Thursday Things: Fast Ride Edition
17 December 2020. Vol 2 No 51 By Dan McGirt. #71
Welcome to Thursday Things! If you enjoy this edition, please click the heart icon in the heading or at the end of the post to let me know. You can also post a comment by clicking the dialogue bubble next to the heart.
Have a seat! Photo by Vidar Nordli-Mathisen on Unsplash
Meanwhile, in Italy…
Italian Police Use Lamborghini Huracan to Transport Kidney 300 Miles in Just Two Hours
Averaging 145 miles per hour, the Italian State Police delivered a donor kidney last week from Rome to Padua—a journey of more than 300 miles—in around two hours. The Lamborghini Huracan they used, which was specially modified for such tasks with a refrigerated frunk, was obtained by the Italian police back in 2017. Speedy organ delivery isn't its only job, though. In fact, it's a regular patrol vehicle for the department with lights, a police computer and other equipment necessary to perform traffic stops and arrests. Luckily for other speeders, it was too busy flying down the road for officers to check their radar guns.
Speed saves lives.
At first I thought frunk was a typo, but the article uses it twice, so I assume that’s an awkward neologism for “freezer trunk”.
Do you ever get a tune stuck in your head and you can’t remember the words? Or the name of the song? Google’s latest advance in artificial intelligence has you covered! Song stuck in your head? Just hum to search
Starting today, you can hum, whistle or sing a melody to Google to solve your earworm. On your mobile device, open the latest version of the Google app or find your Google Search widget, tap the mic icon and say “what's this song?” or click the “Search a song” button. Then start humming for 10-15 seconds. On Google Assistant, it’s just as simple. Say “Hey Google, what’s this song?” and then hum the tune. This feature is currently available in English on iOS, and in more than 20 languages on Android. And we hope to expand this to more languages in the future.
After you’re finished humming, our machine learning algorithm helps identify potential song matches.
Which is great, except now Google will have a database of all the songs you hum. And when the machines take over, we won’t be able to fool them by communicating our human resistance plans by humming songs as a code. Otherwise, this is great!
Thursday Things is in part brought to you by coffee, so we’re always happy to find more evidence of the benefit of drinking large quantities of that delicious beverage. 4 Cups a Day: 4 Surprising Health Benefits of Drinking That Much Coffee
It’s not the only health benefit. “It’s known that four cups or more of coffee lowers the risk for heart attack, stroke, and diabetes,” says Altschmied. So the next time you’re worried about grabbing that late afternoon cuppa, remember these health benefits that come with four cups of coffee.
The benefits discussed include
Decreased Risk of Heart Disease
Reduced Risk of Colorectal Cancer
Defense Against Alzheimer’s Disease
Protecting the Liver
Click to the article to read all the details — and pour yourself another cup of coffee! It’s good for you!
Give the gift of art! 15 quadros para imprimir de graça (e dar de presente no Natal) Grandes museus do mundo permitem fazer o download de suas obras através de seus sites
In English: 15 frames to print for free (and give as gifts for Christmas) Great museums in the world allow you to download your works through their websites
If you don't know what to give this Christmas, why not a painting by Velázquez , Van Gogh or Berthe Morisot? The world's leading museums have made this very easy thanks to their virtual collections, which include thousands of royalty-free images in high resolution for download and printing. And all for free. … We present the selection of some images to print, although there are hundreds of thousands of works that can be found on the websites of these museums. Click on each image to access its download page. (Translated from Portuguese by Google Translate)
For example, you can have your own Monet:
Claude Monet, “The Beach at Sainte-Adresse” (1867) Art Institute of Chicago
Thank you for reading Thursday Things. Again, please click the hearts, comment, and use the share button to send this issue to a friend who might enjoy it. See you next Thursday!
Ooh baby, you got some junk in your frunk...
Not sure that works.