Southwest High School recently ranked in as the 116th best high school in the nation, the best in Minnesota, and one of the 100 best IB (International Baccalaureate) schools in the world. I think it is just because Dr. Will Smith is the principal.
Notable alumni include a cofounder of The Daily Show, 1977′s Miss America, a bunch of hockey players, and the pilot from Airplane!
The picture on the bottom was taken from the Bear Mountain Overlook and the picture on the top was taken from Google Earth at 48° 52′ 2.49″ N 113° 45′ 3.07″ W 6087 ft south by southwest at 11am-ish. The bottom image was acquired by digitizing the angular distribution of light flux through a cross-sectional area over a fraction of a second while the top image was acquired by similar means by a satellite miles overhead and then compared to USGS survey information for heights and solar information to create shadows. Some details are reproduced accurately, others not so much. Either way, it is incredible that the top image was created without blisters.
Today I voted in the Minnesota primary elections that determines who the nominee is for each party for the general election. I did not vote for Kelliher because she doesn’t seem trustworthy and she knocked R.T. Rybak out of the race for governor. Otherwise I voted for whoever was listed last because they have a statistical edge against them and I didn’t care too much about the other offices and Ellison will be reelected for sure.
It was the first time I voted in person. The last time I went to a primary was on the 11th of September 2001 when I missed the bus and got a ride in from my mom after she voted. For some reason the results weren’t announced on the news that night until very late. Go democracy.
Roughly a quarter of the adult (18+) population of the United States of America don’t know what country we won our independence from (has nobody seen the Patriot). Also a quarter thinks Obama was born in another country.
The best case against democracy is five minutes with the average voter – Winston Churchill
…are probably three companies you have never heard of, but they have recently been involved in a new Saudi Arabian issue involving BlackBerry phones. I am a Mobily man, or was before my account time-lapsed before I left in May. The staff at KAUST (some of the staff) got BlackBerries that will no longer work because they send encrypted data that could be a security threat. The irrationality is that all phones do this and no government gets to just look at that data. So do many internet connections for secure things (Gmail, Amazon, etc.). Saudi Arabia’s impetus is the announcement by the UAE (Dubai, Abu Dhabi, and desert) a few days beforehand. In my mind this is like how KAUST and MIST opened on the same day and causes me to believe that my graduate school was based on a wager like the movie Trading Places. It will likely be resolved with RIM (Research In Motion) getting to continue operating as usual as it would shut down business in the Kingdom.
Boulder, Colorado could solve its traffic problem by banning Subaru station wagons. There are no American cars, although gas stations are filled with American Spirits. Budweiser accounts for 50% of Alcohol sales nationwide, but New Belgium seems more plentiful. It is like Uptown in Minneapolis was transplanted into geographically self-confined section of land at the base of the Rocky Mountains. An area of the country that doesn’t care for clever taxonomy with names like Boulder, Glacier, Rocky, Grand Teton, and Dubois. It is a town that reminds of a line from Austin Power: “there is nothing more pathetic than an aging hipster.” Despite all the niceties there is problem with unconstrained progressive zeal that come from the paradox that all people move there to be in the shadow of the mountains, but some do it for “God’s Country” and others for dispensary. The halted sense of freedom that comes with the safety of crosswalks that EVERY vehicle stops for like the parting of the Red Sea. The atmosphere is nothing but a thin layer of smug that is amplified by the immediate false douche chill induced by EVERY person wearing sunglasses to avoid the extra UV. It is less of a black jeans kind of hipster and more of a sense that plaid could catch on at any second. It is on the top of my list of future cities to live in.
It was a blast in Glacier. We spent the first night at Cut Bank and then went to Mokowanis Lake area. The picture above is from Bear Mountain. I broke a nalgene while trying to hit a flower, forgot my camera for the final destination, and got a bad blisters on the backs of my feet. Nobody broke a leg.
Glacier National Park has lost half its Glaciers in my lifetime.
Tag and hide-and-go-seek tag are the same game.
What happened to SimCity? When did video games become movies with intermittent play? Who took away my creativity? There are no more truely open ended game. I miss not having a purpose and having to create one. Slowly cut-scenes became longer and longer. The only survivors remaining are lame MMORPG (massively multiplayer online role-playing game) that are not very sandbox in spirit. The Sims is still a player, but was always a bit superficial.
Roller Coaster Tycoon is now an abandoned amusement park. It reminds me of a fake Onion headline from the 1950′s about suburban America: “Ant like conformity now available to the masses.” We are ushered down a single path to have the same user experience. Frustration is removed to create a blissful world that will always safely reset our Valium-filled character to the last safe checkpoint. Guitar Hero/Rock Band teach us to mash buttons in the proper order for hours on end. These games prepare us for future employment in a McDonalds inside a Walmart. Failure is not an option, nor is entertainment in my view with today’s games.
The other day I stumbled across a partial printout of my penultimate city from SimCity days. A criss cross of roads and rail lines through a dense urban Utopia broken by cleverly arranged parks where Howard Roark would be proud to live. What is the alternative today? How is there no company willing to make a game in a category that was so popular just a decade ago?
These things are too evil – a flying hypodermic needle that silents lands on your skin to drink blood and communicate disease. Yesterday I got to thinking about how scary mosquitoes would seem to somebody not normally exposed if everybody on earth wasn’t at some point in the year. Always squish them from tangentially angles to your body to prevent squeezing other peoples’ blood into your body. Never kill Dragonflies, they kill mosquitoes at all stages of mosquito development.
We need mosquito laser fences TODAY!
First Image of Planet in Other Solar System
Why I dislike soccer: every player attempts to win an Oscar every time they fall down. The players in the world cup are assumedly at peak physical condition and yet falling down on grass causes them excruciating pain. I understand that sometimes things happen just wrong to twist an ankle. It annoys me to no end when they clearly are not hurt and yet still try to pretend that someone else running within a yard of them caused them to trip on their own feet. I have no respect for any of the players because they routinely look like a five-year-old get a skinned knee.
Why Americans dislike soccer: one break, no hands, low points, and the falling down thing mentioned above. Practically, we don’t have good players available because suburban kids play soccer and quit when the go to high school, college, or get a real job. Inner cities don’t have soccer fields. Natural athletic talents play real sports (football, baseball, hockey, basketball, golf, car racing). The point totals are so low that games often feel stolen because of discreteness problems – removing our notion of fairness. We do well at women’s soccer. Perhaps since title 9 doesn’t work both ways (it does not) a female sport like soccer is often limited to women.
The US just lost to a country we could easily invade at a sport we will again not care about for a decade.
A great New York Times piece on how people often don’t know when they’ve made a mistake.
“if low taxes were the answer, then Mississippi would be a leader in this country.” Great slam from Minnesota governor candidate.
You are NOT an environmentalist if you fly on planes. Crossing the Atlantic cancels out one year of recycling, buying locally, watching Al Gore’s documentary, and owning a hybrid – it is like adding an American to the world. I will be flying a few times this summer.
This is how a sewing machine fundamentally works. I didn’t know, but fixed a sewing machine and learned a thing or two in the process. I have done three sewing projects in a gradual progression towards making something I can use long term. My goal is to make a nice water-proof bag for my new laptop (ASUS UL30VT-A1). As an engineer a key lesson is that you don’t make it perfect the first time. Sewing machines are such an awesome invention. The ruler in the pictures is 18″.
13″ Laptop Sleeve – cotton fabric with triple layer of padding. Black exterior with blue floral inside and green floral accent on one side that helped hide a seem. I made it from spare materials at my grandma’s farm with my name stitched on one side to hold padding in place (the green floral fabric hold it on the other side. Time: <3 hours.
Tool Bag – Untreated #12 Cotton duck (canvas) with 1″ webbing and 4″ blue nylon ribbing. Two buckles and some snaps hold it shut with stretchy pockets inside. It has room for a variety of small hand-tools that I find useful to have in one place (pliers, screwdrivers, multi-tools, bottle opener). It is low quality, but does the job. Time: <2 hours.
Netbook/book Bag - Roll-top water-proofish bag made of Waterproof 500 denier White Widow Spectra carbon fiber ripstop Nylon exterior, Nylon/Polyester Silkara water-resistant removable internal liner with a double layer of foam padding, 2″ seat belt strap with adjustable cam, and 3/4″ nylon webbing with orange whistle buckle. This fits my netbook, two books, and the power supply with expandable area on top (the roll-top) and should withstand rain. Time: <4 hours.
For my final design I am going to make a roll-top with a large flap made out of the Minnesotan flag. For supplies I use seattlefabrics.com and rockywoods.com.