Hey there science fans! You will have to forgive my playing a little loose with the premise this week, but boy, have I got one amazing cultural artifact to share with you nice folks, and to sit on this one for an entire day would have darn near killed me.

But first : ON WITH THE SCIENCE!

First up : fake blood saves a life!

A woman’s life was recently saved by a transfusion of a new blood substitute derive from cow’s blood. See, an Australian woman was in a very horrible car accident. She was in dire shape, with multiple serious injuries. And to complicate matters, she had lost so much blood that a transfusion was needed.

Problem : the woman’s religion forbids blood transfusions. Artificial blood, however, would be fine.

Enter our hero, HBOC201 (catch name, what?), a new synthetic blood made from cow blood. They shipped some from the USA to Australia, put it in our patient, and voila, she lives.

There’s been tries at blood substitutes before, a lot of them actually, but none have really worked. This, then, is a big stride in the drive for blood substitutes. What’s more, this stuff is made from something we kind of have a lot of (cow blood… don’t look, Hindus!), can last on the shelf for three years, does not require refrigeration, and matches any blood type.

Pretty damn cool, if you ask me.

The vampire community, of course, is still waiting on the all important taste test before passing judgement.

Our next hero is a humble bit of technological wonder called Gravity Probe B.

It’s a satellite designed to finally figure out if Einstein’s prediction that gravity distorts space and time are true. The effect, if present, would be very subtle, so what you needed in order to test it was :

1) a really big gravity well…. say, as big as Earth’s
2) the ability to go in and out of said well, and
3) the most sensitive gyroscopes ever made.

Oh, and, you know, a way to get the thing up into space and so forth.

This, NASA accomplished. That this involved making the most perfect spheres ever to exist on Earth only adds to the beauty of the whole experiment, in my humble opinion.

I want one.

And recently, amazingly, Gravity Probe B finished its mission. Einstein is, unsurprisingly, completely proven and utterly validated, and we all now know that gravity does, indeed, distort space and time. What’s more, we know that the Earth sits in a big puddle of distorted space and time created by its mass.

Gosh, science is neato!

I first heard about Gravity Probe B many years ago, when it was just a proposal, and I thought it was pretty damned cool then. I am, therefore, tickled a vibrant shade of pink by its success. It is a brilliant experiment, ambitious as hell (they had to invent new technologies just to pull it off) and aimed at some highly cool science, and as far as I am concerned, that all adds up to fantastic mojo.

Great job, NASA!

And now, our science fiction entry. Prepare to be introduced to the greatest superhero ever.

And his name…. is Captain Newfoundland.

No really, it is! Check it out!

Thank you, dear friend Felicity, for this most astoundingly cracktastic bit of Canadian pop culture detritus. The sheer amount of gloriously inept nerdity in that brief clip fills me with post modern joy.

There is just so much to say about it. Let’s start with a run down of facts about Captain Newfoundland.

1. He’s the spirit of Newfoundland. (Funny, I thought that was Screech. )
2. He lives in the hearts of all of us. (Like Jesus. )
3. His ancestors came from beyond the stars (explain how that is possible?) and settled in the great continent of Atlantis (great until that little sinking beneath the waves thing). Today, only the tip of the great island survives. (Wait… Newfoundland = Atlantis? Boss!)
4. He watches over said island to protect and advance the race of Man. (yay, advancing!)
5. He has the power to do anything. (Well, that should be easy to write. )
6. His mind speaks mentally. (That sentence is so clunky it’s beautiful. )
7. He travels through different dimensions and different times. (But, stays in Newfoundland. )
8. He represents the best in every one of us. (Yup… he’s Newfie Jesus. )
9. He has many friends. (And I bet he’s had TONS of girlfriends, and was really popular in high school, and never had acne or excess weight, and was sexually potent, and and and… )
10. And all his fans know his extremely original code : This above all, to thine own self be true.

I love every bit of that. It’s actually remarkably imaginative for a complete and total nerd fantasy, and of course absolutely brimming with everything seventies, which is also a plus.

It’s like something Jerry Todd would dream up for his alter ago. With the power of vudyo!

So remember kids, This above all : to thine own self be true!

Unless you’re a dick, in which case, fake it.