Cool Tech: Cicadas in their Prime

This year there will be a massive swarm of cicadas in the Chicago area. I remember cicadas from when I was a kid. After they moulted they'd leave a cool hollow bug shell on the trees all over our yard. You could hear them all night every night over summer, and it's a sound I was so used to that I can sometimes still "hear" it at night when I am drifting off.

Cicadas live on extremely long lifestyles. They spend 99% of their life digging around underground sucking on the roots of trees, before burrowing up one summer, growing wings, and participating in a massive orgy of sex and singing for a few brief weeks before spawning the next generation and dying.

Cicadas have differing cycles depending on the many breeds, but check this out: all cicadas live for a prime number of years. The number depends on species, including 7, 13, and (including the coming local swarm) 17. Nobody knows why, but there's no 11-year cicadas.

So are these cicadas just cool geek types, or is it a coincidence, or what? There are differing theories. Some think they developed it as a survival mechanism to avoid predators. By picking a long prime cycle, they decrease the chance of synergy with cycling predators. For instance, if they'd picked 15 instead of 17, a predator could feast on them by being particularly active every 3 or 5 years.

Another possibility is that they do it to avoid other cicada breeds. If there are 13-year cicadas and 17-year cicadas active in an area, they can avoid running into each other except every 221 years. At which point, presumably, it's insect armageddon!

A time lapse of a cicada moulting.

Sea Otter Love

Very early in our relationship, Hiroko and I went to Shedd Aquarium (among other places) for Valentine's day. Some of my favorite photographs of her or us are still from that day, including this one.

On that day, we fell in love with Shedd's sea otters. While virtually every other creature in captivity manages to look apathetic, sleepy, or miserable, the otters were downright ecstatic to see us. They kept performing, swimming, and diving for us, with these big grins on our faces. It looked like they were saying to each other, "Look, the humans are here (again)! We're so glad to see the humans!"

After that, we kept bringing them up in front of others, and my sister gave us a couple of stuffed otters, who used to greet Hiroko every morning (before Mr. Lion came along). Sadly, every time we've been to Shedd since that first time, the otter exhibit has been dirtier, almost to the point that you couldn't see anything through the dirty glass last time. And the otters have looked fatter, sicker, and sad. It's too bad.

But despite that, I wanted to share this clip with you. It's really cute, especially when they break off and then embrace again. It's the best clip of sea otters you'll see all day.

Countdown to Baseball -- Baseball is here!

As Soriano comes to bat against Harang to begin the 2007 season, I thought I'd post one last bit of youtube Cubs history. This is an audio clip from a famous press release by 1983 Cubs coach Lee Elia. Saddled with a terrible team and angry fans, he lost it in a post-game interview, creating this instant Cubs classic.

The "video" is just some Cubs fan's personal photo collection, and can be ignored.

Warning: contains extraordinarily adult content. Especially for a public figure in a public interview. :)

Tomorrow: some predictions.

Hey Hey, the Cubs will Go

Not satisfied with the press noise of opening day, the Trib announced today that they've accepted Zell's offer and will be selling off the Cubs.