Data fusion

I was reading yesterday and two facts came together in my head.

First, from "A Day Without Seapower and Projection Forces":
almost 90% of the world's population lives within 500 miles of the ocean

and

from an aviation week article about future technologies:
with hypersonic vehicles we can hit targets 500 nm away in less than 8 minutes

I am going to assume the Navy guy was talking about 500nm, so that means, almost 90% of the world's population would be at risk of attack in under 8 minutes if we have hypersonic vehicles.

How not to make grilled cheese

I'd just like to let the world know that you *can* make a grilled cheese sandwich in the toaster, although I don't recommend it.

I took a piece of cheese and put it between two slices of bread. I then smashed the whole thing to one slice of bread thickness. Went around the edges smashing a bit more. Then two cycles on "not crazy dark" in the toaster.

Its ... meh. Spend the time to do it right, who cares if you make a pan dirty. (I had just finished a weekend full of dishes, so I was looking for something quick.)

I was lucky that the cheese did not drip out, I think they sell sleeves for the sandwich to make cheese sandwiches in the toaster.

Thesis baby (inlaws: no, not a real baby... )

me: "Man, I have gotten fat"
*me grabs belly and pats it
her: "Well... we will just call it... your thesis baby"

1 attoparsec per microfortnight

I feel like my dissertation work is moving at one attoparsec per microfortnight.

gah.

In other news, I maimed a butterfly by accident yesterday. I was driving back from the store and saw this butterfly in my path. I braked and swerved and braced for impact. Sometimes, small insects can just be pushed around without actually hitting the car, but it was not meant to be for this butterfly. I couldn't see the impact, so I thought he was safe. He was not. When I stopped at a light, a dazed butterfly tried to fly away from the front of my car, but fell to the ground and kept trying to fly. I was hoping I missed him, but nope.

my monitor is dying

I bought a crt monitor in 2002, and its been moved at least 7 times (5 of those include a cross country shipping.

Lately, its been acting up, it loses one color so that the screen has a red tint to it.

I'm sort of resolved to see this one to its end, and if I wait, it always goes back to working. While its missing a color, I tend to keep doing what I was doing as I mostly need to read text and type.

I was reading some news this morning though, and they had an article about the North Koreans and getting back into talks. There was a picture of Hilary Clinton, and she was looking much more youthful than normal. I figured it was due to the color change on my monitor, so I googled "bill clinton color blind".

Turns out he is color blind.

Tech transfers from military R&D

I used to have a friend that would always tell me that NASA and the DoD were useless. Part of the argument involved the R&D that each group did. I would counter that sometimes we got really cool things from them (microwaves anyone?).

Anyway, I didn't normally have too many 'recent' advances that were useful, but while reading some magazines a few months ago I ran into some cool things.

First one was a neat non-stick coating for pans that came from aircraft coatings. (it can also be used for prosthetics). Quasicrystalline Aircraft Coating Shows Promise for Cookware, Prosthetics
The tech actually came from the missile defense program. They actually don't have the time/money to develop it further, but I would love to see that on pans, teflon sucks (we have a pan that is only about 3 years old? and the teflon is useless (well, and i *might* have used the wrong sponge on it and removed the coating. or cooked with acids, or something)).

Second one is some radar technology being used to help cure breast cancer. Algorithms designed for radars are being applied to microwaves used for cancer destruction. Radar Technology Finds New Target. The algorithms null out the heating outside of the tumor so that good tissue is not destroyed. They are moving forward with this tech, and doing clinical trials.

Back to swimming

I hurt my achilles tendon(s?) sometime at the end of apr/early may. It hasn't been getting better, so I decided to stop standing (I had switched to a standing desk) and stop running.

Still had to do something, so I did biking and swimming.

It was really awesome getting back into the pool. The first day I went the 50mx25m pool was setup as a 50m pool, which is great. Water was cold and I did 1km.

I need to find a way to keep on swimming, maybe do two 30 min-ish workouts some days.

side note: I bought running shoes :( . Apparently it gets "hot" in July (making the road hot), and I am not sure that I am going to get up to 10k by July 4th on my bare feets [sic]. So, plan is to wear the VFF KSOs a bit while running until the 10k. I'll use them when in inner cities (oh the needles!!! (common reaction)), and for trail/river stuff.

Let over lambda saves the day (sbcl threads)

Messing with threads and sbcl/common lisp.

(loop for n from 1 to parallel-decision-num do
       (format t "~&outsidethread~a" n)
       (sleep 0.5)
       (sb-thread:make-thread
        (let ((m n))
          (lambda ()
            (sleep (random 5))
            (format t "~&insidethread~a" m)
            (sleep 2)))))

Remember to use a let so that the threads all have their own scope as you are spawning them. Also, join those mo-fos back up so that you don't cause horrible things.

(loop for thread in (sb-thread:list-all-threads)
   do
   (if (equal thread sb-thread:*current-thread*)
       '()
       (sb-thread:join-thread thread)))

Probably not the best way to do it, but it is *a* way.

M1911 Adoption Centennial

The M1911 was adopted on March 29, 1911.

To celebrate, I gathered my M1911(well, technically closer to the M1911A1 standard, but I digress) owning friends (friend).

Highlights of the celebration included "eyes closed" 1911 disassembly and reassembly.

My best times for eyes closed were: 41 seconds disassembly, 76 seconds reassembly.
Best times for eyes open was 19 seconds disassembly (stupid barrel bushing!) and 38 seconds reassembly.

Andy got 12 seconds disassembly with his eyes open, he basically picked it up and shook it and parts rained down. He was consistently faster at disassembly but slower with assembly. I think that my disregard for light scratches from the slide stop helped me there.

Went and got the patent for it, number 984519. I found something that shocked me, apparently the firearm originally had a magazine disconnect. Glad he came to his senses. I think one element of the longevity can be attributed to the nice trigger (ha, also that the plans are available and not patent encumbered like other newer designs).

Anyway, thanks JMB, PBUH.

Update: Thinking about the magazine disconnect, it *should* be possible to make one that does not affect trigger pull. I'll need to look at the hi-power and see why it increases trigger pull/gritty-ness. Anyone want to donate to the "Get me a hi-power" fund?

Just in: We interrupt this lack of posts for...

Just thought I would let people know how I am feeling. I have in my bloodstream:

Cetirizine Hydrochloride (Zyrtec)
mometasone furoate monohydrate (nasonex)
Diphenhydramine (Benadryl)
Acetaminophen, Dextromethorphan hydrobromide, phenylephrine (Alka-Seltzer Plus Day)

Reason?:
Pollen count soars (2248 grains per cubic meter of air) 89 is the max that can be called moderate, 1500 is the max high, and anything about that is very high.

Also might have a cold, which is why I was on the Alka-seltzer.

Blog posts coming soon (aren't they always?), I need to fix a computer to get some photos off of it.

Friday at 5pm, really?

I seem to be at peak productivity on Friday at 5pm.

wtf?

really!?

Anyways, heading home.

Two stitches

I got two stitches today.

It is most likely a cyst, the doctor said it didn't need to be removed.

It was driving me crazy, so I had it removed anyway. She might have taken out a bit more flesh than she needed to because it was easier. Next time, I might just grab an exacto knife and some dental floss and take care of it.

Thats a crop from a larger photo, but I doubt you want to see my chest and part of a nipple.

side note: Its hard to take a good picture of your skin with a cell phone camera while using a mirror. I was probably moving slightly.

Blog posts i write in my head

For the last few months I have been writing blog posts in my head.

Then, when I get to the computer, I consume rather than create.

I have forgotten most of the ones I have written, but I need to figure out a way to remember them.

Maybe write it down like I do for other stuff with a pen?

Anyway, a friend has asked his non-blogging friends to get back on it. so here I am.

Gross post to follow.