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End Of The World: Why Is NASA Running Asteroid Tests Drills?

Brendan Bures
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End Of The World: Why Is NASA Running Asteroid Tests Drills?

Bloggers enjoyed some fun this month as NASA posted a job opening for Planetary Protection Officer. The job entails ensuring “organic-constituent and biological contamination”—a.k.a. alien life—didn’t make its way back to Earth.

Now a little digging yielded more information about the gig—ensuring Earthlings don’t contaminate other planets in our space exploration is also paramount—bloggers couldn’t help themselves. Heck, we wrote a story about the government wanting to construct a Space Army, so we get the playful nature.

But perhaps a more interesting space-related story developed this week. This October, NASA will conduct a drill to test its planetary defense systems in the case an asteroid might hit Earth. Previously NASA has run similar drills with simulated asteroids. But asteroid 2012 TC4 is expected pass closely by Earth October 12 and allow NASA to test its defense systems for real.

To be clear TC4 is a small asteroid, estimated to be between 30 and 100 feet (10 and 30 meters) in size. Though exact distance cannot be predicted, scientists believe it will reach no closer than 4,200 miles (6,800 kilometers) from Earth’s surface. While it will become visible to scientists, it will remain at a relatively safe distance from Earth.

“The question is: How prepared are we for the next cosmic threat?” Vishnu Reddy of the University of Arizona and NASA consultant told USA TODAY. “So we wanted to test how ready we are for a potential impact by a hazardous asteroid.”

According to NASA, there will be no known asteroid threat for the next 100 years. So don’t expect Bruce Willis and his miner crew to save the day and plant a nuke anytime soon. October’s drill instead is a test in being prepared.

As program scientist and NASA Headquarters lead for the TC4 observation campaign Michael Kelley said, “Scientists have always appreciated knowing when an asteroid will make a close approach to and safely pass the Earth because they can make preparations to collect data to characterize and learn as much as possible about it.

“This time we are adding in another layer of effort, using this asteroid flyby to test the worldwide asteroid detection and tracking network, assessing our capability to work together in response to finding a potential real asteroid threat.”

Watch: This Operation Cake Actually Functions As A Real Game

Jillian Peterson
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Watch: This Operation Cake Actually Functions As A Real Game

Do you have a lot of time on your hands and want to make possibly the world’s best cake for kiddos? If so, there’s a functioning Operation game cake recipe that’s incredibly intricate, but the end result, if done correctly, is unbelievable — both visually and creatively.

This recipe from Ann Reardon is not for a noob, it’s for someone who’s been around the proverbial cake block a few times. Baking the cake is actually the easy part. The hard work is in the design details: the drawing, the painting, and finishing touches —  all done with the help of a cutout “patient” that can be printed out and used as a stencil. The internal organs and other body parts are all carved out of colored fondant, which is a huge project on its own.

This recipe also requires a bit of tech know-how. To trigger the sounds, you’ll need to add a sound board to the cake that is activated by your computer after assembly is complete.

The entire recipe can be found on the How Too Cook That website. But even if you have no intention to put that kind of effort into a cake that, to be honest, might not even be that edible, this tutorial is worth a watch.

Cards Against Humanity Game Makers Giving Big Bucks to Marijuana

Terry Hacienda
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Cards Against Humanity Game Makers Giving Big Bucks to Marijuana

Cards Against Humanity, the irreverent, hilarious and sometimes raunchy “party game for horrible people,” is getting serious about legal weed.

The socially aware maker of the popular board game is teaming up with the Marijuana Policy Project in an effort to legalize cannabis in Illinois. Cards Against Humanity donated $70,000 to the MPP this week and will continue to fundraise for the campaign until legislation is passed.

A bill is currently pending before Illinois lawmakers and is anticipated to come up for a vote in 2018.  

Earlier this year, Cards Against Humanity released the Weed Pack, featuring 30 cards and is for sale at CardsAgainstHumanity.com for $5. All proceeds from the sales of the custom cannabis cards will go to the MPP.

“We’re proud to support the Marijuana Policy Project because our current marijuana laws are failing,” said Cards Against Humanity head writer Jo Feldman. “Nationally there are more arrests for marijuana possession each year than for all violent crimes combined. The MPP has been at the forefront of changing marijuana laws for the better, in Illinois and nationwide.”

“Also, I could really go for a bean chalupa,” Feldman wryly added.

Similar Cards Against Humanity expansion packs have raised nearly $5 million for charity partners including DonorsChoose.org, the EFF, the Sunlight Foundation, the Wikimedia Foundation, Heifer International and the Chicago Design Museum.

“A recent poll says that 66 percent of Illinois voters support regulating marijuana like we do alcohol,” said Cards Against Humanity co-creator Max Temkin. “You’re telling me this effort is something the vast majority of people support that makes everyone happy and pays for our schools and roads, and we’re not doing it? For us, this is a common sense issue of racial justice, health justice and criminal justice. State and national politics are incredibly screwed up right now, but it gives us hope to think that we can make progress on these kind of common sense issues that everyone supports,”Temkin added.  

The MPP was the driving force behind five successful state campaigns to make adult-use legal. In Illinois, MPP spent nearly a decade and more than $1 million securing an effective medical marijuana law, which passed in 2013.

“The team behind Cards Against Humanity is doing a great service helping us fight what really is a crime against humanity: marijuana prohibition,” said Chris Lindsey, senior legislative counsel for the MPP. “The Weed Pack is a hilarious approach to the topic but doesn’t overlook the fundamental injustice in arresting adults for using something that is safer than alcohol.” 

Gossip: Kris Jenner Puts Rob Kardashian On Suicide Watch; Is Kris Jenner Also Bribing Lamar Odom?

Naughty Gossip
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Gossip: Kris Jenner Puts Rob Kardashian On Suicide Watch; Is Kris Jenner Also Bribing Lamar Odom?

Is Rob Kardashian in danger of harming himself?

Rob Kardashian’s family is worried about his mental health following his explosive breakup with Blac Chyna. As the Arthur George sock designer continue to get caught up in the legal drama involving his former fiancée, Kris Jenner and the rest of the clan are doing all they can to ensure Rob won’t hurt himself — including hiring people to keep him in check.

Kris Jenner Bribing Lamar Odom to Scrap His Kardashian Tell-All?!

Kris Jenner is willing to do anything to protect her family, including stopping anyone from dragging the Kardashian name through the mud. As the momager, it’s 61-year-old Kris’s job to make sure nobody talks trash about her daughters. So when Lamar Odom recently announced he was writing a memoir about his life and marriage to Khloé Kardashian, you bet Kris was ready to put a stop to any slander. (After all, did you see how she reacted when Caitlyn Jenner published her tell-all?)

To avoid bad publicity, word on the street has it that the reality star is trying to bribe the former NBA star to make sure nothing bad is written about the Kardashians.

Love the fresh dirt we bring over daily from Naughty Gossip? Let us know in the comments!

5 Ways Smoking Marijuana Can Make You A Better Parent

Maria Loreto
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5 Ways Smoking Marijuana Can Make You A Better Parent

We don’t normally associate parents with smoking marijuana, and when we do, we think of them hiding it like a deep dark secret they never share with anyone, least of all their kids. Times are changing and so is the world. Wouldn’t it be awesome if parents and their kids were open about the things that they enjoy and had the ability to share that with each other? Who says that’s impossible?

Here are 5 reasons why smoking marijuana can help you pave your way onto becoming a better parent:

Energy!!

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Marijuana is a very malleable drug, capable of affecting you in different ways. Depending on your mood and the time of day it will produce drastically different reactions. Many people vouch for their morning smoke, claiming that it gives them much more energy than coffee. Sativas are known for producing very energizing and creative highs; take advantage of them.

Be The “Cool” Parent

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For real. Your kids are going to be super proud that their parents are in tune with their youthful side and that they don’t care what other parents think. Marijuana will also help you be more relaxed and will give you some perspective for those moments when you’re super stressed or angry.

Be Youthful

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Marijuana makes you joyful and giggly, which is something that you don’t associate with “old people.” It also relaxes you and makes you less uptight, which your kids will love. All of these traits will make you a more understanding and welcoming parent, someone who they’ll turn to when they need some advice or simply want to have a conversation. 

Sleep Peacefully

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Sometimes you need to go to bed and sleep like a baby and marijuana is the best option for this, providing manageable side effects and leaving you refreshed and powered up for the next day.

Hobbies Bring People Together

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Smoking marijuana can also turn into a hobby, where you learn about the plant and its surrounding culture. Sharing this with your spouse will bring you two together and provide a fun experience that will reverberate through your household.

Task Force Report: Jeff Sessions Stands Alone In Marijuana War

Mary Schumacher
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Task Force Report: Jeff Sessions Stands Alone In Marijuana War

One of Jeff Sessions’ pet projects is bringing back reefer madness. As he’s publicly likened marijuana to heroin, he certainly isn’t a fan of the herb. He also put together the Task Force on Crime Reduction and Public Safety, a think tank of prosecutors and federal law enforcement agents to study the effect of cannabis on the population. It was to be your standard witch hunt, however, according to the AP, the results were “tepid” at best.

The full findings haven’t been made public, but the bits that made it to the AP make a very good case for Sessions’ to not release the findings. It seems there’s no news inside their papers, and in this case, no news is good news for the cannabis community. It seems clear that the cherry picked task force took their jobs seriously. There were recommendations to continue studies and to basically keep things status quo for the time being.

Theoretically, this means there is no plan of action for Sessions’ to take down legal and/or medical marijuana and that states continue to rely on their voters to make decisions regarding the plant.

The findings we have access to are neither complete nor final, but no matter what the final documents say, Sessions’ does not need to heed the task force’s recommendations. So we may not be in the clear yet, but the odds lean in our favor. If we were a betting rag, we’d say Sessions is going to table this and get on with other more pressing White House issues.

Activists and proponents for the plant immediately celebrated the news out of the AP, which expounded, “Threats of a federal crackdown have united liberals, who object to the human costs of a war on pot, and some conservatives, who see it as a states’ rights issue. Some advocates and members of Congress had feared the task force’s recommendations would give Sessions the green light to begin dismantling what has become a sophisticated, multimillion-dollar pot industry that helps fund schools, educational programs and law enforcement.”

It sounds to us that cannabis is doing more good than harm, but we already knew that. There have been no recorded deaths by cannabis and it is known as a highly medicinal herb on top of being a source of nutrition. In any case, the found findings point toward an immediate future where pot is left alone and states have the ability to make their own choices and enforce them accordingly.

The Facts On Endocannabinoid Deficiency And Medical Marijuana

Kent Gruetzmacher
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The Facts On Endocannabinoid Deficiency And Medical Marijuana

The complex interrelations happening within the human body are still far beyond rational comprehension, and that includes what we know about endocannabinoid deficiency. Modern science is still regularly surprised by its findings when investigating the inner workings of humankind’s physiology. In a fashion akin to deep sea exploration, when probing the vast abysses of bodily “inner space” medical practitioners and scientists alike continue to discover new and exciting phenomena. Some of these newfound marvels have the ability to cause a paradigmatic shift within medical thought. Moreover, many of these discoveries come about in completely unexpected fashions.

Take the endocannabinoid system, or ECS. During the 1980s, research scientists were investigating “where the psychoactive compounds in cannabis THC” interact with the human body and haphazardly discovered an entire network of “chemical compounds and receptors” now referred to as the endocannabinoid system. Upon discovering the previously unknown element within bodily processes, scientists began to theorize that the endocannabinoid system acts to regulate chemical stasis and balance within the entire human body. It’s crucial to note here that research into marijuana use actually led to the potential discovery of a completely novel, and critical, element of human physiology. What is more, these same scientists came to conceive that imbalances within the endocannabinoid system can lead to certain deficiencies and health issues for sufferers. Hence the term “clinical endocannabinoid deficiency” or ECD. It’s important to note that the endocannabinoid system as whole still remains in the realm of scientific theory and conjecture. However, within this theoretical framework symptoms of endocannabinoid deficiency stem directly from the essential functions of ECS.

Dr. Robert Melamede from the University of Colorado postulates that “it is the role of our bodies’ endocannabinoids to regulate healing processes by controlling free radicals… [he] refers to free radicals as the friction of life and the endocannabinoids as the oil.” Point being, if the theories of Dr. Melamede and his contemporaries are valid, ECS is an essential network within the human organism that presents both challenges and opportunities for medical practitioners. On the negative side, it could take the medical community a number of years to pinpoint and properly prescribe clinical endocannabinoid deficiency within patients. However, if found to be true, studies into ECS as well as ECD could potentially present some relatively easy to treat root causes behind human maladies such as migraine headaches, irritable bowel syndrome, and fibromyalgia.

Medical Study: ECS, ECD, Medical Marijuana And Migraine Headaches

While any studies concerning both ECS and ECD are in their infancy, ECD manifestation in migraine headaches has received some attention in the medical field—which is also in relation to medical marijuana. In fact, in one relevant study doctors studied the cerebrospinal fluids from a group of 15 migraine victims and found that they all had low levels of “anadanamide”. This novel medical term denotes a compound manufactured within the human body that resembles marijuana plant sourced cannabinoids on a cellular level. Many doctors feel that the use of medical marijuana can help with anadanamide deficiencies in ECD/migraine victims. Because, THC is believed to help resupply ECD compounds on a cellular and neurological level, appeasing maladies such as migraine headaches. In fact, the aforementioned study revealed that for regular cannabis users, “the frequency of headaches diminished from 10.4 to 4.6 attacks per month.”

The Queen Of England Drinks How Many Cocktails A Day?

Sam Jones
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The Queen Of England Drinks How Many Cocktails A Day?

Queen Elizabeth reportedly starts with a gin and Dubonnet just before lunch, a glass of wine and a dry gin martini at lunch, and a glass of champagne after dinner.

Being the Queen of England seems like a lot of pressure. How does she take the edge off? It’s easy to assume that she gets it all done by getting a little toasty throughout the day. But despite headlines claiming that the 91 year old monarch is knocking back four cocktails every day, the truth is less wild.

Travel and Leisure wrote that Queen Elizabeth starts with a gin and Dubonnet just before lunch, a glass of wine and a dry gin martini at lunch, and a glass of champagne after dinner.

RELATED: 5 Great Ways To Use Herbs In Your Cocktails

Her former chef Darren McGrady debunked these claims for CNN:

As for her drinking, McGrady mentions all the “silly little pieces in the papers” in which he’s quoted as saying she has four drinks a day. “She’d be pickled if she drank that much,” he said. “All I said was she likes a gin and Dubonnet. That’s her favorite drink.”

“She doesn’t wake up in the morning and have a large gin and tonic,” McGrady said, adding that when she does splurge on a glass of wine with dinner — and this is not a nightly event, he emphasizes — it will usually be a favorite German sweet wine. “Just in the evening,” he added. “She certainly doesn’t drink four glasses a day.”

So, there we have it. To live like a queen, you don’t have to drink four a day—but if you want to, we have plenty of recipes to choose from.

5 Things Women Who Love Marijuana Can Relate To

Maria Loreto
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5 Things Women Who Love Marijuana Can Relate To

While most movies and shows portray dudes as the ultimate stoners, times are changing and women are openly embracing cannabis more and more every time without caring what others may think of them. With shows like “Broad City” and cannabis celebrities like the Weed Nuns, women are getting pretty comfortable with marijuana and the world is really enjoying it. It’s a good time to be a girl and to love and smoke weed, reaping all the amazing perks and benefits that the plant provides.

Here are 5 things women who love cannabis can relate to:

Your Purse Smells Like A Marijuana Dispensary

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You can’t escape that skunky smell no matter how hard you try, and every time someone gets near your purse or tries to open it, you have a near heart attack. Don’t be rude.

No Hangovers

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Unlike alcohol, you can have a wild cannabis fueled night filled with great conversations, dancing and fun, yet still wake up the next day feeling fresh and rested.  That’s marijuana for you. 

You’ve Mastered PMS

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You feel bad for your friends who struggle with their period cramps and try out every possible invention and pill to counteract that paint. You know there’s no better treatment for PMS than marijuana, especially if you know which strain to take. Goodbye headaches and all sorts of pain.

Wake & Bake

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There are some days where the first thought that pops into your head in the morning is not coffee, but marijuana, which will keep you motivated and pumped up for your day.

Your Orgasms Have Never Been Better 

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Women who love cannabis know that marijuana affects your body’s response to things differently, including sex. True connoisseurs of the herb know how to recognize the subtle differences between an orgasm while high on sativa and an orgasm after having smoked some indica.

Does Marijuana Make Society Better? New Poll Says Yes

Terry Hacienda
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Does Marijuana Make Society Better? New Poll Says Yes

More than half of Americans believe that legalizing marijuana would improve our society, according to a new poll.

The latest Harvard–Harris Poll survey found that 57 percent responded “better” when asked “Do you think legalizing marijuana makes societies better or worse?”

The poll results, released on Wednesday, also showed that:

  • 49 percent believe marijuana should be legalized for both medical and personal use.
  • 37 percent say marijuana should be legalized solely for medicinal purposes.
  • 86 percent support legalizing the plant in some form.
  • Only 14 percent say marijuana should remain illegal.
  • 72 percent say that even if marijuana remains illegal, people should not serve any time in jail.
  • 69 percent answered “no” when asked if it would bother them if marijuana was legalized in their state.

Medical marijuana is legal in 29 states and adult recreational marijuana is legal in eight states.

“Voters point to drugs as the major source of crime and support tough sentences for drug dealers but view marijuana in a wholly different light,” Harvard–Harris co-director Mark Penn said. “Most think legalization of marijuana would probably be helpful in reducing crime and almost half support legalization.”

The Harvard-Harris Poll was conducted online between July 19 to 24 and was completed by 2,051 registered voters; 37 percent Democrat, 31 percent Republican, 27 percent independent and 4 percent other.The survey is a collaboration of the Harvard Center for American Political Studies and The Harris Poll.

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