Meteorite over Russia

I love that a large number of humans now carry video recording devices (in their phones). It enables us to get stuff like this:

Science and Art

Move on the the electronic age...

I get lots of printed paper brochures on a daily basis.  People wanting me to buy something or do something.  I like getting these.  I attend several courses, conferences, and seminar's each year.  I have my usual conferences but I also like trying out a few new things each year.  I'm less of prospect for consumer goods but you never know.  

I also share what I receive.  I work with a team of extraordinarily talented people and if I think some course or conference will help them I forward the brochure.  Because I work mostly in a virtual office, I share this by scanning the brochure and attaching it to an email.  I don't forward everything to everyone - just materials I think a specific individual might benefit from.  It always has an appropriate subject line and a short body explaining why I think this is relevant to the recipient.  It's different from spam in that way.

I'm not a very good candidate at all for email spam.  I'm a religious user of spam filters and even when something slips through I typically just delete it.  I don't know why this is but I prefer paper to an email when you are trying to sell me something.  I guess email marketing has that Nigerian 419 scam feel to it.

All this said - who the hell thinks printing stuff on non-standard size paper is a good idea?  I got a brochure today from SkillPath Seminars of Mission KS.  It's printed on what looks to be 11x10 inch stock and won't fit through my scanner.  I've got four people I would have sent this to but instead it's going in recycling.  Their loss I guess.  They need to get with the wonderful modern age in which we live and send me stuff on standard stock so I can scan it and send it on.  Just don't send it to me in an email or expect me to dig up your website.  I'm just not THAT excited about whatever you are selling.

Worst Presentation Ever

I don't think I've ever heard a stronger pro gun control presentation in my life.

Sometimes I hate Google News

I know this is all done via some text search bot and I shouldn't rant but how is this science news?

 

Go buzz

Sorry for inundating with vids but this is just too cool:

 It's a sad time in US history when a hero is persecuted by a religious nut.

More on droids

And now maybe even the manufacture of droids will be simple...

Worker Droids

This clip is pretty fascinating.  Much of what we think of as unskilled labor will soon be supplanted by worker droids.

At the "iCare" lounge in CDG.

At the airport in the "iCare" lounge.  These are not happy faces they are sad only.  Very sad.  Except we get to see you soon.

 

52 Project: Garden Fencing

I think I'm going to stop posting garden projects as separate projects. It's really one big project. This weeks portion of the garden project was to put up a fence on tier 2 to keep the small varmints out (mostly rabbits and a few raccoons).



















































I know it doesn't seem like much but it did take a while and was necessary. Noticed the peas are starting to come up - you can't quite see them in the photos.

52 Projects: Easiest Project Ever

This weeks project was to hook up the speakers in my living room to my computer. I'm tired of swapping CD's in the living room to listen to what I want. I've been putting all my music on my computer through iTunes (copying all the old CD's and I'm even going to purchase a turn table to convert my LPs - yes I'm that old - to MP3's so I can keep them on my computer). I want to be able to play any of my music anywhere in the house, but to start in the living room.

I'm a bit of an Apple Fanboy. Yes you could get something almost as good for less money but it's that "almost as good" that I just don't have time for anymore. Don't get me wrong. I love gadgets and I love geeking out. I've built linux servers from components and developed custom builds of the operating system. I wired my whole house with CAT 5. I built a full local area network including a SAN throughout the house. I put in a secure wireless network for guests and laptops. You can stream movies to any of my TV's. And all this was a lot of work. Hours and hours of learning and configuring. If you don't count my time I saved lots of money too.
For this project I just wanted to wire my speakers into my computer. It's about a 30 foot run. I looked at getting a speaker switch, running wires from my PC to the switch to the attic to the living room. I've done enough of this so I'm pretty fast. I figured I could do this in about 4 hours. The multi speaker box was around $300 and the speaker cable and banana plugs would run around another $75. Then I remember this:

The Apple airport express. It's $100. It has an ethernet port, a usb printer port, and a speaker port. You can stream music wirelessly. I thought I could stream music from my computer, through the wireless network, to the apple airport express and into my speakers (via the speaker port - the one with the jack in it below).

I'd already set aside four hours for this so I figured I'd give it a try. A friend had loaned me his airport express so what the heck. Long and short of this is it took me 5 minute to hook this all together. And it worked perfectly. It was so ridiculously simple it's not even worth describing - just read the directions. From my computer I can now stream music to my living room. Using my iPhone and the Apple Remote product I don't even have to be near my computer to do this.

Going to hook up the family room downstairs and the outside speakers next. At $100 per room I'm still way ahead when you consider my time (and probably even equipment costs). See if my friend ever gets the loaner airport express back ;-).

Project Update: Seeds are growing!

My Garden is starting nicely.  I'll probably transplant this week to bigger pots (still too cold for outside - though I did plant peas and fava beans outdoors this past weekend).