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Wednesday, February 4th, 2009
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just watched Religulous, and wow. I wish everyone in the world could watch and understand this movie - what a great place it would be then!
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Monday, February 2nd, 2009
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Saturday, January 31st, 2009
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...watching West Side Story for the first time in years...
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Friday, January 30th, 2009
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Tuesday, January 27th, 2009
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Friday, December 14th, 2007
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Recent polls show that much of America still believes in creationism. But they also show that the majority of voters don't care whether a candidate believes in evolution or not. A June USA Today Gallup Poll found that 54 percent of Americans surveyed said that it would make no difference to them if a presidential candidate said that they don't believe in the theory of evolution. And 70 percent of those surveyed said that a candidate's view on evolution wasn't relevant.
But that's precisely the point, notes Krauss. A candidate's position should matter because it undergirds so much of the science-driving policy; bad science leads to bad decisions. He equates not believing in evolution to not believing in the laws of gravity.
[from http://www.wired.com/politics/law/news/2007/12/science_debate]
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Last Thursday (June 21) I was in a car accident in a company car. I was traveling west-bound on 38th street, crossing Lamar, having just picked up my carpool buddy and co-worker, Ian. The left 2 lanes were stopped, because traffic beyond the light was stopped in those two lanes. The right lane was clear though, because it was a right-turn-only lane at the next block (Medical Parkway) where I intended to turn right. So I pulled into the right lane and accelerated into the intersection. Just as I entered the intersection, a blue caravan coming from the opposite direction tried to turn left in front of me. I tried to brake and avoid by ran right into her grill. We bounced sideways and stopped in the crosswalk (glad no one was crossing the street at the time!!!) blocking southbound Lamar. Both airbags went off.
I asked Ian if he was ok, and he replied that nothing was broken. We got out of the car, and I ran over to the caravan to see what the situation was. As I ran up, I could see that the driver was not looking around or at me - just down and to the front slightly. I ran up and asked if she was ok, then I looked where she was looking - her phone. She was pushing buttons on the cellphone and not acknowledging me. I figured she was ok enough and went back to check on Ian. By then his side had started to hurt and the ambulance/fire truck/police cars had arrived...
They cleaned up the debris and moved the cars out of the way pretty quick. I made sure Ian was seen by the EMTs, then sat down for a smoke... Then I noticed the abrasion burns on my arms and went to see if they had some burn cream and gauze. They only had alcohol swabs, so I wiped it clean and left it at that until I could get home.
My employer took me to a chiropractor/massage therapist/acupuncturist right away, and they took x-rays and advice on minimizing the damage. It worked pretty well, and just over a week later I'm feeling pretty good - just some soreness on my left ribs.
The other driver was completely and solely at fault, so her insurance is covering everything.
Here's the kicker : last Thursday was my second-to-last day with PC Doctors... I didn't work the last two days for them, but I did "get them a new car..."
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Saturday, November 25th, 2006
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Monday, September 18th, 2006
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Halfway through the move into my new apartment, an old friend of mine asked me for some help. He's a fairly prominent local photographer who has worked the Austin City Limits Festival since it started, and wanted me to help him get his computer (with monitor, external drives, etc.) to and from the festival. Not that he couldn't do it, but I have a knack for such things, and relished the idea of getting a glimpse of what happens behind the scenes at such an event.
I pack up his computer at his house, and we get to Zilker park. He introduces me to the other photographers and I get to work setting his machine up. While I'm doing that, the head photographer gets a phone-call - one of the runners flaked and they were going to be short-handed. After a conversational prodding from my friend, I volunteer to stand in. The job description is simple: assist the photographers who are hired by the festival. I'm assigned to one photographer, and it's my job to help make sure he's at the right stage at the right time, with plenty of blank flash discs, full batteries, and water. In return I get 3x meals a day (catered and yummy), crew access to the festival, which means I go backstage, in the camera pit (where all the thugs are that pull crowd-surfers out)- even under the stage. Here's the bands I saw up close and personal:
Friday:
David Ford [backstage] -
Ghandaia [sidestage] -
deadboy & the Elephantmen [backstage] -
Wolf Parade [backstage] -
Gnarls Barkley [backstage/pit] -
Okkervil River [?] - I remember nothing of this band...
Cat Power & The Memphis Rhythm Band [backstage] -
Thievery Corporation [backstage/pit] -
Sparklehorse [backstage] -
The Tragically Hip [pit] -
Saturday:
Melissa Reaves [pit] - Janice Joplin is alive and well.
Marah [backstage] - Rocky theme
Centro-matic [backstage] -
Murder by Death [pit] - cello?
Ghostland Observatory [backstage] - cape, pink shirt...
I Love You but I've Chosen Darkness [pit] -
Ben Kweller [backstage] - Ben came out a few minutes late, and explained to the crowd that his nose had been bleeding due to allergies. The EMT's had fixed him up - or so they thought... Partway through the first song, the blood starts again, and doesn't stop until he leaves the stage... First he tries towels, but they just spread it around. At one point, he yells, "Does anyone have a tampon" and suddenly the stage is pummeled by dozens of them... He picks one up, unwraps it, and jams it up his nose... The whole time his voice sounds great - couldn't tell he was wounded. At the end of that song, he says, "the tampon expanded" and yanks it out. He sits down at the piano, and bleeds all over the microphone and keyboard. His guitar and the stage and his clothes are splattered. The stage manager signals to him that's it, and he apologizes profusely before leaving the stage... Poor kid - I think he wanted to keep going...
The Secret Machines [?] -
The Shins [backstage] - recorded video with phone from behind the band
Calexico [backstage] -
What Made Milwaukee Famous [pit] -
Iron & Wine [backstage] -
Sunday:
Rocky Voltolato [?] -
The Stills [pit] -
The Black Angels [pit] -
Randy Rogers [pit] -
Patrice Pike [backstage] -
Ween [pit] - sign-language interpreter was hilarious
Los Amigos Invisibles [backstage] -
The Flaming Lips [crowd] -
The New Orleans Social Club [backstage] -
MUSE [pit] - video from top of stairs
Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers [pit] - RAIN!
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Here's what you get:
2x beef patties
2x slice cheese
bacon
onions
lettuce
tomato
pickles
barbeque sauce
mayo
+
2 extra buns to feed to the birds...!
The price? Only $1.98+tax at W*ndy's. Just get a jr bacon cheeseburger and a jr. bbq cheeseburger. Remove one bun from each, slap the remnants together, and you have one of the ultimate two-dollar combo-burgers I've ever heard of...
The power of synergy!
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Saturday, July 22nd, 2006
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A lot has happened since Thanksgiving... Instead of going home from Vail after turkey day, a friend of mine asked me to come to Florida... It seems he'd gotten his insurance adjuster license, impressed everyone with his extensive construction/re-building knowledge, made it to Florida after Hurricane Wilma, and got stuck trying to enter all the data into his computer... He'll remain nameless, but he's an older gentleman who'd rather have me do his computer work than do it himself... Makes sense, as I could breeze through this stuff while it took him hours... (geez, i hope that doesn't sound like i'm tooting my own horn... ANY of my friends could've done it faster than him...)
So he's paying me well, plus room and board, and I'm thinking: I don't need to hold on to my normal job... I can do so much more... While making more money...! $2k in 2 weeks, and we spent a lot of that time fishing from his boat which we parked at his backyard boatdock... He got a place right on the canal... Good times... So I called up my employer, told him it wasn't working out, and that I'd get the badge to him when I got back into town... They had a "either side can terminate at anytime" employment contract, so no bad karma there... I hope... :)
So, we finish up the contracts, and I get itching to get back to Austin... I try to work it out with him where all he has to do is draw out the roof diagrams and pictures of damage, fill out some worksheets I made up, scan it all, and go to bed... I'd remote into his computer, do all the work, and leave it waiting for his approval in the morning... That way I could work from home - or wherever...! (dream come true) Well, he didn't feel comfortable with industry-proven 128bit encryption, so he backed out once I got back into town... No worries - I'm an adaptable guy...
Lucky too, I suppose... That week, I attend an R&D meeting held by the company I designed for last year... They had lots of work that needed to be done, so I stood up and said, "I just quit my day job, so I have all the time in the world" They were all smiles...
By quitting my old job, I was able to:
- Take a working vacation in Florida
- Get a 33% raise
- Quit working Ra-awful midnight hours
- Change to an industry that's directly improving the lives of people who need it
- Personally design electronic devices that have never been made before (at least Google hadn't heard of it in any terminology I could think of)
That's 5 pretty cool things in my book, so needless to say, I'm very excited about my new means of income, and can't wait until we have all the patents hammered down so I can tell y'all what I've been making! :D
That about wraps it up for the employment vector... I'll post more about other stuff, but they deserver their own posts...
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http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/GSP/SEM0L6OVGJE_0.html
Towards a new test of general relativity? - 23 March 2006
Scientists funded by the European Space Agency have measured the gravitational equivalent of a magnetic field for the first time in a laboratory. Under certain special conditions the effect is much larger than expected from general relativity and could help physicists to make a significant step towards the long-sought-after quantum theory of gravity.
Just as a moving electrical charge creates a magnetic field, so a moving mass generates a gravitomagnetic field. According to Einstein's Theory of General Relativity, the effect is virtually negligible. However, Martin Tajmar, ARC Seibersdorf Research GmbH, Austria; Clovis de Matos, ESA-HQ, Paris; and colleagues have measured the effect in a laboratory.
Also, did you know that Granville Woods invented the Walkie-Talkie...?
- kso
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Tuesday, November 29th, 2005
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For Thanksgiving, my sister acquired a condo/timeshare in Vail, Colorado. Beautiful scenery, great times, and unfortunately a minor concussion my first run down the slopes... Apparently helmets ARE a good idea :)
After a few hours under observation, and all the nurses coming in and asking if I still remember their names, they let me go with the warning that if I were to go snowboarding again and hit the back of my head again, I could get what's called a "Second Impact Concussion" and die or go into a coma. Needless to say, I did no more snowboarding... :( Instead I hung out at the lodge and took care of errands... One of those errands was running back down to Denver to get a rental car - after sitting in the Enterprise office for over 4 hours, I finally got a white Jeep Liberty... All I'm going to say about that is make sure you have either an in-state license or a REAL credit card (not debit card) that has at least $300 on it before even calling them... :-S Oh, and Jeep Liberty's have a ***17*** MPG in-town rating! *choke*gag*puke*
So then I get back up to Vail, and me and my older brother decide we're gonna go out and have some drinks. We drive ALL over Vail, see some amazing houses and all kinds of snow - but no bars, no pubs, no clubs, no scene at all... Just as we're about to give up and go home, we stop by a bus stop where two amazingly beautiful ladies are waiting and ask them where the party is. They explain that all we have to do is park in the giant parking garage, walk down the stairs, and there's pubs all over - just not where you can directly drive to. Seems auto traffic got too bad on the main strip there, so now it's only pedestrians and buses. We thank them, follow their advice, and minutes later were warming ourselves inside The George, a badass pub full of kickass people, pool tables, a foozball table, and long leather couches suitable for chatting and making out... After a few beers and getting our butts kicked by an amazing foozball player named Erin, we head out at last call and go home... So remember if you're in Vail and looking for a pub, PARK THE CAR! :)
We celebrated Turkey day a few days early, so that I could fly out of Denver on Wednesday and get down to Florida, which is where I am now. A friend of mine got his insurance adjuster's license, and with 20+ years of construction experience, he's an amazing adjuster... Good client rapport, top-notch construction skills - but can't work with a computer to save his job, apparently :) That's where I come in... He writes up the estimates, I plug them into the computer, and together we make a pretty kickass team. Not sure how long I'll be down here, but it's hard to leave with the kind of money I'm making helping out...
More later...! Time to do more estimates...
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Wednesday, October 12th, 2005
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So busy lately...! But having fun and getting done what needs done in this world takes time, effort, and lots of sweat... I can handle that...
I just hope none of my friends or family think I'm avoiding/ignoring them...
Just not enough hours in the day!!
(I'm working on a plan to fix that, however... Slowing the rotation of the Earth shouldn't be too hard, eh?)
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kso512's journal
quixotic.
mellow.