scientific 'research'

It's not that I don't appreciate the scientific research reported occasionally in the news, it's just that sometimes it sounds a bit unhinged in my mind ... something along the lines of...

-- In a three-year, double-blind experiment, researchers at the University of Nottingham have discovered that menopausal women were more easily satisfied by men from Iowa. The conclusions were expected to have wide-ranging implications in the lives of laboratory rats....

-- Using infrared technology, scientists at the University of Missouri have discovered that cockroaches foraging in darkened kitchens were unlikely to flee when subjected to the strains of Bela Bartok. The John F. Kennedy Middle School in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, is already testing the scientific outcomes by turning out the lights during lessons in classical music.

-- A new study shows that alligators in Florida's Everglades National Park were far more gregarious after having eaten small children. Elated but somewhat confused by the findings, researchers are hoping to apply their conclusions to the sometimes-testy and occasionally anti-social grey whales in the Gulf of California.

Of course real scientific studies are not so silly ... I hope.