Tornado

In Minnesota, we've often had these, some quite destructive.

What is interesting about this video is the fact that at first, the funnel at the ground is almost invisible, because has just started to pick up debris (the road's gravel and some soil).

I wonder why or what conditions could have spawned the cyclonic action without pulling down the clouds type water vapor we often see in these.




Courtsey of jimreedphoto.com

Urban Word of the Day

from Brian Catt in the UK

meanderthal

People who wander around aimlessly and always seem to get in your way in stores and supermarkets, chatting on their cell phones and paying no attention to their surroundings.

I would have been here ten minutes earlier if I hadn't been stuck behind that meanderthal.

Klein Bottles

Remember this from college topology?

Link to a firm that will sell you one.

Interesting instructions are included for filling and drying out the bottles, which include drying in a medium oven, microwaving, rinsing with alcohol (since it evaporates faster), using an aquarium pump and hose, and my personal favorite: expose the water, but not the glass, to a beam of pure antimatter.

Reproduced here is the frightening instructions to clean inside, or is that outside?

I suggest swishing around a small amount of Windex or alcohol. Use Vodka for a Klein Stein. For tough marks on the "inside" (which, of course, is the same as the "outside"), use a pair of small flat rare-earth magnets, each wrapped with soft velcro or cotton, and wet with Windex.

Keeping one magnet on the "outside" (which, of course is the same as the "inside") and one on the "inside" (which, of course is the same as the "outside"), you can scrub both sides of the glass at once. Since both sides are really the same side, so you're really scrubbing two sections of the same side -- a nice labor-saving method that also works on Moebius Loop Conveyor Belts.

Block Party

Concord Transcript article -
Neighbors scoop up fun and friendships - Concord woman's essays wins her a neighborhood ice cream party from Dreyer's

Julia was pictured in the print version of this article today.

The reporter for the CT was Kellie Applen ( kapplen@cctimes.com ).

Final Update to my Planets article now available

I previously wrote about this here

Go to link to download your copy. This can be used, subject to, the Creative Commons 2.5 license. So feel free to pass it on, or setup your own planetary system on your local football field.

Death and Taxes

Freelance designer Jess Bachman has created an ingenious interactive chart (Death and Taxes) that graphically shows how the government's descretionary spending is being portioned out.

This is largely your federal income tax (since SSI and Medicare, etc., are coming from other tax sources) behind this spending.

In this interactive form, the data is much easier to grasp than in those boring tables.

Planets Article

I'm writing an article on the planets (what-- you think Pluto is getting all the action?)

Draft 1 of which, is available here

I'll post updated drafts at the above link as I get this corrected.

***Update*** - related to the topic, Mike Yamamoto at CNET posted a link to the Cassini mission photographs showing a picture of the Earth taken from the Saturn neighborhood.

Brain Donors - Marx Brother's film clip

From You-Tube, this clip has the first "truely portable computer"

Thanks to http://Dvorak.org/blog for finding this gem

Scientists challenge Pluto's demotion

Well, evidently some scientists are objecting to the recent decision

courtesy of Reuters

X-TEL

DragonConTV (DCTV):
X-TEL Posted in Videos, iPod (mp4), DiVX at 01:00 PM Sept 5 by Brian (fearless leader) Richardson [0:27m]
X-TEL (iPod/Quicktime)
X-TEL (DiVX)

Fell off my chair...

Hope the lawyers from Verizon Wireless and Sprint leave this alone, it's priceless

Top 10 most beautiful cellphones

Fosfor Gadgets

Don't you just love it?

(don't complain to me, this is about design, not functionality)

Historic Sanborn feed mill closes its doors

Redwood Falls Gazette

Historic Sanborn feed mill closes its doors - a little sad, I too, remember this mill as a kid.

Darth Vader

I guess he didn't like the answer

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5blbv4WFriM&eurl=#

A Low-Water Mark for Broadcast TV Viewing

A Low-Water Mark for Broadcast TV Viewing
there is nothing, absolutely nothing, on TV.

Former governor's "power" lives on

ContraCostaTimes.com

We are having record heat out here and the only thing that is keeping the brown-outs and power outages from being a problem are the long term power contracts that Governor Davis signed and took so much "heat" over that he lost the election to Arnold.

Audio Books delivered automatically - Podiobooks.com

This is a terrific post. You can look at the books I'm currently into on the sidebar to the right (and about 4 pgdn's down) ------>>

security on the internet

This guy (Steve Gibson) is a pretty prominent person in internet security. I listened to this "episode" and was quite startled by the size of this problem. The advise given at the end is good.

Internet Weaponry Episode #47

Leo and I trace the history and rapid growth of Internet Denial of Service (DoS) attack techniques, tools, and motivations over the past eight years. We discuss many different types of attacks while focusing upon the distributed bandwidth flooding attacks that are the most destructive and difficult to block.

From this website
http://www.grc.com/securityNow.htm
http://media.grc.com/sn/SN-047.mp3 - a 30mb audio file you can play on your computer
http://media.grc.com/sn/SN-047-lq.mp3 a smaller audio file (8 mb) a little less quality
http://www.grc.com/sn/SN-047.htm the written transcript of the audio, in case you'd rather read than listen

Automatic door

Gizmodo Japan: Auto door

maybe not what you would think, right out of a science fiction movie, but this may be useful.

This Fukuda’s Automatic Door , opening to fit the person or object's shape coming through.

Its motion-detecting portal saves energy by keeping a door from having to open and close all the way, which helps to maintain a stable temperature in a room, and can prevent dirt or other materials from entering.

check out this video of the prototype (Real Audio Video stream)

FierceWiFi - Israel

Wifi, WiMAX and wireless broadband news in FierceWiFi

Their announcement of the winners of this year's annual Fierce 15, a list of the hottest, "fiercest" companies in the WiFi world for 2006.

4 of the 15 are in Israel, 5 are in Europe, only 4 are in the U.S.

Driving Drunk

Today, while taking a little trip to Half Moon Bay to see friends, we happened to get behind some guy in a Mazda sort of SUV. After a minute it became evident that he was drunk. He was weaving back and for in the lane and after another minute, Eunice and I decided we needed to call the police. E-911 on a cell is no picnic, and after about 5 minutes of on hold and press 1 for English, well a lot had happened. He decided the stop and go traffic on Hwy 92 wasn't going fast enough for him, so he passed about 5 cars by going into the opposing traffic lane. By the time he actually was staring at some opposing traffic, he swerved back into the stop and go lane, screeching tires all the way to fit into a spot behind some poor dude. Rear ending him in the process and just about putting his own SUV into the ditch. The guy that got hit was ok, but had a good scrape on his bumper. The drunk dude, takes off again, this time, passing about 4-5 more cars, and by then he's out of sight. CHP, when they finally came on the line, said avoid the guy if you can, and of course, we explained the situation fully and gave what particulars we had. We never saw him again, nor any other accidents. Say a prayer, hopefully he didn't meet up with anyone else. The lesson here is obvious, jeez, Don't Drive Drunk (period).