Mythbusters

Did anybody else watch any of the Mythbusters marathon on the Discovery Channel yesterday? What a great show; I had no idea. The idea for having a show in which urban legends and other bits of apocrypha are put to the test scientifically is brilliant enough, but splitting the show between two separate teams (stunt coordinators Jamie Hyneman and Adam Savage are one team--the more technically daring team--and Kari Byron, Grant Imahara and Scottie Chapman make up the other, more J.V. team--they're relegated to tasks like tracking how well Christmas trees respond to different mixtures for food or determining if you can really shoot a hole in a silver dollar with a Colt Peacemaker) is the really genius thing. It keeps you interested the whole time, and from episode to episode, as my fiancee can attest, much to her chagrin.

The highpoint of the episodes I saw yesterday was when they tried to cut a pig carcass in half by snapping a high tension line. They couldn't do it, no matter what gauge of metal wire they used, including some seriously heavy duty stuff. Their conclusion? It might kill you, but you won't be cut in half by a snapping wire, even if it has 40,000 lbs of pressure on it. But then Adam Savage got frustrated with their inability to cut the pig in half, so he looped the heavy gauge wire around Mr. Oinkers, tied the other end to an industrial forklift and hit the gas. Result? "Pork salad," in the words of Hyneman.

The show's pure gold.