Archive for category Dumb thoughts
ABC’s of Scatman Crothers
Posted by Grg in Dumb thoughts, Grg's Reference on Tuesday, May 19, 2009
but I amused myself enough to share here too:
I’ve been tagged, and I am supposed to write a note with the ABC’s of me. I’m not feeling all touchy-feely open at the moment, so I decided to write about someone I barely remember, Benjamin Sherman “Scatman” Crothers, who would be 99 this Saturday.
If I tagged you, it’s because I want you to know more about Scatman Crothers – but not in a creepy stalker kind of way. Mostly.
A- is for Axe, you didn’t see that coming.
B – is for Benjamin, you got your start by drumming
C – is for Capone, you sang for him in Chicago
D – is for Dead, which you sorta kinda are now.
E – is for Entertaining, although your parts were often crummy
F – is for Foxx, as in Redd, who never called YOU big dummy
G – is for your cover of Ghost Riders in the Sky: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xBYAis7akKw
H – is for Hong Kong Phooey, a number one super guy
I – is for Instruments, including your unique voice
J – is Jazz the Autobot, an odd acting choice
K – is for Kick the Can, you’re only as old as you feel
L – is for Long, we heard its like a conger eel
M – is for “A Man’s Gotta Eat,” a song I never heard
N – is for Narcolepsy, a random sleepy kind of word
O – is for “One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest,” your other film with Jack
P – is for Pate, as bald as a worn out thumb tack
Q – is for Qantas, the name of an Australian airline
R – is for Random, like the word in the above line
S – is for Scat, which you were known for, but not really the best
T – is for Time, I got none, so I’m gonna scat the next
U – is for ubi, doobie dippo dee
V – is for vappa donna doo-ah debba see
W – is for Women, like that Afro-babe above your bed
X – is for Xenograph, like adding a second head
Y – is for Years gone by, as sweet as cream de cacao
Z – is for Zapped! in which you starred with Scott Baio
Man, these viral movie promotions are going too far…
Posted by Grg in Dumb thoughts, PR Guy, Rant/Rave on Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Robot attacked Swedish factory worker – The Local.
The incident took place in June 2007 at a factory in Bålsta, north of Stockholm, when the industrial worker was trying to carry out maintenance on a defective machine generally used to lift heavy rocks. Thinking he had cut off the power supply, the man approached the robot with no sense of trepidation.
But the robot suddenly came to life and grabbed a tight hold of the victim’s head. The man succeeded in defending himself but not before suffering serious injuries.
“The man was very lucky. He broke four ribs and came close to losing his life,” said Leif Johansson.
Fruitflies like the wind, time flies like a banana…
Posted by Grg in Dumb thoughts, Grg's Reference, PR Guy, Rant/Rave, Science Fandom, Science/Geek on Thursday, March 12, 2009
Another neat Eurekalert! feed story, one that offers tips for catching flies:
Caltech scientists discover mechanism for wind detection in fruit flies
Tiny, lightweight fruit flies need to know when it’s windy out so they can steady themselves and avoid being knocked off their feet or blown off course. But how do they figure out that it’s time to hunker down? According to a team led by California Institute of Technology (Caltech) scientists reporting in this week’s issue of the journal Nature, the flies have evolved a specialized population of neurons in their antennae that let them know not only when the wind is blowing, but also the direction from which it is coming.
The behavior of fruit flies in the face of a stiff breeze is remarkable in and of itself, notes David J. Anderson, the Roger W. Sperry Professor of Biology at Caltech, and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) Investigator. “We discovered that you can stop a fly dead in its tracks by blowing a gentle stream of air over it,” he explains, adding that the flies’ immobility is so complete, you could pick one up with a pair of chopsticks as long as a steady stream of wind was passing over the insect. Once the wind stops blowing, however, the flies immediately start walking around again.
Here’s a link to the video.
“…we are all vainer of our luck than of our merits…”
Posted by Grg in Dumb thoughts, Grg's Reference, Uninformed Critic on Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Still breaking in my Sony Reader. Sure it isn’t as hip as the Kindle — and doesn’t have wireless — but it does what I want it to do very well. I’m on my third Rex Stout Nero Wolfe novel in the canon, chronologically, The Rubber Band.
Stout came out on of the gate roaring with the first novel Fer-de-lance. All of the Wolfian trappings were in place: the beer, the brownstone, his schedule, Fritz, Theordore, Saul, etc. Archie did the leg work while Wolfe sat back, grumbled and occasionally “relapsed.” All these touches carried the novel through what was otherwise are fairly lame, plodding plot. It was also the longest Wolfe novel.
It lacked the quick action and gotcha moments of later Its like watching a pilot for a familiar television show. Sure, Spock’s there on the Enterprise, but who the heck is Capt. Pike? Hrmm, that’s a bad analogy. All the parts are there, but it just feels slightly off.
The League of Frightened Men was better, but suffered from having too large a cast (the titular league, obviously). League was notable for getting the pattern down — Wolfe’s in-office interrogations are always as entertaining as Goodwin’s sleuthing — and for establishing the bond between Wolfe and Goodwin. They fight like an old married couple, yet they firmly know the bounds between employer and employee. Heck, Wolfe knowingly gets in a car with an unhinged woman to save Goodwin (while Goodwin bawls his eyes out thinking his lapse in judgement sent Wolfe to his doom).
The Rubber Band has everything, right down to the exasperatingly complicated case that only Wolfe can tease out. So far, in the series, its the first perfect Wolfe novel. And there are many more.
And Louie, Louie Gets Me Hot Just Thinking about It
Posted by Grg in Dumb thoughts, General stuff, PR Guy, Science/Geek, Skeptic, Uninformed Critic on Tuesday, February 24, 2009
In an article published in the April 2009 issue of the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, researchers found that teenagers who preferred popular songs with degrading sexual references were more likely to engage in intercourse or in pre-coital activities.
Already, with the euphemisms. What are pre-coital activities? Heavy petting? Badminton?
Writing in the article, Brian A. Primack, MD, EdM, MS, Center for Research on Health Care at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, states, “This study demonstrates that, among this sample of young adolescents, high exposure to lyrics describing degrading sex in popular music was independently associated with higher levels of sexual behavior. In fact, exposure to lyrics describing degrading sex was one of the strongest associations with sexual activity…These results provide further support for the need for additional research and educational intervention in this area.”
If I had known this then, I would have taken extra care in putting together mix tapes for the girls I fancied.
Surveys were completed by 711 ninth-grade students at three large urban high schools. These participants were exposed to over 14 hours each week of lyrics describing degrading sex. About one third had previously been sexually active. Compared to those with the least exposure to lyrics describing degrading sex, those with the most exposure were more than twice as likely to have had sexual intercourse. The relationship between exposure to lyrics describing degrading sex and sexual experience held equally for both young men and women.
Similarly, among those who had not had sexual intercourse, those in the highest third of exposure to lyrics describing degrading sex were nearly twice as likely to have progressed along a noncoital sexual continuum compared to those in the lowest third. Finally, the relationships between exposure to lyrics describing non-degrading sex and sexual outcomes were not significant.
Students reported the number of hours per day that they listen to music and their favorite musical artists. Through a detailed content analysis, the percentage was calculated of each artist’s most popular songs containing lyrics describing degrading sex. An exposure score for lyrics describing degrading sex was then computed by multiplying each student’s hours of music exposure by the percentage of his or her favorite artists’ songs that contain lyrics describing degrading sex.
Oh, OK, I think I found the problem here. They surveyed “711 ninth-grade students at three large urban high schools”…now, I’m no expert on youth culture, but I think you’d be hard pressed to find a song popular among urban high schoolers that wasn’t about degrading sex. Of course kids listen to songs about sex.
When I was a kid, I’d hover over any material, in print, on video or sketched by a 17th c. Dutch Master in the often vain hopes that there would be some sort of sexual content in it. A kid would no sooner pass up a song about deviant sex than they would a Trader Joe’s Vanilla Joe-Joe (Crom, I love them). On the surface, there seems to be some correlation/causation confusion.
And that’s the danger of it. For all I know, this is probably good, legitimate science and there are factors here that just aren’t coming across in a press release. Mark my words, this press release will picked up unedited and regurgitated in news outlets across the land.
It doesn’t help to use phrases like “noncoital sexual continuum” as if that’s a normal everyday figure of speech. What does that mean? It sounds like the leading cause of blindness in teenage Borg. I’m assuming “noncoital sexual continuum” is how we round the bases in science-speak. Does that make it degrading? If so, I don’t know what’s normal.
How do you quantify degrading sexual lyrics, anyway?
“I’m sorry, son, that hip-hop song rates a 6.5 on the Ludacris scale and, well, that’s logarithmic and the logarithm is going to get you. Your mother and I don’t want that sort of thing in the house. You understand? Good, now here’s $20, go see American Pie 7 while your mother and I get our freak on…Gladys, where’s the butter and the Lil Wayne?”
Ho Ho Ho, Green Comet
Posted by Grg in Dumb thoughts, Science Fandom on Wednesday, February 4, 2009
This will guarantee that:
1) Someday, we’ll land on Mars and find, inside an elaborate Martian mansion, the bodies of dozens of little green cultists.
2) Its an elaborate marketing campaign for environmentally-friendly kitchen and bath cleanser
3) Somebody’s getting super powers.
Looking forward to the return of the New World Order
Posted by Grg in Dumb thoughts, Rant/Rave on Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Sure, the left woo (and these are imprecise terms, people) was active then…but that was when the New Age movement took hold..all about alternative healing, angels, crystals and black t-shirts covered in wolves, bears and/or Native Americans. (I liked the music, I admit. Enya. Those chanting monks. Crap with pan flutes and dolphins humping that they used to sell at World of Science. Good stuff.)
The mainstream culture embraced both in a woo-nami that tempered the worst of either side (Art Bell quickly shut up about New World Order nonsense after McVeigh) and kept the kitsch. It was, in hindsight, a golden era when we knew who the kooks were and what they thought.
What did the The Bush Era get us? Warmed-over preachy message movies and documentaries about current events. Michael Moore documentaries with the subtlety of a day-glo sledgehammer. Bill Maher monologues with the subtlety of a Michael Moore documentary. (And don’t get me started on the Bill Maher documentaries!) The right didn’t do much better, mind you. With their guy in power, it became all about Intelligent Design, bad Pelosi jokes and other low-level, completely ignorable nonsense.
Perhaps the difference was the tone and clarity of the message. The 90s conspiracy nuts frothed about the UN teaming with UFOs to take your guns and bibles. It was fun like your favorite uncle and you couldn’t take it seriously, like your favorite uncle who wears a tinfoil beanie.
The mainstream 2000s conspiracy nuts, however, froth about Big Oil, Drug Companies, Katrina, Global Warming and Dick Cheney, none of which were fun at all. The truth is, I don’t fear corporations or Dick Cheney. The woo left always whined about such things, but I need oil and I need pharmaceuticals. Katrina, in retrospect, the Federal response might not have been as horrible as we thought at the time. Global Warming concerns me, but I’m the kind of guy that sees how technology and reasoned, sane discourse will do more good than hysteria. Dick Cheney, I could do without, of course, but he shot a guy and looked like Burgess Meredith’s Penguin. If it weren’t for starting wars, the Bush Administration would have been enjoyably surreal.
In fact, the anti-Bush conspiracy nuts were notable not just for their unoriginality, but for the surprising way people who should know better latched on to the malevolent Bush conspiracy notion. Its one thing when late night talk radio twits rant about Clinton creating a third term for himself, but it is quite another when the intellectual (and celebrity) elite honestly believe that Bush was going to declare martial law if Kerry won in 2004. (I’m looking at you, Gore Vidal.) So prevalent are such beliefs, that Congressman John Olver of Massachucetts had no qualms about suggesting Bush was going to declare martial law in 2008. For some, the 2000 election was just triggered something in their brains and they were never able to accept that history tumbled along on its own sloppy path without the aid of a cabal of Neo-Conservative puppetmasters.
Then there were the 9/11 Truther films and websites. They are on a class of their own: outside the mainstream paranoia, and on a completely different level and with shading of anti-semitism. So far out there, in fact, that they can’t be loathed on a absurdly comedic level like any of the Clinton Era New World Order material still floating around the Internet. They are as every bit as religious as creationists. But with creationists, you know the boundaries of the debate. With truthers, however, there are no boundaries, anything is game for their delusions.
So, its a brand new era. Will we see a return to 90s nostalgia? (And, why not, considering who’s in power in Washington!?!) Or will the right wing wooists take on the venom of the truther crowd? Let’s hope not. So far, the best the right can do about Obama is question his birth certificate, his associations with 60s radicals and his Secret Muslim past. At least they aren’t saying he killed Vince Foster…
Philly Phat Still Trending Down
Posted by Grg in Dumb thoughts on Wednesday, January 14, 2009
Of course, Philadelphia has a long way to go. Many of the fitter cities benefit from better climates and better urban design that allows for more outdoorsey activities. Philly has the Schuylkill river trails, but not much else for bikers and runners. And, as a fair-weather bike commuter, I can say that the suburbs are even worse and less accessible for cyclists. Places like Portland, OR, benefit from generally more moderate (albeit soggier) weather than Philly, but what is more important is their acceptance of bicycles.
Sure, they don’t have hoagies and cheesesteaks to contend with, but easy accessibility to exercise matters.
Still, what surprised me was Pittsburgh’s ranking. Their weather is, in general, as bad as ours. We’re a little hotter and muggier in the summer, and they’re a little cooler in the winter. Their food, if anything, is worse. We’re talking about people who add french fries to salads and sandwiches — not as sides, but actually part of the salad or sandwich — and that’s on top of the inch of cole slaw they usually stick on stuff. While living in the burgh, my cholesterol tripled within days, thanks to the cheap availability of O Fries.
Even MORE surprising is that it is the only place in the Northeast listed.
What couldn’t giant rockets revolutionize?
Posted by Grg in Dumb thoughts, Grg's Reference, PR Guy, Rant/Rave, Science Fandom, Science/Geek on Wednesday, January 14, 2009
Giant rockets could revolutionize lots of things: ice hockey, Buddhism, my daughter’s time outs for poking her little brother…
The release does give a wonderful idea of just how big the new Ares V rocket will be. Big enough to lift 396,000 lbs into orbit. That is, as the release puts it, 16 or 17 school buses or, as I reckon, about 200 average (178 lbs) adults (naked and without life support, that is, these shouldn’t be people you actually like).
In any case, yes, this thing should be able to lift a decent-sized telescope to orbit.
Confusing things, somewhat, is NASA’s own verbiage on the topic, according to the Ares V site:
The versatile, heavy-lifting Ares V is a two-stage, vertically stacked launch vehicle. It can carry nearly 414,000 pounds (188 metric tons) to low-Earth orbit. When working together with the Ares I crew launch vehicle to launch payloads into Earth orbit, Ares V can send nearly 157,000 pounds (71 metric tons) to the moon.
What’s even more confusing is all the geekspeak for the new shuttle replacement rockets. I think I got it, though, if you’re curious…
The Constellation Program is the umbrella name for the shuttle replacement.
The Orion is the capsule where the crew (about 4-6 people) sits.
The Ares I is the smaller rocket, capable of lifting 25 tons to orbit and beyond. It looks top heavy, which is fine, but it might shake a bit too much, which isn’t.
The Ares V is the aforementioned biggun.
The Altair is the lunar lander, which will go aboard an Ares V.
The Altair IV is where Dr. Morbius and his daughter Altaira live.
Meanwhile, none of this will happen for a while. The Ares I is set to launch in 2014, I believe. The shuttle, however, stops launching next year (making it very unlikely at this point I’ll ever see a shuttle launch in person).
Taking up the slack — since astronauts still need to go up and down the well — will be the Russians in their Soyuz (people mover) and Progress (thing mover) vehicles, which sensibly sit atop Soyuz rockets. (Seriously, NASA loves naming things.)
In addition, NASA is spending about $500 million or so — the cost of an average shuttle launch — on the COTS (Commercial Orbital Transportation Services) program. COTS is, essentially, a service contract to a commercial outfit that will send their own rockets up to resupply the space station.
Two companies recently won the contract: Space X (Elon Musk’s rocket company) and Orbital Sciences Corporation (who seriously have to work on their name if they are going to compete with Space X, a name that is only cool by comparison).
Space X has the Falcon 1 (which has launched before) and Falcon 9 (which hasn’t, but will soon). There’s a Falcon 9 variant called the heavy, which can carry more stuff (but less than the Ares V) They also have a crew capsule called the Dragon, which can carry seven folks and their luggage. I take back what I said, as goofy as “Space X” is, the company knows how to name stuff.
Orbital Sciences Corporation (yawn) has the Cygnus unmanned resupply vehicle and the Taurus rocket (which hasn’t lifted yet, either) I was wrong, the Taurus rocket has lifted, a number of times. The COTS entry is the Taurus II, which has yet to go up.
.
With some luck and skill, both COTS contractors will get their acts together this year and we’ll see some fun by 2010, when Roy Scheider will finally learn what happened to the Discovery.
Anyway, that’s all the geekiness I can manage before the sun comes up.
New art project, sheet metal antennae for the wall
Posted by Grg in Dumb thoughts, Grg's Reference, Tales from Stinkbug Manor on Sunday, January 11, 2009
Anyway, with the upcoming digital conversion, I’ve been thinking a bit about the home TV setup. We’ve always had rabbit ears around Stinkbug Manor — and I only scratched my cornea once by walking into on — but this video has inspired me to try something else.
I plan to do what the guy did in the video, create my own antenna using some household items, some screws & washers and a widget from Radio Shack. I plan on hiding it all, however, behind some sort of sheet metal wall art. A nice wall squid or octopus would look much better than the rabbit ears.
I’ll start next weekend,* I need to take stuff back to Lowe’s anyway. In the meantime, I’ll think of a pattern and a way to cut everything without shearing off my own fingers. (I can’t help but think of Eric’s birthday grill leg wound…good times.)
Wish me luck.
* unless life intervenes.
UPDATE 1/18: Life’s intervening somewhat. I bought the sheetmetal and some of the parts, but I don’t think I’ll get to it today.