Body Worlds
Tracy and I went up to LA today to see Body Worlds at the California Science Center. It's an exhibit of a new technology that has allowed plastination of human bodies. It is bascily a chemical process that turns living tissue into plastic/rubber material. The bodies are on display in various active positions so you can check out what a body looks like with no skin, muscle, etc. They have the ability to only preserve the parts they want (the blood vesseles for instance), which was pretty neat to see. It's only in California for a little while longer, I highly recommend you go. It is very cool, especially if you are in the medical field or have any interest at all in health or your body. Beware to those of you that are squeamish: it's gruesome.
The tech behind it is neato. They wash all the blood from your body and let it soak in water. Then they replace the water with acetone. Once all the water is gone and only acetone remains, they suck out the acetone and replace it with a checmical that plastinates it. Then they cure it with light or heat. Pretty neato. They even had a full horse and rider near the end, pretty amazing.
Traffic afterwards was terrible, but David and Ann met up with us for some Korean BBQ in Hollywood. Good stuff, and my first experience with it other than my man Nick. ;)