Cowboy Who?

New Cyanide and Happiness Comic

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You really just can't trust a guy with glasses and no hair.

Today's News:

Shortly after Japan's Hayabusa2 probe returned to Earth, JAXA showed off some of the samples it collected from asteroid Ryugu. Those rocks came from the “A” chamber of the probe’s sample capsule, which means they were collected during the mission’s first touchdown in February 2019. Now, JAXA has released photos showing the contents of the capsule’s “C” chamber, which it opened on December 21st.

We have not yet confirmed the origin of the artificial object (人工物). A projectile was used during the sample collection and it is possible that this is aluminium separated from the sampler horn at that time.

— HAYABUSA2@JAXA (@haya2e_jaxa) December 24, 2020

In JAXA’s tweet, it said the agency opened both chambers “B” and “C.” The “B” chamber is empty since it wasn’t used for collection, but the “C” chamber was used to collect samples during Hayabusa2’s second touchdown in July 2019. JAXA fired an explosive into the asteroid before the second touchdown to create a crater and be able to gather samples from deeper underground. Scientists are hoping that the subsurface samples can offer more clues about the solar system’s formation and early period, since they hadn’t been exposed to the harsh environment of space.

JAXA says the largest particles in chamber “C” were about a centimeter in size. If you take a look at the photos, the agency marked one of the particles as “人工物” or “artificial object.” It has yet to confirm where that object came from, but JAXA believes it could be “aluminum separated from the sampler horn” when it used an explosive on asteroid Ryugu’s surface.

Some smart people say we should be doing more to protect the Earth from asteroids. The technical issues are relatively easy. The economics — figuring out who's going to pay — are much harder. | Support our show here.

Although this year has been a rollercoaster, I hope you all have a very lovely and warm Holiday season. Merry Christmas and be sure to treat yourselves with kindness and a giant mug of tea ❤️

I don't have time for this right now, Red Robot.

I guess technically it was the best 2020 ever

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Have you noticed that we're afraid that anything smarter than us would feel obligated to kill us?

Today's News:

Just like libraries and businesses everywhere, ALB has finally prepared our COVID-19 Response Plan. Sorry it is late. We were busy. I was still reading all my vendors’ COVID-19 response plans. I can get a doctor’s note if you need one.

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Awful Library Books (“ALB”) COVID-19 Response Plan

We realize this is a trying time for everyone. As the entire world faces an unprecedented public health emergency, we want to be open about the challenges we are facing and the contingency measures we’re putting in place to serve our public at this critical time. Here at ALB, we endeavor to make your experience at our site as safe as possible. We also want to be totally transparent in our policies and actions given the global pandemic.

We have implemented the following procedures and policies to keep ALB running at peak efficiency.

All our posts have been sanitized for your protection. We even used that weird sticky stuff that you must let sit for at least a minute.

We also recommend wearing a face mask while viewing our content. When we say “wear a face mask” we mean it should cover your mouth and nose. Wearing your face mask only on your chin, or just hanging off your ear or genitalia, or in your pocket, does not count as wearing a mask.

Other changes we have made. ALB staff meetings will be held via Zoom, instead of at local bars. Alcohol will be required, both in hand sanitizer and in cocktails. We have both trained on these differences. We read this article.  We both awarded ourselves a continuing education credit.

We also made sure that we used the following words and phrases over and over in our correspondence per our communication policy:

• Unprecedented
• New Normal
• Trying Times
• Uncharted

We are also implementing a social distancing policy of at least 6 feet from people we like and 1 mile from people we don’t like. This is an update and clarification of our “avoid all annoying people” policy from 2010.

As many of our tasks and working conditions have changed, please allow us extra time to complete the following library-related tasks:

• Changing out of pajamas
• Finding our pants
• Putting on a bra
• Looking in the couch cushions for stray M&Ms
• Rage journaling
• Removing cat hair from clothing
• Stopping all the cursing
• Hiding under my desk in the fetal position
• Passive-aggressive email

In all seriousness, we all hope you and yours are safe and healthy.

We wish you peace, love, health, and stable library funding for 2021.

Mary and Holly

P. S. After the holiday, we will be publishing our best/worst of for 2020.

The post ALB, COVID-19, and the end of 2020 appeared first on Awful Library Books.

New Cyanide and Happiness Comic

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The fact that the universe clearly runs on complicated buggy code is proof that there are at least 100 gods.

Today's News:

1. Finish what you start

Resilience is a difficult skill to learn, so work up to it in small doses. Instead of watching the first three seconds of every Pinkfong YouTube video, make an effort to watch the entire minute. Ignore those trying to distract you from your goals. Isn’t it suspect that as soon as you start to climb the outside of the stairs your caretaker seems to require your help with some menial task? Keep your focus. Remember: no one will allow you to squeeze all the diaper cream out of the tube except you.

2. Eat better

Try a simple mantra like “More fruit [snacks], less trash [green foods]” to keep you on track. If you’re interested in a more complex and thoughtful approach, try the ever-popular toddler diet: refusing to eat something you previously loved for no apparent reason.

3. Move more

Run sprints in crowded parking lots, climb atop dining tables, army crawl under public bathroom stalls — it all counts towards higher daily activity.

4. Learn a new skill

Have you already mastered walking? Have you been putting a few words together for weeks now? Why not learn how to train your parents to offer you candy for successfully peeing in a designated location. But be careful: if you choose correctly too often, the rewards start to disappear. Remember to “Pee the 3 C’s” (corners, closets, and car seats) in order to optimize your reward timelines!

5. Do something that scares you

Watch someone vacuum. Visit a bathroom with automatic flushers. Let your brother wear his Wookie mask in your presence. Screaming in terror is not only allowed, it’s encouraged.

6. Spend more time with family

Family is the most important thing in life. Show your family how much you love them by zeroing in on their location like a heat-seeking missile whenever they are out of sight. Accompany your caretakers to the restroom at every opportunity. Insist on sitting on their lap. Stand outside the shower stall and provide insightful comments on their physical form for an intimate bonding experience. Later provide an invite to a 3 AM dance party. Caretakers are suckers for nostalgia. They’ll enjoy remembering the good ole days of not sleeping, even if they were only a few shorts months, weeks, or days ago.

7. Get organized

The new year is a great time to reorganize your living spaces. Return puzzle pieces to their separate designated locations around the house for safekeeping. Roll lesser-used matchbox cars under the couch, or strategically place them on the stairs for later use. Set a mental reminder to move the remote back to the bottom of the toybox every weekend.

8. Replace bad habits with new, better ones

For instance, replace unraveling the toilet paper with unscrewing lids. Instead of chewing on your fingers, try chewing all the sippy cup straws. Replace hitting or biting with pinching or scratching. It’s really all about simple swaps!

9. Rediscover a creative outlet

Inject creativity into your day in small ways. Doodle on your leg with a random pen some idiot left within reach. Redecorate the couch with a Play-Doh slipcover. Change up your look by styling your freshly washed hair with pancake syrup.

10. Pay it forward

Help others reach their potential by using your special skills. Help your caretakers learn a second language by immersion — refuse to “use your words” and only communicate in grunts and the three baby sign language gestures they taught you before giving up. Assist your older siblings with the challenge of learning patience by destroying their painstakingly constructed LEGO villages in seconds. Encourage the entire family to slow down and enjoy each other’s company by hiding the car keys in a saucepan in the play kitchen.

I don't have time for this right now, Red Robot

From almost the start of the Angry Video Game Nerd, there have been holiday specials. From riffing on Bible Games to destroying Home Alone games with Macaulay Culkin, the Nerd has had a lot of cool holiday moments. So, here's a clip reel to get you in the mood for Christmas right around the corner. The AVGN Holiday Memories from 2006 to 2020!!

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This month’s Undersung Scientist of the Month is Dr. Adám Lovas-Kiss of the DRI Wetland Ecology Research Group of the Centre for Research Ecology (which has been authorized to use the label “Hungarian Academy of Sciences Centre of Excellence”).

Dr. Lovas-Kiss’ is not entirely unsung, just undersung. His work has achieved some fame, much of it from the study “Whole Angiosperms Wolffia columbiana Disperse by Gut Passage Through Wildfowl in South America,” G.G. Silva, A.J. Green, V. Weber, P. Hoffmann, Á. Lovas-Kiss, C. Stenert, and L. Maltchik, Biology Letters, vol. 14, no. 12, 2018, 20180703. The discovery reported in that paper can be summarized in the slogan “Living Duckweed Gets Air Travel Passage by Internal Passage Through Ducks.”

[CAUTION: One must not mistake Dr. Adám Lovas-Kiss with another too-little-sung Dr. Lovas-Kiss: Dr. Antal Lovas-Kiss, author of the study “How dog owners perceive public space when walking their dogs?” published in: Mental Mapping. The Science of Orientation. New Approaches to Location – Spatial Patterns of the Global Economy Conference, Schenk Verlag, Passau, pp. 137-150.]

In the Footsteps of Shit Fun Chew

This is the first time Dr. Adám Lovas-Kiss has been celebrated as Undersung Scientist of the Month. Dr. Lovas-Kiss now has a chance to follow in the tradition of Dr. Shit Fun Chew, who was celebrated as Undersung Scientist of the Month three times—in 2004, again in 2010, and yet gain in 2011.

Dr. Shit Fun Chew was further celebrated in 2012 for her research study about certain turtles peeing-through-the-mouth.

“The 44th President of the United States has, as has become custom, shared his list of faves from the year as we head into its final days.” – Vanity Fair, 12/20/22

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Bowing to legal pressure from the supplement maker Herbalife, Elsevier earlier this year retracted — and then removed — a paper which claimed that a young woman in India died of liver failure after using the company’s products. The move has led to more legal threats. In August 2018, a group of researchers in India … Continue reading After legal threats from Herbalife, Elsevier journal retracts — and then removes — a paper

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The ratio of online posts about semi-nude instagrammers to posts about protein-folding having been solved would be a pretty good metric to assess society.

Today's News:

Dear Smith’s Food and Drug Shopper,

I couldn’t help but overhear your tirade in the dairy aisle as you loudly complained about how Land O’Lakes kowtowed to the “libtards” by removing the image of the “Indian” woman from its butter tub.

I would apologize for eavesdropping, but the decibel of your voice indicated you wanted us all to know the “PC Police are coming for our freedoms.” Assuming “freedoms,” in this case, means being able to look at a drawing of a Native American woman holding a stick of butter while eating that same stick of butter. And assuming PC Police are not a deputized group of individuals but rather a general shift in our collective consciousness away from exploiting stereotypes in order to sell products.

Perhaps I misread your tone. Maybe you’re upset about the lack of representation of Indigenous Peoples and are using your white privilege to speak on behalf of a group that for centuries has been mistreated by white Europeans and their descendants. However, based on how heavily you stressed the first syllable of “INdian,” I’m making assumptions. So shame on me, who’s stereotyping now?

You might be right that I am a “slave to woke culture” by assuming Mia, the Land O’Lakes maiden, is a stereotype. According to Robert DesJarlait of the Red Lake Ojibwe Nation, whose father redesigned her image in 1954, “Mia seems to have stirred a sense of remembrance and place" among many Native Americans who never objected to her representation. Maybe you only wanted to amplify their voices when you pivoted from butter to football and declared that to you, they will always be the Washington Redskins. You, a white woman of indeterminate older age, living 1,873 miles away from FedEx Field.

We could both be wrong, and Land O’Lakes told the truth when it said the logo redesign was to recognize the dairy farmers who make its products. Butter was never a part of the traditional Native American diet anyway. Particularly for the Ojibwe people, whose diets revolved around beans, wild rice, berries, and game meats. But look at me — telling you this as if you don’t know it already!

I was troubled to hear you threaten to take your business to Trader Joe’s, where they have resisted the “Strong Arm of the Left” and continue to sell their vaguely ethnic foods under the Trader Ming’s, Trader José, and Arabian Joe banners. First, it is my duty to inform you there isn’t a single Trader Joe’s in Edgewood, New Mexico. You’ll have to drive to Albuquerque, which is 60 minutes round trip, unless it’s rush hour, and then you’re looking at 90 minutes, maybe two hours. All for butter? It’s madness! Second, Trader Joe’s butter is just called “Butter,” not something racist and catchy, which I think is what you’re looking for.

I implore you to consider choosing another brand of butter. They say when God closes a door, he opens a window. Maybe that window is Country Crock. Or Kerrygold. Or Kate’s Homemade Butter, whose spokesperson is a little girl dressed like Rosie the Riveter if she decided to become a train conductor. It’s so confusingly American!

You seem like a reasonable woman, mask around your chin, yelling at your husband who stands silent, staring at the packages of ground beef thawing in your cart. Could it be you’re mad about something else and projecting that anger onto something more tangible, like butter? COVID-19 ravages our nation, we’re creeping toward the worst U.S. recession since the 1930s, and Netflix canceled Glow at a time when we need familiar comforts to get us through this interminable quarantine.

I want to assure you: you will learn to love butter again. It will take time, but eventually you’ll realize you don’t need a picture of a native woman kneeling in a field to enjoy butter’s creamy, churned goodness. Kind of like when Ruth and Debbie in Glow realized their conflict was never about Debbie’s husband Mark, but about a complicated kind of competition that permeates many female friendships.

As we celebrate this holiday season — whether it’s alone or dangerously surrounded by family who ignored the advice of medical professionals and traveled across state lines anyway — let’s focus on what we have, not what we’ve lost. I think your oversized T-shirt says it all — America really is the land of the free and home of the brave. And just a reminder that America is a capitalist nation that gives companies free rein to make changes to their marketing strategies to boost profits. Because most decisions are made in the interest of money. I hope that gives you some comfort.

Happy Holidays,
Liz Reuss

New video out. Trailer for Free Melly. A skit of our druid Asiago and her best friendo forever.

"Before I Go" from the Youtube Audio Library

New Cyanide and Happiness Comic