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No, this is not a post about how much water you should be drinking. This post is inspired by Merry and Pippin. That’s right, it is triggered by the supporting hobbits in The Lord of the Rings; specifically the scene when they are drinking Ent-draught and growing taller. In the movie, Ent-draught appears to just be … Continue reading
Ignoring the whole philosophical issue of what is truth, is there anyway to force someone to tell the truth about something? This is a pretty common plot device in a wide range of genres. From veritaserum in Harry Potter, to creatures crawling in your brain in Star Trek, to injected drugs in spy movies, it … Continue reading
As I relearn how to move my wrist and use my thumb and fingers yet again I notice how much attention I have to pay to simple tasks. Holding a fork, not even using a fork, or opening up a mint package takes a lot of mental processing to make my hand do things that … Continue reading
I went for a massage a few days ago. I thought I would try a different therapist since my regular one is a fair drive from home. Unfortunately, she lost her street cred pretty quickly and I’ll be heading back to my normal massage in the middle of nowhere. She said that I needed to … Continue reading
I saw today that one of Edmonton’s city councillors wants to look at replacing some of the city’s sports fields with artificial turf. The part of me that enjoys being in nature and wants all people to have more opportunities to connect with nature is struggling. I feel like there are many different factors in … Continue reading
Caffeine and I don’t get along very well so I don’t get the whole addiction but a recent study makes me wish I could turn to a cup of coffee when I’m super tired and still need to function. First a little about how caffeine works. It takes about an hour for caffeine to reach … Continue reading
With some gorgeous sunny days happening (and yes we could talk climate change) the topic of sunscreen has come to mind. We have to coat ourselves in sunscreen to protect our DNA from the harmful effects of ultraviolet light (specifically UV-B), but are we really that different from plants who bask in the sunshine all … Continue reading
Most liquids behave like we would expect them to. But there are liquids, known as Non-Newtonian Fluids, that behave strangely under stress. Consider your ketchup bottle. Why is it that we hit the ketchup bottle to make the ketchup come out faster? Turns out it isn’t because the force knocks the ketchup lower down, but … Continue reading
It was a little disconcerting when the garlic in my potato salad turned bluish-green the other day. What had caused it, and was it safe to eat? The flavour of garlic is created by a few different sulfur compounds and some enzymes (an enzyme is something that affects the speed of a chemical reaction). Basically, what … Continue reading
Connecting with Science 