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Category Archives: ponderings

Giant tomatoes on the sun

I recently came across a headline that read, “See giant tornadoes on sun.”

I have a tendency to misread things when I’m sleep deprived, so I read, “See giant tomatoes on sun.”  And then I had to do a double take.

But actually, that would make a lot of sense, that tomatoes would grow to giant sizes on the sun.  Tomatoes really like sunlight.  On the sun, there’s sunlight all the time (duh).  The tomatoes are probably ginormous.  You know, it’s probably where we’re getting our weapons-grade lasers from.  You haven’t forgotten that lasers and tomatoes are directly related, have you?

Anyway, this explains so much.  We don’t really see laser guns and laser cannons in use because those tomatoes have to be cultivated on the sun.  But that’s pretty hard to do given that the sun’s surface isn’t the greatest living environment for humans.  And our manned space program is in shambles anyway (I’m not counting the ISS in this).  We could send rovers to do everything for us, but all the active missions are on Mars.  The sun’s surface isn’t the greatest place for rovers anyway.

Hmm…maybe they’re growing tomatoes on SDO.  Maybe SDO’s mission isn’t to observe the sun and the sun’s influence on earth.  Or maybe that’s just the cover mission.  The real goal is to grow weapons grade tomatoes.  I bet SOHO was doing that too.

I think…I may be onto something here.

Well, I don't imagine the tomato would be happy to be growing on the sun. It's hot. Also, even though I put stars in the background, it's a lie. You'd never be able to see any stars in the background with the sun in the way. It's too bright.

Well, I don’t imagine the tomato would be happy to be growing on the sun. It’s hot. Also, even though I put stars in the background, it’s a lie. You’d never be able to see any stars in the background with the sun in the way. It’s too bright.

Here’s a video of the giant tornadoes (the storms are many times the size of our planet) on the sun if you’re interested.  The sun is an interesting place.

Mosquito choke hold

The other day, my friend was telling me about a new bug bite she had gotten. In particular, she was asking me what kind of bug would leave a bump about 3/4 cm in diameter that is red or flesh colored, AND ALSO leave the surrounding area bruised. Well, I don’t really know. I suppose any bug that has a lot of anti-coagulants in their saliva.
Now, you might wonder why a bug would need anti-coagulants in their saliva. Obviously, it’s so that they don’t have to waste energy making 291837923 different holes in you to get enough to eat.  Also, it’s so they don’t choke on a blood clot while they’re trying to get a meal. Have you ever wondered what that might look like? Here, I drew you a picture.

Mosquito chokeI’m pretty sure a mosquito would look something like that when she realized that she sucked up a largish blood clot because she didn’t inject enough saliva into you to prevent you from making blood clots.  Now she’s going to choke and die.

Anyway, what I assume happened was that whatever bug ended up biting my friend and leaving that mark injected a little too much saliva into the bite.  So, when the bug was finished eating, my friend wasn’t able to clot and continued to bleed a little, subcutaneously.  That’s what caused the bruise.  The bump was caused by the body’s natural reaction to the bite itself and the saliva the bug left behind.  It really could have been any blood sucking blood.

It could have even had been a leech, but that’s pretty unlikely seeing as how she wasn’t in leech-infested waters at the time of the bite and a leech bite normally bleeds for quite awhile afterward and my friend probably would have noticed that.