New Spineless Song and New Toolbar

I discovered a great site for musicians to host their music, ReverbNation. You'll take a gander at the fancy new widget under my Spineless Songs sidebar! I love it and it seems to work just fine for me, so let me know if you have any problems with it. I've loaded 15 in it for now, including covers of lesser known artists that I enjoy. You can also embed the widget on other websites, even choose the songs you want in the queue and get a special widget for those ones. I believe only the first 5 songs are ones that long time readers will haven't have heard yet.

With that, I'd like to introduce the newest edition to the Spineless Songs Series! I wrote Reef City (Click link for lyrics) for Deep Sea News fabulous Coral Week, going on right now! Its number 1 in the widget (the newest songs will be in the top spot). Additionally, I've launched a personal website with a song vault of EVERYTHING I have done, sciencey or not. You sign up for song updates via iTunes podcasts or RSS feed.

The World of Entomologists

Want to study bugs? Make sure you look at this public service announcement first!

Hat tip to SALP and the Penn State Entomology Department.

Circus of the Spineless Reminder

Deep Sea News is hosting the Circus of the Spineless this month. Due to their amazing Coral Week going on right now, they will be putting up the Circus on Saturday. So feel free to email submissions to kzelnio at gmail dot com until Friday evening.

Muddy Waters Anniversary

Today marks the 25th anniversary of the death of an amazing blues legend, one that I was influenced by early in my life when I was exploring musical tastes. His songs, still timeless, are played throughout bars, clubs and arena to this day and have become standards in blues music, but also jazz, rock and other genres. Invertebrates everywhere salute you Here is an excerpt from Blues Legacy:

Remembering Muddy Waters 1915 – 1983

The Classic Studio T label and Blues Legacy would also like to take the opportunity of commemorating the life and music of the legendary Blues artist Muddy Waters who passed on this day (April 30th) 25 years ago.

As many of you know, British trombonist Chris Barber introduced Muddy Waters to UK audiences in 1958.The outcome of the tour with The Chris Barber Band was nothing short of a magnificent milestone in history.The recordings recently discovered by The Blues Legacy are now available on The Blues Lost & Found – Volume 2 album and it is possible to find out more details and purchase online via: http://www.blueslegacy.net/

If you wanted to just hear a few Muddy Waters tracks for free, simply check out our My Space page: www.myspace.com/blueslegacylabel

Muddy Waters was a huge inspiration for musicians in the British scene and is known as one of the most influential artists of the 20th century. Not only did the tour with Chris Barber enhance Muddy’s reputation in Europe, but in turn, reawakened an interest in the blues from the other side of the Atlantic. Arguably, it was this visit to British shores, with Muddy on electric guitar, which led to the phenomenal rise of the blues explosion. We salute you Muddy!

I am sure he would want each one of us to honor his memory by getting our mojo working!

It's CORAL WEEK at Deep Sea News!

Its finally Coral Week at Deep Sea News! Its only been 2 days and its already chock full of awesome coraliscious articles, history, biblical references, videos and pictures. Make sure you bookmark DSN this week and head over there everyday this week to read about everyones favorite reef-builder. Articles are written by the 3 stooges of Deep Sea News, but each day brings guest articles by professionals in the field of deep-sea coral research.

Lophelia pertusa (white parts are the actively growing region) with the crab Eumunida picta. Photo courtesy of C. Fisher.

Calamari Thermal Gradient

So exactly how long does it take to thaw out a 495kg squid?

That is a good question. A few relevant details are that the thawing tank is a 10,000 Litre salt water tank. The 8m long squid is currently frozen in a block of ice.

Well it turns out that the best estimate by the folks at Te Papa were a little bit off from the original estimate due to a miscalculation of the amount of ice surrounding the squid. Still, they have adapted their schedule and as my Environmental Reaction and Transport Professor constantly reminds us, "What's a factor of two or three between friends?"

Follow all the developments and links to webcasts and webarchives at the Te Papa blog.

How Not To Use PowerPoint

Earthcast 2008 Reminder

Just a reminder that I will be a guest along with Rick MacPherson of CORAL and the wonderful marine conservation blog Malaria, Bedbugs, Sea Lice and Sunsets and Karen James of The Beagle Project and its blog on Jason Robertshaw's special Earth Day Cephalopodcast as part of Earthcast 2008.

You can listen in live at the Edtechtalk website (audio stream upper right sidebar) and join the conversation live via a chat room where you can ask us a question. Our conversation will be on the "The other 71%", our oceans! Tune in at 10pm GMT (6pm Eastern US, 3pm Pacific US time). See Jason's post for more details.

Inverts in the Ear

The Blieman brothers have put up an invert post about a tiny crab invading the ear of a friend with painful results.

This one touches a childhood fear of mine: an invert in the ear. Specifically for me it was a fear of a spider or an earwig crawling in my ear when I was asleep.

Scorpions? No problem. In my boots? Sure, whatever.

Tarantulas, yeah I loved them as pets (Much to Mom's chagrin!)

Earwig on my sleeping bag... Holy Sh*t! Get it (or me) outa here.

Fortunately I eventually outgrew that as an irrational fear, but earwigs are still my least favorite invert. Of course Ceti Eels in the Wrath of Khan did nothing to help matters.

Squid Workshop will be Televised

I mentioned before that this was a possibility, and with an overwhelming response - the Te Papa museum and Discovery Channel have announced that the examination of four giant squid (Architeuthis dux) and one colossal squid (Mesonychoteuthis hamiltoni) currently on ice in the Te Papa collection will be will be webcast. Additionally they will be filmed for a Discovery Channel documentary that will be released in late 2008.

The webcast will be live on the Te Papa and Discovery Channel websites: April 28-29 the four giant squid will be examined. On April 30th the colossal squid examination will be webcast. The seminars will be on May 1st and 2nd -- but no news on whether those will be webcast or not.

More details in Te Papa's media release.