We might as well get down to it. This week: the 2011 TMQ All-Unwanted All-Pros. After the jump…
TMQ watch: December 27, 2011.
December 28th, 2011Obit watch: December 28, 2011.
December 28th, 2011Don’t we all pretty much want to live our lives like that? Doesn’t that explain the appeal of “House”?
Edited to add: The Cheetah that died may not have been the real Cheetah.
Legal note.
December 28th, 2011The University of California and Dr. Patrick Harran, a chemistry professor at UCLA, have been charged with three felony counts of “willfully violating occupational health and safety standards”. Yes, you read that right: the University itself is being charged with felonies.
The charges stem from the death of Sheri Sangji in December of 2008. Ms. Sangji was employed in Dr. Harran’s lab:
She died 18 days after the incident.
I’m kind of hoping Derek Lowe will have some comment on this, and I’m willing to listen to arguments on the subject. My gut feeling is that the felony indictments are appropriate: Ms. Sangji should not have been working without a flame-resistant lab coat, and it isn’t clear to me that she was provided with appropriate equipment, training, or supervision. This is what trials are for, of course, and details may come out during the trial that will change my mind. But:
But the required corrective actions were not taken before the fatal fire, the records showed.
Edited to add: Many thanks to Chemjobber both for pointing us to Derek Lowe’s commentary, and for providing a link to an article from Chemical and Engineering News summarizing the incident in more detail.
Also, thanks to Lawrence for a somewhat related link, which we had missed: the U.S. Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board report on the Texas Tech lab explosion in January of 2010. I swear that I covered the explosion at the time, or shortly afterwards, but I can’t find the link now. In any case, the report is pretty much what you’d expect: “the physical hazard risks inherent in the research were not effectively assessed, planned for, or mitigated; the university lacked safety management accountability and oversight; and previous incidents with preventative lessons were not documented, tracked, and formally communicated”.
(Short summary: the lab was working on a government project involving detection of explosives. Part of their work involved making something called nickel hydrazine perchlorate, which goes bang rather easily. The lab had been making small amounts (100 milligrams) but the students involved in the production of NHP that day decided, for various reasons, to scale things up and produce about 10 grams. The NHP went bang while one of the students was trying to break up “clumps” in a mortar and pestle.)
The Old Bag.
December 27th, 2011Back many thousands of years ago, when I was just a wee lad shooting photos with a Pentax K1000 and reading Popular Photography (rest in peace, Herbert Keppler), I kept hoping that PP would do an article or a series of articles or a column or something on “what’s in your camera bag”; basically, I wanted to know what real pros like Walter Iooss Jr. (warning: some photos, especially one in particular, may not be safe for work) and Eddie Adams took with them when they went on the road. I had ideas about being a professional journalist, one who not only did his own writing but also took his own photos.
Getting to the point, this piece at PetaPixel, showing what Umit Bektas packed in his camera bag for his stint embedded with a US military unit in Afghanistan, made my day today. That, in turn, links to a first hand account by Bektas for the Reuters Photography Blog, which goes into a little more detail and has some amazing photos. (Not of battle. You’ll know the ones I’m talking about when you see them. My God, look at that sky.)
My one gripe about these articles is that I’d appreciate some annotation. It looks like his backup laptop is an eeePC (a fine choice indeed), but I’m curious about what his primary one is. I can’t tell what his cameras are, either; the logo kind of looks like Canon, but again, I find it hard to be sure. I’m glad to see that he packed a GoPro (also the official choice of the Park City Snowmamas). And I had to look up “Bgan” and “Thuraya“.
But I still think this is pretty interesting, as is “A Glimpse Inside the Camera Bag of a Newspaper Feature Photographer“. More like these, please.
(Hattip: his Jim-ness on the Twitter for the initial link, and PetaPixel for the ones after that.)
(And of course, the most important thing about photography, war or otherwise, is: have a camera with you. I was so wrapped up in getting Christmas presents together on Saturday that I completely forgot to bring my camera gear, which ticked me off. I ended up having to resort to the Evo camera for photo purposes. Granted, between my sister and mother it wasn’t like we didn’t have multi-camera capability, including the ability to deploy a digital SLR if we needed it, but I was still ticked at myself.)
Administrative note.
December 27th, 2011I’m taking this entire week off of work, and using the time either to do stuff I’ve been wanting to do, hang out with family, or both. (If the weather holds up, we may try for a range trip this week.)
In the meantime, blogging is sort of on the back burner. There will be a TMQ Watch this week, but it may not go up until later this evening.
Side note: Apparently, I have been designated the “coolest uncle ever” on Facebook (I am unable to verify this for myself, since I don’t do Facebook) because I got this one:
one of these:
for Christmas. (At least, I think it was one of those: it was an H&K folder that McBride’s had on sale, cheap, but I didn’t make a note of the exact model. I know it was one that had the tanto point. If he still has the box, I’ll get the exact model later.)
Someone is about to start a new chapter in their life.
December 27th, 2011Chapter 7, that is.
There’s a rapper who calls himself “Young Buck” (real name David Darnell Brown). He owes money to people. People like the IRS. People like his baby mama. And people like 50 Cent and the G-Unit record label; according to the LAT, he owes them “more than $10 million”.
“Young Buck” originally filed for bankruptcy under Chapter 11, which, as you know Bob, allows one to reorganize their debts. But now the Chapter 11 has been turned into a Chapter 7, aka “total liquidation”.
The fun part? The name “Young Buck” (which is also trademarked) is an asset that will be sold off in the liquidation.
A couple of notes:
- How did he get that far in debt to G-Unit Records? According to the LAT, there’s some sort of contract dispute involved, but I’d really like to know more about what’s going on here. In a way, it is kind of reminiscent of Steve Wyrick: how do you get that far in the hole before someone pulls the trigger?
- Can we all agree that the phrase “peep the mad flow” does not belong anywhere in an article on a major daily newspaper’s website (except maybe as a direct quotation, in quotation marks)?
The street finds its own uses for things.
December 26th, 2011Things that say “Christmas” (part 1 of an ongoing series).
December 26th, 2011
Lord of the Rings PEZ dispensers
More Christmas related stuff later, maybe.
NFS: Not For Storage
December 21st, 2011The Unix-Haters Handbook (which I am proud to say I own a physical copy of) is now available for free download.
(Hattip: Unix tool tip.)
Is this a dagger that I see before me?
December 21st, 2011I’m linking to the HouChron and not the WP because the HouChron story contains an illustration of the daggers and the book. (“Chapter 2: Ninja Equipment”?)
Or, as we in the civilized world call it, “six inches”. About the length of a ballpoint pen.
The awesome power of the Internet.
December 21st, 2011I went over to ask a cow orker a question, and he had this up on his monitor. And I said “What?!”
List of animals with fraudulent diplomas.
So it isn’t quite “A Short, Incomplete, and Somewhat Random List of People Who Have Had Their Heads Impaled on a Spike on London Bridge“, but still fun.
But hey! At least the trains ran on time!
December 21st, 2011(By way of Balko, who calls this “The most vile thing you’ll read today.” It is still early, but we feel that we’re going to have a hard time arguing with that.)
(And by the way, the whole “trains ran on time” thing? Not so much.)
Important medical news.
December 21st, 2011This is why I only use single-malt scotch in my Neti pot. (Mixing it with Mountain Dew is optional.)
The OSU Sanction.
December 21st, 2011(I really liked The Eiger Sanction
(And I’m more than a little surprised that there’s been no FARK link yet.)
Quote of the day.
December 21st, 2011Indeed. In our studies of the history of technology, we have found that much scientific and technical advancement is motivated by that same principle.