That blood lamp thing is creepy, but at the same time, it raises a lot of potentially cool questions. For example, I’ve got Thalessemia Minor–basically, I have more red blood cells than the normal person, they’re much smaller, and off-shaped. If it weren’t for the anemia symptoms that go along with a slight inability to process iron effectively (meaning iron supplements make it worse), people with Thal Minor would be off creating a new race of super-people. It takes a lot to get us drunk (or rather, we get drunk pretty quickly, but we burn through it so quickly, people don’t notice; this may have something to do with why hang-overs are something I’ve heard rumors of, but have yet to experience), our exercise tolerance levels are well above the average person’s (when we’re awake), and we tend to be rather thin because we metabolize like hummingbirds. We’re super-tired super-people, basically.

The funky size and shape of the red blood cells makes me wonder if the lamp would work differently (longer, more brightly, &c) for me than a regular person. I bet the effect would be markedly different for someone with full blown Thalessemia, since Thal major means you can’t process iron, so you have to get blood transfusions all the time. It’d be interesting (if not really creepy at the same time) to see how this varies across blood disorders.

Posted by Genevieve on 15 February 02010 @ 10pm

About the “why is the sky blue” link: I thought the most interesting part was that the sun only appears yellow because we’re viewing it through the atmosphere. Seen from space, it’s white. Never knew that.

Posted by Janis Jaquith on 16 February 02010 @ 9am

Or less snow…the 2010 Winter Olympics are being held in Vancouver during the warmest Winter in Vancouver, B.C. history.

Posted by Bubby Hussein, Hillbilly Sheikh on 16 February 02010 @ 12pm

that shut-off-internet-access-so-you-can work thing would be ideal for when I’m trying to work from home…. except that about 95% of the work that I do from home is basically just emailing people.

Posted by James on 17 February 02010 @ 4pm