December 11, 2009
Short Updates
Good morning! Whoa! 21°F this morning and wind gusts up to 40mph. Regardless of what the calendar says, winter is here! Fire up the wood stoves and crank 'em! (related link) must be happy when we talk like that...
Dropped the kidlets off at their schools. Michelle and her sister are at the YMCA where Michelle will teach her Hi/Lo class. I'm VPN'd into the San Diego and Finland offices today. (yes, at the same time).
As seen in the Twittersphere: At this rate there'll be more plaques at hotels saying "Tiger Woods 'slept' here" than George Washington. "Slept" will have to be in quotes. (related link)
Took my wife and her sister out for lunch. Stopped for caffeine on the way back. Timothy's friend Jamie is coming by after school. Fired up the play room stove to heat that space up. Hoping the four of 'em have a great time this afternoon.
Holy cow! Google has up'ed my Google Wave invites to 23. Are there 23 people I know who would even care to try the service? The only 2 I've given away were to fellow Qualcomm employees. Disclaimer: I still find the service a PITA.
Bookmarks I made today:
EWTN Mobile
Comment: EWTN now has a lighter weight website tuned for mobile phones. The original announcement referred to the iPhone, but it works well on my humble Palm Centro phone as well. It includes links to stream their audio and video to your phone. On a Palm Treo/Centro use the Kinoma Player to decode the Windows Media format streams. As always, be sure you have a good data plan before streaming audio/video.
High efficiency traffic lights don't melt snow cover, creating traffic hazard - WITI
Comment: Too funny! These new energy efficient traffic lights (based on LEDs instead of the usual bulbs) don't generate enough heat to keep them clear in a snow storm. So now we don't have to change them as often, but we now need to send up crews to brush them off. [Hat tip: Lynne Flatley ] "You can't win, you can't break even, you can't even quit the game."
Excerpt: Some Wisconsin communities that have installed high efficiency traffic lights are discovering the energy-saving bulbs are a hazard in a snow storm.City officials say the LED lights use less electricity and don't give off enough heat to melt ice or snow. So when the snow falls and the wind blows, t...
Why Switzerland Has The Lowest Crime Rate In The World
Comment: There's not much that I envy Switzerland about, but this would be one major exception! [Hat tip to Domenico Bettinelli for the pointer]
Excerpt: The key to freedom is to be able to have the ability to defend yourself &, if you dont have the tools to do that, then youre going to be at the mercy of whomever wants to put you away. Guns are deeply rooted within Swiss culture - but the gun crime rate is so low that statistics are not even kept.
Snapshots I took today:
