Bad Astronomy

Bad Universe Episode 2 swag giveaway!

Episode 2 - “Alien Attack!” - of Bad Universe airs this Wednesday, October 6, at 10:00 p.m. Eastern time on Discovery Channel (check out the sneak peek!), right after the season premiere of MythBusters!

To celebrate, as I did for episode 1, I’m giving away some BU swag related to the show. All you have to do is leave a comment on this very post! Well, there are other rules, too, but more on that in a sec.

Here’s the loot [click the pix to embiggen]:

Specifically, the winner will receive:

- A signed copy of my book Death from the Skies! on which Bad Universe is based

- A Bad Universe promotional postcard

- A glossy color brochure for the U.S. Air Force’s Thunderbirds, with whom I flew for the second episode

- Some Thunderbirds stickers - yes, two are missing; I used one my for my car, this is free so deal with it… but the other was used for:

- A water bottle given to me for the Thunderbirds F-16 flight with one of the above stickers on it

- An “I’m a Bad Astronomer” button from the New Detroit Science Center and the Cranbrook Institute

- An alien drink bottle

- A sticker for SETI’s Are We Alone radio show signed by astronomer (and featured scientist in Episode 2) Seth Shostak

- A NASA Kepler planet-finder mission bookmark

- A limited-run Surlyramics Bad Astronomy necklace with a flying saucer on it, made by my pal Amy Roth

- A wind up jiggly-robot thingy that will make sense once you watch the show

- A bottle of NASA anti-bacterial hand-gel. Yes, I’m serious, I picked it up at an astronomy meeting from a NASA booth, so it’s official, and why NASA needs it I don’t want to know, especially after making this particular episode.

… and, just for kicks and because they’re the lead in for my show Wednesday night: a ridiculously oversized MythBusters swag bag from Comic Con 2010, featuring My Close Personal Friend Adam Savage™ on one side and all 5 ‘busters on the other!

RULES:

So how do you win this great stuff? Here’s the deal: 0) This contest is free.

1) This contest is right here in this blog. I’ve done this through Twitter before, but it’s just too hard to track the hashtags, so I’m doing this like the blog contests of old.

All you have to do is leave a comment on this post. It can say whatever you want (don’t break my commenting rule, though), as long as you say something. Writing “Phil is awesome” may be true, but won’t increase your odds of winning.

2) Only leave one comment. If you post more than one, I will disqualify you from winning, and I will also infect you with the slime I found at NASA’s Ames Research Center in a jar labeled “DO NOT OPEN” and festooned with skulls and crossbones and biohazard symbols. Trust me here; don’t comment more than once.

3) You have to use a valid email address when commenting, because that’s how I will contact you if you win.

4) The contest ends on Wednesday, October 6, at noon Mountain time (18:00 GMT).

5) At that time, I’ll generate a random number, and the person with that comment number wins! I’ll notify the winner via email, and they will have until Saturday, October 9, 2010 at 12:00 MT to respond. If I don’t get a response, I’ll pick another random commenter, who will have until Monday at 12:00 MDT, and so on, giving everyone after that two days to respond.

6) Anyone on Earth is eligible, except (to be fair) for people who know me in real life. I’ll leave that up to you to decide if you count or not. People who know me can certainly leave a comment, but they cannot win the bounty. Those comments will count in the random numbers I pick (in other words, if my wife comments, I won’t give her the prize, but her comment will be counted in the total number used). Again, please don’t comment more than once.

7) Just so’s you know, this is not an official Discover Magazine or Discovery Channel or Bad Universe contest. It’s just me playing around and having some fun. I’m doing this, duh, to promote the show.

So comment away!