomfort, but went to hospital because he was worried about his condition.
Doctors thoroughly cleaned his armpits but it took only 10 minutes for his sweat to turn a piece of white gauze green again.
They have carried out blood tests on Cheng, but found everything to be normal.
“We can’t find the cause,” admitted a spokesman for the hospital which reported the case to the media in the hope of finding a solution.
Source: Ananova
Tags: Cheng Shunguo | Green Sweat | Green | Sweat
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Dec
5
2007
A video tutorial on how to make you own lockpicks. If you’re going to try your new tools out, you might want to take a look at these videos first:
How to Escape a Handcuff
Handcuffs, Handcuffs, Whatcha Gonna Do
Link [Metacafe] – via Miniature Brainwave
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Dec
5
2007
The Zigview S2 Digital Viewfinder clips onto the optical viewfinder of your DSLR, adding a swiveling live 2.5-inch LCD display that can not only be extended on a cable as a remote, but can also automatically trigger the camera when it detects motion. That makes it possible to mount your camera in odd places or to snap photos of wildlife that might otherwise be sketched out by the presence of a human. It's only £230, too, which seems fairly reasonable for the amount of flexibility it would add to your rig. The S2 works on a variety of DSLRs from various brands, including Canon, Nikon, Sony, Pentax, and Fuji. (But not, for some reason, on the entry-level Canon Rebel series, which is what I own.) While you're waiting behind a blind to capture your latest snapshot, you could occupy your time by trying to identify bird songs with this Birdsong Scanning Wand, which plays one of 206 bird song sound files when scanned over the corresponding picture the included booklet. It's $100. Z2 Catalog Page [Speedgraphic.co.uk via Red Ferret] Previously: Wingscapes Birdcam Review (Verdict: Sort of Awesome!) [BBG]…
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Dec
5
2007
Carolyn Bohach, a microbiologist at the University of Idaho claims that our bodies contain 10 times more bacterial cells than human ones (bacterial cells are a lot smaller and thus occupy less volume). Human genome researchers believe that at least 40 of our genes are bacterial in origin. Let the compulsive washing begin! All the bacteria living inside you would fill a half-gallon jug; there are 10 times more bacterial cells in your body than human cells, according to Carolyn Bohach, a microbiologist at the University of Idaho (U.I.), along with other estimates from scientific studies. (Despite their vast numbers, bacteria don’t take up that much space because bacteria are far smaller than human cells.) Although that sounds pretty gross, it’s actually a very good thing. The infestation begins at birth: Babies ingest mouthfuls of bacteria during birthing and pick up plenty more from their mother’s skin and milk—during breast-feeding, the mammary glands become colonized with bacteria. “Our interaction with our mother is the biggest burst of microbes that we get,” says Gary Huffnagle, a microbiologist and internist at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. And that’s just for starters: Throughout our lives, we consume bacteria in our food and water “and who knows where else,” Huffnagle says. Link (via 3 Quarks Daily)…
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Dec
5
2007
I went through and made all of the search terms below into actual links. Now you don’t have to copy and paste. Just click on the term.
Here’s something fun to do when you’re bored. Just copy paste one of the lines below into Google search (be sure to keep quotations). Send in your coolest or funniest photo in to householdhacker@gmail.com from a cam to be featured on an update from Household Hacker!
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