Researchers at the University of Minnesota filled a swimming pool with guar gum in order to find out whether people swim faster in water than they would in a higher viscosity liquid. The question has a long and interesting history, the results surprised me, and the story of their getting permission to conduct the experiment is humorous.

This is, at once, both cool and revolting:

Maggots aren’t high on most people’s favorite-animals list. But maggots–specifically, the larvae of the green blowfly, Phaenicia sericata–can be helpful for the very reason they horrify. By eating dead tissue at a patient’s wound site, maggots may help decrease the risk of post-operative infections, according to an article in the October 1 issue of Clinical Infectious Diseases, now available online.

The St. Louis Business Journal has an otherwise long, boring article about Carl Z. Levin, a local business consultant who claims psychic abilities, and about how his clients have responded to the news of Levin’s claims.
But the article contains this great line from one client who terminated their business relationship with Levin:

Levin was disappointed by the termination, notification of which, Fleming said, was made by phone. “But if he is a psychic, he obviously didn’t see this scenario happening the way it did.”

I love this quote from a New York Post article about how poorly the delegates to the Republican National Convention in NYC are tipping:

Abraham Bolzman [concierge at the New York Hilton] was also perplexed by the prudence of his guests. “It’s just no tips at all,” he said.
“It’s strange. It’s not that they’re not friendly. They’re always saying ‘God bless you.’ I guess I’m used to something more tangible.” (emphasis added)

This Yahoo! news photo just gives me the creeps:

UPDATE: Katie tells me those nails are probably fake–which doesn’t reduce the yuck factor by much for me.

Since I titled a recent post “Office Snacks of Mass Destruction,” I thought I’d investigate the use of the term “X of mass destruction.” A Google search for the phrase “of mass destruction” excluding the words “weapons” and “weapon” returns 41K+ results. Guess it’s an official cliché now. Glad to see I’m such a cutting edge trendsetter.
Some highlights of the search results:

• Sales strategy article: Presentations of Mass Destruction
• A recipe for Chicken satay of mass destruction
• Infrequently updated Weblog of mass destruction (gee, that’s a surprise)
• An eWeek article on patents of mass destruction

For the second time this week, someone has burned popcorn in the microwave at work. To my knowledge no corporate drone in America has ever succeeded in popping microwave popcorn at work without, at best, sickening their coworkers with the smell, and at worst causing the building to be evacuated. At least the fire alarm makes a nice break.