There’s more when you click the link.

We can allow reality stars only as far as dance-monkey-dance, but once that monkey decides to write a book about a “fictional monkey” dancing, and then sell it to us with ridiculous, pop-star stipulations, it’s time to replace the fucking monkey.

—Is this the Hill you want to die on?

Navigation Pet Peeve: Solved!   (geekin)

I had a good experience today with the Google Maps mobile app; one of those moments where technology did exactly what I wanted it to do. It makes me think that the developers actually use it themselves and care about making it work for all the different ways people want to use it.

But first, my navigation pet peeve. The most frequent way I want to use a navigation device is to get around a traffic jam. I already know how to get where I'm going, but there is traffic in the way and the goal becomes to take a less efficient route.

Old photos turned into underwater cities.

Where does that computer/tv/cell phone go when you throw it out? Old and busted, China; new hotness, Ghana. Heirloom design helps everyone.

Terminator technology was originally developed as a taxpayer-funded USDA joint project for genetically engineered seeds to kill their own embryos with the stated goal of preventing 1.4 billion peasant farmers from saving the seeds their families depend on for food.

—Seed Saver’s Exchange, Svalgard, and the USDA

Frey observed two factors in how microwaves at low power could affect living systems. First, there was the carrier wave: a frequency of 1,900 megahertz, for example, the same frequency of many cell phones today. Then there was the data placed on the carrier wave—in the case of cell phones, this would be the sounds, words, and pictures that travel along it. When you add information to a carrier wave, it embeds a second signal—a second frequency—within the carrier wave. This is known as modulation. A carrier wave can support any number of modulations, even those that match the ­extra-low frequencies at which the brain operates (between eight and twenty hertz). It was modulation, Frey discovered, that induced the widest variety of biological effects. But how this happened, on a neuronal level, he didn’t yet understand.

In a study published in 1975 in the Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, Frey reported that microwaves pulsed at certain modulations could induce “leakage” in the barrier between the circulatory system and the brain. Breaching the blood-brain barrier is a serious matter: It means the brain’s environment, which needs to be extremely stable for nerve cells to function properly, can be perturbed in all kinds of dangerous ways. Frey’s method was rather simple: He injected a fluorescent dye into the circulatory system of white rats, then swept the ­microwave frequencies across their bodies. In a matter of minutes, the dye had leached into the confines of the rats’ brains.

Caffeine buzz map.

LaBoeuf projects a pathetic, wall-eyed dorkhood, when he’s not babbling like a tumor removed from Woody Allen’s prostate that somehow achieved sentience.

taco with a butt   (pic(s))

wait for it...

thanks somethingawful!

fema comic + goons = trippy   (pic(s))

my other favorite (2Mb image!)

website mashup   (geekin)

I haven't been updating this site regularly, but I have been using a blogging service called Tumblr for a while now. It's pretty minimalist, but definitely less micro than Twitter, in that it allows you to post other media types (images, video, audio) in addition to just text.

The only super easy way to get your Tumblr feed onto an existing domain (without using the APIs and writing actual code) is to point your whole domain at your Tumblr page. That's not what I wanted at all, but I've been too lazy to spend the time integrating.

However, over the last few evenings, I've done just that, and what you see on this site is (as of */10) posts from those two sites, mashed together. Enjoy!

Nerdigras   (random re me)

Nerdy holidays abound in March! The newly-christened Nerdigras being the 10-day period starting with The Square Root of Christmas (12/25=1225=35^2=3/5) and ending with Pi Day (3/14). Pan-Galactic Gargle Blasters all around!

"Family" Reunion 2008   (random re me)

Family reunions are fun, sometimes. You don't get to pick your family... or do you? This year, the 3rd Annual Family Reunion will be going on in beautiful Boulder, Colorado. Probably Denver, too. Details. It's not technically family. It's a group of high school and college friends who like keeping good friends once they have them.

The weekend of September 27th is when it all goes down. There's an Oktoberfest going on in Denver, David Allen Coe is playing at The Fox, Kevin is having a birthday, and we'll probably go to some museum or something.

Love it.

new pics!   (pic(s))

I've been taking pictures and posting them and not saying anything about it. Some of the more recent ones are Roller Skating 80s Party and OSCON 08. Whee!

new pictures!   (pic(s))

Posted some new pictures finally, from closing day at Vail. Whee!

how many?   (personality test)

waterboarding. really? really?!   (opinion)

I know I'm a little late on this. But honestly, who cares? This is important. Let's follow the link trail. Even if you followed the issue but haven't seen these particular things, take a second.

It started with Mark Morford's column titled "Outrage Fatigue?". From there, we find ourselves watching Keith Olbermann talk about waterboarding in general, as well as its wider implications (transcript). This was the "holy shit" moment for me. I've heard the word waterboarding tossed around, and I kinda assumed it was a synonym for Chinese Water Torture, but when you watch the video and see the demonstration and listen to the description of it by someone who underwent it... that fired me up in a way I don't often get.