currently reading: Jim Steinmeyer, Art and Artifice

Space has a smell!? Apparently, it's that of "pleasant welding fumes." Well, I'm glad we finally got that answered. I'd also like to know what DNA tastes like. If you just had a big ol' spoonful of double-helixy goodness. Somebody should get cracking on that.

I actually don't dislike the smell of welding, though I have had several traumatic experiences associated with it. Aside from setting my pants on fire twice, I've also nearly formatted my brain by hitting the trigger with my mask up. When they say "don't look at the spark!" maaaaan, they aren't kidding! It was probably the only time I've ever experienced being completely stunned. My vision wasn't affected so much, but my mind went totally blank for a few seconds. I just froze, completely aware that I was spacing out, but unable to do anything about it. It was like someone hit the pause button on the universe.

The new IKEA ad is pretty nifty! I like the old 360-degree spinning ones more, though (one two).

A few weeks ago, I saw a Japanese show about fish tank decorators. One guy made incredible terrestrial-looking landscapes using all sorts of grasses and shrubs that happen to grow just fine underwater. I'm not sure if it's the same guy, but here's a gallery of some similarly jaw-droppingly gorgeous tanks. I was inspired and promptly visited every fish shop in the area before becoming discouraged by my lack of money and ability and slinking back home. I spent the rest of the day watching TV and gorging on tangerines.

The most surprising part of the BBC's Life After People is how quickly all evidence of human civilization would disappear after everyone vanishes. On a geologic time scale, after just an instant there'd be absolutely no record that we'd developed intelligence, culture, technology... Maybe it's not so crazy to look for dinosaur relics on the moon. After all, it's quite possible that intelligent beings have evolved and become extinct in the past, only to be lost in the mists of time. Perhaps the longest-surviving remnants of the human race will be our vehicles on the moon or our probes drifting in space.

I was going to somehow tie that into these pictures of things embedded in asphalt. But hey, it's late, and I'm going on vacation tomorrow!