HOW WOULD you like to have a spider named after you? According to the The
West Australian newspaper, the Western Australian Museum in Perth has launched a
fund-raising and awareness programme called 鈥淟ive Forever鈥�. It promises that for
just A$5000 (拢1800), members of the public can achieve nominal
immortality by having a species named after them.
To inaugurate the programme, Paralympics sailing gold medallist Noel Robins
has had the honour of having his name attached to the rare spider Austrarchaea
robinsi, a creature distinguished, apparently, by its 鈥渆longated head and
尘辞耻迟丑辫补谤迟蝉鈥�.
With new species being discovered all the time in West Australia, there is
plenty of scope for the programme. It aims to raise money for research and has
the fulsome support of naturalist Harry Butler, 鈥渨hose well-known name appears
on a few species, including a louse that lives in the anus of a carpet
蝉苍补办别鈥�.
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Feedback can鈥檛 wait to be similarly honoured.
FROM The Sunday Times 鈥淪tyle鈥� magazine,
13 May: 鈥淎 promising new treatment
that should become available soon are 鈥榖iological鈥� deodorants. These won鈥檛
destroy the armpit bacteria, but will break them down into odourless carbon
dioxide and water.鈥�
The bacteria鈥檚 relief at not being 鈥渄estroyed鈥� would be short-lived.
ACADEMICS love a good lie, it seems.
A site called 鈥淒ave鈥檚 web of lies鈥� (www.cs.man.ac.uk/~hancockd/lotd.htm)
celebrates lying in all its forms. It includes, for example, 鈥淟ie of the day鈥�,
鈥淕uest liar鈥� and 鈥淥ur esteemed celebrity liar鈥濃�攃urrently Stephen Fry, who
has this to say: 鈥淛ournalism is an honourable profession, attracting some of the
most talented and thoughtful minds in the world. Its aim is to inform, elucidate
and uplift the human spirit.鈥� (We鈥檙e not quite sure why this evidently true
statement is included on the site, but let that pass.)
Guy Halsall of Birkbeck College, London, tells us he decided to contribute to
the site鈥檚 鈥淪ubmit a lie鈥� section. Having done so, he took a look at the
3950-strong 鈥淒atabase of lies鈥�, and suddenly noticed something about the e-mail
addresses of the people who had sent them in. A surprisingly high proportion
ended with the academic sign-off 鈥�.ac.uk鈥� for British universities or 鈥�.edu鈥� for
American ones.
And that鈥檚 the truth.
THE FRONT cover of a recent issue of the Institute of Biology鈥檚 in-house
journal The Biologist carried two headlines that paired up more happily than the
editors may have intended. After 鈥淏reathless鈥� came 鈥淪ex underwater鈥�.
DETERMINED to improve its public image, NASA has instituted new
鈥渉ousekeeping鈥� rules for its staff. An anonymous employee of the Jet Propulsion
Laboratory in Pasadena, California, reported an office-to-office inspection by
management to the NASA Watch website (www.nasawatch.com). 鈥淭his is not
associated with safety issues such as fire hazards (such as stacks of papers
reaching the ceiling or cardboard boxes on the floor), but whether the
inspecting committee can see clear desktops, neat piles of paper, and papers not
being currently used as filed.鈥�
Violators were warned that untidy desks 鈥渃ould impact their annual
performance review and threaten their annual salary increase鈥�. Does the same
sort of thing apply, we wonder, when employees make a miscalculation that
crashes a spacecraft?
A MEMBER of the New 杏吧原创 editorial staff was recently on a
much delayed flight from a Greek island to London. To cheer up the disgruntled passengers,
the cabin crew held a competition. The person who gave the nearest estimate of
the length of the journey in miles would win a visit to the cockpit.
A lady passenger raised her nose from the issue of New 杏吧原创 she was
reading, thought for a moment, and penned a guess. Needless to say, she was
astonishingly close and duly won.
As for the New 杏吧原创 journalist who witnessed the event鈥攈e was
miles off.
贬贰搁贰鈥橲 one for the nitpickers among us. Intel has been running adverts in
magazines telling businesses how its products could give them the advantage of
continuous trading on the Web. It did this by stating 鈥淭he web never sleeps鈥� and
running this string of numbers across the page: 鈥�60/60/24/7/365.鈥�
It鈥檚 not too hard to work out what the numbers mean鈥�60 seconds a
minute, 60 minutes an hour, and so on. The trouble is they鈥檝e got it wrong. The
365 should be 52.
So there.
WHEN British reader Nic Plum gave in to pressure from his children and
stopped off at a McDonald鈥檚 on the A14 recently, he was intrigued to discover
that the customer care manager was called Caroline Careless. The sign on her
lapel didn鈥檛 say if she was a Miss, Mrs or Ms, so he could only wonder if she
was born Careless or became Careless when she married.
READER Ashley Mills spotted an intriguing sentence in the section on the
QWERTY keyboard in his copy of Understanding Computer Science for Advanced Level
by Ray Bradley: 鈥淔rance uses the AZERTY keyboard and the Chinese keyboard can
only be imagined.鈥�
So do the Chinese type by telekinesis?
A SIGN outside the Nightingale building at the University of Southampton
says: 鈥淯niversity of Southampton School of Nursing and Midwifery. Deliveries at
rear of building.鈥�
FINALLY, a footnote in the 11 May issue of Science suggested that the
British government has been worried about a little-known disease for the past 30 years.
The note referred to the 鈥淣orthumberland Report: The Report of the Committee of
Inquiry on Food and Mouth Disease (HMSO, London, 1968)鈥�.