mdawrcn

http://siwild.si.edu/

Check out this website.

Smithsonian Wild.

lynnspotter

Happy Birthday to Tim42
http://www.thinkdraw.com/picture.php?pictureId=134381

Baldur

Happy Birthday to Tim42!!!, Jed Collins, Santonio Holmes, Chris Roberson, Derreck Robinson, Jessica Biel, Dusty Dvoracek, Mason Unck, Tyler Florence, Tone Loc!, Herschel Walker, Jackie Joyner-Kersee, Snowy White, Jennifer Warnes, Perry Ellis, Doc Watson, James Doohan!, Jean Harlow!, Kittens Reichert, Beatrice Wood, Edmund Lowe, Charles Ponzi, Alexander Graham Bell, George Pullman, Shiranui Koemon and King John II of Portugal.

sheftali52

Charles Ponzi--too bad Bernie Madoff is of the same ilk. Every era has its scoundrels.

Baldur

Happy Birthday to Zak Whitbread, Spencer Larsen, Sarah Stock, Cesar Morales, Crowbar, Lacy Rose, Chaz Bono, Wash West, Grand Puba, Jonathan Shearer, Yuri Lonchakov, Ray Mancini, John Mugabi, Mike Quarry, Bobby Womack, Don Perkins, Ed 'Big Daddy' Roth, Robert Orben, Charles Rudolph Walgreen Jr., Lefty O'Doul, Shemp Howard!!!, Knute Rockne, David 'Robber' Lewis!!, Kazimierz Pulaski, Jack Sheppard, Antonio Vivaldi and Henry the Navigator.

Baldur

Baldur uses Wikipedia to find the Birthdays for his broadcasts and must say that there was an amazingly long listing today on their site.
It seemed twice as long as any other I'd read.
This must be a popular day to be born.

Baldur

Happy Birthday to Katpedro, Jolene Blalock, Michael Irvin, Joel Osteen, Andy Gibb, Teena Marie, Penn Jillette, Elaine Paige, Eddy Grant, Murray Head, Billy Backus, Samantha Eggar, Fred Williamson, Dean Stockwell, Canaan Banana, Philip K. Chapman, Jack Cassidy, James Noble, Sir Rex Harrison, Zhou EnLai, Howard Pyle, King David II of Scotland and King Henry II of England.

Dragon

Dragon had an interesting (if tiring) day today. We had a dog with a foreign body in it's intestinal tract that needed surgery. Well I was the only one working with the doctor today and I've never really assisted with a surgery before. So we closed down a little early and prepped the dog then got to it. Amazingly the dog had swallowed a donut shaped toy that was quite large, the Dr. couldn't believe how far into the bowel this toy had gotten. In fact, he couldn't believe that it got past the stomach in the first place. Well, it was quite neat to see how he had to pull the intestine out to check it from one end to the other and how you could see the other spots in it where the toy had gotten stuck and made the tissue change colour and everything. Even in the time we were in the surgery we could see the tissue starting to look like it was healing so we're praying for those intestines to heal up nicely.
Now I'm going to go soak my sore feet in a nice hot foot bath. Ahhhh.

Baldur

Happy Birthday to David Flair, Ken Anderson, Shaquille O'Neal, Sean Morley, Tom Arnold, Rob Reiner, Kiki Dee, David Gilmour!!!, Mary Wilson, Kiri Te Kanawa, Valentina Tereshkova, Marion Barry Jr., Hal Needham, Gordon Cooper, Alan Greenspan, Wes Montgomery, Ed McMahon, Will Eisner, Lou Costello, Bob Wills, Empress Kojun of Japan, Furry Lewis, Ring Lardner, Oscar Strauss, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Cyrano de Bergerac and Michelangelo

Baldur

Happy Birthday to Larry Asante, Hatem Ben Arfa, Anfre Fluellen, Steve Beuerlein, Wanda Sykes, Taylor Dayne, Tommy Kramer, Lynn Swann, Ernie Isley, Franco Harris, Billy Joe Dupree, Peter Wolf, Michael Eisner, Tammy Faye Bakker, Willard Scott, James Broderick, Piet Mondrian, Luther Burbank, Henry Draper, John Herschel, Pope Clement XIII and Emperor Publius Septimius Geta.

marius

Okay, marius is having a headache. And, Baldur, please excuse this little rant but seriously, am looking for some clarity.

A few years ago my environmentally-minded spouse decided to try some CFL light bulbs to save energy. That sounded nice but since fluorescent lighting makes me nuts and always has I was not thrilled with his idea!

We tried some anyway. Unlike the overhead tube-kind of fluorescent lights, the CFL’s in our lamps did not seem to flicker and make the skin feel like it was crawling but the lights did not last any longer than incandescent bulbs and our energy bills did not go down.

Marius wonders why, of all the things that need to be fixed, people are messing with light bulbs?

So, I did a web search and heavens! It seems many governments in the world are switching to CFL’s. Check out this link. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phase-out_of_incandescent_light_bulbs

More searches led to the conspiracy theory folks. Haha, they believe CFL’s give governments the ability to spy, hear your conversations. Well, I don’t mind that because they’ll just be bored and if that appeals to them, okay.

But here is something I found at another site: The Environmental Protection Agency has a three-page manual describing how to properly clean up a broken compact fluorescent light bulb (CFL). The "before cleanup" steps include: "a.) Have people and pets leave the room. b.) Air out the room for 5-10 minutes by opening a window or door to the outdoor environment. c.) Shut off the central forced air heating/air conditioning system, if you have one." http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703445904576118530602868542.html

Can someone explain this to marius? It is making NO sense in her brain and also, the CFL dimmer lights are hard to find and do NOT work well. Oh, I love my dimmers.

Marius is thinking of stocking up on incandescent bulbs (which many people are doing) and then going back to the oil lamps. Or hey, maybe candles. : )

marius

Dragon, that was a really neat story about helping with the surgery. Thanks for sharing. Has the dog recovered nicely?

Dragon

So far the dog is recovering well, she seemed really perky this morning which is, of course, a good sign.

As for CFL lights, I'm surprised you didn't notice a difference in the length of time they last. When we switched we started getting at least 3 times the length of time out of them as we did out of our incandescants. Unfortunately I don't think I've ever seen any that work on a dimmer switch so I can't help you out there. I do know that they are full of some kind of nasty gas or something and that's why you have to air out a room if they break. You're also supposed to only dispose of them at a facility that is made to handle them because otherwise if they just get crushed they release that gas into the atmosphere and it's bad for the environment, so I guess it's one of those 6 of one, half dozen of the other situations.

polenta

Amazed at the quality of the Old Masters Showcase. Congratulations to all.

inked_gemini

Where I work, fluorescent lights are everywhere (although we are slowly beginning the transition to LED's). Dragon is correct about there being some nasty stuff inside of fluorescent light bulbs. In fact, we have to keep special spill/clean-up kits on hand in case any of them ever break.

The reason is that the nasty stuff inside of compact fluorescent light bulbs is mercury. That is why the EPA advises caution when cleaning up broken bulbs. It is a relatively small amount of mercury, but it's a great enough amount to harm small children or the elderly. The mercury in fluorescent lights is usually in powder form. So if you break a light bulb don't touch the powdery stuff--that's the mercury. They instruct you to turn off the air conditioner because you don't want your central heat and air system circulating that stuff through your home.

That's also why there are special recycling facilities for CFL's. It is all in an effort to keep the mercury out of the ground. I have not yet had any reports of a broken fluorescent light bulb, but the thought of mercury exposure is still a little bit scary. It almost makes you wonder if the benefit outweighs the risk....

Baldur

Happy Birthday to Amanti Edwards, Princes Tsuguko of Takamado, Kat Von D, Hines Ward, Freddie Prinze Jr., Cheryl James, Lester Holt, Aiden Quinn, Gary Numan, Carole Bayer Sager, Randy Meisner, Micky Dolenz, Lynn Redgrave, Pete Dawkins, Dick Hyman, Cyd Charisse, Alan Hale Jr.!!, Mississippi John Hurt, Sam Jaffe, Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., Carl Phillip Emanuel Bach, Anne Bonny and John of God.

Dragon

When I was in High School we had a mercury spill in one of the hallways. I'm not talking about someone breaking a thermometer, we had to evacuate the school and call in a Hazardous Materials clean up crew to take care of it. It was pretty big news in the city. For the rest of the year we proudly touted ourselves as the "Home of the Mercury Spill"

Baldur

Happy Birthday to Julia Mancuso, Clint Dempsey, Antonio Bryant, Chingy, Melina Perez, Emmanuel Lewis!, Michael Patrick MacDonald, Brian Bosworth, Rick Steiner, Mike Leach, Mark Dantonio, Jeffrey Osborne, Bobby Fischer, John Cale, Raul Julia, Mickey Gilley, Joyce Van Patten, Yuri Gagarin, Keely Smith, Mickey Spillane, Vita Sackville-West, Eddie Foy, Phoebe Knapp, Tsar Alexis I, Amerigo Vespucci and Emperor Go-Nijo of Japan.

sheftali52

Oh Dragon--lol about the home of the mercury spill. When Sheftali was a kid, she'd roll the little glob of mercury from a broken thermometer in her hand. Ackkkk......

Qsilv

Marius et al

http://www.wimp.com/lightbulb/

*winks from Q (whose electric bill dropped by ~half w/ new fluorescents in the shop!)