Etcetera

Chaos

In Rochester NH this morning I saw a Cumberland Farms store changing their gas price from $2.81 to $3.07.

The prices for gasoline here in the NH Seacoast are really in chaos. Driving around I've seen prices as low as $2.57 up to the $3.07.

It appears that the "pecking order" of stations is broken. The ones that have always been cheapest are now highest, and vice versa.

Where will it all settle? Two days ago I thought the new average would be around $2.70, but we seem to be blowing right through that level.

Black Tuesday

Update on my earlier story about gas prices.

Early this morning I topped my tank at the Cumberland Farms station in Epping NH. The price was 2.56. It had been at that price for about a week.

At 3 this afternoon I drove by that station and the price has risen to $2.65.

Two hours later at 5pm, the same station was up to $2.80. That's a 24 cent increase in 14 hours.

CNN is warning that the wholesale price of gas is near $3 per gallon, and that could translate to $3+ prices at the pump by the end of the week.

That never happened to me before

I was grocery shopping the other day. I left my shopping cart at the end of an aisle and took a few steps to look for something. When I returned to the cart, it was gone!

I looked around. No sign of it.

For a few minutes I watched for a someone with a cart that had my things in it, but no joy.

I went back to the front of the store, got another cart, and started over.

Hurricane pics

There are now many more storm and damage pics on Flickr under the tag "Katrina".

It's OK, the president says so.

President Bush is promising to help the gas price increases by releasing some crude from the strategic reserve. And the main stream media is reporting that without any question.

Yet, all the analysts are pointing out that the problem, even before the hurricane stopped the flow of gas from the gulf coast refineries, isn't having enough crude oil, it's having enough refinery capacity to make gasoline.

The president and his gang must know that more crude will have little effect. But, truth and accuracy have never been all that important in this government's dealing with its citizens.

If the president announced he was gonna solve the problem by waving a magic wand, would the main stream media report that without comment too?

False Positive

Everyone is expecting gas prices to jump as a result of the hurricane, and I agree that an increase is likely.

I went out this morning figuring to see the first sign of increases. My usual station has been at $2.59 for a couple weeks now. I figured it would jump to like $2.65. But to my surprise it was lowered to $2.54!

Last time I saw prices dip at all, they jumped the next day. Look out.

Katrina Pics

I'm watching Flickr for pics from the Hurricane. I'm guessing that many people are too busy avoiding injury to be posting. Also, reports are that MANY places are without electricity, which also means no internet.

The flow of pics will start soon.

Shipyard Saved!

By a vote of 7-1 the BRAC committee has voted to NOT CLOSE the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard.

This is a major victory for community forces who fought for it survival, and will save the region from a major economic loss.

Portsmouth Navy Yard saved???

This morning in NPR, the chairman of the base closing commission was interviewed, and he used Portsmouth Navy Yard as an example of a base that might deserve to be taken off the closure list.

Was he telegraphing the announcement later today?

He also singled out Oceana (in Virginia?) as a base that wasn't on the original list, but which maybe should be closed.

It'll be interesting to see what happens to these two.

OS X on generic PCs still a possibility.

Back in June I wrote about Apple's plan to switch to Intel processors. I was disappointed when Apple clarified this plan to state that they would never allow OS X to be run on a generic PC. But as time goes on this is looking more and more like it could be a red-herring.

The hacked dev version that has been released and is being run on plain vanilla PCs continues to look like it could be a trojan horse to allow Apple to sneak into this bet-the-company new business model.

This must be keeping Bill Gates awake at night.

The selling of the pentagon

I am just so horrified and disappointed by the never-ending, self-serving, callousness of the Bush government.

Now they are using the gravestones of military who died in Iraq to promote and justify this war.

Yahoo News:

Unlike earlier wars, nearly all Arlington National Cemetery gravestones for troops killed in Iraq or Afghanistan are inscribed with the slogan-like operation names the Pentagon selected to promote public support for the conflicts.

Families of fallen soldiers and Marines are being told they have the option to have the government-furnished headstones engraved with "Operation Enduring Freedom" or "Operation Iraqi Freedom" at no extra charge, whether they are buried in Arlington or elsewhere. A mock-up shown to many families includes the operation names.

Internet Advertiser Wakeup Day

Nov 13, 2005:

We, the undersigned, wish to demonstrate the pointless nature of forced web site registration schemes and the dubious demographic data they collect.

On November 13th we will each register an account using fake details at one or more of these top 10 offending sites...

More...

Interview with Daily Show's Jon Stewart and Ben Karlin

They get (a little bit) serious for a minute to talk about the future of TV. Wired.com.

Stewart: "The Internet is just a world passing around notes in a classroom."

Party Game

A Mind Game:

Werewolf is a simple game for a large group of people (seven or more.) It requires no equipment besides some bits of paper; you can play it just sitting in a circle. I'd call it a party game, except that it's a game of accusations, lying, bluffing, second-guessing, assassination, and mob hysteria.

Weekend update

Busy weekend.

Spent a lot of time with Jan and her girls. I visited the rain curtailed airshow at Skyhaven airport on Saturday. Went to my niece's birthday party on Sunday.

I may post more detail on these later.

Happy 80th to Steve's Mom

Steve Garfield is one of my old BCS*Mac running buddies. His mom turned 80 today. And she has her own blog.

Happy happy Millie!

SoBeDi Update

It was just about a year ago that I first adopted the South Beach Diet to try and lose weight. Since that time I've gone from around 200 pounds down to a low, this past spring, of 164.

Over the summer I rebounded a bit, back up into the mid '70s. Although I was getting a bit more exercise this summer than during the winter, I also found the temptation of ice cream and hamburger buns to be stronger than I could resist. But now it's time to get serious again.

For the past two weeks I've been back trying to follow the low-carb rules. I'm not as serious as Phase One, but I'm trying to be pretty dedicated. It seems to be working.

This morning my weight is back down to 172. I'm hoping this will be a good exercise weekend, so next week's drop could be very satisfying.

My doctors seem to believe that the "right" weight for me is 155. For most of the past year my ultimate goal was to get into the mid 60s. But now that I've seen what 165 is like, I think that, although 155 seems very low, it's closer to where I should really be.

Here I come.

Power-walking at the Mall

The latest edition of the Carol and Steve Show features the kids' visit to the new Apple Store on the Boston South Shore.

The two-parter includes Carol powerwalking, Steve riding an escalator, the embarrassingly fun moment when the store actually opens and the customers enter to the cheers of the staff, and Steve's secret method for making sure his raffle entry gets chosen. (Well, formerly secret.)

More about running Mac OS X on regular PCs

Wired.com:

Now the hacked version of OSx86 is running on Dell laptops and other PCs with Intel and AMD microprocessors.

...

The hackers suspect Apple wanted to demonstrate the weaknesses of TPM security, and may have plans to license its operating system to PC makers eventually.

"Perhaps Steve Jobs wants to be able to tell Apple shareholders, 'Hey, I tried,' before he licenses the operating system (to other manufacturers)," said Mashugly.

It seems like getting around the TPM wasn't that hard, according to a hacker nicknamed "parch," who said, "Apple could have made the lock heavier."

Would this be a good thing? or a bad thing?

Business 2.0:

What if Google wanted to give Wi-Fi access to everyone in America?

Get ready: Survivor Guatemala is coming.

Premieres Thursday, September 15.

Show creator Mark Burnett says this year's contestants will face triple-digit heat, crocodile infested waters, relentless mosquitoes and terrifying sounds of the howler monkeys. The first episode will feature an 11-mile, overnight hike through the jungle, as well as two additional (and yet-to-be-revealed) surprises in the first episode that will dramatically impact how they play the game.

From Yahoo! News

Official Site.

Did you know why it's chocolate, vanilla and strawberry?

One of my nieces has embarked on a career in the ice cream scooping business. Here's the kind of info that could really boost her tips.

History of the stuff in a banana split:

We still call them marshmallows, but there's no marsh mallow in them anymore. Candy made with honey and thickened with sap from the root of the marsh mallow (Athea officinalis) plant was savored in ancient Egypt. Marsh mallow, the plant, grows to be two to four feet tall. It has gray-green leaves and pink flowers. Not surprisingly, it grows in marshes and is related to other "mallow" plants, such as the rose mallow, the apricot mallow, and the common mallow.

More... [Thanks boing boing]

Simple, fun computer games

Here's a collection of simple, non-commercial, computer games.

www.ferryhalim.com/orisinal/

I think it's a GOOD thing.

When she speaks, her voice is like music to my ears. AFP via Yahoo! News:

The Mail quoted researcher Michael Hunter as saying, "The female voice is actually more complex than the male voice, due to differences in the size and shape of the vocal cords and larynx between men and women, and also due to women having greater natural 'melody' in their voices.

Crash and Zoom

Two things that are notable from the baseball standings I just posted.

1.) The once highflying Baltimore Orioles only managed to win 3 out or the previous 18 games.

B.) And the cella-dwelling Tampa Bay Devil Rays won 13 of 18. This after only winning 4 of 18 in the previous block.

After 108 games

With all the excitement here recently, I've fallen behind on updating the baseball standings. Here are the numbers adjusted for each team after 108 games.

==================================================
AL EAST STANDINGS
After 108 games each.

LA ANGELS    10  10  11  12  11   8
OAKLAND       9   5   7  11  14  15
TEXAS         9  10  12   7  11   7
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

We hates 'em

Al's Morning Meeting:

I have seen stories all over the country about how city/county parks become overpopulated with geese. Then, there has to be a big, dramatic -- and, some would say, inhumane -- roundup. Those roundups make great TV, but there has to be a better way.

It turns out there is a group called GeesePeace that promotes a sort of spaying and neutering kind of program. It involves treating the eggs while still in the nest, rather than rounding up adults, which mate for life, that could get separated or injured.

The federal government believes in GeesePeace enough to spend money on the group's projects. The city of St. Louis is getting serious about working with GeesePeace to do something about the big goose population that you might expect along the Mississippi.

Good Morning Doctor Chandra

For years I've been talking about the incredible complexity of the "web" causing it to "wake up" and a become self aware. Now this from Wired.com by way of KurzweilAI.net

It [the web] has already surpassed the 20-petahertz threshold for potential intelligence as calculated by Ray Kurzweil. For this reason some researchers pursuing artificial intelligence have switched their bets to the Net as the computer most likely to think first.

Around the Field: Sun July 31 2005 #8

Sunday's column:

The strongest aspects of our community remain steady, while we never stop searching for the next great thing. Not a bad formula.

The new and the old, the best and the better. It’ll all be back here next summer. See you then.

Around the Field Archive, 2005
Sun Jul 24 #1
Mon Jul 25 #2
Tue Jul 26 #3
Wed Jul 27 #4
Thu Jul 28 #5
Fri Jul 29 #6
Sat Jul 30 #7
Sun Jul 31 #8

I'm back

I Ieft Oshkosh around noon on Sunday. Since then I've been traveling, and visiting friends.

I'm back now, and I hope to post a final batch of Oshkosh pics later today.