Weird News

[VisibilityMissing]

Tesla and Edison fistfight in heaven . . .

[quote]November 14, 2007, 12:53 pm

Off Goes the Power Current Started by Thomas Edison

By Jennifer 8. Lee

Today, Con Edison will end 125 years of direct current electricity service that began when Thomas Edison opened his Pearl Street power station on Sept. 4, 1882. Con Ed will now only provide alternating current, in a final, vestigial triumph by Nikola Tesla and George Westinghouse, Mr. Edison’s rivals who were the main proponents of alternating current in the AC/DC debates of the turn of the 20th century.

The last snip of Con Ed’s direct current system will take place at 10 East 40th Street, near the Mid-Manhattan Library. That building, like the thousands of other direct current users that have been transitioned over the last several years, now has a converter installed on the premises that can take alternating electricity from the Con Ed power grid and adapt it on premises. Until now, Con Edison had been converting alternating to direct current for the customers who needed it — old buildings on the Upper East Side and Upper West Side that used direct current for their elevators for example. The subway, which has its own converters, also provides direct current through its third rail, in large part because direct current electricity was the dominant system in New York City when the subway first developed out of the early trolley cars.

Despite the clear advantage of alternating current — it can be transmitted long distances far more economically than direct current — direct current has taken decades to phase out of Manhattan because the early backbone of New York’s electricity grid was built by Mr. Edison’s company, which had a running head start in the first decade before Mr. Tesla and Mr. Westinghouse demonstrated the potential of alternating current with the Niagara Falls power project. (Among the customers of Thomas Edison’s Pearl Street power plant on that first day was The New York Times, which observed that to turn on its lights in the building, “no matches were needed.â€

[Bocaj Claw]

Thomas Edison would be ashamed. He lobbied against alternating current for purely altruistic reasons I'm sure! In fact he even killed an elephant with alternating current to demonstrate its (the AC) evils and therefore inspired the electric chair.

[Tom Flapwell]

And the next day he said, "Last night I electrocuted an elephant in my pajamas. How he got into my pajamas, I'll never know."

[Zaaphod]

And the next day he said, "Last night I electrocuted an elephant in my pajamas. How he got into my pajamas, I'll never know."

[Muninn]

Harry Potter helps improve English school to be one of the best in the country.

Harry Potter has cast his spell over pupils at a once-failing Nottingham school - transforming results.

Children dress as their favourite Harry Potter characters, chant spells and use their wands in maths classes at Robert Mellors Primary School.

The innovative approach, where children vote on the theme for a term's lessons, has raised academic standards.

The school has gone from being in the bottom 25% of all schools in England three years ago to the top 25%.

It recently received a glowing report from Ofsted inspectors.

Head teacher Donna Chambers, who has been known to dress up in Harry Potter costume herself, said: "We are just a little school who let the children decide how they want to learn.

"With maths, the teacher will say 'today we are learning how to do inverse operation'. They put on their Harry Potter hat and wands, and work it out in their books."

Year Three pupil Zak said: "The newspaper said we were one of the lowest in the country in maths but we have moved up - and I'm happy about that.

"It is easier when you are thinking about Harry Potter - and having fun when you are learning."

Classmate Lauren said she loved the curriculum: "It's really good and it has got loads of magic spells and different characters in it."

The school is divided into four houses, named Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Slytherin after the houses at Hogwarts, Harry Potter's school in the JK Rowling novels.

Inspectors judged maths lessons to be "outstanding", saying: "Subtraction was seen as a spell by Harry Potter.

"Behaviour in lessons was of the highest standard and reflects pupils' enjoyment," inspectors added.

"Pupils enter the school with standards well below average. Over the last three years, standards and achievement have improved greatly."

In English, pupils are creating a screenplay from a chapter in Harry Potter And The Philosopher's Stone.

In physical education they have practised balancing in a way that would allow them to climb onto a broomstick.

"Historically, the school had a really bad reputation, which is why I applied for the job here," Mrs Chambers said.

"But (the success) isn't just down to the creative curriculum. This wouldn't happen if the staff weren't on board, prepared to take risks and step out of their comfort zone to really inspire the children.

"They (the pupils) have studied the history of flight, written scripts and really believe in what they're learning about. They don't realise we're ticking boxes in the national curriculum as well."

[Bocaj Claw]

There is something simultaneously very wrong and very right about that.

[Steve the Pocket]

In other news, I had no idea that "maths" was the correct term in England. I always thought that was something people said to be silly. Like Lolcat language.

[Rooster]

In other news, I had no idea that "maths" was the correct term in England. I always thought that was something people said to be silly. Like Lolcat language.

Naw, we say that and it's the right way as we invented the language. It's all you ignorant colonists that have it wrong

[VisibilityMissing]

See, he told us not to squeeze the Charmin!

`Mr. Whipple' TV Actor Dick Wilson Dies

By JEFF WILSON – 2 hours ago

LOS ANGELES (AP) — Dick Wilson, the actor and pitchman who played the uptight grocer begging customers "Please, don't squeeze the Charmin," died Monday. He was 91.

The man famous as TV's "Mr. Whipple" died of natural causes at the Motion Picture & Television Fund Hospital in Woodland Hills, said his daughter Melanie Wilson, who is known for her role as a flight attendant on the ABC sitcom "Perfect Strangers."

Over 21 years, Wilson made more than 500 commercials as Mr. George Whipple, a man consumed with keeping bubbly housewives from fondling the soft toilet paper. The punch line of most spots was that Whipple himself was a closeted Charmin-squeezer.

Wilson also played a drunk on several episodes of "Bewitched," as appeared as various characters on "Hogan's Heroes," "The Bob Newhart Show," and Walt Disney productions.

The first of his Charmin commercials aired in 1964 and by the time the campaign ended in 1985, the tag line and Wilson were pop culture touchstones.

"Everybody says, 'Where did they find you?' I say I was never lost. I've been an actor for 55 years," Wilson told the San Francisco Examiner in 1985.

Though Wilson said he initially resisted commercial work, he learned to appreciate its nuance.

"It's the hardest thing to do in the entire acting realm. You've got 24 seconds to introduce yourself, introduce the product, say something nice about it and get off gracefully."

Dennis Legault, Procter & Gamble's Charmin brand manager, said in a statement that Wilson deserves much of the credit for the product's success in the marketplace. He called the Mr. Whipple character "one of the most recognizable faces in the history of American advertising."

After Wilson retired, he continued to do occasional guest appearances for the brand and act on television. He declared himself not impressed with modern cinema.

"The kind of pictures they're making today, I'll stick with toilet paper," he told The Associated Press in 1985.

Procter & Gamble eventually replaced the Whipple ads with cartoon bears, but brought Wilson (as Whipple) back for an encore in 1999. The ad showed Wilson "coming out of retirement" against the advice of his golfing and poker buddies for one more chance to sell Charmin.

"He is part of the culture," his daughter said. "He was still funny to the very end. That's his legacy."

He was born in England in 1916, the son of a vaudeville entertainer and a singer. He moved to Canada as a child, serving in the Canadian Air Force during World War II, and became a U.S. citizen in 1954, he told the AP.

In addition to Melanie, Wilson is survived by his wife, Meg; a son, Stuart; and another daughter, Wendy.

Associated Press writer Kathleen Hennessey in Las Vegas contributed to this report.

[Bocaj Claw]

In other news, I had no idea that "maths" was the correct term in England. I always thought that was something people said to be silly. Like Lolcat language.

Naw, we say that and it's the right way as we invented the language. It's all you ignorant colonists that have it wrong

He has a point. He did invent the english language.

[Zaaphod]

In other news, I had no idea that "maths" was the correct term in England. I always thought that was something people said to be silly. Like Lolcat language.

Naw, we say that and it's the right way as we invented the language. It's all you ignorant colonists that have it wrong

Then you won't mind if we call that ball-kicking game "soccer," since it was you Brits who coined the word.

[Steve the Pocket]

In other news, I had no idea that "maths" was the correct term in England. I always thought that was something people said to be silly. Like Lolcat language.

Naw, we say that and it's the right way as we invented the language. It's all you ignorant colonists that have it wrong

He has a point. He did invent the english language.

JONES CLAIMS TO HAVE INVENTED ENGLISH
What a dork, huh? Let's repeat this sound bite ad nauseum!

[CodeCat]

Then you won't mind if we call that ball-kicking game "soccer," since it was you Brits who coined the word.

Nope. But it does of course follow that football and soccer are the same thing, and the game Americans play is Colonial Rugby.

[Tom Flapwell]

One problem with modeling a school after Hogwarts: Who wants to be in Slytherin?

[Doc Sigma]

One problem with modeling a school after Hogwarts: Who wants to be in Slytherin?

*raises hand* I'm ambitious, cunning, and dark, though not necessarily evil. I've taken multiple "which house would you be in" quizzes, and each one has said that I'd be in Slytherin. Plus there have been some damn cool Slytherins (Andromeda Black comes to mind). I'm also a huge fan of Slugworth and an even huger fan of Snape, so, yeah, I'd want to be in Slytherin.