Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in DelosD's LiveJournal:

[ << Previous 20 ]

Saturday, June 27th, 2009
4:28 am	Remembering Ricardo Montalban This is actually more than a bit out of date, since Montalban passed away about six months ago, but I only today read an obituary that I simply had to share.  It’s always something stupid that people remember you for. Ricardo Montalban appeared in hundreds of movies and television shows in a career that began before Pearl Harbor, yet to members of the age cohort that is now running America, he is best remembered for extolling the Chrysler Cordoba’s “soft Corinthian leather.” Here at National Review, Montalban made a deeper impression — as a longtime subscriber, a thoughtful conservative, and a friend of the magazine. Our publisher, Jack Fowler, recalls a National Review Institute dinner “where, nobly perturbed, he stood up and hushed the chattering crowd because Bill Bennett was speaking. Just the hint of the wrath of Khan was enough to bring instant silence.” Cheesy commercials aside, Ricardo Montalban will be remembered as a perfect gentleman, courtly and patient with fans and strangers alike; as a devout Catholic; and as one of a tiny handful of performers who, when the situation required it, could actually out-overact William Shatner. Dead at 88. R.I.P. From National Review Magazine, Feb. 9, 2009 (5 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, June 25th, 2009
2:06 am	To the non-college graduates... ...a simple question - what did YOU do with the time you didn't spend at college?  "...Alexander Hamilton [...] lived in St. Croix from ages 9 to 15.  St. Croix was his last stop before college; like many a resume stuffer today, he thought of Priceton, but ended up at Columbia (then King's).  He never graduated, fighting the Revolution, writing the Federalist Papers, and running the Treasury Department all intervening; slacking isn't what it used to be."  -- Richard Brookhiser, "Sugar Islands", National Review, 25 Jan 2009 (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, June 23rd, 2009
3:30 am	Birthday Presents I have a most marvelous girlfriend.  She asks for things for her birthday present that are even more fun for me to give her than they are for her to get!  (Well, maybe not MORE fun, but it's probably a close thing. :) ) Current Mood: grateful Current Music: None (7 Comments |Comment on this)
Monday, June 22nd, 2009
12:02 am	In memory of the fifth grade Sometimes things strike you as so funny, you have to share.  Even if they are *definitely* elementary school humor... Word of the Day "Cummingtonite"   [kuhm-ing-tuh-nahyt] –noun an amphibole mineral, magnesium-iron silicate, similar in composition to anthophyllite but richer in iron. Origin: named after Cummington, Mass., where it is found; see -ite 1 (With thanks to Dictionary.com.) Current Mood: silly Current Music: Many keyboard taps (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Saturday, June 6th, 2009
12:11 am	Well...? ...are you all frakking HAPPY now?!? What is WRONG with you people?! EDIT: I should note that this comment was an expression of general frustration at numerous things going oin in Real Life, and that I was only venting at those who read this LJ, NOT directing the comment at them.  Sorry if I panicked anyone. Current Mood: infuriated Current Music: Rusted Root - Faith I Do Believe (10 Comments |Comment on this)
Saturday, May 30th, 2009
3:42 pm	The "Miniatur Wunderland" If you have even the slightest interest in model trains, or just love gadgets and amazingly well done modelling, then you have GOT to see this video.  The Miniatur Wunderland is the largest model railroad project in the world: over 16,000 square feet in layout, more than 10,000 train cars running simultaneously, and 6.8 miles of HO gauge track.  A mammoth labor of love, and a huge tourist attraction, it is truly a wonder of the world.  See it here: Current Mood: artistic Current Music: Taproot - Birthday (3 Comments |Comment on this)
2:17 pm	Squirrel Tidbits (Literally) The latest news in the ongoing battle against the Great Squirrel Menace.  Officials in the city of Spokane have recognized the extent of the menace, and are replying with advanced technology.  An incursion of hundreds of ground squirrels is being beaten back with the help of ... THE RODENATOR!  Here's the news story: April 13, 2009 in City Spokane parks detonating ground squirrels Thriving rodents digging up Finch Arboretum Mike Prager Staff writer Hundreds of ground squirrels have invaded Finch Arboretum and are turning the grounds into Swiss cheese. Even worse, it’s breeding season. Spokane Parks officials are mounting a counterattack with a commercially available weapon – the Rodenator Pro — that injects their burrows with propane and oxygen and sparks an explosion that shakes the ground and collapses their furrows. It also turns the little critters into fertilizer. Full story.... Also, here's a great look at the latest in WSD (Weapons of Squirrel Destruction) technology.  In the splendid tradition of Caddyshack, behold the Rodenator Pro!     Current Mood: aggressive! Current Music: Peter Frampton - While My Guitar Gently Weeps (4 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, May 29th, 2009
9:12 pm	Work, and 1,001 uses for a sheep... One of the unfortunate things about my job is that I am constantly faced with dealing with people where the only conceivable response to the things they utter is "Where in the hell did you come up with THAT!?!".  It seems I'm not the only one with this problem.  And, as is the case these days, someone did a YouTube video about it.  I present to you: "The Vendor Client Relationship". And, for no particular reason, and with absolutely no connection to work, I submit to you "Extreme Shepherding Art".  Yes, art with sheep.  EDIT: Oops - almost forgot to give credit where credit is due.  Thanks to hyrkanian for the link - though she doesn't know she gave it to me.  Shoot, she doesn't even know ME. :) Current Mood: drained Current Music: None - just silence (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Monday, May 18th, 2009
8:46 pm	Ninja Squirrel When Squirrels Attack!  They even turn on their own - sort of.  But I have to say that I've never seen a squirrel perfectly execute a Flying Tiger Leap before.  There must be some secret Shao-Lin Squirrel Monastery out there somewhere. Fast Forward to 3:50 into the segment... Flying, Tumbling, Throat-Rending Squirrel of Death! A fervent thank you to star_gazersusan  for the link!  She KNOWS about the Great Squirrel Menace. Current Mood: cranky Current Music: Silence (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, May 12th, 2009
12:17 am	Today's Quote 05/11/09 Hello everyone.  I just realized that I have not posted anything in THREE BLODDY MONTHS.  Well, I'm afraid that life has been too full, and too draining in many ways.  I'm sorry, if there are those of you that missed these posts, but sometimes things are like that.  I'm not exactly chock full o' time right now either, but avoiding going to sleep is a good enough excuse to say *something* to all of you.  "All of you".  A strange construction given the fairly low number of LJ friends I have, and the fact that I've gone "radio silent" since early February.  But if I felt sure that *nobody* was reading, I'd hardly bother to write anything, would I? On the other hand, there's PLENTY of people out there on LJ who seem to write only to themselves.  In any case, I don't have a great deal to share right now, nor a great deal of energy to do it with.  I'm afraid I'm saving it for that whole reality place.  It's kind of a strange place, and quite unpredictable, but it's the only reality I have available, so I'll have to make due with it.  With that being said, let me share two more quotes with you, which will put a wrap to my long-running series of quotes.  The first, a bit of political humor. "The most frightening words I ever heard on the floor of the Senate chamber were [Joe] Biden’s request to speak for an unlimited time (which, when granted, he then strove to exceed)." -- Ed Whelan, former Republican Senate staff And lastly, one to think about. "When all is said and done, Civilizations do not fall because of the barbarians at the gates. Nor does a great city fall from the death wish of bored and morally bankrupt stewards presumably sworn to its defense. Civilizations fall only because each citizen of the city comes to accept that nothing can be done to rally and rebuild broken walls; that ground lost may never be recovered; and that greatness lived in our grandparents but not our grandchildren. Yes, our betters tell us these things daily. But that doesn’t mean we have to believe it." -- Bill Whittle, NRO Online, 09/19/08 Current Mood: somber Current Music: Mono - Life In Mono (5 Comments |Comment on this)
Wednesday, February 11th, 2009
10:25 pm	Odds and Ends I wish I had someone to make a cup of tea for me now! (Four days in a row home sick from work.  You all know  how unheard of THAT is.) Thought I'd share this - it's Doug's worst nightmare... And lastly, an Internet story which I doubt the veracity of, but which is too good not to pass along anyway. Supposedly, the following was said by a flight attendant on a Southwest Airlines flight.  As I said, I suspect it never really was, but it SHOULD have been... "Welcome aboard Southwest  Flight XXX to YYY. To operate your seatbelt, insert the metal tab into the buckle, and pull tight. It works just like every other seatbelt and if you don't know how to operate one, you probably shouldn't be out in public unsupervised. In the event of a sudden loss of cabin pressure, oxygen masks will descend from the ceiling.  Stop screaming, grab the mask, and pull it over your face. If you have a small child traveling with you, secure your mask before assisting with theirs. If you are traveling with two small children, decide now which one you love more."  Current Mood: crappy Current Music: None - just silence (9 Comments |Comment on this)
12:09 am	Today's Quote 02/10/09 “In politics if you want anything said, ask a man. If you want anything done, ask a woman.” -- Margaret Thatcher, former British Prime Minister There will never be another like the Iron Lady.  Current Mood: tired Current Music: The Classics IV - Everyday With You Girl (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, February 10th, 2009
11:44 pm	A Quantum Leap! (Seriously) Sometimes technical news is just too COOL to let go by without sharing.  A research team has managed to store over 4 bytes of data in a single electron cloud!  It just doesn't get any niftier.  Here's the story... February 3rd, 2009 Quantum holographic storage: it works! Posted by Robin Harris @ 7:13 am Researchers at Stanford University have demonstrated quantum holographic storage, shattering long-held assumptions about the information limits of matter. Moving into the sub-atomic realm, they permanently stored 35 bits in the quantum space surrounding a single electron. Moreover, the technique allows holograms to be “stacked” in 3 dimensions. They demonstrated 2 35-bit storage elements in the same space. Encoding data using mere atoms would be less than half as space efficient. [For more click title] Current Mood: geeky Current Music: Christopher Franke - Finale (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, January 30th, 2009
10:46 pm	Today's Quote 01/30/09 One of my all time favorites; it sounds utterly absurd, and yet it really makes complete sense if you just take the time to understand it. "As we know, there are known knowns. There are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns. That is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns, the ones we don't know we don't know." -- former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld Current Mood: accomplished Current Music: Sarah McLachlan - Worlds On Fire (Live) (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, January 29th, 2009
7:27 pm	Strange Memory I was having a discussion with one of my coworkers yesterday, and he mentioned that someone he was having an argument with did not understand that when you have a conditional statement, and the result is not true, then the initial condition can't be true either.  For instance, if you say "If you drop that vase, it will break." and then you tell me that the vase is not broken, I can safely assume that no one dropped the vase. As he explained this part of the argument, I suddenly said: "Ah yes! The fallacy of denying the consequent.  Or, modus tollens as it is formerly known." What amuses me is that I have probably not run across a reference to formal logic rules or a definition of that logical fallacy since my (early!) college days.  Probably something like 25 years ago now.  And I'm sure that if you asked me to define that logical statement a few weeks ago I would have come up utterly blank.  Yet, when I wasn't even trying, it popped up out of the bubbling black tar-laden pit of my memory.  So where has that knowledge BEEN all these years!? Oh, and I also remembered the inverse concept of modus ponens at the same time.  Memory is a weird thing. Current Mood: Logical Current Music: Fields Of The Nephilim - Last Exit For The Lost (Comment on this)
7:12 pm	Warning - Zombies Ahead! "Keep Austin Weird" happens to be an actual slogan of the area, they ENJOY their oddities down there.  And what could be more odd and unexpected than a portable roadside warning sign, flashing out it's traffic advisory of "Zombies Ahead"? Full story... (P.S. Didn't Rob Landley move back down to Austin? Hmm...) (P.P.S. Yes, that music really IS what was playing.  I have witnesses.) Current Mood: amused Current Music: Seal - Prayer For The Dying (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Sunday, January 18th, 2009
3:39 am	Today's Quote 01/17/09 "Decent people should ignore politics, if only they could be confident that politics would ignore them." -- William F. Buckley Jr. And ain't that the truth? Current Mood: contemplative Current Music: Evanescence - Hello (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Wednesday, January 14th, 2009
11:01 pm	Today's Quote 01/14/09 Today, an interestingly inciteful quote from an unexpected source... "The best measure of a man's honesty isn't his income tax return. It's the zero adjust on his bathroom scale." -- Arthur C. Clarke Current Mood: tired Current Music: Silence (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, January 9th, 2009
9:16 pm	Quote of the Day 01/09/09 "Steve Waldron reports having attended a wedding in which the bride and groom decided it would be neat to release two white doves at the end of the ceremony. However, the birds purchased at a pet store for this purpose had clipped wings and no survival skills. They made it as far as a tree, where they were attacked by squirrels as the children watched. I will spare you further details. The organist said he was not going to play for any more weddings where the ceremony called for an animal sacrifice after the recessional." -- Cecil Adams, "The Straight Dope", 02 May 1997 Current Mood: geeky Current Music: Terra - Final Fantasy VI (live) - Nobuo Uematsu (2 Comments |Comment on this)
8:57 pm	December 2008 Books Well folks, it's come to an end.  I've been reporting my reading to you for a full 12 months now, and though I've mostly enjoyed sharing my thoughts on these books with you, the time it takes and paucity of commentary mean I'm bringing this to an end.  So, for you final reading pleasure, the books of December 2008... The Gods Return - David Drake - The concluding volume of the series "The Crown of the Isles", and Drake was obviously ready to be done.  Predictable plot, no character insights, no depth, nothing other than a novel length exercise in wrapping up plot threads to bring a series to a close.  1635: The Dreeson Incident - Eric Flint & Virginia DeMarce - The latest in the 1632 series.  This one doesn't seem as tight or deep as the previous books.  Not sure if that means the series is getting stretched too thin, or perhaps the new co-author just isn't up to the standards of the others.  Still worthwhile though, so future readings should tell. By The Sword: A Repairman Jack Novel - F. Paul Wilson's "Repairman Jack" series never fails to disappoint.  It has long left the area of Jack's repair jobs, and is now an approaching Apocalypse horror / fantasy series.  But the stories are fascinating, and the characters are endlessly intrigueing. Starship: Rebel - Mike Resnick - Latest in Resnick's Starship series, part of his Heritage Universe.  Old fashioned space opera, but strangely...thin, is the only way to describe it.  In some ways it's like reading the Cliff Notes of a book, rather than the book itself. Odd Girl Out - Timothy Zahn - I love Tim Zahn, I really do, but his books have felt kind of... light lately.  This is the third in the series that starts with "Night Train to Rigel", and seems to have a bit more heft than the first two.  It's fun, but just not filling. As you can easily see, my December reading was waaaay down.  This is mostly due to a very active holiday season, and an even more active social life, which I can not find it in my heart to complain about.  If I can manage to keep my reading down to this pace, it is vaguely possible that my library will not outstrip my home before I die.  I doubt it, mind you, but it could happen. For those of you who are interested in such things, counting graphic novels, web comic collections, and short story collections as books, then 2008 contained the reading of 135 books.  This works out to 11.25 books per month, or a rate of just over one every three days.  Interestingly enough, this is substantially *down* from 1997 - 1999, when my rate over a three year period was approximately 180 per year, or one every TWO days.  I feel that perhaps I have more life in my life now.  Luckily, I still ready about the same amount of *original* books, it's just that I don't have to scrounge around and reread things so much to fill time.  That IS an improvement, right? Current Mood: accomplished Current Music: Downfall - Sirenia (4 Comments |Comment on this)