the Star Ship Open Sleigh

via Samurai Frog

pondering

Is there a statistical correllation between the rise of contact lens use and the lowering of test scores in schools?





Addendum:
Here's my thinking: With the rise of contact lenses, you have fewer girls (and men for that matter) "forced" into the Smart Girl role by way of their eyewear. For those of you who dont think that people can be forced into a role by a pair of glasses, consider that social behavior is a back-and-forth construct, where where the only truly independent action* is the first one upon meeting someone... maybe.


*Unless you tend to act in a manner which is independent of those around you. You know, like a street crazy.

Pretend to be a Time Traveller Day

I'm not sure if it's still on, but today, at least as of two years ago, is when Aaron Diaz, creator of the comic Dresden Codak, proclaimed it to be Pretend to Be A Time Traveller Day. There is a Facebook page about it, unupdated since then, unless I missed something. Even so, it's such a fun idea, I just couldnt resist announcing it. I mean, why not?

sunday funny

more here.

a thought

"As to examples of the common masses showing ingenuity and common sense, I suggest talking to farmers. Not Agri-business hacks, working massive enterprises barely distinguishable from Soviet-era plantations and quite happy to spoil the topsoil and squeeze thousands of pigs into tiny feedlots just to squeeze out another dollar today and to heck with tomorrow, but real dirt farmers who have immensely complicated problems to solve in a dozen different fields, starting with plant and animal biology ... and who plan to pass on a working farm to the next generation's next generation. I think you'll find the bulk of them not necessarily good at calculus but very good at making rational decisions that are good for the community."

From a discussion at Contrary Brin about the "wisdom" of the masses. Reading this, it occurred to me to wonder if the dumbing down of America is a result not of television or consumer culture so much as our increasing urbanization and industrialization. When you work a job doing basically the same thing week in and week out, you have far less need to do any long-term planning. Once upon a time most of the people in the nation were farmers, and your life and your family's lives depended on how well you planned out the year. Now few have that problem.
I mean, how smart can you hope that a nation will be when half of them are pretty much working as meat robots.

big,really big

Every once in a while, I'll look up and see the moon, and it will strike me: That's a freaking planet! I mean, it's huge, and there it is, hanging in the sky! It's something like 235,000 miles away, and yet I can still see it.

Damn.




And yes, I said planet. Technically, the moon does not orbit the Earth, but rather the Moon and the Earth orbit a common point, which just happens to be located inside our planet. Argue if you want, but I can get away with calling it such.

iPod love... or not

I have this folder in my iPod called "new stuff for testing". I use it to make sure that I listen to everything I put into iTunes at least one time. Everything gets dumped in there, and after it's been listened to it gets removed from the list next time I have the Pod hooked up to the computer.
In theory.
Unfortunately, this process breaks down in a few of spots:

1. Anytime the iPod locks up, which is way too often for my taste, it generally loses the information about what songs were played recently. It also does this when it runs out of power, sometimes.
2. Whatever my daughter has on her Shuffle*. She plugs it in daily, I plug mine in only every few days (or weeks, depending). If she's listened to one of her songs more recently than I have, it moves it up the list, ahead of the time when I know I was listening to my iPod. This is especially true of Green Day, which both she and my I-pod love.
3. Queen's "Radio Gaga". I'd swear I get rid of it, and the damned thing plays again. Why my iPod loves it, I have no idea, but it does, it really does.


* Not a problem anymore, since yesterday she dropped it while crossing the street and it got run over by a car. She's got a new one on her Christmas list, of course.

huh?

So, wait, we're fighting in Afghanistan to protect the nukes in Pakistan? Isnt that a bit like protecting Texas by sending the FBI to Oklahoma?

snow!!!

Holy cow! It snowed today! How weird is that for Dallas? Nothing stuck for long, but still...

My wife thinks it's gonna be a hard winter.

quote for the day

One of the problems with capitalism is that only the things that pay get done.

James P. Hogan in "Giants' Star"