Did You Know…

-The sun is in the process of giving everyone on Earth the equivalent of a galactic dutch oven?  According to NASA, satellites orbiting Earth detected a solar flare on August 1, and the origin of the explosion was located on a spot that is pointed directly towards us.  Although not uncommon, this particular blast ended up turning into something called a “coronal mass ejection,” or CME – so maybe it’s more like the sun is giving us a flare facial.  This ejectulation has sent an estimated ten billion tons of plasma hurtling towards our planet at speeds reaching 1 million mph.  When it reaches us, the CME could interact with the Earth’s magnetic field and create a geomagnetic storm – I smell a Sy Fy original movie in the works.  NASA has stated that there’s a slight chance this event may also induce blackouts, affect satellites, and cause problems with various types of communication devices.  Let’s just hope this won’t prevent anyone from getting on Facebook or Twitter while using their iPhones, because if that happens, mass panic will surely engulf our entire nation.  I mean, how could I possibly go about my day without knowing that someone I used to go to school with forgot how much they liked pickles?

- Brett Favre is reportedly walking away from the NFL after 19 seasons?  I mean, who could have possibly seen this coming, right?  It does remind me of an old joke though, stop me if you’ve heard it before.  Brett Favre and Rhee Peete play on a football team together, Brett retired, who was left…

- Researchers at UCLA have found that fructose enables pancreatic cancer cells to divide and multiply?  In their experiment, they “fed” fructose and glucose to tumors, and found that the two are metabolized very differently in the body.  When you combine that with the fact that US consumption of the worst kind, high fructose corn syrup, went up 1,000% between 1970 and 1990, it sounds like the deadliest form of cancer will be bellyin’ up to our pancreas’s for years to come.  And for those of you keeping score at home, you can now add fructose to the list of 18,965 additional things that have been shown to cause some type of cancer…

- That copying U.S. Currency is illegal?  This bombshell comes courtesy of quite possibly the most worthless article about money that I have ever wasted my time reading.  According to “6 Money Habits That Are Illegal” (“Dough Don’ts For Dummies” would’ve been more fitting): “Color printers, scanners and copiers make it surprisingly easy for just about anyone to replicate U.S. or foreign currency.  But it is, in fact, illegal to print your own money and try to spend it to buy goods or services.”  I’m sure there were a lot more people who didn’t know how “surprisingly easy” it is “for just about anyone” to counterfeit money before reading this article, as opposed to those who didn’t know counterfeiting was illegal.  In case you were raised by a pack of wolves, here some other illegal money activities the story reveals: using another person’s name and personal information to obtain credit, writing bad checks, and lying on applications for home loans.  I’ve got a few more gray area-type activities they may want to consider for their follow-up article, like bank robbery, embezzlement, money laundering, and tax evasion. (Story)