Social Sites

I was listening to NPR today and they had a story about a social media site I’d never heard of. It’s called Pinterest. The site is an online scrapbook / bulletin board, and it’s one of the fastest growing websites in history: 10 million unique visitors last month!

Here are two NPR stories about it: Story 1 and Story 2.

The sign-in is an invite, which attests to it’s popularity. I signed up and we’ll see how long it takes to get invited… :-)

There’s another one out there called Posterous Spaces. I was able to sign-up for this one. I’ll master these sites and incorporate them into the blog. Join! Get your username now.

Update: Pinterest sent the invite in one day!

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Categorized as Site Stuff

Thumbs

I’ve been trying to treat some matching winter cracks on my thumbs by wrapping them in cream and bandages. I’m fighting off and conquering some other major cracks on my hands this winter, but thumbs are tough…

Cream, bandages and thumbs don’t mix when you’re trying to survive in a snow covered cabin. You need your hands for so many things. I’ve come to believe that thumbs are our most important appendage…

SlideShow (Thumbs)
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Categorized as House

CityToCity

I know you think I’ve been doing nothing but grabbing other peoples content lately. The truth is, I’ve been creating a new app which is now ready to deploy.

It’s a Directions app that takes a From and To City and shows you how to get there. My ultimate goal is to show the current weather from City to City…

So, introducing my new app: CityToCity.

Update: I’ve got the Lat/Lon of each point, and places to put good stuff. Weather next!

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Categorized as Site Stuff

Ski Bum

I totally plagiarized this article from the 2/23/2012 Teton Valley News. If Ken sees this and wants me to take it down, I will, so read fast! :-) I am including a link though, to our wonderful local paper, and this content is the copyrighted property of Ken Levy.

Karen’s a friend and I wanted everyone to see how cool she is! Read the article by column, left to right, then drop down below the black line to read the rest.

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Categorized as The Valley

Note From Rod

My buddy Rod is feeling depressed and he sent me this email:

Over five thousand years ago, Moses said to the children of Israel, “Pick up your shovels, mount your asses and camels, and I will lead you to the Promised Land.”

Nearly 75 years ago, when Welfare was introduced, Roosevelt said, “Lay down your shovels, sit on your asses, and light up a Camel, this is the Promised Land.”

Today, Congress has stolen our shovels, taxed our asses, raised the price of Camels and mortgaged the Promised Land!

I was so depressed last night thinking about Health Care Plans, the economy, multiple wars, lost jobs, savings, Social Security, retirement funds, etc… I called a Suicide Hotline. I had to press 1 for English.

I was connected to a call center in Pakistan and when I told them I was suicidal, they got excited and asked if I could drive a truck…

We are really in trouble!

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The Perfect Answer

I found this very interesting question and answer today online:

Does it cost more to turn lights on and off then it does to just leave them on?

No, this is quite false. I suspect this is a distortion of the idea that turning lights on and off stresses them and shortens their lives, but the power used is a nearly linear function of operating time.

For an incandescent lamp, there is a very brief high current impulse when they’re first turned on, but this doesn’t remotely justify leaving them turned on — it stresses filament lamps, but doesn’t require very much power.

I speak as a NASA engineer who designed the power supplies for the Space Shuttle lights. For that mission, because of limited available power, we had to research this exact issue, and concluded that the lights should only be turned on when in use.

The guy that answered the question is Paul Lutus and he was the perfect person to do so.

He also has this great quote:

“The secret to using modern social media is not locating people who actually have a particular answer, but filtering out all the people who think they have the answer”.

I also relate to him: we’ve both developed applications in Assembly language!

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Categorized as Various

Horse Drawn Cart

I was in Victor today, waiting a few minutes before picking up my Community School kids, when I spotted a dog harassing a horse drawn cart coming up behind me. I thought the cart driver was going to shoot the dog as it was keeping him from proceeding up the road.

I rolled my window down and took this shot as they finally passed by.

And this picture seems to imply that the dog was his…

Strange…

SlideShow (Horse Drawn Cart)

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Categorized as The Valley

Combo Toy

I was playing with Piper tonight and her three main toys got tangled up. My neurological damage prohibited me from untangling them, so I just created one toy.

She likes it!

SlideShow (Combo Toy)
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Categorized as Piper

Clean Again

Our washing machine has been broken for some time now and the dryer was old. Laundromats really suck and clothes management has been interesting.

The new washer/dryer has arrived and it’s sweet! Here they are in their virgin state, but the washer is working as I type.

Update: I’ve been doing laundry all evening and these devices are amazing! Computer controlled washing and drying to perfection. This technology has come a long way…

SlideShow (Clean Again)

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Categorized as House

Horses

I was coming into the base this morning and spotted a lot of horses along 5th Avenue. Horses stretched all the way to the back forty and I don’t see any food source…

SlideShow (Horses)
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Categorized as The Valley

Hot Pussy

I woke up in the middle of last night to do my pussy check. I instinctively know where she is throughout the night and my hand was sliding slowly underneath the covers when I suddenly encountered a very hot, pretty pussy!

Turns out I’d left her side of the electric heating blanket on seven! She apparently was loving it. Pussies love to be hot, but this was too much. I would have had a well done pussy on my hands by morning.

I turned it back down just in time…

Update: She’s been in and out of my office all night! In and out, in and out, in and out…

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Categorized as House

Winter Sports Day

Today’s the day that the High School kids get to play at Grand Targhee. This image is very telling as to what kind of equipment they prefer…

I remember when Riley joined the ski club in high school, he was a boarder (still is) but I figured that was just a natural transition from his custom designed skateboard.

What was that you asked? It was our first online purchase shortly after the Internet appeared. He picked out the parts, had it assembled in L.A. and shipped to Kent, WA.

Paid for it with his own money! He was pretty young, about thirteen…

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Secret Beach…

Riley and Jess just got back from a trip down into Oregon and they made a point of venturing over to the Oregon coast before arriving at their spa destination. My boy has picked up a lot of my adventurism from me. We made a point of including the Oregon coast in a couple of our vacations.

We’ve also done Secret Beach together. This is a very special spot south of Carmel, CA. where my ashes will be scattered. Here’s some photos:

It’s funny to look at old photos, I notice my gig line really sucked in some of them :-)

And yes, that’s a young Riley walking by the big rock…

SlideShow (Secret Beach…)
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Categorized as Travels

Encamped

I was going to put Piper in Lucy and drive around for awhile today. I’ve never driven her anywhere yet and thought this would be a good day. Then I opened my office blinds…

Then I opened the kitchen window blinds…
Then I opened the garage door…

Piper just went back to bed and I’m making myself a cocktail…

SlideShow (Encamped)

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Categorized as House, Piper

Bucket List

  • Mardi Gras.
    • A festival where women love to show off their breasts, along with lots of fun drunk people. Why am I not there? Now! I’ve been to New Orleans several times, even down on Bourbon Street, just never made the event.
  • Hawaiian Islands Cruise.
    • I was a well paid computer consultant for American Hawaii Cruises back in the eighties. I could have gotten a great discount on their 7 day island hopping cruise. Never got around to it, even though I made it to Hawaii often.
  • Long Summer Vacation.
    • A lazy drive around the U.S. in a small camper for three months in the summer.

That’s pretty much it…

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Categorized as Various