My Project

So I had big plans this weekend to redo the famous beer bottle cap coffee table mosaic. Basically Emma and I made a big chessboard/design on a coffee table we build and covered it with plexi/acrylic. Words don't do it justice.
When I moved I had to transport the table and, alas, despite my best efforts the caps came undone in tragic, dramatic fashion. Woe! So this weekend I had hoped to redo them. Then I got sick (see previous post). So now that I've recovered, it's time to get down to business and rock on this thing. Pics and details to follow.

Ouch

So I finally turned in my paper for my Master's project last Friday, which felt great to get out of the way. It was one of those papers that had a strict page limit. I think I did a good job, but it felt a bit ridiculous at times. I had a lot to talk about, and I found myself almost constantly making references to this or that appendix. Which led to what seemed to be an entire paper of references. Oh well. They got what they asked for. It's somewhere in Appendix A-14.

And now onto the ouch. Remember the great food in college? Great in that it was served in large quantities, was prepared for you and you purchased it with a card that had fake money on it? Yeah, I just got reintroduced to it today. Let's just say my stomach has rebelled. Violently. Like 1848 revolution style. Seriously, the Spring of Nations has occurred in my gut. I forgot two things in my hunger: one, the food is terrible. Two, it tends to remind you of its terrible nature repeatedly. Damn you dining services.

Happy Large Hadron Collider Day!

Well since I'm writing this the world didn't end today! That's actually a mixed blessing. I mean I have to endure 55 more days of pathetic political bickering on TV and I can't use the excuse that small black hole ate my final report for my Master's project. On the other hand, in a couple of months we might find out a whole ton about the Higgs boson, which is pretty damn cool in my book. Or we might not, which is equally interesting.
I love the wave of terror it caused, as well as the bevy of poorly researched editorials. And the pieces were great because they would quote 10 scientists saying that a tiny black hole forming in the collider would be about as likely as one forming randomly in your living room and then completely ignore it and rant about how crazy bad a black hole forming would be. I mean come on, worst case we loose Switzerland. And a bit a France. But just the boring bits.
Anyways, I'm ranting as procrastination. My paper really is due in 48 hours or so. So ahhh. Back to work.

EDIT: Freud would love that both this post and a major newspaper referred to it as the "Large Hardon Collider." I mean the mental images are ridiculous. 10 bucks says someone makes this a porno in the next 3 month.

Bikes can be a theme, yes?

I figured my first real post on this should be both on company time and force me to figure out how to put neat things like pictures and movies into them. That way when I run out of minimally cogent things to say I can at least put something suitably shiny and distracting on the screen.

So first: I bought a bike this weekend. I guess I need to give some background here. I live far enough from campus and work that I could walk, but it would be somewhat lengthy. At the same time it's close enough that I feel like a terrible person for driving. Clearly, a bike is the solution. I've moved past the heartbreak of having the bike I had while an undergrad stolen (sob), so I found myself a nice hybrid bike on Craigslist at a drastically reduced price. I believed this was because the seller was desperate for cash. She showed up in a pants suit and more jewelry I've ever seen. So much for that. So here she is (the bike):

So secondly, the RNC was last week and the one thing I didn't see much of was coverage of the protests that happened in St. Paul during that span. I suppose the news networks didn't want to encourage the anarchists that were randomly attacking buses and generally causing havoc. But there were legitimate protests too, that got labeled as radical fringe groups because of this. Apparently, the St. Paul cops took a page from the NYC cops in 2004, arresting first and asking questions later. No Guantanamo on the Hudson, but similar sweep everyone up tactics. So here's my favorite video. These folks were just trying to get to a concert and ended up in the wrong place at the wrong time. I understand maintaining order and such, but three people walking down the street with bikes does not an unlawful assembly make. Tell them to disperse or they'll be arrested. Give them time to clear out. Now you don't get to see what happened before the arrests, so if they were rousing rabble, well then fine. But I went to the groups website and while they were anti-Republican it seems they were really just there to see the sights and hear some music. Oh well. It's just interesting seeing 4 cops in riot gear standing guard over some girl in a sun dress.