Says io9: “Two enormous, gamma-ray-emitting structures are bubbling out of the center of our galaxy. And astronomers have no idea what caused them.” That’s comforting. They do have an explanation for the enormous white brackets and letters and numbers, each of which is several hundred light-years across, but about the bubbles they got bupkis. That’s not what gets me, though: it’s the Milky Way. Suddenly it seems as if we really should have a better name for the galaxy. You meet some aliens, work out the language issues, and find out they call the Galaxy “The Hand of God Prime” or “The Torch of the Void” or “The Cradle of Light,” and then they ask us, and then they look at us with their eyes on stalks moving quizzically up and down and say, in their grating metallic voices, “The Fluid of Mammary Glands Road? Seriously?” And one of them spies a Milky Way candy bar – actually, he heard its distinct chemical signature as it underwent a chemical change when the wrapper opened, and this produced a rather dissonant change in the infra-red spectrum, which they usually reserve for tragedy and dark comedy – and he asks why that is named after the galaxy. Or if it’s named for breast milk. “It’s all about tits with you people, isn’t it?” And then we sort of nod and say, well, you got us there, what can we say. But what did you say you called Andromeda, the Comely Buttock? To each his own, then.
Also thoughts on colliding galaxies, and failure to us a turn signal.
The teams appeared to be evenly matched, but I think that was misleading. What those watching saw was a well-balanced (offense/defense) team play a team with a monster offense, and one of the worst defenses in the nation. Michigan’s offense made Illinois’ defense look much worse than it was, and their defense made Illinois’ offense look much better than it was, so it looked as though it was a purely offensive battle with poor defense on both sides. I have to say, though, that despite the score, Michigan’s defense was looking better than it had been, with some key stops (especially, of course, the final one that won the game by preventing the two-point conversion). Of course, it will have to continue to improve if they’re to have any hope of beating Wisconsin and Ohio State.
[Update Monday morning]
Without looking it up, I’m guessing that Michigan now has another (dubious) record — points allowed while still winning (65).
…finally won a game. And they only allowed the other team to score sixty-five points. People are going to look at that final score and think that they were playing basketball.
Prominent Muslim religious heads have expressed anger and dismay on the information of a US dog being named ‘Khan.’ Maulana Syed Athar Ali said that it is a known fact that Muslims detest pigs and dogs.
“To name a dog a Muslim name by US security agencies is to deliberately incite the Muslim community. We would be meeting soon and devise a strategy to protest and seek apology from the US,” said Maulana Athar Ali.
Yes, of course. It was a deliberate act of provocation. And just how angry are they? This angry.
Michigan is collapsing again. You can’t win games without a defense. The way they’re playing against Penn State, it’s not clear that they’ll even be able to beat Minnesota. They could go bowlless again. And that will be that for Rodriguez.
Well, there go their chances for the national championship. Barring a miracle, looks like no more undefeated teams in the Big Tweleven. They could still be conference champs, though, if someone else beat tOSU, and they can recover the rest of the season. Down 37-0 in the third quarter sure won’t impress many poll voters, though, or the computers.
[Update a few minutes later]
Well, they finally scored, but missed the two-point conversion, so now it’s only 37-6. They’re coming back! And it’s only well into the fourth quarter!