Shake Some Action

So I was catching up with the Swedish newspapers, as is my wont, and what should I learn after checking out the recipes from my favorite Swedish chef in the pages of the Lantbrukets Affärstidning, but, and I hope you're sitting down, cows make lousy earthquake detectors. I didn't ask you to sit down because it's surprising that cows make lousy seismographs, I asked you to sit down because scientists were funded to do this study and it didn't take the U.S. Congress to roll that particular pork barrel (or, in this case, cow barrel).

We're talking cows here. ("Moo, moo." Although in Sweden I'm sure they say something else, at least "möö möö.") An acquaintance used to do a joke impression of a cow having sex--she'd blink her eyes, once, very slowly. And it's ultimately imperturbable animals like that the Swedes think will warn us of earthquakes. Instead, we need to find perturbable animals, like terribly inbred fox terriers or Henny Penny or Contopus sordidulus malkinus.

The results from this study also discovered cows look funny wearing GPS on their heads. The scientists working on the study claim that their parallel research is not yet over. So soon we might find out if cows are good at fantasy baseball, picking who will win American Idol, or finding their way to the nearest IKEA with their GPS devices. The good news is even after these strenuous experiments, all the bovines were very healthy and gave delicious milk. Or, as the case may be, milkshakes.

And in Norway scientists are observing a lemming named Richter that is rumored to be quite sensitive. Luckily these scientists are being careful not to leap to any conclusions following his lead.