Podfade!

In case you've haven't noticed, we've gone underground for a little while. Because nobody's listening to the podcast, we're not exactly worried about letting anybody down. We plan on starting up the podcast sometime in the future, but circumstances of life has made it a little difficult for now. Maybe we'll actually get some listeners next time!

The Green Bomber

No, it's not a comic book villain. It's a worm. But it's a worm that ought to be a comic book villain, because that would be awesome.

I reference an Onion article in the podcast, so here it is:
http://www.theonion.com/content/radio_news/researcher_secures_funding

Diving Bell Spider

Wait, what's this? A new show?! Yay, we're still alive!

So much for that idea..

Nauty and I did a recording the other day over my computer's built-in microphone, but the recording was just too hard to hear in some portions (too much noise). And now that my wisdom teeth are out, it'll be a few days before I can talk clearly. We'll be back up and running, I promise! Just not for a few more days. :(

We went to the Aquarium last weekend, so we have a few new ideas for the Sea Thing of the Week. There's also a certain sea creature that's been making lots of headlines lately that we may address. So look forward to that in the coming weeks.

A lull in releases

Nauty and I haven't been able to find good timing to record recently, so that's where the lack of episodes is coming from. We might try recording this weekend, but it'll have to be over the crappy-recording device. We'll see.

In the meantime, here's an awesome article you can show to all of your endtime-preaching friends. It involves creating black holes by using SQUIDs. What more could you want?! Here it is!

New episode!

The latest episode has just been posted. Take a listen!

I'll have a lot of spare time with nothing else to do tomorrow, so expect to see the Sea Thing of the Week up tomorrow evening. Because I know that they're hundreds of people waiting intently for the next episode to come out. :/

Also, a reminder... please send an email to mr.cuttles@gmail.com to tell us what you think of the show! Criticism is encouraged... we want to make the show even better, but it's hard to do it without any feedback. Fan mail is appreciated too, of course. But most importantly, I just want to know if there's anybody out there!

We're not dead yet!

Well, at least our podcast isn't dead. Our listenership, on the other hand... It's like a graveyard. Without gravestones. Or graves. Or grass. :(

Anyway, I digress. We have one podcast recorded that's taken a while to edit... it'll probably be out tomorrow. And the fish of the week is going to be a few days late because of that, but hopefully it'll be recorded by tomorrow night and out on Monday.

In the meantime, here's a fun cheer that you can shout in the streets to promote the podcast:

Mr. Cuttles! Mr. Cuttles!
Four times the arms!
Four times the huggles!

I think it really brings out the friendliness of the podcast. I purposefully missed the part where the huggles would leave hundreds of circular scars... they don't need to know that, right? We should probably all come up for a cheer for Nauty too. Maybe we could rhyme it with "hotty" if it were done in a British accent? I dunno, just a thought. Email your suggestions to mr.cuttles@gmail.com (plug!)

Disclaimer: Shouting this in the streets will more likely get you thrown in an asylum than get us listeners. But sacrifices must be made, for the betterment of the podcast.

Cooler Than You, Fish of the Week

They're up! We've both been kinda busy this last week, so not too many shows. I'm gonna shoot for three next week, but we'll see.

To give credit where it's due, here's the page we got most of the info on the pipefish from:
http://www.dive-the-world.com/creatures-harlequin-ghostpipefish.php

Sea Thing of the Week!

Our first episode of Sea Thing Of The Week is now out! This week's special critter is the Piglet Squid... you'll have to listen if you want to learn about it, though.

The follow-up of the experiment was also posted yesterday. Sorry for the delay on that one!

The world conspires against me! (episode 5)

Well, we got episode 5 recorded... and then half of it was corrupt. The first half was fine, but our review of the experiment itself was lost. We'll re-record later, but for now, I've posted the items themselves. For those who don't feel like listening to the details, here's a list of the items (images included in the podcast):

#1- A bit of plushie stuffing
#2- A plush walrus (purple)
#3- Codd Bottle (would have accepted "a bottle")
#4- Nanny Ogg's Cookbook (orange/brown; would have accepted "book")
#5- Season 1 DVD set of Arrested Development (would have accepted "DVD box")
#6- Deck of Cards (1933 World Fair deck; black/gray box)
#7- An empty pack of fruit snacks
#8- A black water shoe
#9- Windows XP Home edition box + discs
#10- A kite

Episode 4: Bee Balls

A real short episode, but still worth a listen.

I just realized that the intro music wasn't in Episode 3, and was replaced with a few seconds of silence. I'm not sure how to edit an RSS feed, but I'll see what I can do later.

http://www.sciencenews.org/view/generic/id/45269/title/Hornets_suffocate_in_bee_ball

Episode 3: Giant Earthworms

Now on our RSS feed! There's now a link to the feed on the right side of this page.

A quick alteration: I did a little more research on the electrical technique they mentioned in the article (to get worms to come up), and as best I can tell, the chances of a death are indeed small.

We're on iTunes!

You can now subscribe to us on iTunes! Just search "cephalo-pod." One or two others might pop up in the search... we're the one with the same image as on this blog.

Maybe let us get a few good episodes out before you leave comments. 'Cause, let's be honest... not exactly top quality at the moment. We've finally gotten all of the audio equipment set up, though, so hopefully the audio quality will improve.

Expect the next episode to come out Sunday or Monday!

Episode 2

Episode 2 has just been released... I made a bit of a mistake that cost major audio quality, so sorry about that. It won't happen again!

This episode is about the Red Bull/cocaine scandal in Hong Kong and Germany about a month back. And I use the word "scandal" in the same way one would describe politician stealing a nickel from the government funds. I'm no fan of Red Bull, but it was a utility in Worms 3D, and that's got to count for something.

Now with sound effects! Cheap, crummy sound effects.

Article source: http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/afp/090602/health/hongkong_austria_crime_drugs_drink_redbull

It's here!

The first episode is out! Check it out at http://cephalopod.mevio.com/ ; hopefully you'll be able to pick us up on iTunes by the end of the week.

Because this episode's topic was mainly my (Mr. Cuttles) work, you're going to hear mostly me yammering, with Nauty only from time to time in the background. This is not going to be the general case, but that's just how it turned out this time.

Please, send comments, questions, and criticism our way. We want to make this podcast the best we can!

Our first episode is coming out!

We just finished recording our first official episode. It will be coming out tomorrow, as soon as I edit it and find a host. Links will be posted as soon as we have them.

In the meantime, here's a link of interest: http://www.psionguild.org/forums/showthread.php?p=51937
The first podcast will basically be more info on this... it's not what we'll normally be doing (commenting on real science), but it's an interesting start, and we can use it to further discuss critical thinking and scientific setups. Remember: science is not just about learning from what goes right, but learning how to fix what's wrong!

Also, we've recorded Nauty's guesses, so we'll see how her psychic abilities fair against someone else.

Meet the hosts!

Nauty-
Namesake: Chambered Nautilus
Scientific interest: Biology
Scientific hatred: Physics
Hero: Marie Curie
Superpower: Is always right.
- Biologist by training who likes exercise the other side of her brain by studying classic literature and playing various musical instruments
- Knows the words to virtually any song you could possibly hum
- Has an unfounded loathing of socks
- Thinks jelly belly jellybeans are the best candy ever invented

Mr. Cuttles-
Namesake: Cuttlefish
Scientific interest: Physics
Scientific hatred: Biology
Hero: Carl Friedrich Gauss
Superpower: Knows everything
- Actually a mathematician and computer geek by training, but has a fairly decent background in physics as well, particularly astronomy.
- Often refers to wikipedia as "god," as it is both omnipotent and omnipresent.
- Thinks that people who believe in telekinesis are weird.
- Will shout "PUTIN!" when asked a trivia question for which he doesn't know the answer

In production

CephaloPod is a weekly podcast dealing with science, logic, and skepticism.  We're currently in production, and the first episode will most likely be a test run that won't air, so expect the first show to be sometime in early July.

This podcast is intended to be as politically and religiously neutral as possible, but may touch upon either of these topics where they intersect with science.  We also intend to keep this podcast clean, but topics involving sex may come up in science.

Here's the current rundown of the segments that we'll most likely include:

-  Science stories from the week, plus commentary.  We'll be shooting for about 2 stories each week

-  Bad science or pseudoscience in the news

-  Scientist of the week (historical or modern, with a brief explanation on why they're cooler than you)

-  A brief Onion-esqe story that will report on the happenings of a world where pseudoscience is actually real.

-  Emails (starting whenever we get them)

Also, a shout-out to Rob for letting us use the absolutely amazing picture of a Pharaoh Cuttlefish as our logo. You can visit his photo album here.  I highly encourage everybody to check this guy's page out; all of his images are equally as stunning.

The hosts of CephaloPod can be contacted at mr.cuttles@gmail.com