The walking tour teaches visitors about ‘real hauntings’ in the historic parts of the city. Continue reading 6788 – New ghost tour is in spirit of Fort Lauderdale
Tag Archives: nifty trivia
6785
Made plans set in sand (if not stone) to go see I, Robot with Dan on Thursday… I’m going to go in, with Asimov-free bias. I just want a fun sci-fi / action movie with robots. I think Will Smith can pull that off. If I want Asimov-tight story, I’ll watch Bicentennial Man.
It surprises me how aggressive women can be to other women, watching a dynamic where the people are primarily female gives an interesting vantage. Cliques, backstabbing, and political friendships pop up much more quickly from what I’ve seen. I’ve observed this once prior, when I worked at the library, ages ago.
60 years ago today, Operation Valkyrie was attempted. (An assassination plot against Hitler via a time bomb.) I wonder how things would’ve turned out if it had succeeded?
It’s also the 35th anniversary of the moon landing… I also wonder how things might’ve turned out if that failed?
6760 – museum pix, waiting for news on my condo, misc
The condo owners are out of town… silly for them to list it and not be available until later, but, whatever. I’ll know more today, I think.
Did the guy that invented combos see a snausage, and think it would be tasty for people to have a snack like that.. or was it the other way around, benefiting dogs?
Intelligent observation overheard ages ago – “Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit; wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.”
I can’t believe that a single packet of ramen noodles is considered to be “three servings”. That’s almost as bad as the “two fig newtons per serving” rule. Who decides this stuff? Very full people who aren’t so hungry and don’t like the product?
Random ramen factoids –
- “Ramen” is the Japanese pronunciation of the Chinese characters lo mein, which means “boiled noodles.”
- Ramen was popularized in Japan by a 17th century samurai named Mito Komon. You can see Mito’s actual ramen bowl and a reproduction of his favorite meal in the Momofuku Ando Instant Ramen Museum in Osaka, Japan. The museum that attracts 1500 visitors a day–more than Japan’s national art museum.
I’m in the mood to watch the Rockford Files again.
Random Scotto Factoid: I had trouble remembering the difference between definitions for vertical and diagonal, until I learned the word vertigo. Likewise, horizontal was never a problem, because I already knew the word horizon. I learn better by association, rather than simply by rote.
6748 – 183 Days into 2004. 183 Days to go.
Lazy daydreams and nice thoughts of mi Habibti this morning. Not much for writing, so here’s some linkiedoos.
Five pounds of silly putty for $60. (plus shipping) Egg not included, but you can buy 144 glow in the dark plastic eggs for $5.
Things in the sky on this day in:
- 1900 – First zeppelin flight on Lake Constance near Friedrichshafen, Germany.
- 1937 – Amelia Earhart and navigator Fred Noonan disappear over the Pacific Ocean while attempting to make the first round-the-world flight at the equator. (Nobody ever remembers Fred.)
- 1947 – An object speculated to be a UFO crashes near Roswell, New Mexico, though the United States Air Force claims it is a weather balloon.
- 1978 – Charon, a satellite of the planet Pluto, is discovered.
- 1982 – Larry Walters uses 45 helium balloons and a lawnchair to propel himself to 16,000 feet.
- 2002 – Steve Fossett becomes the first person to fly solo around the world nonstop in a balloon.
Very groovy tunes on Smoke and Mirrors, leftyrok! Thanks for sharing them with me! the cd case’s production values are sharp, too. 🙂
Regarding this post from a couple of weeks back… The lizard I saw was a Knight Anole. Thanks for the herper info, Bart!
6742 The mysterious green flash – I’ve seen it.
For more than a century, sky observers have argued about the cause of a brilliant green flash of light that sometimes occurs for a fraction of a second just before the sun rises, or just after it sets. The flash appears only rarely, usually when the atmosphere is very clear, and only when the sun is outlined against a distant horizon, such as a mountain ridge or ocean. Jules Verne described the phenomenon in fiction, mentioning the ancient Scottish legend that attributed supernatural powers to the flash: “At its appearance all deceit and falsehood are done away, and he who has been fortunate enough to behold it is enabled to see closely into his heart and to read the thoughts of others.”
The is still some debate over the cause of the green flash, but it is almost certainly a type of refraction phenomenon. In their book, Sunsets, Twilights, and Evening Skies, Aden and Majorie Meinel of the optical Sciences Center of the University of Arizona argue convincingly that atmospheric refraction causes the image of the sun to be separated into a ring of colors, with green located slightly above the predominant red image. For a second or less, when the sun is just below the horizon, a sliver of the green band is refracted above the horizon and becomes the last bit of visible light, erupting in a silent, instantaneous flash of emerald. The flash is just as likely to occur at sunrise as sunset, although it is more difficult then to be watching the precise spot where the sun will appear.
A gallery of green flash examples… This is closest to the one I saw.
From Jules Verne’s Le Rayon Vert (The Green Ray) :
“a green which no artist could ever obtain on his palette, a green of which neither the varied tints of vegetation nor the shades of the most limpid sea could ever produce the like! If there is a green in Paradise, it cannot be but of this shade, which most surely is the true green of Hope”
Well, I know my heart, but my mind-reading powers are limited.
Had Fun in CoH with Whims and Sam yesterday… a nice break after a lousy morning at work. They did some phone work and killed the internet connection until about 11am…they finally confessed to it being an offsite problem, after I reset the router and network. Bleah. Also as a result, our line 4 was confused with another office’s in Boca… it was the main line for them, so they were none too happy… we just put it on hold after the first 12 calls came in… they got fixed by 1:30dish.
Had a nice lunch of veggie rolls at the local sushi place… VS and I got to vent a little bit over assorted work-politics that’re going on. Nothing major, just the usual gripes.
45% of documented serial killers are lefties.
Art-Instruction Books of Andrew Loomis
Your one stop source for human anatomy references for 3D and traditional artists. If you desire to learn human anatomy be sure to check “Drawing Figure for All It’s worth” By great anatomy and drawing teacher Andrew Loomis.
6742 The mysterious green flash – I've seen it.
For more than a century, sky observers have argued about the cause of a brilliant green flash of light that sometimes occurs for a fraction of a second just before the sun rises, or just after it sets. The flash appears only rarely, usually when the atmosphere is very clear, and only when the sun is outlined against a distant horizon, such as a mountain ridge or ocean. Jules Verne described the phenomenon in fiction, mentioning the ancient Scottish legend that attributed supernatural powers to the flash: “At its appearance all deceit and falsehood are done away, and he who has been fortunate enough to behold it is enabled to see closely into his heart and to read the thoughts of others.”
The is still some debate over the cause of the green flash, but it is almost certainly a type of refraction phenomenon. In their book, Sunsets, Twilights, and Evening Skies, Aden and Majorie Meinel of the optical Sciences Center of the University of Arizona argue convincingly that atmospheric refraction causes the image of the sun to be separated into a ring of colors, with green located slightly above the predominant red image. For a second or less, when the sun is just below the horizon, a sliver of the green band is refracted above the horizon and becomes the last bit of visible light, erupting in a silent, instantaneous flash of emerald. The flash is just as likely to occur at sunrise as sunset, although it is more difficult then to be watching the precise spot where the sun will appear.
A gallery of green flash examples… This is closest to the one I saw.
From Jules Verne’s Le Rayon Vert (The Green Ray) :
“a green which no artist could ever obtain on his palette, a green of which neither the varied tints of vegetation nor the shades of the most limpid sea could ever produce the like! If there is a green in Paradise, it cannot be but of this shade, which most surely is the true green of Hope”
Well, I know my heart, but my mind-reading powers are limited.
Had Fun in CoH with Whims and Sam yesterday… a nice break after a lousy morning at work. They did some phone work and killed the internet connection until about 11am…they finally confessed to it being an offsite problem, after I reset the router and network. Bleah. Also as a result, our line 4 was confused with another office’s in Boca… it was the main line for them, so they were none too happy… we just put it on hold after the first 12 calls came in… they got fixed by 1:30dish.
Had a nice lunch of veggie rolls at the local sushi place… VS and I got to vent a little bit over assorted work-politics that’re going on. Nothing major, just the usual gripes.
45% of documented serial killers are lefties.
Art-Instruction Books of Andrew Loomis
Your one stop source for human anatomy references for 3D and traditional artists. If you desire to learn human anatomy be sure to check “Drawing Figure for All It’s worth” By great anatomy and drawing teacher Andrew Loomis.
6737 – more misc
Webalizer is a lot sharper than the old stats package I used to nibble on.
It’s sort of a disappointment to me that more people seek out the melon-girl on the gallery page than newtcam, but that’s to be expected of net- pervies. Maybe I should put an evil clickthrough on that picture…or at least one that will get me a nickel each time someone looks at it.
I’m really tempted to pick this laser keyboard up, just for the uber-nerd “Science!” factor. The rechargeable batter lasts 3 to 4 hours which seems fair.
Waxy’s hosting Heat Vision and Jack. well worth the download. Get it while his bandwidth lasts! Well worth the 280ish megs.
Random memories:
When I was a kid, I had a few favorite junk foods that I couldn’t get enough of. My brother and I beat our parents home by about three hours or so, and we were always keen on a little bite to eat right after school. We were fairly well-off, but that might’ve been a result of how frugal my folks were with the grocery bill.
Steak-umms. (usually prepared with american cheese (bleah), and A-1 sauce on a hamburger bun)
Mac & cheese (with peas.) (Our house always got whatever the el cheapo 3 for $1 grocery-store brand was, with the day-glow orange powder of plague.) Always had butter, but more often than not, there was no milk in the house. I acclimated to bad mac & cheese pretty earl in life, which made being broke in college that much more acceptable.
6721 Morning-time once more
Hmm.. it looks like my email rattles around the ether for up to 45 minutes before landing locally. I wonder if there’s a way to fix that?
Upside, the new host spam-filters all those virus attachments before they get to my sorting spot, now.
Regarding the whole “what do you do with a drunken sailor” song.
As far as I understand, ‘Captain’s Daughter’ was a tool of discipline, usually either a lash or something similar. to “kiss the captain’s daughter” (for light shipboard transgressions) was a light beating, while “put to bed with the captain’s daughter” would be a beating until the sailor passed out from the pain.
(Related, if you’re kissing the gunner’s daughter, it means that you’re being bent over the cannon for a flogging.)
Other misc – A Cat O’ nine tails had nine lashes because superstition had it that a flogging by a trinity of trinities would be more sacred. The whip consisted of a handle made of rope about 3 1/2 inches thick in circumference & about 18 inches in length. At the end are fastened 9 tails made of log line with at least 3 knots on each tail. “Flogged around the fleet”, a man was lashed in a long boat & rowed to each ship in the harbor where he’d receive 6 lashes per ship as all hands witnessed. The cat was aways put in a red bag to disguise the bloodstains… also giving new meaning of worry when “the cat’s out of the bag”
Also, the term “poop deck” makes me laugh.
“Arr, Where be the Cap’n?” “He’s right there, on the poop!”
I wonder what Danger Turtle is up to these days?
Entry #6145 Nice weather, pesky people, squids, space, sea and starburst fruit chews.
Beautiful Morning today… cool, not humid at all, and just about the perfect temperature.
Rhode Island was in a mood… I suspect that she has either too much or not enough on her plate. She’s got micromanagement all over Newbie. Kahuna is out of town for at least the next two days, so we’ll see how that goes.
An organized online aquarium, in 2D and 3D.
“The discovery that they seem to be turning on each other at such a pivotal point in the species’ existence could be unsettling to squid lovers all over the world.”
The violent perils of biomass domination are let loose, exaggerates some journalist, as giant squid cannibalism shadows an inky doom for squidkind. On an octopod message board, however, the quoted scientist despairs.
What’s Really Visible from Space
There is a longstanding myth that the Great Wall of China is the only manmade object visible from space. It and several variations on the theme are great fodder for water cooler arguments. In reality, many human constructs can be seen from Earth orbit.
Continue reading Entry #6145 Nice weather, pesky people, squids, space, sea and starburst fruit chews.
Entry #6144 amazing land art, misc linkies and thoughts.
Earth as Art – For over 20 years the artist Stan Herd has worked the earth using indigenous materials to produce evocative and mystical works. From 160 acre plowed portraits to one quarter acre intimate stone designs, his work has become a platform for discussion of mankind’s contemporary relationship to the land.
Amazing. I’m astounded by the scape of this.. pardon the pun. Just, Wow.
To those that say a vegetarian can’t enjoy Oktoberfest food without eating sausage…. Pretzels and Kraut and Beer!
Carl posted a nice follow-up to the entry I posted about MOND a few weeks back. He’s also got a nifty interactive Crystal drawing program on his homepage.
Note to all Vampires. Don’t run out of turns near the train station. I got slurp-blasted and robbed big time. I had half a mind to turn the entire block, out of spite.
Weblogging Stats. I was surprised at how many were abandoned outright.
Going to get wet the end of this week! I look forward to the coming thunderstorms. I’m really digging putting hover-titles on my linkies now.
Classic D&D Monster: The Bulette or more commonly called, Land Shark (No Relation to Chevy Chase.) My first introduction to large, tunneling monsters, later mimicked by Tremors. (Though Star Trek’s Horta predates D&D, and Herbert’s Sand Worms are ahead of that.) I’ve always pronounced it “BULL-et” but apparently it’s pronounced “BOO-lay”. Sort of a sissy moniker for such a supposedly nasty critter.
Bulettes have this neat defensive adaptation where, when they are enraged, their dorsal fin sticks straight up and exposes their only vulnerable spot. Of course, this is only a slight weakness. It’s vulnerable in the sense that it’s softer than the rest… It’s not a soft, pulpy squish insta-kill Smaug-zone or anything.
Also, getting close enough to stab this upper back weak spot with your sword is pretty difficult, because apparently a bulette can Leap into the air and hit with all four legs at once.. *That’s* something I’d like to see. I sort of envision a Gamera spinning-turtle attack…though a leap into the air with all four legs impacting on something as a uniform punch is possible, too, I guess. This is the sort of creature I’d like to see exist in the lost jungles somewhere, and be discovered in my lifetime.
factoids / semagic jumps to 1.3.6.0U (after I just got 1.3.3.2 last night) / doing the wash
A new world record has been set by Jim Hager, 47, of Oakland, California. Jim ate 115 M & M Candies, using chopsticks, in 3 minutes. (that’s pretty impressive.. but still seems beatable. I wonder how far the bowl has to be from your mouth?)
Marcelo Torres, 22, was riding the Big Thunder Mountain Railroad when the roller coaster derailed inside a tunnel as it was climbing a steep grade. An “unknown, blunt object” caused “blunt force trauma” to his chest and fractured his ribs, leading to laceration of his lungs. Marcelo bled to death before help could arrive. Ten other passengers were injured.
The animal most often hallucinated by someone experiencing drug withdrawal (including alcohol) is a black or gray dog.
Dendrophilia is sex with trees.
Bees are more likely to sting on windy days.
The newest semagic client allows you to download your journal to disk and search it, comfortably. I just finished dumping all 6100+ entries and (comment grabs are currently disabled) to my hard drive. That’ll teach me to download the prior update the night before. They’re going to use a built-in spell checker rather than word’s soon, too.
D&D monster of the moment… in perhaps more in honor of Blackie than of Newt’s Birthday, a Displacer beast. Newt’s more of an anti-displacer beast, considering that he’s generally when I look for him, and easily petted. He does attack well with his teeth and front strikers, though for no appreciable damage.
The displacer beast is a savage and stealthy carnivore that resembles a puma with six legs, glowing green eyes, and two muscular tentacles growing from its shoulders.
A displacer beast has luxurious, blue-black fur and a long, feline body and head. It is the size of a Bengal tiger, about 10 feet long and weighing about 500 pounds. The tentacles end in pads equipped with horny ridges.
Displacer beasts favor small game but will eat anything they can catch. They regard all other creatures as prey and tend to attack anything they meet. They have a deep-seated hatred for blink dogs, and the two attack each other ruthlessly when their paths cross.
Displacer beasts rake opponents with their tentacles and bite foes that get close.
Displacement (Su): A light-bending glamour continually surrounds a displacer beast, making it difficult to surmise the creature’s true location. Any melee or ranged attack directed at it has a 50% miss chance unless the attacker can locate the beast by some means other than site. A true seeing affect allows the user to see the beast’s position, but see invisibility has no effect.
Ok. Off to do my laundry. Until later, dear journal.
Real-time Newtcam running again for a bit.
Just added a fun little image to my userinfo and the toybox
Random Teen Titans Factoid – in one of their incarnations, they had their headquarters in the basement of a Long Island disco.
Ok.. went to the Doc this morning, and he’s approved my going to a neurologist to see if there are any other alternatives to surgery. I’m doing reasonably well, so I’ve got high hopes and reasonable expectations. The insurance company has been hassling me doctor terribly, to the point of him mentioning, “I know it’s not your fault, but they’ve disrupted the whole office with incessant requests and pointless forms.” Apparently, they’re under the doctor has orders now to put stuff in a file (I imagine circular) and just contend directly a maximum 2 times a week, and ignore the rest.
I wonder how things with my brother went at the courthouse today… I hope everything got sewn up with a minimum of fuss.
While I wait for 11 to roll along…
Digital Librarian: a librarian’s choice of the best of the Web – Mucho Scotto-used linkage.
Cincinnati’s Abandoned Subway System
I am a sucker for abandoned places, especially tunnels. The adventure possibilities are endless. Morlocks. Gene Hackman – Luthor’s lair from the first Superman movie. The Beauty & the Beast TV series. Grant Morrison’s Invisibles.
Giant lizard terrorizes Beirut
He’s big, he’s a carnivore, he’s terrorizing the neighborhood’s residents, he’s been swimming in people’s pools and he’s already claimed victims – several cats, a dog and apparently even a horse. Continue reading
Looking into A Child is Missing. It looks like they do really good work, helping the police during the first few hours of the disappearance of a child / elderly / disabled person. They’re funded by donations and government grants. The home base is only about 2 miles from my apartment, too.
Sakes… what a little celebrity gossip-mongering list this is. Newest stuff in blue…Like all gossip, I’m sure it’s best taken with a grain of salt. Maybe a whole salt lick. (Orson Welles possibly the Black Dahlia Murderer?)
Omniglot: A Guide to Writing Systems -For fun stuff, see the alternative writing systems, including alphabets from Fantasy and Science Fiction. See your name in assorted systems.
Metacritic is a ratings accumulator not unlike Rotten Tomatoes (except that it covers music as well as film, videro/dvd, and games). Gigli is currently at 19, and falling, or “Overwhemiing Dislike and/or Disgust.” (0-19 is the lowest possible score range, out of 100) Right now, Rotten Tomatoes has Gigli at an average rating of 2.6/10, with only one positive review out of the 59 accrued so far. A decent movie is considered 60% or better… the current list is 2%.
*60 activates call block. I’d been getting annoyance calls from a “disconnected number”, so I did the smart thing, and added that number to my block list. Simple, elegant solution. Speaking of calls, I spoke with my doctor’s office, and had to phone up workman’s comp in order to schedule my MRI and get my leg brace… waiting for a call back. They’re supposed to recall by end of day today.
Oddly, I got another call after activating it.
My new phone came today… much nicer than the $6 phone I was using as a temp. That will be relegated to the tech-box in case of emergencies. My only complaint is that the new phone takes 3 C batteries… and my charger seems to only handle AA and AAA as well as 9v clips. I will concern myself with it more as the batteries grow weak.
This is my kind of “running of the bulls”. Thanks, sweetalyssm! I think the horns were attached a la Steve Martin’s Arrow through the head method. See also Ralph’s screen test.
For Ray, who was right… Batroc is indeed a Frenchman, not Belgian.