As not an NYC native, grain of salt, but... I was surprised how familiar parts of Manhattan felt (we usually go to NYC once a year - only reason we're not going this year is because of wedding/house buying financial crunch that leaves no room for a vacation).

In general it's a caricature of the city, but still very cool to just drive around in.

I feel quite bad for them. I don't think sending them food is an answer, though. This is a scenario that will not get any better until you fix their ability to survive on their own.

As far as birth control options go... this is a little crude but,

Pull out. Also, oral and anal sex don't tend to produce offspring.

The condom free strategy for birth control.

#77 I thought the exact same thing.

There's a chain of grocery stores in western Pennsylvania and parts of Ohio called Giant Eagle that actually has a few honor systems in it.

First, all of the self-serve donuts and baked goods, you just pile in a bag and for as long as I've been alive every cashier will just take your word for what you put in the bag. It could be 2 bagels or 6 rolls, they'll just ring it up as you say it.

The second is the large bulk candy and spice sections. There's a little coin box that if you want to take some candy to drop in a nickle or a quarter. When I was young I remember it was 1 piece for a nickle and 3 for a dime, but these days some of them don't even have prices! Just put in what you think you should.

Also the spices you weigh yourself, print up a price tag and set it up. There's nothing stopping you from printing up a .10 sticker and slapping it on $5 worth of something.

Finally, at least in my experience, I've had cashiers take my word on what something should cost if it doesn't ring up properly.

A few months ago I was buying a Lion candy bar. The candy didn't ring up, the girl asked me how much it was and I said I honestly didn't know... She then asked me what I thought was fair, so I guessed a dollar, she agreed and rang it up a such.

I always wind up feeling like a dick but...

Laika wasn't the first living creature intentionally sent into space. They experimented, like in so many other blog posts, with fruit flies first.

"First Vertebrate In Space" isn't as sexy.

License Farm, read my post again; I'm making sure that people who aren't familiar with 3D apps won't assume it is.

So he did his reel using Max? 3DS Max is the furthest possible thing from free software. It runs about $4,000 and has a yearly license fee.

Blender (http://www.blender.org/) is an excellent example of a free 3D app.

Not to derail the dude's talent, because he has very good chops - but I don't want people not familiar with 3D to assume the "free software" blurb refered to what he was using.

First: Death to the turtlists.

Second: This guy needs his own show. I'd watch daily. So many questions... so many. I think the first thing I'd ask him to do is draw me a map of the earth and show me how I can fly east from Chicago and wind up in Japan and I can fly west from Chicago and wind up in Japan.

Let alone how come I can fly pretty much north from Chicago... and wind up in Japan.

It'd be an awesome moebius strip / klein surface map that I gladly embrace over our crappy spheroid.

Here... I can be someone for everyone to hate:

Allow me to partition you off.

Side A) Gender Matters - it's sick.
Side B) Gender Doesn't matter - it's brave.
Side C) There's no such thing as gender.

Side A: Not your life. Be glad your mother didn't have a full beard. There was once a time where people didn't have machine or baboon hearts. That time is gone.

Side B: If gender doesn't matter, then why change it in the first place? A person's sex doesn't match their gender, they change it... fine. But this whole mix-n-match, one from column A one from column B salad bar approach IS WEIRD. The vast majority of people do not do this. You can go on and on about how it's beautiful, or special or anything you can conjure - you will never trump, ever trump, the fact that it's just bizarre. Doesn't negate any of your points... just deal with the fact that it's odd.

Side C: I'm quite sure there's biological stratum of gender, but it's not a naturally occurring phenomenon for this to manifest itself physically.
Just because medical science is now allowing for us to build physical representations of these levels doesn't mean everyone should be like "Oh, what an understandable phenotype!"

So in conclusion, layer whatever caring and sensitive or confused and aggravated patina over the following, indisputable truths:

Genetically male humans don't give birth.

We're now at a point where we're surgically manufacturing ones that do.

Focus on whichever of those two points that irritates you and beat it into your skull until you accept that fact.

Yeah....

....

yeah.

As far as frying the earth is concerned, depends on how close to the earth the gamma ray burst is. One that is say, 8,000 light years away would only damage the ozone layer - 20% or so.

Sure...we'll all die, but life would probably continue on the earth in some form. Tardigrades perhaps.

My point is, doesn't have to be 8 light years away to kill us all. And in fact, researchers have found the beginings of a Hypernova just far enough away, angled at just the right amount to do just that.

I, for one, welcome our new electromagnetic overlords.

I, for one, welcome our current paranoid overlords.

I, for one, welcome our new Dasyatidae overlords.

I, for one, welcome our new robot overlords.

Man... That was genuinely a difficult decisions!

I eventually did decide on American Gods because, despite its popularity, I do believe it to be one of his best works.

At the risk of being an asshole...

Even I, NOT a professor at MIT, know that anything utilizing magnets is not perpetual motion.

You are simply using the stored magnetic charge, that will eventually* run out, just like a battery.

Even a permanent magnet can lose it's charge.

(* even if 'eventually' is years).

The plural of annecdote is not evidence but...

In my art school days I'd often draw a streak of Zippo fluid from the cuff of my jeans up and over my crotch and down the other side for the purposes of super funk dancing.

While warm, it was not too hot to handle. However! You do experience something akin to sunburn if done too much. A subtle redding and irritation, but not what I'd call a "burn".

Furthermore - using the art school bent again, if thats compositing... that dude has SUPER super kung fu.