Q & A's from around the web

My neck is often sore, probably from sleeping in a funny position. How do I avoid it and secondly, how can I relieve the pain quickest?

Lie on your back and rub it.

How's that going to help my neck?

Frustration Squared

When attempting to to look at my account standing on a particular site, I get the following error messages:

Microsoft VBScript runtime error '800a005b'
Object variable not set
/includes/common.inc, line 1743

When I try to report the above problem through their help facility, I get the following error, but only after I waste my time filling in a ton of information and clicking on "Submit":

CDO.Message.1 error '80040213'
The transport failed to connect to the server.
/support/supportVerify.asp, line 71

Q & A's from around the web

Why do vacuum cleaners usually have lights on the front, do they expect you to vacuum at night?

It's so that oncoming vacuums can see you approaching.

its to warn the cockroaches

Rain delay

...prompted an airing of "Are You Smarter Than a Fifth Grader?"

I believe it was in about grade four that I learned that a blue whale is the largest animal in the world. Apparently, some people think the tiny elephant is the largest. His fifth grader classmate saved him.

I can understand the confusion:

Scientists closer to developing invisibility cloak

WASHINGTON – Scientists say they are a step closer to developing materials that could render people and objects invisible. Researchers have demonstrated for the first time they were able to cloak three-dimensional objects using artificially engineered materials that redirect light around the objects.

Previously, they only have been able to cloak very thin two-dimensional objects.

The findings, by scientists at the University of California, Berkeley, led by Xiang Zhang, are to be released later this week in the journals Nature and Science.

The new work moves scientists a step closer to hiding people and objects from visible light, which could have broad applications, including military ones.

People can see objects because they scatter the light that strikes them, reflecting some of it back to the eye. Cloaking uses materials, known as metamaterials, to deflect radar, light or other waves around an object, like water flowing around a smooth rock in a stream.

The research was funded in part by the U.S. Army Research Office and the National Science Foundation's Nano-Scale Science and Engineering Center.

Below is Xinag Zhang and his research team working in their lab.