Drawing You In

Howdy all you Steeplechasers of Inquisitiveness running around the Track of Knowledge, leaping the Hurdles and Water Hazards of Obfuscation, to win the Gold Medal of Truth! Baba Doodlius here, with a Revelation of another Mystery of the Universe!

• Seriously, humans, what's up with that "steeplechase" thing? It sure seems like a strange athletic event, running around jumping over walls and pools of water. Throw in some crocodiles, vine swinging, and gold bars and you could call it "Pitfall".

Left: Steeplechase now. Right: Steeplechase made more interesting by adding vines and crocodiles.

As you may have noticed, I have athletics on my mind lately, ever since a friend told me that I should watch these "Olympic Games" that you humans love so much. I started watching, and I had not been able to tear my eyes away until the closing ceremonies were over. The things you humans do are just fascinating! And it's not just the performances - even coming up with some of the events took some serious human ingenuity. I mean really, only humans could have come up with "Rhythmic Gymnastics" - what the heck are they doing, jumping around with a big ball or a ribbon on a stick? I never would have even thought to do anything like that, and humans make a world-wide contest out of it! And I'm not even going to get into the global geopolitical ramifications of "Synchronized Diving".


Left: She's doing something called "Rythmic Gymnastics". Right: I'm not really certain what these guys are trying to do.

Everyone has their favorite events, and I don't mean to belittle anyone's preferences, but like most humans I have mostly been paying attention to the "marquee events", like swimming, track & field, gymnastics, and basketball. For those of you who have not been paying attention, I shall hereby summarize each of these event categories:

• Swimming. From the press coverage, I'm pretty sure there was only one serious competitor in the pool at this Olympics, and his name is Michael Phlippers. He won every event, including the Women's 4x8000 Meter Blorkstroke.


• Track & Field. Jamaicans run faster than any other humans. In fact, one of them called Usain "Lightning" Bolt (I swear I did not make that name up) actually runs faster than most horses and a more than a few gazelles.


• Gymnastics. The citizenry of China is stronger and more agile than everybody else on the planet, making the other countries' gymnastics contestants look like a bunch of seasick porcupines.


• Basketball. The United States men's team is made up of freaks of nature who can jump over adult male African elephants and won all of their games by a combined score of 3,176 to 25.

So these Olympics are not so much about human versus human contests - its more like a series of utterly dominating performances. So the Olympic Spirit is not really about beating your fellow humans, it's more about competing against the very Laws of Nature. Frequently the worst law for competing against would be the Law of Gravity, which tends to make the primary Olympic activities like running, jumping, and throwing hugely difficult. And with Gravity we have a Serious Mystery of the Universe!

Right now you might be thinking "There's no Mystery about Gravity. Sir Isaac Newton figured most of it out over 300 years ago and Einstein pinned it down about 100 years ago, so there's no room left for any Mystery at all!" Well lah-tee-dah, just who's the Mystery expert around here anyway? It just so happens that Gravity is one of the most enduring Mysteries in all of science! It's such a tough Mystery that most physicists won't even ask the big question


Just What the Heck Is Gravity, Anyway?


Think about it: two objects are mysteriously drawn towards each other, even if they are separated by billions of kilometers! Under extreme circumstances, like near a Black Hole, even light cannot escape the inexorable pull of this spooky force. Sure, thanks to Newton we can describe how Gravity works, and Einstein said Gravity is caused by massive objects denting space-time like a big dude on a trampoline, but nobody in the world really knows WHY it works like it does. What kind of force is so incredible that it could bend the very fabric of the Universe?


An illustration of Gravity: Imagine the big guy in the middle is the sun, and space is the trampoline. Not hard to see that things are gonna get sucked right down into the middle, eh?

One of the big projects in science right now is to detect "gravity waves", which, if Einstein was right, would be produced by such common things as two black holes orbiting each other. Currently there is a herd of science-type folks out there hard at work looking for these waves - and by "hard at work" I mean "they're spending a veritable assload of money designing instruments sensitive enough to detect them". Finding gravity waves would yield great insight into the true nature of gravity, but so far scientists have had no luck in this cosmic endeavor.

Being of such curious nature, I decided to take my super-duper Bird Cam out, take some close-up pictures of orbiting black holes, and see if I could use my unique analysis skillz to get to the bottom of this whole gravity wave Mystery.

So here's a pic I took of some orbiting black holes, about 7 billion light years from Earth. (I have one hell of a zoom lens!)


Two orbiting black holes, magnified about 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 times.

Not much to look at, really. There are no obvious signs whatsoever of any gravity waves. But the Universe is no match for my photo enhancement ability! If there's a gravity wave in there, I'll find it!

Let's see... change the brightness a little... tweak the saturation... add some color for contrast and visual effect... aaaaaand voila!

A Gravity Wave is clearly visible! What's more, the shape of that wave reveals the True Nature of Gravity, a force capable of altering the curvature of the Universe itself!



Gravity Waves are heart-shaped, leading one to the inescapable conclusion that

Gravity = Love!

That's right, the reason that every object in the Universe tries to get closer to every other object is because they all love each other! The entire Universe is nothing but one big-honkin' group hug of epic proportions!

Those who say that "Love makes the world go 'round" are exactly, scientifically correct. So c'mon all you humans - let's stop with the hate and war and violence against each other and just let Gravity take its course!

And in the spirit of the day, I hereby refuse to fight Gravity/Love by not going to the gym to lift weights tonight. The Way of Love is a whole lot less tiring, but also much less likely to lead to me getting any Olympic medals. Guess I'll just leave that to Mr. Phlippers.

Water on the Brain

Howdy folks. I am posting today not to reveal a Mystery of the Universe, but rather because I have a Mystery I cannot definitively solve. This Mystery is so confounding that without concrete evidence I honestly can say that I have exactly zero idea what the solution to it is.

This Mystery concerns that little event which you humans periodically hold which you call the Olympic Games. Not being a human and also not being of a particularly competitive nature, I would normally not have a huge amount of interest in such activities, but a human friend of mine told me today that there was something I should see. He pointed me the following web page containing an interesting story and accompanying video clip:

Men's 4 x 100 Meter Freestyle Relay

If you haven't seen this race, I have to suggest that you do so. Not being an aquatic bird, I don't swim at all, and I have no particular desire to watch humans swimming most of the time, but I took my friend's advice and watched the video of this race and I have to say that my appreciation of human accomplishments grew dramatically in the 3 minutes or so the race took to complete.

In case you didn't watch the race or read about it, here's the Reader's Digest version:

This relay race, with each 4-member team swimming a total of 400 meters, was completed by the winning team from the United States in 3 minutes, 8.24 seconds. The second place team from France finished in 3 minutes 8.32 seconds. That's a scant 0.08 seconds separating first and second place. The previous world record was 3 minutes, 12.23 seconds. So both of the first two finishers beat the previous world record by nearly 4 seconds.

World records are generally very, very hard to eclipse. This is the way it ought to be, really - nobody in the history of history has ever done activity X as fast as that, so going even faster should be very difficult. Breaking one by four seconds in a fairly short race is an accomplishment of Herculean proportions! The thing with this particular swimming race was, not only did the first two teams break the old world record (by a huge margin), but a total of five teams broke it! That's' right, even the team that finished in fifth place was faster than anybody who ever swam it before. At four swimmers per team, that's a grand total of 20 humans who were faster than anybody had been in history! Even the team that finished in eighth place was fast enough to have won the Gold Medal in the Olympics of four years ago!

So what's the Mystery of the Universe in all this, the one that even the Great and Powerful Baba Doodlius cannot solve? Here it is:


How the heck can all those guys get so damn fast all of a sudden, and all at the same time?


C'mon people, it's almost embarrassing how seemingly easy it was to break that world record! From the perspective of someone unfamiliar with that whole 'swimming' thing, I'd have to say that if I had tossed a bunch of deformed chimpanzees into the pool next to those guys they would have had at least an outside shot at breaking the old record.

I have a couple of theories about the cause of this huge performance improvement, neither of which I can prove without proper laboratory analysis:

1) Swimmers are taking fish oil dietary supplements, and they are beginning to turn into fish themselves. This would explain why they're all wearing those full-body swim suits nowadays - they're hiding the scales growing on their legs.


Is Olympic swimmer Cullen Jones hiding a nice crop of scales under that suit?

What with security the way it is at the Olympics right now, I can't get close enough to any of the athletes to check for scales and gills.

2) The entire pool is doped with EPO. I tried to get a sample of the water to test this theory, but about 500 Chinese guards chased me out of the arena. (My Bird Fu may be the best, but 500 to 1 odds is just a little too much to overcome.)


So I am at an impasse. Without evidence I cannot solve this Mystery, and I just know the solution would probably blow my mind and the minds of all you readers. Whatever the truth may be, I would just like to say congratulations to the entire human race for putting on such a captivating display of athletic prowess. Who knows - someday you may sprout wings, and when that happens I know a few Peregrine falcons who'd love to challenge you to a fly-off!

Heads on the Rock

Greetings all you Freckle-faced Tots of Inquisitiveness peering longingly through the window of the Candy Shop of Knowledge at the mouth-watering, sugary Treats of Truth! Baba Doodlius here, with a Revelation of another Mystery of the Universe

My regular readers (all six of you) may have noticed that I have not been around of late. For this I wholeheartedly apologize, and as way of excuse I'd just like to point out that it's hard out here for a bird. And there are, oddly enough, some places on this planet that are completely without any internet access, like, for example, Baba Sr.'s house.

Baba Sr.: "Consarnit, I can't even get the dag-gum clock on the VCR to quit flashing '12:00', and they gots to go invent that there new-fangled 'Internet' thing!"

All that aside, I'm not here to bitch and moan that life is tough, I'm here to Reveal Mysteries of the Universe! So without further ado, I present the Revelation of today's Mystery (by special request of that poetry-slingin' human Poetikat), the Secret of


Rapa Nui!


Rapa Nui is an extremely isolated island in the South Pacific, located about 2,000 miles from anything. (Have you heard the expression "it's not the end of the world, but you can see it from there"? Well, Rapa Nui really is the end of the world). The name "Rapa Nui" is Polynesian for "Big Head" (I made up half of that; it is left as an exercize for the reader to figure out which half), which is appropriate because this island, similar to Hollywood stars and corporate CEOs, is famous for big heads. The Rapa Nui heads, however, are made of rock rather than ego.


A bunch of famous Big Heads on Rapa Nui, Donald Trump, and Alec Baldwin

Let me jump back a step and start at the beginning of this Mystery.

The first European to reach Rapa Nui was a Dutch sailor named Jacob Roggeveen. Rumor has it he was searching for a good supplier of marijuana, or possibly some employees for a new business in which he was a partner. Whatever the case, he sighted the island on April 5, 1722, which happened to be Easter Sunday, and therefore he named the place "Island of Why The Heck Do I Have To Be At Work On Easter Sunday". Ha Ha, actually he named it "Easter Island", because he found there herds of happy bunnies that brought colored eggs to the natives.


This scene was fairly common on Rapa Nui in the early 1700's

The most intriguing aspect of this island as noted by Captain Roggeveen was the presence of huge stone heads that dotted the coastline. These monoliths, some standing over 7 meters in height and weighing over 30 tons, had apparently been erected by the local islanders, a group whose technological achievements did not include any metal working or the use of the wheel.


I'll put up another pic of a Rapa Nui head because they're just so darned cool

So how did such a supposedly primitive culture manage to carve huge slabs of rock into the shape of people's heads and stand them up on platforms all over the island? For centuries foreigners have asked the locals this question, and the conversations tended to go like this:


European Guy: "So, how did you islanders manage to carve these huge stone heads and prop them up next to the ocean?"

Rapa Nui Guy: "Ia orana, ua ite oe i te parau Rapanui, tane?" *

EG: "I have no idea what you're trying to say. I think I'll enslave you and spread European diseases throughout your population."

RNG: "Raho popa'a!" **

* - "Hello, do you speak Rapanui, sir?"
** - "Damn foreigner!" (or something like that)


As one can imagine, the whole slavery and disease thing didn't exactly endear the Europeans to the Rapa Nui locals. The lack of trust and the inability to understand each others' languages caused the visitors to remain completely in the dark about the origins of the big heads. So naturally, this means I had to do my own darned investigation. As usual.

What with energy prices going through the roof, I decided it would be better to forego the typical use of the Reverse K.E.G. Process to get to the bottom of this Mystery. (Hey, even us birds have to scrimp a bit in these trying economic times.) I had to resort to good ol' fashioned detective work and insight! Join me, if you would, in this fascinating journey into the world of forensic analysis!



Turns out this Mystery was way easier to solve than I excpected. I simply took some close-up photos of the big heads and took a couple samples of them back to the Bird Cave for analysis. Here's an extreme close-up pic of one of the heads:



Look how porous that rock is. Interesting! I began to formulate my theory, which was backed up by the laboratory analysis of the samples:



To those few of you not well-versed in organic chemistry, the chemical found in trace quantities in the Rapa Nui heads is... Sugar!

So let's see... a porous material... containing lots of sugar...

The Rapa Nui heads are not natural rock! They're petrified marshmallow!

The original inhabitants of Rapa Nui are the inventors of marshmallow! Their invention, being not only yummy but also easy to work with, was the perfect material to use in fashioning huge head sculptures. These sculptures were so easy to make and transport that they put up dozens of them all over the island! Unfortunately, the islanders had to coat their sculptures with protectants to keep them from dissolving during rainstorms, and this led to a rapid fossilization process of the building material. Very little of the original marshmallow remains, having been replaced by the minerals used to protect their creations.

An obscure note from Captain Roggeveen's log book provided final proof of this theory:

"Captain's Log, April 6, 1722: I cannot understand a single word these island folk say to me, but they have given myself and the crew a delicious gift which is apparently a local delicacy: tiny birdlike sculptures made of some sort of air-puffed sugar! Such a novel idea! In commemoration of the discovery of Easter Island, I shall distribute to all my friends facsimiles of the islanders' gift on the anniversay of sighting this land!"

And thus was the tradition of giving the gift of Marshmallow Peeps on Easter established!



Aren't the little details of history just fascinating?

Rocks in my Head

Greetings all you Mosquitoes of Inquisitiveness alighting on the juicy Buttock of Knowledge to feast upon the succulent Blood of Truth! Baba Doodlius here, with a Revelation of another Mystery of the Universe!

Today's Revelation is about a subject ripped right from recent headlines, but it's a Mystery that goes back almost as far as the Pyramids, and is at least as interesting. By now you've figured out that I am speaking of none other than

Stonehenge!

The Secret of Stonehenge is one of the grandest Mysteries in all of human endeavor. Imagine this: Enormous slabs of solid rock weighing tens of tons, dragged many miles and assembled into a monument of cylindrical design, with the precision of modern engineering implements, and all of this labor performed by a Mysterious stone- and bronze-age people! Standing like sentries on Salisbury Plain in southern England, the towering monoliths of Stonehenge have enchanted visitors dating back to the ancient Romans, who are known to have hacked off pieces of the stones to take home as souvenirs. Seriously! Asshole Romans.

For literally thousands of years (yeah, it's pretty darned old), humans have studied the ruins of Stonehenge. Some interesting points about this enigmatic structure that have been discovered so far include:

1) "Stonehenge" is from the Old English words "stan", meaning "rocks", and "henge", meaning, well, uh, modern science has really yet to determine just what the heck a "henge" is. Research is ongoing.

2) Stonehenge was constructed between 3000 and 1600 BC, but nobody is certain who the builders were. Except me. I have discovered that Stonehenge was built by: ancient Brits. (That's a bonus Secret of the Universe, no extra charge!) I know, my knowledge is astonishing! I just can't imagine why nobody has figured this out before.

3) A monument as monumental as Stonehenge cannot help but be inspirational to artists, as evidenced by the megastar heavy metal band "Spinal Tap".

More recent investigations have theorized that Stonehenge was used as a royal burial ground. But you have to keep in mind that this "discovery" was made by archaeologists, and these folks say that just about everything they dig up was a burial ground, or a battlefield, or something related to violence and death. You can't really blame them, though, because violence sells - just go to any modern movie theater if you want this point proved - and archaeologists need to keep getting funding to go dig up more and more stuff. Hey, you always do what's right for the wallet, eh?

The thing is, I happen to know several modern Brits and they most definitely are not all about violence and death (well, maybe some of the football fans). On the contrary, these folk are quite the fun-loving bunch - they're always singing, dancing, drinking (oh yeah, lots of drinking), telling jokes I don't understand, and laughing hysterically at them. They seem so jolly that I can't believe their ancestors would have built a huge, enduring monument to death.

So what was Stonehenge really? I cranked up my patented reverse K.E.G. process and took my camera back in time to see what Stonehenge looked like a few millenia ago. I took this enlightening picture on my trip:


There you have it: "Stonehenge" on opening day. Click picture to enlarge.

Monument to Death, huh? Hardly! It was the world's first Amusement Park!

I was lucky enough to get the picture before the crowds arrived, because once people started showing up it was one huge party! The "Celt-O-Whirl", as the Stonehenge swing ride was called, was a major attraction of the ancient world. It wasn't exactly an extreme G-force astronaut training centrifuge, more like a carousel really, but c'mon, it was 4,000 years ago so give them a break.


The Celt-O-Whirl wasn't quite like this air force extreme-G training session. Click the pic for video, it's pretty cool.

So where do researchers get off saying that this thrill ride was a burial ground? Well, they note that there is evidence of burned human remains at Stonehenge, and they are absolutely right. However, they're wrong about the site being a burial ground. What they have found is the evidence of a terrible side effect of amusement parks: sometimes people fall off the rides! Nowadays when that happens, the accident makes headlines and the victim's family sues the bajeebers out of the amusement park. But 4,000 years ago, if you fell off the ride and your family want around to see it, then tough noogies! They just "got rid of the evidence" right where they found it:

"Why no, Mrs. Pickleford, we haven't seen your little Ian around the Celt-O-Whirl today. He must have gone fishing or something instead. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go dig a big hole and, uh, rapidly rub these two sticks together..."

So they didn't worry about lawsuits back then - they hadn't invented lawyers yet, nor ambulances for them to chase. We're much more enlightened nowadays.

Anyway, now you know the great Secret of Stonehenge. By the way, don't go visiting the site and try to play on the swings - they really, really don't appreciate it.

You have Questions? I have answers!

Howdy all you speedy skaters slapping the Puck of Knowledge into the Goal of Truth! Baba Doodlius here, with a Revelation of another Mystery of the Universe!

• Today's intro brought to you by the National Hockey League and their championship trophy the Stanley Cup, which is about to be won by the Detroit Red Wings, who I am pretty sure win it every year so this should not be a surprise to anybody.

Today I'm doing something a little different. I was actually asked a bunch of questions by Azzitizz over at "The Totally Transparent Party" (also known as "Azzy's Blog-a-Roonie" because Azzy can call her blog whatever she darned well wants to call it, thank you very much). Since I get from you readers very few Mysteries of the Universe to Reveal, I figured I'd take this opportunity to add this as a feature to this blog to encourage you shy folks to ask any questions you may have. I now present to you the

Baba Doodlius Reader Mailbag!

All of the questions today are, as I said, from Azzitizz, or more accurately from Azzy's little sister "Lil'Sis" (which is a highly appropriate name for one's little sister in the opinion of the Great and Powerful Baba Doodlius).

---

Question Number One:

This is actually a bunch of questions linked together, so I'll just quote Lil'Sis directly and get to the answers and commentary afterwards:

"How come almost every animal on the planet can swim by just nature and instinct, yet we humans have to be taught?
New born babies seem to manage just fine without lessons!
Is it because we are told we can't swim as we get a little older and therefore believe we can't until we have lessons?
Does that mean we shouldn't believe what we are told about anything? In which case, take for example, The Law of Gravity. The Law of Gravity must be so, as nobody can tell an apple or a leaf whether or not to fall to the ground. But, if we decide not to believe it, will we be able to float or fly?"

Well that's some serious questioning, Lil'Sis. I'd first like to say that you have a brilliant future in Philosophy, assuming you don't decide to test your "Belief in Gravity" theory and jump off a building first.


This is a cartoon by John Callahan. You should immediately go buy all of his books.

But now on to your questions. As you pointed out, humans can actually swim just fine as infants without being told how to do it. The problem with humans is that they have this innate drive, as powerful as the need for food, shelter, and sex, to be right about everything and to be better than everybody else at everything. Lil'Sis has hit on the basic Truth of Human Existence, which controls every aspect of human society, from religion to politics to the aforementioned Stanley Cup: Humans Have to Fight About Stuff.

It starts early, and with the simple things, like swimming:

"Look here, that swimming you're doing, it's all wrong! You can't just paddle around until you get to shore, you have to move your hands like THIS, and kick your feet THIS WAY, and then you'll go FASTER and you'll be DOING IT RIGHT!"

And things get worse from there:

"Watch this, I can kick this spherical air-filled bladder into that net over there BETTER THAN YOU! In fact, me and my ten friends are the BEST IN THE WHOLE WORLD at this activity!"

"Your economic system is NOT OPTIMIZED at all! You should be running your economy THIS WAY or I shall SCOFF AT YOU and ADVOCATE YOUR TOTAL DESTRUCTION!"

"Those rituals you are performing to please your god(s), they're all wrong! You've got to do things THIS WAY, which is the only CORRECT way to do it, and if you don't do things the CORRECT WAY I'll just have to SUBJUGATE YOU and FORCE YOU TO DO IT RIGHT."

So you see, swimming instruction is just the symptom of this excessive human competitive behavior. It has nothing to do with belief, so please don't go stepping off any high cliffs to test your Gravity theory, please.

---

Question Number Two:

"When the sunlight is so bright it hurts your eyes, how come it doesn't hurt anymore if you shut just one eye?"

Uh, hmmm, well, to that I'd just have to reply that I have not had this experience. I generally don't make a habit of staring directly at the sun, Lil'Sis, because that sort of activity can be harmful to your health. To answer the question, I will have to defer to the expertise of Sigmund Freud, who postulated the Theory of Eyeball Denial. The theory goes like this:

"Pain coming from both eyes cannot be ignored because it has no source of counter-sensation. However, if input from one of the eyes is eliminated, the Ego has the capability of denying the pain because it is not reinforced by an alternate pathway, and thus can pretend that the pain does not exist. All of this, naturally, is proof of the desire to have sex with one's mother."

So there you go, Lil'Sis. You can't argue with the Father of Modern Psychoanalysis. Well, except maybe about the "sex with your mother" part, which is just creepy and disturbing.

---

Question Number Three:

"How come men have nipples? Why hasn't evolution eliminated them by now as they are of no use whatsoever?"

This one is also somewhat foreign to me, Lil'Sis, seening as how I am a bird, and birds of both genders lack nipples. But I happen to know the answer to this one offhand, because I have done extensive research on human nipples (don't even ask why, there are some Secrets of the Universe that I won't reveal).

The reason for human male nipplage is based in the very evolutionary theory that you have already referenced. Rather than eliminating man nipples because they are unecessary, evolution has preserved them because it simplifies the manufacturing process. Think about it: Human babies all look pretty much the same. When you're making two things that are nearly identical, you don't waste effort retooling the assembly line just for a cosmetic difference, you save your effort for the pieces that make a difference.

Charles Darwin himself alluded to this evolutionary fact when he said:

"Oh yeah, baby, that feels soooo good! YES! Oh yeah, put the clamps right there and... OOOHHHH!!!"

What a freakazoid.

---

That about wraps up this edition of Baba Doodlius' Reader Mailbag. I hope you come away from this experience enriched, edfied, and entertained. And have a nice day!

A Short Mystery

Howdy all you thoroughbreds galloping down the home stretch of Truth! Baba Doodlius here, with a Revelation of another Mystery of the Universe!

• Whaddaya think, is "thoroughbreds" better than "bloodhounds"? Anyway, on to today's Mystery!
  

There's a story that's been circulating for the past several years about Hobbits. No, I'm not talking about the fictional ones of Middle Earth. Rather, I mean jungle-dwelling, little tiny people - apparently related to humans - who went extinct about 12,000 years ago. The scientific name for these little guys is not actually "Hobbits", but rather Homo floresiensis, named for the Indonesian island of Flores on which the skeletal remains of several of these dudes have been found.

A big "Thank you very much" goes out to the New York Times for letting me use this copyrighted image from their web site, even if they don't technically know they let me use it.

Since this story goes in and out of the media periodically, you may have heard about it from reputable news sources like these:

Nature.com
National Geographic
New Scientist

The gist of the story is, some folks digging on Flores found some skeletons that are similar but not identical to modern humans, but the adults are only 3 feet tall! Pretty cool, finding real 12,000 year-old Hobbit skeletons in Indonesia, eh?


Here's a Flores Hobbit skull next to a modern human skull. Pretty neat, eh?

So you're asking now, "What's the big Mystery? Critters go extinct all the time." Well that's true, but like many scientific stories there is plenty of controvery surrounding the Flores Hobbits.

Some folks claim that the hobbits represent a separate, previously unknown branch of the human family tree. Others think that the Flores researchers have merely unearthed a deformed, diseased pygmy modern human. From a scientific point of view, that's a pretty humongous argument. And let me tell you, I've hung around plenty of scientists and I can say definitively that when they argue you better duck!


Lab fight! Watch out for flying glassware.

Since you humans can't seem to get to the bottom of this whole Hobbit thing, I figured I'd lend a hand with my impressive investigative skills and huge, hyperintelligent brain. No need to thank me, helping humans is what I do!

I flew over to Flores and started poking around the paleo-arechaeological dig sites looking for clues to the Truth behind the Great Hobbit Mystery. While I was out in the nearby jungle, just sitting there minding my own business, I saw a shocking scene, one that completely took me by surprise and solved the Mystery of the Flores Hobbits!

And lucky for me, I happened to have my camera with me. (Don't leave home without it, I always say.)

Here's the picture I took, which, as you can plainly see, shows the actual True Truth of the Flores Hobbits:




The Flores Hobbits are a hoax! Sheep are planting fake hobbit bones all over the island!


Sheep, you say? Where'd the sheep come from? Flores is mostly jungle, and jungle is not exactly a natural habitat for sheep. And why the heck are they planting these bones on Flores?

I wondered the same thing. And since I caught them red hoofed, they agreed to fess up and spill the whole story to me (a sheep may be bigger than a parrot, but they respect the power of Bird Fu.)

So here's the scoop: These sheep are from New Zealand, a country where sheep significantly outnumber humans. Using their "sheer" numbers (hah, ha, a little sheep humor there), they overwhelmed security at Canterbury Museum in Christchurch and stole a pile of early hominid fossils. Then they hopped a boat to Indonesia, disembarked on Flores, spread the fossils around, and notified some local science-type people that there was fame and fortune to be had just by digging in the right places in the jungle! Voila! A new species of "Hobbit" was discovered, all because of a bunch of scheming sheep!


But why would they go through all the trouble?


Puzzled, I asked sheep leader Curly Jack this question.

"You want to know why?" he said. "I'll telly you why. It's because of all the humans' damned "Lord of the Rings" movies! We sheep are sick and bloody tired of humans trodding all over our country filming orcs and ents and elves and bloody HOBBITS! And as if that weren't enough, now all the bloody NERDS in the whole world are comin' here to visit the damned filming sites, like it was some sorta PILGRIMAGE or somethin'! Well we're SICK AND TIRED of it! We figured if somebody found some hobbits somewhere else, they'd bugger off and LEAVE US ALONE!"

Actually, I can't really argue with him on any of that. I mean c'mon, the movies were kinda fun, but is it really necessary to have tours of the locales so people can see "where Helm's Deep and Isengard are"?

So to all you humans I say: by all means, read the books again for the 279th time, go play some "Dungeons and Dragons", and practice speaking Elvish, but for sheep's sake do it at home!

Humming Right Along

Greetings all you bloodhounds sniffing out the fleeing perpetrator of Truth! Baba Doodlius here, with a Revelation of another Mystery of the Universe!

• (Note to self: come up with something better than "bloodhounds" next time.)

I am going to confess something to you today: For many years I thought I was

Going Insane!

Why, you ask, did I feel this way? Well, it was because I had this persistent ringing in my ears, a low, almost imperceptible background "hum" that I thought was purely imaginary. Plus, anyone who has ever experienced ear-ringing (also known as "tinnitus") knows that if it lasts for any significant length of time it can drive you batshit crazy all by itself!

Recently, though, modern science has taught me that I was actually NOT going insane. I wasn't hearing non-existent sounds - I was hearing a REAL sound!

I was hearing the humming of the Earth itself!

You don't believe me, do you? "The Earth doesn't hum, you stupid crazy bird", you're saying to your computer screen right now! Well Mr. or Ms. Smartypants, check this out and then tell me how stupid and crazy I am!

Earth's Hum Sounds More Mysterious Than Ever

For those of you to busy (lazy?) to click the link to read the story, it starts off with this:

"Earth gives off a relentless hum of countless notes completely imperceptible to the human ear, like a giant, exceptionally quiet symphony, but the origin of this sound remains a mystery... Researchers call it Earth's hum. "

Yep, the Earth is humming. You read that right, the planet you live on is emitting a constant, albeit very quiet, hum that is imperceptible to human ears. Unfortunately for me (in this case), I am not a human, and I happen to have super-tuned auditory reception capability that can pick up sounds that no other earthling can detect! (Sometimes it's hard being the Great and Powerful Baba Doodlius!)

So what's up with the Earth and it's "relentless hum"? What could this possibly mean? And how can we ever understand the immense cosmic significance of this "giant, exceptionally quiet symphony"?

I knew that there was only one way to answer such questions: I, the Great and Powerful Baba Doodlius, must become

One with the Earth!


Here's me becoming One with the Earth. "Ommmmmmmm!" Or as when electricians meditate, "Ohmmmmm".

I got into some serious meditation to make this happen. I managed to reach a state of Supreme Oneness with the Earth Itself! I felt a kinship with the planet you live on! I got so friendly with Earth that we struck up a conversation. It went something like this:

---

Baba Doodlius: Hi there Earth! Howya doin'?

Earth: Baba! Whazzup!?!

BD: Oh, not a heck of a lot, just doing some meditation. Hey, this "altered-state-of-consciousness" stuff is seriously cool!

E: Oh, don't I know it! I've been getting high on diesel fumes ever since humans invented internal combustion! It blows my mind, man!

BD: You know, you really should lay off that stuff, dude, it can really mess you up. Reduces life expectancy and all.

E: Yeah, you're right. I'm trying to cut down.

BD: Smart planet!

E: Hey I've been around for billions of years, I ought to have accumulated some wisdom, you know.

BD: Billions of years? You don't look a day over 500 million!

E: Oh stop it!

BD: No, you look great! Have you been moisturizing?

E: Well, my surface is 75% water, so I guess I kinda have been by default.

BD: And it's really working!

E: Thanks Baba! You're too kind!

BD: Say, Earth, I have this gig where I solve Myseries of the Universe, and...

E: Oh yeah, that blog of yours! I read that all the time, it's tremendously informative as well as entertaining!

BD: You read my blog? A big, famous planet like you reads my blog? I'm flattered!

E: Oh, I love it! Except you don't post very often. Do you know your last post was almost a month ago?

BD: Yeah, well, sorry about that. Sometimes I just get busy doing bird-related stuff and I lose track of time. I'll try to put up stuff more often.

E: That would be nice.

BD: Anyway, as I was saying, I reveal Mysteries of the Universe, and there's one in particular you can help me with.

E: Is it about how much oil I have left? Because I can't tell anybody that, it would ruin the surprise.

BD: No, it's not about oil. It's about your humming.

E: Oh, that old story! Yeah, I hum all the time. Sometimes I even sing!

BD: So I'm NOT crazy! You really are humming!

E: Yeah, is that so strange? Everybody does it occasionally.

BD: I suppose that's true. So, what's up with that anyway? Why all the humming and singing?

E: Oh, well, that's no big secret - I've got this song stuck in my mantle and I can't get it out!

BD: Oh, that's horrible!

E: Tell me about it! Want me to hum a few bars for you?

BD: NO! No, that won't be necessary! I'd hate to pass along a stuck-song to all my readers out there (all seven of them).

E: Oh, it won't hurt to hear just a little of it. Here goes!

<-- Turn on your sound and click to hear the Earth's lovely song


BD: : AAAAAAGHHHHH!!!!!

---

At this point I snapped out of my meditative state, awash in a cold sweat, with those horrible, horrible notes going around in my head! Thanks a lot, Earth! He may be a decent planet, but he sure can be a real jerk sometimes!


If you would like to get this song stuck in your head legally, you may purchase it here.

The Sting of Mystery - Solved!

On last update, I had discovered that my old buddy Buckirk McGurk the chicken was the mastermind of the "Hive Action League" (HAL), who has kidnapped millions of North American honeybees and demanded a 10 billion Euro ransom!

But something just doesn't add up here. I know Buckirk McGurk. Buckirk McGurk is a friend of mine. The bee-napping mastermind is no Buckirk McGurk!

So I'm back to the drawing board, looking for more clues to this Mystery using the only evidence I have, which is the picture that HAL sent with their ransom demand:



Hmmm... there's something besides the chicken in this picture that I recognise - that mountain range in the background looks awfully familiar:



Now where have I seen that before? AHA! I got it! I seem to recall a postcard, sent to me by none other than Buckirk McGurk, when he went on vacation a few years back:



Those mountains are the Grand Tetons! Let's see, Grand Teton National Park, quite famous for its striking natural beauty, is located in the state of Wyoming in the U.S. of A.


Wyoming, hmmm...


And that name, "HAL" - where have I heard that before?


What... are... you... doing... Dave?

Yeah, there was the crazy computer in that movie "2001 - A Space Odyssey"*. But I've seen those letters more recently than that. Wait a minute, I think I remember...



HAL is the stock ticker symbol for Halliburton Company!


Hmmm... Wyoming... Halliburton...


No. Oh, no. It can't be!


Ziiiiiiiiiiiiip!






That's not Buckirk McGurk! It's Dick Cheney!


U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney and his buddies at Halliburton, where he was formerly the CEO, are behind the kidnapping of all the North American honeybees! Why would they do something like that? I have to infiltrate Halliburton headquarters to get to the bottom of this! Don't go anywhere, I'll be right back!


...


(Wow, this is some white-knuckle suspense right here, ain't it? Worth the price of admission, I tell you!)


...


I'm back! And I know exactly why Halliburton kidnapped all those bees! Check out the following unassailable evidence:



Halliburton is working on genetically modifying honeybees to spit out oil instead of honey! But they don't want to put their oil business profits into the research, so they came up with this kidnapping and ransom scheme to 1) get plenty of test subjects, and 2) to fund the genetic research!




Uh, well, hmm...

Let's see here - Dick Cheney is the Vice President of the United States, and Halliburton is a multi-billion multinational corporation.


I am a bird.


Sorry folks, but I have exactly zero clout here - these folks will just not listen to me when I ask them to please release all the bees!

So, the next time you see Dick Cheney or a Halliburton employee, please ask them very nicely to let the bees go! Bees are our friends! Bees wanna be free! Free the Bees!




* R.I.P. Arthur Clarke. That was quite an imagination you had!

The Sting of Mystery, Continued

When we left off, I was jumping on the trail of the nefarious organization known as the "Hive Action League" (HAL), who has captured millions of North American honeybees and is holding them for a ransom of 10 billion Euros.

So where do detectives start when trying to solve a Mystery such as this? Naturally, we examine the evidence!

The only piece of evidence I had was the picture posted by HAL of a bunch of hostage honeybees



I scoured this photo looking for clues to the identity of the kidnappers! As I was close to blacking out from hours of intense scouring, I noticed something interesting in the picture:




Something about that little blur looks awfully familiar! Let me dust off the ol' photo enhancement skillz, similar to the ones I used to uncover the Truth about the Loch Ness Monster! I'll just zoom in a bit, bring that thing into focus, clean it up a little, and VOILA!





Holy Mackerel! I know that guy!


It's my old buddy Buckirk McGurk, who was a guest Mystery Solver on this very blog a while back, with his own Revelation about the Mystery of "Which came first, the chicken or the egg"!

Buckirk! Say it ain't so! You can't be involved with HAL! You can't have kidnapped all those bees just for a ransom of a measly few billion euros!

Well, come to think of it, Buckirk was always a little jealous of all the money I have. Maybe he's just trying to keep up with the Doodliuses.

But that's not like Buckirk at all! He's such a gentle, good-hearted chicken that he would never stoop to such an underhanded undertaking as kidnapping bees for ransom! Something is bothering me about this Mystery, and I can't quite put my talons on it...

There's more to this bee story than meets the oversized compound eye!



...to be continued AGAIN!

The Sting of Mystery

Howdy all you Formula 1 drivers of Curiosity negotiating the chicanes of Misunderstanding to capture the checkered flag of Truth! Baba Doodlius here, with a Revelation of another Mystery of the Universe!

A while ago I was on a flying tour of North America, and I noticed an odd feeling of lonesomeness. It was as if, in all the wide open spaces, there was something missing, something important, something that one knows should be there but is mysteriously absent. Then it hit me:

There aren't any bees!

Yes, I'm talking about honeybees. Regular old bees. You may generally overlook them, or even be afraid of their painful stings, but the common honeybee is actually very important to the well-being of world agriculture. They are required to pollinate all sorts of crops, so without them there could be a collapse of the food supply of North America!

Fortunately, my statement of a couple paragraphs back is just a little bit alarmist - there still are some bees around, but populations are off by millions compared to a few years ago. So we have a case of millions of missing bees!

When I noticed this phenomenon, I naturally notified the authorities. Scientists took note, and this issue has received a fair amount of press. Check these out for more info, if you're curious:

National Public Radio
The New York Times
Jim Lehrer

Anyway, this problem has been brewing for a while, and I figured that this was a pretty important Mystery to solve, what with the food supply at risk and all. Hey, I need to eat just like anybody! So I went off in search of clues about all these missing bee&l.nievprhe%$&...

Hey, what the....oas03kxfx... *lnf(HHB^%$%IJ8s...

I'm getting some interferen...3e88nchz>OAF$#mnsu... s

DG48t59uk)_^jkihol &hmw[CE ngfhH65&$#^Hw 4^ /456 OL*P,AEY...

[BOF]------------------------------------------

Attention! We have intercepted this blog feed in order to send the following IMPORTANT MESSAGE to the citizens of the world!

We are the Hive Action League!

We have your bees!

This is but a tiny sample of the bees we are holding hostage!

We demand Ten Billion Euros (the dollar's weak right now) or you'll never see your precious bees again!

We now return you to your regularly scheduled blog, already in progress.

------------------------------------------[EOF]

Hey! They hijacked my blog to deliver a ransom demand? For bees?!?


Well folks, looks like I have a serious Mystery to investigate!

I'm off!

... to be continued!