Wednesday, January 26, 2011

23 AND ME

My brother Lawrence participated in the 23andMe genetic profiling.

My world was rocked a little when I found out that my mom's side is genetically Scandinavian, Moroccan, and Spanish, while my dad's side is Russian, Polish, Pakistani, Indian, and Asian.

Check out these maps. The areas that are darkest are where my genetics most likely come from.

UPDATED: A message from Lawrence:
Not quite: First, the dark colors are where the population of R1a1a and H1o are larger percentages. It doesn't necessarily mean origin. Second, those are just the Y-chromosome and mtDNA, respectively. What's more important is what population we're closest to and, according to my DNA, I'm right at the nexus of Palestinians, Bedouins, and Druze. That location, of course, is Israel:

http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5136/5390526431_34f7914674_o.jpg

So, mazal tov! When archeologists find my bones 10,000 years from now, they'll know I'm an Israelite.





Tuesday, January 25, 2011

A SEAL SCREAMING LIKE A MAN

I nicked this from Ke$ha's site and was in tears. Maybe it's just been one of those days, but this shit is hilarious:



HAVE YOU SEEN?: ZEITGEIST: MOVING FORWARD

The latest installment in the Zeitgeist The Movie series came out today.

WHILE YOU WERE SLEEPING

(image courtesy of http://senorgif.memebase.com)
  • It appears as though 2010 was among the most deadliest years caused by natural disasters.
    "Some 373 natural disasters claimed the lives of more than 296,800 people last year, affecting nearly 208 million and costing nearly $110 billion, according to annual data compiled by the Center for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters (CRED) of the Université catholique de Louvain in Belgium, and supported by the UN International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (UNISDR), the UN body charged with helping coordinate efforts to achieve substantive reduction in disaster losses and build resilient nations and communities."
  • The terror reigns in Mexico as the drug cartels continue to cause needless murders throughout the country. In Juarez, seven men were assassinated by Mexican drug dealers while playing soccer and appeared to hold not ties to the drug cartels in the northern part of the country.
  • Russian President Medvedev chastised the security and management team of the Domodedovo Airport in Russia after a suicide bombing caused the death of approximately 35 people.
  • The food industry will be introducing new labeling to let you know how much you should regret eating that cookie.
  • Indonesia is jumping onto the crop circle craze about 20 years too late. A crop circle was discovered. Authorities suspect human intervention. Duh.

Monday, January 24, 2011

STUPID CUTE FACES

If you can't get any work done today because you're too busy looking at their faces, you can blame @karenplusone.

WHILE YOU WERE SLEEPING





HAVE YOU SEEN?: CAT'S EYES

A few years ago, in a life long ago, Stolen Transmission (my now defunct record label) signed The Horrors. I love The Horrors.

The singer, Faris Badwan, launched a new band (in addition to the horrors) called Cat's Eyes and filmed the video for the song "I Knew It Was Over," from their first gig which at the Vatican. NO BIG DEAL.

more info at gigwise. video below. thanks @karenplusone for the link:

Thursday, January 20, 2011

ASTROPHYISCS!!!!!

Last night, my friend Robin Monheit, I attended The Secret Science Club at the Bell House which featured the amazing Astrophysicist Charles Liu. Astrophysics is my favorite kind of physics after quantum and particle, but after watching the amazingly hilarious, informative, and delightful Charles Liu... i may have to rethink that. The place was PACKED. At least 300 people, standing room only, and quiet enough to hear a pin drop. The crowd was filled with the kind of people you might expect at like, a Warpaint show... not the type of folk you might expect at a science lecture. Are science lectures the new indie rock show? Fuck, i hope so.

There's video of the lecture below -- 1 minute segments because that's how my G1 works... but the video also includes me on stage singing a couple songs with Liu. Kind of surreal. I was as excited about that as I was when AndrewWK put me up on his shoulders during one of his shows in 2003.

Anyway, I asked people to submit #astrophysicspickuplines on twitter. Here are the entries (including my own):

sarah lewitinn
I want to get theoretically physical with you and let you explore my clusters... maybe even my black hole.
Rosemary Gonzalez
RT @: I want to matter to you.
Kevin DeStefan
@
@ I'm CERN your bosons are giving me a raging Hadron.
A Second City Saint
@ let's go & play "Large Hadron Collider": you shoot your proton beams & make my particles accelerate
Danny Gonshor
Imma let you finish, as soon I spontaneously combust all up in you

Tom Fiffer
@
@ @ Sure, size matters, but everything is relative
David Capogna
RT @: I Wanna Some Of Your Phi!
Tom Fiffer
@
@ @ You're going out a white dwarf, but you're coming back a star!

Tom Fiffer
@
@ @ Is your universe expanding, or is that just a slide rule in your pocket?
Tom Fiffer
@
@ @ Can I show you my particle accelerator?
Allan M
@ "Hey baby, what's your sine?"
sarah lewitinn
I want to feel your skin before I see it (because light travels at 108,000 miles/hr). @
sarah lewitinn
I want to matter to you.

Johnny McDaid
@
@ ' I'm sensing some really dark energy between us...will you sleep with me?'
Johnny McDaid
@
@ 'who took the stars from the sky and shoved them up your ass?'.
Johnny McDaid
@
@ ok so how about 'Uranus is my favourite planet.'

sarah lewitinn
Show me your antimatter.
Justin Warfield
@
@ "is that a flux capacitor in your pocket, or...."
Aaron Steinbach
@
@ "hi, I like super-novas, do you?"
chantal claret
@ I have this big bang theory that I wanna test out with your help.
»
chantal claret
@ I like your pi's
Tom Fiffer
@
@ @ Can I show you my particle accelerator?
Maria Garcia
@
@ "I'd love to be the tangent to your curves"
chantal claret
@
@ come with me if you have a thing for white dwarfs with black holes




And here are the videos:
























These next bunch of videos are of me on stage singing Astrophysics songs with Charles Liu: