We went to Old Chicago last night. Had a pretty rockin time. Here is the low down.

The food is about the same price as Applebees, like always you have to look at what you are ordering, you cant just pick anything and expect to get a cheap dinner. The place inside is pretty good, they have a fair amount of TVs, but no trivia (What?), so that is minus some points. The wait wasn�t too bad, for basically opening night (it opened Monday, but the paper ran their article about them opening on Tuesday) we waited about an hour, the worst part is that there isn�t much room to wait, so we had to sit outside in the very hot sun.
The food is just like any other OCs, good. An although they serve Pepsi products I can overlook that because they bring out fresh a glass for each tea refill, which means that I get a new lemon for every glass of tea (yay!). One interesting thing that they did was split the appetizer between all three checks, which is handy, and good to know for future reference.
All in all, it is everything you can hope that OCs would be in Manhappinin. It adds one more good place to put on the restraint rotation.

AMV - I Love You / Vision of Escaflowne

A M V - Video Information (site)

Way back in '98 (some of the non-stop happiest days of my life) Matt, Newgen and I went to Non Desu Kan. At the con we watched a very, very good anime music video of Escaflowne done to Donna Lewis' "I Love You". It is still the best music video that I have seen. And I have been looking for it online ever since... well not ever since... ever since in a recent way. Anyways this is now the closest I have got. It is actually about the video, unfortunately you can't d/l it. :(, ah well. Maybe some things are better left for memory.

WONDERPIZZAUSA - The Company (site)

Wonder Pizza of Italy will place America 's most popular food source in places never before available.
The innovative machine holds, cooks and serves 9� whole pizza pies in just 2 minutes. There are 3 different pizzas available in each machine at one time. Delicious Connie�s Pizza of Chicago is featured in all WonderPizza Kiosks. 5 years and 6 million dollars of R&D went into this design and subsequent manufacture of WONDERPIZZA of Italy and the product is now beginning worldwide distribution.

I approve.

Most scientific papers are probably wrong

New Scientist Breaking News (article)

Most published scientific research papers are wrong, according to a new analysis. Assuming that the new paper is itself correct, problems with experimental and statistical methods mean that there is less than a 50% chance that the results of any randomly chosen scientific paper are true.
John Ioannidis, an epidemiologist at the University of Ioannina School of Medicine in Greece, says that small sample sizes, poor study design, researcher bias, and selective reporting and other problems combine to make most research findings false. But even large, well-designed studies are not always right, meaning that scientists and the public have to be wary of reported findings.

So very, very true. (Although I would argue with "less than 50%", because if that were the case then we would be fine, just take what the report didn't find to be true. No, I think he means is there are errors in more than 50% of the papers, which could, *or could not* lead to a wrong decision.)

Traditionally a study is said to be "statistically significant" if the odds are only 1 in 20 that the result could be pure chance. But in a complicated field where there are many potential hypotheses to sift through - such as whether a particular gene influences a particular disease - it is easy to reach false conclusions using this standard. If you test 20 false hypotheses, one of them is likely to show up as true, on average.
Odds get even worse for studies that are too small, studies that find small effects (for example, a drug that works for only 10% of patients).

ummm...no... properly conducted small experiments have the same error rate as properly conducted large experiments... Now, the power for a large test is better, but that is a different issue...

So what this article is saying is that sometimes people report the wrong conclusion based on a poor understanding of statistics, when this article itself has no clue. So was this article just an example of that problem?

Hockey and whatnot

Hockey practice went pretty good last night. Most of the people from last year returned, with the most notable exception being Trav. But we picked up a fair amount of new people as well, including the Wood brothers (they are very good).
Practice wasn't too hard, and I’m not all that sore this morning, although I did sleep past the alarm. (When I woke up this morning I remembered the feeling of sleeping through the alarm, although I didn't remember hearing the alarm...strange.)
Today is a big pile of classes, help sessions, and work, so not that fun of a day is foreseen. But the one bright spot is trivia, possibly at Old Chicago.
Ah, off to class.

Well that weekend came and went fast. On Friday we went to the Stat club picnic. On Saturday Newgen came down and we had a massive Warhammer battle (more here). And Sunday we did some stuff with Newgen and then putzed around the house for the rest of the day. And now it is Monday.
The main event for today is hockey practice (the first of the year). Hopefully I will remember how to skate...

Animal right activists steal diseased dogs

National News (article)

Animal rights activists have stolen six huntaway dogs from a Massey University farm, some of which are carrying a fatal genetic disease also found in humans.
Massey veterinarians had hoped that because of the genetic similarities, if they found a cure for the dogs they would also be able to save children. In this respect, they were working with the Adelaide Women's and Children's Hospital.
Without expert treatment, the infected dogs will waste away and die fairly quickly.

but wait there's more...

"(The activists) thought they were liberating animals facing vivisection," said the head of the Massey University Veterinary School, Grant Guilford said. "Instead they have got things horribly wrong and condemned at least some of the dogs to certain death."
The activists, claiming to be from the Animal Liberation Front (ALF) posted an anonymous message on an animal liberation website yesterday boasting of breaking into Jennersmead Farm near Bunnythorpe in Manawatu on Tuesday night.
They say they stole records of the dogs' medical treatment which they destroyed in the belief that they were "breeding records".
The buildings with sprayed with graffiti and animal rights slogans.

Ace!

Biggity-freaking-booyeah!!!!!

Fair Use Guidelines for Educational Multimedia (site)

(Section 2)
Students may incorporate portions of lawfully acquired copyrighted works when producing their own educational multimedia projects for a specific course.

and

Students may perform and display their own educational multimedia projects created under Section 2 of these guidelines for educational uses in the course for which they were created and may use them in their own portfolios as examples of their academic work for later personal uses such as job and graduate school interviews.

That would be a green light for Mad.

I say, my faith in the world is restored.

Game Knighted!

The first Game Night of the school year went pretty good. We had baked ziti, a pretty good salad, and peanut butter bars. The game we played was Would You Rather? Good times were had by all.

Quiz Answer.

If you said socks you are correct!

I also would have accepted mp3 player or camera as well.
p.s. it rained this morning.

Pop Quiz

What did I bring to school today in a Ziploc plastic bag?

I'll post the answer later today.

Oh, that Wednesday...

Today has been pretty good so far. Just working on some notes and going to a consulting meeting. Later today I need to get on down to Dillion’s to get some food for our refrigerator, it is getting quite bare inside.
Mental note: Ramen for breakfast is not a good idea.

Classes: Sitting and Standing

School went pretty good today, besides missing the first class (it's not like i even overslept, i just didn't leave home at the right time, oh well). The class that I am taking this semester is Nonparametrics, which is doing statistics with basically no parameters (mainly rank based stuff and well as some boot-strapping). It went pretty good, and since Dr.Higgins is teaching it I think I will learn a good amount. The other news of the day was that today was the first day for the class that I teach. It went relatively smoothly. The classroom is packed (had about 50some people in the room), hopefully a couple of people will drop and that will make enough room for everyone to have a chair.
Well I'm gonna go eat stuff because the union doesn't have anything good in it (although Panda Express opened up there) so I haven’t ate lunch yet.
And I'm hungry.

Mission: Attend Class - Failed

Who would have thought that actually looking at when a class started mattered. I thought it was suppose to start at 8.30, but it really started at 8, ah well, it made it pretty easy to decide to drop the class. :)

8AM?!? They make time in AM as well? Crazy.

Ok, now it feels like the school year has started. I'm up before 8 :P and I have to teach today. I think that I am gonna drop my early class though since I don't need to take it, but I'll go check it out today to see what it is like anyways.
Welp I've gotta get going so that I have enough time to go figure out when the class is (probably somewhere in Bluemont).
Have a good Tuesday.


Hey, here is a question. what does AM stand for?

Click here for 3D unicorns.

Click here for 3D unicorns. (blog)

Maria (Nicole’s sister) has started a blog. She is starting college up here at K-State, and so far it looks like she is off to a good start, with a substantial post. Hopefully she'll keep it up!

School

Classes started today, luckily i don't have anything to do on Mondays except for a GTA meeting. Today was pretty productive, mainly doing things for my class that I will start to teach tomorrow. I talked to my new officemate Matt for a bit, he seems pretty cool. Not much else happened today.
Hockey practice starts in a week.

Music file sharing to be offered legally

Guardian Unlimited (article)

Playlouder is offering the first legal alternative with a comparable experience to the "peer to peer" file sharing sites often used to swap pirated tracks.
Subscribers will be charged £26 a month for a high speed broadband internet connection, similar to the price charged by BT, with the added attraction of being able to share as much music as they want with other subscribers at no extra cost.
After signing the UK licensing deal with SonyBMG, whose acts also include George Michael, Bruce Springsteen and Dido, Playlouder's chief executive, Paul Hitchman, is confident that its big rivals will follow suit.
It has already signed deals with dozens of independent labels affiliated to the Association of Independent Music, representing artists such as the White Stripes, Franz Ferdinand and Dizzee Rascal. AIM's chief executive, Alison Wenham, said the idea was a "simple but radically different solution to the means of accessing music on the internet".

Whoa, whoa, whoa. How is this helping anything? The reason that downloading music is "illegal" is because the artist will starve if we don't buy their stuff. But I would guess that this deal with Sony and the internet company will get the bands a total of no dollars. So people are sharing music and the artists are not getting compensated. What is wrong here?
Oh yeah, that’s right, when the RIAA says that they musicians will be broke if everyone file shares, they mean that the RIAA will go broke because of file sharing.
This is crap. As long as the music labels make their money they don't care what happens.
Proof:

Playlouder claims that if all ISPs adopted its model, the record industry would make an additional £300m a year in the UK alone.

Crapfaces.

Hockey Schedule!

Our inline hockey league looks like they are getting their stuff together even more this year because they have released the weekend for hockey tournaments already. (!!!, i know.)

The weekends are:
Nov 5-6
Nov 12-13
Jan 21-22
Feb 4-5
Feb 11-12
March 4-5 (Regionals)

One great thing about our schedule this year is that we will get to go to *all* the K-State home football games. :D
One bad thing is that one of the weekends will probably be on Super Bowl weekend again (what are they thinking?).
Anywho, it's good that we already got the schedule.

After disc golf we all (plus Maria (nicoles sister who is now up here for school), Aaron, Amber and Rzan (back from Little Rock)) we to go eat dinner ate Applebees. We noticed that the Old Chicago that is going in next door to Applebees is very close to done, and in fact they are opening the 29th. Hurrah!
Isn�t it the spiffiest Old Chicago that you have ever seen?

Disc Golfing

Today, as a last hurrah for summer, we played a round of disc golf. Unfortunately, there were alot of people walking around on campus, so we had to throw around them, but it was still fun. To see our disc golfing in action click here.

Umbrellas

To follow up Michelle's post about The Lyndsay Diaries, he now plays with a group called the Umbrellas. They sound pretty good, here is one of their songs, The City Lights:


Rock on.
(p.s. most of the reason I posted this is to test out the player. As long as my dissection of the putfile system works the player should work...)

Tracker Trail - Fire From Ice - Rob Bicevskis (site)

I gave myself a 15 minute time limit and started with a "random" chunk of ice. The picture on the left [above] shows what I came up with.

The sphere was able to start a fire, and it looks like it is a pretty easy thing to do, as long as you can get a hold of some ice....

This Spartan Life

This Spartan Life (video / show)

This Spartan Life is a talk show set in Halo. Well it's a real talk show... but all the guests are also on an internet game of Halo. The show is pretty good itself (the first guest talks about organizing data in three dimensional environments), but what is really entertaining is that the game of Halo rages on around them. Added to this that (apparently) the guest has never played the game before and the show is laugh-out-loud funny.
My favorite line so far is the guest saying (after being shot): "Oh... I'm dead now."
Also the guest coming on to the show in a vehicle that doesn't quite make the jump it was suppose to is pretty good as well.
Really, check this show out.

Hey hey,
Went to Wichita today to drop Nicoles mom off at Jaymes house. While we were there we ate dinner at Ted�s Montana Grill. That is some good stuff, I got a buffalo French dip that was very good (instead of beef they used buffalo meat). Anyways we had a good time today, as you can see. :)

Death by Caffeine

Energy Fiend (site)

Just incase you wanted to know Fry (from Futurama) must weigh more than 157 pounds because if he weighed less than this he would have died when he drank 100 cups of coffee in the one episode.

Also it will take 295 cups of tea to kill me.

So, how much of your favorite drink would it take to kill you from caffeine?

Arkitus - Growth (flash)

This site has a bunch of neat flash programs.

And you know me, I'm a sucker for neat flash things.

Future Feeder

Future Feeder (Blog)

It is hard to find unique blogs these days. Future Feeder is indeed unique. It has links related to computers, technology and art. And from what I have seen it seems to have stuff that my other regular checked on blogs don't report on.
(My last two posts came from links on this blog)

Did you ever wonder what it would be like to see a water balloon pop in space?

NASA (videos)

Oh NASA, you get to do all the cool things. Luckily you record them and put them on the internet for us to watch. And for that I salute you.

Color Code- A Color Portrait of the English Language (site)

Color Code searches all the nouns in the English language and assigns a color to each word by using an image search on the internet. It is fully clickable, searchable, and comes equipped with a good dose of awesomeness.

I had to go to a GTA meeting today, and on the way there I saw a construction crew doing the finishing touches on a new concrete slab.
"So what?" you say?
Well a guy on the construction crew was wearing a huge sombrero!

Awesome! ^_^

NHL finds new broadcast home

ESPN.com (article)

Think the lockout didn't hurt the NHL?

Comcast, which owns four regional sports networks as well as a majority share in the Philadelphia 76ers and Flyers, will put the games on one of its channels, OLN. Under the agreement, the network will televise at least 58 regular-season games that will air on Monday and Tuesday nights throughout the season. The network will also carry the league's All-Star Game and the conference finals, as well as the first two games of the Stanley Cup finals, with NBC airing the remainder of the championship matchup.

What’s OLN you say? It's the Outdoor Life Network (A hunting/Fishing Channel), and as far as I can tell I don't get that channel. Spectacular.

So is Major League Soccer the number four sport now? (It at least has an ABC contract.)

Misleading? Irrelavent? That's the New York Times.

Fair? Balanced? A Study Finds It Does Not Matter - New York Times

Disregarding third-party candidates, Professors DellaVigna and Kaplan found that towns that offered Fox by 2000 increased their vote share for the Republican presidential candidate by 6 percentage points (to 54 percent, from 48 percent) from 1996 to 2000, while those that did not offer Fox increased theirs by an even larger 7 percentage points (to 54 percent, from 47 percent).

You would think that with the title of "Fair? Balanced? A Study Finds It Does Not Matter" the New York Times article would go on to say that it does not matter even if a news source is biased people will still get information from the news cast. Well, if you thought that then you were expecting way too much from the New York Times.
This article does a craptacular job of analyzing flimsy data to draw a conclusion that is not even implied by the data. What the data boils down to is that in cities where Fox News is aired on cable it turns out that one percent more of the population voted for Kerry than it did for Gore.
So, at best, it shows that Fox News is in fact not biased (although not really), But really the data just means that more people voted for Kerry than Gore in these cities, and that is it. There was no replication in the study, and there is NO connection to say whether a biased news channel makes a difference in the Presidential voting anyways. There are so many flaws that even a person that failed my stat class could point them out.
In short this article would, at best, get a D in my class, and that is mainly do to effort. Obviously the author has no education in statistics, or if he does then he must have bought (?) his way through the class.
The kicker? The author is a Professor at Princeton. I thought they employed smart people there...

p.s. Statistics is like power, in the wrong hands it is a very bad thing.

Kidsbeer proves hit suds for minors

The Japan Times Online (article)

Satoshi Tomoda, president of the beverage maker, said: "Children copy and mimic adults.
"If you get this drink ready on such occasions as events and celebrations attended by kids, it would make the occasions even more entertaining."
The Kidsbeer label captures a nostalgic mood as it was modeled after classic beer labels.
"Even kids cannot stand life unless they have a drink," reads the product's advertising slogan.

Yeah, that's a real winner of a product...

Sony PlayStation3 $299?

Amazon.com (site)

Amazon is (was?) taking preorders for PS3's for $299. If this is the case, and Sony is really gonna be selling them for that cheap there is no reason not to get one, just for the blu-ray player.

I hope this is gonna be the real price on them...

hockeyfrog: Concerts update...

hockeyfrog: Concerts update... (blargticle)

Ready for this?

September 22nd,
in Lincoln (puke),

Ludo,

Anything But Joey,

and *Jupiter Sunrise*.

Holycrap.

Who’s going with me?

p.s. Thanks Amber for the post about it on your blog!

Puzzle Express - doublegames.com (game)

It has been awhile since I have found a game worth of posting.
In Puzzle Express you use Tetris (or more accurately Blokus) style pieces and fill up a box. A game that Nicole will surely love. ^_^

Husbands and Wives: Point 1: Guys Are Primarily Task and Goal Oriented

family.org (article)

Guys like sports. That’s because there’s a goal involved: make baskets, get on base, score a touchdown. Most guys don’t like figure skating. “What’s the point?” a guy asks. “You spin around to music."

These series of points (8 in total) are a very good guide to understanding guys. They are not always dead on, and are from the perspective of a Christian wife and a non-Christian husband, but the points are the same, and the advice is almost completely correct. If you interact with a guy and you are a girl then you should read this... if you are a guy and want to know what you do in the eyes of a girl, read this.

It doesn't take too long to read (15 minutes) and even shorter if you skip the Christian/non-Christian parts (like i did).

Xbox 360 weighs in at $299 to $399

Engadget (article)

$299 for an Xbox 360. Not too bad, specially if they are still doing free weekends of online play for the games.

Movie-List Presents: Ed Wood (video)

One good thing about only paying half attention to movies is that there always seems to be a good movie that I've never seen before to watch.
For example Ed Wood. Gretchen (from Frivolity fame) posted about it, including this link. The movie looks great, and Johnny Depp is always a great actor. I'll have to look for it next time I rent a movie (which happens about once a year).
Anybody else see this one before?

U.S. Court Says It’s Okay for Men to Come to Work in a Dress and to Shower with Female Co-Workers

lifesite.net (article)

A Pennsylvania court has opened the door for men who believe they are women to come to work in a dress and to use the women’s restroom and shower facilities. The decision by the Commonwealth Court, which upheld a lower court ruling mandating that “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” be added to the Allentown (Pennsylvania) human relations ordinance, is being decried as an “outrage” by a traditional values group.

A couple of days ago we were talking about how many bathrooms places will need to have in the future. The completely obvious two will eventually wear away to 6. Just because some guys feel that they are girls, or some guys are girls but are gay...
This bathroom situation should be simple, boy parts, boy bathroom. Girl parts, girl bathroom, both parts, then whatever you identify as.

OC's? Soon.

The Manhattan Mercury (article)

Old Chicago, which will serve pizza and pasta in addition to a full service menu, will open Aug. 29. The establishment will also serve 110 different types of brewed beer.

That is only a couple weeks away. And then we can trivia at OC's and BW3's. Good deal, because BW3's is getting too full, we didn't even get to eat there tonight because the place was packed.

Information regarding Downloading Stand Up Songs to iPods

The Official Dave Matthews Band Website

Please follow the instructions below in order to move your content into iTunes and onto an iPod:
If you have a PC place the CD into your computer and allow the CD to automatically start. If the CD does not automatically start, open your Windows Explorer, locate the drive letter for your CD drive and double-click on the LaunchCD.exe file located on your CD.

Once the application has been launched and the End User License Agreement has been accepted, you can click the Copy Songs button on the top menu.

Follow the instructions to copy the secure Windows Media Files (WMA) to your PC. Make a note of where you are copying the songs to, you will need to get to these secure Windows Media Files in the next steps.

Once the WMA files are on your PC you can open and listen to the songs with Windows Media Player 9.0 or higher. You may also play them in any compatible player that can play secure Windows Media files, such as MusicMatch, RealPlayer, and Winamp, but it will require that you obtain a license to do so. To obtain this license, from the Welcome Screen of the user interface, click on the link below the album art that says If your music does not play in your preferred player, click here. Follow the instructions to download the alternate license.

Using Windows Media Player only, you can then burn the songs to a CD. Please note that in order to burn the files, you need to upgrade to or already have Windows Media Player 9 or greater.

Once the CD has been burned, place the copied CD back into your computer and open iTunes. iTunes can now rip the songs as you would a normal CD.

Or you could just download the song from bitTorrent, and skip all the crap. How is DRM helping to reduce piracy? It seems like it is only punishing the people that want to actually buy the CD. So I guess be aware of this stuff if you do buy a CD, you may be better off just downloading it. (Heck while you are at it, send the band a check for $3, it’s more than they get for a $15 CD anyways.)

Teachers unions call for Wal-Mart boycott

startribune.com (article)

Both the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers and the St. Paul Federation of Teachers, which together represent about 9,500 teachers and other school employees in the Twin Cities, say the retailer pays substandard wages and has a high percentage of workers without health care insurance.
The Minneapolis Federation of Teachers may go a step further. The 5,000-member group is considering a resolution not to reimburse its members for any school supplies bought at Wal-Mart.
"This is the beginning of a much more in-depth education program, in which we tell our members why and what Wal-Mart does -- not just to small towns, but to workers," said Louise Sundin, president of the Minneapolis Federation of Teachers.

1) This is in the Twin Cities where Target seems to be almost a religion, so them not liking Wal-Mart is no surprise.

2) And this is another example of a group of people trying to limit its member’s rights, because the group is trying to protect the world. (Unfortunately there is not emoticon for rolling eyes...)

Guess what I got in the mail

A postcard from Tara and Dan (my cousin and in-law) when they visited South Park! Visiting South Park is a mission for Project: Best Summer Ever that I threw in there for fun; I never thought that anyone would actually go out there. ^_^

Thanks for the postcard, and if you guys ever get a chance you should make yourselves a blog.

Crazy.

Copying music now threatens business like file-sharing did

Taipei Times (article)

"Burned" CDs accounted for 29 percent of all recorded music obtained by fans last year, compared to 16 percent attributed to downloads from online file-sharing networks, Mitch Bainwol, chief executive for the Recording Industry Association of America, said on Friday.
The data, compiled by the market-research firm NPD Group, suggested that about half of all recordings obtained by music fans last year were due to authorized CD sales and about 4 percent from paid music downloads.
"CD burning is a problem that is really undermining sales," Bainwol said in an interview prior to speaking before about 750 members of the National Association of Recording Merchandisers in San Diego on Friday.

But...

Yet the recording industry has seen a lift from online music sales, which when factored in with albums and sales of CD singles, increased overall music sales through July to 21 percent over last year.

So overall music sales are up... yet burning is undermining profits... huh?

So their solution:

"If, particularly, the technology allows two-to-three burns, that's well within acceptable limits and I don't think why consumers should have any complaints," Wright said.

I will complain. I will complain because I BOUGHT the CD. That means I OWN the CD. And I can do whatever I want to with the contents of the CD. Three burns mean (I am assuming a rip counts as a burn), once to put on my computer, once for my mp3 player, and once for my car CD player. Good so far except: I am gonna get a new computer soon, so I can't get it on there, my mp3 player has limited capacity so I must delete songs regularly off it, and my CDs for the car can, and do, get scratched, so new CDs will be needed. Three burns is not enough, 25 burns is not enough, unlimited (i.e. no copy protection) is the correct amount.

Oh well, even if they do enact such stupid policies I am sure the cracking community will have fixed problem within a week or so... but if I am downloading a crack to the copyright protection, why don't I just download the music from the net, and save a couple of bucks (and a big headache)?

I am sorry "artists" but when I buy your CD I own a copy of your work. You can not charge me more if I was to listen to them in different places, or if I let my friends to borrow it. And I'm not gonna let the music industry try to tell me otherwise.

SMW - Internet Archive

This makes me happy.

The rest of his stuff is here:
Jason Cox - Super Mario World Soundtrack

:D

'Stop stealing our F**king signs'

Ananova (article)

The mayor of an Austrian town called 'F**king' has appealed to British tourists to stop stealing the road signs.

The story is not really noteworthy, what I find interesting is that they censor the name of a place. Seriously, the place is named Fucking, that is the name. It is not a cuss word when it is used in this context. I *really* hope that we do not start censoring "offensive". Cause if they do, I might officially be called D*** on all my records.

250 miles per gallon? They're doing it.

CNN.com (article)

Gremban, an electrical engineer and committed environmentalist, spent several months and $3,000 tinkering with his car.
Like all hybrids, his Prius increases fuel efficiency by harnessing small amounts of electricity generated during braking and coasting. The extra batteries let him store extra power by plugging the car into a wall outlet at his home in this San Francisco suburb -- all for about a quarter.
He's part of a small but growing movement. "Plug-in" hybrids aren't yet cost-efficient, but some of the dozen known experimental models have gotten up to 250 mpg.

Nicole and I figured up (before gas got above $2) that it would take about 10 years of using a hybrid to start making money from using it (as in it would be cheaper after 10yrs to buy a hybrid model instead of a normal car, for the same model). If the efficiency can be bumped up to even half this for normal cars, and prices decline or even hold for the cars, soon not getting a hybrid car would be stupid. Huzzah!

NOAA - Struck by lightning imagery (site)

Can you guess what is in this lightning bolt?

If you guessed Airplane you are correct!

Throughout this week Patch and Crow's Nest has been moving their store to the basement of the commercial complex that they were in before. The new store is much bigger, and it looks like they will be able to have even more room for gaming. I am glad to see that a Games Workshop store that does things right will actually make money.

McDonald's diet? Some say it works

CNN.com (article)

Inspired by the documentary "Super Size Me," Merab Morgan decided to give a fast-food-only diet a try. The construction worker and mother of two ate only at McDonald's for 90 days -- and dropped 37 pounds in the process.

Wait, how is that possible? Doesn't McD's kill you? Why is she different?

Morgan, from Henderson, North Carolina, thought the documentary had unfairly targeted the world's largest restaurant company, implying that the obese were victims of a careless corporate giant. People are responsible for what they eat, she said, not restaurants. The problem with a McDonald's-only diet isn't what's on the menu, but the choices made from it, she said. [...]
"Just because they accidentally put an apple pie in my bag instead of my apple dippers doesn't mean I'm going to say, 'Oh, I can eat the apple pie."'

Being responsible for your own actions? Gobbledygook!

Putfile

Oh Putfile, first you make me happy because I can upload videos to you, then you rip my heart out when you stopped working. But now, now you do this for me and everything seems right with you again. How could I ever get mad at you, Putfile, I’m sorry.

(Putfile will now allow mp3 uploads, so now when I find a song that I like I can upload it. For example: Cherry Blossom Color Season, From the Katamari soundtrack)

Tennis of the Gods

Tonight we played a jolly good round of Super Tennis. Michelle is the best at it (haha). Here is some footage, marvel at its phenomenal glory.

p.s. It takes a good 45seconds for the video file to load up, and I am on cable. So open up the link, and chill for a bit, make some tea, and perhaps listen to a Barry Manilow record.

N.Y. Wants Trans Fats Off Restaurant Menus

NCBuy (article)

New York City wants restaurants to narrow their list of ingredients - and maybe some waistlines - by cutting out trans fats. The Department of Health and Mental Hygiene said the voluntary change could also help fight the city's biggest killer, heart disease.

First they ban smoking in restraunts, then they ban fat... next sugar? Alchohol? Carbohydrates?

Still think a smoking ban is a good thing?

Here is todays RMNP picture of zen.

A couple of nights ago, Michelle and I worked on a couple of new logos for Michelles band She Said...

Now you can buy some merch with one of the new logos at the She Said... CafePress store.

SaveSURGE.org - KC Catches Pepsi Attacking SURGE (post)

Our friend K.C. Cool was on his way to Myrtle Beach, SC when he saw something he couldn't believe. A sign outside of a Pepsi bottler was attacking his favorite soda!
The bottom line is that Pepsi feels the need to attack because they know Vault is doing very well in test-marketing!

Obviously coming from SaveSurge.org this is slightly biased, but it really looks like Pepsi is getting geared up for a war with Coke over Vault...
Hopefully that means Vault will be released everywhere soon.

Pocket-sized computer 'soul' developed

New Scientist Breaking News (article)

Personal computers could soon fit entirely on a key ring. Researchers at IBM in New York, US, have developed a way to carry a powerful, personalised virtual computer from one PC to the next, without losing the user’s work.
The trick is to store the virtual computer on a USB key, or any portable device with substantial storage space, like an MP3 player.
The virtual computer’s "soul" - as the researchers dub it - can then be uploaded to a new PC simply by plugging the portable device in. This host machine needs no special software or even a network connection to take on an entirely new personality.

Nifty

claudiotosado (site)

Nintendo Revolution controller revealed!

Man that is one spiffy controller. My favorite feature is the three D-Pads.

Dead Arm

frivolity (blargticle)

Have you ever woken up in the middle of the night to find that one of your arms is dead? I rank that fairly high up on my list of terrifying experiences, along with the temporary blindness that sometimes comes from standing up too fast. I woke up last night and discovered that my left arm had become a useless dead weight at my side; no urging from my brain could make it even begin to move. At first, it's a novelty: there's no feeling quite like picking up your own arm, feeling it in your hand, yet having no sensation at all in that arm itself. It's even a little gross, like picking up some dead, naked animal and watching it flop back to the ground when you let go. But after that brief moment of awe, the fear sets in. Despite the fact that I have experienced this plenty of times and it always turns out the same way, there's always that point of worry where I wait anxiously for the feeling to return to me, fearing that maybe this time it won't. I can't imagine what it would be like to live like that every day, as some people do.

As I begin to feel tiny prickles spreading over my arm, I always breathe a sigh of relief and am briefly that much more grateful for the physical capabilities I have. The feeling never lasts, though, at least until I go numb again. But I shouldn't have to wait until numbness sets in to consider how fortunate I am; it's far better to recognize and appreciate what you have while you have it. I'm trying not to take so many things for granted anymore. I'm wiggling my fingers while I still can!

My family always called it "asleep" instead of "dead", so I never worried about it "coming back to life", since I always knew that it would "wake up".

I wonder if I too would have been worried about it if my family called it a dead arm instead of saying my arm is asleep.

Survey time: What does your family call an asleep/dead arm/leg? I have never thought about it, but it might be something like the pop/soda thing...

ESPN.com - MLB - White Sox at Yankees

A fan reacts after falling from the upper deck onto the netting behind home plate during the eighth inning at Yankee Stadium Tuesday Aug. 9, 2005 in New York. The game was delayed for four minutes while he climbed back up to the loge level before being led away by security.

This is all I can find about the kid that fell today during the Baseball game today (its the most interesting that baseball has been in awhile now).
Hopefully there will be a video up sometime tomorrow.

Here is another good picture from Rocky Mountain National Park that I took.
When you get stressed at work, come to this page and have a relaxing look.

Mosquitoes are drawn to people with malaria

New Scientist (article)

huh:

Mosquitoes are more attracted to people already infected with malaria. And this appears to be because the malarial parasite orchestrates its own onward transmission from within the human body, a new study suggests.

strange.

Here is Michelle sporting an awesome hat.

Balloon Bowl (video)

Skateboarding through a bunch of balloons works surprisingly well, and looks pretty cool.

Mini field goals

Putfile (video)

Ramping rocket powered Mini Coopers through a field goal. That’s good stuff.

(and it was on SciFi?)

Technorati Search for: stuck on broadway

Technorati Search for: stuck on broadway (site)

Um yeah, so apparently we are the only people that post about Stuck on Broadway...
check out the link.

I believe today is my Grandpa's birthday.

Happy Birthday!

(The picture is from a couple days ago when we had a Birthday party for him at Efrain's, a really good Mexican restraint in Longmont Colorado)

FSU Responds To NCAA Decision Banning Use Of Native American Symbols

Florida State President T.K. Wetherell (article)

On June 17, the Tribal Council of the Seminole Tribe of Florida spoke unequivocally of its support for Florida State University in its use of the Seminole name and related symbols. Accordingly, I intend to pursue all legal avenues to ensure that this unacceptable decision is overturned, and that this university will forever be associated with the "unconquered" spirit of the Seminole Tribe of Florida.
National surveys have shown in recent years that an overwhelming majority of Native Americans are not offended by the use of Native American names and symbols. In making its decision, the executive committee has been swayed by a strident minority of activists who claim to speak for all Native Americans. It is unconscionable that the Seminole Tribe of Florida has been ignored.
The rules as we understand them would have us cover the Seminole name and symbol as if we were embarrassed, and any committee that would think that is a proper and respectful treatment of Native Americans should be ashamed.

booyeah!

Antitrust case puts NCAA on defense

indystar.com (article)

In U.S. District Court in New York, the National Invitation Tournament is challenging the NCAA's requirement that teams attend its championships if invited. The NIT, a once-prominent postseason basketball tournament but now greatly overshadowed by the concurrent NCAA event, contends teams should have the choice to play in any tournament. That could open the postseason to entrepreneurs or prompt the top schools to organize themselves, as in football.

You know what would be fun? If the NCAA would break up into smaller college organizations. Well it would be fun for awhile at least. Let’s try that.

NCAA - Ratto: Please, ban the ban

ESPN.com (article)

ESPN's reaction to NCAA banning Indians, etc... from NCAA championships:

But here's the other interesting thing about the decision, a halfway measure designed to irritate everyone with an opinion on the matter: It opens up lots of other refreshing possibilities.
Starting with the inevitable PETA lawsuit, demanding the elimination of the Tigers, Bengals, Lions, Golden Lions, Nittany Lions, Wildcats...
Or the Audubon Society, which would demand the end to Eagles, Purple Eagles, Golden Eagles...
Or the church groups who want to get rid of the Demons, Demon Deacons, Blue Demons, Blue Devils...
[etc...]

Aaron gets a point for calling this shot.

I bet somebody wishes he didnt forget his camera...

This is us holding off the Midget Army advance down at Rocky Mountain National Park.
Little known fact about midgets: they are scared to death of rocks... rocks and blue jeans.

Dont you worry about us, we know what to do incase of a midget flood, climb to high ground. Climb and smile, thats all you can do when the dam breaks that holds the midgets back.

This is one dang cool Estes Park Chicken.

Just seconds later Fishing-for-books Man and Silver Potato Chip Girl had a no-holds-barred-rumble.

Ironically, Timid Water Boy actually was declared the winner of the clash.

Mental note: The chicken hat seems to be going in style. Buy two next time I see a chicken hat vendor on the street.

The Bear Rock Cafe in Longmont had large sandwiches. So large that you must close your eyes while taking a bite, lest you see the shear amount of food you are trying to eat.

Who's that rocking with the root beer keg?
Jenette's that one rocking with the root beer keg.

We are the rebellious type. ^_^

Drew from Stuck on Broadway. (probably the sharpest concert pic I will ever take.)

Andy leaving Lonestar after eating lunch with us.

Here are pictures that I like from the Garden / Colorado trip:

Andyman and M.Chelle at the Stuck on Broadway show in Garden. (And Steve from SOB in the background)

Bryan And Bill Get Married, Keep Girlfriends

Outside The Beltway (blargticle)

Bill Dalrymple, 56, and best friend Bryan Pinn, 65, have decided to take the plunge and try out the new same-sex marriage legislation with a twist -- they're straight men.
"I think it's a hoot," Pinn said.
The proposal came last Monday on the patio of a Toronto bar amid shock and laughter from their friends. But the two -- both of whom were previously married and both of whom are still looking for a good woman to love -- insist that after the humour subsided, a real issue lies at the heart of it all.
"There are significant tax implications that we don't think the government has thought through," Pinn said.
Dalrymple has been to see a lawyer already and there are no laws in marriage that define sexual preference.

Yes! I am so glad that some did this and it appears that no one else has thought about doing it until now (?!?).
But you know what, it gets better:

Predictably, a "warning" from Toronto lawyer Bruce Walker, a gay and lesbian rights activist.
"Generally speaking, marriage should be for love," he said. "People who don't marry for love will find themselves in trouble."

So, yeah, guys can marry guys, only if they love each other. Oh, and that “I love my friend” doesn't count, only that "I want to screw you" kind of love counts.

Ok, ok, ok. Now we need to get siblings to marry each other. I mean who is to say that they can't love each other. Then, a person and a dog... why couldn't they love each other? Heck let's go with a computer and a nerd, that sounds like a good love couple as well.

Top 10 dot-com flops

CNET.com (article)

The dot-com boom/bust is my favorite time period in recent history (since the 70's or so). It was amazing how much money was invested in just ideas, and how a whole sector of businesses collapsed. Anyways, cnet has listed the 10 biggest dot-com flops, it’s a good read.

NCAA Executive Committee Issues Guidelines for Use of Native American Mascots at Championship Events

NCAA (Article)

The presidents and chancellors who serve on the NCAA Executive Committee have adopted a new policy to prohibit NCAA colleges and universities from displaying hostile and abusive racial/ethnic/national origin mascots, nicknames or imagery at any of the 88 NCAA championships.

p.s. the school mascot of "Indians", "Seminoles", or even the "Fighting Scots", fall into the "hostile and abusive racial/ethnic/national origin" category.

Why is this even being discussed? Why are schools being forced to drop "offensive" mascots? Doesn't the NCAA have better things to do with their time?

RMNPed

Hey hey hey hey!

Just got back from a rockin (ha!) day down at Estes and Rocky Mountain National Park. Highlights include: a very cool chicken, Chris as an indian, fog, some rocks, and rocks with fog. I'll post some mucho moreo pictureos latero.

Ajuua!

F to the on due

Today we rocked it on down town Longmont. We visited such scenic sights as Hobby Lobby, Hobby Town and The Cheese Importers. While at the Cheese Importers we grabbed stuff for fondue so that we could have a fun-due party for dinner.

And party we did.

FlatIrons

Yesterday we spent the whole day wandering around the FlatIrons shopping district in Broomfield. We actually remembered to use the Zip to get from one shopping center to another and although it took a long time for it to show up at stop, it was useful to catch a ride on. To know more about my day, listen to Michelle's audio post from the Zip.

Today we are either gonna go around Longmont doing random things, or head up to Estes and Rocky Mountain National Park, depending on what the weather is like.

Root beer kegs for all!

Hippies ahoy!

Today we spent the day down in Boulder. We walked along Pearl street for most of the day, and before we headed back to Longmont we stopped at "the Hippie Food Mart" (Whole Foods Market). As always they had a wide variety of very delicious food to choose from, and we came home with the ingredients to have one rocking dinner.
Well I gots to get back to cooking now, but latter I’ll post a pic of two.

Whoo woo!

Trident!

heyyo, at the moment i am sitting at a coffee house in Boulder. not much more to report at the moment.
whoo whoo!

Apologies accepted

In response to my spreadshirt post:

Hello, here are the apologies from spreadshirt. Bart is an intern at spreadshirt EU, his real name is Bartosz. I asked him to comment some articles on blogs about other T-shirt sites.
I think generally it's o.k. to do this when one does it in an , uhm, a little more honest way that makes it clear that the commentator is an company representative and not talking bad about the competition.
So, even a phrase like 'use spread instead of XYZ' is not acceptable. Spreadshirt ist just one other service, we have some advantages and also some disadvnateges compared to other players in this market.
So you are right in being upset. Pls. take our honest apologies for the poor post.
Lukasz
CEO spreadshirt EU

Now there is no way to confirm that Lukasz did indeed post this, but even if it was just another intern posting, I am glad to see that they did apologize.

And so I will retract my "spreadshirt sucks" comment, and I may even give them a try. One thing that they do that is a plus is print on dark colored T-shirts, which may be useful to remember for the future. (You can only do so much with a white t-shirt.)

Anyways, I am gonna sleep now, so that I can get up at the ungodly hour of 9am tomorrow. :)

p.s. Lukasz blog is here.