Best meal in Vegas...

...the blog feasted on the queso fundido appetizer at Bobby Flay's Mesa Grill in Caesar's Palace. Jon, the recipe is available at bobbyflay.com. What does fundido mean? "Molten," which should have been obvious...

Birding Vegas

There are actual flamingos at The Flamingo on the Las Vegas strip and they do what flamingos do, as photographed by Jon. The answer to why flamingos engage in this mysterious behavior was published only last year by researchers at St. Joe's in Philadelphia. Little did they know they could have conducted their study in Vegas.

Zoo Biol. 2010 May-Jun;29(3):365-74.

Why do flamingos stand on one leg?

Anderson MJ, Williams SA.

Source

Department of Psychology, Saint Joseph's University, 5600 City Avenue, Philadelphia, PA 19131, USA. mander06@sju.edu

Abstract

A series of observational studies of captive Caribbean flamingos Phoenicopterus ruber were conducted to determine why flamingos rest on one leg. While frequently asked by the general public, this basic question has remained unanswered by the scientific community. Here we suggest that the latency of flamingos to initiate forward locomotion following resting on one leg is significantly longer than following resting on two, discounting the possibility that unipedal resting reduces muscle fatigue or enhances predatory escape. Additionally, we demonstrate that flamingos do not display lateral preferences at the individual or group levels when resting on one leg, with each bird dividing its resting time across both legs. We show that while flamingos prefer resting on one leg to two regardless of location, the percentage of birds resting on one leg is significantly higher among birds standing in the water than among those on land. Finally, we demonstrate a negative relationship between temperature and the percentage of observed birds resting on one leg, such that resting on one leg decreases as temperature rises. Results strongly suggest that unipedal resting aids flamingos in thermoregulation.

Way out west

The blog in Nevada again. The sky was really that blue. We didn't see any sheep.

Is it ever a good idea to make a recipe you get from a comedy video?

Maybe, although the blog tried to stop the experiment before it began. Last Sunday the visiting Diana and Maurice concocted a manly mushroom out of meat (pork and beef) - a meatshroom from the online show called Man Cooking. A very bemused Nate looked on as Diana carved, but it was absolutely delicious, and we all took a second helping.

Blast from the past

It's hard to remember that there was a time before the blog...but Jon went into his photo archives yesterday and retrieved this amazing pre-blog photo of Nate with the D.C. Typewriter Eraser (of course, we had to explain to Nate what a typewriter was).

Surprising encounter with an old friend in Las Vegas

Jon immediately suspected a knock off or theft of this famous work from the National Gallery of Art in DC, but it turns out to be authentic and legit (for beautiful photos of the restoration of this edition of Claes Oldenburg's Typewriter Eraser including refurbishing of the individual bristles, follow this link.) There are three in all, and the third is now in the Nasher Museum in Dallas.

In the Valley of Fire

Here the blog is not speaking metaphorically about the Republican primaries, but rather about the Nevada State Park of that name that it visited as a day trip from Vegas.

Reading the information sign at the park reminded the blog of its favorite quotation from Representative Barney Frank: “Tax cuts are fun, but I never saw a tax cut put out a fire. I never saw a tax cut make a bridge” Barney Frank, MSNBC, August 1, 2011

Frank could have added, "I never saw a tax cut initiate park development."

Caesar's Palace obelisk

OK, no more Las Vegas obelisks, but the blog feels it has made its point. It's nice to encounter obelisks just being obelisks (although they also make fine grave markers and war memorials).

Yes, I am blogging instead of checking the results from the Iowa caucus

We saw this sign at the entry to the Valley of Fire State Park in Nevada. We did not see any bees, but the advice to "just remain calm" is probably generally applicable during primary season.

Posh glowing obelisk

At the Bellagio Casino and Resort.

Indoor obelisks at the Venetian Resort and Casino

They were just lovely!