Sometimes, I'm amazed by the collective efforts of the Internet

In my last post, I wanted to add a little snippet from Seinfeld -- "The Ukraine is not weak!" So, of course, I googled it.

And stumbled onto a site rife with amazingly stupid stuff, which proceeded to eat my spare time this afternoon.

Stupid, but really, really amazing. Check it out.

Pirates! With Tanks!

Pirates Seize Ship Carrying Tanks, Ammo

It's not often you see news stories involving the following actors:

• Pirates


• The Ukraine


• Tanks

Seriously. Now it's going to be even more dangerous to sail off the coast of Somalia -- because the pirates are going to be armed with tanks!

Ever wonder what a plasma looks like at 33,000 frames/second?

I just found out in this last week, after being able to borrow a Phantom v. 7.3 camera from PPPL!

Shiny New Movie (2.5 M DivX-encoded AVI)

Pretty darn spiffy, huh? :) Now I just need to write some image processing software...

This Can't Be a Good Thing (for my thumbs)

Capcom released Mega Man 9.

A stroll down memory lane -- via pure 8-bit Mega Man goodness. Jumpy blocks, cleverly placed pits -- and who can forget those pesky instant-death spikes?

WHO WILL SAVE DR. LIGHT FROM BEING FRAMED BY THE INFAMOUS DR. WILY? WHO??

This can't be good for my Ph.D. research. :)

Waking up on the Funny Side of Bed

Since my wife started her new job as a Assistant State Public Defender, we've been working on getting used to a much earlier schedule.

This has forced us to do several things, in the spirit of making the 5:30-5:45 AM wakeup period as automatic as possible, including:

• Streamlining the bathroom


• Adding new bathroom shelving


• Reorganizing drawers in the bedroom


• Pre-making coffee and tea (a lifesaver!)

Still, since we've been at it only for a week, we haven't quite gotten in the groove; I end up getting in her way taking showers, etc.

So, it was a little bit surprising to me when this morning my wife started laughing while the alarm clock was not-so-pleasantly waking us from peaceful slumber. It turns out she had a very elegant, parallel solution to the morning "bathroom problem."

Use the second bathroom.

It's really a shame that it took two people with advanced degrees in law and nuclear engineering a week to figure that one out. :)