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Peter Nixon
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Monday, 26 December 2005
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In the future, in an effort to save gas and make money, we may
be required to have GPS units on our cars and pay per mile.
This raises many civil rights concerns.
I'm not going to write too much about this because this
commentary by CNET News.com Chief Political Correspondant Declan
McCullagh does a good job of explaining the issues involved.
In the past, the Federal Highway Administration has given
funds...
This is already underway in the UK, but not for pay per mile reasons, but for universal surveillance.
Unbelievable! But true.
[morons.org headlines]
8:17:24 PM 
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David Pescovitz:
Over at Cryptomundo, Loren Coleman has posted his list of the "Top Cryptozoology Stories Of 2005." Thanks to Loren, many of these cryptozoological events are familiar to regular BB readers. It was certainly a great year for high weirdness and strange animals. Below are the headlines. Follow the link for Loren's analysis.
1. The Rediscovery of the Ivory-billed Woodpecker
2. Filming of the First Live Giant Squid
3. New Homo floresiensis Discoveries
4. New Animal Discovered in Borneo
5. First Cryptozoology and Art Symposium at Bates College
6. Bobby Clark's Manitoba Bigfoot Video
7. Bigfoot Bounty
8. Mystery Photos of Cryptid Felids and Fish
9. Disney Yeti Expedition
10. The Laotian Rock Rat is Discovered at a Meat Market
Weird world, man.
Link
[Boing Boing]
8:04:33 PM
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Sunday, 25 December 2005
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Get ready for a minute with 61 seconds.
Fantastic! Now I'll have time to do all those things I've left to the last second!
[ABC News: Science and Technology]
3:56:30 PM
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Saturday, 24 December 2005
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Australian researchers have discovered that too much Christmas cheer not only can result in a headache, but damage your DNA, sometimes permanently.
Oh dear, it's a good thing I'm not planning on leaving any more copies of my DNA on the planet, and those I have, were organised a long time time ago.
[ABC News: Health]
8:38:23 PM
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Wednesday, 21 December 2005
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Mark Frauenfelder:
 Interesting interactive Flash movie shows model retouching before and after.
This is more than just interesting; it's a little scary. These essentially fake images are the basis for comparison for young girls evaluating their own looks, so they become the instruments of low self esteem and poor body image. Just a step to an eating disorder.
Link
[Boing Boing]
3:15:28 AM
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Scientists say they may have found a missing European spacecraft nearly two years after all contact with the probe was lost as it attempted to land on Mars.
So what now?
Can they get something there to try to find out what happened.
[ABC News: Science and Technology]
3:05:26 AM
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Saturday, 17 December 2005
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I loved her then and I guess I love her still
Hers is the face I see when a certain mood moves in
She lives in my blood and skin
Nick Cave from Let Love In
11:46:16 PM
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Sunday, 11 December 2005
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The term 'podcast' has been declared Word of the Year by the New Oxford American Dictionary.
The term is defined as "a digital recording of a radio
broadcast or similar program, made available on the internet for
downloading to a personal audio player".
The word is derived from a combination of "broadcasting" and "iPod"...Another triumph for the unstoppable iPod. [BBC]
9:28:03 PM
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Saturday, 10 December 2005
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By 90%!
Due to the strange way that statistics work, this means that a baby sleeping on its stomach without a dummy is 2.5 times more at risk of SIDS than a baby with one.
It completely elimates the statistical risk posed by the baby sleeping on its front.
Even so, researchers are advising sleeping on the back, with or without dummies.
[Scientific American]
7:11:47 AM
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Cory Doctorow:
This alarm clock launches a small, noisy helicopter to hover over your bed when it goes off:
One thing that sometimes wakes you up at night and prevents you from sleeping is the mosquito or blowfly when flying around your room. You can't and don't want to fall asleep again until you've caught it. These produces adrenalin and requires movements. The alarm clock blowfly works like a "blowfly" that at the desire time it escapes from a cage in your room. It starts moving and producing sound around you - to turn it off you should catch it and put it back in the cage.
Now, everyone needs one of these, right?
Link
(via Gizmodo)
[Boing Boing]
6:34:51 AM
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Friday, 9 December 2005
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Perth researchers say early tests indicate a new drug has the potential to reduce the damage caused by burns.
Progress.
[ABC News: Health]
8:44:54 AM
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sylvan: pertaining to woods or forests.
The original botanical name for the chimpanzee was homo silvanus, meaning man of the the forest.
It was decided that the genus homo should be reserved for one living species only, ours.
So the chimp became pan troglodytes.
There is a tradition that a species should retain its first botanical name, which has assisted a movement to restore to the chimp its human status. Gene study is borderline as to whether chimps and humans ought to be the same genus, but personally, it gets my vote.
[Dictionary.com Word of the Day]
1:33:48 AM
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I love my husband, but I need my own place.
This is from Salon's agony aunt column. You'll need to click on an ad probably, to gain a day's premium membership. It only takes a minute, and there is a lot in Salon that's worth reading.
This particular issue is one that Felicity and I discussed years ago. We thought we would be happier together as next door neighbours. It seems irrelevant now, but really, if it helps resolve conflicting lifestyles and hours, and if you can afford it, why not?
[Salon - salon]
1:01:14 AM
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Last Sunday morning I attended the baptism of a former co-worker of Felicity's.
She was baptised in the Anglican St Peter's Cathedral in North Adelaide. Adult baptism is pretty rare in the Anglican church, but she was one of two that day.
I really enjoyed the service, a pretty high church, almost anglo-catholic affair. The music was exquisite. I just love plainsong, particularly performed live, but there were also motets, and medieval hymns. One Irish hymn from the 8th century was so breathtakingly lovely, and recognisably Irish, as heard against much more modern Irish folk music.
I was fascinated by the ritual of bells, candles, procession, costume, and incense; oh, the incense!
I love the poetry and ritual of religion, I love the social justice promoted by the great monotheisms, I love the hope, the focus on joy, the emphasis on love, but I still favour reason over the supernatural.
Afterwards, lunch at the Cathedral Hotel; quite good, but always too much for me. Which is weird, because in the right social setting I can eat like a pig.
As I've said before, after a Jewish funeral and a Christian baptism, a Muslim wedding would have topped my week.
12:48:08 AM
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Thursday, 8 December 2005
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Tests on the hair and skull fragments of Ludwig von Beethoven show the legendary 19th century German composer died from lead poisoning.
Poor grumpy old bugger - wait a minute - he wasn't much older than I am!
[ABC News: Entertainment (with Mpeg1)]
1:31:02 AM
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Wednesday, 7 December 2005
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On Sunday I went to the Ramsgate Hotel at Henley Square to see my old chum Ian Lehmann play in the band Club Schmaltz. I had phoned one of my old school friends I have recently re-met, one with whom I have been having pretty regular, and I must say, delightful, email contact, to let her know that he would be there, as she had known him reasonably well and hadn't seen him for more than thirty years. I didn't expect her to go, and told her more out of courtesy than anything else to give her a convenient way to see him if she wanted to. As it happened, she did turn up so we watched the band together.
It's a very good band; very much a party band, with a repertoire of hits aimed at anyone who's listened to Top 40 style radio any time in the last 50 years. Ian was playing better than I've ever heard him. The show was slick, with relaxed and often surprising presentation from a hard working front man. I'd met all the players before (worked with the drummer for quite a while) except for the keyboard player who was new. I was surprised by this, having met the old keyboard player a few times. He had seemed very enthusiastic about the band, but has apparently left to pursue other projects.
We stayed for nearly three sets, which is longer than I would have stayed had I been on my own, and a lot longer than if I'd been with Felicity. I would have left for the Bacchus around the corner. But I couldn't leave my friend alone in the pub, so I stayed too.
When I told this to Felicity, she said, "Why didn't you just ask her to go with you to the Bacchus".
Now, why didn't I think of that?
In fact, I think I did, but reasoned that by that time, the band in the Bacchus would probably be as unpleasantly loud as Club Schmaltz was getting, and, while we had seats at the Ramsgate, we would be very unlikely to get seats at the Bacchus. Although we may have got seats outside which would have solved both problems. Didn't think of that.
Oh well. There'll be other times.
11:37:02 PM
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Tuesday, 6 December 2005
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This morning.
My first peach of the season.
An indescribable gorgeosity.
7:57:23 AM
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Monday, 5 December 2005
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Farmers may one day blast out a recording of kangaroos thumping their feet to scare them off, new research suggests.
How weird is this?
[ABC News: Offbeat (with Mpeg1)]
10:47:54 PM
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It began with a phone call last Tuesday night from a singer I had helped mentor when she was 15/16 to tell me her sister, who married a piano player I've played with off and on since 1979, is expected to die in the next few hours. For years I've enjoyed her hospitality and friendship, becoming fast wine drinking, cheese eating, philosophy arguing combatants/chums.
She's run a race against secondary cancers following a thought-to-be-successful breast cancer treatment years ago. With doctors in her family she had access to the best specialists and care. One flare-up would be successfully treated only to have another more aggressive attack somewhere else a few months later. She just wanted to see her two children into their teen years. She's a few years short. Her husband, the most generous in spirit man I've ever known will be devastated. They adore each other.
The next night came the phone call I'd been dreading.
Being Jewish, she was to be buried Thursday. Such a sad time. I had never been to a Jewish funeral, and was touch by many of the slightly unfamiliar traditions. The first thing I noticed was that something was missing. At any gathering of this family with their friends, you would normally constantly hear "Shalom", "Shalom" as people arrived. Their were no greetings of "Shalom". I looked this up later, and sure enough, it is not appropriate to greet people with "Peace" at a funeral. I was very touched by the tradition of the mourners filling the grave, three shovels full each. This is a very nice tradition. It's seen as the highest mitzvah (good work), because it is a kindness that the recipient can never repay.
Som of the musicians who had worked with the deceased's husband, and indeed the deceased, and who had always enjoyed the hospitality of the home were there, and unusually, were all lost for words.
I mourned Wednesday with wine.
I mourned Thursday morning with loud music. Toots & the Maytals; lyrics kept jumping out with new significance, Love is gonna let me down, love is gonna walk out on me, I got dreams to remember, etc.
I mourned at the funeral.
I mourned afterwards with cooking.
I'm pretty well done.
There was a sticky point though. After the ceremony, when I went to embrace the deceased woman's husband, he said that she had given him a message. He was to tell Chris Finnen and me how much she loved both of us. I pretty much lost it then.
The whole experience reminds me again, that if we don't make the loving gesture now, we may never get the chance to.
10:39:22 PM
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The most noticable difference is the improved performance...
The Mozilla Foundation has released Firefox 1.5, the first
release since 1.0.7 and the first major update since 1.0.
Firefox is still the recommended browser for visiting
morons.org, as it is arguably the fastest and most
standards-compliant browser...
I have four browsers on my main computer, none of them Internet Explorer. On my old computer I use the long-deceased Cyberdog still. But Firefox has become my main browser.
[morons.org headlines]
10:02:20 PM
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Sunday, 4 December 2005
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Against all better judgement I
went to a smallish high school reunion the Saturday before last. An old
friend was needling me; no that's not fair, encouraging me, but I must
admit that I suggested that pestering might produce results. So she did
pester me, but only a bit. I could never refuse her anything.
It was very stressful for me, so I ate too little and drank too much. I
don't think I disgraced myself, but I probably did.
I have to say I enjoyed the whole thing pretty much. Certainly, while I
was there. Conversations with people I had forgotten I knew were
delightful; one man in particular was such a warm open human being I
think I fell in love with him!
On the other hand, some conversations were just strange. One man I
don't remember speaking to for more than a few minutes at a time at
school, immediately opened up about doubts about his long, but, he
thought, loveless marriage! Why me?
I got a chance to tell one woman how she changed my life; she is still as lovely as I remember.
I had a weird conversation with a significant person in which I had no
idea where she was heading, or really what she was saying. And I was on
the receiving end of a tirade by another about health and my future
health problems. Now, I am overweight and do have some health issues,
but in the context of the gathering I would have thought I'd be pretty
well down the list as a health risk. Who knows?
I walked home having caught a bus there. That evening I slipped into a
serious deep depression. This may not have been a negative thing. It
may well have been a response to the feeling that this was worthwhile,
and why had I not kept up relationships over the years?
But we were venturing into the world, and saw new things and people,
and without explicitly rejecting them, moved away from the things and
people we knew.
And of course it is a little depressing that, even if we wanted to,
renewal of relationships is not going to happen. No one is coming to
any of my gigs; they lead such sensible lives. I'm not going to run
into anyone fishing, or kite flying, or at the football, because that's
not where I ended up.
11:18:02 PM
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I have a new niece; my brother and his wife have a second daughter; lovely.
10:56:40 PM
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People have proposed trapping them, bludgeoning them, baiting them,
freezing them, fencing them in and launching biological and genetic
warfare on them.
What?
[ABC News: Science and Technology]
10:45:38 PM
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The birth of a niece, the death of a good and loved
friend, a Jewish funeral, an Anglican adult baptism (a Muslim wedding
would have completed the trifecta), a small high school reunion, a
brief catch-up with more old friends, a short, but important
conversation. All features of my week. If I have time I'll outline each.
10:00:59 PM
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© Copyright 2005 Peter Nixon.
Last update: 26/12/05; 8:18:41 PM.
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