The Day the Earth Shook

The Wikipedia has an excellent entry on the recent (Dec. 26) earthquake which spawned the deadliest tsunamis ever. The earthquake was the fifth most powerful since 1900, having enough energy to boil 2,600 gallons of water for every person on Earth. Sadly, that energy translated into a catastrophic natural disaster with 140,000 dead, countless wounded, and a million more homeless.

The Wikipedia entry has detailed info about where it hit, how it happened, and who was affected. There are links to pictures and videos of the event and the aftermath. There's also information about ongoing relief efforts. Posted by Chris on 12/31/2004 01:39:00 PM :: Permalink   

Fire and Ice

While Victoria was at home with a fever of 104.3, Delaney found her way to the North Pole where she patiently waited in line 45 minutes to get this photo with Santa.

Delaney told Santa she wanted "a toy santa and clothes" - the same thing she had written in her letter. Victoria always says she wants "presents". And when asked how many it's always "two".

Merry Christmas everybody!

Labels: family

Posted by Chris on 12/25/2004 01:53:00 AM :: Permalink   

The Physics of Santa and His Reindeer

Because I'm a scientific kind of guy, I just love reading this once a year.

The Physics of Santa and His Reindeer

But don't let that dissuade you from believing in Santa Claus. I saw him last weekend at the mall. Posted by Chris on 12/23/2004 10:10:00 AM :: Permalink   

SuprNova.org Goes Dark

The premiere BitTorrent site goes dark - SuprNova.org shutdown. Apparently, some other sites have been shutdown as well, apparently by threat of the MPAA and/or RIAA. But www.isohunt.com was still up earlier today! Posted by Chris on 12/19/2004 07:13:00 PM :: Permalink   

Pez For Sale

If my Pez collection would command over $30,000 at auction, it would be on the block tomorrow. But it won't, so I still keep it in my office. I wonder who's collection this was.

Labels: pez

Posted by Chris on 12/17/2004 01:50:00 PM :: Permalink   

Xbox Identifier

Perhaps you're getting an Xbox for Christmas.

Perhaps you want to know its version number.

Just run this app and enter the serial number. Posted by Chris on 12/17/2004 01:45:00 PM :: Permalink   

A Charlie Brown Christmas

It's a classic.

Don't miss "A Charlie Brown Christmas".

Tonight at 8pm Eastern on ABC. Posted by Chris on 12/16/2004 04:40:00 PM :: Permalink   

Stephen Hawking Reads This Blog!

OK, not really. At least as far as I know.

But you can use FeedSpeaker to have a Stephen Hawking-like voice read it to you (it's actually "Microsoft SAM"). But I think I like "Microsoft Mary" a bit more. Have a listen to her.

While the speech isn't great, it only takes a couple of minutes to adjust to it and it's very understandable. This is a pretty cool application. You could then listen to your blogroll while you do other things (surfing, driving to work, etc.). And since there are RSS feeds for news, sports, weather, and virtually everything else you've now created your own radio show on your schedule with only shows you are interested in.

Sort of a high-tech, low-fidelity, robotic, automated podcast! Posted by Chris on 12/16/2004 02:09:00 PM :: Permalink   

Next Stop Nairobi

My brother Tim left on Friday for a 10 day mission trip to Nairobi, Kenya. He's with a group of about 30 others from Providence Baptist Church.

Here's more in his own words [links added by me]:

We will be going into an area of unbelievable poverty (no electricity, running water or sanitation) to share the love of Jesus Christ. We will be conducting Vacation Bible School in several different villages in and around Nairobi. Last year, children were so excited to hear the message of Christ that some walked over 50 miles to attend. We will also be discipling many of their school teachers, most of whom are only teenagers. In addition, we will be delivering Christmas gifts to many children who own nearly nothing. And as if that’s not enough, we also plan to be doing some light construction work on a church in the Kibera slum area (a church which was started by Providence roughly 2 years ago in what is considered the largest slum in Africa).

Say a prayer for him and his entire group, his family at home, safety there and while traveling, and for spreading God's word. He returns on the 21st.

[ EDIT: More about the trip experience here. ]

Labels: family

Posted by Chris on 12/13/2004 01:15:00 PM :: Permalink   

PezCam Sabotage!

And then the PezCam went black.

The PezCam has been sabotaged! It's blocked!

And by a Pez dispenser no less.

Image analysis of the first degraded image shows an upload timestamp of Wednesday, December 8th at 19:04 UTC which converts to 2:04pm Eastern. The previous unobstructed picture was taken at 1:54pm. So the perpertrator took advantage of that 10 minute timespan to take things into their own hands and completely black out one corner of the Internet, blinding my readership without regard to their wishes!

The audacity!

Labels: pez

Posted by Chris on 12/10/2004 10:14:00 AM :: Permalink   

Maximum Mail

This was the sight I saw when I opened my mailbox last night.

Now I realize that there is a lot of mail this time of year. Christmas cards, sale catalogs, and boxes of all sizes. But when a box doesn't fit, let's not force it, ok?

If you look carefully, the corners of the box have disappeared behind the rolled lip of the mailbox. It went in, but it almost didn't come out. It took me several minutes to get this thing out of the mailbox without pulling down the mailbox post or bending up the mailbox.

And I'm not trying to blame this on Amazon (it's their box as you can see from the logo), but I have a standard size mailbox so perhaps they should consider making their boxes just half an inch shorter. Sure would save me some trouble.

I wonder how long it took the mailperson to get it in there? Posted by Chris on 12/07/2004 04:09:00 PM :: Permalink   

Tivo for your iPod

Newsweek overview article on podcasting. Apparently the mainstream media are catching on to podcasting and its potential much faster than they did with blogging. BBC Culture Show recently ran an interview with Adam Curry, one of the creators of podcasting (and yes, the ex-MTV 1980's VJ).

They really didn't explain that it's not just for iPods, though. They're in MP3 format so you can listen on your computer or lots of portable players or even burn it to CD for listening. Currently, most of the software that makes it so easy is for the iPod, but I've been listening on my Palm for a couple of weeks now during the commute.

Labels: tivo

Posted by Chris on 12/03/2004 11:07:00 AM :: Permalink   

396 Months and Counting

At what point do you start expressing your child's age in years instead of months?

Since I have two young children, I understand that saying your child is one year old does not convey the same thing as your child is 20 months old. There's a BIG difference between 12 months and 20 months.

But here's a shirt that is labelled as size 48 months (rollover image for closeup). Forty-eight months! Come on, can't you just say "4T"? (The 'T' is somehow required to indicate "Toddler" size, as though you might otherwise mistake it for a "Misses size 4" or something.) Posted by Chris on 12/03/2004 10:17:00 AM :: Permalink   

Another Podcasting Find - Leo & Woz

I'm liking this podcasting thing more and more now. One feed I've been listening to lately is Leo Laporte's radio shows. I can't get these on the radio and now that he's gone from The Screen Savers and the show has undergone yet another overhaul, it's not really worth watching. The only thing left there are the cool Dark Tips from Kevin Rose, but I can get those elsewhere. I miss Leo, Pat, Yoshi, and the rest of the Lab Rat geeks who really knew what they were talking about.

So this morning on the commute in to work, I'm listening to Leo's show and he just got back from a Mac Mania Geek Cruise. [ I tried to get my employer to send me on a Perl Geek Cruise, but have so far been unsuccessful. ] The podcast was an excellent interview with Steve Wozniak, creator of the Apple computer. Certainly worth a listen. Posted by Chris on 12/01/2004 03:19:00 PM :: Permalink   

Blog This!

Merriam-Webster announced that 'blog' is the word of the year for 2004.

I fully expect 'podcasting' to be word of the year for 2005. Posted by Chris on 12/01/2004 01:46:00 PM :: Permalink   
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