Lifehacker linked to a howto for roasting coffee with a heat gun and claims the hand held devices give more control than a popcorn popper. Anybody tried this?
Might be a good excuse to buy a heat gun. Packrat has one that looks just like the one in the pic, and it’s a hell of a lot of fun to play with / burn yourself with.
Check out these eight cars and pick a favorite. I’ll take the Nissan Pivo 2 so that I would never have to worry about my coffee spilling out in the g-force-less ride, unless I just spill it on myself.
This article at NYTimes.com more or less makes the case that it’s, of all people, Shane Battier.
The Article is long, and that’s a good thing. It’s both an explanation of the trend towards hyper-analytical statistics in pro sports, and a piece on Battier. Should be interesting if you are into statistics or into sports. It’s also well written, and ties everything together nicely since Battier is a player that is both cerebral enough to make use of these new stats, and is also vindicated by them in a lot of ways.
Just yesterday, ben and I were just talking about the upside to a recession: it forces everybody to figure out what they’re doing that really matters and/or what is really worth doing. Seems like now would be the time for half baked schemes like Microsoft launching a bunch of brick and mortar retail locations to get cut. Maybe they’ve got some really awesome strategy that I don’t get (I mean somebody from dreamworks is heading it up!). Probably not though.
My latest infatuation: the medieval mural at local dive bar, Bernard’s. Take my word for it: medieval revivalist art will be huge in a few years.
Since June 2007, I haven’t had a television in my residence. For a two-month stint last year, I didn’t have a computer. I became well acquainted with the programming schedule of my local NPR station. On Thursday nights, they broadcast a program that actually makes my life better, and I have downloaded all the podcasts that are available.
The program is called Radiolab and is produced by WNYC in, well, NYC. It is hosted by Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich. Krulwich is a science correspondent for NPR and hosted Frontline on PBS-a legit journalist. Abumrad is a producer (music/documentaries).
I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that I’m the last one of us to discover this program. It’s all about science and human existence. This show is absolutely fascinating, and I encourage everyone to give a the episodes a listen. It reminds me of the conversations we had in college over an OE 40.
If you need a starting point, I recommend Sperm or Placebo. Enjoy!
Dan Savage, local Seattle celebrity, editor with the The Stranger and somewhat famous sex advice columnist, is in Fayetteville, and he’s blogging about it. His impressions are here and here.
Until I read this article over at reason, I would have said I was in favor of Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) standards (despite the weirdness they cause like SUVs sneaking by on separate light truck standards and manufacturers practically subsidizing their low end models to lower their averages). But it’s worth it if it raises overall fuel economy, right? The article makes the good point, though, that the standards (current and the proposed increases) raise prices on cars quite a bit, in lieu of the more direct and more efficient solution of just raising gasoline taxes. CAFE standards are popular because right now raising any taxes seems like a bad idea, and CAFE standards will, in theory, create new jobs as it forces Detroit to retool. Sounds nice, but will increasing car prices by a few grand really help Detroit hire more workers or will it just reduce demand?