Category Archives: environment

more happy birthdayisms to me!

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Woohoo, if I were in Second Life, I’d be rich. I’ve gotten virtual hugs (*raises eyebrow*), virtual booze, and virtual cephalopods galore.

As faithful readers of the ol’ raincoaster blog know, we’re all about the cephalopods. Sometimes, however, we are torn: are we more octapussian or more squidilicious? Oh, how to decide, how to decide…

But now, thanks to some intrepid and possibly-mad scientists off Hawaii (their big project is vacuuming up random animals from the deeps) and the hard legwork of Frontier Former Editor, I can have the best of both worlds! Presenting the Squidoctopus/Octosquid! Ain’t she a beauty?

squidoctopus/octosquid

 

It’s a squid, it’s an octopus, it’s … a mystery from the deep.

What appears to be a half-squid, half-octopus specimen found off Keahole Point on the Big Island remains unidentified today and could possibly be a new species, said local biologists.

The specimen was found caught in a filter in one of Natural Energy Laboratory of Hawaii Authority’s deep-sea water pipelines last week. The pipeline, which runs 3,000 feet deep, sucks up cold, deep-sea water for the tenants of the natural energy lab…“It’s a beautiful squid. It’s a gorgeous ruby red color,” Kelley said. “We really enjoy these little mysteries that come up.”

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lollemur!

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Oh, why not? Like you’re surfing the internet looking for Protagoras and Meaning, eh? They’re over at Manhunt.

lollemurbaby

Also, bonus “hey, rare lemur triplets born” story tacked on to pathetically justify lollemur blog filler.

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pic o’ the day: Newfie iceberg of death!

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Newfoundland iceberg spine

First the facts, then the theory!

Yeah, this should really help the tourism industry, eh? Snap above, from the neighbor of the photographer, story below (link in previous sentence) from Canada East.

Marine scientists in Canada and abroad are puzzled by bizarre photographs that appear to show the skeleton of a large mammal jutting out of an iceberg that recently drifted past Newfoundland’s east coast.

The six pictures show what looks like a brown rib cage and spinal column, slightly bent, sticking out of a crust of ice.

But researchers throughout Canada, Greenland and Norway are unable to determine the origin of the skeleton, said Garry Stenson, a marine mammal scientist with the federal Fisheries Department.

“It’s definitely unusual,” Stenson said Monday. “It’s not something that I’ve encountered before.”

His colleagues have been debating whether the carcass belongs to a bearded seal, a walrus or a beluga whale. But without the actual specimen in his hands, Stenson said he can’t resolve the mystery.

“It would be really nice to get a copy, a sample, a hold of it, but at this point we’re not quite sure what it is,” he said.

The photos were taken near Newtown, in Bonavista Bay…”If it was Photoshopped, it’s a damn good job,” he said. “The way that it’s laying there, with what looks to be part of it underwater, looks authentic.”

Stenson said he was told the backbone was roughly 2.4 metres out of the ice, leading him to believe the spine belonged to a large mammalian creature.

But he is uncertain whether the animal would have fallen into a crevasse in an iceberg and then got stuck, or if it simply died on an ice floe and later became embedded by other pans of ice.

“It could be a walrus, for example, that died and is laying on its back and the pressure of the snow and the ice has flattened those ribs,” he said….

“Sometimes a lot of my mysteries never get solved,” Stenson said with a sigh.

Deep One, mid-transitionOh man, I hear ya. If I had a dime for every time I said that I’d have enough to go on cruise to Newfoundland.

Despite suggestions from the unruly mob that this could be the corpse of a bucket-mourning, suicidal lolrus, we at the ol’ raincoaster blog are in fact quite certain that these are the remains of the Byakhee that was reported missing over the Plateau of Leng more than sixty years ago. Would the owner please come to the information desk at the Kadathian Lost and Found to pick it up, preferably before the warm weather starts.

Newfies would be ill-advised to mount a scientific expedition at this point. VERY ill-advised. Not that we don’t love scientists: why, the last ones were delicious…

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United Nations invites Pivot Legal Society lawyer David Eby to Geneva

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Dave EbyUN agency invites Pivot lawyer to Geneva

David Eby to present on homelessness and Olympics

May 31, 2007

Vancouver – A United Nations-funded housing rights agency has invited Pivot Legal Society lawyer David Eby to Geneva to make a presentation on the impacts of the 2010 Olympic Games on Vancouver’s most marginalized residents.

Eby’s presentation to the Centre on Housing Rights and Evictions (COHRE) in mid June will be part of a larger workshop presenting final results from COHRE’s two-year study of the housing rights impact of international events, with a specific focus on the Olympic Games.

“I am honoured that this internationally recognized research agency has chosen Pivot to present on homelessness and the Games,” said Eby. “I will do my best to provide this international audience with a comprehensive report on Vancouver’s progress, or lack of progress on these issues.”

Eby has spent the last two years with Pivot studying the state of low-income housing in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside, Canada’s poorest urban neighbourhood. In 2006, he was co-lead author of Cracks in the Foundation, Pivot’s comprehensive study of housing issues facing low-income residents in Vancouver. In 2007, he was an editor of the Impact of the Olympics on Community Coalition’s Interim Report Card and is a member of the Board of that organization. Experts from the UN High Commission on Human Rights and UN-HABITAT are also scheduled to present.

“Given Vancouver’s experience with Expo ’86, I would have thought our governments would be more concerned,” said Eby, “but with just over two and a half years to go before the games, the affordable housing legacy promised in the bid process has yet to appear and through Civil City our city council is poised to harass and displace Vancouver’s most vulnerable citizens.”

Stops at the World Health Organization, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, and the Joint United Nations Program on HIV/AIDS are on Eby’s itinerary.

—–

The results of the COHRE study are announced June 14 and Mr. Eby is speaking on June 14 and 15.

For more information contact:

David Eby – Pivot Legal Society – (778) 865-7997

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About Pivot Legal Society
Pivot’s mandate is to take a strategic approach to social change, using the law to address the root causes that undermine the quality of life of those most on the margins. We believe that everyone, regardless of income, benefits from a healthy and inclusive community where values such opportunity, respect and equality are strongly rooted in the law.

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pic o’ the day: Venus and the Moon

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venus and the moon

It’s too bad we haven’t got a Dr Cornelius handy to interpret this auspicious-looking juncture for us. Does it mean that the werewolves will get laid tonight?

Photo from the ever-stunning Astronomy Photo of the Day. Click on the picture or the link to view it in full-size and astonishing detail.

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