Real-Life Weirdness

[dcarson]

This has to be a powerful mystic artifact https://www.spacecowboyrevolver.com

[Icelander]

Originally Posted by dcarson

This has to be a powerful mystic artifact https://www.spacecowboyrevolver.com

It's beautiful, but how heavy are those grips?

Does it balance well in the hand?

[Dr. Beckenstein]

No job is safe any more.

In Dresden (Saxony), they presented the world a robot conductor.

With 3 arms!

[William]

If I were a musician in that orchestra I might have mutinied.

The Hattusa Bronze Tablet is a cuneiform-inscribed bronze table from about 1235 BC, recording a treaty between the Hittite king Tudhaliya IV and a new vassal, laying out the land provided to the latter and his levy responsibilities in return.

So we have an ancient contract, in a dead language, written on metal (not iron), and for some mysterious reason having chains (!?) attached to it - and one that is fairly hefty at that, and the image suggested to me one much larger, the size of a man. Surely something of great, err, historic interest for your scholarly PC to read!

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by dcarson

This has to be a powerful mystic artifact https://www.spacecowboyrevolver.com

Yeah, I posted about that in this thread last year (although considering the thread is getting close to 3000, one can certainly be forgiven for not seeing and/or remembering everything from it). As noted in that post, the Space Cowboy isn't the first fully-functional firearm to be made from the Gibeon meteorite, but it's a much more attractive specimen to my eye.

It's also a good reminder of how interesting the Widmanstätten pattern is, which may be useful for identifying meteoric metals in settings where being such confers special properties.


For my own contribution, scientists have managed to grow a plant from a 1000 year old seed (which isn't a new feat - they've previously managed it with even older seeds) in part because they were having difficulty identifying the species. And in the process, they may have rediscovered what the Bible called the balm of Gilead.

[cptbutton]

Wyoming rangers stop blowing up dead horses due to wildfire risk

In less extreme times, the US Forest Service routinely blows up carcasses of fallen horses – after removing horseshoes to minimize the hazard from flying metal debris – to prevent gatherings of ravenous grizzly bears that frequent Wyoming’s open spaces.

The service follows directions from its own manual, Obliterating Animal Carcasses With Explosives, detailing best practices for detonating horses, moose and mules.

[RyanW]

Originally Posted by cptbutton

The service follows directions from its own manual, Obliterating Animal Carcasses With Explosives

It's a cookbook! It's a cookbook!

[William]

Following up on the new Mozart, we now have new Bram Stoker: a short story called Gibbet Hill, found in a collection overlooked by his catalogers.

People familiar with D&D's "Ravenloft" setting, with its many Domains arranged around the central Domain of Barovia focused on the vampire Strahd von Zarovich, might find it amusing to have Gibbet Hill be a brand new Domain suddenly appearing themed around this story. What mystic ties there are to the writing of an author in some distant world (and the awareness of a given work by the general public) would, of course, remain mysterious.

[Varyon]

Originally Posted by cptbutton

Wyoming rangers stop blowing up dead horses due to wildfire risk

Sky Burial Speedrun 100%.

I'm assuming the reason this prevents the gathering of the Council of Bears is that, with the body now in tiny bite-sized pieces, scavengers can make quicker work of it than if it were still a whole horse. I also can't help but imagine the local scavengers in Wyoming have a habit of making their way toward the sound of explosives rather than running away.

[ravenfish]

Originally Posted by Varyon

I also can't help but imagine the local scavengers in Wyoming have a habit of making their way toward the sound of explosives rather than running away.

"In the absence of other orders, always march towards the sound of the cannons."