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January 27, 2006
Roving Mars
An IMAX movie is opening featuring the Mars rovers of the last decade in Roving Mars.
Propelled by the yo-yo minimalism of another phoned-in Philip Glass score, the movie chronicles the production, launch and triumphant success of Spirit and Opportunity, nicknames for a pair of wildly complex gadgets designed to explore and analyze the Red Planet. Read no more if you want to grow up to be an astronaut; here are 40 minutes of nonstop robots, spaceships and bright-eyed NASA geeks enthusing about tangles of circuitry and nifty hydraulics. Sample line of voice-over: "It's going to another planet for real!"For the Kennedy Space Center set, "Roving Mars" is sure to prove a rocket-science riot, but others may grow perplexed and dismayed once the journey takes off into space. Computer animation takes over where cameras can't go, so that the whole spectacular Rover adventure ultimately plays like an extravagant cartoon. If many of the scenes are fake, however, the thrill of the project is not, and what we do see of the surface — hyperclear photographs on the scale of 100-by-180 feet — is out of this world.
Sounds cool, I hope I get a chance to see it in an IMAX theater.
Posted by Steven at 02:18 PM | Comments (1)
January 24, 2006
Alanna is Fourteenth in Her Class
Alanna came home today with her class ranking. Out of six hundred and eighty-eight students, she ranked 14th! We're just delighted with this ranking -- way to go kiddo!
Posted by Steven at 05:25 PM | Comments (0)
January 18, 2006
Just for Alanna
O'Reilly Books has a webpage showing hilarious send-ups of their bookcovers. This is the one that Alanna will like the most.
Posted by Steven at 03:46 PM | Comments (0)
Worst. Job. Ever.
Check out this amusing, ribald short video that answers a question many people have been pondering for years -- who does he talk to all day. Watch the video and you'll understand.
Posted by Steven at 03:07 PM | Comments (0)
Coolest Toy This Year
Imagine owning your own roller-coaster. Now you can.
CoasterDynamix has been formed to produce high-quality, easy to assemble, realistic amusement rides. Scorpion, the newest product from CoasterDynamix, is an extremely twisted, outside-looping roller coaster modeling system.In pushing the envelope of what is currently available for modeling roller coasters, CoasterDynamix has focused on the best way to design and produce a high quality roller coaster model that is infinitely modifiable, visually accurate, easy and quick to assemble, expandable and just plain fun! Click here for more info on Scorpion.
Posted by Steven at 03:03 PM | Comments (0)
January 12, 2006
More Monty/Forte
Apparently, Anne wants to name our new cat "Forte". The adoption name for this critter is Monty, which I have grown to like (afterall, with another cat named Python ... it just flows). He's gone from being very skittish to downright kittenish, and was romping all over the downstairs this morning.
Posted by Steven at 10:16 AM | Comments (1)
Telecommuting Can Be Flu Antidote
Another great reason to telecommute: avoiding the flu.
Of course, there's a human side to the flu season, one that presents a dilemma to business owners. They want to get the work done, but they also need to be concerned about everyone else on the premises catching the same bug if an employee shows up sneezing and coughing.Pressuring them to come to work is a mistake.
"If a person is really sick, you don't want them in the office because you don't want the whole staff to go down," said Reed Baker, owner of Sophist Productions, a New York-based music label and production company.
Moreover, someone with a fever probably can't concentrate on what he or she is doing. And leaning on staffers to come to work when they really don't feel may well generate a morale problem - not only will sick workers be resentful, but so will all the other employees they complain to.
One reason why workers in some companies might want to come in sick is because they're afraid of using up their sick days. That's a particular concern this early in the year. Small businesses with restrictive sick time policies may see more people showing up when they don't feel well.
Some business owners worry that a too-liberal sick time policy will encourage some workers to abuse the system. To Baker, the solution is to be sure from the get-go that you have a solid team of workers behind you.
Baker said he looks for workers who have the same entrepreneurial spirit that he does, who aren't going to take advantage of sick time. Also, he said, with a highly qualified and motivated staff, employees are more willing to step in and do a co-worker's job.
Other workers might come in because they're so dedicated to their work, or find it hard to give themselves permission to take their sick time. That's another reason why equipping employees to work at home is a good idea.
I've always been happiest working for small firms that need lots of different skills from their staff, and don't pidgeonhole workers. Being able to telecommute for Maskina means I don't waste time driving in Dallas' notorious traffic, don't get and stay stressed out as a side effect, and I don't get what everyone brings to the office!
Win-win, I say. The proof? I've not been sick for a year.
Posted by Steven at 10:04 AM | Comments (0)
Oz Man Recites First 4,400 Digits of Pi
Australian Chris Lyons spent 150 minutes reciting the first 4,400 digits of 
. Scary.
Posted by Steven at 09:58 AM | Comments (0)
Whole Foods to use Wind Power
Whole Foods Market, Inc. has purchased 458 GW of wind generated electricity to power its stores, making it the largest corporation to commit to wind power in America.
The Austin-based company said it is purchasing 458,000 megawatt-hours of wind energy credits a year — enough to power 44,000 homes annually — from Renewable Choice Energy of Boulder, Colo.The decision follows the publicly traded company's mission of environmental stewardship without losing sight of the bottom line, Whole Foods regional president Michael Besancon said.
"It's a sales driver rather than a cost," he said. "All of those things we do related to our core values: help drive sales, help convince a customer to drive past three or four other supermarkets on the way to Whole Foods."
Nice to see them (at least pay lip service) to their ethical and community goals.
Posted by Steven at 09:54 AM | Comments (1)
January 10, 2006
New Cat
Tonite we adopted a cat named "Monty" from the Flower Mound Animal Society. He's a DMH tabby with a white bottom and distinctive markings on top.
He's got a beautiful mask, and is a four-month old neutered male with a very quiet, high meow.
We got him home around 8:30pm, where he was very tenative in investigating the house. I ended up playing with him quite a bit with our cat fishing pole and laser pointer (he loves the laser pointer).
But it's clear he's got a few days to go before he will accept us and start exploring the house as his own turf.
He has a habit of scampering to the underside of Anne's storage chest in the front hallway when he gets spooked. On the wood floors, he has poor traction and cannot control his movements as well ... with predictable hijinks.
Posted by Steven at 11:10 PM | Comments (1)
January 08, 2006
Father of LSD To Turn 100
I caught this story in the New York Times about the father of LSD, Albert Hoffman, who turns 100 this week.
His work on ergot produced several important drugs, including a compound still in use to prevent hemorrhaging after childbirth. But it was the 25th compound that he synthesized, lysergic acid diethylamide, that was to have the greatest impact. When he first created it in 1938, the drug yielded no significant pharmacological results. But when his work on ergot was completed, he decided to go back to LSD-25, hoping that improved tests could detect the stimulating effect on the body's circulatory system that he had expected from it. It was as he was synthesizing the drug on a Friday afternoon in April 1943 that he first experienced the altered state of consciousness for which it became famous. "Immediately, I recognized it as the same experience I had had as a child," he said. "I didn't know what caused it, but I knew that it was important."
I've never taken LSD, but I'm fascinated by the chemical ever sense I read Storming Heaven. It's really annoying that the CIA and Timothy Leary screwed up LSD for the rest of us. Read the book, and you'll understand.
Posted by Steven at 06:45 PM | Comments (0)