Two words: Siegfried & Roy.

People who fool themselves into thinking they are in control of situations like this are indeed fools.

It's amusing how the "one species dies, opening the door for another" concept can be used as both curious archeological footnote or modern day battle cry for species preservation. I suppose the difference is that we humans are the cause of most modern species disappearances, and we don't ultimately understand how this will all affect us.

I mean, I love me some lions and tigers and such, but what would really happen if they all were gone? So many species are artificially supported already (even in the "wild") that their loss would be negligible on a planetary scale. Again, not that that's a *good* thing, just sayin'.

And the 99% number is not surprising at all when you consider the tens of thousands of species that existed on the planet from 400 million to 65 million years ago.

#6 - LOL

I wish I had the balls to get a vasectomy.

Who comes up with thee names? "Predator X"? You're joking, right.

Still, it would be no match for a Liopleurodon, which looks very similar but was close to 75 feet (!) long. It was the largest known predator ever, land or sea.

http://www.ivanstalio.com/immagini/Illustrazioni/Prehistory/liopleurodon%20ferox.jpg

It's so nice having a curious 3 year old to help me (re) learn all my dino stuff.

How come cool places like this are never, like, 10 miles from my house? That thing is awesome.

I have great memories of many Oingo Boingo shows from the late 70s and early 80s. That was a great time when they still did a lot of the costume stuff, as well as huge jams on their homemade instruments.

Sadly, I don't think their music has aged all that well. The motifs that Elfman became known for work much better in the later, orchestral soundtrack formats that Elfman pursued.

And #9 is right - the first EP still ruled over all the later stuff. It also had great cover art by artist Louis Wain, created during the later stages of his schizophrenia.

It's nice to see a model who's not rail-thin or emaciated for a change, too. What was this post about again?

I think it has less to do with even consumerism than entitlement. That's the #1 character flaw with young-ish people these days - thinking the world owes them something.

A former coworker's wife was named Lee Vallone. At least she married into that instead of getting smacked with it at birth.

I, for one, welcome our new Martian liquid water overlords.

I call the big one "Splashy".

I guess the country that invented gunpowder is still a little behind on modern fire-suppression equipment for high-rises.

These are wonderful. There's something very sinister and/or mysterious going on in a few of them. Very compelling to look at.

Solar Still ftw! Yeah, this has been in the boy scout manual for, like, a hundred years. Or at least since the invention of clear plastic wrap. Much more portable than carrying around a satellite dish-sized rigid plastic cone (which no one will bother with during the Zombie-pocalypse).

My friend Monica told me the bottom of the desk also has some stunning, intricate scroll-work.

It's a sad state of affairs when people's responses to seeing this type of stuff is "you think YOU have it bad?!" when in fact may of our poor neighborhoods are fast on their way to becoming this.