Random
catdynamics | February 16, 2012Web Astrophysical Calculator - I don't know how I missed this for 16 years...
I'd so totally pay $0.99 cents for this if someone wants to make it into an App
How to Optimize Your Caffeine Intake - PSU provides a genuine service to society - and it is an App!
catdynamics | February 8, 2012but now I hope to see one:
from io9
Purple Squirrel Found in Pennsylvania
again?
catdynamics | January 11, 2012ok, on a roll, so lets put out some must listen:
Blog Talk Radio interviews Bill "CR" McBride from the legendary Calculated Risk blog
on a completely different note:
The Must Have Billy Bragg and Wiggy podcast collection - linked to before, but can never be reminded of too often, 'cause there ain't nobody that can sing like him!
er, that's all I got for now
catdynamics | January 10, 2012some random links for your reading pleasure
Free SF Online - indexed, mostly shorts and audio podcasts.
Excellent way to get an intro to some new reads.
Then go out and buy the books.
eg Ted Chiang
David Brin
Greg Egan
On a different note:
"5 things you should know before dating a scientist"
Chad has some good stuff going:
Shameless Innumeracy
Grumpy About Education
I have several hundred AAS press releases in my inbox, may get to reading some
kbonham | January 6, 2012The thing I like most about this mashup is that it's superficially just a mashup of the most popular music of 2011, but it also manages to be a statement on some of the most important events of 2011: the protests from Egypt and Libya to OWS
Maybe it's hard
We will never be never be broken and scarred
There's no way I'm turning back oh oh oh oh
Here's the situation
Got this feeling that you can't fight
Been to every nation
The city is on fire tonight
Maybe it's hard
We will never be never be broken and scarred
There's no way I'm turning back oh oh oh oh
Here's the situation
Got this feeling…
catdynamics | December 23, 2011And, so, as this feast of Saint Thorlacius comes to an end, we await the arrival of the last of the yule lads the sneaky candle swiper hisself
Kertasníkir
The lads are bathed, a major achievement in and of itself, and ready for the grand finale
tomorrow night they leave town, but first their mother comes for a quick naughty-or-nice inspection
Grýla and Leppalúði
of course they do not stop at some token onion, potato or coal in the stocking,nah
Jólakötturinn
will hunt down the little miscreants and eat them.
Well, some of them, the rest are delivered to Grýla's sack and she gets to…
catdynamics | December 22, 2011The penultimate half-troll trundles into town today,
ready to pounce on the shoppers rushing home with their treasures
Ketrókur
he carries a big stick and he is not afraid to use it,
upon it is a hook with which he'll snag the who-beast shanks straight from the pot and scarf it up while it is hot
catdynamics | December 22, 2011getting ready for the grand finale,
the eleventh of the elven comes sidling into town
Gáttaþefur
He is well endowed this lad, and his long and sensitive proboscis will sniff out the christmas baking and he will swipe it if he can
he is hoping for some Laufabrauð
nom nom nom
catdynamics | December 21, 2011bit naughty this half-troll is
Gluggagægir likes to peep through your window late at night and see wassup
he's a sweety, really he is, just checking on whether you've been naughty as we get closer to the big day
catdynamics | December 20, 2011and the jólasveinar march on with their stout staffs in their hand...
this morning
Bjúgnakrækir
he climbs the rafters looking for sausages being hung or smoked, he particularly like the thick fatty bjúgu - lamb or horse he'll eat them all
nom nom nom
catdynamics | December 19, 2011Oh dreadful son-of-a-troll!
Last night the most feared of all the jólasveinar came, and a true son of a troll is he...
Skyrgámur!
Curse you!
He steals your skyr, the last of the precious few hauled hundreds of miles across the mountains, in the snow, up hill, both ways...
and then he taunts you!
catdynamics | December 17, 2011If you wake tonight to the door slamming, it is probably just the wind,
or is it...
Hurðaskellir - he's a bother.
This explains it all...
catdynamics | December 16, 2011And the jólasveinar keep stumbling in, the pace ramping up as christmas approaches (actually it is steady at one per day, it just feels ever more frantic)
Askasleikir - he licks your Ask clean, natch.
No, this sort of Askur, silly - the sort you keep your skyr in!
kbonham | December 16, 2011I'm sure that science isn't the only profession that gets misrepresented in popular media. I'm sure lawyers and police cringe when watching crime dramas, and soldiers are uncomfortable when watching war movies. Leaving aside shows like CSI, I think that scientist's main media foil is almost by definition science fiction. On the one hand, I've learned to mostly ignore exaggeration, over-simplification, and implausible technology - I've come to understand (though it was hard) that these things are sometimes necessary to drive a plot, and that it's unrealistic to expect that the writers are all…
catdynamics | December 16, 2011
Pottasleikir - cheap, but he licks the pots clean, saves on the washing up
catdynamics | December 15, 2011For my class, one f the things I asked is what I should tell them about which I did not do.
Somewhat to my surprise, one question, endorsed by a number of other students, was whether I could recommend some good science fiction to read over the holidays.
Why, yes, yes I can...
Ok, we'll jst let rip in random free association...
I'll also mention some more fantasy oriented stuff at the end, just for fun.
I'll presume everyone knows of Wells and Verne, and Asimov, Clarke and Heinlein?
Heinlein: I'd go for the early shorts and mid-career juveniles. The later novels are mostly for hardcore…
catdynamics | December 14, 2011
Stúfur is the littlest jólasveinn, and, I am told, much beloved of the girls.
He is not so much a (half)troll as your very own Home Gnome.
Very stubborn, loyal, somewhat fierce and generous to a fault.
He rowed to our distant shores last night, bringing wee little treats, received with much joy this morning. As is his custom he also licked the pots and pans clean, mostly, refreshed for the journey back north.
catdynamics | December 13, 2011and the jólasveinar march on and on across the floor...
Giljagaur came this morning.
He likes to hide in the folds in the landscape, crawling towards your barn, where he will sneak up to the cows in the morning and skim the significance off your double blinded data set, leaving but a suggestion of a hint of the Higgs Particle on the pail of photons.
No cream for theorists on this morning.