The obvious answer to this question, except to a certain ignorant few, is yes. However, those ignorant few apparently have a strong presence on the internet. They have managed to turn this simple question of zoological anatomy into a full-fledged, message board flamewar. The following are some of the highlights of this continuing hot-button topic:

http://www.answerbag.com/q_view/303276

Galeanda:
“All cattle have horns whether or not they are cow or bull. The exception are cattle that are naturally polled, that means they don’t have horns.”

https://www.fondsgoetheanum.ch/en/kampagnen/landwirtschaft/haben-kuehe-hoerner-eine-umfrage-gibt-einblick.html

Daniel Haberthür, Basel:
“The horns have a significant function as part of the cow’s body. According to the ideas of biodynamic agriculture they are important for the cows’ wellbeing, their social behaviour, and they serve as receivers for various kinds of waves.”

Christof Dietler, Chur:
“Cows eat, chew (several times, actually), are great mothers, good mates, and hard workers. They also star in films, sell chocolate, and have the job as the Swiss national animal. The cow has horns so that this beautiful, multi-faceted animal turns into a proud and graceful animal.”

Eva Holzmann, Zurich: “Cows have horns because they’re beautiful on them. Horns are a connection to the sky. They make it easier for cows to keep their heads up straight and balanced.”

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20071219015122AA8pZnn

Nightrider:
“Male (bulls) have horns.

Cows (females) dont. I have a challenge for you: You can look long and hard and look everywhere, up and down…….all over the place. Go to a farm where the cows are grazing in the grass field, in the wild blue yonder.

You will NEVER be able to find a cow that has white ears. That’s your challenge. This challenge will drive you crazy. Tell your friends too………….

If you do, that cow is worth a lot of money but you will never find it. Ha………you thought you knew everything, didn’t you?”

Lola:
“Cows with horns are boy cows, cows without horns are girl cows.

Boy cows with horns are the bulls which still have their “man bits” to help produce more cows – with or without horns.

Boy cows without horns have had their horns (in both senses) taken away and they become beef.”

THE MEXICAN SAYS…:
“FOR EVERYONES INFORMATION THERE IS SUCH A THING AS GIRL COWS WITH HORNS. AND I GOT PIX TO PROVE IT!! DONT ARGUE WITH ME!!! IM A COW MILKER IN WISCONSIN.. I GOT SOME PICS ON MY SPACE ASWELL. SEND ME A MESSAGE AND ILL SHOW THEM TO YOU … AND ITS NOT RARE TO FIND COWS WITH ALL WHITE EARS.. I ALSO GOT PICS OF THEM .. LIKE I SAID DONT ARGUE WITH ME ..

Source(s):

I HAVE BEEN MILKING COWS FOR 7 YEARS ALREADY”

There is a new greatest event in all of sports! Fill out your bracket now!

Unfortunately, Cavernous Pitts didn’t qualify, so I’m putting my money on Pierre Champoux (probably because it reminds me of Pierre Tin-Hat).

It wasn’t my post to update, but since Gee-Rant and Atticusser were both so vehement in their comments about the Invention of the Day requiring a sketch or schematic, I felt that MrHattyHat’s ingenious invention wasn’t getting a fair shake, so I took it upon myself to lend a hand.  I hope that my interpretation is true to MHH’s original vision for the device.

I subscribe to a lot of RSS feeds.  There are very few I actually read religiously but I feel bad unsubscribing from the others — until today when I was sent a very clear message:

Sorry Joystiq, we can no longer be friends.

Per Atticusser’s suggestion, I am taking this opportunity to introduce the inaugural product in our new Invention of the Day category.

Introducing the Swiss Army Penchuku Sabre!

This ingenious device provides all of the following:

• Pen
• Sword
• Light Sabre
• Nunchuku (which is really just another pen, tied to the other one with string. But it’s a really hard pen.)
• Fishing Pole
• Corkscrew (but it’s a light sabre cork screw)

Many thanks to Atticusser and MtyThor for providing the inspiration for this invention.

Ok, the title might be a bit grandiose, but for those of you who are atuned to all things brilliant, the first few minutes of both this week’s and last week’s episodes of NBC’s The Office were treated to a real feast of the show’s own recipe of random comedy genius.

Unfortunately, at the time of writing, this week’s (last night’s) episode had not yet been posted to NBC’s web site, but the previous week’s episode is there.

In both cases, the entire episode is great, but you only need watch the first minute or two, prior to the introduction theme and credits, to enjoy the feast.

Bon Apetit.

I know most of you, our avid Word readership, spend countless hours reading and re-reading the posts we write for this blog, and you’re wondering to yourselves, “Selves, how do the Minds come up with all their profound and fantastic notions?”  Well the following chat transcript should give you a little peek into the minds of the Minds, two of us at least, to show you how we come up with our particularly inspired brand of magic.

Thor:How’s that synthetic cow coming along?
atticusser: awaiting funding
Thor: What???
Thor: Stupid buer…burr
Thor: …buaer…
Thor: I have no idea how to spell burocracy
atticusser: bureaucracy
Thor: bureaucracy
Thor: That is a stupid word.
atticusser: well, it is french in origin
Thor: That is a stupid originally French word.
atticusser: indeed
Thor: Did you know that English is derived from a combination of French and German?
atticusser: I think english is derived from a combination of awesome
Thor: Before England was really England, it was populated by French speaking nobility and German speaking commoners.
Thor: That’s why we have two words for so many things.
atticusser: look, I already read “The Mother Tongue”
Thor: Huh?
atticusser: wow
Thor: Wow what?
atticusser: I just experienced a super-colossal meltdown of my system
atticusser: that’s never happened to me before on linux
Thor: I was having a very similar problem two days ago.
Thor: I spent the whole day fighting with my stupid computer.
Thor: Of course, I run Windows, so it’s expected.
atticusser: what kind of weapons were you using?
Thor: A bo staff.
atticusser: nunchuks?
Thor: No, Atticusser.
Thor: They’re called Nuchaku.
Thor: Seriously.
atticusser: no that’s different
Thor: Only because I spelled it wrong.
Thor: Nunchaku.
atticusser: I mean nunchuks
atticusser: those things that nuns chuck at you
Thor: Exploding bibles? No I didn’t have any of those.
Thor: But that would have come in handy.
atticusser: too bad
Thor: That’s also different than a Nunchucker, which I really could have used.
atticusser: you know what they say, “the pen is mightier than the sword”
atticusser: of course, the guy that wrote that later had his head cut off by a sword that sliced right through the pen he was using to defend himself
Thor: Showed him.
Thor: What if I got a really big sword and attached a pen to the end of it?
Thor: Then I could either lop your melon off or draw a moustache on your lip at sword point.
atticusser: I think that was his assumption
atticusser: the pen/sword combo is mightier than just the plain old sword
Thor: They should really have specified that.
atticusser: plus you can first mark where you intend to slash with your sword
atticusser: so you know where to aim
Thor: It’s that kind of generality that gets people’s pens cut in half and their heads cut off all the time.
atticusser: an even better idea would be a pen that double as a light saber
atticusser: but you’d have to be careful which button you push
Thor: OR A FISHING POLE!
atticusser: I think the fishing pole has been done
Thor: You have seen those commercials, I assume?
atticusser: yes
Thor: What a fantastic idea that is. Almost as good as the Snuggie.
atticusser: imagine if they were combined
atticusser: the awesome power you would wield!
Thor: But you know what would be even better than a pen/light saber combo? A pen/nunchucker/nuchuks combo.
Thor: It’s a pen that produces a guy that chucks nuns who in turn chuck exploding bibles.
atticusser: this reminds of an idea I had for the blog
atticusser: I already introduced the “question of the day” category
Thor: Which I did enjoy.
atticusser: but I intend to extend that to the “invention of the day” category
Thor: Well a precedent has been established.
Thor: With the faux cow milk machine and the whole post on the snuggie.
atticusser: because I have too many invention ideas in my head to not publish them to some kind of blog
Thor: It does seem the proper venue.
atticusser: yes, it’s a veritable thinktank

I saw a cow this morning on the way to work with a swollen udder (I was on the way to work, not the cow). It reminded me of an old farmer I knew in Iowa who tried to teach me how to milk one. What I remember is that it’s gross. In fact, just thinking about it makes me not want to drink milk.

So I got to wondering; if we can determine the chemical composition of cow’s milk, and if we can feed our milk cows on a diet of hay, hormones and supplements to produce the best milk product money can buy, why is it that we can’t simply create a machine that would simulate that exact chemical process that occurs inside of a cow and just cut out the middle man (or cow)? It seems like it should be pretty easy. Just feed it some hay, wait for it to digest and let the milk squirt out the other end. Here is a crude diagram of the exact design that would be required:

Patent pending.

UPDATE: Looks like my design was not far off, except they forgot to point out the horns.

UPDATE 2: Apparently, the agro-scientists are already on it. And if that was too pleasant, check out the progress in the foreign markets.

Now I realize that Donjuanica is the only other Word contributor who plays WoW with me, but I think everyone here can appreciate this little pop culture crossover easter egg I found in the game.  I was flying over Bittertide Lake in Sholazar Basin when I saw this tiny little island with a strangely familiar feature on it.  Check out the tooltip that appeared when I moused over it.

(Click image to enlarge)

Now I have to watch out for a rare epic black smoke monster, which I bet will drop some phat lewtz when I pwn it.  (That’s what Mrs. MightyThor would call NerdSpeak.)

I’ll give fair warning right from the outset here: this is a rant post.  If your opinion of American Idol is too dear to you or too fragile to withstand criticism, you might want to stop reading right now.  For those of you wearing your big boy pants, let us proceed.

So I watch American Idol.  There are a lot of people around my office who try to ridicule me for admitting that (all of whom I’m convinced watch the show in secret themselves), but in my opinion, the show is pretty entertaining, especially at the beginning when you get to watch all the lunatics who just want to get on TV.

Well I think I’ve about had all I can stand of the show after last night’s episode, in which the eight wildcard hopefuls were selected by the judges.  Here’s my issue: if the producers of the show were even thinly masking their shameless ploys for ratings in the past, they’ve stepped right out into the open now by picking Tatiana Del Toro as a wildcard possibility.  She is quite possibly the single most obnoxious, ridiculous, annoying person living on the planet today, and the fact that the judges continue to advance her through from round to round can only mean that they know how annoying she is, and that America will watch because they can’t stand her.  Good quality singers got snubbed from the wildcard round last night so this girl could go through and Idol could boost its ratings.  In my opinion, that pretty much obliterates the credibility of the show and the claim the judges make so often over the course of each season that “This is a singing contest.”

Yeah, right.

It’s a selling contest, plain and simple.  The judges have used the word “commercial” about the contestants enough this season already to make the price tags plain to see.  I have no problem with that part of it, it’s the shameless ploys for ratings that drive me nuts.  So pay attention, Idol: your ploys are backfiring.  The annoying people you put through are so nails-down-a-chalkboard grating to my nerves that I can’t stand to watch anymore.  If Tatiana gets through to the top 12 tonight, I’m done with the show for good, I swear it.

Also, on a side note, I think this year’s crop of contestants pretty much stinks.  It’s gonna come down to Danny Gokey and Lil Rounds for the finals, that much is as good as scripted.  The group of people that performed last night was awful for the most part.  And does anybody notice a trend with the judges?  Jorge Nunez was okay, but not phenomenal, but the judges lauded over him like crazy because he’s “living the dream,” coming from Puerto Rico to Hollywood and all that.  Scott MacIntyre (the blind guy) seems like a genuinely nice guy, and with the piano he’s good, but his voice alone is really not that spectacular, but Kara actually said, “You move mountains when you take the stage.”  Huh?  Move mountains?  Really?  It just seemed all a little too affirmative action to my taste. Even Danny Gokey, whose voice I like, seems to be getting a lot of play because of his story, his wife having recently passed away and all.

So if it’s really a singing contest, let’s stick to the singing.  That’s my final word.