Author: cosmo

Normandy was scarier than I thought.

Finally, I’ve been vindicated.

For at least a decade I’ve felt that the astrophysicists’ theory of “dark matter” was nothing more than a convenient math trick to explain anomalies in physical observations. Call it a kludge or whatever– it just seemed like they made up some mysterious invisible substance that made the equations balance. Just like Einstein’s Cosmological Constant– which he latter admitted was the biggest folly of his illustrious career– dark matter feels wrong.

Well, now a physicist has come out and said as much. He thinks there are alternative explanations, and we should darn well get to work figuring out where the missing mass really is.

First comment on Slashdot:

“Dark matter is the ugliest kludge to the standard model ever. It’s worse than the Plus upgrade for Windows 98.”

As someone who remembers Plus, I can only chuckle at the analogy.

Cool. A photo of a Perseid meteor taken from the International Space Station.

Instead of the usual shot of a shooting star coming toward you, it’s actually below the photographer. A rare sight indeed.

Whoever thinks it’s too late to patent things that are obvious has clearly not read Google’s latest patent. In part, it says:

Holy cow! That’s innovation!

For those who are confused or flabbergasted by such technology, Google has provided a helpful diagram showing this amazing process.

Does anyone in the room still believe the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office is doing a good job reviewing applications like this?

Nice.

Last week we were at Rocky Mountain National Park with mom and dad. The kids stopped to pose on just about every rock along the trail.

I love how Zack and especially Alex have adopted the “too cool for school” pose.

A couple of weeks ago when I was camping and rafting with Alex, I had the van (to haul the supplies for the Scouts) and that left Laralee with my car. Of course she used it to tool around town running errands and dropping off kids and all the usual mom stuff.

When I was back, I drove Kyra to the store and she commented that my driving was “so much smoother than mom’s”. Maybe Laralee’s manual transmission skills have lapsed a little bit or something.

Of course when I mentioned Kyra’s comment to her, Laralee was indignant. “I drive a stick shift just fine!” Harumph, harumph.

I’ve heard a lot of good things about so-called “stand-up desks”. There’s been a flurry of recent studies claiming that sitting all day– even if you get up and exercise– can lead to increased incidence of heart problems. I know a couple of people who have stand-up desks and they say they’re great.

Since I’m sitting most days and don’t really feel like having a heart attack any time soon, I figured it would be worth digging into a bit. But motorized desks (which adjust from a sitting to standing position) are pretty spendy, and I don’t want to leap right into this and buy a new stand-up desk without giving it a trial run.

So with a bit of engineering, I converted my trusty basement office desk into a stand-up version. It involved eight cinder blocks from Lowe’s (total cost: $14) and help from a neighbor, but my desk is now sixteen inches higher and a perfect height for standing.

Do the cinder blocks look ghetto? Absolutely. I’ll run with this for a few weeks and if it turns out that standing is as awesome as everyone says, I’ll think about getting something a little more professional. In the meantime, if my feet get tired I’ve got a barstool right behind me.

According to a poll by the New York Times, only 14% of Americans approve of the job Congress is doing.

About time. Hopefully we’ll see a huge shakeup in next year’s elections. In the meantime, I just watch my savings plummet as Congress plays chicken on the world stage.

Although I like Dell’s servers, I’m astonished at their marketing email process. They really enjoy sending automated surveys to their customers, and on more than one occasion I’ve opted out and specifically said I don’t want to receive their surveys.

So imagine my excitement when I received yet another survey message from them today. In part, the message says:

Wow.

So I’ve asked not to receive any marketing emails, and they send me a marketing email to tell me about an upcoming marketing email.

I wrote a pretty blunt letter back to the woman who sent me this message (in reality I’m sure it was an email ‘bot that sends this sort of thing). We’ll see if an actual human responds, or if I can look forward to more junk like this.

Sheesh.