Spreadin’ Love 475

~ Laura

Jessica Valenti. My New Normal.

The best way to make bee paste?

The first steps were awkward, partly because the Army lab was not used to testing bees, or more specifically, to extracting bee proteins. “I’m guessing it was January 2007, a meeting in Bethesda, we got a bag of bees and just started smashing them on the desk,” Charles Wick said. “It was very complicated.”

The process eventually was refined. A mortar and pestle worked better than the desktop, and a coffee grinder worked best of all for making good bee paste.

Good to know. Now I can stop using my hands.

"And, on Thursday, Chris Christie, the governor of New Jersey, canceled America’s most important current public works project, the long-planned and much-needed second rail tunnel under the Hudson River."

Dumbass. That's my word of the week, BTW. Let's say it again. Dumbass. 

 

Published by Laura

13 thoughts on “Spreadin’ Love 475”

  1. Get a mortal and pestle for home-made bee paste. If you bring out the coffee grinder, you may as well go get the bee paste at Burger King.
    P.S.: Why is every canceled or threatened to be canceled public works project the most important one?

    Like

  2. I don’t know if EVERY public works project is the most important, but this particular public works project was the most important, primarily because it would reduce MY commute time into Manhattan. Center of the world = me.

    Like

  3. I was mocking Krugman, not you. I’ve just noticed that locally the “most important project,” a freeway bypass around the tunnel, is also the one least likely to be built. (Which is fine with me as it would let the suburban commuters dump on the freeway between me and my office instead of making them wait behind me. I have to pay 3% more income tax, so they should wait for me.)

    Like

  4. Now I have that song in my head, I’m smooshing up my baby bumblebee… won’t my mommy be so proud of me…

    Like

  5. Can I be a geek and point out that the bee story was a pretty amazing scientific success? They think they’ve figured out what’s been killing the bees. Now, maybe they’ll figure out what’s killing the frogs.
    The collaboration between civilian & military groups on a civilian project & the use of a military tool (the analysis of potential battlefield pathogens) was also pretty amazing.
    (And, yes, those kinds of scientific advances often involve innovative ways of making paste)
    In another invertebrate story, they’ve apparently made a silkworm capable of making spider-like silk, and, a woven panel made of spider silk! is hanging in the American Museum of Natural History.

    Like

  8. Wait a minute – Christie has been handed a doubling of Jersey’s expected cost on this project, and for the benefit of that relatively small fraction of his citizens who commute to NYC. By saying ‘cancel’ he has maximized the chance that the deal will be redone in a way which favors his state’s budget. Maybe this is in fact the end, and if so maybe it would have been worth the hugely increased cost to his citizens – but had the project been shown to be justified on the increased cost basis? It’s not clear to me that he has done the wrong thing for Jersey.

    Like

  9. I presume everyone remembers the Star Trek movie where some motorist calls Captain Kirk a dumbass, and he responds “Double dumbass on you, then!” Sort of the epitome of non-witty repartee.
    Not that I’m calling anyone–certainly not our hostess–a double dumbass. It’s just one of my favorite Star Trek movie scenes.

    Like

  11. I didn’t learn a single thing about bee paste, but I did learn that if you carve a pumpkin in September, it will be looking very bad well before Halloween. Especially if it gets near 80 for a couple of days.

    Like

Comments are closed.