Monday, May 29, 2006

Space and Sky, Shipwrecks and Spooks



One of the things they teach you about blogging is to come up with a snazzy title to attract attention. So, looking into the pile of links I have been sitting on this week I found those seemed to fit nicely; both with alliteration and attention.

Space and Sky:

Captain Picard's Journal - One of the most hilarious blogs I've come across in a long time. I'm not pulling pages right now so hopefully the Paramount lawyers haven't been sic'ed on the the dude. A more realistic (and whiny) account by the Starship Captain regarding life on board the Enterprise--for example. A recent post accounts what happened when the crew found the laundry machines out of service. Clever stuff!

Lego Sky City - Another really awesome site I came across is BLDGBLOG. Kinda a fusion of the worlds of architecture and design and science. Anyway. Dude built one of those "Flash Gordon" sky cities of the future out of Legos. Good work. (I truly wish I had studied to be an architect in college...oh well...)

We Feel Fine - Not really space and sky, more of an "inner space" thing--but does cover in a magnificent way the world of the net. Billed as "An exploration of human emotion, in six movements." Specifically, it uses Java or Flash to track emotions and feelings on the net. It is really clever and beautifully done. I kinda wish I could stick this as my Active Desktop for a while. Go visit it and tell me what you think. It's very addicting and has a rich depth to it. Well worth the time to fully explore and get to know.

Shipwrecks and Spooks:

ROAMER - So what do you do if you are a bunch of MIT geniuses, have a Senior Design Project staring you in the face...and want to go play in the water? Well grasshopper, you go and convince your professors to let you design and build a "cheap" remotely operated aquatic motorized explorer. What? A remote viewing robot for undersea exploration. It is really cool. These guys give me hope in our science programs

Shipwreck World - that site led me to this one. I've been a fan of Clive Cussler for a long time. So much so I took archeology in college as my minor and had brief dreams in a career in underwater archeology...alas, I couldn't work out getting into SCUBA lessons in college. Anyway, this site highlights recent shipwreck discoveries around the world. Fun.

Five-Digit Spam - I've seen some patterns in some Spam I've gotten. Usually with a really weird foreign name in more than a few. I've pondered if there was some strange connection or conspiracy going on. But figured it was probably just an attempt to work around Spam filters. Peter Kaminski noticed a similar weird Spam trend. He saw that more than a few Spam in his comments contained arbitrary five-digit numbers in the body. Weird. Take a look--sinister or silly? You be the judge.

Numbers stations - I first heard about these number series shortwave radio broadcasts on NPR a long time ago. Listening to these things is very haunting. It is the stuff of spies and spooks and cold-war. Some are just downright creepy. Kinda reminds me of LOST and the whole numbers thing on that show.

Disney Haunted Mansion (via DoomBuggies.com) - This has to be my most favorite ride in all the world. I've been on this ride both out in Disney Land and Disney World. It is fantastic. If I could ride just one ride ever in a Disney park, it would be this one hands down. Ever been curious to look behind the Haunted Mansion's curtains? Check out the The Haunted Mansion Cast Members’ Manual of Standard Operating Procedure and take a secret backstage tour of what makes the ride tick. Warning: this is kinda like pulling back the curtain of OZ. Lots of stuff to see here on this site. It's gonna take me a while to get through everything.

Oh, despite my Dwight Silverman inspired "no-tech" holiday challenge weekend, I succumbed. Friday night I installed a DSL account at the home of a family-friend I give "tech-support" to--that is a story for another day!

I also got a really neat pc toy. I can't wait to share this one with you. But it will have to wait for next week when I can finish setting up the "other half." Nothing expensive or flashy. And definitely not attainment of my dream D-SLR camera. Although I found that Best Buy carries it and showed Lavie--she oo'ed and ahh'ed over it with me. So there is hope yet I might score one by the end of the year.

It's good to have your wife on your side when you are looking at Tech.

See you in the skies!
--Claus

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Claus,

HELP! I got another big computer problem including the loss of your email address. Please email me so I can give you the details.

Uncle Jimmie