Pop quiz, hotshot

What is the difference, if any, between these different forms of electro-magnetic energy?

Answers by noon tomorrow.

New Safety Regulations

CAUTION: Falling Houses in Area

You Can Panda Dance

Everyone loves pandas. Prove me wrong!

Bubbles

Ultimately, this is what everything is: A bubble, which briefly comes to bubbly life, then pops off into the great bubble beyond. Transitory and temporary, illusions of solidity, matter is energy, after all. Think about it. Or not.

Spy pic from ComiCon

Click for big, if you're into over-analyzing a blurry, fuzzy promo shot. Of Lost, Season 6 - my most anticipated TV show ever!

Technically a spoiler, I suppose, but I am as anti-spoiler as anyone, and I'm fine with this. So you should be too!

If you do waste your time looking at this, I report back from the Intertubeyweb: It appears all sorts of dead characters are in this poster - Shannon, Boone, etc. Additionally, the dead characters all appear light, while the living characters - Hurley, Jack, etc - are in dark. Hmmm. Also, and most significant, I think, is Locke in the center, turned away and looking in the opposite direction from everyone else. Also in light. Hmmm.

My speculation for how Lost will end, and it is only speculation: Locke and Jack will become the new avatars of whatever forces currently manifest via Jacob and the Man in Black; Jack will become Jacob, Locke the MIB, and they will remain on the island for a looooong time, until their replacments come.

Cuz that's thing about Black and White, Yin and Yang: No side ever wins. They just fluctuate back and forth, and go on, and on, and on.

Magic Carpet Ride

If a motorcycle were a carpet, that is.

Pictorial representation of a portion of today's American political scene

To wit: All the problems created by Bush are now Obama's problems. Ironically -- or, I would say ironically if the Repuglican party were capable of irony anymore (they're not) - the very same Repuglicans who took part in many of these Bush debacles are now on the front lines of the "hate anything Obama does" camp.

A neat trick if you can get away with it: Create a clusterfuck, and then blame someone else for not fixing it immediately. Your modern Repuglican party people!

Anticipation

Anticipation is quite a powerful sensation -- you're no doubt experiencing it right now looking at this pic. Unaware, perhaps -- your mind is playing out the scene above, and you - your brain - is almost literally seeing all these eager commuters hitting the blacktop. As such, your body can respond to these anticipated events.

Anticipation is obviously an evolutionary advantage if used correctly - foreseeing future events, and thus a possibility of changing that future. For example:

You're driving. You see the car ahead of you edging slightly to the left side of the lane. You pass on the left and as you do, you see the driver talking on a mobile. You now anticipate this person not paying attention to you and also moving into the left lane. As such, you pre-emptively move into the even further left line, knowing it to be empty from a previous glance, moments before the other car does indeed move into the lane.

Magic? Not at all -- based on a series of visual cues and combined with recollection of similar events in the past, your brain calculates out future scenarios, and that's a possibly deadly one. The better you get at reading the informational cues and recalling past lessons, the more powerful your anticipation becomes.

It then becomes possible to envision that given enough data cues and other, similar scenarios, one could entirely anticipate all of the future. Unlikely though, of course.

Largest Organism in the world?

Is a fungus? Not this fungus (this one is especial), but a type of fungus that grows in symbiosis with northern latitude trees; there is a specimen in Oregon which measures some 2200 acres -- that's quite large, and makes a blue whale look like a tiny fish.

Fungi are quite fascinating, don't you know?

"Spent the day boating..."

Whenever you see or hear the phrase "Spent the day boating...", you can be assured -- with 93% certainty - what they mean is "Spent the day drinking and acting crazy on a boat.".

There's a reason America's lakes are a noted killing ground. See: Crystal Lake

Less than 1%

I would never use the word "miracle" lightly, and I would certainly never use it in the religious sense. Rather, I think the word can apply when something happens that is so against the odds, so improbable, that the fact of it occurring is a "miracle".

In this light, we are miracles - everyone of us. In fact, every iota of life on this planet, from microbe to blue whale, is a miracle. Because it is so very, very improbable.

Consider, for us to be here, right now, in this way: First, the Big Bang (or whatever) had to have happened precisely as it happened. Any derivation would cause massive changes over time. This is the first miracle.

Then, over the millenia, the various interactions of energy and matter had to happen exactly as they happened, or once again, large changes would have developed over time and none of us would be here.

Then, a star somewhere near by either had to so supernovae, or expand in such a way as to seed our area of space time with the various elements -- especially the heavier elements - that would later congeal into our sun and solar system.

Then of course our sun had to form, and in this process, of course, everything had to happen in the way it did, or we would not be here -- consider, if the Earth were just a bit further from the sun, liquid water might be a rarity, and life may have never taken hold.

Then, the Earth needs to get hit by another planet -- this collision created the moon, and the moon is absolutely critical to all life on earth.

I could go on and on, but only now are we here on Earth, with the first shoots of life emerging. But a-ha! There have been multiple mass extinctions on Earth so far (off the top of my head, 6 or 7), and during these extinctions, over 99% of all life on the planet was wiped out. And this happened multiple times.

Think about it -- every iota of life that exists right now is a descendant of the lucky few lifeforms who have managed to survive these mass extinctions. And not just one, but many.

This is just the big picture of course, as there are an infinite amount of other variables that could change the whole equation.

But I hope my point is clear: To merely exist, to live, is a miracle. If only we could remember this.

Under the Sea

Look it up yourself: 31 15'15.53N 24 15'30.53W

I don't know what it is. You can probably guess what the Internets think it is...

Don't blame me....

Trust me, no one's blaming you. They're laughing. At you. And possibly, thanking you for making it so easy to identify morans.

Also, such a blatant rip off

More in accurate signage

A wonderfully expressive sign that accurately captures pretty much all the fun, and danger, of alcohol.

That's one way...

Technically, accurate.

Here's where the fun begins

I believe we have reached, or are very near, "a moment". This picture accurately represents our current situation. Stay safe!

RIP Baby Hawk

Now, me and my truck had nothing to do this, although my death dealing truck was about 30 feet away -- but it was parked and played no role in the following tale!

Anywho, there are many hawks in the area outside my infernal office park -- both rather drab brown ones, and brighter Red Tails, as above. This is a male, and I believe a male was the culprit in the following crime:

Heard a screeching -- looked up to a light post to see one hawk charging another. That hawk flies to another light pole, followed by the screeching hawk, who again charges him. What I assume is the male flies off again to the original light pole, where I can see there is something on the top (I assumed it was food at first). The screeching hawk follows, and attacks again. The male flies off into the nearby woods, and what I assume is the female spreads her wings over the item on top of the light post - and then I see something fall. The screeching is going on the whole time. She flies off into the woods. I then run over to this lightpole (wary of hawk attack of course) to inspect what fell to the ground. Bummer -- a little tiny baby hawk. Dead. RIP little one.

I left quickly, what I assume is the mother returned to the light post, still screeching, as I left. And she continued to screech for the next five minutes, and longer for all know. It was all quite sad, but alas, nature, red in tooth and claw.

It is shocking to us, of course, but this behavior -- males killing babies -- seems quite common in the animal world. It's all about the genes, and it is brutal situations like the one above that should cause you to ask yourself: Who is really in charge of your life? You, or your genes?

I suspect most if not all people would say themselves. I would say, I'm not so sure about that. Consider for a moment the role sex plays in our life, and that is clearly a genetic imperative, and voila! You have the majority of our lives clearly ruled by genetic impulses. Are you so sure it's not your entire life?

My Birf Sertiphikate

They done found it! Impeach me!

Wingnuts

I have obtained a wealth of Wingnut Teabaggin' pictures. If my fancy strikes, I might post many of them, as part of the project all Americans of good faith (not the religious sense) should be engaging in -- pushing back these thugs. These right wing wackos who are essentially a homegrown insurgency. They are dangerous -- in both the physical sense (shootings -- and there's been several already this year), and political sense. These people are a threat to our country.

So know them. They might even be in your families. Push back on incorrect facts -- it probably will not change any minds, but we have to try. For the children, dontchyaknow?

Crazy McCain Lady

As Jon Stewart wondered last night, does this crazy lady show up at every tea bagging protest? She's the one with her birth certificate in a baggy, or demanding the Government get their hands off her Medicare, or screeching about "Muslins".

It's interesting/important to note: These same freakshows who are now storming town halls are the same freaks who showed up at those hilarious tea bagging rallies, and the same freaks who populated McCain Palin rallies last year (which got heated).

Whatever they're complaining about is not the point - the point is, they can't handle a black man as President. That's it. And he's a Democrat. It's blasphemy, and the South won't have it.

Also, with the latest polling on Birther stats (hint: It's a Southern phenomena), it's ever more clear that the Repuglican party is nothing more than a Southern regional party, who's time is short, given demographic trends.

And when they do finally collapase under their absurdities, I hope I am ready to dance the Yub-Nub.

Why not, continued

Here's fun sport: Think up some absurd image - for example, a monkey riding a dog - type into the Google machine, for images, and see what comes up. Make sure "Safe Search" is off though -- it detracts from the excitement.

Why not?

The questions "why" and "why not" are perhaps the two most powerful concepts known to humanity. For they allow... everything. Anything. As above.

Gondolin Bound!

It's official! The years long "My own Private Gondolin" project is now officially underway. You'll be reading cryptic bits and pieces of it in the months to come no doubt. So set your decoder ring to "Mountaintop".

Robocop on a Unicorn

No false advertising here -- what you see is what you get. A Robocorn.

The Internets

A general rule of thumb for internet activities: If you don't already know the person you are conversing with over the internet, assume they look like this. For one, it's likely to be fairly accurate. For two, no one is who they say they are on the internets. It's all facade.

Happy surfing!

Mercury - The Solar System's Red Headed Stepson

Mercury, sadly, doesn't get much love out there. So here's a pretty shot (time lapse) of our innermost planet. Please note: If you're ever looking for Mercury in the sky, it only comes out either at duck or dawn, and will be low on the horizon, as in the above photo. (Click for big if you cannot see the path of the planet)

Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra

Great show. The Woodstock of 1991. If you missed it, you missed everything.

Also:

(Ball O') Frustration

Sitting in a traffic jam this morning, it occurred to me that most, if not all, of my frustrations in this world can be tied to just a few factors. Your mileage may vary, of course, but I bet there's some commonalities. These factors are:
A. People. Only people and their actions (or lack thereof) frustrate me. I am mostly immune to all other sources of frustration -- such as the weather, animals (bugs, for example), plants, objects, etc.
1. Actions done out of ignorance or unawareness.
2. Actions done out of maliciousness or insincerity
a. When these actions effect someone or something else.


Littering is an easy example -- the litterer is most likely acting out of ignorance or maliciousness (there is a chance of course it's a complete accident). Their act of littering effects the local environment and anybody in it -- if for no other reason than to see a littered environment is to send the message that "no one cares". This has a deleterious effect on society. Another easy example: Talking on the phone while driving. You lose awareness of your driving, and thereby effect the drives of other people, most likely without you being aware of it. Given that vehicles are one of the most likely ways we have to die, this example shows an extreme ignorance of one's actions in the wider world.

And that's the takeaway: We all could, right now, this very moment, decide collectively that we all will be aware of our acts (and non-acts) and their implications, and strive to make our actions all for the good. With a veritable snap of fingers this world could be made a paradise.

Unlikely, of course, but possible. Hence my frustration. How about yours?

Bye Sarah!

I'm sure it's not the last we'll hear from ya! In fact, I sincerely hope you run for the Repuglican Presidential nomination in 2012. Really -- best of luck. Also, please know I support our troops!

The power of distraction

Giving it about 15 seconds of thought, there seems to be two general types of distractions: 1. Loss of focus due to environmental circumstances (the norm), and 2. Intentional acts designed to deflect attention away from one subject towards another.

Day three of Gatesgate tells me all I need to know about the latter.


Also, good doggies! This is the real police academy K-9 training folks. Only the best of the best pass.

Rapture Ready!

I bet there's a near 1 to 1 corollary between those folks who believe this "Birther" nonsense, and those folks who believe in the Rapture. I would put money on these same folks not believing in global warming, evolution, birth control, etc.

Bottom line is: Folks who believe - sincerely - in a Biblical "rapture" are already predisposed to value beliefs over facts. Thus, any crazy idea that gets in their head and takes hold becomes true, facts be damned.

To wit: Religion = Insanity

TruckNutz

In case you were wondering what "TruckNuts" were (or I suppose in this case, CarNutz), wonder no more.

Birthers

The crazies, they get crazier by the day. Here's Obama's birth certificate. Won't make any difference to the crazies.

RIP Finch

Well, apparently my truck is the vehicle of choice for suicidal birds, as another bird has been killed flying into my truck.

Attention, all birds reading this blog! I do not want to kill you, even if you are suicidal. Please find another method, or make your intents known to me beforehand. I will try and seek some kind of bird counselor for you.

Also, I know of some great bird seed locations. Leave a note if you'd like to know where.

Conspiracy nuts ahoy!

It won't make any difference, I'm sure, but Moon Landing Conspiracy nuts should take note of this photo (and the entire series, here ).

Smack dab in the center of the above picture is the Apollo 11 landing capsule. You can see it's shadow quite clearly. Very cool. But as I said, I doubt it will change any nutjob's mind. I've been learning lately (thanks to the Repuglicans) that cognitive dissonance is not a condition that prevents you from operating in the world. And for the hardcore nutjobs, there is no such thing as proof or evidence or truth. They know what they know, end of story.

Kindlenacht

Folks, this is some incredible stuff. I'm slightly flabbergasted, and I thought myself immune to all forms of flabgastery. But, here I am. This is so... outrageous? Incredible? Chilling? So many things at once. Read the entire article below, original post from the NY Times.

This morning, hundreds of Amazon Kindle owners awoke to discover that books by a certain famous author had mysteriously disappeared from their e-book readers. These were books that they had bought and paid for—thought they owned.

But no, apparently the publisher changed its mind about offering an electronic edition, and apparently Amazon, whose business lives and dies by publisher happiness, caved. It electronically deleted all books by this author from people’s Kindles and credited their accounts for the price.

This is ugly for all kinds of reasons. Amazon says that this sort of thing is “rare,” but that it can happen at all is unsettling; we’ve been taught to believe that e-books are, you know, just like books, only better. Already, we’ve learned that they’re not really like books, in that once we’re finished reading them, we can’t resell or even donate them. But now we learn that all sales may not even be final.

As one of my readers noted, it’s like Barnes & Noble sneaking into our homes in the middle of the night, taking some books that we’ve been reading off our nightstands, and leaving us a check on the coffee table.

You want to know the best part? The juicy, plump, dripping irony?

The author who was the victim of this Big Brotherish plot was none other than George Orwell. And the books were “1984” and “Animal Farm.”

Scary.

I had been vaguely thinking about at least checking out a kindle, as I find the medium to be intriguing, especially the idea of instant downloads. But this, this is just beyond the pale in my mind, and ensures I will never buy a Kindle.

And that they would do this with George Orwell books? Boggling. In fact, I am thoroughly boggled and flabbergasted. Nice work, Amazon -- if you had the choice, you should have pushed back against the publisher rather than do this. No one will trust the product now with this kind of behavior.

When we were brave

Do you remember a time when America was willing to take bold risks?


Me either.

Also, a google image search for "Moon Landing" mostly returns pictures of supposed moon hoaxes. Which says a lot about the intertubes.

More in Confederate Fashions

Pretty hot, right? But would be even hotter if those were NAZI flags.

PS Southerners: You still lost.

Also, to debate amongst yourselves: At this point in time, how much would you say the Republican party is a direct descendant of the traitourous Confederacy?

Professor Dog

Known to grade on a curve.

Did Jesus ever ride a Dinosaur?

The answer, apparently, is... probably.

WTF 80's?

Thankfully, I never partook of this fashion trend -- though there were some close moments. But really: What the hell were people thinking? Not just the hair, but the androgyny. I suppose these fashion trends have something to do with the 70's, which of course had everything to do with the 60's (which was in turn a response to the harsh conformity of the 50's -- and all history ends there). By the mid 90's, these ridiculous fashion trends started to fade away, such that today, I'm fairly confident we are living in the least embarrassing fashion era since 1955.

But still, you ought to be embarrassed, decade of the 80's. Good music though, in retrospect.

Greek Stormtroopers

British Museum, London

While this mask might have helped during hand to hand combat, man, it must have been uncomfortable, hot, and blinding.

One Definite Apocalypse

Say hello to the Andromeda Galaxy -- in many ways our Sister galaxy in the local area. The only other big galaxy near us for many hundreds of thousands of light years.

The Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies both have much smaller galaxies orbiting them (see the smudge in the foreground above), and the two galaxies orbit each other.

However, they are also drawing closer together, and given that Andromeda has quite a bit more mass than the Milky Way, eventually the two galaxies will collide, and merge, with Andromeda taking the dominant role. At that time (approx 3 Billion years hence), our planet's destruction is likely. Not because the sun will be destroyed necessarily, but because of the great turmoil in the interstellar medium.

So, don't worry about the end of the sun (red giant stage in approx 5 Billion years) -- our world will be destroyed well before then!

Asteroids - The Movie!

Seriously. Universal Studios has an Asteroids movie in the works, after winning an intense bidding war for the rights. Yes, indeed, an Asteroids movie. Here's a "leak".

Now, back in the day, and many days after that day, I was something of an Asteroids wiz -- I have achieved the second highest score possible in the game (99,980; 99,990 is the highest possible score in Asteroids, as the score goes back to 0 once you hit 100K). Now, getting this score takes a lot of skill, as you have to selectively shoot targets in a very controlled manner in order to get that score and not roll over. So, bravo me!

In order to become good at Asteroids, it is necessary to play a lot of Asteroids. A lot. And so I did, and while playing, a lot, I came up with a plausible back story: The Asteroids are the nursery of the alien ships; the human based triangles have invaded this alien space, and are engaging a genocidal war against said peaceful, asteroid dwelling aliens. Having no choice but to defend themselves, they launch their lame spacecraft to try and take out the evil human triangle ships. While achieving some success against less experienced pilots, alas, they are fairly helpless against Aces. And thus, the genocide against the Asteroid Aliens continues apace....


Don't think the Hollywood version will use that plot however; but close -- they will invert the good/evil focus no doubt, such that the aliens have launched an Asteroid cloud at earth in order to destroy it, and a brave group of humans (Vin Diesel, Nic Cage, and Megan Fox) are all that stands in the way of humanity's end. Think it will have a happy ending? Sequel bait (the sequel will of course involve the adding of shields to the triangle ships)?

Finally, never forget: Hyperspace is for emergencies only.

IOKIYAR

It's OK If You Are Republican. This acronym can cover pretty much any situation these days when it comes to political issues. Scandal, cheating, affairs, lying? IOKIYAR.

Enjoy this fine picture of two "real Americans" - again, real American = White Republican.

Back in Green Masks

If you only watched CNN the last few days, you'd think nothing was happening anywhere in the world other than Michael Jackson dying, and Sarah Palin just cold "quittin'". But the situation in Iran burns on, a slow burn up till today, wherein the conjunction of a religious holiday and a previous memorial day has led for more action on the streets.

But the action on the streets of course is but the surface of the real turmoil, which seems centered on Qom, the religious capital of Iran; there, the various Ayatollah's seem deeply in conflict with the regime. And with the recent appointment of the son of the Supreme Leader as head of Basij; which just makes more apparent that this is an internal coup, where one group within Iran is seeking to take control over another -- that's the real battle going on right now.

The youth is with the Mousavi; thus, barring a massive, massive crackdown, given the demographics of Iran, the defeat of the current leadership is inevitable.


Also, masks: We've seen folks wearing masks at protests since the mid 90's; Islamic forces started wearing masks to hide their identities from the Israelis; now, everyone everywhere will be forced to wear a mask if they go out in public, since truly, the cameras are everywhere.

So long, fellas!

So, them fancy pants scientists have gone and created artificial sperm cells from stem cells, and successfully fertilized mouse eggs with them, and then presto! Little mouse babies. All without the help of a mousey stud. Linky.

Which of course leads to the obvious conclusion: The end of the male sex. Sure, there will be a longish transition period in which men are enslaved by their matronly overlordesses, for manual labor no doubt, but eventually the new Queens of the earth will tire of the troubles caused by these slaves, and do away with them. Ushering in peace on earth, natch.

So, men, I say to thee: Enjoy this time we have left as lucky recipients of a patriarchal system. It's not long for this earth!

Your Summer forecast: More Rain

I try to never complain about the weather, as every instance of weather is a miracle and a blessing -- even the worst weather. For, what are your other options?

That said, good god y'all! This is getting out of hand! It rained pretty much all of June, and most of July so far, and there is no indication anything will change. We need the rain, of course, but can't it be scheduled a little better?

Thanks in advance,

Redshirt