Happy Birthday, Nikola!

July 10th is the 156th birthday of Captain Jack's favourite inventor and engineer, Nikola Tesla, a.k.a. the Master of Lightning.  Described by his fans on cracked.com as, "Celibate, yet surprisingly doable," Mr. Tesla (an ethnic Serb from Croatia) pretty much invented or at least laid the groundwork for most of the things that make life awesome today:  An efficient means of generating alternating current and transmitting it over long distances (suck it, Edison!), the first real wireless radio (suck it, Marconi!), x-ray machines (suck it, Roentgen!), fluorescent lighting, neon lighting, robotics, remote controls, an efficient telephone signal repeater system, the basis for logic gates and radar, and pioneering work into the wireless transmission of electricity that is still being explored to this day (the US government confiscated all his personal files when he died and none of them have been seen since, which makes it a bit difficult for those trying to follow in his footsteps) and 700-odd other patents.  Thanks to corporate coverups and intrigue (I'm looking at you, Thomas Alva Edison!) he's only just recently getting the recognition he deserves for his contributions to science; several young supermarket cashiers have in the past few months assured me that the schools are indeed FINALLY teaching kids about Tesla... nearly 70 years after his death!  Better late than never, I guess.  Not only that, but during his childhood his best friend was his cat Macak (they even had actual adventures, like Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn!) and he was a fellow vegetarian and bird lover just like Captain Jack... in fact, when he died, his beloved pigeons were the only ones at his bedside.  We love you, Nik!  Happy 156th!

"Hey, baby.  Wanna check out my death ray machine?"