Retired Postal Worker Finds Meteorite in Bottom of Sock Drawer

Sock Drawer-FNT-Small.pngHALIFAX – A South Shore man made a surprising discovery on Wednesday morning when he found what is believed to be a meteorite in the bottom of his sock drawer. Experts believe it to be a fragment of a much larger meteorite that was found in the area after it crashed down from the sky years before.

Alan Thorndike, a retired postal worker from Bridgewater, said as soon as he recovered from the shock of finding the piece, he called the authorities immediately. Thorndike, who lives alone and has never been married, says he doesn’t know how the small space rock came to be among his foot garb, thirty years after it struck the earth.

The earlier event, which happened in 1987, was much talked about at the time because of the blinding streak across the night sky, the sonic boom, the subsequent explosion and bus-sized crater that it yielded. Roger Arneson, a scientist from Ottawa who headed up the investigation of the site back then, said that his team of meteoriticists removed a thirty-six pound meteorite from the crater.

“There was one large chunk of mesosiderite there, and a few small bits of it around the edges” he said. “And we’re sure we got them all before we packed up and left. Also, no one could have gotten in and out of the site at the time because we had it sealed off as tight as a jar of dill pickles.”

Alan Thorndike said he recalled the 1987 event vividly.

“Oh sure, I remember it like yesterday. The thing blasted a big hole down there between Lunenburg and Mahone Bay. At first people around here thought it was a UFO. We even had the guys from NORAD snooping around.”

He also had a possible explanation for the strange find in his house this week.

“Well I remember now, having to replace a pane of glass in the bedroom window back then,” he said. And I get a dozen or so pairs of socks from my brother’s family every Christmas. I haven’t seen the bottom of that sock drawer since Pierre Trudeau was Prime Minister.”   Source: FNT Staff

Photo credit: Original images at The Meteorite Exchange and Bravo Life Coaching

OACD Study Shows That Squirrels Are Better At Math Than Porcupines

Mathematics-FNT-SmallOTTAWA – An international study that covered 58 countries and economies found that squirrels edged out porcupines when it comes to tested skills in mathematics. The results of the findings of the latest assessment by the Organization for Animal Co-operation and Development (OACD) were released on Tuesday. The OACD assessment takes place every four years.

More than a quarter-million squirrels and the same number of porcupines were tested on their skills and knowledge in mathematics. About thirty-two-thousand of these were Canadian squirrels and porcupines, in about equal numbers, from nine provinces and two of the three territories. Rodents from Alberta and Yukon Territory did not take part in the testing. Officials said that the animals there were sound asleep and missed the tests when they were administered.

The scores were then assessed in each OACD country and pooled together as a baseline average for the study. The results showed that squirrels in all 58 countries scored consistently higher than porcupines in mathematics, by an average of 3 percentage points.

Canadian squirrels and porcupines however scored noticeably low on the overall list of countries’ results, coming in sixteenth in the rankings. Their test scores in math were slightly above the average, but were disappointing compared to their front-running counterparts in China and Bulgaria, who came in first and second respectively.

“We were shocked and appalled to see such a noticeable decline in these key abilities among Canada’s most intelligent rodents” said Jasper Cunningham, an official from the federal Ministry of Animal Education in Ottawa. “The government will be taking action to correct this alarming disparity.”

No distinction was made for gender in the tests, a factor which the organizers argued over vehemently. Cunningham was vague as to the reasons for the gender-neutral tests saying that scoring them that way: “…would really have set the cat among the pigeons!”

He was definitive however when asked if the OACD could account for why squirrels scored consistently higher than porcupines on the tests.

“I’m sure it has to do with nuts,” he said. “Math is a fundamental skill when it comes to storing food for the winter.”   Source: FNT Staff

Photo credit: Original images at Mental Floss, FantasyStock, and Times Higher Education