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September, 2008:

A Better Mousetrap?

rentokil mouse radarIt seems that the clever people at Rentokil have invented a better mousetrap [^].  The new and improved mousetrap has been dubbed The Mouse RADAR – Rodent Activated Detection And Riddance. 

Rentokil bill this as being a more efficient and humane way of ridding us of our small furry friends.  The Mouse Radar is a box with pressure sensitive pads in the base that detect when a mouse enters the box.  Once the “engaged” sign goes on, the box is sealed and a dose of carbon dioxide is released, sending the mouse into oblivion.  No nasty pesticides and no visible dead mouse. 

The Radar Mouse can even be set-up to send an email or SMS to notify trained “operatives” of the capture.

Zooillogix on ScienceBlogs [^] have an interesting discussion on whether or not the CO2 induced death is humane or not.  They also suggest that the next improvement to the mousetrap will be “a satellite-mounted, laser that vaporises mouse from space, using Google Earth as a tracking system.”  Now that’s what I call a mashup [^]!

Tesselaar Tulip Festival 2008

No sooner had I spoken about our trip to the Tulip Festival at Tesselaar’s last year, and Mrs CannibalRabbit is back there again.  Mrs CannibalRabbit took some wonderful photos of the outing – here are a few of the best.  There are beautiful spring colours everwhere, just what we need to lift us out of the winter doldrums. 

burgundy and white tulip

burgundy and white tulip

tulip field 2008
tulip field 2008

(Click on photos to enlarge.)

USA Financial Meltdown

The best commentary that I have seen on the financial meltdown in American, and the rescue package is here at buymyshitpile.com [^]

buymy

The idea behind the site is to allow ordinary Americans access to the same deal as the big banks.  From the website:

With our economy in crisis, the US Government is scrambling to rescue our banks by purchasing their “distressed assets”, i.e., assets that no one else wants to buy from them. We figured that instead of protesting this plan, we’d give regular Americans the same opportunity to sell their bad assets to the government. We need your help and you need the Government’s help! buymyshitpile.com [^]

In line with the deal that the banks are getting, the site suggests that the estimated value that you use should be what you think the asset is worth, not what you think you can sell them for.  All of a sudden Billy Ray Cyrus and Men at Work LPs have a value again, rather than having to pay to dispose of them!

After looking at it this way I have one question for you: Does it make sense?

Stubby Symphony

Those good people at CUB have managed to improve the iconic Victoria Bitter (VB) theme tune.  VB is probably the one beer that you can get right across Australia (we’ll have no Fosters here).  I’m not saying that it’s good, just that you can get it in any pub or bottle shop.

vb stubby symphony

Together with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, CUB have put together an ad campaign, and online companion site, The Stubby Symphony [^].  The advertisement features the MSO playing theme music by blowing or tapping Stubbies [^] or bottles of VB.

As the ads say: “… a hard-earned thirst needs a big cold beer you can get it … ” conducting an orchestra or writing a post, matter of fact I’ve got now.

Youtube has some of the originals – VB Ad from 1984 [^] from 1974 [^].

The Sunscreen Song

It’s amazing how you forget about songs, and then all of a sudden you trip over them when you least expect it.  That was definitely the case when I tripped over “The Sunscreen Song” last week in my RSS Reader – it was one of the big hits of 1997.  This is one of the songs that I remember having playing in the car while delivering pizzas, such a long time ago.  I would have bought it back then, but it was never released as a single despite the radio airplay it received.

sunscreen spf20

The backing music to “Everybody’s Free (to Wear Sunscreen)” can be heard in Baz Luhrmann’s “William Shakespeare’s Romeo + Juliet”.  The song takes the form of speech to graduates; a guide on how to get on in life.  The song is actually the work of Mary Schmich a journalist with the Chicago Tribune – the newspaper where the article originally appeared.

If I could offer you only one tip for the future, sunscreen would be it. The long-term benefits of sunscreen have been proved by scientists, whereas the rest of my advice has no basis more reliable than my own meandering experience. I will dispense this advice now…

Do one thing every day that scares you.

Sing.

Don’t be reckless with other people’s hearts. Don’t put up with people who are reckless with yours.

Floss….  (Full Text at onemansblog [^])

It runs for around 7 minutes, but we think that it is worth checking out one of the videos on YouTube – The Sunscreen Song [^].

Sources: Wikipedia [^], onemansblog [^], Chicago Tribute [^].