machine project » Edible Estates. Great diatribe somewhat akin to reclaiming a kind of Victory garden.
I always thought cactus was a sensible and eco-responsible front lawn/easement design. Fried cactus anyone?
Good idea and I'm going to have to check out this Machine Project space.
I think I took a Mac toolkit programming class from this guy around 1993 or so? Solid guy...I had tons of fun in that class. Nice to see what he's been up to.
About KrazyDad
I think he may live near me as well, judging by the density of pics taken in my neighborhood!
(courtesy of fabulous geotagging feature @ flicker)
I volunteered as a timing control worker at the Treeline Rally - Treeline 2006 this past weekend. It was viciously hot but I was lucky to get an assignment on stage 1/6 which was mostly shaded and near a stream. The heat wasn’t so bad but the bugs sure were aggressive. Bug spray seemed to incite them more than repel them.
Worked with some cool people and got some great tips on co-driving and how to go about getting into that. I may try to take the training and get licensed sometime next year with a goal to do some co-driving by 2008.
Next rally cross race is July 29th at Glen Helen and then Volunteering again at the Gorman Ridge rally sometime in August.
Some minor press coverage of the Glen Helen Rally Cross Event including some quotes from yours truly here PE.com | Inland Southern California | Sports | Recreation
Also some video coverage here
Wooo Hoo! The Glen Helen rally cross event this past weekend was a fantastic time for me. I had put a lot of effort into preparring and made it out to some lake beds the weekends before to get some more seat time. It paid off nicely....3rd place finish in street stock class and 16th of 56 cars overall.
Good enough to earn me 100 points toward the California Rally Series championship in street stock and bump me up to first place in the standings.
One glitch in the organization at this event is that we never got to see our times until the next day. Four runs and no way to know if you were improving or how you were doing compared to the other drivers. Oddly, my morning runs were both the same time and my evening runs also the same, but 10+ secs better than the morning runs. Complete times for all classes are here: http://www.socalrallyx.com/
Next event is July 11th at Thunderhill in Willows. Going to be a loooong drive but I hear it's one of the best venues.
More photos up on my flickr site here http://www.flickr.com/photos/mjmeyer/
I volunteered to work the Rim of the World Rally this past weekend in Antelope valley, CA. I worked the Service and Fueling areas, keeping cars on tarps, chasing fuel out of the public areas, and generally trying to do whatever I could to be helpful to the various ametuer and professional rally teams there to compete.
On sat I got to start cars on the Del Sur North stage and then man the stopwatch for the return run on the Del Sur south stage. We had 43 cars to start with 1 minute intervals and what a hoot it was to see them up close and be part of such a well organized event.
Excellent article on JavaRanch Journal about Evil Unit Tests: clarifying some similar thoughts we've been having about functional vs. unit tests.
Ran the Ridgecrest Rallycross this weekend. Being the first points event of the season the competition was a bit stiffer than the San Diego rallycross. Still, I ended up 4th and was very happy with my improvement in times.
I still need to push harder, left foot braking has improved quite a bit but I need to stay in the throttle more, look further down the track, and hang it out more.
Points standing for the California Rally Series Rallycross championship are here. I'm third right now and plan to stay in the street stock class for the season.
More pics
Final Results, 1st annual - Del Mar Rally Cross - January 20, 2006
I did go...and decided to run...and met some really cool and vastly more experienced drivers who helped me a ton.
First run was pretty scary on street tires but I got the feel for it and the track got quite a bit faster by the last run of the day.
I didnt think I hit a cone on the last run, but must have missed that info at the gate. An experienced driver told me "if you dont hit at least 1 cone today, youre not pushing hard enough".
Judging by the results, it seems that not hitting cones was key to my success.
Ended up with a 2nd place finish in the street stock class!!! Recouped my entry fee and had enough left over for a coffee!
Some shots from the event on flickr by Christopher Keach
...and a slideshow which has some actual pics of my runs here!
Next event is the CRS rally school and competition Feb 11 & 12 in Ridgecrest. Going to need to get some better tires before hand. Word was the BFG KDWS are a good way to stay street.
Four Star Motorsports: "2002 Subaru group N Impreza STi Rally Car" for only $85K CDN...heh...only.
I think the build out is pretty reasonable. Not sure how the USDM 6 speed in the STi stacks up against the Spec "C" dogbox...but build vs. buy is an interesting puzzle.
Considering scrambling out to the San Diego Rally Cross event this weekend...might just spectate...limiting factors include:
- My helmet is expired! :-{
- rules seem to call for a 32mm restrictor on the STi!
- The RE070s are really going to suck in the dirt and even chasing some snow tires here in So Cal seems dicey.
Hmmm...maybe just grab a digicam and go spectate? Might go grab a helmet in case they have room for any fun runs!
Been planning to make a trestle table for my dining room. Rockler seems to have some slides specifically designed to allow extention leaves to be used at the ends of a trestle table.
See also pdf spec sheet
Other design ideas:
Nice information visualization taken by montioring RSS feeds from various news sources and analyzing the content to find the top 100 words and representing them in a 10 x 10 grid of photos.
The www.tenbyten.org site has a nice flash control to render and navigate the content.
Very nice galleries, vids, and other great Hubble shots at hubblesite.orgthat I ought to get onto my HTPC to compliment Celestia.
Purdue University scientists say extreme weather events, such as floods and heat waves, may increase in frequency and severity during the next century.
"The more detail we look at with these models, the more dramatic the climate's response is." - Noah S. Diffenbaugh, assistant professor of earth and atmospheric sciences, Purdue Climate Change Research Center.
"Critics have complained that climate models lack sufficient spatial detail to be trusted. In terms of looking at the whole contiguous United States, we've quadrupled the spatial detail and, as a result, it appears that climate change is going to be even more dramatic than we previously thought. Of course, we can never be completely certain of the future, but it's clear that as we consider more and more detail, the picture of future climate change becomes more and more severe."
James Irvine Garden, Little Tokyo
The James Irvine Garden in Little Tokyo tells a story that's worth hearing. But first you have to find the space, on a recessed plot at the Japanese American Cultural and Community Center in Little Tokyo. Take the lobby elevator to the basement and walk through an institutional-looking hallway to the doors that open to the garden. The painstakingly landscaped Japanese-style sanctuary is hidden just enough so that it's often empty.
Cross its perfectly manicured lawn, traverse two wooden bridges and you'll discover the fountainhead. The spring represents "the immigrants coming from Japan," says Robert Hori, director of board and donor relations at the center. Then the stream divides.
"One path is a turbulent, chilly path, and the other moves slowly, contains more placid waters," says Hori. "These are the two sides of the immigration experience: those who saw Japan as their homeland, and those who saw this as their own country." In the end, the two streams merge into a pond that symbolizes the great American melting pot.
What's Your Brand Mantra?: Brand as Ecosystem: "Right now we're focusing so much on the customer that we've lost sight of the big picture. When we focus on the customer, we see a person out there separate from us that we need to identify, label and categorize. "
"We need to move beyond a focus on a specific department (silo mentality) to a focus on the interconnections between individuals (system mentality). What are the most critical connections in your company? Why not have VPs over key connections instead of components?"
Teradata Magazine | IN THE BEGINNING: An RDBMS history: "'SQL is no longer a language for real users, if it ever was,' says Date. 'It has become a developer's language.' "
Nice retrospective of the massive research effort going on decades ago to bring us SQL.
Sandia National Labs: News: Team investigates Active Denial System for security applications: Sandia researchers Willy Morse and James Pacheco fine-tune the small-sized Active Denial System.
Rumored to be ready for deployment in Iraq by 2006. What's that burning smell?
"Legal and Illegal Uses. The information on this web site is made available solely to protect the public. Anyone who uses this information to commit a crime or to harass an offender or his or her family is subject to criminal prosecution and civil liability.
Any person who is required to register pursuant to Penal Code section 290 who enters this web site is punishable by a fine not exceeding $1,000, imprisonment in a county jail not exceeding six months, or by both the fine and imprisonment. (Pen. Code, � 290.46, subd. (i).) "
A friend with limited internet access asked me to check their neighborhood. My first hits from Google were for PAID sites that give you a samle report for free but charge for a full report that puports to include photos! These are people who, while obviously convicted of the unthinkable, have been through the justice system...they served their time.
How does this help them, after hopefully being reformed by prision, return to try to become a functioning member of society?
What's the avergage rate of repeat offenses? Would the effort and money be better spent on treatment instead of simply incarceration?
Also spooky and confusing, the disclaimer for the CA offical site above seems to mean either:
A) that if youre on the registry, you are barred from using the web site ??
or
B) if youre supposed to be on the registry and, presumably, havent registered yet, you can go to jail for checking to see if you're already registered ???
Does this thing have an expiration, or are you forever to be listed?
A bizzare new flavor of FEAR.
