Beware of creative retooling of the Drake equation

Greetings.

Jewish date:  28 Ṭeveth 5770 (Parashath Wa’era’).

Today’s quasi-holidays:  Bald Eagle Day, National Hot Pastrami Sandwich Day, National Dress Up Your Pet Day, Ratification Day.

Worthy cause of the day:  “Take Action: Help Protect Wilderness!”.

Today’s news and commentary:

• “Wet Plants Feel the Burn:  A study in the journal New Phytologist confirms the gardener's belief that droplets of water resting on some types of leaves can focus sunlight until the plant's surface actually burns.”:  I had no clue such a phenomenon occurred.
• “Chemical in Many Consumer Plastics Linked to Heart Disease”
• “Turn On, Tune In, Drop Dead”

Today’s weird things are “Peter Backus Uses Math to Explain Girlfriend Woes” and the actual article it references, “Why 
I 
don’t 
have 
a 
girlfriend:  An 
application 
of 
the 
Drake 
Equation 
to 
love
 in
 the
 UK
”.  This article should win an award for most creative use (or abuse) of an astronomical formula.  Basic probability is used to show why there are few women who are appropriate for Peter Backus.  The same logic should work for the rest of us.  So if you have found your soulmate, be very, very thankful.  And should you, the reader, be a woman who is appropriate for me or know of such a woman, feel free to contact me.  (Yes, that was shameless, but one cannot marry the right woman unless one actually finds her, which may call for extraordinary measures.)  Enjoy and share the weirdness.

Aaron