you smell like mouse.

Ok... it happened once before but I hadnt given it too much thought and just kinda laughed it off... but it happened again today. I got chased by a cat while riding my bike. In the same area... but by a different cat. What could this mean?

Funny story. Benzine, in German, is gasoline. Your call, Alison.

hehe...
My combined two-post electricity ramble was exaclty 50/50 on the good/evil scale according to the Gematriculator

Hmmm... yeah, I don't know whether benzine=benzene or not.
I do know however that benzene is definitely genotoxic - a carcinogen.
Due to it's planar conformation the benzene molecules insert themselves between the stacked base pairs in DNA and is therefore known as an intercalating agent. The presence of the benzene itself does nothing to the DNA sequence, however during transcription or replication it's presence affects the watson-crick hydrogen bonding between template and incoming bases and can lead to increased mispairing and base substitutions. Also when it is intercalated (but not during replication) the size and shape of the helix is distorted which triggers the nucleotide excision repair (NER) pathway which nicks the DNA backbone on one side of the distortion, then on the other, removes the strand in between and replaces it with new DNA. The problem is that there was no real sequence damage to start with, but when the DNA is replaced the benzene will screw up the wc H-bonds again and induce the mismatch. This escalates into a downward spiral of "repair" leading to more and more mutation and even double stranded breaks. At this point the cell will often enter apoptosis if it can, otherwise it may become "immortal" and grow as a tumor.
So basically... benzene BAAAAAD!!!

thanks Beck and Paras, but mostly Beck... 'twas interesting... but did you know that the waste products of the photovoltaic cells used to generate household electricity, or cars or whatever else you desire to have solar powered, are incredibly toxic and apparently non-recyclable given our current technology standards? Just goes to show you that Einstein's right again: The problems of today will not be solved with today's technology.

I was asking about the benzene thing because apparently Switzerland uses Benzene to generate electricity (?) and didn't have the foggiest idea how it would happen. It is toxic still, right? and unless benzine is something different from benzene (I was reading in french, so everything was different, I just couldn't figure out whatelse benzine could be and babelfish was no help whatsoever) then that's what they're using. Crazy Swiss...

Also on the crazy note... isn't it amazing the amount of knowledge and "stuff" you acquire over the course of your life? Like, for example, I know that dirt is gritty in your mouth, clay feels silky when you rub a wet sample between your fingers and that beavers can close their ears and nostrils and have a see-through membrane over their eyes when they swim under water. I just could never put it all into logical sentence and paragraph format (without a lot of planning and organization) the way you did, Beck. CRAZY!

And... Eric, thanks for the refresher on Massive Attack... I burned it off of a friend of mine and neglected to copy any information about it down at the time... and she lives in Calgary. so cheers!

Hey Beck, shouldn't the disclaimer be at the beginning of your rant..?

End of the World

PAR - like the new background

Yeah... I know... I forgot solar and geothermal electricity so sue me.
Geothermal's not that exciting - heat-turbine-electricity get it? Good.
Solar is cool though. At least it's unique.
It was discovered by accident when some guy (no research remember) shined a light on some metal and noticed that electricity was produced... he wasn't searching for it.
Anyway it became known as the photoelectric effect whereby a photon of light containing a quanta of energy hits an atom of the metal and dislodges a valence electron which happens to be conducted away from the photoelectric metal by a more conductive metal underlying it. With continuous lighting a current is produced.
So what have scientists done with this newfound technology?
... ... powered calculators hoorah!!
Texas Instruments would be nothing... nothing without the photoelectric effect.
On another side note the photoelectric effect was seen by Albert Einstein as proof that light travels in particle form as well as/instead of wave form because the amount of energy needed to dislodge an electron was at a threshold level which he called a quanta. The photoelectric effect wouldn't work if light were a wave and the new realm of science known as quantum mechanics was born.

Thanx Albert... More information that'll be whizzing around in my head when I should be sleeping.