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This is cool.  I just added a plug-in to the blog that auto-magically creates a mobile version!  You know how some web sites (including this one until now) would display terribly on mobile devices, such as Blackberry’s, Windows Mobile smartphone’s, and iPhones?  That’s no longer a problem here.  I’ve tested it from my Motorola Q and it displays great!

I also just added some new buttons for Digg, Twitter, Facebook, Reddit, and Yahoo Buzz.  The old one were so small and bland that they practically faded into the background.  The new buttons which appear at the end of each post and page are more like what you’re used to seeing on other sites. I’m still playing with this, so it may change, but if you like the site, spread the word by using the buttons!

gk

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Sergeant Pepper told the band to – nope, it wasn’t the Beatles.  40 years ago today, Apollo 11 landed on the moon.  I’ve been listening to WeChooseTheMoon.org a lot over the past weekend.  It’s being put on by the John F. Kennedy Library, and they’re doing a “real time” replay of the entire Apollo 11 mission, just 40 years later.  You can listen to the audio between Houston and the spacecraft, exactly as it happened 40 years ago.

It’s amazing how wrapped up you can get in something that happened 40 years ago….  I was 7 at the time.  I don’t remember much about it expect that my parents woke me up so I could watch the first steps on the moon.

I found a couple of other sites that also have some great info about the mission.  NASA has a page that where you can download the transcripts of the mission.  There are three different transcripts available:

• A Technical air to ground transcript which is all the radio communications between the spacecraft and ground control.  Available in the original raw PDF (a 16MB scan of the original paper transcript), an OCR PDF (1.9MB transcribed text), and a 1.3MB  HTML version.
• A “PAO” spacecraft commentary version.  This includes the commentary from the NASA Public Affairs Office, which adds some additional information about what ground control and the spacecraft are talking about.  Available in original scanned PDF (18MB), OCR PDF (2.5MB), and HTML (1.3MB) versions.
• A on-board transcript of conversations in the command module.  This one is the conversations that went on in the command module, so you’d be able to read what the astronauts said, and their side of the radio transmissions.  Available in the same scanned PDF (5.7MB), OCR PDF (1.6MB), and HTML (.5MB) versions.

The on board transcript is really cool…  You get to read stuff like this:

04 00 04 40 CMP
Okay, I wouldn’t be surprised …. all over this goddam stuff.

04 00 05 00 CMP
A three-ring circus. I got a fuel cell purge in progress and trying to set up cameras and brackets, watch an AUTO maneuver, and -

04 00 05 22 CMP
Jesus Christ!

04 00 07 58 CMP
NORMAL, NORMAL.

04 00 09 19 CMP
Another MASTER ALARM coming.

04 00 10 52 CMP
Stand by for MASTER ALARM.

04 00 12 54 CMP
Neil, where’s the voice tape recorder, you know?

04 00 12 59 CDR
Might be in the …

04 00 13 01 CMP
Okay. Oh, you son of a bitch, you! Gah!

*CMP is Command Module Pilot Michael Collins, CDR is the Mission Commander Neil Armstrong, and (although it’s not shown in this bit) LMP is the Lunar Module Pilot Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin.  The numbers in front of the transcript segments are the number of days, hours, minutes, and seconds since the mission started.

And here’s a link to the original NASA footage of the mission.  Which reminds me – it’s kind of ironic that Walter Cronkite passed away this weekend….

Enjoy!

gk

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I submitted this review of the “Gator” mulching blade for the 28″ Snapper HiVac mower earlier tonight on Amazon, and I figured I might as well post it here….  The Gator blade has a unique design, but it didn’t work well for me.

I purchased the Gator blade for my 28″ Snapper Hi Vac about a month ago. First I put it on straight out of the box – terrible cut. The grass was ragged and it totally missed blades of grass sticking up 2″ in spots. I sharpened the blade (it wasn’t very sharp from the factory) and it’s a bit better, but in no way would I consider it acceptable.

The standard Snapper Hi Vac (non-mulching) blade has an excellent cut – even better than the John Deere 445 I had a few years ago (at a different house with 3 acres to cut). I bought the Gator because from what I could find online it was the best mulching blade.

If it’s the best, I’d sure hate to see the worst! I tried the Gator both without and with the mulching cover on the Snapper mower. Without the cover (basically a plug that covers the discharge) it has a decent cut – IF you cut at the slowest possible speed – but it gets progressively worse if you try to cut at a normal (2nd or 3rd gear) speed.

With the discharge plug, it’s simply unacceptable at any speed. Even after going over the same area 2 and 3 times it leaves blades of grass sticking up uncut.

The blade is super sharp, and no, it’s not installed upside down. I’m typing this while letting the motor cool off before I remove the Gator blade once and for all. I would not recommend this to anyone for cutting grass – it might work ok for chopping leaves in the fall, but so does the standard Snapper mulching blade.

From my observations, it doesn’t appear that the Gator blade has enough lift.  It doesn’t “suck” the grass up straight so it can be cut cleanly. To me, the Gator appears to have just a tad bit more lift than the standard Snapper mulching blade, but not much more.  And the standard mulching blade also works fine for chopping up leaves.

Bottom line – save your money and use the standard Snapper blade or mulching blade. The standard blade gives a great cut, and the standard mulching blade chops up leaves. No need to purchase the Gator, which doesn’t do anything well from my experience.

gk

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This is simply my experience from the past few days, but I’m pretty impressed with Microsoft’s Bing.com search engine.  For example, I’ve been looking for a hat rack, one of those that stand up in a hallway with a few hooks at the top to hang hats, coats, scarves, etc.

I Googled “Knoxville, TN, furniture, hat rack” and on the first page of results there’s only one entry that’s even remotely related to what I’m looking for – and it’s online only, not local in Knoxville.

When I did the same search on Bing, the first 3 results are exactly what I’m looking for – hat racks available locally.  And the next 2 results are for hat racks available online.   I found what I needed and picked it up the same day.   Bing found it for me when Google didn’t.

I don’t remember the other examples right now, but today was a concrete example of Bing delivering better search results than Google.  That’s the first time I’ve been able to say that someone beat Google in years – and I’ve been online since Compuserve and Genie in the late 80’s.  I may look back on this a year from now and say “what was I thinking!” but as of 10 minutes ago, Bing.com has replaced Google.com as my default search engine.

gk

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I took a look this evening at the various search terms people used when getting to this blog.  Since there’s a dearth of information with real world data about heat pumps, I’m not surprised that various searches about “heat pumps”, “heat pump cost”, and “heat pump reliability” are high on the list.  I described my frustrations about that last year when I needed to purchase a new heat pump.

I am surprised at one term that showed up this week – twice.  It’s “darwins theory of relativity”.  No, I’m not joking.

I give my opinion on a wide variety of topics here, and I have talked about Darwin in the past.  As in here, and here, and here.  I don’t remember talking about relativity, but I guess it’s possible, since (as I understand it) Einstein’s theory of relativity is the best explanation we currently have regarding how the universe operates.  It contains lots of predictions which have been verified to the limits of our equipment, such as the effect of gravity on light, and I know of no data that contradicts the theory.

I just searched for that term on this blog, and I referenced relativity in the “Why is Darwin still controversial” post.

But come on – “Darwin’s Theory of Relativity?”  Really?  Twice in one week?

From the logs I can’t tell if it was the same person who happened to search for that term twice or two different idiots.  But it happened.  So it must be possible.

Another search term I found strange was “who invented the stupid laws we have”.  Only one hit from that term, but it’s still really strange.  I mean strange as in dumb.  I’m curious to find out who thinks laws are “invented”, and why they would think that way.  Laws are simply the rules we (as a society) decide to use in dealing with each other.  They aren’t invented, they are proposed, debated, perhaps modified, passed, and only then do they become law.

Many of them – like the restrictions on freedom and various illegal searches passed after 9/11 – are later ruled unconstitutional, but none of them are “invented”.  Laws may be “proposed”, “submitted”, “debated”, and “bullshit”, but they are not invented as the term is commonly defined.

Just thought it was weird how people found this site.   I get many more hits from valid searches, but these were really weird and for some reason I felt the need to say so.

gk

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Just had to post this link to an article in The Sun.   Check out the pictures of tennis player Simona Halep – there’s even a video on the Sun website….

According to the story:  The 17-year-old claims they are a disadvantage and has vowed to have a reduction later this year.  She declared: “The breasts make me uncomfortable when I play.“

I think there are laws about plastic surgery for minors – for the sake of the future of tennis, I hope so…..

gk

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Brazilian style bikini waxing is close to being banned in New Jersey.  FoxNews.com has a story on this hairy problem.

Let’s get to the root of the problem.  New Jersey – and many other states – actually has a state “Cosmetology and Hairstyling Board” which allows the state to stick it’s fingers into your business.

Do we really need a state run board to determine how fuzzy a beaver can be?

Is this the kind of outside the box regulation that we want from government?

Do we want government sticking around private honey pots?

I think it’s just another example of the government plucking around where it’s not wanted.

Do I really need to wax on about this burning issue?

gk

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Evidently publishers and authors are upset at Kindle’s text to speech feature, and they’ve convince Amazon to allow them to disable that function for their books.  It’s a bit nuts to me, as many teachers do it everyday in classrooms, and many parents read to their kids.  Are they also violating copyright law?

The LA Times has a good story about the Kindle controversy here.  In it they say But the Authors Guild objected to the text-to-speech function, saying Amazon doesn’t have the right to essentially turn e-books into audio books. Guild President Roy Blount Jr., well-known for his role on the NPR quiz show “Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me,” wrote an opinion column in the New York Times denouncing the function.

“They created a hybrid product,” Paul Aiken, executive director of the Authors Guild, said when reached by phone late Friday. “It was being used in a way they had not been given permission for.”

And further down in the story Ben Sheffner, a Los Angeles copyright attorney and author of the blog Copyrights & Campaigns, said Amazon probably reversed course to maintain good relationships with authors, not because of legal concerns.

Sheffner said that Amazon probably wouldn’t need different rights to sell an e-book with the text-to-speech function enabled, but that book contracts could differ dramatically so there was no way to know for sure.”I think this announcement was 95% motivated by business and relationship concerns,” he said. “The copyright claims were speculative at best.”

A good article that pretty much sums up my feelings is here.  It has this quote:  They don’t have the right to read a book out loud,” said Paul Aiken, executive director of the Authors Guild. “That’s an audio right, which is derivative under copyright law.”

Bullshit.  I may not have the right to record a book and sell my audio version for profit (without permission) – but I have never heard of reading out loud being called a copyright violation.  You’d think Mr. Aiken would be in favor of anything which promotes sales of books – after all, the Authors Guild couldn’t exist if no one bought the books.  He’s shooting members of the guild in the back with this insane position.

gk

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CitiBank evidently isn’t aware of various Nigerian scams, because they actually fell for it.  No, I’m not making this up.  Here’s a link to all the details according to the NY Times.

Swindles in which someone overseas seeks access to a person’s bank account are so well known that most potential victims can spot them in seconds.

But one man found success by tweaking the formula, prosecutors say: Rather than trying to dupe an account holder into giving up information, he duped the bank. And instead of swindling a person, he tried to rob a country — of $27 million.

To carry out the elaborate scheme, prosecutors in New York said on Friday, the man, identified as Paul Gabriel Amos, 37, a Nigerian citizen who lived in Singapore, worked with others to create official-looking documents that instructed Citibank to wire the money in two dozen transactions to accounts that Mr. Amos and the others controlled around the world.

I know everyone has seen the Nigerian email scam spam, but who’d a thunk that Citi would fall for a more elaborate version of the scheme?  Maybe this is the real reason they need billions in bailouts? 

gk

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It’s the 200th anniversary of Charles Darwin’s birth, so here are a few relevant links to celebrate the day.

First off, if you haven’t read The Origin of Species, read it.  It’s very readable and easy to follow. If you’re too cheap to buy the book, here’s a link to a free text version from Project Gutenberg.

With that out of the way, here are a few links with good stories and info.  Enjoy!

Human evolution kicks into high gear – from MSNBC

We’re all living in Darwin’s world – MSNBC

On Darwin Day, many in America beg to differ – From the Christian Science Monitor

Wikipedia has several good articles about Darwin linked from their main page today, but here are a couple of direct links in case you aren’t reading this the same day.

History of evolutionary thought

Evolution

Evolution as theory and fact

Introduction to evolution

gk

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