More True Science News Facts For Kids!
by: 'Doctor' Max Burbank

Hola, kiddoes! The ol' 'Doc' is back with a whole pantsload of entertaining new Science Headlines, facts, discoveries and other mind-blowing triviata so for God's sake sit down, suck on your juicebox a tad more quietly in respect for my MONSTER HANGOVER and LISTEN UP, DAMN IT!

SCIENCE HEADLINE! It seems a certain brick loving little piggy was WRONG! At least, when it comes to earthquakes. University of Nevada alumna and civil engineer Darcy Donavan's 14 by 14 foot 'House of straw' withstood multiple earthquake simulation tests where acceleration and shift were equal to or greater than... big earthquakes recorded by earthquake recording devices.

In related Science News, Dr. B. Badvulf of the University of Blowinrealhard Germany isn't fooling anyone with
his research into 'seriously low budget stage make-up' and it's 'impact' on making children's theater less 'gay'.

This raises several interesting questions, children. FIRST, What the HELL is Ms. Donavan's problem. What sort of terrible childhood trauma results in a need to prove a straw house is sturdier than a stick or brick house? What's next? My advice to long haired girls is WATCH OUT, RAPUNZLE! God knows what sort of weight baring device scientists are fixing to latch onto your braids.

ASTRONOMY NEWS! Astrophysicists based in Hawaii have discovered a very old Lymann-Alpha blob, theoretically a cluster of small galaxies becoming one single large galaxy. At the very edge of the known galaxy 2.9 BILLION light years away, that makes this phenomenon something that happened not just a long way off, but a phenomenally long time ago! For those of you youngins who believe, like the renowned anti-Semitism enthusiast and inventor of the automobile, Gerald Ford, that 'history is bunk'; THIS sort of history would be old enough to induce vomiting. In the event you are still not following, which I would wager is all of you but the Weinstein lad over there in the corner, the phenomena these Hawaiians stopped hula-ing long enough to observe took place almost 3 BILLION YEARS AGO, leading many scientists to ask 'Is this going to be on the test?'. To them and to you I say, even our own sun is eight and one half light minutes distant. Would you like to tell them what that means, Weinstein, or is your present level of ostracization sufficient? It MEANS, children, that our sun could have exploded some 4 and one half minutes ago and you would not know until four minutes from now at which point you would be blinded, liquefied and boiled to vapor in that order.

Some scientists believe that if this were an actual photo of our sun going nova, you would be badly hosed.

I tell you this, obviously, because I do not have to rock you to sleep at night. Incidentally, if it does happen at night, you will be spared blinding. Instead you will be roasted as the earths crust, and you, are propelled through the atmosphere at speeds well beyond those necessary to friction cook you like a wiener subjected to an industrial belt sander.

Apropos of that, here's an ASTRONOMY JOKE! What's more powerful than a massive Black Hole at the center of a galaxy? YES, YES, TWO BLACK HOLES. Oh, kids, it's so funny because it's so true. Astronomers Todd Boroson and Todd Lauer working together at the National Optical Astronomy Observatory in Tucson Arizona recently discovered that THEY ARE BOTH NAMED TODD!... Wait... I'm fairly sure that isn't what I meant to tell you. Oh. Yes. BLACK HOLES! Objects so dense with gravity, so massive even LIGHT cannot escape, huge sucking pits consuming everything not unlike you all, and I say this while fully believing that , as pre-crack Whitney Houston so eloquently sang "The children are our future". Hmmm. I just thought up another astronomy joke about Black Holes.

Anybody? Anybody?

Any of you kids wanna guess? Patricia? David? Ah, well, it's probably not appropriate anyway.

OBSERVATION is the basis of all good science, so here's an observation of mine: The Platypus is REVOLTING and evidence that the theory of intelligent design is FALSE! Or, conversely, that God is perverse. One good look at one of these disgusting clammy little beaver/ducks should assure you of one hypothesis or another. BUT DIG DEEPER TINY SCIENTISTS! FACT: The male Platypus can secrete POISON from a spur on its hind feet! THE FEMALE, not content with the appalling display of a MAMMAL laying EGGS, nurses her newly hatched spawn not through NIPPLES but through nasty little grooves in her BELLY! Remember kiddies, extinct is forever, so get on that.

SCIENCE FACT! With a Bunsen burner and tin foil you can make a crude cook stove, perfecto for Dad's Pad When Mom's Mad. If your 'pad' is a reasonably well-equipped science lab, like mine. If not, children, you are what we scientists call 'screwed' vis-à-vis hot food. If you have ever tried to brown hamburger by burning it repeatedly with the cigarette lighter in your '97 Subaru Outback, you know what I mean. Thankfully, you are all too young to be married, yes? If you are wise you'll stay that way.

SCIENCE QUERY! What happens when common Chlorine and Bleach are mixed? ANSWER: Groups of school children possibly exposed to Swine flu are rendered non infectious. Oh don't look so glum, I'm only kidding. None of you even seem symptomatic.

BRAIN TWISTER! If driving a hybrid makes you intrinsically better than your neighbor who drives a gas guzzler, what mode of transportation allows one to shame the hybrid driver? PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION! And that, children, is why the good doctor arranged to surrender his driver's license after what proved to be a very enjoyable shirtless high speed chase. But what method of locomotion will allow me to sneer with contempt at the holier than thou Greenies dutifully commuting en masse? MY OWN TWO FEET! Which explains my plan to be banned from the public bus lines after what I'm sure will be a very enjoyable pantsless trip downtown.

DEMOGRAHY STATISTICS CHALLENGE! What simple legal maneuver would greatly reduce the number of undocumented foreigners currently filling our nation's meat packing a fruit picking industries? ANSWER? Rescind current child labor laws. Now HIGH TAIL it, you hideous band of MISCREANT MUNCHKINS before my mood deteriorates any further. You all breathe too loud.