mmm... bacon

astropixie has been baconified! :)


and to commemorate the occasion, i will share one of my favorite quotes from the simpsons:

Homer: Are you saying you're never going to eat any animal again? What about bacon?
Lisa: No.
Homer: Ham?
Lisa: No.
Homer: Pork chops?
Lisa: Dad, those all come from the same animal.
Homer: Heh heh heh. Ooh, yeah, right, Lisa. A wonderful, magical animal.

how many days are in each month?

as soon as i learned the knuckle trick, it was all i ever needed to quickly remember how many days are in each month! as demonstrated in the photo below, start with two fists. the leftmost knuckle represents january, then the valley is february, the next knuckle is march, etc... all the months on knuckles have 31 days. the valley months have 30 (or how ever many february has in a particular year!). very useful!


image found at top of the lawn.

calvin and hobbes in the snow

never get tired of calvin & hobbes.

venus and the moon over my 'hood

finally caught a few glimpses of the crescent moon and venus shining over my neighborhood of nottingham at the end of last month. lovely!





venus is to the lower right of the moon, although its a bit tough to spot in the small versions of the photos! oh well.

millenium falcon sled

i would love to do some sled riding with this: the millenium falcon sled!!


by the way, it sounds so weird to my ear to hear everyone in england talk about going "sledging."

while on the star wars theme, i'll share these funny action figures. you decided... obama or darth vader??

dick cheney helps economy?

once again, the onion finds a way to hysterically encompass many of the US's political issues into one solid headline:

Cheney Dunk Tank Raises $800 Billion For Nation


if only it were that easy (and that fun)...

physics turns me on

y tu?


get your very own here

snow creatures

in honor of snow finally sticking to the ground a little bit in nottingham... here are various snow creatures i've found pictures of around the web!

snow face from neatorama.







funny snowmen pics from unmc...







simonk at flickr...



mbryan777 at flickr...



snowman guarding... a beach! from extra medium at flickr



from chick-a-dee at flickr


carnby street - london!

stereo astronomy images

this is one of the cooler things i've seen in a while: stereo astronomy images created by J-P Metsavainio at astro anarchy.

remember those images from 15 years ago or so, that looked like spotty noise, but if you adjusted where your eyes focused, you could see a three dimensional image pop out?? that's what J-P Metsavainio has done with images of astronomical objects! he explains how to view the images on his website.




i remember the first time i saw these types of images at the ohio state fair. i couldnt figure out what everyone was staring at, but the moment i finally figured out how to "see" them and watched the statue of liberty pop out of the flat image - i was amazed!

now, J-P Metsavainio has created a very interesting method for imagining the 3D structure of astronomical objects that we can only view from one direction!