"This breakthrough in goat nuclear transfer technology will..."

According to Peggy at Biology in Science Fiction, spider silk is strong enough to conceivably stop a 747 in flight.

Didn't know it was quite that strong, but I already knew the part about it being stronger than kevlar, which accounted for the motivation to manipulate dna and create the spider goat a few years back.

Making Biosteel

The science of superheroes

Completely irrelevant

I always wanted a Batman utility belt

There's this guy named Christopher and he has this site he refers to as Christopher's Backpacking Zone. Either that or Christopher's page of nonsense and Chaos.

If you read his website (http://members.fortunecity.com/kainwind/), you'll see that he's a pretty eclectic and adventurous guy: rock climbing, cliff walking, and trail blazing in the jungle. The whole nine yards.

He has, though, a really neat page titled "The Great Batman Equipment Archive".

This definitely goes into my scifi directory (whenever I get it finished, or even started for that matter)

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Iron Man - from comics to the movies

I want to be psyched about the Iron Man movie. Mainly because Iron Man, like Green Lantern, was one of my favorite comics when I was growing up.

I read quite a few series back in the day (Of my long lost youth in which I naively thought I'd be markedly different when I got older. You know, wiser, surer, all that. Thank goodness, it didn't happen). And this was when comic books were just that. They were comic books. Not graphic novels. Although, I think the artwork that appeared back then was on a par with today.

How much were comics then? Twenty cents, five for a dollar. You could literally read every series there was and not spend much. I even had my hands on a couple issues of something that were 15 and 12 cents, respectively (they were before my time and I found them in the used section of a book store). Sounds like one million years BC, huh? Hey, I even thought it was crazy when comics went to 35 cents (because then you couldn't even get 3 for a buck! What a rip!...the world has changed).

Anyway, back to the Iron Man movie. God, I hope they don't eff it up. I really do. And my fear is based on several disappointments in recent years.

1. Lost in Space - sucked really bad.

2. Fantastic Four - despite the fact that they're making a sequel, this sucked also. They didn't get Ben Grimm, The Thing, right at all.

3. Daredevil - Ben Affleck. Nuff said.

My trepidation is also based on the casting. Robert Downey Jr. as Iron Man? I say again: ? (translation: WTF?)

However, back in 1988, I felt the same way when I learned that Michael Keaton was going to be Batman. Batman, I thought? How can Mr. Mom be Batman? Turned out that Michael Keaton was the consummate Batman---dark, brooding, and twisted. And echelons above the horrific portrayals of the Dark Knight by Val Kilmer (an otherwise great actor) and George Clooney (great in Syriana and very funny in Welcome to Collinwood and O brother where art thou?).

So, maybe Mr. Downey will surprise us all. I'm hoping he will. Oh, by the way, I recently watched the recently-released Iron Man animated movie. I'm sad to say that my recommendation is to take a pass on this one. Boring.

Iron Man armor

Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark aka Iron Man


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From Paris to Jail in three easy steps (Paris Hilton goes to the pokey)

Asked whether she had understood the terms of the drunk-driving plea that she agreed to Jan. 22, Hilton, 26, said: "I just sign what people tell me to sign…. I'm a very busy person."


Paris the heiress is headed off to the pokey. For other worthless socialites who'd like to follow in the footsteps of this worldy sage, here's how she did it.

1. She was stupid (got her license suspended).

2. She stayed stupid (completely disregarded the law and continued to drive).

3. She got spanked for being stupid (off to jail where many amorous women with short haircuts anxiously--nay, needfully--await her arrival).

Jail Baby! Yeah!


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