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  May 2008
 
The Astonished Head Tee! Buttons, Small and Bigger! Chomskybat Magnet! Proloxil T-shirts and Mugs! 
Ba-Bow Limerence (Falls In Waves) 
Astonished Head: The Ad Miserable Ovoid Creature 
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August 01, 2005
Idle BrainsAugust 02, 2005
Me must work hard this week!
No free roots and berries for you!
August 04, 2005
Idle Brains
August 05, 2005
"O, Love - bourne ecstasy that is Mrs. Miggins, wilt thou bring me but one cup of the browned juicings of that naughty bean we call 'coffee', 'ere I die... " - - Shelley
And to that, I can only add that on a day such as this, when the very air becomes a hot plaster wall bashing on my skull, iced coffee is an untrammelled, finger - trembling delight. August 06, 2005
Idle Brains
August 10, 2005
August 13, 2005
I like Treehugger alot, because I'm a solar guy and I like gadgets. Still, the blog occasionally toes* the party line with bits like this, which can best be summarized as "Ha! Look! Global warming non - believers miscalculated." The good folks at TH picked up on this NYT article outlining the errors made by John R. Christy and Roy W. Spencer of the University of Alabama in Huntsville, who ... conceded yesterday that they had made a mistake but said that their revised calculations still produced a warming rate too small to be a concern. The assumption underlying the NYT article and the Treehugger bit is that 20 years' worth of data can be a predictor of complex atmospheric behavioral with cycles that span millennia, not decades. The concluding remark by Yale scientist Steven Sherwood ("Nobody is debating any more that significant climate changes are coming") is misleading at best. Plenty of people debate the fact of climate change; still more grant the fact, but debate the cause of that change. Take just one example. From the 10th to the 14th centuries, temperatures were 1 to 3 degrees higher than they are now. It's called the Medieval Warm Period or Medieval Climate Optimum, and whether or not it was a global phenomenon is still open to debate. This was followed up by the "Little Ice Age" from about 1300 - 1900. This entire warming and cooling cycle happened in the absence of significant human industrial development. It is prudence that should inform the technological and economic changes required to live more lightly on the planet, not "science." I use quotes because what passes for science on either side of this debate at the policy - making level is alarmist at best, and fraudulent at worst. We are seeking answers to questions for which we simply do not have sufficient data. Trying to claim a political imperative based on conclusions drawn from this flawed and incomplete data and then presented as fact is actually counterproductive to any green goal, because it provides those opposed to change with so much ammunition that inaction is inevitable. As a case in point, Chris Horner, a senior fellow at the free - market environmental think tank Competitive Enterprise Institute, had this to say about the 2003 Medieval Warming Period study: "This new study merely affirms the obvious: climate alarmism based on a few years' or even a century's data is sheer folly, reminding us again that geological cycles spanning millennia do not share the rush of agenda - driven scientists or activists." I agree with him... but his rhetoric is lousy: "affirm the obvious" and "sheer folly" aren't really terms that I'd choose to emply in a search for truth. I would, however, use them in a political debate. This is, at its core, a philosophical issue. Science has become a schismatic religion which issues regular pronouncements with near - clerical authority. Using the authority of science in this way will never sway the electorate, which instinctively recognizes the authoritarian nature hiding beneath the "scientific" trappings. It's why Bill Clinton - - consummate politican that he is - - never submitted the Kyoto treaty to Congress for ratification, and why the Byrd - Hagel Resolution came into being. What is needed is, I think, exactly what is often found on Treehugger: incremental technological improvements that introduce the ideas of environmental stewardship to the populace by harnessing the forces of the marketplace and making them work to the Earth's advantage. I believe that alot of the alarmism and cries for instant action stem from the same thing that drove Leftist concepts of revolution: a mistaken conflation of the increasingly fast, technologically - enhanced pace of individual life in the West with the evolution of cultures and society. Societies have an inertia that individuals do not. Similarly, Central Park is not going to be beachfront property tomorrow, this decade, or even this century. - - - Of course, it might be... it doesn't make much sense for me to make such declarations of certainty, either. One of the most succinct takes on all of this came from the now - retired Captain of the USS Clueless, who asks: why should we base extremely expensive public policy on science which is so tentative? August 16, 2005
Hey. I said hey! The Third Anniversary Issue of Virtual Occoquan is up, so get thee hence and commence to reading it and so on! August 17, 2005
Thought for the day: what we need now is a way to put LEDs inside the implants. Very cyber - raveish.
 Well well well well well well well well how very nice. My name is Anton, and I'll be your babbler this evening. I must tell you, since I got my White's metal detector, I've lost thirty pounds and found eight tons of scrap gold and silver. Actually, that's not what I've got to tell you. What I've got to tell you is nothing short of revelatory. It's the kind of thing that makes a priest drop his pants and beg forgiveness. Anton LaVey (no relation) became a Mormon when he heard this, I have it on good authority. President Bush, it is rumored, is now considering becoming a Buddhist monk after receiving this news. The Pope himself is having a much - delayed bar mitzvah, and Grand Ayatullah Sayyid Ali Al - Hussaini Al - Sistani is giving Billy Graham a call this very evening. What I've got to tell you is is so revolutionary, so mind - bendingly unique... that it can't just be given away. I must ask for money. Cash! Great heaving sacks of the stuff! Only then will I reveal this... this... god - like knowledge. Drop a line if you're innarested. Moving on: sometimes, the medications, they fail. And then it's time to ride the Big Wheel on Satan's macadam. Have you ever been poked in the eye with a fire - sharpened stick by a lesser demon of the Eighth Plane? Not exactly a plate of lime Jello, let me tell you. Not quite. But then, what is, these days? What with Peak Oil coming along and presenting such a threat that we'd better cripple our economy before it gets here, and the bereavement of mothers in the hot sun shaming us all, even the simple pleasure of sitting down to a nice piping - hot plate of lime Jello isn't quite what it used to be. Now, if you're talking about sitting down to a nice piping - hot plate of parmesan - crusted braised beef short rib with carmelized red onions and fresh potato gnocchi in a rich balsamic reduction that borders on chocolate well, then, we can discuss. But the Jello is right out. Join me next week, when I'll ask is there a God, and then answer, Yes! And He's in my pantaloons!!! Ta - ta! August 19, 2005
What do you want from me? It's August, fer Chrissakes. August 22, 2005
Idle Brains
This is the kind of thing that really serves to remind all of us here in the First World just how much of an exception we are, and how even our poorest are still within the top tier of the world's privileged: The Lifestraw is a little longer than a toilet paper tube, and about the same diameter [... ] Inside the tube, a series of mechanical screens, carbon particles, and resin beads filter and kill most pathogenic bacteria and microorganisms common in water systems throughout the world. Using a patented material called PuroTech Disinfecting Resin, the filters are rated for 700 liters of water - - approximately one year's use for a single individual. They require no training to use (just suck) and minimal maintenance (parent company Vestergaard Frandsen recommends periodically blowing the straw clear of water to clean the filters) Two bucks buys disease - free water for a single person for a year. How cool is that? Hey, Bill - - how about forking over some o' that big fat cash pile you sleep on? You could provide a year's worth of clean drinking water to a billion people for chump change. And check out manufacturer Vestergaard - Frandsen's product line: mosquito beds with deltamethrin - impregnated netting; plastic sheeting that contains insecticide, plus the aforementioned LifeStraw. Even their tag - - "Disease Control Textiles" - - is a self - contained revolutionary concept. I'm all for pure research, but sometimes I think that this is what Science should be all about, all the time: creating practical methods of improving the quality of life for the species by yoking the powers of the marketplace to human ingenuity.
Check out Engadget - - 1985! It's retrolicious. August 24, 2005
The blogging well, she is dry, like a kiss from the Pope. But do enjoy our extensive archives. More than three years of crap, preserved like, uh... crap in amber, I guess. August 25, 2005
Y'know... as a gay man, you'd think that Andrew Sullivan wouldn't have such an affinity for the politics of shame. No one is quite so bitter as an ex - believer. August 27, 2005
It's a little past 9AM, and I'm sitting on the shore of a lake... well, more of a pond, really... in Bath, NY. I'm at the annual BentRide, camping out with a bunch of other people who like piloting lawnchairs. It's also my first test of the whole "blogging while camping" thing... Bath NY isn't a big town, but I've managed to hook into Verizon's broadband network, albeit at considerably reduced speeds. I am, as they say geeking out. I'd post some purty pitchers for you as well, but although I remembered to bring the USB connector for my PDA/camera/cellphone/pedal wrench, I forgot to install the ActiveSync software on my laptop, so the pitchers, they are trapped. And,I must say: trying to view a highly reflective screen while wearing a BRIGHT! ORANGE! tee - shirt in full sun is... difficult. Nevertheless: I am by a lake/pond - thing, and writing to you. Because I can. Because I care. In a little bit I'll pedal on over to the rally, there to test - ride trikes and bikes unusual. Tomorrow is the BentRide itself, a 45 - mile trip around some proper lakes with possible side trips to local wineries. I think I need to put sunblock on my eyelids. I feel them crisping like be - lashed Pringles. Ain't technology great? Now I can waste your time with inane drivel... from anywhere! 
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