Bored and Nuts

These things are wildly addictive. Our craving to consume the entire bag made us glance at the nutritional facts label on this new product to make sure we weren't eating sugar by the metric ton and spare us the horrible, bloated future as predicted in Wall-E.

Serving size: 8 clusters. Servings per container: about 6.

There are not 48 of these in that little bag. We should know -- we would loved to have eaten that many. The next thing I knew a second bag had been purchased, the counting began, and both the electronic balance and calculator were deployed. Oh, how bored we were! Some fun numbers:

Total product mass: 156g stated, 156g actual.
Total number of clusters: 48 calculated, 24 actual.
Total amount of nut debris in bag bottom: 22g
Individual Cluster Weight: 3.5g calculated, 5.6g actual (average).
Serving size stated: 8 clusters (~28g)
Serving size actual: 5 clusters (~28g)

At actual weight, eating a suggesting serving size results in eating about 44.6g of product versus the stated 28g for an error of ~16g, or 57%! (federal law permits up to 20%) That's around 100 extra calories and 7.7g more fat than printed on the label. Whoops.

They're [mostly] nuts and nuts are healthy, so it can't be so bad. Right? Hopefully, Frito-Lay will be kind enough to give us a lifetime supply for correcting their manufacturing problem.

Bat Rescue

The bat hanging around just outside my office hadn't moved from its spot in more than 72 hours, meaning she hadn't had any food or water. So, using a good pair of gloves, we scooped her up and shuttled her off to The Florida Bat Conservancy, where she was declared to be in good health, but too young to be out hunting on her own just yet. It is possible, we think, that she was displaced by all the construction going on in the business park.

She is most likely a Southeastern Myotis who is, indeed, very far south for her range. Bonus: this species does eat mosquitoes!

Mosquito Control

Today's discovery: a tiny brown bat hanging out on the outside of my office building. He/she was snoozing away at eye level on a support pillar, waiting for the sun to drop before taking flight and hopefully to eat thousands of the mosquitoes that have proven very bitey, lately.


Love the tiny claws. I see more cool wildlife at my office than at the local parks.

Making Green

Proof that green is in: it can be found in advertisements completely unrelated to the environment and, of course, horribly misused. I found this ad prominently displayed on each and every table in the dining area inside my office building, having been placed there by the catering company that supplies and maintains the cafeteria. It seems to imply that if you'd like to help the planet (recycle! reuse! ...refuel?), you can do your part by, uh, ordering a combo meal. I'm not entirely sure that is what the ad designer had in mind and, in truth, I have no idea what this ad is supposed to say other than "you should purchase a drink and chips with your meal". Too bad those additions don't actually get you any type of discount, negating the very concept of a combo meal.

Extra green bonus points for the including both modern day icons of the antithesis of reuse and reduction: a bottle of water and the inefficient, incandescent light bulb.

Camping at the Falls

There is no better reset for stress than camping at Lake Rabun and getting to play in the waterfalls.

...oh, and a massive omelet. That helps, too.

Everything is coming up tulips

"Blasphemous greed and stupidity of the masses."

Just wait until they place drinking water on the commodities market.

Buzz versus Buzz

Watched Discovery lift off, yesterday -- we had a good sight of her from Tampa despite clouds on the horizon. It was amusing, knowing that a Buzz Lightyear toy was atop that column of flame speeding thousands of miles per hour into orbit.

To prepare for the difficult journey, Buzz had to be trained by...Buzz.



I'm also really pleased to see the Mars Phoenix Lander has a Twitter page.