Because the night belongs to insomniacs

I don't often fall asleep easily, and tonight is no different. I'm not the type who can just stop thinking long enough, and my usual nightly routine is to get caught up in some long random train of thought for a couple hours. I've been getting bored of that lately -- I've got nothing to do during the day, so I sleep in and don't do much besides go to the market or walk to Brighton Center, and then that messes up my sleep schedule even more because I'm not fatigued by a reasonable hour. The car horn that got stuck on across the street around midnight didn't help much tonight; my roommate called in a noise complaint to the police, but they never showed up. (Actually, that's not true: a police car drove by our street, paused, and then went on its way.) Thankfully a car horn can only hold so much compressed air, in this case about 45 minutes worth.
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I was looking at my RCN bill this afternoon and saw they've got a whole bunch of rate changes taking effect this week. We get the cable/internet bundle, which is about $85 a month, but I see they also offer internet with cable ala carte for about half that. Comcast apparently has the same deal: cable and internet for ~$40. So tomorrow I'm calling RCN to find out exactly why I'm paying so much. Exciting!
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Bad Astronomy reports some higher-ups at NASA strongly hinting that their education budget may be slashed. I suppose I can understand it but I think that it's a terrible waste. Partly I say this because the US has fallen far behind most other countries in math, engineering, and other physical sciences, and it's a shame to lose any inspiration that young kids might connect with. But also I don't think it's good strategy for NASA. They do provide a lot of technical innovations that are used down here on Earth, but they're supported by the taxpayers, and they will only remain that way in the future if they can justify their value to the public. They're different than, say, the DoD in that it's never politically dangerous to cut their funding, because as a whole we are not a country that appreciates knowledge for its own sake (but we do appreciate explosives for their own sake). If NASA fails to explain to people why exploring space and other planets and the upper atmosphere are worthwhile goals, NASA can expect an even tighter budget. No-one is going to do it for them -- well, the National Science Teacher's Association would love to but they don't get nearly the respect and funding than NASA does. So anyway, I think it's a bad move for them to take.
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On the other side of the planet, a seven-year-old was killed by a box jelly. Those animals are nasty. The box jelly is one of the most dangerous animals in the world (its venom works by, among other things, damaging the membrane that regulates the heartbeat, and can kill a human in about fifteen minutes), but the nematocysts are weak enough that in some cases, sunblock or arm-hair have prevented a serious sting. I don't want to meet one.

For what it's worth, I've been stung by about a dozen different types of jellies. Some, like moon jellies, are super-weak and most people don't feel it at all (I've held specimens about the size of a dinner plate in my hands); others like the sea nettles leave a burning welt for about fifteen minutes or so and then itch for a few days. I've had Cyanea tentacles touch my hands a number of times without feeling anything, but since they're considered one of the more painful ones, it may be they simply didn't react to me for some reason, or they may have been weak individuals, or who knows for sure. Not all jellies produce the same reaction in different people: there are a few that never bothered me but are considered moderately venomous, and one species (Cassiopeia) always made my hands and arms really itchy after I handled them, but aren't very venomous at all.

Of those, the worst I experienced were the different sea nettles. They have strong venom and long tentacles, so you get a lot of it. I've had them wrapped around my forearm before, which gets extraordinarily unpleasant very quickly. I did accidentally rub my eye after I'd been moving some one afternoon and barely noticed at the time, but I took a shower later that day and the fresh water reactivated it -- thankfully there wasn't an awful lot of venom there, but it still hurt. Jellies are a lot more interesting than I first thought -- the pain isn't the only thing interesting about them of course, but I think I've already said enough about them for now.
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Okay, 4am, and I'm talking about jellyfish. Time to try to sleep.