2011 — 15 March: Tuesday
I can't say that the news from Japan1 is cheering me up, so I've accepted my neighbour's offer of a healthy brunch over at the bikers' café in a couple of hours. Gives me time to start feeling human again. Or, failing that, to get dressed.
It's 09:07 and the sun is currently doing its shiny thing.
A collection of hypotheses...
... of rectal provenance isn't a phrase I recall having used before. I found it in the "Jesus and Mo" strip as the duo sing a ditty in pursuit of the Templeton prize. I don't think the cartoon strip's author will be a contender anytime soon. But the list of winners is certainly interesting. I wouldn't have put Freeman Dyson, Billy Graham, and John D Barrow in the same room, for example.
I love maps
And this one...
... strikes me as a particularly fine one. Though it clearly shows a long road still to travel, on a journey begun in 1846.
Bad moon rising
I see that Ben "badscience" Goldacre has a secondary blog. He doesn't seem too keen on the quality of that upstanding news organ the "Daily Mail", does he? (My own opinion was formed rather earlier.)
The time (14:00) has come for dear Mama's next chocolate delivery, methinks. Then, maybe, an afternoon icecream? [Pause] The drive back from Mr Icecream was greatly improved by Beethoven's Triple Concerto — not a piece I know very well. It's "finishing off" as it were on the home hi-fi while I relax for a few minutes and vaguely contemplate what to do next, beyond emptying the washing machine when it, too, has finished finishing off. This domestic lark is simply endless :-)
Digits crossed...
... as I'm now (allegedly) experiencing the beauty of the web and am liable to be blown away by the speed of my newly-installed 64-bit final release of the IE9 web browser. We shall see how it behaves. Or, perhaps, if it behaves.
Stress testing atomic power
It seems the EU's energy commissioner now wants to re-examine many issues around the use of nuclear technology to generate power. Meanwhile, this piece in the NYT makes for interesting reading. I hardly dare ask my friend Carol which reactor design is in use at the elderly power plant on the Hudson a couple of miles upriver from her home in Croton.
This seems a reasonable (and calm) summary. (Link.)
I thought it only "fair" to try the Firefox 4.0 release candidate, too. No problems so far. It's 22:19 and I've finally made a start on my accumulated "Weeds". (Season six.)