But beetroot is a root! And beet greens are extremely nutritious and eaten too (or at least blended). So of course you designate.

One of our tubie friends lives in Queensland. This message is brought to by him.

Sigh. I can't have poppyseeds or seseme seeds or you know, seeds or nuts or anything small that might lodge in one of the 150+ holes in my gut. Therefore: can't have my most favorite type of bagel.

Keep in mind, billytea is from a culture where they put "beetroot" on burgers. And also call it "beetroot."

Hold up a moment, I just want to savour the experience of an American trying to pick a fight about the relative palatability of national cuisine.

No, no! I am not trying to pick a fight! Just like Jess said, commenting on the cultural differences. It's not your fault!

ION, I have figured out how to reward/reset myself if I can make it through next week: I have a massage scheduled for Saturday, a holiday (Patriot's Day) on Monday, and I'm going to take Tuesday off as well. That should do it!

Hold up a moment, I just want to savour the experience of an American trying to pick a fight about the relative palatability of national cuisine.

Funyuns and Velveeta FTW!

No, no! I am not trying to pick a fight! Just like Jess said, commenting on the cultural differences. It's not your fault!

It is quite the relief to be absolved of responsibility for beetroot.

Headline o' the day?

Robotic Squirrels Battle It Out With Rattlesnakes

"Alasdair Wilkins writes that when a squirrel encounters a rattlesnake in the wild, it does something very peculiar to survive its brush with the predator — something is so peculiar that scientists are building robotic squirrels just to try to understand the behavior. A live squirrel does two things when it sees a rattlesnake. It starts moving its tail in a flagging motion and actually heats up the temperature of its tail. Because rattlesnakes can see in the infrared wavelengths, they should be able to see both the tail move and heat up. The question is which of these two signals is important and just what message it's supposed to send to the rattlesnake. To that end, engineers at UC Davis have built robosquirrels, which allow the biologists to simulate the two squirrel behaviors one a time and the research so far suggests it's the heated tail, not the flagging motion, that the snake responds to, making it one of the first known examples of infrared communication between two distinct species. 'Snakes will rarely strike at a flagging adult squirrel — and if they do they almost always miss,' says Rulon Clark, assistant professor of biology at San Diego State University and an expert on snake behavior. 'In some cases, it seems the rattlesnakes just decide it's best to cut their losses after dealing with these confusing critters,' adds Wilkins, 'as sometimes the snakes just leave the area completely after encountering these flagging, tail-heating squirrels.'"

Hey, I have never even been to Australia, and my favorite pizza has pineapple on it. The Luau - pineapple, chicken, andouille sausage, and hot sauce. Oh, Pepper's, how I miss you.

Also - anchovies, ptui!!

I don't eat anchovies and I'm allergic to pineapple, so I don't really have much to say in the pizza conversation. I feel like I should have a controversial pizza topping, but all I really like on pizza is peppers, tomatoes, mushrooms, eggplant, garlic, and onions, all of which I suppose are relatively normal.

ION, why does my boss forward me emails asking me to forward them to other people? How is this not a colossal waste of time?

Oh, I have one or two of those. Not my big and main boss, but yeah, huge waste of time.

People, our Good Friday music is beautiful and I feel pretty good about knowing it (alto part for someone who doesn't hear parts well), but there is one piece, Lamentations, oh it is rough, rough rough rough. Last nightin church I proclaimed it Donkey Balls. But at least they got me an alto practice cd, so I have all day today and tomorrow to try and learn it.