The Hammer, Special One-Year Anniversary Edition

Don’t Be Alarmed, But: The Earth is presently spinning off its axis.

This Has to Be True Because: A new study about the Earth’s molten core prompted a “BREAKING NEWS” banner, in blood red, atop the website of The Washington Post the other day.

Democracy Dies in Molten Lava: Reading further, one learns that the axis is not really in question here, but many other core issues (see what we did there?) are highly in question in this new study. It examines how the planet’s molten Tootsie Roll Center apparently is “slowing down” rotation wise. This “… influences some of the most fundamental aspects of our planet, including the length of a day and fluctuations in Earth’s magnetic field.”

Then This from a Scientist: “It’s probably benign,” said John Vidale, a geophysicist at the University of Southern California, according to The Post. “But we don’t want to have things we don’t understand deep in the Earth.”

True Dat, Because: Understanding these molten proclivities will allow us to … maybe dig 3,000 miles down there and have some words with the core? Stop throwing Bic lighters into landfills? We’re here to help.

Ultimately, the Story Concludes: “Don’t panic. The core’s slowing down isn’t the beginning of the end times. The same thing appears to have happened in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and the study authors at Peking University in China suggest it may represent a 70-year cycle of the core’s spin speeding up and slowing down.”

In Other Words: This cycle coincides perfectly with the launch of the television show, “Gilligan’s Island,” which very likely caused the atmospheric rift that set it all into motion. (Follow-up study forthcoming.)

Sorry, But Someone Has to Ask: Now that we know the new Coast Salish-style longhouse on Western’s campus will get a fancy $450,000, federally funded kitchen: Will “food sovereignty” meals prepared there be allowed to be cooked on a traditional open flame, or is it induction stovetop only?

The Hammer is swung on Wednesdays, or when the Earth’s magnetic field suddenly reverses.