By way of the YCombinator news feed:
(You know, I’d read about Mantango in one of the Golden Turkey books, but it wasn’t until I read the Wikipedia entry that I became aware it was based on a William Hope Hodgson short story.)
Archive for the ‘Geek’ Category
Matango, Fungus of Terror!
Tuesday, November 5th, 2013Go Pods!
Thursday, October 31st, 2013I was looking at my “Squid” tag the other day (no, really, I am not making this up) and thinking “I don’t use this tag nearly enough”.
Well, the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI for short) has their own YouTube channel. And they have a tradition of posting themed videos for Halloween.
This year’s video is “Spooky Eyes”, and it is chock-full of squidly goodness. (There are also some non-squid creatures in it.)
I also kind of like the music in this video. It sounds a little like a toy piano or maybe a child’s keyboard. The title of the piece is “Halloween Sputnik” by Richard Desilets, in case it catches your ear as well.
There’s a playlist of MBARI’s other Halloween themed videos, including “Big Teeth” and “Predators and Scavengers”.
And if you don’t want to watch the video, the LAT has a slideshow based on it.
Bad Idea Jeans.
Thursday, October 31st, 2013Available scents are claimed to include:
Yeah, I’ll believe it when I see it in action. But even if this does turn out to be real, and not a hoax, I still think it is a damn stupid idea. (Anyone remember the iSmell?)
Also:
Almost as cool as making the theme song to “The Wire” (the Season 5 version) your ringtone … almost.
Oh, bullshit. Everyone knows the Season 1 version (with the Blind Boys of Alabama) is the best version.
Edited to add: I have been challenged to provide support for the above statement.
Here’s a handy page that contains YouTube versions of the theme song from all five seasons.
Big dismal science.
Thursday, October 31st, 2013Happy Halloween, everyone.
Dean Karlan lives in New Haven, Connecticut. He gets a lot of trick-or-treaters in his neighborhood: “Residents say the area’s popularity is because the houses are so close together, minimizing the door-to-door travel time for trick-or-treaters.”
Dr. Karlan is also a behavioral economist. So why not combine the two and do science experiments on children?
In other experiments, Karlan has found that the more generic the costume is, the more likely it is that the child will choose a see-through bag with candy in it over a non-transparent bag. Karlan has also found that…
I’d like to see a follow-up to this experiment where children get equal amounts of candy, but those who identify as Democrats have more of their candy confiscated by the researchers.
One more thing I’d like to know: why isn’t Dubner interviewing Karlan, instead of doing a re-run this week? With all due respect, guys, it seems like you’ve been doing a lot of re-runs recently, and that doesn’t really motivate me to give you money.
(This also reminds me that my youngest niece has gotten to the age where I can start doing science experiments on with her. She’s still a little young for the economics based ones, though.)
Important safety tip (#18 in a series)
Saturday, October 12th, 2013A while back, I suggested the words ‘f–king” and “b-tch”, along with the conjugate “f–king b-tch”, do not belong in a professional email.
To that list, I now suggest that the word “whore” be added.
Also: pay the writer! But that’s not really a “safety” tip…
Obit watch: October 11, 2013.
Friday, October 11th, 2013Scott Carpenter, the second man to orbit the Earth.
NYT.
Scott Carpenter’s biographical page from NASA. I was hoping for a tribute, but…you know.
Random notes: October 3, 2013.
Thursday, October 3rd, 2013Tom Clancy obit roundup: LAT. Appreciation from LAT. NYT. Baltimore Sun. A/V Club. WP.
In other news, the Dread Pirate Roberts graduated from Westlake. I’d also like to direct folks to Popehat, where former federal prosecutor Ken White has posted an analysis of the charges.
And it seems that the Brooklyn DA’s office has found at least one witness who says “the police coached him into giving false testimony”.
Scarcella is not accused of being the person who got Mr. Ivory to lie:
Consumer advisory: iTunes 11.1
Sunday, September 29th, 2013If you have not updated to iTunes 11.1 yet, don’t.
This is a screen snapshot from my iTunes 11.1 of one of the podcasts I listen to, the Accidental Tech Podcast. Click to embiggen.
In spite of what you see in the “Plays” column, I have actually listened to every episode of ATP. I delete podcasts from iTunes as I listen to them.
When I “upgraded” to 11.1, all of these podcasts I had already listened to, and deleted from iTunes, popped back in with that little “cloud” icon under the “Unplayed” column. Apparently, Apple wants me to know that these podcasts are available in “the cloud”.
That’s great, Apple, but if I want to find an episode I’ve missed, I can go to the podcast’s page in iTunes, or to the podcast’s website. How do I turn off the display of podcasts in “the cloud”?
Surprise! According to everything I’ve been able to find on Apple’s support sites, you can’t. You can’t delete them from iTunes. You can’t get rid of them. The “Show iTunes purchases in the cloud” option does nothing for podcasts.
You can use the “My Podcasts” view to show just the podcasts you’ve downloaded and not deleted, without the “cloud” podcasts. But I have sound reasons for preferring the “List” view over “My Podcasts” – “List” shows you more information and less graphics.
Bad job, Apple. May the person who decided on this develop a case of painful rectal itch.
TMQ Watch: September 24, 2013.
Tuesday, September 24th, 2013“Any one who considers arithmetical methods of producing random digits is, of course, in a state of sin.”
Thursday, September 19th, 2013There’s an interesting post over at the Cryptographic Engineering blog about Duel-EC.
The post itself is pretty wonky, but a couple of scattershot points:
Flaw #3: You can guess the original EC point from looking at the output bits.
…
Flaw #5: Nobody knows where the recommended parameters came from.
So does all of this amount to a backdoor? Quoth Matthew Green,
…including some kind of hypothetical backdoor would be a horrible, horrific idea — one that would almost certainly blow back at us.
You’d think people with common sense would realize this. Unfortunately we can’t count on that anymore.
(You know, I’m halfway tempted to start a Kickstarter for a truly random random number generator. Something based off atomic decay, perhaps. What’s stopping me is:
- I have no electronics design skills or ability. Of course, I could hire someone, but…
- I’d be surprised if someone hasn’t already done this.)
(Edited to add: You could just get your random numbers from here, of course, while you’re waiting for the revolution. Nothing wrong with that plan, is there?)
(Speaking of Big John von Neumann, I just finished Turing’s Cathedral: The Origins of the Digital Universe
Onion headline, or New York Times headline?
Tuesday, September 17th, 2013Toes in the water.
Tuesday, September 3rd, 2013Sorry about the short blogging quasi-hiatus there.
After work on Friday, I drove down to San Antonio for LoneStarCon 3, the 71st World Science Fiction Convention. It was a swell time. I got to hang out with several friends, including Mike the Musicologist, Andrew the Colossus of Roads, RoadRich, and Lawrence, who was doing a land office business in books. (Who says people don’t read any more? I covered the table for him a little bit, and by Ghu the books were flying off the table like snow crab legs at an all you can eat Chinese buffet.)
I haven’t been down to San Antonio for reasons other than medical for years, and hadn’t been on the RiverWalk since LoneStarCon2. I’d forgotten how nice the RiverWalk is, even though the vendors make things a bit crowded. (I don’t remember there being as many sidewalk vendors there last time I was down. But I’m getting old, and memory fades.)
Mike the Musicologist did most of the meal planning. Breakfast for two out of three of the days we were there was in the Marriott Rivercenter, mostly for reasons of timing. However, it is a pretty good buffet; I’d go so far as to say, with the custom omelets and made-to-order waffles, it comes close to being worth $20+tax and tip. Especially since I really didn’t see any breakfast places near the hotels or along the Riverwalk. (McDonalds and Whataburger excepted. There was also a Denny’s across the street from the Rivercenter; but literally the first thing I heard when I got to the hotel was that a mutual acquaintance of ours got food poisoning from the Denny’s bacon.)
The one non-Marriott breakfast was at the Magnolia Pancake Haus on Embassy Oaks, which was packed to the gills. We waited 40 minutes for a table, but the Munchener Apfel Pfannekuchen was worth it. I’d love to go back (and maybe try the wild mushroom hash) but I’d make sure I brought a good book.
(At some point in the near future, I want to do a post on how tablets, and especially the iPad, are transforming the restaurant industry, with Magnolia being one of my examples.)
We also had an excellent meal at Moroccan Bites (I loved the lamb shank and the chicken bites) and a pretty good meal at a place called Charlie Wants a Burger. (I had the pulled pork sandwich. And wings.) Sunday night we went to Fogo de Chao…which, you know, is Fogo de Chao. If you want huge amounts of roasted meat, you know what you’re getting into. For reasons I won’t discuss here (think Tim Cahill’s rule #6, corollary 1), I just had the salad bar. Which is actually a reasonable thing to do at Fogo de Chao (especially since you also get to eat the fried polenta, bananas, and cheese rolls), and I didn’t feel ripped off at $22.50. (I did feel gouged by the $3.25 iced tea. Note to self: water next time.)
(If you think you detected a trend, you may be right: Moroccan Bites and Magnolia have both been on Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives. Guy Fieri may have problems running a place of his own, but as far as recommendations go, he’s batting 100% with me.)
Oddly enough, I bought more t-shirts (three) than I did books (two). Of course, one of those shirts is a gift for my brother. And one of those shirts I don’t actually have yet (they’re shipping it). And one of those books I bought mostly so I could support my friends. (I would have bought more books, but nobody had any Robert Frezza. “The Whistling Pig” was the theme to my last few months at 4LCC.)
I do want to say a few words about the best thing that happened at the convention. I don’t like bragging about famous people I know, mostly because I’m always afraid someone will ask them about me and they’ll say “Dwight who?” (Or, if they’re talking to Gardner Dozois, “That a–hole Dwight?!”)
(If you’ve never met Gardner in person, let’s just say he has a puckish sense of humor.)
But I digress. The best thing that happened at the convention is that one of my closest friends in the world won the Hugo Award for Best Novelette. That put the cap on a pretty swell weekend.
Congrats, again, Pat.
Quote(s) of the day.
Friday, August 30th, 2013I probably would have posted these even if Lawrence hadn’t done a quote of the day, because: Derek Lowe! More “Things I Won’t Work With“!
But I can’t decide which one I like more:
Explosions are definitely underappreciated as a mixing technique…
Or:
“Spaying hyenas” has so many possible uses.
“How was work today, honey?”
“Spaying hyenas.”
(“Spaying Hyenas” is also the name of my next band. We do Daft Punk covers.)
The economics of expensive fluids.
Monday, August 26th, 2013Would you believe that IV fluid (specifically, normal saline) is almost as cheap as house-brand cola at the grocery store?
That is, if you buy it in bulk from the manufacturer. If you go to the hospital and get an IV…
Of course, there’s hospital overhead and such involved. You don’t expect to go to Best Buy and pay wholesale price for a laptop, so why would you expect to pay wholesale for IV fluid? But isn’t $786 a lot of markup?
At White Plains Hospital, a patient with private insurance from Aetna was charged $91 for one unit of Hospira IV that cost the hospital 86 cents, according to a hospital spokeswoman, Eliza O’Neill.
Ms. O’Neill defended the markup as “consistent with industry standards.” She said it reflected “not only the cost of the solution but a variety of related services and processes,” like procurement, biomedical handling and storage, apparently not included in a charge of $127 for administering the IV and $893 for emergency-room services.
SmarterTimes has one take on this. I have another. Actually, I have two:
- If you go to watch a dragon dance, don’t eat lunch from food stalls at the Buddhist monastery.
- This is one of the reasons I have qualms about health care reform. I really do believe the system is broken and needs reform. But many of the proposed changes seem like tugging at a protruding wire in a deeply intertwingled snarl of wiring, without knowing whether you’re going to rip something vital loose or shock yourself or both.
This also gives me a chance to plug a forthcoming paperback that I’m very excited about: David Goldhill’s Catastrophic Care: How American Health Care Killed My Father–and How We Can Fix It
I’m not sure how applicable Goldhill’s prescriptions are to this incident. Much of what he talks about involves changes in routine health care, such as providing consumers with better cost information; being poisoned by monks at a dragon dance is the kind of catastrophic event you’d figure should be covered by insurance, and not the sort of thing where you shop around for the best deal on IV fluids and antibiotics.
Still, this does give me a chance to plug his book, which I was previously unaware of…
Random notes: August 20, 2013.
Tuesday, August 20th, 2013NYT headline:
(Edited to add: I am willing to offer karma points and gratitude for a photoshop of Admiral Ackbar in a Yankees uniform.)
At least Richard Cohen is consistent. Here’s a man who’s never met a totalitarian initiative he doesn’t like.
Speaking of NYC and guns…
Say what?
So let’s see. NYC has strict gun control. So crooks are stealing weapons (already illegal) or engaging in “straw purchases” (also illegal, and rarely prosecuted by the Feds). So what we need is more gun control, and also stop and frisk.
I would laugh at these guys, but…I’ve got my own embarrassing gun related issue (which I will write more about at some time in the future; no, it wasn’t a negligent discharge, I’m just having problems getting something to run right), so I’m withholding the laughter for now.