Friday is for linking

Time for some Friday linkage!

1. First things first, it’s Octopus Week at the Seattle Aquarium! I’ve been to this aquarium, and they had the busiest octopuses I’ve ever seen, so I’m guessing they’re going to have a great week.

2. In continuing cephalopod news, I’m rather fond of this large knitted squid made from shopping bags. I especially love the photos of it cozying up to a Darwin statue.

3. Moving onto some snail finds, if you’re in Utah, you can hear a talk about the development of powerful pain drugs derived from cone snail venom. Cool stuff! Here’s a cool photo of a textile cone snail, which I like because they’re especially mathy.

(photo: Richard Ling)

4. Snails, they’re just so useful. I found this BBC news slideshow of snails acting as proverbial canaries in the coal mine for a St. Petersburg waste incinerator kind of hilarious. Why did they pick snails? Well, terrestrial snails have a lung, and they don’t get fussed about all the sensors.

5. Snail’s, they’re also so cute. This week New Scientist had a great story about new evidence that snails sleep. Seriously, that’s just really cute.

You know what else are cute? Lollusks.

see more Lolcats and funny pictures