A blog about societal, cultural, and civilizational collapse, and how to stave it off or survive it. Named after the legendary character "Crazy Eddie" in Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle's "The Mote in God's Eye." Expect news and views about culture, politics, economics, technology, and science fiction.
@MarkRober is also an established YouTuber and his creation is part Ninja Warrior but hopes to make eating food out of the bird feeder more difficult, he greatly underestimated his opponents.
People also found simple pleasures while staying safe at home. May we not forget the lessons we learned during the pandemic.
That's a wrap for today's fake holiday. The next day inspired by Wester is Norther, which will occur on Sunday, January 19, 2025. In the meantime, stay tuned for whatever I can blog about next.
Large asteroids have struck Earth in the past and they will in the future. Learn about Asteroid Day, a movement that recognizes research on the dangers of Near-Earth Asteroids.
I think that's the most complete story of the origin of Asteroid Day I can remember watching since I started observing it in 2016, which means I learned something new. Any day I learn something new is a good day!
Astronomy Magazine's video mentioned the asteroid that killed off the non-avian dinosaurs 66 million years ago, so I'm using that as an opportunity to have BBC Earth Science ask and answer What Exactly Killed The Dinosaurs?
Since the 1980s, scientists have believed that the main culprit for the dinosaur extinction was an asteroid. It came from the far reaches of the solar system, and was the size of Mount Everest.
I'm a paleontologist and attended graduate school when geologists debated and eventually accepted the asteroid strike as the cause of the terminal Cretaceous mass extinction, so this shaped my ideas about asteroid impacts. I don't particularly want humanity to go the way of the non-avian dinosaurs!
In September 2023, scientists with NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission will gather in the Utah desert for the arrival of the largest asteroid sample ever received on Earth. “Asteroid City” actors, including Scarlett Johansson, Jason Schwartzman, Maya Hawke, Rupert Friend, Jake Ryan and Jeffrey Wright, join NASA OSIRIS-REx sample expert Dr. Danny Glavin to discuss how studying the asteroid sample will give scientists insight into how the early solar system formed and how life began on Earth.
After a seven-year round trip journey that included mapping Bennu’s surface (a near-Earth asteroid that is no threat to our planet), identifying minerals and chemicals, and collecting a sample from the surface, OSIRIS-REx is on its way back to Earth with more than eight ounces of material.
I have two things to say about Asteroid City. First, why this it here instead of Barbie? Second, the only thing it could win in this field is a game of "one of these things is not like the others."
I now have a third; I enjoyed the cast in this promotional video, although I think they did a better job of increasing the visibility of OSIRIS-REx than promoting the movie. Darn. Speaking of the asteroid return mission, it was one of the first missions shown in 2023 in space from NASA, ESA, Reuters, and PBS NewsHour. I'm looking forward to 2024 in space already.
That's a wrap for June's blogging. Stay tuned for Canada Day to begin July.
Biden greeted surviving members one-by-one, thanking them for the service on that fateful day.
As an expatriate Californian, who loves entertainment nearly as much as my country and tells my students you can take me out of California but you can't take California out of me, I appreciated the name checks of The Longest Day and Band of Brothers. I'm only surprised he and his speechwriter(s) didn't manage to mention Saving Private Ryan as well. I guess one Tom Hanks show was enough.
I also appreciated how President Biden related D-Day to the present day, especially the domestic fight to protect democracy against authoritarianism at home and foreign aggression in Ukraine. May we be up to the task.
Follow over the jump for videos representing France, Canada, and the United Kingdom at the event.
If your choices in the upcoming federal election have you pining for candidates from a galaxy far, far away, there may be a new hope on the horizon.
Rick Di Lorenzo, a councillor from the town of Milton, is creating cheeky election lawn signs, featuring characters from Star Wars and Harry Potter, as a fundraiser for local charities.
With candidates like Darth Vader and Obi Wan Kenobi, and featuring slogans like “Together we can rule the galaxy” and “Seriously it’s not a trap,” this campaign is meant to be more light-hearted than its federal inspiration...
“It's been very positive and like 99 per cent of people are saying it’s hilarious,” Di Lorenzo told CTV News Toronto. “Some people took the signs, because they're saying in this election they can’t support either candidate, so they’re going to put this sign out instead.”
Read the rest of the story and watch the video, which doesn't embed and which I can't find on YouTube to embed here, but which shows the rest of the signs seen below.
Both of the above were in Canada. Australia has also seen signs inspired by Star Wars, as Pulse Tasmania reported.
A series of fake election signage has been popping up on street posts and traffic light poles across Tasmania in the lead-up to the March 23 state election.
One Pulse follower reported spotting several ‘parody signs’ alongside legitimate candidate signage in Kingston over the weekend.
“I think they are pretty hilarious given the upcoming election. Someone had a lot of fun making them,’ he said.
A majority of the signs reference various niche cultures and movie characters, including Darth Vader.
A spokesperson for the Tasmanian Electoral Commission said the homemade signs are not considered “official election material”.
No kidding.
I haven't seen any news stories about Star Wars themed lawn signs in the current U.S. election, although there are plenty of them for sale. I'm not feeling like doing any unpaid advertising for them right now, so I'll skip them. Instead, I'm concluding today's entry with Mark Hamill's tweet from November 2020, which The Hollywood Reporter shared.
On Saturday, after the election was called by numerous news outlets for Biden, Hamill shared a few tweets but one, in particular, really made a splash.
Hamill posted a picture featuring three posters with the titles of the original Star Wars trilogy. The New Hope poster featured a picture of Barack Obama, the Empire Strikes Back poster featured Trump and the Return of the Jedi poster featured Biden. Hamill wrote, “#BestEpisode_EVER.”
May The Force awaken and keep The First Order out of office this year.
That's a wrap for today's modern holiday. Stay tuned for Cinco De Mayo and highlights of tonight's Saturday Night Live as the Sunday entertainment feature. Depending on tonight's episode, I might be able to combine the two. May my readers and I be so lucky!
As it enters its awkward pre-teen years, the company that invented fame in 140 characters has had a tough run recently. It lost its longtime CEO Dick Costolo, who was replaced by co-founder and formerly ousted CEO turned new CEO-slash-savior Jack Dorsey. Yes, people use Twitter (more than 300 million of them), and yes, Twitter brings in money (more than $500 million each quarter), but its stock plummeted to an all-time low this year as Wall Street worried over its slowing user growth.
People rightfully complain that the platform can be a hotbed for hostility. It also offers a loudspeaker for the disenfranchised, but swarms of voices also silence through harassment. It’s a company, it’s a platform, and it’s the world’s biggest cocktail party. That means sometimes it’s a mess.
But for all its problems, Twitter is everywhere. It’s the place where the world talks to itself, often sharing and even making news in the process. Twitter has become a powerful force, but it wasn’t always that way.
It all begins with a tweet from Jack Dorsey himself.
