Happy Apollo 11 Launch Day

It was a school day, but dad’s rocket was going to take men to the moon!

nine is a secret

Ravens have the unusual distinction of having different collective nouns depending on what the group is doing. A group of ravens or rooks feeding or hunting together is an unkindness, but a group of them watching something together is a constable of ravens. If they are chatting or conferring together they are either a conspiracy or a parliament of ravens… note that any group of owls is always called a parliament, which seems odd given owls’ (somewhat undeserved) reputation for wisdom and the notable lack thereof in most parliaments.

Like magpies and crows, ravens have a traditional rhyme.

One for bad news,
Two for mirth.
Three is a wedding,
Four is a birth.
Five is for riches,
Six is a thief.
Seven, a journey,
Eight is for grief.
Nine is a secret,
Ten is for sorrow.
Eleven is for love,
Twelve, joy for tomorrow.

Common Raven, two juveniles

Corvids are believed to be the most intelligent of birds, and the raven (Corvus Corax) is the most intelligent bird that has been tested to date.

Or to put it in a more traditional way: Tha gliocas an ceann an fhitich – “There is wisdom in the head of the raven.” You can see it in the whites of their eyes.

You need a flying motorcycle.

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Falcon 9 reusuable 1000m fin test video

This video’s got on-board cam and wide-angle shots of the entire flight. The landing gear catches on fire, which was apparently expected by SpaceX (later versions will fold up their landing tackle after liftoff) although a bit surprising for me at first viewing. This flight is to test a set of landing flaps they are calling “fins”.

SpaceX Dragon v2 revealed.

Xeni Jardin has pics and video at the Boing.

The Owl and The Pussycat

Fum (Smoke) & Gebra (Frost), the Internet’s favorite Cat and Owl, as animated .GIFs.

Black cat and barn owl playing together

Barn owl and black cat playing together

The Owl and the Pussy-cat went to sea
In a beautiful pea-green boat,
They took some honey, and plenty of money,
Wrapped up in a five-pound note.
The Owl looked up to the stars above,
And sang to a small guitar,
“O lovely Pussy! O Pussy, my love,
What a beautiful Pussy you are,
— Edward Lear (1812–1888)

There’s an archive of Fum and Gebra, but unfortunately Fum died of FUS last year. Gebra has a new friend, though, and a Facebook page.

Native American Chickens

No, not Dick Cheney.

The Boston Globe has some newly digitized footage of the New England Heath Hen (Tympanuchus cupido cupido) taken by the Massachusetts Department of Conservation Division of Fisheries and Game in 1918.

If you want to know what the Heath Hen sounded like before it was hunted to extinction in 1932, Arkive.org has more recent footage of the Greater Prairie Chicken (Tympanuchus cupido pinnatus), which is rapidly headed for extinction itself.

I used to bullseye womp rats in my T-16 back home.

“…the approach will not be easy. You are required to maneuver straight down this trench and skim the surface to this point. The target area is only two meters wide. It’s a small thermal exhaust port, right below the main port.”



I stole the joke from Jason Kottke.