Gritting Saw Teeth and Swiffy Grey Matter

The Futile Pursuit of Happiness, [NYTimes, login required] is an excellent article about a recent study about how people believe they will feel after positive or negative situations and the actual results. For instance, although you might think that your whole week will be ruined if your favorite college football team is beaten by University of Huston. This is likely wrong (unless you are Lloyd Carr). Conversely, if you buy a new computer gadget it won't improve your happiness for very long. If these sorts of studies pan out and become more proven they might have public policy rammifications, especially for the medical institutions.

Although, I'm pretty sure that one of these would make my day. [Quicktime Movie of Wooden Mirror -- High Bandwidth Only] Amazing combination of digital and analog.

Have you ever seen an Aggregate Traffic Animal? Well, according to this guy you probably have but didn't know it. In fact, you probably have been part of an Aggregate Traffic Animal. Although the article is a confusing read, the author raises some proto-reality questions that are simply mind-boggling. Scroll down to Typical Morphologies for more about how Aggregate Traffic Animals exist and what they look like. In a related topic, I have been listening to a lot of Modest Mouse. Cochrane recommended the band to me and I downloaded a few songs. Third Planet, Out of Gas, and Tiny Cities Made of Ashes are all enjoyable. The lyrics to Third Planet share some subject fodder with the Aggregate Traffic Animal.

A 3rd had just been made and we were swimming in the
water, didn't know then was it a son was it a daughter
When it occurred to me that the animals are swimming
around in the water in the oceans in our bodies and
another had been found another ocean on the planet
given that our blood is just like the Atlantic
And how
The universe is shaped exactly like the earth if you go
straight long enough you'll end up where you were

This also has some Toponymy repercussions. But I want to watch football.