Category Archives: Science

And now, the weather forcast, with Charles Fort

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Fort's Greatest HitsFrom the often-accidentally-reliable Sun. I shall have Yavanna save me a BFO in the freezer for when I come over. How handy if the fish turned out to be something yummy; according to Charles Fort, they're virtually always pilchards or whitefish, though.

BRITAIN is set for a summer downpour of FROGS and FISH, scientists said yesterday.

Recent changeable weather conditions such as storms, droughts and sudden downpours have vastly increased the chance of objects falling from the sky.

Experts say the most likely spot for a BFO — “bizarre falling object” — is the Norfolk resort of Great Yarmouth.

The phenomenon is highlighted in a British Weather Services report.

Past recorded BFOs include jellyfish, frogs, crabs, fish and coal.

BWS senior meteorologist Jim Dale said the phenomenon can be caused by heat and air pressure coupled with atmospheric instability.

He said: “Converging cold air off the North Sea and warm air off the land make for the necessary conditions.”

Other BFO hotspots include east Manchester and Ipswich.

Admiral Akbar for President

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So this is our third celebrity campaign on the ol' raincoaster blog, and I have to say so far it's my favorite. Why? One word, my friends.

SQUID

Admiral Akbar for President!!! Squid!! SQUID!!!

Greetings and Salutations Global Citizen! 

For around twenty years now the fish faced shenanigans of the Mon Calamari known as Admiral Ackbar have been delighting we humans. Supposedly he was a great warrior and a mighty leader – that at least is what we are told in the Star Wars films. Yet his sole contribution to the almost disastrous attack on the second death star was to spin round in his chair,waving his flabby hands about, shrieking "It's a twap! It's a twap!". Anyone who witnessed the actions of Admiral Ackbar can be in no doubt – these were the actions of an idiot.Yet, contrary to popular belief, this idiocy was NOT a failing on the part of Ackbar. Nay. With his erratic arm movements and his absurd lisp, this Calamarian clown was actually attempting to boost the morale of the rebel troops – and just look at the results of Ackbar's watery wit. In one single day of sustained jestering, the Admiral managed to kill the emperor, destroy the evil empire and save Anakin Skywalker from the clutches of the dark side. Are these the actions of an idiot? We once thought that the power of the force lay with the jedi knights, but we can now see that it does not. The true power of the force lies with risible Vaudevillian comics like Admiral Ackbar.

VOTE ACKBAR

That is why we here at the UK offices of Finned Celebrities Co.(a subsidiary of Amphibious Actors(UK)Ltd.) believe that the comedic genius of Admiral Ackbar must be recognised now, and must be put to good use. Quite simply we demand he be made president of the entire world.

VOTE ACKBAR

Think of the rewards and opportunities that would arise for planet Earth if we had an oceanic bug-eyed clown ruling over us. Day to day problems like mass unemployment, a growing violent subculture, inadequate health care and the worst global economy this side of the Horse Head nebula would all fade into insignificance, for we would all be too busy laughing at the marine madness that is Ackbar.Just think – no more racial tension. All that xenophobia that seems inbred in we humans would be channelled into the ridiculing of the dome headed buffoon that would be leading our planet.

Global citizens unite – you know it makes (non)sense.Akbar Trading Card!!! Collect them while they're hot!!! Cuz ain't nuthin' so repulsive as cold, dead calamari

Manifesto 

(Complete and unexpurgated)

1. More fish for everyone.

2. Plenty of squid for just about everybody.

3. Erm…

4. I think that just about covers everything.

Operation Global Media Domination: Lost in Translation

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TIAWhen raincoaster checks the ol' raincoaster stats, she looks for many things: total hit count, most popular blog entry, signs of the coming Apocalypse…it's like necromancy, but you don't have to wash your hands afterwards unless you get very excited. Among the things that she looks for are links through which readers have clicked to arrive at raincoaster, the blog. And this one from yesterday particularly caught her eye.

It appears to be a Google translation of this post, a roundup of search engine terms that brought people to the blog. This is known as a feedback loop, and is sneakily effective in gaining new readers and hooking back the old ones, even if they were only looking for Narnia Mango Somali Porn.

Oops, I did it again!

Anywhoooo, the words on this page that were beyond Google's ability to translate were quite interesting. In the interests of creating a new, more selective feedback loop, and in the interest of confusing the Chinese, I will here list all terms in that raincoaster post found untranslatable by Google:

Narnia, Ian McKellen, Fatman, pervs, snotflower, creamer, ventibrevemocha, lattes, buggers, cholesteral, patchouli, eggnog latte, decaf, comin', Pablo, Sandford Tuey, raincoaster, voyeur, appy, tiaras, 9.11, WhiteSpot, Hogwarts, Deuel, Cates, vagina, spankin', Conference, shebeen, Wuthering, screencaps, jocari, Doktari, sumpin', slimin', spay, watchin'.

Did you ever do those assignments in school where you were supposed to use each of a whole snotload of words in a sentence? I was terribly literalminded, and always tried to get them all into one sentence, which drove my teachers nuts, but even I would have to admit defeat when faced with the above list.

FYI Here are today's search engine items that led here. I must say, we're getting better. Classier, weirder, and less Somali-porn-based. Some Somali trivia: You know Iman? When she left Somalia she took everything worth looking at with her.

beautiful agony, shit eating, dorks, eagle cam in Vancouver, Canada, Juvénal Habyarimana -site:africadatabas, Celebrity Censorship, jesus lego, birthday animation, cocaine corner, Giant Squid

Nuclear Reactor Assplosion: the drive to Oregon will never be the same

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Nuclear Cooling Tower, Trojan plantThe Trojan nuclear reactor is being dismantled. Assploded, actually. And road trips will never be the same.

How well I remember the first time I laid shocked, awed eyes on this behemoth of nuclear arrogance; it had been raining steadily in Vancouver for three uninterrupted weeks, and my friends Christi and Ken and I had decided to take a wee road trip south for shopping and general recreating purposes.

I don't know what the rain in Spain was like, but the rain in Seattle was exactly the same as the rain in Vancouver, so we just kept driving. At a certain point about halfway to Depoe Bay, Oregon, Christi, gripping the wheel a little too hard and her teeth also, hissed out the side of her mouth, "I hope you two don't mind, but I'm just going to drive south until I see the sun."

We did not think it an opportune moment to wrest control of the steering wheel away from her, nor did we think hers a bad idea in the first place, so we just nodded and continued to passenge passively.

Somewhere south of Seattle and north of the Oregon state line, I saw something looming out of the mists. I know it's a cliche, but some things just loom; this did. At first I thought it was a low-flying plane, because I could see a blinking red light, but as we got closer I realized there were only other red lights, at vast distances from one another, and that they were attached to a structure. A tower. A huge, Orwellian example of nuclearchitecture that did, indeed, loom out of the lead-coloured mists like the solidification of a Greenpeacer's worst nightmare. We just kept driving.

Trojan Nuclear Power Plant

It's not every day that I'm cowed by a building, but it was that day.

And never more:

In less than two weeks, history will be made when the cooling tower at the old Trojan power plant along the Columbia River is brought down.

I imagine there will be cheers. Unless they're a little sloppy, in which case there will be trouble.

Trojan Assplosion plans

The tower will come almost straight down, 150 feet off center, and far away from the radioactive spent fuel rods that are still stored at the site…

If you want to see the demolition, the best way to do that is from your own livingroom because there will be no public viewing spot. KATU News will be airing live coverage of the event on Sunday, May 21 starting at 6 a.m. The demolition is scheduled to take place at 7 a.m.

Mars Pathfinder NIN Animation/Music Video

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Yes, I know we've had a ton of videos today, but you MUST see this.

Awesome Daniel Maas NASA Mars Pathfinder Animation set to "Sunspots" by Nine Inch Nails (Trent Reznor) via Fark.