Creepy critters
SHOULD a visitor to North Carolina鈥檚 backwoods report the existence of giant, glowing pink squirrels, you might be forgiven for thinking they had been on the moonshine. But it is no joke. If you go down to the woods tonight, equipped with a UV light, you are quite likely to get a big surprise.
The eastern part of the state is famous for its fox squirrels, which can stand 65 centimetres tall. As if that weren鈥檛 disconcerting enough, state biologists report that many have a genetic condition that makes their fur glow a spectral pink under UV light.
Called congenital erythropoietic porphyria, in people it can cause hypersensitivity to sunlight and has been suggested as an explanation for the origin of vampire legends. Although if vampires were pink glowing furballs with a penchant for nuts, we might not find them so scary.
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Silver service
AN APARTMENT building in Massachusetts has been evacuated after a resident melted down his grandfather鈥檚 collection of dental fillings.
鈥淲hoosh! India鈥檚 new high-speed train looked impressive in a video posted by railways minister Piyush Goyal 鈥� until users pointed out the clip had been sped up to twice normal speed鈥�
Local news channel CBS Boston reports that the man thought the fillings, gathered during his grandfather鈥檚 career as a dentist, contained silver. But they actually contained mercury, which the amateur alchemist vaporised, landing himself and two other residents in hospital.
In-the-red planet
COMING down to Earth with a bump: Mars One, the commercial arm of the reality television show/Martian colonisation project is bankrupt. Over more than seven years, Mars One garnered headlines and huge public interest, though no space travel, with the promise to send 20 humans on a one-way trip to the Red Planet.
Sadly, it seems that populating the first graveyard on Mars is no easy feat. A proposal to fund the mission by selling the documentary rights 鈥� a commission so eye-wateringly expensive it would have made Game of Thrones seem very cheap 鈥� fell through, and a crowdfunding effort to raise money for a Martian orbiter and lander petered out at $313,000. By comparison, Mars Express, a European Space Agency lander and orbiter, had what was often called a shoestring budget 鈥� of $345 million.
It can only be a matter of time until an unflattering documentary lays out the saga, a sort of interplanetary Fyre festival with wannabe Martians instead of models. Which funnily enough, is something we think is definitely worth watching.
Fighting dirty
THE cable TV show Fox & Friends has something of a reputation as a purveyor of alternative facts 鈥� inviting disgraced clinician Andrew Wakefield to air his views about vaccines, for example. Even so, host Pete Hegseth raised eyebrows by disavowing the existence of germs live on air. 鈥淚 don鈥檛 think I鈥檝e washed my hands for 10 years,鈥� the anchorman told viewers. 鈥淩eally. I don鈥檛 really wash my hands. I inoculate myself鈥� germs are not a real thing. I can鈥檛 see them, therefore they鈥檙e not real.鈥�
The idea that being unable to see something means it doesn鈥檛 exist is a view we have all held, though 38-year-old Hegseth has held onto it for 36 years longer than most. Yet faster than you can say 鈥渇ake news鈥�, Hegseth said he was satirising the loony left and their preoccupation with germs. Er鈥� take that, liberals!
Extra longs
CIGARETTE smokers in Hawaii might have to wait a long time to get their fix, if a local law-maker gets his way. Democrat representative and medical doctor Richard Creagan has proposed raising the smoking age to 100.
Creagan鈥檚 proposition would see the age limit rise from 21 now to 30 next year, and then by a decade every year until 2024, when it would jump to 100. Presumably, anybody that old is unlikely to live long enough to succumb to many of the ill effects of cigarettes, but they might have to suffer pleading from 50-year-old grandchildren to buy them some.
Tipping the scales
THE Australian Bureau of Meteorology is pushing unusual units to new heights, informing Patrick Murphy via its Facebook page that 鈥渞oughly 16,000 cubic metres of water is currently flowing over Burdekin Falls Dam in Queensland every second, the equivalent of 16,000 fully grown saltwater crocodiles being flushed down the river every second鈥�.
We鈥檙e not sure the terrifying mental image of 16,000 tonnes of fangs, reptilian muscle and armoured skin tumbling over a weir every second is actually any easier to grasp than 16,000 cubic metres of water, but we know one thing: the two don鈥檛 feel equivalent at all.
Pushing their buttons
鈥淲E ARE confident that thousands, if not millions of couples will realize benefit from using LoveSync.鈥� So say Ryan and Jenn Cmich, who are seeking backers to fund an electronic device that promises to improve your sex life.
It features two buttons. Press yours to surreptitiously signal your amorous desires. If your partner also presses their button within a set time, bingo, LoveSync alerts you to the fact that you are both in the mood.
Truly there is an app for everything, even couples who are too shy to hit on each other. After all, is there anything more romantic than the phrase 鈥淒esire may be canceled using a 4 second button hold鈥�?
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