Quickies
Skepchick Quickies 1.23
- Man considers bank error a “gift from God” – Uh, that’s not a gift that’s *stealing* from the bank. From LJ.
- Three strange fish, one species – “Researchers believe they have solved the puzzle of three seemingly different fish, one all males, one all females and one all juveniles. They’re the same fish, and undergo remarkable changes as they mature.” Thanks Steve.
- Eugenie Scott on Bigfoot -  A video of a talk by Eugenie. From David.
- Cookbooks with Science – For the nerds who love cooking (including me, I own a couple of the ones mentioned).
- For today’s cute animal, in an attempt to melt your icy cold skeptical hearts, I bring you a frolicking baby pygmy goat. Since everyone liked the shark babies so much, here are some stingray babies, too.
Cooking + Science = Heston Blumenthal’s Search for Perfection (http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/tv_and_radio/perfection/). BRILLIANT show.
I just want to point out that any cookbook by the “Cook’s Illustrated” crowd is automatically a cookbook with science.
They are a test kitchen, and make Alton Brown sound like a no-nothing idiot. (Not that I don’t enjoy Good Eats, just using a scientific approach to cooking comparison.)
God just gave them someone else’s money? I guess that He can be pretty immoral sometimes.
Thank you for not saying “fishes”.
Hey, if an experienced pilot successfully landing a plane after being struck by birds can be called a “miracle”, then a bored bank employee accidentally shifting a decimal a couple positions can be called a “gift from God”.
@Steve: Unfortunately, you’re right.
Too bad there isn’t a financial category for the Darwin Awards…
Aww… That tiny teeny sweet goat has really melted my cynic heart. Now I’m ready to take homeopathic pills for my snoring and accept Jesus as my lord and savior.
Damn you, goat!
@writerdd – but it probably should have said “fishes” instead of “fish”…. “fish” is fine as a plural for more than one individual fish, but “fishes” indicates that you are talking about more than one species of fish – which is what this is about.
Great, thanks a ton, Amanda… now my life will never be complete until I get my very own pygmy goat.
@noisician: Well, I can accept “fishes” for multiple species. I just get frustrated by even science shows and articles saying “fishes” when the mean “three fish”…. it sounds so ignorant.
@noisician: But didn’t it end up being one species of fish after all? oooOOOoooo! Did I just BLOW YOUR MIND? :)
@writerdd: But they weren’t talking about three individual fish … they were talking about what they thought were 3 different species. This point was confused by the fact that they used “fish” when they should have said “fishes”. If they’d meant individual fish, then this line makes no sense: “three seemingly different fish, one all males, one all females and one all juveniles.” Anyway, sorry to get all grammar nazi.
And yes, my mind is blown.
Using gills as extra mouths? Seriously?
You’d think an environment would have an upper limit for batshit insanity, but nooo…
“The universe is not only queerer than we suppose but queerer than we can suppose.”
That’s one of my favorite quotes and I think it sums up those fish quite well.
Awwww… that baby goat is so cute! I might have some of them soon, despite my vet telling me my male goat has been neutered one of my females looks suspiciously like she’s pregnant.
RE: 3 Strange Fish
“This thing was basically a set of testes looking for the female,”
Perhaps humans evolved from this fish?
Cooks Illustrated has a cooking show componant called “America’s Test Kitchen”, which airs on PBS. It’s like Julia Child meets Bill Nye, in that they show you how to cook great food and show you the science behind it. I’ve rented their books from the libraries and watched their shows, and they my friends, are excellent. Thanks to them my apple pies don’t collapse anymore into a giant mushy heap with a giant gap between the top crust and the apples. Turns out the secret ingredent is science.
I worked on a farm were the farmer raised pygmy goats for fun. There a hell of a lot less cute grown up with horns, dirty, and chasing you around their pen.
@Noadi: Your female goat is a hussy.
Goats are tricky bastards, but I still think they’re adorable
@skepticalhippie: Think of goat horns as less of weapons and more of handlebars. I infinitely prefer trying to wrangle them when you can get a good grip on their head than when they just have slippery little nubbins.
@skepticalhippie: Ah but when they grow up, you can just eat them. Mmmm, goat.
And the Cook’s Illustrated apple pie recipe is such a close approximation of my grandfather’s apple pie that I was shocked when I first made it. His pie was the best I’ve ever had and I’ve never tasted an apple pie that came close until that recipe.
@skepticalhippie: Oh I love America’s Test Kitchen! Yay PBS.
@LOLkate: @Amanda: Yeah, I have grabbed their horns to control them before, but that just distracts you while there mate does a flighing leap into your thigh with their rock hard heads. And all I was trying to do was castrate their babies! Also goat is delicious, though damn near impossible to find.
One of my favorite parts of Cooks Illustrated/ ATK is the double blind studies of foods and products. It’s through them that I was able to find cheap balsamic vinegar that didn’t taste like colored sugar water.
@skepticalhippie: If there’s a halaal market anywhere near you, they often carry goat meat.
Nope, not were I live now. When I lived in Minneapolis I lived around a Somali community with many-a-Halaal market around, still, they never carried much goat.
” ***They*** were buying a house in the Orlando area when the mistake was traced. …. Melissa Pratt, who told the court she was ***estranged from her husband***, was free on unsecured bail.”
Must have been a REALLY BIG house.
Tell us anything .. your not under oath.
Some years ago I heard a call on the Bruce Williams radio show from a woman with the same god’s plan mentality. Her son had a herion problem, and they were wondering if he should try methodone, when the door bell rang. It was a package of methodone that was actually for the apartment upstairs, but clearly this was god telling him to take it. He did, OD’d, and died.
She called the show to ask if it might have been god’s plan to have her sue the messenger company and pharmacy to get out of dept. The host told her no.