The Wheel turns your bike into a moped

This idea has been around for a couple of years and may be making its' debut any time now. It is a really cool idea. Cozy Beehive is wondering what has happened to it. Most of it is the speed reducer. Something like this would need some careful engineering and plenty of field trials to make it consumer friendly.

H/T to Mike

Blue Man Group

I found this video on page about microdiesel. Mike sent me the link. The article is a little thick, but the idea is interesting. I like this video because of 1) the head banging, and 2) the shooting smokestacks. As to global warming, well that's another political battle I am going to try and stay out of.

Slut-gate

Yet another letter from Foster City, along with a (!?!?!) reply:

The GOP has a candidate whose daughter is an underage, unwed -- um, pregnant teenage slut. If you had asked me even a month ago, I would have said the GOP frowns on this kind of behavior. Yet they seem to be embracing it, they're saying they're "super proud" of this person, and perhaps they'll put underage pregnancy into their campaign platform. I don't get it.

Candidates spend SO much time on obscure nuances in an effort to "swing voters." But apparently voters aren't even swayed when their own candidates do a complete 180 on their own ideals and pee in their own punch bowl.

What gives?

Reply:

"We embrace the utter failure of our hypocrisy, and hope all underage
unwed mothers and their soon to be responsible partners will join us
in promoting family values that will carry us into the 21st century
and beyond."

Sounds pretty good when you put it like that.

Politics: The Poision Flower

Another letter from Foster City. This one is from a week ago. I really should try and keep up.

It's kind of like the NFL: they set up this totally contrived structure for competition, promote the heck out of it, and people line up to pay big money to align themselves with one team or another -- to the point where it's really costing them in terms of dollars, emotional investment, stress, time wasted, etc.

This is how I view politics. Nobody is so concerned about improving things so much as they are about scoring points and beating the other team.

The way I see it, I just happened to be born here, I pay good money to live here, and I'm a realtively excellent citizen. Why should I have to drink the political Kool-Aid as well?

And yet, I cannot turn away from TV coverage...

Iraq Strategy 204.1

Letter from Foster City, CA:

It's 12:40 and my mood is philosophical. Reviewing the situation objectively, and from the current standpoint, disregarding past (charitably phrased) mistakes.....

[NB: I find it helps your objectivity if you consider the situation in terms of "the US," rather "us."]

It is very compelling to want to withdraw from Iraq and staunch the wasteful flow of lives and money. Nevertheless, the US created this mess, and you can argue that therefore it is their responsibility to clean it up. As someone once said about Iraq, "You break it, you buy it." I therefore submit that one course of action is to stay in Iraq and continue policing for several years, until some kind of semi-stable arrangement is attained, if possible.

The drawbacks to this policy, with responses, are:

-More lost lives -- well, the US killed 10's if not 100's of thousands of people already; losses are part of the cost and the US can't expect not to lose soldiers. Remedy: don't join the army.

-More trillions of dollars spent, with commensurate burden on the deficit, taxes, the domestic economy, etc. -- well, it's the penalty countries pay for waging war; many countries have warred themselves into insolvency; US went through this with Viet Nam not 40 years ago. One would think people would exercise common sense or learn lessons, but they haven't throughout history so why should people be any wiser today? One could argue that ignorance has earned a more severe lesson in the consequences of adventurism. Remedy: try to discern the money flow and minimize your exposure, or even profit.

-US insistence on unrealistic solutions may draw out the adventure for decades. US is only likely to approve solutions with an obvious pro-US benefit; thus many otherwise promising independent or nationalist solutions will probably be stymied. Remedy: none. Prepare that this may go one for decades.

One sub-strategy is, under guise of US police presence, to make Iraq a de facto colony, and take over the hydrocarbons -- at least that could defray the cost or maybe turn a profit. Downside: criticisms of US imperialism, but so what? Governments can be remarkably free of shame.

Marc & Madeline Shooting Trap

From Someone I Usually Think Is A Jerk

But occasionally he gets something right. I dunno about the sports angle, but I don't really care either.

Why Should Anyone ::.

ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD think America should care what they think about us, our politics, commerce, or culture?

Oh, I dunno... Envy? Ignorance? Hubris? Stupidity?

... all of the above...?

But serially, folks.

I mean... I mean... what the fardles has the world done better than we have that the advice they have to give us should be given any credence whatsoever? Economy? Science? Invention? Individual liberty? General prosperity? Military and political power? The strength of our culture -- meaning people actually (you know) want it, as opposed to being told by their (scorn quotes) "betters" the should appreciate it? Our absolute dominance in any sport any thinking, self-aware person could possibly find interesting (i.e., not scoccer or cricket)?

The lesser beings of this world really should stop embarrassing themselves and, instead of presuming to lecture Americans about how inferior and stupid and provincial they are, should instead buy a frelling clue.

Mark Philip Alger

Kohler Karbon

Kohler has a cool video promoting their Karbon line of faucets.

Man Machine Interface

Stu Savory makes some good points about control design.

Hellfire

I found the link to the picture on View From The Porch


I found this explanation for the text on the "bumper sticker" in a comment by ed foster:

The greek reads "Molon Labe" in English. When the Persians offered to let the Spartans at Thermopolae walk away alive, the only requirement was that they lay down their weapons.
Leonidas replied "If you want our weapons, Molon Labe". It means "Come and Get Them".

Prime Numbers Illegal To Possess

In the spirit of Oregon's copyrighted law statutes and Walt Disney's 100 year patent on Mickey Mouse and Amazon's one-click patent:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illegal_prime

From Don.

Spiders

You only think you have seen this before. Found on Writer Chick's blog.

Athens Monitors

I had a link on my main web page labeled "Athens Monitors", but when I clicked on it today it went nowhere. So I went looking and I found this. The company that produces them seems to have gone bye-bye, but it is still a very cool idea.

Public Service Announcement

Medical Problems

From a doctor friend:

Date: Sunday, August 10, 2008


Hello fellow thinkers and ponderers,

I have to say I feel a bit inept and uninformed in conversations with those of you who are well-read and have sophisticated levels of understanding about our world.

That being said, here's my experience:
1. A significant number of physicians seem to have lost interest in his or her skill and hate their lives. They find themselves filled with disdain for not only the entire system, but patients as well.
2. Of course, it wasn't always like that. Medicine used to be fun.
3. Many physicians, myself included, work to keep the fun alive. We're careful about not burning out, and take care to remember the patient is a human being.

I agree that the AMA keeps an artificial shortage of doctors. Emergency rooms are often crowded and waits can be hours and hours. My next available appointment for a new patient is in October sometime, for example. My colleagues up river stopped taking all Medicare and Medicaid patients over a year ago. These patients jam into community health center waiting rooms and are lucky if they get three minutes of a nurse practitioner's or PA's time.

All this begs the question: Why would anyone go looking for homeless patients to run tests on when the whole system is overrun? I can't imagine, but I believe anything I hear nowadays.

My experience is quite opposite. It's now so cumbersome and time-consuming to get an MRI, for example, that some doctors just forget it. Not good ones, but the less ethical ones. Why? Because BC/BS won't pay for an MRI without a litany of questions, forms, proofs and prior imaging studies. Ever wonder what your doctor is doing while you wait in the waiting room for 2 hours?? He is probably on the phone with a high school graduate attempting to explain why he thinks the MRI is necessary. (Well, an exaggeration, but there are secretaries and nurses embroiled in a fax battle with managed care.) Does the doc make money off the MRI? Absolutely not. I think it's a law or something... we can't be paid bonus money on lab tests, etc.

Scrutiny. Constant. "Report cards." Did you get your notes done, chart documented on time, orders signed? No? Well, you will have to be reported to the State Board. Would you like Fraud insurance? Why would I want that? I don't commit fraud. You certainly do! See that progress note with a bill attached by the billing department at the hospital? You have billed for 9 physical points checked, and you only have 8 written down! (This is not a mistake, but actually "fraud.")

Government has guys that travel around reviewing such charts looking for oversights in a crowded, overrun system. Whatever mistakes -- aka fraudulent entries or bills -- they find, they make 25%. One doctor said, "Why doctors? Why healthcare? I mean, why don't they go visit the Pentagon and look for overcharges on hammers or toilet seats?"

The truth is that I am scanning maybe 15 or 20 systems in a patient, not 9 or 8. But I can't take an hour to list my every thought or to "prove" that I really asked all the questions and ruled out all the differential diagnoses I was thinking about.

Finally, probably the biggest shocker of all: Most physicians don't need incentives to do a good job or be careful to "do no harm." We're aware we can kill someone with a pen and prescription pad. We want to help patients get better, that's all.

On the other hand, why do physicians order MRIs, CT scans and unnecessary tests? We all practice defensive medicine. Better get an XYZ test because if you miss that condition you're sunk. It's called "standard of care." Defensive medicine costs some number of billion dollars per year. Some 50% of physicians will be sued.

Answer? Americans need to be incentivized for good health, maintaining healthy weight, not smoking, lifestyle modifications. We need to get money in our pockets every year when we do. BC/BS is like Exxon-Mobil when it comes to making money. Medicaid's administrative costs are only about 5%, while BC/BS's are some 25-30%. See the skyscrapers in New York made of glass and steel?

I'm not against physicians making decent salaries, after dedicating long hours and years to what usually begins as an altruistic pursuit. Most docs will never be rich -- not like basketball players or money market fund managers or CEOs of insurance companies or oil execs.

Well, that's some of my experience. I do not feel "protected," and I don't feel any lack of criticism. I have 900 patients, and I hope they will be OK. Ask Andy how many times I have called in sick. I have excused myself from an exam room to throw up, washed up, then returned to finish treating a patient. I have gone to work the day after sobbing 12 hours over the death of my mother. We can work all night and all day without complaint. Many of us sleep with pagers or phones under our pillows so as not to wake our spouses if we get called. Almost every doctor I know is the same. The only thing that makes us tired, like Andy says, is the paperwork.

Yes, there probably are doctors and hospitals committing fraud, but rarely.

Sorry it's so long. :-( thought you guys deserved a real answer :-) now to enjoy the weekend.

French for Grapefruit

My daughter has started a food blog as part of a class she is taking at you-dub:

http://www.kathryn-pamplemousse.blogspot.com/

Makes me happy.

Truth in Communications

From Miriam's brother, via Miriam and Dustbury:

Hello, and thank you for calling Furndock Corporation. Your call means nothing to us because we do not value our customers or their time. If we did, we would have a human to answer our phone. However, humans cost money and your time is free, at least for us, so we have bought a cheap automatic caller direction system. Since careful programming of this machine also costs money, we have programmed it very badly which means that you will waste a great deal of time getting to the person you want, if you get the person at all, which isn't very likely. We don't give a damn how much this inconveniences you.

Substitue Verizon for Furndock and you will understand the hate part of my love/hate relationship with my "phone-internet-TV-cell phone-DVR-remote control" company.

Adam & Jamie

One of their more elaborate spectacles. Thanks to Marc.

Ah! That explains everything ...

I was over at Dustbury's and I came across this comment:

If anyone's expecting the world to end in 2012, maybe that's why both parties look like they're trying to throw the 2008 election.

"The world's ending and it's THEIR fault!"

Posted by McGehee at 9:28 PM on 26 August 2008

What's that sound?

So I am looking for information on death rates and I find a page on the CIA website, but the data does not make any sense to me. So I go looking for an explanation, which eventually leads me to their home page. The page comes up and the title starts showing up one character at a time:

CENTRAL INTELLIGENCE AGENCY

But what's that sound? Could it be a typewriter? The CIA is using typewriters? Of course, I could only get it to play once. Now they are listening to me.

A Wearable Motorcycle

Take a gander.

Found on Benchilada.

If it wasn't FUBAR before, it is now. . .

H/T to Ross.

http://www.stanleyfubar.com/

To get to the fun stuff, you have to enable pop-ups. It's worth it.

Cows with Guns

I like puns. H/T to Matthew.

A Day in the Life of Joe Middle-Class Republican

My brother sent me this. I think there is a lot of truth in it. Besides I am really ticked off at the Republican Kleptocracy this morning.

A Day in the Life of Joe Middle-Class Republican

Joe gets up at 6:00am to prepare his morning coffee. He fills his pot full of good clean drinking water because some liberal fought for minimum water quality standards. He takes his daily medication with his first swallow of coffee. His medications are safe to take because some liberal fought to insure their safety and work as advertised.

All but $10.00 of his medications are paid for by his employers medical plan because some liberal union workers fought their employers for paid medical insurance, now Joe gets it too. He prepares his morning breakfast, bacon and eggs this day. Joe's bacon is safe to eat because some liberal fought for laws to regulate the meat packing industry.

Joe takes his morning shower reaching for his shampoo; His bottle is properly labeled with every ingredient and the amount of its contents because some liberal fought for his right to know what he was putting on his body and how much it contained. Joe dresses, walks outside and takes a deep breath. The air he breathes is clean because some tree hugging liberal fought for laws to stop industries from polluting our air. He walks to the subway station for his government subsidized ride to work; it saves him considerable money in parking and transportation fees. You see, some liberal fought for affordable public transportation, which gives everyone the opportunity to be a contributor.

Joe begins his work day; he has a good job with excellent pay, medicals benefits, retirement, paid holidays and vacation because some liberal union members fought and died for these working standards. Joe's employer pays these standards because Joe's employer doesn't want his employees to call the union. If Joe is hurt on the job or becomes unemployed he'll get a worker compensation or unemployment check because some liberal didn't think he should loose his home because of his temporary misfortune.

Its noon time, Joe needs to make a Bank Deposit so he can pay some bills. Joe's deposit is federally insured by the FSLIC because some liberal wanted to protect Joe's money from unscrupulous bankers who ruined the banking system before the depression.

Joe has to pay his Fannie Mae underwritten Mortgage and his below market federal student loan because some stupid liberal decided that Joe and the government would be better off if he was educated and earned more money over his life-time.

Joe is home from work, he plans to visit his father this evening at his farm home in the country. He gets in his car for the drive to dads; his car is among the safest in the world because some liberal fought for car safety standards. He arrives at his boyhood home. He was the third generation to live in the house financed by Farmers Home Administration because bankers didn't want to make rural loans. The house didn't have electric until some big government liberal stuck his nose where it didn't belong and demanded rural electrification. (Those rural Republicans would still be sitting in the dark)

He is happy to see his dad who is now retired. His dad lives on Social Security and his union pension because some liberal made sure he could take care of himself so Joe wouldn't have to. After his visit with dad he gets back in his car for the ride home. He turns on a radio talk show, the host's keeps saying that liberals are bad and conservatives are good. (He doesn't tell Joe that his beloved Republicans have fought against every protection and benefit Joe enjoys throughout his day) Joe agrees, "We don't need those big government liberals ruining our lives; after all, I'm a self made man who believes everyone should take care of themselves, just like I have".

Another Broken Levee

The midwest is still suffering from flooding. Mike sent me the link to this video. Note though we are talking about Gulfport, we are talking about ILLINOIS, not the Gulf Coast.



Yea, yea, yea, conditions very bad, but what we really need is a song, so I went looking for a video of Led Zepplins' "When The Levee Breaks". Did not find one I really liked, but at least you can listen to the tune. The pictures here are from New Orleans which is on the Gulf Coast, not in ILLINOIS.

Radioactive Snails

I was looking for pictures to go along with my story about radioactive lead and I came across this one. It didn't really fit with the other story, but I couldn't pass it up. It is just too great!

Patti Smith: Dancing Barefoot

I was looking for stuff about the P-38, and I came across this video, which uses the song for a soundtrack. I like this song, and I had not heard it for a long time, so I looked around on You Tube for a bit to see if I could find a better video. I didn't. I don't care for "live" recordings, and I don't much care for watching the band play. I want some kind of show. I'm not sure there is any connection between what is going on in the video and the lyrics in the song, but I'm not sure there isn't either. Patti wrote the song, and I think this is her singing, but I cannot be sure.

Stu Savory's Bike in Scotland

The Periodic Table of Rejected Elements

by Michael Gerber and Jonathan Schwarz

I am working on my table and I came across this one, which I really like.

Sales Guy Versus Web Dude

A little crude, perhaps, but stupidity has no bottom. From i-am-bored.com via Dan.


"The Web Server is Down. If you`ve ever called tech support and wondered what was going on,  this should answer some of your questions."
Update June 2016 replaced missing video.

How To Not Hire An American

The video is a little tedious, but perhaps I am a tad impatient with blather.

You can read all about it on the DAILY KOS.

Notes about the video:

• DOL PERM refers to Department Of Labor process for becoming a Permanent resident.
• The web site mentioned is: http://www.programmersguild.org/

A friend of mine is working a contract job at Intel. There are 20 cubicles on his aisle. There is one other Caucasian and one Chinese man. All the rest are Indians. I am not opposed to hiring foreigners, but I don't like people gaming the system, and that is certainly what it looks like. I am beginning to suspect Intel of being not a very good member of the community.

H/T to Andy.

ROBOTS ARE ALMOST AS LIBERAL AS PENGUINS

This was a comment on a blog about about Wall-E. I thought it was the best of the lot. Robot Wisdom auxilary had a link to a nice story on this same page.

More Cowbell

There was a kid wearing a More Cowbell T-shirt at the movies last night, and Dustbury is writing about the More Cowbell app for the iPhone, so I just gotta put the video up, because you can never have too much cowbell.

Digital People

Everything is getting digitized these days, even art. Nathan Sawaya is busy with Legos.

Update June 2016. Another page about Nathan.
Picture is missing.

Picasa & Planetary Gears

Eric Haines created this drawing and posted it on the web some ten years ago. I came across it while looking for a drawing to illustrate a post on my regular blog. I passed this one by because the original was too dark. Turns out I had the tool at hand to correct that problem. Eric clued me in: Picasa. Click on Auto-Contrast and presto! You get the image you see here.

Asymmetrical Looney Gear

I was looking for pictures of planetary gearsets and I came across this piece of weirdness. At first I thought it could not possibly work, but the animation convinced me otherwise. Not sure what it would be good for, but it sure is strange. Search for title on linked page to read more about it. Click here to watch the animation if it isn't running on this page.

Goll-oll-oll-olly Mr. Daily!

H/T to Just An Earth-Bound Misfit

Rhenium

I've been putting together a spreadsheet of the elements, and I came across this little tidbit in Wikipedia:

(Rhenium) is among the ten most expensive metals on Earth, at times exceeding US$ 11,000 per kilogram. About 35 kilograms of Rhenium are required in the construction of a commercial jet engine.

$385,000 worth of Rhenium to build a single jet engine!?!? Well, that would go a long way towards explaining why the things are so bleeding expensive. I would think that this would make their scrap value much higher than it is.

From The Expert Network:

Analysis: Rhenium is a critical metal, one without which it would be impossible to produce modern military jet engines, the most efficient jet engines for civilian aircraft, and rocket engines for military use and space exploration.

This is because when it is used in concentrations of 2 to 6% to make superalloys those alloys can be used to make jet and rocket engine components to contain and direct the superheated exhaust of jet and rocket engines without melting or losing their strength.

The higher the temperature at which a jet or rocket engine operates the more efficient and powerful it is.

Sorry about the picture. I got tired of looking at poor quality, fuzzy, smeared black and whites, and settled for this diagram of a Kawasaki gas turbine.

German Plane Landing Attempt

I had this in my list of videos on regular Pergelator, but it got deleted due to some vast media conspiracy, so I dug around and found another version and posted it here. Enjoy it while you can.

Gone Daddy Gone

Via Dustbury
I liked the first part of this video when the bugs are little, but I did not enjoy the last part with the human sized bugs. Gave me the creeps.

Tim

Mmm, mmm, good

Found on SondraKiStan, USA

Cuthbert Lift

I am poking around on the internet using some clues I found on my Dad's old computer, and I stumble across this guy who is trying to build a better elevator. He is using some of my ideas. Actually he probably thought of it all on his own, like many other people, but this Cuthbert guy has actually built a prototype of an elevator that might actually work. Here's a longish video:

Strange Horizons fundraising drive

Something I had never heard about, but I like the idea so much I gave them $25 without even reading any of their stuff. Strange Horizons:

"We're a nonprofit online speculative fiction magazine that pays professional rates for fiction; we're run by a staff of volunteers; we've published new material every week, freely available online, for nearly 8 years (and almost all of it is still available in our archives), including fiction, poetry, articles, reviews, art, and columns; we're funded entirely by donations, in a sort of public-radio-like model; in the US, donations to us are tax-deductible. Stuff we publish gets picked up regularly for Year's Best reprint volumes. Last year a story we published was on the Nebula ballot and another was on the Hugo ballot. Also, our Editor-in-chief, Susan Marie Groppie, was nominated for the World Fantasy Award."

From Boing Boing.

Black Rock City

People do strange things. Groups of people do stranger things.

http://www.wikimapia.org/#lat=40.7681267&lon=-119.2241478&z=14&l=0&m=h

Recorded Music

This is the second time I have heard complaints about the way the sound is processed before being recorded on a CD. Via Dustbury.com.

http://www.dustbury.com/backlog/2008/06/not_a_petty_issue.html

About email addresses

I ran across this on one of Google's help pages. Cleared up some things for me.


Sometimes you may receive a message intended for someone whose address resembles yours but has a different number or placement of dots. For example, your address might be homerjsimpson@gmail.com, but the message was sent to a Homer.J.Simpson@gmail.com. What's going on?

Gmail allows only one registration for any given username. Once you sign up for a particular username, any dot or capitalization variations are made permanently unavailable for new registration. If you created yourusername@gmail.com, no one can ever register your.username@gmail.com, or Your.user.name@gmail.com. Furthermore, because Gmail doesn't recognize dots as characters within usernames, adding or removing dots from a Gmail address won't change the actual destination address.


Messages sent to yourusername@gmail.com, your.username@gmail.com, and y.o.u.r.u.s.e.r.n.a.m.e@gmail.com are all delivered to your inbox, and only yours.

If you're homerjsimpson@gmail.com, no one owns Homer.J.Simpson@gmail.com, except for you. Sending mail to Homer.J.Simpson@gmail.com is the same as sending mail to homerjsimpson@gmail.com, or even HOMERJSIMPSON@GMAIL.COM. If you're getting mail addressed to Homer.J.Simpson@gmail.com, most likely someone was trying to send a message to Homer.J.Sampson@gmail.com, or Homer.J.Simpson1@gmail.com, and made a mistake. You might even get messages from mailing lists or website registrations because the intended recipient accidentally provided the wrong email address. In these cases, we suggest contacting the original sender or website when possible to alert them to the mistake.

For security reasons, when you log in to Gmail, you must enter any dots that were originally defined as part of your username.

Note: Google Apps recognizes dots. If you'd like to receive mail with a dot in your username, please ask your domain administrator to add the desired username as a nickname.

Nashville Teens - Tobacco Road

I stumbled across this. I hadn't heard this song since I don't know when.

Batting Practice

Nephew Nick and brother Andy. And the shovel.

Idle

"A" sent the rest of us some links, which engendered a little chat:

A:
Idler
Idle Pleasures
Freedom-Manifesto-Government-Supermarkets-Melancholy

M: "The book gives tantalizing anthropological insights into society's views on those lazy habits that the author so enjoys, but the viewpoint is so antiquated and condescending toward the poor slobs who must actually go to work every day that readers will often find themselves staring aghast at the page."

A-ghast. Curious word. I should look that up someday, but just now I have a plate a cucumber sandwiches that seem to beckon me, arisen, as it were, they seem to have, from the very prettily starched tablecloth upen which they sit, cooled by the silver platter they occupy.

D: It occurs to me that M is the only one of us working a job right now...

C: Yes, and he is the only one with cucumber sandwiches.

D: Can maintaining a multi-media website, writing and publishing books, and promoting events really be considered "idle?" Isn't that a bit disingenuous? Like hunting whales, and donating the proceeds to "save the whales?"

C: Hmmm. If it's what you were going to do anyway and it turned out to make you some money, well maybe. If you are doing with the intent of turning a profit, well maybe not. There is idle, and there is bored. Even when I am idle, I need something to do.

M: Being truly idle includes not thinking about it.

A Love Song For Joyce

Poking around on the internet I came across this story by Ambulance Driver. It's a little over a year old, but it's still a heck of a good story.

Quiz

When life throws adversity at you, how do you determine whether it is:
A) A test of your fortitude and mental strength, which will result in reward;
B) A signal that you are pursuing the wrong path and should correct course?

Currently I can only do a sort of rudimentary cost-benefit, risk-reward analysis, and that is based on probablilities and expected outcomes which are fundementally unknowable. Unsatisfactory.

Submit your answers to enter a drawing for a free loaf of pumpernickel!

Dan

----- Answer ------

There is no future. There is only the now.

My college eduated son says the one true way is Monadology.

ccp

Wowzer

Good ol' Onion.

'Warcraft' Sequel Lets Gamers Play A Character Playing 'Warcraft'

Witch, witch!

After seeing this ad on TV, I have been using that phrase to denounce any clever approaches to program problem solving.



Mike

Flood

Dateline Iowa,

The TV news is running 24/7, much video of Cedar Rapids under water.

Things I heard:

-) Sandbag basement drains and sumps to slow down water entering basement
-) Officials announced flood would at most be 3 feet above devasting flood of 1993, 22 feet. Currently 32 foot above flood stage.
-) Big main, modern fire department under 10' of water.
-) If well funded and water recedes quickly, 30 days to strip business to impermeable, dry out, back into movein condition.
-) Many homes and businesses won't be rehabbed within 30 days and will have to be destroyed.
-) Neighbors' son lived and work downtown CR, 2nd story apartment OK. Couple days ago they learned business would be flooded with a couple feet, sandbagged, then water rose quickly to 4 foot deep and breached bags.

I offered through friends, my house as a sanctuary for a family in need. But CR is 70 miles away.

I am headed to Fort Madison, where Mississippi is expected to rise dramatically higher than the flood of month ago. Glad I don't have a boat in the marina. Maybe I can snag a run-away boat escaping downstream.

Come to think of it house boats in CR are breaking away.....but would be reduced to flotsam by the time they reached FM.

Andy

Report from Iowa

Sirens going off, tornado 8 miles south moving NE at 51 mph.

Cool.

...

Hi, from Fairfield,

Survived bypassing of tornado ( dopplered, not seen)

Sky was really spooky clouds going every which-way.
The Sky did turn pale green in the area of the tornado.
Rained hard, blew, then all was quiet.

The news pics of Cedar Rapids are sobering.
I had driven down many of those streets with the affordably priced homes.
They are now have water up over the 2nd story.
500 year flood 14 years after the 100 flood.
They expected it to go a couple feet over the 19' 1993 high-water mark.
It is now 27 feet and climbing.
Saw a TV news clip about a Jon boat rescuing a couple old guys from their brick house, while the boatmen was fighting a fast moving current. jeeze.

Was at the neighbors helping him figure out vcr-DVD dubbing. His weather radio kept coming on every 15 minutes with new warnings of everything within a 100 miles.

Andy

Oil

From known associates:

This is a couple years old but contains some good stats:

US is about 25% of world oil consumption;

US imports about 60% of oil consumed;

About 45% of each barrel goes to gasoline -- balance to diesel, industrial production;

Some gas goes to delivery vans and taxis, thus about 40% of each barrel of oil goes to gas for commuter and leisure driving.

http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=3947

And:

I found this surprising:

(for 2008) "Canada remained the largest exporter of total petroleum in March, exporting 2.542 million barrels per day to the United States, which is an increase from last month (2.464 thousand barrels per day). The second largest exporter of total petroleum was Saudi Arabia with 1.542 million barrels per day."

http://www.eia.doe.gov/pub/oil_gas/petroleum/data_publications/company_level_imports/current/import.html

I sold CNQ a couple years ago after it had doubled. It doubled again.

Gas Gun

I am not quite sure what to make of this picture, but it is certainly startling. Shooting ones self in the head with a gasoline nozzle? Is that what we are all doing?

Letter from CA

I'm writing from the Mountain View library, over the free WiFi network that Google has provided for MV.

MV library is very nice, superior even to Foster City, bigger, better appointed, more computers.

Google Wifi sounds attractive because it's free, they have a secure encrypted version, and they have nodes all over MV -- including one directly across the street from my apt. Sounds great, right? Well there are all kinds of conditionals: the signal works best outside, but if you want to get it inside your house, you need a "wifi modem" to capture and amplify the signal.

How does a "modem" differ from an "antenna," "amplifier," "bridge," or a "wifi wireless LAN ethernet converter adapter card?" I have no idea. But there are apparently only a couple items that will work:

Ruckus Metroflex Wi-Fi Modem and

Peplink Surf 200 Wi-Fi modem

Reading the support page, I see all kinds of comments like:

"I bought the modem and still can't get the signal."

"I get a strong signal but my PC still won't connect."

"I get a strong signal but only intermittently; it's very unreliable."

Anyway I configured a connect profile here at the library for the Google "secure" connection. I'll test it in front of my building. If I can get a strong, consistent signal, maybe I'll invest in a "modem" and try to access it from inside. But what do you bet it turns out to be a crock? There's always Comcast.

Initial search for hotspots at my building revealed DOZENS, mostly secured.

I'm leary of poaching an unsecured node, although I used in FC for 18 months with no apparent identity theft issues. Comments?

Other notes on the move:

Apartment is OK, large spacious with nice appointments, but no in unit washer/dryer or garage. Residents seem mature and reasonably well-behaved, but who the hell knows.

Even with few actual problems, the move was exhausting and depressing.

After years of ranting about the financial foolishness of buying a house, and my dogged determination to live in cheap apartments, I have quite suddenly become intolerant of seedy living conditions: I don't like living around poor people, living in dirty neighborhoods, making the best of crummy apartments, and mouthing platitudes like "people everywhere are all alike, and all deserve respect."

For whatever reasons, my values seem to have finally caught up with the average upper middle class person, viz:

I'm going to drive the extra mile to the nice Safeway, so I don't have to see or be around fat Mexicans wearing huge t-shirts and huge black jeans and braided ponytails and tatoos, dragging their filthy kids around. I'm going to spend the extra money to live in a nice place, around cleaner quieter people, because I don't like seeing trash and plastic crap and kid paraphernalia all around. People everywhere AREN'T all alike, and they DON'T all deserve respect. I may even buy a "nice" car.

I won't say I'm "embracing" it, I see it as more of a capitulation. And I guess all this makes me a big elitist fag. Well, whatever, I have no explanation. That's just the way it is. I await to see what horrible judgement befalls me for being vain and effete. My bet is, no penalty in particular. It may just as likely produce benefits somehow.

I've long held these loosely formed beliefs in social justice that say, "no one gets a Mercedes until everybody is at least fed." Well I see nothing past or present to indicate that that's the way the world works. So why should I be the one stuck out in the cold, stubbornly adhering to some radical fringe viewpoint, and probably suffering considerable detriment as a result? Stupid.

Last notes: transitional periods highlight the things one really values. Over the past 3 weeks, I've learned some of mine:

My coffee machine and good coffee;

Hot water for bathing;

Razor and shave cream;

TV;

News radio;

Internet connection, computer and printer;

Preparing my own food;

Clean commodious accomodations;

Peace and quiet.

I wasn't without wheels but that's gotta be up at the top too.

Regards.

Moose Turd Pie

I stumbled across this somewhere. In memory of Utah Phillips. Listen all the way to the end. It's not too long.

John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation

If you ever watch PBS you have undoubtably seen that this program was made possible by a grant from the "John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation". So, did you ever wonder just who John D. MacArthur was? My brother found a video he liked: Cspan BookTV program. I didn't watch it because it uses Real Player, which I despise.

New data regarding an old argument: did life originate on earth?

From Don.

Did life originate on earth (recent findings)?:

NASA's new composite photo of the Milky Way:



120k old bacteria found living in ice

What is the Oort cloud composed of?

How Dumb Was That?

Let Tam tell you.

Conspiracy Theories 'R' Us

Oooo! This one is really good!

Inside Richard Mellon Scaife's Conspiracy

Hell Hath No Fury

I came across this quote and it really struck me as . . . as what? Profound? Confusing? Something, but I don't know what.

"No Biblical hell could ever be worse than the state of perpetual inconsequence." Dangerous Beauty

Or perhaps I have long been inured to being of no great consquence, but then I never aspired to be, or am I lying now? I never saw the movie.

Pod People, Part 2

More stuff I didn't write, but I really like it.

The commonly recited pros of having a healthy, educated, socialized population are: social stability; less desperation, violence and civil disobediance; presumably more development and social benefits by having a wider pool of talent to draw from.

But the drawbacks are: a wider pool of talent to draw from. This means more competition for the current priveleged groups. John McCain, for example, would be much better off if women or blacks hadn't been enfrachised.

These are basic protectionism arguments, applied to talent rather than international boundaries.

Additional point that is demonstrated by emerging economies: increased competition for resources. You can liberate/elevate a bunch of people, thinking they're going to become productive members of society and become an asset for you. But those newly productive people are developing tastes for gasoline and beef, and that's driving up prices for everybody -- not to mention generating environmental impacts. And as anyone who has gone from a driving a broken down Maverick to a new Toyota can attest, once you taste wealth and convenience, you will redouble your efforts to prevent backsliding.

Interesting if the legacy of Reagan and that lot will turn out to be, not the champions of "freedom," but rather, "the dimwits who let the rabble into the country club."

Think

Via Dustbury: So That Might Not Be The Problem

Via View From The Porch:Eloi Revisited

Carlos Marcello Conspiracy Theory

My son is giving a speech in class about Carlos Marcello and the assassination of JFK. I like conspiracy theories, the more far out the better. But this one sounds completely believable. I had heard of conspiracy theories about the assassination of JFK before, but they were mostly of the "second gunman" variety. And, you know, does it make any difference? All this rehashing of ancient history may be very entertaining for some people, but it is not likely to change anything.

I wanted to post my son's speech here, but he refused, so I being forced to write this myself.

Since I read my son's speech, I looked up Carlos on the web, and the few stories I looked at paint a pretty clear picture. It certainly seems much more probable that Carlos was behind the assassination than that Oswald acted alone. Besides, it lends support to my theory that drug money is one of the biggest forces in this country. It also makes it sound like the Republicans are dirty, or maybe they just have a better understanding of what the real power situation is. Look what happened to Kennedy when he tried to clean up organized crime. You don't imagine there is any connection between Bush being President and opium production increasing in Afghanistan, do you?

Pod People

From someone I know:

I heard this on the radio this morning, and found this from January. City letting homeless people live in their cars in designated areas. No more living like a hunted animal, hiding from the cops.

This is very generous of the cops, although it's perhaps inevitable -- when that many people are driven into the street, you are pretty much forced to recognize the problem.

But this is still a subsidy. Somehow, someone has to figure out a way to extract wealth from these people. These are people who are so marginal that they can't pay for housing (although housing is pretty expensive). There has to be a medium between extracting $500 a month from someone for a full-fledged apartment, and letting them live for free. How about a big parking lot, with ultra-low maintenance concrete showers and latrines, charge people $3 per day?

Indeed, as market efficiencies expand and people are increasingly forced into pods, this could give rise to "high-end" parking lots, with some trees and decent facilities, where mid-level people can park their living pods.

More thoughts on the inevitable decline:

• In the mid-century and postwar era, one could earn a good living from labor. This was due to sheer abundance of resources and opportunities, ie: a "boom-town" environment;
• Technology, efficiency and free trade have turned labor into a cheap superfluous commodity;
• When people are desperate enough they revolt. But the requirements to keep people passive are relatively few, and can be made cheaply (TV, shiny vehicle, salty fatty food).
• Will commodity prices, technology and efficiency, and profit motivations produce a world where people are living in pods, eating meals of starch and fat out of drive through windows, and staring at celebrity gossip on little glass screens? And not able to afford anything else?
• The current system where voters can "change the government" is good in principle. In reality, the government is entrenched and designed for continuity and expansion, not change and responsiveness. Thus, while voters can still register their discontent about the size of their pod or the starch content of their diet, those votes will only be met with rhetoric, viewed on the TV screens. We can't expect the underlying trends to change.
• Cost of health care will remain prohibitive. Good thing is, when people get sick, they are price-insensitive, and you can extract their last dime out of them. And often they die so they're not around to provoke outrage, people just forget about them.
• Is this really better than having a population of healthy, educated, confident people? I guess the theory is that a small minority of healthy educated confident people is adequate, they can run things and extract profit from the rest of the population, who are basically reduced to slaves. Lets all hope that our kids get a lucky draw.

Pen Crazy

Yet another little known world of devotees and collectors: fountain pens. My brother has been hanging around Fort Madison, Iowa, and discovered that it is home to the Shaeffer pen company. Shaeffer is now owned by BIC, but they still have a presence in Fort Madison. Once you find an entry portal it is easy to wander off into pen-land.

Saudi Oil

Saudi Aramco by the Numbers

Saudi Armaco World is a very odd publication, but the numbers and graphs do give you a sort of baseline on what is going on in the oil business.

Musical Tesla Coils

at Penguicon 2008

No, I don't know how it works. I don't even know what Penguicon is.

South Pole Station

I was channel surfing and I came across a National Geographic show about the South Pole Station. They are building some big buildings there, ten's of thousand's of square feet, and they have a ten meter telescope that was just finished earlier this year. All this was a big surprise to me. I didn't know there was anything at all at the South Pole. I knew people had been there, and I knew there was a base at McMurdo sound, which is in Antartica, but it is not at the pole. So the TV show gives some information, and then gets side tracked into a drama about whether the building is going to be ready for occupency before winter shuts down their air transport link for the winter (summer for those of us in the Northern Hemisphere). Well, that sort of manufactured drama gets old pretty fast, so I got on the net to see what I could find. Turns out we have had a base at the South Pole since 1956! Sure are a lot of telescopes being built.

I found McMurdo Station using Google Maps, but I don't think they go all the way to the South Pole.

View Larger Map

Inscrutable Japanese

More strangeness from the other side of the Pacific rim. Trampoline Jump Game Not too difficult. Something to amuse you for a few minutes.

Ceramic Countertop

My brother found some estimates as to how long house stuff lasts. I took a look and noticed that they claim that a ceramic countertop will last 100 years, while a granite countertop will only last 25. I find this a little confusing. First of all, what the devil is a ceramic countertop? I understand about ceramic tile countertops, but I don't think they would outlast granite. But that is a "ceramic tile countertop", not a "ceramic countertop", if there is such a thing. My other brother clarifies the situation:

Ceramic Countertops: It's fired in place. Of course, it's the only thing left after the firing. Maybe he means concrete countertop. They engineer some pretty sturdy stuff. Granite is not as strong, in my opinion. Just kidding. I can't find a thing except this and it looks like a mistake. The rest of their stuff is junk.

Physics Blob Gish 2

Via Robot Wisdom Auxilary and Fun Motion.

Utility Citizen

Roberta X writes about citizens, armies and civilization. She says it better than I can.

Escher Revisited

Via I Am Bored.

Hinterland Appliance Repair Story

The fairly new clothes washer in Fort Madison had very little hot water, just a trickle.

The hot water heater had been replaced a month ago and that set dormant pipe rust into motion. I already replaced the kitchen faucet.

After removing the offending part I find indeed the washer solenoid valve was clogged with rust, checking the solenoid shows the valve to be jammed with mini-rust particles.

No fixing that.

Web shows best price on a new solenoid assembly $28.

Yellow pages showed "Appliance Doctor", I have no phone since washing my cell.

I drive, searching for 3902 Bluff Drive., back and forth, then figure out the shop is in someone's trailer home in a trailer park.

Pull up in front of a semi-decrepit trailer. This doesn't look good.

Go to the door. "Come in" I hear hollered from the inside.

Entering into the oily mechanical gloom, I look for the voice. Finally turning all around I see an Uncle Eddy type character sitting at a cluttered desk.

But unlike Eddy he is open, warm and chatty. "Hi I'm Chuck. Whatcha need?"

"My hot water solenoid is not working."

"Yup I got whatcha need, an older model, but more robust and will fit exactly. $25 "

After a brief lesson about how Whirlpool had better direct drive than the Maytag belt system, that is why Whirlpool absorbed Maytag, and not vice versa, I pay mostly in coins and walk to the car.

"Oh good, coins, my daughters love to find these in my truck ashtray." Chuck smiles.

As I drive back I see a eagle wheeling over the Mississippi alluvial corn fields.

Easiest part pickup ever.

Andy

Power Rangers on Patrol

Found on Lavalier.

Strength

I am always interested in the relative strength of various things. For instance, when I was a kid, an older kid who was studying to be a mechanic was telling me about pulling engines out of cars. At school they tell you to always use two chains and four bolts and an adequate hoist, etc. etc. Then he tells me he had seen the mechanic down on the corner pull an engine out of a car by the water pump. It's funny how strong some things are in some situations, but change things just a bit and it becomes a very different story.

So I was shocked when I read this on Tam's blog: "The recoil impulse on these guns is so savage that bullets are pulled from their crimps sometimes."

What she is talking about is the other five cartridges that are not in the firing position. Technically, I think you would say that the recoil of the gun pulled shells away from the resting bullets (bullets at rest tend to remain at rest), but the effect is the same. The rim on the shells are held by the cylinder, the bullets are only held by the crimp of the shell.

No, it's not snow

I imagine this may be how Portland looked when Mt. St. Helens blew. Bicycles are not fazed by a little dust in the air. Click the picture for the full story. I found the link on The Bitch Girls.

Maravida

Marc & Sandy are selling their monster sailboat. For less than the price of a medium size house you too can sail away. Go on and buy it. You know you want to. Yachtworld has a listing.

Donkey Kong

This thing has me a little confused: a 100 HP BMW dirt bike. It's got the traditional BMW engine with the horizontally opposed cylinders sticking out the sides. They are not as wide as the handlebars, and they provide some protection for the riders feet from brush and what not. If you are big enough to handle a bike like this, then you can probably avoid running those exposed cylinders into rocks. And big you have to be in more ways than one. There is the 100 HP engine to start with, the 400 pound weight, which is kinda light for such a powerful motor, and then there's the 20K (US) price tag. That's a little rich for my blood.

Rant on, dudette!

Something worthwhile from a celebrity! I am shocked, I tell you, shocked!

"I think it ruins the magic. That's why I like watching films from 20, 30, 40, 50 years ago, because I don't want to know who (the actors) are, I don't want to know their life story. I want them to be characters on the screen. The magic is in the screen, not knowing what's behind it, because that ruins the magic."

Is This Rupert's Handiwork?

Looks like what many people were afraid would happen is happening over at Rupert Murdoch's latest acquisition, the Wall Street Journal: Rupert is throwing his weight around. This is an excerpt from a recent story:

Mississippi's Tort Reform Triumph By STEPHEN MOORE May 10, 2008

James Copland of the Manhattan Institute's Center for Legal Policy reports that, thanks to big Democratic gains in state legislatures in 2006, trial lawyers from coast to coast have replenished their army of allies in state capitals. "The legislatures are busy at work repealing many of the reforms while creating new rights to sue, through such scams as patient bill of rights laws," he says.

Mr. Moore is senior economics writer for The Wall Street Journal editorial page.

Patient bill of rights is a scam? I did not know that. Thanks for clearing that up for me, Rupert.

A Really Good Rant Was Had By All

This was written by someone I know.

The reason gas prices are high is the grasping idiocy of the American public.

Most of the people I work with who all make 50k or more have NEVER used public transportation. It is demeaning to them.

I have taken the train and bike to work many times and they always make a big deal out of it, when I walk my bike in through employee entrance and lock it under the stairs. The word spreads through the office and I get several inquiries throughout the day from the "Is your name really Michael Bolton?" types. I explain that it is a wash expense wise, and I enjoy it. They shake their heads. For some reason it is very foreign to them.

My supervisor baited me the the other day announcing her new re-fi brought her mortgage down to $1500 plus $300 taxes, and wanted to compare notes, thinking she was a wiz. I had to sidestep the issue since I have no mortgage. The $300 taxes means a house worth less than mine, in a neighboring town.

Since everybody lies pretty much about everything, I don't tell people my situation, because it really does sound like a lie. I was never really ambitious, liked an occasional puff, never really wanted to climb any corporate ladders, made a bunch of small financial mistakes but no real big ones, and I do like to eat lunch out. And I find myself nearly in a position to take a couple years off to return to graduate school and build another house.

How could I expect people who think a $500 car payment is a permanent fact of life to get the idea that "just paying attention" and "don't do anything stupid" is not only a method to achieve some security, but a sign of attainment.

I was suspected of duplicity this past week, when a poorly documented processing system of various programs and methodologies was handed off to us by a quitting programmer. I was the to be the 2nd tier backup, but paid close attention, took lots of notes, kept a good attitude, and ran through the process once before he left. The guys who were to take it over basically whined that it was not well documented. They wanted checklists.

So the day comes, and my back goes out. I process one of the jobs without incident, but am obviously in pain and take a half day off. I return the next day, when the bulk of the work arrives, and the 2 guys are flailing madly, cursing, whining, throwing fits. I'm on Vicodin so I sit there impassively and answer questions. When it came down to it and they started throwing questions at me I had to respond:" You guys went through the same training as me." and that pretty much ended it. I took the next day off altogether and they worked until midnight. The upshot is that they did all the work and look now like whiny crybabies and I watched TV and I got props. How does this relate to gas prices? Well these 2 guys are decent programmers, but other than that talk sports. Not really well-developed personalities. They are typical of people here, and pretty much everywhere, where they think they found a niche and can sit back and ride it out, and whine and whine if they face difficulty.

I spotted the trend, that of dumping work on people who are there, and got ahead the curve, by NOT BEING THERE, but still being there and "ready to help as best I can".

Someone finally mentioned how convenient it was, that I got crippled, just before the shit hit the fan, so I had to do a little spin control.

I mean, I really was kind of crippled, but the biggest factor was that I was insulted by the whining from those lazy jackholes attempting to inflate their self-importance and damed if I was going to respond to that. That alone required narc-ing myself up and staying there for the duration.

And now the work is theirs. And I go back to writing to my family.

Microwaves 'cook ballast aliens'

US researchers say they have developed an effective way to kill unwanted plants and animals that hitch a ride in the ballast waters of cargo vessels.

Click picture for story. From Ross.

Funny Dutch Web Store

Roberta X does it again.

Cyberspace Paradigm

The essential paradigm of cyberspace is creating partially situated
identities out of actual or potential social reality in terms of canonical
forms of human contact, thus renormalizing the phenomenology of narrative
space and requiring the naturalization of the intersubjective cognitive
strategy, and thereby resolving the dialectics of metaphorical thoughts,
each problematic to the other, collectively redefining and reifying the
paradigm of the parable of the model of the metaphor.

http://www.info.ucl.ac.be/people/PVR/decon.html

Thanks to Jack.

The Aristocracy Of Incompetence

From The Adventures of Roberta X:

"This is a work in progress; I don't know if I'll even make much sense in this go.

I do tech-y work. I'm good with my hands -- a bump of mechanical aptitude, a dollop of artsy-craftsiness, and the sheer good fortune to grow up with parents who figured anything one applied oneself to, one could do; which they both demonstrated on a regular basis and passed on to their offspring like a fish passes on swimming skills: I never realized there was any other approach.

But there most certainly is and it's nothing nice. In my working career, in my adult life, I keep encountering over and over again* the hard truth that those who can end up doing for those who can't, over and over. Can't drive a truck? Roberta can. Can't do trim carpentry or finish wood? Roberta can. Need a bespoke microcontroller designed, built, programmed and installed? Can't work out and retrofit a technical ground system? Can't sew, can't cook, can't plan a week's menu? Hey, I know just the gal! Meanwhile, we'll go have coffee and think Higher Thoughts....

And that's fine; I like being able to do things and I take a certain pleasure at my job in being able to do just about anything -- some things better than others, but "no, I can't," is rarely in my vocabulary, unlike a few of my nominal peers.

Nevertheless, it's irksome at times to do all the work for half the credit, to be paid the same as the bum who walks away from sloppy, incomplete work; to always be the thrifty ant, never the heedless grasshopper. And I wonder, is it that way for others, too?"

I think the answer is YES.

The Polished Steel Truth

From Harley Davidson, via Peter Michael DeLorenzo, and finally Mr. Dustbury:

"We don't do fear. Over the last 105 years in the saddle, we've seen wars, conflicts, depression, recession, resistance, and revolutions. We've watched a thousand hand-wringing pundits disappear in our rear-view mirror. But every time, this country has come out stronger than before. Because chrome and asphalt put distance between you and whatever the world can throw at you. Freedom and wind outlast hard times. And the rumble of an engine drowns out all the spin on the evening news. If 105 years have proved one thing, it's that fear sucks and it doesn't last long. So screw it, let's ride."

It may not be entirely accurate, but they certainly have got the sentiment right. I may just have to buy one. This was the ONLY picture I could find of people riding harleys and not wearing helmets. Thousands of pictures of bikes, many with people, but almost all were stationary.

Monty Python

Sometimes Monty Python is funny, sometimes they are not. This morning I came across this link on Dustbury.com and I could not stop laughing.

ShopBot Buddy

Just what every inventor needs: a personal CNC machine for your home shop.