2012 & The End Of The World Explained [video]

Best Local News Bloopers of 2011 [video] NSFW

Time For A Change? Overhauling The Calendar

ScienceDaily reports –

Using computer programs and mathematical formulas, Richard Conn Henry, an astrophysicist in the Krieger School of Arts and Sciences and Steve H. Hanke, an applied economist in the Whiting School of Engineering, have created a new calendar in which each new 12-month period is identical to the one which came before, and remains that way from one year to the next in perpetuity. Under the Hanke-Henry Permanent Calendar, for instance, if Christmas fell on a Sunday in 2012 (and it would), it will also fall on a Sunday in 2013, 2014 and beyond. “Our calendar would simplify financial calculations and eliminate what we call the ‘rip off’ factor,” explains Hanke. “Determining how much interest accrues on mortgages, bonds, forward rate agreements, swaps and others, day counts are required. Our current calendar is full of anomalies that have led to the establishment of a wide range of conventions that attempt to simplify interest calculations. Our proposed permanent calendar has a predictable 91-day quarterly pattern of two months of 30 days and a third month of 31 days, which does away with the need for artificial day count conventions.” Hanke and Henry deal with those extra “pieces” of days by dropping leap years entirely in favor of an extra week added at the end of December every five or six years. This brings the calendar in sync with the seasonal changes as the Earth circles the sun.

Continue reading HERE

Ugandan Grasshopper Harvest Threatened By Power Supply Issues

According to Yahoo –

Stripped of their wings and fried with onions, grasshoppers are a delicacy in Uganda’s central region — gobbled up by the handful and washed down with beer in bars around Kampala. This time of year should be peak season for the insect catchers but Turyamugumya — who uses bright lights to attract the flying insects before disorientating them with smoke and trapping them in disused oil drums — says that business is tough.

Continue reading HERE

 

Click Button – Make Everything OK

Just go to this site and click the button. Everything will be OK.

10 Unusual 2012 Calendars

Mental_floss presents a collection of strange calendars for 2012. The list begins with one featuring the medical oddities of the Mutter Museum, and includes such favorites as The Naked Archaeologists – you may need to order several.

Check out all 10 calendars HERE

 

 

Christmas Cartoon – No! Not Facebook!

original source – Dave Coverly

 

 

Christmas Cartoon – Santa Economics

original source

Truly Strange Christmas Parade in Graz, Austria [video]

Crash Different – A Mac Crash (if Macs crashed) Would Be Incredibly Styish [pic]

A Brief History of Santa [video]

Wild Monkeys To Help Detect Radiation From Crippled Fukushima Nuclear Plant

MSNBC reports –

Wild monkeys fitted with collars containing detectors and GPS transmitters will help researchers at Fukushima University measure radiation in the forests surrounding a nuclear power plant crippled last March by a powerful earthquake and tsunami. The monkeys will wear the collars for a month and they will be remotely detached, says a team of scientists led by Professor Takayuki Takahashi.

Continue reading HERE