Another birthday...

Happy birthday, GrannyJ!

Happy birthday

We had a post for the people celebrating their birthdays in April, but there are so many opportunities for some eye-candy and a bit of banter today, that I decided to have a special post for our dear Tumbleweed.

Imagine a cake:

Now imagine all these guys popping out of it:

Happy birthday, Tumbleweed! Drink and be merry, but remember:

I won't mention the other girl having her birthday party today...

Useful venom

Our friend Phuket Tom sent me some amazing videos of a deadly creature, the cone shell snail.

The first two videos show the cone snail in action:





In this third video, scientists explain the effects of the hundreds of different compounds that go into the venom of each type of cone snail, how they could be used as bio-weapons, but most importantly, how they can be used to develop new drugs to help control or alleviate the symptoms of many conditions.



Dr. Baldomero Olivera is a good friend of Tom's:

"The gentleman in the longest video about the lab in Utah is a good friend of mine, Dr. Toto Olivera. A few years ago he was named U.S. Scientist of the Year (I believe by Harvard University) for his studies of cone shell toxins and their possible use in human medicine - one of his discoveries is now in use and while more powerful than morphine has none of the side effects of that drug. In his research he has visited me here on Phuket several times, looking for additional species of deepwater cones in order to analyze their toxins."


Thank you very much for these videos, Tom. I find this research fascinating, tapping into Mother Nature's resources to produce drugs to help mankind...

Big Mac da Vinci

Get it right!

It's about time we had a joke. Mrsgunka has an endless supply of very funny ones:

I was in my back yard trying to launch a kite.

I threw the kite up in the air, the wind would catch it for a few
seconds, then it would come crashing back down to earth.
I tried this a few more times with no success.

All the while, my wife is watching from the kitchen window,
Muttering to herself how men need to be told how to do everything.

She opens the window and yells to me,
'You need a piece of tail.'

I turned with a confused look on my face and said,
'Make up your mind. Last night, you told me to go fly a kite.'

Thank you, Mrsgunka.

Irritated...

The GOP's War on Women is seriously getting on my nerves. I saw an excellent sign on Facebook this morning: "Keep your rosaries out of my ovaries." I decided to show a selection of recent cartoons about it.

When is it OK to use a swear word?

Grammy97 sent me a few examples of situations when it's more than appropriate to resort to certain choice words...

Thank you, Grammy.

For cat lovers

Yesterday we had photos of some very energetic dogs. I promised something for the cat lovers and here it is, courtesy of 1smartcanerican. As you can see, cats are too laid back to chase balls or take a dip in the pool...

Thank you, 1smartcanerican.

For dog lovers

View_From_Here sent me some great photos taken by Seth Casteel. Seth has a cool site, with many fantastic photos. Thank you, View.

Enjoy!

Tomorrow we'll have some cats...