gregladen | April 15, 2010These ads actually appear on our local TV. Not cable, just regular:
This one's funny:
But this one's risqué:
And finally, the story behind "Ballroom Jeans"
gregladen | April 14, 2010... if you take time off from work to do so.
Nice.
Massey Energy told employees that if they miss work to attend the funerals they would be fired, workers said. A Massey worker, who did not give his name because he is afraid of losing his job, said that his coworkers were outraged that they were not given time off to mourn their friends and brothers.
The WSWS spoke to workers and relatives outside a local market. Chuck Smith, an unemployed miner with seven years work underground, said Massey's decision to force miners to work during the funerals was a calculated move. "What would it look like…
gregladen | April 14, 2010 ... Or is he the Congressmember from the Fifth District of Minnesota?
I suppose it is quite reasonable that the man chosen by the Republicans to run against Fifth District Congressman Keith Ellison, is a firm believer that we are presently in the End Times and that the Antichrist is almost here.
Is Keith Ellison the Anti-Christ? at Quiche Moraine
gregladen | April 14, 2010There are two things I've learned over the last year.
1) If you get a room full of self-described skeptics, gathered to converse skeptically about something, a minor tweaking of the conversation can cause an alarmingly large percentage of said "skeptics" to start spewing utter nonsense; and
2) Manyself-described skeptics seem to believe (yes, believe) that nothing can be believed, and assert that the ONLY thing that EVER matters is "the" truth, and at the same time insist that "the truth" can never be trusted (unless they themselves have uttered it). Such an approach can cause said…
gregladen | April 14, 2010There is something strange in the cosmic neighbourhood. An unknown object in the nearby galaxy M82 has started sending out radio waves, and the emission does not look like anything seen anywhere in the universe before.
"We don't know what it is," says co-discoverer Tom Muxlow of Jodrell Bank Centre for Astrophysics near Macclesfield, UK.
Whatever it is appreas to be moving at four times the speed of light. In other words, it has a Warp Drive. And, it is moving towards us, more or less. Well, at a slight angle. Better to surround us that way!!!!
I'm going to go stock up on canned foods…
gregladen | April 14, 2010"Mr. Tangarone, a 17-year veteran of the Weston school system, claims that a program he wanted to teach about Charles Darwin and Abraham Lincoln was rejected by the school administration because it involved teaching evolution -- the scientific theory that all life is related and has descended from a common ancestor."
Mark Tangarone, who teaches third, fourth, and fifth grade students in the Talented and Gifted (TAG) program at Weston Intermediate School, said he is retiring at the end of the current school year because of a clash with the school administration over the teaching of evolution…
gregladen | April 14, 2010There's been a flurry of interest on reference managers, and especially Mendeley, so I thought I'd throw up a few links that you will find useful.
Reference managers were discussed at ScienceOnline 2010.
A blog post about that session:Gearing up for scio10: Online Reference Managers
A handy Wikipedia page
An interview with Mendeley's Victor Henning
gregladen | April 14, 2010Randall Hyde's book is now out in it's second edition.
Your computer has little dohickies in it that know how to read and respond to commands that are, in turn, stored in (and read from) other dohickies.
These instructions are collectively known as "machine language." If you do an programming at all, you probably know this. A form of this very low level language that is designed to be somewhat more readable by humans is known as Assembly Language.
Higher level languages allow programmers to avoid messy details like the kind of hardware their program may run on, and higher level…
gregladen | April 13, 2010It is said that the forceps ... for delivering babies ... was invented by a doctor working in the American Midwest* who used it only to deliver the babies of people to whom he was related. The forceps caused babies who might have died during childbirth to live and may have increased the survivorship of the mothers as well. In this way, inclusive reproductive success of Dr. Forceps increased significantly. Presumably, as more people moved into the region, and still more were born there, and the land was divided up and farmed, competition between farmsteads would have increased. By using…
gregladen | April 12, 2010What was that sound? A hand-cranked railroad cart that needed oiling? An old firetruck with a broken siren? A group of boy scouts with a dying hippopotamus?
No, no, not a hippopotamus. Too artifactual sounding. Too human-made sounding. More like the siren, like an old fashioned air raid siren. And as I listened, not only did it get louder, but I had the distinct impression that it was getting closer.
Read on (QM)
gregladen | April 12, 2010I would wager that you don't know where many of your most important files are. If you are into music, and use iTunes, you can't find a particular song file using your file manager. You would need to locate it using iTunes. iTunes would then give you limited access to that file. It does not let you do the same thing your file manager would let you do. Many of your most important pieces of information are in emails or attached to emails. Where exactly are those things? Can you access them with your file manager with little effort, print, copy, delete, duplicate, or otherwise work with…
gregladen | April 11, 2010A while back I would have said that I have three reasons to maintain a Windows computer.
1) iTunes;
2) a couple of games;
3) tax software.
Yes, yes, I know, these things can be done with Wine or an emulator. But really, having the relic Windows machine sitting there has simply bee easier.
Tax software is now obviated because it all works on line. Ironically, one of Microsoft's original ideas was to have the "browser" be part of the "operating system" which, we may guess, was a ruse to avoid orders to remove their browser from the shipped OS back in the early browser war days. But it turns…
gregladen | April 11, 2010Check out this report at The Raw Story:
Up yours, scientists.
That's essentially the message sent by former politician Sarah Palin during a recent speech to the Southern Republican Leadership Conference, where she disparaged the work of thousands of the world's top minds to the delight of a large crowd that laughed, clapped and cheered her on the whole way.
gregladen | April 9, 2010Credo (as in Working Assets) gives a percentage of its charges to various organizations. Now, there is a way for you to vote for which organization will get an infusion of cash. One of the choices is the NCSE.
According to Robert Luhn of the NCSE:
... NCSE is on the 2010 ballot. If your readers support the teaching of evolution in the public schools...well [they can go to the] CREDO ballot and [the] to the "Economic and Social Justice" section, where the listing for "National Center for Science Education" resides.
On the Credo site, it says:
If you are a current long distance, mobile or…