Still missing out?

Hey, it's me again, here to tell you about what you've missed if you're still getting my old blog feed through Blogger.

You've missed me talking about my exploits in driving. Also, of course you're missing out on the weekly features, The week in Walks, along with This Was The Week That Was. There have been some excellent links posted in there the last few weeks.

If you need help with getting over to my new site (which I doubt, y'all are very smart ;)), drop me an email; the link is to the right; otherwise, y'all keep good. ;)

A new addiction

This is what you get when you start browsing random Flickr streams - I was browsing a stream (from, apparently, the founder of del.icio.us - he had some screenshots of when they first started). I did some more surfing and found this picture of a program called "Within a Deep Forest."

I'd not heard of it and kind of assumed that it'd be one of those try to buy games, but as it turns out, it's a piece of freeware! :)

It's a puzzle game where you are playing the role of a bouncy ball and have to clear a bunch of stages. It's a very good game, and one that really makes you think (well, at least until you find someone on youtube who posted a video walkthrough of the game ;))

Although it is very addictive, if you know what you're doing or have found the videos, it does go by very quickly. If you're up for a challenge, it's a very small program that leaves no junk on your system, so feel free to delete it when you're done with it. :)

(Oh, did I mention that there's a program included called Secret Levels.exe? I haven't seen that yet, but I'm sure it's a good deal.)

Friday This-and-That

First off, yes, I am posting this after 4pm - it's been a bit of a busy day these last couple of days, so I haven't had a whole bunch of time on the computer. ;)

We got a lot of random housework done (including putting all the VHS tapes into two shelves of a bookshelf, two deep), and over the weekend we should be getting a bit more done.

One of the projects that we're working on is cutting a, well, bush which has turned into more of a sprawling tree back down to its size. Just as a gauge of how bad the tree is entangled in itself, I cut a branch that goes over my head apart. However, it didn't fall, in fact it didn't move at all. However, the next branch that gets cut will loosen both branches.

I've already run once to clear a falling branch, I can do it again. I hope. ;)

I've talked about the fact that I live by the railroad, and that there is a box right here. In the last few days, they've been doing some work on the box apparently. The other day, I heard a train go through and the box announced the temperature as minus 42. Now, a crew truck has shown up in the same place that it had back in July and they're doing some repairs to the box.

I say repairs because as there is a train going over the sensor, it put out an alert only seconds after the engines crossed over it. I think the fella manually turned it off to keep everyone from hearing the beeping for the duration of the train. ;)

I'm heading out to walk now, since the train has a caboose on the end of it!

You Wanted to See It

A long time ago, I had mentioned someone looking for a video of a truck using an escape ramp. That request was echoed by Radioactive Jam. As it so happened, I flipped on the National Geographic Channel today, and they had a show on about the science behind runaway vehicles.

The first segment mentioned the well-known (at least if you've watched those John Bunnell police chase shows) PIT maneuver - which usually ends a police pursuit. The case they mentioned featured someone from the Washington State Patrol PITting someone, but since he didn't have access to the local PD's frequencies, he couldn't coordinate with them on how to sort out the chase. So the bad guy got away. I'm just curious why they didn't have the local channels available to them - here, the State Patrol is heard frequently on local Police and Sheriff frequencies. I guess it's different in Washington.

Anyway, the last segment of the show featured the Runaway Truck ramps, and their science. They also featured a truckie who was forced into using a runaway truck ramp, and she says straight out that if it weren't for the ramp, she would have rolled the truck down a mountain.

All in all, it's an interesting video to watch. I think that's why National Geographic is one of my favorite channels on cable. ;)

Fun with Google Hot Trends

One of the lesser known features of Google's vast empire is based on one of their most popular productions - Google Hot Trends - basically a continuously-updated version of Zeitgeist. You're given the 100 most popular searches overall for the day, so let's have a look at some of them. :)

#8, 86, 90 - nightly.msnbc.com, www.nightly.msnbc.com, nbc nightly news.
Why are you searching Google for a website address you hear on TV? I think a lot of that has to do with people are now using their Google Toolbars (this would mostly be IE users probably) as a de-facto address bar. Save yourself a click, folks. Use the address bar. :) Also, if you don't know where the NBC Nightly News website is....I'll reserve judgement. ;)

#12, 13, 21, 26, 28, 29, 31, 32, 35, 72, 75, 76, 78, 87, 93, 98 - hurricane Flossie, KITV, KGMB, Hawaii Hurricane, Hawaii weather, KHNL, hawaii news, KHON, Hilo webcam, KGMB News, Hawaii Channel, Maui Weather, Central Pacific Hurricane Center, Hawaii earthquake, Honolulu Advertiser, Hurricane Watch.
This is definitely the power of a major weather situation. Hurricane Flossie is spinning near the Hawaiian archipelago, but isn't expected to make a direct impact. The most recent Hurricane to impact the state was Hurricane Dora, but most people remember Hurricane Iniki (#81 yesterday) more - that was only a couple of weeks after Andrew devastated South Florida in 1992. However, hurricanes are unpredictable, though I will venture to guess that folks there know what to do.

In other news, there was the passing of legendary Yankee Phil Rizzuto and the Duct tape bandit will be brought to justice. Apparently there will be a new season of Flavor of Love - apparently Flava can't find the right woman? Then again, "New York" can't find the right man since there's an I love New York 2 planned...vh1 makes money, therefore you can't find love, I guess... At least it's not the case of another wrestler dying, which, while very sad, is becoming way too frequent now. Maybe Yogi Berra has some advice for them? Ok, that went too far. I'll just stick to watching "Dirty Jobs" from Vomit Island...

Sacré Bleu

I have French heritage and it took a phone book to tell me. Well, not exactly; it turns out that it was someone from out of town who put the information together. You'd think that if they, as they claim "work with every prominent member of the business community in the towns where we publish", they might have tried asking some basic questions. For example -

* Is Baruch a French name?
* What's the bigger event? A three-day picnic that raises funds for the local fire department or a celebration of an instrument played by a small group of people?
* Is there an ice rink available for use in winter?

Probably the most unusual thing is that, due to the nature of the two towns covered in this book being so closely linked (they share a school district, and maybe some community services offered through the schools), the people who put together the book labeled it "Town A/Town B 2007". Of course, logic would dictate that you might change some of your templates to reflect the fact that you're talking about two independent communities. Well, that didn't happen, so you have lines like this -

In the style of hometown telephone books from an earlier era, our A/B Directory contains large type type and the names and numbers of your friends and neighbors in A/B. ... If you look through the huge regional yellow pages, you'll notice that there are not many A/B businesses listed as advertisers ... they have little need to advertise to families 45 minutes away.

Well, there is a bit of truth there - the book does have larger print than other phone books, yet is no thicker than the white pages that cover these same communities that is distributed by the local phone company. It's also true that there aren't many businesses in my town that advertise in the über-regional yellow pages which covers all or part of 11 counties in the region. However, they are in the two phone books which cover our county, along with the two phone books which cover the same two towns.

The last minor error they made was that they decided to move a highway about 70 miles to the south, but aside from cutting some roads off on the map, they didn't make too many mistakes. The good news is that they managed to figure out the right cable and telephone companies for the area.

Some strange identification there...

In the paper I found this headline -

Ultralight crash survivors identified

Uh, wouldn't you name the survivors? By saying identify, you're implying that there's other evidence than asking the people their names which led to their identity.

Le Mans update - I didn't make it the whole 24 hours. I wound up sleeping from about 4:30 until 7:30. I watched the finish and then we went out and did some shopping, one part involved me buying an espresso from the local coffeehouse, and it was very bitter. I tried putting some sugar in it, but that did no good at all, and they didn't have any regular milk available to put in. Just hazelnut-flavored creamer... I'll stick to my own coffeepot or other kinds of coffee from now on I think.

So that's how they do it....

It seems that once you have someone or something figured out, another little curve ball gets tossed/bowled/etc. at you.

In this case, a writer in the Sydney Morning Herald's "Stay in touch" blog wrote this interesting description of how TV ratings are calculated Down Under. Here's a little taste -

At 2am each day, all Diary recordings over the past 24 hours are sent to the central Taminondas computer, from which the ratings figures are calculated and sent to TV networks at 8am.

I managed to get that far believing everything that was written. Of course, it was around that point that I started to see the comments correcting this "history" of Aussie TV Ratings. If you want the straight dope, read up over here.

In other news, I've gone and done something quite stupid - allowed myself to get sunburnt. I am aware of the risks of this, and I'm happy to report that I do have some sunscreen, and I also have an umbrella that I can use while outside. I also have the advantage that there is partial shade where I go outside; at least until about 10 am.

What a waste

One of the things about living in a more rural area is that at times people will just toss junk out of their cars and into the ditches alongside the road. Usually, it's an empty fast food bag or cup. Sometimes you'll see an aluminum can or soda bottle in there.

However, this one takes the cake. While I was out mowing the lawn, I spotted a largeish object in the grass, and went over to investigate. Note that these pictures are a re-enactment of the original scene.



At first glance, it appears to be a bottle of booze. And you'd be right with that guess. It is a bottle of Kessler Whiskey, as witnessed by this, what almost could be termed, marketing quality shot. If only it had a proper label and a full bottle.



There was one part of the bottle that was still intact however. It turns out that the little bit about the history of the product was still there, and here it is for you all to enjoy:



The only question I have for the person who threw it out of their car is why? My suspicion is that it was someone who was underage and didn't want their parents finding out about their experimentation with the bottle. It might also be someone who drank three quarter of the bottle and decided that the taste wasn't for them. Ah well, it will remain one of nature's mysteries. All I know is that the only place that it's fit for now is the trash can.