Does the bear shit in the kitchen waste?
No, but if he's a giant panda, he might as well offset is nonexistent libido, imminent extinction, and the indifference of BBC wildlife presenters as to his fate... by being allowed to do so.
Luminaries from the world of improbable research last night gathered at Harvard's Sanders Theatre for the 19th Ig Nobel Prize Ceremony, which saw honours awarded to a gas mask bra, research proving cows with names give more milk, and similarly vital work showing that "kitchen refuse can be reduced more than 90 per cent in mass …
It's a shame that a lot of the press (excluding El Reg) miss the point of them. In their own words:
"Improbable research is research that makes people laugh, and then think"
It's not just sill science stories which the press then utterly misrepresent. A good example was the outrage that Defra spent money researching that ducks like showers. They were actually researching the best ways to improve hygiene on duck farms to reduce disease and improve animal welfare.
Of course all the papers could do was shout "Tax money spent to prove ducks like water!". And they wonder why scientists don't like the media.
While a lot of stuff in the ignobles seems weird or silly at first glance, when you actually look into it they are often quite interesting. And they often demonstrate the importance of researching things that are obscure, odd, or otherwise niche, and not just how to make the next shiny gadget.
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"Garda is the singular, Gardai is plural"
When I was last in Eire, several RTE radio news announces used the plural 'Guards', which seemed to be common parlance for the locals too; It is refreshing to see that Irish Gaelic is still a living, evolving language...
...even if it is borrowing heavily from it's world-dominating neighbour.
I for one welcome our new English speaking overlords.
Oh, wait.
Crap.
Okay don't answer that, but generally speaking, they get loaded with a lot of underarm sweat that wouldn't be too nice to have stuck to your face.
The practicalities of stripping off just in time before the gas cloud reaches you also aren't good.
Bras can be taken off without removing the garment on top of it but it takes some time if it's not a strappy one.
Looking at the photo in this link (taken from your article)...
http://improbable.com/ig/winners/#ig2009
...I find myself wondering if it only won so that those male "Nobel laureates" had a reasonable excuse to play with / sniff bras, am I the only one who thinks the guy on the right looks a little too excited by the whole thing?! Lol
Moving the focus off of the bra's (only to grab a drink though)...
Oh how I would like a funding grant to buy unlimited amounts of Tequila and try to make expensive rocks at the same time...
Very surprised it got far at all.
Now, I have drink, diamonds and that girl with the bra looks great (Guaranteed with tequila glasses ;-) can anyone think of the next step……