I recently discovered you can make your own ethanol from sawdust and kitchen scraps.
Also that a woodgas stove can boil 1 gallon of water with a 5 inch long x 1 inch diameter stick of wood as fuel, and run indoors with no smell of burning wood or any emmissions.
There are two places you can get cow magnets; farm supply stores, and slaughterhouses. Yes, farmers buy 'em back and reuse them.
A decade or two ago, there was an urban/rural legend saying that you could increase your car’s gas mileage by taping a pair of cow magnets around your fuel line.
Another UL said cows in a field all faced the same direction because of the cow magnets. 
And there’s my laugh of the day! LOL!
I was taught they face the same direction because of the wind… Ass in to the wind to help “dry them off” if you know what I mean.
I was taught this in ground school as a way to figure out wind direction from the air.
hmm. I drop a couple of ideas that are helping to solve the world’s energy crisis, and they are eclipsed by cow magnets (I used to have one myself, really fun to play with)…
Im melllltinggg…oh what a world…!
What do you mean? Cow magnets are a great way to help solve the energy crisis. Just lay some loops of wire in the field, get all the cows to run in circles in one direction, and voilà! Bovine electric generator! They could power their own electric fence!
My best friend put a salad spinner on her bridal registry, and I thought she was nuts til I saw her use it. Now I want one. No more wet salads! No more paper towels fruitlessly dabbing water off lettuce without really working! No more “I have to wash the lettuce and let it drip-dry for awhile before I use it!”
Salad spinners ROCK.
So did the Teflon cheese grater she was given; I wish I knew where it came from. That thing was a breeze to clean, even hours later when all the cheese had dried out and settled into the grating crevices. But I digress.
AMAZING RECENT DISCOVERY: Some people, my gal pal Sharon included, use the grease from the sides of their noses to dissipate the head on a pint of beer. As in, rub side of nose with finger, dip finger in beer foam, watch foam melt away.
Yes, I’m serious. Yes, I’m revolted. Yes, I have bartended for five years and yes, I hope this doesn’t catch on.
Ye gods.
I never heard of cow magnets until this thread, does that count as a recent discovery?
Why isn’t the magnet crapped out by the cow? Is it simply too big to leave the place it settles?
I’m amazed. My sister-in-law just handed me one of these tonight as I was wrestling with a stuck on mess from burnt spaghetti sauce. Just zzip zzip zzip and all the burnt on stuff was gone!
Appearently there’s a moving company called “Apaca moving company” that’s well, not a Llama store.
Outside of Kirltand AFB there’s a sign that said, “Apaca” and for the longest time (for about 10 months) I thought they sold Llamas. I didn’t find out they didn’t until the last day I was at Kirltand.
Yesterday I discovered Cornell University’s Making of America. Well, I didn’t discover it like no human ever knew about it before yesterday, because I assume someone at Cornell spent a lot of time with a scanner making it, but it’s new to me.
And it’s really freaking cool. Seriously, if you’re a history geek, check it out.
P.S. Rand McNally, the reason the Apaca things have nothing to do with llamas is that the word is “alpaca”. Not that an alpaca is a llama either. They’re related, but not the same thing.
Been doing that for 20 years. Don’t need to do it for normal beer, just keg beer that is too foamy. My technique is to leave my index finger in the cup as it is pored. It’s only disgusting if you use someone elses grease.
I discoverd the wasp that turns cockroaches into zombies here on the Dope recently, and while looking for info on them, discovered the Dracula Ants. We’re talking one horrible thing after another here!
You need a tree-dwelling marsupial? How about a sugar glider? Cutest damn thing in the world and I have two as pets.
Holy smokes. I just died from acute cuteness overload.
croak
My amazing recent discovery is … my chin! I shaved off my goatee over the weekend after being hairy for about 8 years. It’s amazing how sensitive my chin is to wind direction and temperature.
I used to play with the cow magnets when I worked at the cattle auction. They’re pretty big - probably like as big around as a hot dog and about half as long. I think the fact that they’re so big and heavy is why the cows can’t crap them out.
Cows eat all sorts of things while they’re grazing - staples, nails, pieces of barbed wire - because they just grab food and swallow without looking. Apparently all that crap will stick to the magnet but I never did understand how a giant ball of sharp metal in a cow’s stomach does less damage than lots of little sharp pieces. When I asked the vet he acted like he didn’t know either. He didn’t know a whole lot about anything, really. He said that the slaughterhouses would sell them back to the farmers for a dollar.
I don’t have an amazing recent doscovery. Sorry, I already know everything.
Today, I learned about assassin spiders. Nine new species of 'em have recently been discovered in Madagascar. They don’t look like spiders at all. In fact, it’s hard to figure out what they look like. They don’t make any webs and *luuurrve * to hunt other spiders. Pretty cool critters, if you ask me.
Today I discovered that I’m getting paid $14.01 an hour, because if you work nights, you get an extra ten percent tacked onto your paycheck. This means I won’t be as broke as I thought I’d be when I leave for Europe in a few months.
He was also, obviously, in “A Bit of Fry and Laurie” with Stephen Fry and he was the dad in Stuart Little. I remember being dragged to see that. Loved the book as a young child but wasn’t too interested in the film as an adolescent.
And House is a great show, start watching if ya can.
My ‘awesome’ discovery was figuring out how the japanese beetles were getting into the room - the window air conditioner. I watched like 20 waltz right in - never had seen that before. I taped it all up but more still got in - through the bottom of it down into the heater, then back up. Sneaky bastards.
