Self Care – Astronomy Picture of the Week: The Observable Universe

(I’m also incorporating this series into my Self Care series for the foreseeable future…)

I guess this is the best way to follow up the last post. I’m using Wikipedia for this one.

This is one simulated image of the entirety of the observable universe. As I already mentioned last week, the universe is currently estimated to be roughly 93 billion lightyears in diameter, putting the edge around 46.5 billion lightyears away from us.

This image is taken from the Wiki page linked to above, as is the information I’m including about it and about the universe…

Observable_Universe_with_Measurements_01

Visualization of the whole observable universe. The scale is such that the fine grains represent collections of large numbers of superclusters. The Virgo Supercluster – home of Milky Way – is marked at the center, but is too small to be seen.

Diameter 8.8×1026 m (28.5 Gpc or 93 Gly)[1]
Volume 4×1080 m3[2]
Mass (ordinary matter) 1053 kg[3]
Density 9.9×10−30 g/cm3 (equivalent to 6 protons per cubic meter of space)[4]
Age 13.799±0.021 billion years[5]
Average temperature 2.72548 K[6]
Contents Ordinary (baryonic) matter (4.9%)
Dark matter (26.8%)
Dark energy (68.3%)

So the universe is not only old (to us), but huge.

From HuffPo: “The Most Dangerous Bill You’ve Never Heard Of Just Passed The House”

Oh great. Wonderful.

This is where we’re headed…

The Most Dangerous Bill You’ve Never Heard Of Just Passed The House

Last, week, under the cover of a media bliss-out except among Koch funded right-wing channels, the House of Representatives passed a bill which would effectively repeal future standard setting under every important environmental, public health, consumer protection, labor standards, occupational safety and civil rights law on the books.

The bill, called the REINS Act, requires that any future major regulation adopted by an Executive Agency — say a new toxic chemical standard required by the recently enacted Chemical Safety Act, or a new consumer protection rule about some innovative but untested kind of food additive — must be approved by a specific resolution in each House of Congress within 70 days to take effect.

[Read more…]

Self Care – My Own Ultimate Bisquick Maple (Non-Dairy) Pancakes

Woops! This is a bit late. Sorry.

I decided to share my own little recipe, here, with included nutritional facts courtesy of MyNetDiary.

I hated maple syrup when I was a kid, but now I can’t get enough of it. The flavor is incredible.

I use a maple syrup and maple sugar from a place called Breezie Maples Farm, which is featured at Long Island’s Chocolate Expo every year. Make sure that whatever maple syrup and sugar you get, it’s pure. Also, this recipe is non-dairy by necessity; we don’t have any milk in the house, just non-dairy almond milk. If I had milk, I probably would have used it.

And finally, this is Bisquick’s Ultimate Pancake recipe split in half and with a couple replacements, since it’s Bisquick I use to make pancakes (because we have it; yes, I can also make pancakes from scratch).

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Self Care – Porcupine Tree Plays Linton Samuel Dawson

(Quick note: this video is made to be trippy… lots of colors and such. The flashing is minimal here, but still… just be careful if you’re sensitive to this kind of thing…)

Since my last post talked about LSD and the music inspired by it, here’s one I thought y’all would enjoy, and get a kick out of. This was recorded back when Porcupine Tree was just Steven Wilson. And yes, that’s him singing; just with some added effects to his voice.

The video is not official at all. It’s just… well… it fits with the theme of the song, if there even is one…

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GoFundMe “Defense against Carrier SLAPP Suit”

https://www.gofundme.com/defense-vs-carrier-slapp

I’m just gonna quote:

Dr. Richard Carrier is suing us for reporting  on his well-known allegations of misconduct. These allegations were widely reported on throughout the community, including by third-parties critical and sympathetic to him who are not themselves defendants.

This lawsuit has all the hallmarks of a SLAPP suit — a lawsuit filed to stifle legitimate criticism and commentary. The named defendants are Skepticon, The Orbit, and Freethought Blogs – as well as individuals Lauren Lane, the lead organizer of Skepticon; Stephanie Zvan, a blogger for The Orbit; PZ Myers, a blogger for Freethought Blogs; and Amy Frank-Skiba, who publicly posted her first-hand allegations against Carrier.

We need your help to keep our voices alive. All the defendants are represented by the same attorney, First Amendment lawyer Marc Randazza. Randazza is providing his services at a significant discount, but we are not asking him to work for free. Plus, there are thousands of dollars in “costs” for the case that don’t include legal bills, and there is no way to discount those. In order to continue fighting this lawsuit, we, the defendants of this case, have put together this campaign to raise money to defray our costs, some of which is outstanding. Donations will be used only for this case. In the event that the funds raised exceed our legal bills, they will be donated to Planned Parenthood .

We are pooling our defense costs with Skepticon, however as a 501(c)3 non-profit Skepticon is also conducting its own fundraiser where donations may be tax-deductible (ask your tax advisor). Skepticon cannot use donations it receives to help pay the shares of other individuals or organizations, though, and any excess funds raised via their campaign will go to the Skepticon conference fund.

We are confident that the court will uphold our First Amendment rights. But, through time, stress, and of course financial expense, every case like this has a chilling effect. Your support enables us to fight, and creates a warmer environment – not just for us but for others in the future.

Thank you for your support of freedom of speech, and may your new year be powerful and effective!

-Amy Frank-Skiba
-Lauren Lane
-PZ Myers
-Stephanie Zvan

Please donate.

Thank you.

Self Care – Great Guitar Solos: Jimi Hendrix Plays Third Stone from the Sun

(Obviously, this has gone up an hour early, as this series is being incorporated into my Self Care series. The others will go up at the normal 12 pm time, but still as part of my Self Care series for the foreseeable future.)

Story time!

I’m a huge fan of psychedelic and experimental rock. I’m also, incidentally, fascinated by LSD, and while I haven’t tried it yet, I hope to one day. Since I am fascinated by LSD, I’m constantly on the look-out for music clearly inspired by it. And finding such music is, of course, very easy. So many genres, songs, and even full albums to choose from (I mean… we’ve all heard Sgt. Pepper’s and Magical Mystery Tour… right?).

One day, it occurred to me that writing a musical soundtrack to an LSD trip would be awesome. Of course it’s been done before, but this one would serve a specific purpose: envelope a trip with positive, major-key music to keep it happy, while expounding upon the wonders of the universe, allowing the person or people taking the trip to fly through the Cosmos, spurred on by guitar, keyboards, drums, bass, atmosphere, and many different scientists to visit the very birth of our universe and, eventually, the birth of us… and the cosmic tourists would come back home, enlightened, happy and content. So obviously it would have to last as long as a trip does, which means I won’t finish this until I go on a trip myself… it’ll be as long as mine lasts.

In looking for a spark of creativity short of LSD itself, I kept coming back to this Jimi Hendrix song. Something about it fascinates me. I’m sometimes surprised by how many people I know, including Hendrix fans, who find this overly-long, meandering, and boring, but I guess that’s the kind of thing I love. And it inspired the first part for my LSD suite, tentatively titled The Heven Suite.

So here it is… the amazing Third Stone from the Sun…

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Self Care – Emerson, Lake, and Palmer Play Karn Evil 9 (YouTube Video)

Since Mondays are Great Guitar Solos day on this blog, today’s Self Care theme is music.

I’ve already highlighted a bit of this in my GGS series here (1st Impression, Part 2). So now, I want to share the entire suite with you. It’s a masterclass in Progressive Rock, and is just incredible to listen to. Karn Evil 9 is made up of 3 Impressions, and the 1st Impression is split up into two parts.

I was hoping to bring y’all a live performance, but, sadly, I can’t find a full live cut of the song with video; I can only find audio. And the point of posting a live cut would be for y’all to watch the musical mastery of Keith Emerson, Greg Lake, and Carl Palmer. Since I couldn’t find that, here’s audio of the full studio version, from the album called Brain Salad Surgery. Since there’s no video here, you can just listen.

It’s a full 29 minutes and 39 seconds long.

Self Care – Best Vegan Mac & Cheese Recipe (YouTube Video)

It’s time to prep a midnight snack, although you may want to make sure you’re either alone, everyone is awake, or whoever you’re with is a HEAVY sleeper, as it requires a blender.

This is definitely a comfort food.

Now, I made this earlier in January while my parents were in Las Vegas (yes, I currently live with my parents; I’m barely making enough money to cover my car and health insurance payments; I definitely can’t afford rent). I didn’t have the nutritional yeast, so used a little almond milk. I can’t say exactly how much because I basically added to taste, and it was very little because the bulk of the liquid came from the broth. It was delicious, but I do want to try it with the nutritional yeast.

I haven’t made it for my parents yet, though… my dad especially likes to make “I’m a meatatarian” jokes, so it’ll be interesting to see what he thinks of it…