- Once-gone television shows are making quite the comeback
in recent weeks. “Veronica Mars” is getting one (and possibly two) movies made
after fans donated millions of dollars to fund it via a Kickstarter campaign,
decommissioned British spy series “Spooks” is generating traction for its own
feature film and now cult favorite “Arrested Development” is experiencing its
own revival. The series, which was critically acclaimed during its three-season
run and built a small-but-rabid following, will debut May 26….on Netflix. It’s
an unusual step because episodes won't be shown on any over-the-air or basic
cable network, but will air exclusively through the online video streaming
service. Fans of the show have been pushing for the show’s return since it went
off the air in 2006 and while seven years is a long time to pine for a defunct
show and campaign for its return, the efforts have paid off. During its initial
run from 2003-2006, the show won an
Emmy for Outstanding Comedy Series, as part of a total haul of six Emmys. Also
working in the show’s favor as it returns to the air – metaphorically speaking
– is that the entire cast, including Jason Bateman, Will Arnett, Jeffrey
Tambor, Michael Cera, David Cross and others, are on board. Lead writer and
series creator Mitchell Hurwitz is also back to pen more wacky tales about the
off-kilter Bluth family. Netflix will air 14 episodes as part of a short season
and has not given any official word on whether there will be any other episodes
beyond that. Getting even a short revival is more than good shows such as
“Everwood” and “Ed” received despite impassioned efforts by their fans to keep
them alive, so “Arrested Development” fans deserve plenty of credit for that………
- Few people are prouder of where they live and the identity
that location gives them than New Yorkers. Be they from the Bronx, Brooklyn,
Long Island, Queens, Manhattan, Harlem, Staten Island or any other section of
NYC, those who live around the city take immense pride in being a New Yorker.
That pride even extends to the phone number they use, as evidenced by the
reaction to the 212 area code finding its way outside New York City’s city
limits. The prefix is popping up not only in other parts of New York state, but
in other states as well. Residents who have heard about the development have
expressed outrage, but they need to direct their ire at Internet phone company Vonage. Vonage is the
one assigning 212 numbers to people in other states and although not every New
Yorker has one of the numbers (some have been assigned 347 numbers), the 212
area code has become synonymous with the city. Unfortunately, this subway train
appears to be rolling down the tracks with little chance for anyone to stop it.
Companies such as Vonage purchase a set of phone numbers from a federally
regulated company, through a regional intermediary, and in this case some of
those numbers happen to begin with 212. Who is assigned one of these numbers
depends entirely on a person who already has one canceling their number.
Working from a strictly mathematical point of view, 212 numbers were all taken
15 years ago. New 212 numbers only become available when a current one is
canceled, somewhat like a choice pair of season tickets for the Green Bay
Packers becomes available. Worse still for New Yorkers, the Federal Communications
Commission is considering a proposal that would give Internet phone companies
direct access to available numbers, enabling 212 numbers to be more easily
available to non-New Yorkers…….
- Blame it on the clouds, yeah, yeah. That is precisely what
Dave Turner, a physical scientist at
the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's National Severe Storms
Laboratory, have done when it comes to global warming. The NOAA team has
identified the real culprit behind the record-shattering level of ice melting
in Greenland in 2012 and they believe it is none other than low, thin clouds.
If true, this research could also be important in solving climate mysteries
elsewhere in the Arctic. Should the ice sheet covering Greenland melt completely
(not happening any time soon or remotely soon), the 720,000 cubic miles of ice
being turned into liquid form would raise global sea levels by an estimated 24
feet. That’s definitely an extreme outcome, but one scientists have on their
radar after the summer of 2012, when Greenland saw an extraordinarily large
amount of melting across nearly its entire ice sheet. It was the largest melt
in the region since scientists began tracking melt rates there in 1979 and ice
core records, while not conclusive, suggest melting events so extreme have only
occurred once every 150 years or so over the past 4,000 years. “The July 2012
event was triggered by an influx of unusually warm air, but that was only one
factor,” Turner explained. “We show that low-level clouds were instrumental in
pushing temperatures up above freezing.” He and his colleagues analyzed temperature
data from the ICECAPS experiment run at Summit Station atop the Greenland Ice Sheet
at about 10,500 feet above sea level, where melting occurred on July 11, 2012.
Blaming low-hanging clouds might seem like a reach, as such clouds typically reflect
solar energy back into space, the NOAA team's computer models suggest these
clouds can be both thin enough to allow sunlight to pass through to heat the
surface while simultaneously being thick enough to trap thermal radiation
emitted upward by the surface. It’s a two-edged meteorological sword, but it is
theoretically possible. Most climate models minimize the occurrence of these
clouds, but this study suggests that this type of cloud is present about 30
percent to 50 percent of the time over both Greenland and across the Arctic,
said Ralf Bennartz, lead author of the study and an atmospheric physicist at
the University of Wisconsin at Madison. "A very narrow range of cloud
thickness allows for amplification of surface warming," Bennartz said.
"This shows how well we have to understand individual components of the
climate system, such as clouds, in order to accurately understand the system as
a whole." As usual, more research is needed and more dollars must be spent
for further clarity on the subject……..
- Another day, another forgotten World War II bomb founded
and disposed of in Germany. The most recent neglected incendiary device to be
found and safely detonated by bomb disposal experts was taken care of in central Berlin on
Wednesday as nearly 840 people were evacuated and a team moved in to defuse the
device. The target of the mission was s a Russian-made aerial bomb weighing in
at 220 pounds, unearthed just two meters away from a train track leading into
the city's main train station, Berlin Hauptbahnhof. A spokesman for the bomb
disposal team said afterward that the device could have blown a crater 3 to 4
meters wide and 3 meters deep if it had gone off. Defusing the bomb took about
25 minutes, with the team first unscrewing its mechanical fuse and then disarming
the device itself. It was found near Heidestrasse, a lightly populated street in
the former "no man's land" framed by the two opposing sides of the
Berlin Wall, between East Berlin and West Berlin. This particular case was more
intricate because a depot for freight trains and a row of houses framed the
site on opposing sides. The speed with which the process of disposing of the
bomb was impressive, as it was found Tuesday afternoon by a bomb disposal team
that was checking out a construction site near Hauptbahnhof and roads in the
area were quickly closed as experts spent the night assessing the best way to
deal with the device. Some trains traveling to and from Hauptbahnhof were delayed
Wednesday, according to Holger Auferkamp, spokesman for national railway
operator Deutsche Bahn, but Berlin's metro system was not affected. It was a
scene that has played out both in Berlin and other cities in the nearly 70
years since Allied forces stopped dropping bombs on then-Nazi Germany and Deutsche
Bahn and other rail companies routinely contract private bomb disposal teams to
check that sites are safe when building works are planned. The latest Berlin
bomb was significantly smaller than others found across Germany, including a
550-pound bomb discovered in central Munich last August that had to be
detonated where it lay because the fuse was unstable. Another large bomb was
found and detonated in the city of Koblenz, situated on the Rhine and Moselle
rivers, in 2011 and forced the evacuation of 45,000 residents. These incidents
are all part of the price a nation pays for once being ruled by the worst human
being ever to live………
- CAN YOU DIG IT? And then take it down, burn it and put up
a more accurate version of it to serve as a monument to the accomplishments of
one of the greatest players in the history of your NBA franchise? Both
questions are in the laps of the Los Angeles Lakers just days after the team unveiled
Shaquille O'Neal's retired No. 34 jersey the Staples Center rafters Tuesday
night before their game against Dallas. With O’Neal on hand, the team unveiled
the banner showing O’Neal’s jersey number on the front of an oversized replica
of the uniform he wore with the Lakers. There was just one problem with the
tribute….the team mistakenly put O'Neal's last name and number on the front of
a jumbo-sized replica Lakers home jersey, rather than on the back. All of the
other retired jerseys hanging in the rafters at Staples center feature the
player’s last name and number on the back of a uniform, just the way it was
when they were playing. All the other retired numbers also appear on scoop-neck
style jerseys where the back is pretty much identical to the front, while O'Neal
was commemorated with a post-1999 Lakers jersey after the uniforms were
redesigned and a V-neck was added to the design. The difference was obvious as
the banner was being unveiled as the "Superman" theme song blared
through the arena and the team has already admitted its error and is working to
fix it before the Lakers host the Memphis Grizzlies on Friday. "The new
jersey will be ready and installed prior to Friday's game," a team
spokesman said. Along with the new banner for Staples Center, the team
will also need to replace the O'Neal jersey recently hung up at the team's
practice facility because of the same error……
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