Day: September 18, 2012

Today marked the death of one Steve Sabol. You might remember him as the reason you missed a lot of classes in college due to his captivating voice on NFL Films. Sabol had the ability to make the 1-15 2007 Dolphins sound interesting. He was a great man who really captivated the essence of what the NFL really was.

We often get saturated with the NFL Network, ESPN and Sports Illustrated having way too many opinions and takes on the sport, but without really having good insight. Sabol was able to break things down to an understanding and intricate level, without sounding too high-handed about the deal.

NFL Films will carry on, but the voice that made us care will never be the same.
Continue reading

It’s expensive because the air is fresher

In Spaceballs, Mel Brooks huffs canned air. Like, straight-up huffs, as if it’s a brown paper bag filled with spray-paint or glue. The movie features a made up brand. Who would’ve guessed that the product would eventually become a reality?

In China, billionaire and philanthropist Chen Guangbiao launched his line of canned air. Each can of “Good Person Chen Guangbiao” (a trademark name that can’t be anything than fantastic) canned air is priced at the equivalent of 80 cents (American) and contains fresh air from Wuhe county in Anhui province and Taiwan.

Which means absolutely nothing to me. Should it? I have no idea. Write in and tell me if and why it should. The first person who does gets nothing.

Snakes. Why did it have to be snakes and spiders?

Guam, a tiny U.S. island in the South Pacific, is known for one thing and one thing only: a really nice golf course. Also: snakes. Ever since the brown tree snake was accidentally introduced to Guam in the 1940s, the species took off, having no natural predators and 12 native species of birds to eat.

Well, now Guam is down to two — count ’em: two — species of birds and plenty of snakes to go around. Oh, and did we mention spiders? Because, without birds to eat them, the spider population has exploded to 40 times more than that of other nearby islands. Scientists can’t even walk around the jungle without a stick to cut through the webs — they’re that thick, sometimes with dense swaths filling the gaps between trees.

So, the next time you see someone feeding the birds, shake their hand. That homeless person is on the front line, protecting us from a world of spiders, snakes and crawling skin.

The shark with a heart

Sharks have gotten a lot of bad press this summer, and it seems they know it. As animals go, humans are probably the most aware of the threat posed by giant killer fish that they can’t see in the water below them, so as any enemy propaganda would, the sharks are trying to make themselves look better. That’s why one of them saved a man’s life.

Near the South Pacific islands of Tarawa and Maiana, a man and his brother were sailing in transit from one island to the other, when they decided to fish and spend the night on the sea. This is where the story gets weird. They awoke the next morning to find they had been swept out to sea and had no fuel in their engine. While they had enough food, there was little water, and the man’s brother soon died. Days later it rained, and the man collected all the water he needed.

Three weeks later, he was awoken by a shark circling and slapping the boat. The shark then swam off in the direction of a ship that soon saved him. This sounds fishy. What’s most likely is that the rescued man was paid off by our enemies the animals to make it sound as if they saved him.

Nice try, sharks.