Mostly about my amusement
I’m no longer prone to blogging sentimentally anymore, but my mood demands it.
Today is the 9th anniversary of that horrible day. I’m at a loss to explain to my children accurately what happened that morning and convey to them how the whole world changed due to a group of madmen.
The closest I can get to explaining to my children is this.
It’s official. The MG Gouf version 2.0 is awesome.
There have been hardly any surprises and I can’t find anything that demands gluing. Tomorrow I’ll complete the back pack cables and start the arms.
I’ve started building the 1/100 MG Gouf 2.0. So far so good, once again I am trying to slim down on my Gunpla stash. I’ve only completed the first 2 parts (torso and head) but it’s a very different model than the original MG Gouf.
As I usually do, I’ll post photos once it’s done.
Science is cool and there is no getting around that. It’s also hard work but that’s how it should be. Here is a video taken from the crumbling Titanic that shows how cool it really is.
See it while you can. The Titanic is going the way of all things, which after so many years is not at all surprising.
While I don’t care for wholesale exploitation of the wreck (you know, selling trinkets for cash), this is a part of history. Hopefully something can be preserved in some form.
The other day I heard someone say “Scientists challenge and contradict God” (not an exact quote, I’m paraphrasing) and I thought to myself “What unmitigated bullsh**” (that one is a direct quote). It was in church, I heard it during the homily and I was with the kids. Not a good time to let celebrant know he’s talking nonsense. He was trying to talk about having humility and doing it badly. Forgivable, it’s not easy to speak in front of a lot of people.
I’ve never seen or read about anyone challenging God. What I have seen people challenge other people understandings. I have even seen and read about people behaving badly. It’s not the same thing. How can you challenge God anyway? I mean, didn’t these people read about Job?
People should be encouraged to challenge ideas and frameworks. It’s not disrespectful, it’s called learning.
Back in January I became the recipient of my brother Stefan’s Epson Stylus Photo R300 color printer. He no longer used it because he had a better one and the R300 inks would run. The printer was discontinued and replaced with a newer version.
So I bought inks and premium glossy photo paper. The problems he had? I just don’t see it. I’m on vacation and I’m printing up a storm. In Photoshop Elements 8 I can even print edge to edge and the results look fantastic.
I used to be an avowed HP Inkjet fantastic but Epson’s R300 has converted me.
I should consider buying stock in the Discovery Channel. Not all their shows are hits, but they sure know the formula. They continue to create entertainment that me and the kids like to watch together.
Phil Plait of Bad Astronomy fame is getting his own show. The patented Adam Savage “Oh My Gosh! ™” look when he pushes the button is great.
I hope this continues a trend; the kids get to learn and have enjoy watching. Science is fun. It’s hard work too, but that’s alright.
Wednesday August 25th the family and I went to the Statue of Liberty. The trip was planned weeks in advance and we took the Huntington Station line at 6:15 Am to get there nice and early before the crowds.
It was raining cats and dogs the whole time we were there.
I had expected to take lots of outdoor photos so I only packed my 18-200mm lens. Since it was raining, we went into the museum. For museum photos, I consistently use my Sigma 30mm f/1.4 lens with a circular polarizer attached. When I do, I get photos like these.
You can see more from that set on my Flickr page.
With the 18-200mm the results are OK but not inspiring. Here’s a sample.
This was an OK picture but the ISO got bumped up to 3200 and the photos lacked a lot of sharpness. Also without the circular polarizing filter, reflections off the glass was a pain.
With the 30mm I get a nice prime lens that opens wide. With the circular polarizer I can dial out most of the reflections off of the display cases.
Next time I’ll plan better. We still had a good time, but I want to take better photos.
No way this is real. But it would be really cool if it were.
Just the thought of it, all those bouncing bowling balls.
My Netgear WNR834B v2 has been showing it’s age and giving me grief lately. After a few hours of network usage, my Netgear would suddenly start rebooting itself and keep doing that every few minutes.
The only thing that would bring it back to life would be to pull the plug, wait a few seconds, and put the plug back in. The last firmware for my device is version 2.1.13 dated May 16th, 2oo8. This doesn’t fill me with confidence that the vendor can solve my problem. I don’t blame Netgear for that; they make money on the sale of hardware and not support.
I use a pair of these WNR834Bs to connect my second floor to my ISP in the basement. It’s strictly for bridging a gap where I am not easily able to run a wire.
So I went to the dd-wrt website and picked out the firmware using their router database tool and put in my model. This lead me to their wiki page to read some instructions, and in less than an hour of playing with settings I had dd-wrt running.
The speed difference is pronounced. It’s not just my imagination, web pages are loading more quickly than before. I don’t think that means the Netgear firmware was defective, I do think that tuning additional options in dd-wrt helped improve the situation.
This is a low cost solution to extending the life of some hardware and keeps me from running cable. So far so good and I’ll just see how it goes.
Something looks different, did Danny learn a new move?
The new additions are a great touch. Can you imagine if George Lucas had a platoon of Dance Troopers in the background while Obi-Wan and Darth Vader slugged it out?
