Next Party

The next party is happening! It's somewhat related to current events (The screenshot on the right tells you I'm talking about the economy, not the flu.) I'm looking forward to it and hope it's not too much of a costume party. I think the drab colors portray the sense of hopelessness out there.

Here's the link.

Bricks

The Dude is using a robot to build a brick wall for an architecture
school project. The precision is amazing, yet the robot is very
"dumb" and can't cope if things are out of place by a few
centimeters. This fact was actually somewhat comforting because we
imagined the robot dropping the bricks and coming after us. You can
just barely see the slight lean of the wall if you look closely at the
left edge.

Pulled Pork

Trimming 7 pounds of meat for pulled pork. Don't try this at home
(it's not kosher.)

Beer schedule

From the chalkboard on the side of a pub this past weekend listing
the day's lineup. Note the last matchup...

Immunity

Look!

Four little bandages on my arm from four injections for four amazing diseases!

Combine this with a big charge for airfare on my credit card statement, and a trip to Kenya is imminent!

Sort of imminent. Two-months-from-now imminent. Very excited, though temporarily sore in this arm.

Talking with the doctor before the shots, I realized my awareness of my own immunization history is somewhat poor. I feel lucky that I don't have to be vigilant with regards to my polio booster, for example. But I feel uneasy at the thought that I tend to give so little thought to my own medical history.



Getting older means worrying about this crap more.

VIP at work

The mayor's coming to my office Friday. Not sure why...

On the T

Unbeknownst to most, Skip's employer actually has a sense of humor. (A sign at the Harvard T stop.)

Saving humanity vs. saving the planet

I’ve downloaded a program for my work computer called Folding@Home. The idea behind it is that all the computing power I have (which goes unused while I create spreadsheets and so on) can be put to use in the name of science. The program runs in the background, analyzes proteins, and sends the results back to a central server at Stanford to help some researches learn more about bad diseases like Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and others.

Here's a screenshot of the protein analysis in action. Like, cool.

Running the program, even in the background, uses energy of course. A bunch. My battery drains at least twice as fast and the laptop's little fan has to run constantly (rather than intermittently). So in the process of contributing to science, I'm burning extra power. Of course progress has a cost, but where's the trade-off?

Telluride

Back from a great weekend in Telluride, where Red Bull is a controlled
substance. (This sign from the drink cooler at a bakery in town.)

Wedding

Back from my sister's wedding in CA. Everything was great.

There are lots of pictures from the event, of course, but this is the
only one that matters: the cake's chocolate buttercream filling.
Amazing. And how could it not be with a name like "chocolate" "butter"
"cream"?

The pen

I'm amazed by the Boston Globe's web team right now. Check out the teaser headline (circled) for a story on signing some new pitching talent to the Sox. Just awesome. Sean Connery/Will Ferrell would be pleased.

The end

It is indeed the end... Just 10 more days for this guy.

From street art in Cambridge.