For some time now, it's been difficult to avoid hearing or reading about the latest plan to revive the economy and how much money would go into that plan. Using official measurements of American currency from the U.S. Bureau of Printing and Engraving and the U.S. Mint, CNBC created a mock-up of what these huge sums would look like in comparison to everyday objects.

For example, if the $173 billion poured into American International Group (AIG) were denominated in $100 bills, the pile would weigh 1,907 tons — just short of equaling the weight of four Boeing 747-8 jumbo jets at their maximum takeoff weight.

According to FreightCarAmerica, the $700 billion put in for the recently implemented Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) would fill up 62 BethGon II high-capacity railroad freight cars if denominated in $100 bills. If denominated in $1 bills, the train would be 6,175 cars long, stretching more than 56 miles. At 30 miles per hour, it would take this train 1 hour and 52 minutes to pass you by.

Click HERE for CNBC's complete slideshow; HERE for the real-world equivalent of $700 billion; and HERE for a list of what the $787 billion stimulus package could buy (fourth item).

Google the Future
A new paper by Google's chief economist Hal Varian and Google colleague Hyunyoung Choi claims that "the fluctuations in the frequency with which people search certain words or phrases online can improve the accuracy of the econometric models." Because Google's search data is updated daily, it can — in theory — capture shifts in consumer behavior before official numbers are released.

The tool, available to everyone in Google Trends, allows people to download an index of the aggregate volume of searches for particular terms or categories.

According to Varian and Choi, adding search trends to econometric models "improves their accuracy." Using the search data for trucks and SUVs to predict monthly sales of these cars reduces the average error by up to 18 percent compared with predictions that did not incorporate the search data.

Wooden Sports Car
Far from Fred Flintstone's foot-powered, wood-frame car, Joe Harmon's "Splinter" sports car is a marvel of molded wood. First begun as a graduate-school project in industrial design at North Carolina State University, the recently graduated Harmon and his team weaved wood veneers from 20 types of trees into a kind of cloth that was shaped and laminated to create the body and frame. He used woven cane for seat covers and made wood spokes from rotary-cut oak veneer. Non-wooden parts include a modified Cadillac engine (to be installed), windshield, tires and bolts.

Image Credit: Joe Harmon Design

Harmon tells the Charlotte Observer he was inspired by the World War II de Havillan Mosquito, a British twin-engine fighter plane that was built entirely from birch, balsa and other woods. The wooden two-seater roadster will have a 4.6-liter, 700-hp Northstar V-8 engine that Harmon expects to be able to boost the car up to 200 mph. Harmon concluded, "it will be loud and bumpy, but real fast, and a lot of fun."

Solar-Powered City
Florida developers Kitson & Partners unveiled an ambitious plan for a 19,500-home city that will be "powered by zero-emission solar energy." Babcock Ranch will be built on 17,000 acres northeast of Ft. Myers, Fla., and will include the world's largest photovoltaic power plant. The solar panels will sit on 350 acres and more than half the city's acreage will be permanently protected as greenways and open space.

"We're out to prove that it works economically," developer Syd Kitson told the Miami Herald.

Florida Power & Light, which will operate the solar power plant, estimates the solar facility will cost about $300 million and add about 31 cents to the average customer's monthly bill. The 75-megawatt solar generator will produce more power for the state's electric grid while the sun shines, though Babcock Ranch will rely on conventional power sources for the evening. Subject to approvals, groundbreaking on the solar plant could start later this year and construction of the city center could begin next year, Miami Herald reports.

Update: Colbert Space Station Module
After garnering the most votes (last entry) in NASA's poll for naming the new node of the International Space Station, Colbert — for comedian Stephen Colbert — will be the name of a treadmill to be installed in Node 3 instead.

The Combined Operational Load Bearing External Resistance Treadmill (COLBERT) "is expected to keep astronauts in shape." NASA decided to name Node 3 Tranquility after the Sea of Tranquility, where Apollo 11 landed on the moon.

In regards to having the treadmill named after him, Colbert said, "I think a treadmill is better than a node ... because the node is just a box for the treadmill. Nobody says, 'Hey, my mom bought me a Nike box.' They want the shoes that are inside."

Capturing Images of Discovery from Earth
Using a 25-centimeter telescope and video camera, astrophotographer Ralf Vandebergh was able to capture the image of Space Shuttle Discovery docking with the International Space Station (ISS) on March 20 from the ground. He tracked the telescope by hand using an ordinary finder scope mounted on the side. Click HERE to see the image.

Although seemingly impossible, Discovery Magazine calculated how Vandebergh was able to get the shot. According to the magazine, the ISS orbits at 350 km over the surface of the Earth and if looking at it straight overhead, it is as close as it can get. The wingspan of the ISS is a little over 100 yards, about 1 arcminute in size or 1/60th of a degree. For comparison, the moon is 0.5 degrees across.

Coincidentally, the resolution of the human eye is about an arcminute, so, when directly overhead, people with keen eyesight will be able to see the station as not merely a dot but as an actual shape.

Toodles.