Flutterby™! From 2010-03-05 to 2010-03-31

Charlene and I have been tooling around the northeast for the past few days. Full report when we get back. We were over in Boston the day before yesterday, and ended up killing two hours walking along Revere Beach. While we were there we watched a police officer (MA State) behaving extremely unprofessionally, going all drill sargent at a very subservient guy whose car he was towing.

Later that evening we got pulled over for license plate lights and a headlight out, and got some attitude.

I've had 3 moving violations in my life, and several other interactions with police officers, and these two, one which I witnessed, one which was directed at me (but was way toned down from what I saw earlier in the evening) were the worst I've ever personally seen police officers behaving. The first was bad enough that I considered calling someone about it, but I realized that I'm in a strange town, and the last thing I wanted to do was to be pissing off the police.

That right there says something.

The other guy let me off with a warning, which is fine, I can suck it up and let him be an asshole for that.

Other than that, it's been a pretty cool, if more driving than I'd planned on, trip. From Toledo to Sheffield, MA. Toured quickly through my old stomping grounds, including a stop in Harlemville, NY, where I talked with two people I went to elementary school with, thence up to West Lebanon to look at the old house, then back to Great Barrington for the night. Debra Hyde got word we near her state, and Charlene had a friend over in Boston she thought it'd be fun to drop in on, so we went over there and back down through Mystic, CT. On the way back across we got off the freeway at New Haven to avoid an accident, and ended up spending the afternoon at the Yale museums, then up to Newtown CT, where I went to high school, and across. Tonight we're near Syracuse, tomorrow we're going to hit Niagara Falls, then probably return to Toledo via Canada.

[ related topics: Dan's Life Law Enforcement Travel ]

Slate is doing an interesting series on signs that direct people from one place to another. One discusses London's attempt to do for walking maps what the famous 1933 Underground Map did for transit systems. This installment deals with the bad signage at and around New York's Penn Station. One element is a slide show of how you would find your way (or not) from the subway to the Amtrack platforms, and how a workable system breaks down with the lack of one sign. I remember being in London many years ago, and how impressed I was with a system where every point where you could change directions had a sign explaining the consequences. (go left and you can get to Baker Street, go right and you can get to Oxford Circus)

The London installment also makes an interesting point: watch the actual users. The Legible London set up prototype maps of how to walk to various places, but the designers left out the index to create a cleaner look. But the pedestrians couldn't take time to scan the entire map looking for just one spot, so they gave up.

[ related topics: Invention and Design Maps and Mapping New York Public Transportation ]

From io9: SF book covers by Richard Powers. These Dali-esque designs were standard for the late 1950s SF paperbacks, now I realize it was largely done by one artist. But they were advanced looking, and I guess that's what was called for. I don't read anywhere near as much SF as I did back in school, but the more realistic cover design has taken over.

[ related topics: Books Art & Culture Heinlein Graphic Design ]

Interesting investigation into what Whole Foods means when they carry products from China claiming to be "organic". Via Genehack

So Portal 2 is coming, but here's the really cool part: A recent patch to Portal embedded messages, including Morse code and slow-scan images, about the sequel.

[ related topics: Robotics Current Events Embedded Devices ]

A Brainwagon post on the physics of soda bottle compressed air rockets had a link to Rocket Science, some musings on the physics of them.

[ related topics: Space & Astronomy ]

M17N - A good Linux centric bit on doing multiple language/character stuff in Linux. Made a lot of things easier to understand even if you were not using Linux.

[ related topics: Free Software Open Source ]

"Supercritical state"? of fuel injection system from Transonic Combustion offers 50% milage increase? I smell Steorn droppings. But dang, I am an optimist and hope it's not. Again, time will tell.

I always find circumstances where technology or scientific knowledge is lost fascinating. Maciej Cegłowski looks at how the Brits lost the connection between vitamin C and scurvy that lead to scurvy becoming a huge issue in Scott's expedition to the South Pole.

[ related topics: Health ]

good artists copy, great artists steal a blog post by Jonathan Schwartz (former Sun CEO) - says what I have heard many people say, but he puts it in elegant simple terms with a up close personal perspective. A great read about patents, and IP and how they are used.

[ related topics: Intellectual Property Weblogs Art & Culture ]

Utah governor signs law allowing women who miscarry to be charged with murder.

[ related topics: Sexual Culture ]

In our road trip around the east coast, it felt like Connecticut had sold its soul to the strip mall. Places that used to be quaint towns, that used to have downtowns, were replaced with strip sprawl. A high school friend suggested that next time we check out Connecticut Roads first.

[ related topics: Travel ]

Harold McGee looks at kneading and breads. Summarizing so I can find it again, for an aerated bread like those currently in vogue, you don't need to do much to the bread beyond what gets the water incorporated. Knead more if if you're using whole grains. 60%-75% water to flour by weight, with up to 2% salt for the wetter doughs.

I'll be experimenting some, my trend with dough has been towards the "how much water can I get this flour to absorb" end of things.

[ related topics: Food ]

This article about Verizon's attempt to grab iPad traffic for its own network alerted me to the existence of Verizon's MiFi 2200, a WiFi to Verizon's data service device. That's kinda cool...

[ related topics: Apple Computer broadband ]

Okay, so far Windows 7 doesn't suck more than Vista (aside from the fact that the .NET framework handles 2d matrices differently in ways that broke my software), but the upgrade process?

Went to Staples. Guy met me when I walked in the door, asked if he could help, I said "Windows 7 upgrade", he called specialist. I thought "great, don't have to learn anything, just let guy solve problem!". They were out of "Windows 7 Ultimate" upgrade, so he suggested "Professional" for my "Vista 64 Home Premium". Got home, opened case, saw 32 bit disk, drove back to Staples, someone figured out that, indeed, stuffed in under the packaging was the 64 bit disk.

Came home, put disk in machine, started install, disk told me that I could only install if I wiped the drive and started again, but if I'd bought the Windows 7 Home Premium or Ultimate upgrades then I wouldn't have had to do this.

Drove back to Staples, where they told me that since the disk package was opened I couldn't return it.

Drove home, commenced backing up my machine in preparation for total reinstall (+ 2 days of feeding the stupid things disks for software I've already installed on it), got pissy, left a nasty email with Staples web site.

Later that evening, while machine was still backing up to server, got call from Staples headquarters that they'd relented and would let me return the "Professional" for "Home Premium". While there, we looked at the packaging, and there were no warnings on the box that you had to match the upgrade to the original version, in fact the box implied everything would work.

Got home with "Home Premium" and realized that there was an additional layer of wrapping that hadn't been on the "Professional" upgrade I'd bought. So someone else had returned the "Professional" upgrade before me.

Hopefully Staples will filter this back up to Microsoft, but: Dear Microsoft, you can't possibly convince me that as use cases for the packaging was being discussed someone didn't say "here's the scenario, I bought a PC with Vista on it, I walk into retail store looking for upgrade, how do I find the right version?"

Damn, I'm glad I only have to deal with that sucky-ass excuse for an operating system when I'm getting paid to do so.

And what's with the graphic design? My status bar feels like I got time-warped back into the late '80s.

[ related topics: Microsoft Software Engineering moron ]

Academy Award Winning Movie Trailer (YouTube), or, an explanation of why I'm disappointed almost every time I see a movie, in trailer form.

[ related topics: Movies ]

Prepare for the largest food recall in North American history. Salmonella in HVP (hydrolyzed vegetable protein) made by Basic Food Flavors may have made it into 10k products.

Make it yourself, and know your growers.

[ related topics: Weblogs Food Current Events ]

Fruit Sticker.com - understand the PLU codes on fruit. If it starts with a 9 it's organic, 8 it's genetically modified. But in all cases it's reducing your fruit to a commodity...

[ related topics: Food ]

The recent experiments with the neighbor kids and hydrogen reminded me of the Doctor Doctor episode involving the hydrogen Alhambra rocket, which led me to Incompetech.com which has all sorts of royalty free music, next time you're looking for a soundtrack for some project.

[ related topics: Music Video ]

A few years ago, Charlene and I got our amateur radio licenses. I've tried to use mine once, driving SAG for the Wine Country Century, but the radio they lent me wasn't working right. And we've never bought radios of our own and taken this thing to the next level.

Today MarkV mentioned the Alinco DJ-G7T tri-band (2M, 440MHz and 1.2GHz) full-duplex transceiver. Looks cool.

[ related topics: Radio ]

NY Times: Texas Approves Curriculum Revised by Conservatives:

Cynthia Dunbar, a lawyer from Richmond who is a strict constitutionalist and thinks the nation was founded on Christian beliefs, managed to cut Thomas Jefferson from a list of figures whose writings inspired revolutions in the late 18th century and 19th century, replacing him with St. Thomas Aquinas, John Calvin and William Blackstone. (Jefferson is not well liked among the conservatives on the board because he coined the term “separation between church and state.”)

Not only is satire dead, but what passes for the modern "conservative" movement insists on repeatedly pissing on its grave.

[ related topics: Religion Law Education ]

In light of a whole boatload of discussions I've had recently about things like causes of autism, this seemed interesting: Sociological Images on Fetal Alcohol Syndrome and the social control of mothers:

It turns out that only about 5% of alcoholic women give birth to babies who are later diagnosed with FAS. This means that many mothers drink excessively, and many more drink somewhat (at least 16 percent of mothers drink during pregnancy), and yet many, many children born to these women show no diagnosable signs of FAS. Twin studies, further, have shown that sometimes one fraternal twin is diagnosed with FAS, but the other twin, who shared the same uterine environment, is fine.

[ related topics: Children and growing up Nature and environment ]

Spent a lot of time this weekend learning about SVG and am attempting to use it for some semi-interactive charting needs. Interesting stuff.The ability to mix "EcmaScript" and vector graphics has a lot of potential, if only the browsers implement things in a similar fashion.

[ related topics: Interactive Drama Graphics Mathematics Education Fashion ]

Just signed up for WhereCamp. I know I'm going to see Eric there, anyone else?

Bacon/Bakon Vodka - because it just might make a kick-ass bloody mary, and everything is better with bacon. Almost everything at least.

[ related topics: Wines and Spirits Food - Bacon ]

YikeBike, looks like about the same speed, range is about half the Segway, but it's only 22 lbs and folds to a form-factor that you could actually carry on public transit. So unlike the Segway it'd actually be usable for a commute.

However, price is still such that I don't see it flying off the shelves.

[ related topics: Aviation Segway/Ginger/IT Public Transportation ]

Had some finishing disasters this weekend, but as I was blowing dust off of some pieces I was working on, I realized that along with "you can never have too many clamps", the other truism of woodworking is "you can never have too big an air compressor".

[ related topics: Work, productivity and environment Woodworking ]

Porn is good for you.

...Now here is the kicker: A positive correlation was obtained between the amount of hardcore pornography that was viewed and the impact of the benefits reaped. This positive correlation was found for both sexes. In other words, the more that one watched porn, the stronger the benefits (for both sexes)! There you have it.

That drawing on Gert Martin Hald1 and Neil M. Malamuth, Self-Perceived Effects of Pornography Consumption and various other articles, and is courtesy of ErosBlog's "porn is good for you".

ErosBlog followed that up with a look at how porn might be good for society, largely stuff you already know, pointing to The Scientist magazine's look at the inverse correlation between pornography availability and sexual violence:

... ooking closer, Michael Goldstein and Harold Kant found that rapists were more likely than nonrapists in the prison population to have been punished for looking at pornography while a youngster, while other research has shown that incarcerated nonrapists had seen more pornography, and seen it at an earlier age, than rapists. What does correlate highly with sex offense is a strict, repressive religious upbringing. Richard Green too has reported that both rapists and child molesters use less pornography than a control group of “normal” males.

[ related topics: Religion Sexual Culture Sociology ]

One of the disadvantages of not having TV is that I miss out on popular culture. Fortunately, Shawn pointed this one out to me: TheAwl.com: Vagina-less Commercial For Vagina Product Forced To Skimp On Vaginas, direct YouTube link.

"Sometimes I just want to run on the beach... I like to twirl..."

[ related topics: Sexual Culture Sociology Television ]

interesting, see what you think I particularly like "blatherskite -- one who loudly displays his ignorance. Universally applicable in the American public discourse; think radio talk show bloviators and the combatants on the Sunday morning television mud wrestling (aka political commentary) shows.

and: tootle -- to move along in a very leisurely manner.

http://www.lost-vocabulary.com/index.html

[ related topics: Politics Technology and Culture moron ]

Big Ed has compiled some of his "Advice to the Young" tweets in a blog post. I think they're worth a perusal.

[ related topics: Weblogs ]

Can you be too smart to be a chess champion? The world's top-ranked player thinks so.

[ related topics: Games ]

Linux for Devices talks about the $99 Qi Hardware Ben NanoNote. 3.89 x 2.95 x 0.69-inch (99 x 75 x 17.5mm), 3" screen, a thumbable QWERTY keyboard, 366MHz MIPS compatible CPU, 32MB RAM, 2Gb flash, mini-USB master, microSD slot (which can take a WiFi card).

[ related topics: Free Software Open Source Current Events ]

I went by a shop in Chicago's Loop yesterday that deals in rare coins, medals and other artifacts. Alongside a display of ancient Roman coins and US commemeratives they had one crisp, uncirculated note from 2009: a $100 Trillion bill issued by the Bank of Zimbabwe. At today's exchange rate it is worth about $79 US. Count thy blessings.

[ related topics: Currency ]

Heather Corinna is doing a survey on Multigenerational Experiences with & Attitudes About Casual Sex.

[ related topics: Sexual Culture Sociology ]

Nice: I think we've mentioned that we've got a friend who's in some severe medical distress. She's currently drifting in and out of consciousness in the ICU, hopefully recovering, but we're soliciting any input we can from her friends, who are arranged around the world, to give her a reason to pull through.

Some folks are having trouble recording MP3s on their own. Drop.io just let me set up a free account, attach a phone number plus extension which I could call and record a message, and then let me download that message as MP3.

Download was kinda slow, but it was free, I was trying to download immediately after recording (there may have been some post-processing happening), so who am I to complain?

Also sure that there are other services which do this, this was just the first one I found.

[ related topics: Music ]

Okay, lazy web:

I'm seeing more and more QRCode, a 2d bar code that's on everything in Japan (including buildings), and is starting to become required on papers and presentations for things like links to the online versions of the media being presented.

I've been really lax with business cards, because for the most part I'd rather enter your data into my phone directly (or use Bump), but I'm realizing that I need actual paper cards. I'd like to put a QRCode on the card, and I probably also want to print up a bunch of stickers so that when I go to meet & greets people can point their phones at my "Hello, my name is ..." and get my info.

My first attempts at playing with this seem like URLs are recognized fine, various vCard type data sets aren't universally recognized. But when they get to my bio URL, what's the best format or set of formats on which people can click and get an easily importable set of contact info for me. Is vCard the way to go? What MIME type should I be serving it up with?

If I can't have LID I want the next best thing, but I've no idea what that is.

[ related topics: LID (Lightweight IDentity) ]

Two MeFi comments that deserve a wider audience:

• "You just don't expect a career you spent a lifetime learning to just go."
• A good little tale of Utah Phillips and how to find common ground and have discussions with bigots

[ related topics: Education Archival ]

Biography of a Taco: a class takes a taco truck in The Mission and follows its ingredients back to the source. Via Rebecca's Pocket.

[ related topics: Food Bay Area ]

Duke study links high fructose corn syrup with liver damage.

[ related topics: Health Food Physiology ]

Making your own OLED at home. Via Mars Saxman

[ related topics: Cool Science ]

Mike Rowe: Safety… do I hear 1? 2? 3?

Last Wednesday we were in SF, sitting in Alta Plaza park eating empanadas while waiting a bit before going back in and visiting with a friend who's in the ICU at CPMC (<psa>Make sure you have a current medical advance directive, damn it!</psa>), and we looked south and wondered "what's that hill?"

Yesterday's Hike The Geek was at San Bruno Mountain State Park, I went to hang out for a bit with Chris and all the cool people, and had a good little hike. Charlene and I are going to have to go back there, it's a nice piece of open space.

One of the conversations I had was with the people behind For the love of Seitan, a vegan cooking blog. I'll be making the pickled mushrooms.

[ related topics: Weblogs Nature and environment Food Bay Area Space & Astronomy ]

Bison Bill's Weird West looks at Sally Rand's Nude Ranch, a burlesque show from the 1930s. Found by Gloria Brame.

[ related topics: Erotic Sexual Culture Nudity Community Burlesque ]

Please: If you do not have a written and witnessed medical advance directive (aka "living will"), sit down with your loved ones and write one by the end of this week. Include scenarios like reduced brain function if you survive, loss of various physical abilities, breathing tubes or other intubations, whether you'd like to be kept alive but barely conscious while people fly in to visit you in your last days or hours. All those things.

Make the hard decisions now, because you could end up in a scenario where your loved ones are unable to be sure enough of your blinks and hand clenches to be able to communicate those wishes to doctors and nurses.

If you're lucky, this is hypothetical for you right now. Hopefully it'll stay hypothetical. Do it anyway.

Those close to you may not be able to do anything to ensure that those wishes come to pass, but they'll thank you for giving them that guidance.

[ related topics: Health Law ]

How a $500 Craigslist car beat $400k rally racers. Bill Caswell bought a 1991 BMW 318i, found a way in the FIA rules into the World Rally Championship's Rally Mexico, with stage notes in Portugese borrowed from another competitor (which caused some unintended air-time). Via MeFi.

When you read those smug Esquire articles written by Manhattan dwelling Princeton grads who think putting the bike rack on the Volvo is mechanical prowess about skills every man should have? Yeah, this is the sort of bad-assery we should aspire to.

[ related topics: Automobiles ]

So my comment urging you to write medical advance directives and make sure that you've left instructions for the disposition of your body was not hypothetical: Cynthia died yesterday. Cynthia was the woman whom Charlene has been helping with fundraising and emotional support and everything while they tried to arrange a liver transplant. After many ups and downs and elevator trips on the MELD score, she got her transplant, but by that point everything else was failing.

This morning we take the mom from our Family Connection family to oral surgery. There are some extreme anxiety issues which mean we end up in yet another facility on the other side of San Francisco, but Charlene and L. go into the room, I'm hanging out in the waiting room, I do the crossword puzzle (Crossword fail: there was no "e" on the "blond" answer for "Marilyn Monroe or Madonna", there should have been), and then someone comes out and says "are you with the two people in there? Someone's passed out", and I'm all like "What the hell? Who's the medical professional here?"

But it was fine. My first question was "where's the closest Kaiser?", but then I paused and asked "do you have a blood pressure cuff?" (Actually, I probably said "sphygmomanometer" but then they looked at me funny and I made a arm cuff like gesture), and they had a fancy machine. We hooked Charlene up, got blood pressure and blood oxygen and heart rate, and her vitals were all stable, pulse was a little low but hers runs down there normally, speech was fine, peripheral vision was fine, just a bump on the head (which, she tells me, hurts a lot).

And then at the Petaluma T&TAC meeting this evening the audio was out and we had all sorts of wacky potential legal issues from that, but we went ahead and ticked a couple of things off the agenda.

[ related topics: Health Bay Area Sociology California Culture Archival ]

I used to be a hardcore libertarian sort. I used to want government out of my healthcare. I used to complain about the Clinton administration. Whole lotta things. I didn't vote for Bush II, and obviously was so repulsed by his administration that I'd vote for pretty much anybody to replace him, but there are a lot of issues in terms of government spending and attitudes where the Republicans could get my attention.

Russel King writes an open letter to Conservatives that pretty much sums up why the Republican party has lost my attention.

[ related topics: Politics Libertarian moron ]

David Mamet's Master Class Memo to the Writers of The Unit

[ related topics: Writing ]

What would happen if Terry Pratchett's "The Luggage" and a Segway had an illegitimate love child? The Cajun Crawler (YouTube), a dodecapod personal transportation device. Via JWZ, who points out that you'll do better with audio muted, start from :55 and stop by 3:45.

[ related topics: Cool Technology Segway/Ginger/IT Terry Pratchett ]

Worth a read: Susie Bright: My Little Runaway. Susie Bright reminisces about the LA 1970s punk scene, fueled by The Runaways movie.

[ related topics: Sexual Culture Movies ]

very timely and relevant, given the new startling revelations in Europe http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VABSoHYQr6k

[ related topics: Movies Invention and Design ]

Top 10 Anti-Gay Activists Caught Being Gay.

[ related topics: Sexual Culture ]

When Charlene and I flew out east, we flew American Airlines, because they had the least stops into Toledo. Generally I really like Southwest, but the last few times we've flown we've had trouble getting seats together, and they fly into Detroit, which is a bit further away.

But I did wonder why American was charging $25 per checked bag, it always seemed to me like an airline would want to reduce the number of big heavy bags being slung around the cabin.

Here's an interesting look at the Southwest Airlines baggage strategy.

[ related topics: Aviation ]

A couple from Shadow:

• Student uses Westboro Baptist Church demonstration to raise funds for LGBT/Q advocacy organizations. College student sets up a table across from Westboro Baptist Church demonstration collecting donations for various organizations that deal with lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and generally queer issues, to be made in Fred Phelps's name, along with thank-you cards to be sent to Westboro Baptist for their efforts in fundraising. Right on.
• Transportation department embrases bikes and business groups cry foul.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood has announced a “major policy revision” that aims to give bicycling and walking the same policy and economic consideration as driving.

[ related topics: Religion Sexual Culture Sports Education Pedal Power Bicycling Economics Furniture ]

The Act On Energy E-Smart Programmable Thermostat. With the ability for your power company to turn off your air conditioning in extreme conditions.

Glenn Greenwald: The war on WikiLeaks and why it matters. Short version: The CIA is concerned about manipulating public opinion in Europe to maintain the support of various governments for the war, and is concerned that if WikiLeaks continues their work in bringing hidden documents to light, ie: if the truth comes out, it could galvanize public opinion against the war and undermine those efforts.

[ related topics: Interactive Drama History Current Events Work, productivity and environment Salon magazine ]

pwnat - NAT to NAT client-server communication, port tunneling between machines when both computers are behind NAT firewalls. Cool!

Sculptris - dynamic mesh tesselation 3d modeling tool that I haven't had a chance to take a look at yet, but maybe if I put it up here I can grab it from the Windows box and try it out over there.

[ related topics: Interactive Drama Microsoft Graphics ]

Just got done with an air trip. I always check out the "Sky Mall" brochure for project ideas, and came across an interesting ad for a doormat. You send us your address, we'll send you a charming custom made doormat. The graphical example accompanying the ad was emblazoned with the text:

Welcome to 40^o 75' N 73^o 99' W

I figure only on Flutterby am I likely to find folks who find the humor in this.

[ related topics: Humor Travel ]

"Magnetic pulses" applied to the right temporo-parietal junction (RTPJ) region of human brains, just behind the right ear, impaired judgment of right and wrong and switched off morality. Or, as lilmookiesquire said in the SE entry:

First you get the magnets,

then you get the money,

then you get the power,

then you get the wo/men.

[ related topics: Psychology, Psychiatry and Personality Cool Science Current Events Physiology ]

Nothing short of brilliant: Dark Side of the Moon, arranged for the Nintendo Entertainment System (direct link to the YouTube playlist). Via MeFi.

[ related topics: Music ]