New Look

I've made a few changes to the old Blog:

* new "Graffiti on the Walls of Valhalla" banner (using the Subway font and some Photoshop)
* new set of links to other people's Blogs and Journals
* link to archives of my previous Blog entries, organized by week

Drop me a line and let me know what you think!

'Virgin births' puzzle shark experts

Associated Press

DETROIT -- Experts at a city aquarium are baffled by the unexpected births of three baby sharks to a mother who hasn't been near a male shark in at least six years.
The female whitespotted bamboo shark gave birth at Detroit's Belle Isle Aquarium. The births, often called virgin births, are among the few known at accredited U.S. zoos or aquariums.
Female sharks, like many animals, will lay infertile eggs even if there is no male mate around. The eggs are generally assumed to not be viable and thrown out.
But when the bamboo shark laid a clutch of eggs in late winter, Doug Sweet, curator of fishes at the Detroit aquarium, left them in the tank because he had heard about a bonnethead shark at a Nebraska zoo that had a virgin birth last year.
Sweet kept the eggs in the tank with the female for a while, then moved them to another tank where the first egg hatched in July. It was followed soon by the second, and the third egg hatched last week. Three or four more eggs may hatch in coming weeks, Sweet said.

[Erik says: As if I needed another reason to avoid sharks.]

Egypt Team Finds New Mystery Door in Pyramid

CAIRO (Reuters) - A mysterious door has been found in a previously unexplored shaft inside Egypt's biggest pyramid, only days after a similar stone slab was found in another shaft, antiquities chief Zahi Hawass said on Monday.
Last week, in front of television cameras, a specially designed robot climbed about 215 feet up one of two narrow passages stretching from a chamber inside the pyramid of Cheops to peer through a hole drilled into a stone door, only to find another door behind it.
Away from the cameras, the robot was sent up the second shaft, only partially examined in the past. It found another door, which had copper handles like the one in the first shaft and was at the same distance of 65 meters, Hawass said.
"I think we'll find another door behind it," Hawass, head of Egypt's Supreme Antiquities Council, told reporters.

[Erik says: One step closer to releasing the Curse of Cheops on the world....]