So, I've been at home with a head cold the last couple of days and have been catching naps after telecommuting for a few hours so the day's not a complete financial loss. During this afternoon's nap, my fevered brain came up with a brilliant sci-fi weapon... An aerosolized explosive that is triggered by artificial gravity. Even better, it sticks to natural fibers like human hair.

In the dream, a terrorist sprayed it in a ground-based spaceport and it settled in the hair of people preparing to board shuttles. As the shuttles reached orbit and switched on artificial gravity, their hair exploded, pretty much taking the rest of their heads with it.

Sleeping through a head cold, dreaming of people's heads exploding. I wonder if there's any connection.

I ran into someone today with an adjective for a first name and a noun for a last name. You know the type of name I'm talking about: Sandy Beach, Red Irons, Rusty Speck, Misty Forest. For people already saddled with the adjective/noun name combos, it's too late, but to those people out there with nouns for last names who are pregnant or planning to have children... STOP DOING THIS TO YOUR KIDS! IT ISN'T CLEVER! STOP IT!

Remember those old commercials for Trident sugarless gum, where they said "4 out of 5 dentists recommend sugarless gum for their patients who chew gum"? Many a person has honestly wondered what the fifth dentist recommends. Many a comedian has humorously speculated on it. I believe I have the answer.

I realized what the 5th dentist recommends while I was considering the debate over whether or not to give birth control and information about how to use it to teenagers. Many people who are against making the products and knowledge available to teens take the position that doing so is like approving of teen sex. Their position is essentially "if we give them condoms, they'll use them."

And it hit me what the 5th dentist recommended... don't chew gum. He'd be of the opinion that saying "if you must chew gum, then chew sugarless gum" was like giving his patients permission to chew gum, so he'd just say "don't chew gum!" The patients who disobeyed his dictate would potentially be in greater jeopardy because he refused them the knowledge of the safest gum to chew, but he'd be secure in the knowledge that he stuck to his principles.

Then I looked it up. The survey in which the 4 out of 5 dentists recommended sugarless gum for their patients who chew gum had three options for the dentists to choose from: sugarless gum, sugared gum, and no gum.

The breakdown between sugared and none has been lost to history, but if we are keen observers of sociological phenomena, it's pretty obvious how the average 5th dentist voted. He wasn't going to tell you the safest way to chew gum, because if he didn't hold the line against gum chewing, the result would be dental anarchy.

So, 4 out of 5 dentists recommend sugarless gum for their patients who chew gum. The 5th has an overinflated sense of his importance.

If all you've ever had is steak, chicken sounds exotic.

When someone tells me "slow and steady wins the race", I tell them "it depends on the kind of race you're running." In the 50 meter sprint, the tortoise always loses.

I spent my weekend hunting down online coloring books made by government agencies so I could strip public domain art from them. The Army had one with a cartoon dog teaching kids what to do when they find unexploded ordinance. And this wasn't for kids in Iraq. It was for kids in Hawaii. Chew on that for a while.