94394369

i’ll say it again

coffee shops are scary fscking places in the am. business guys having inane conversations like you wouldn’t believe. like how to properly illuminate clear glass sculptures (“made by one of the world’s leading glass sculptors”) so they can be photographed digitally. the reason the conversation started? one guy wanted to trade his sculpture to another for a car. seriously. everybody should hang out at the coffee houses in the am. it will have the police officer at the 5k effect.

the police officer at the 5k effect is what i call the feeling that you can get away with way more than you’re trying to get away with. it is a realization that i had when i was younger and running this 5k in carlisle that was also attended by members of carlise’s finest. well, i wasn’t in great shape, but i finished the race faster than the cops and even if the cops will probably shoot me in the back if i was ever running from them, it’s encouraging to know that all things equal, i could outrun them. in the case of the business guys – let’s put this in perspective again – THEY’RE SPENDING THEIR MORNINGS TALKING ABOUT TRADING GLASS SCULPTURES FOR CARS. seriously, it can’t really be that hard to plunder the s out of them.

94372830

i’ve been living more and more of my life online lately as i’ve been glued to my computer trying to make some money to counteract an impending financial crisis as i burn through cash working on projects. it’s nice though, because i have certain friends who are pretty wired and it’s only online that i get to hear from them or see a certain side of them which is neat. it sucks because the internet, or the web in particular is the worst thing ever if you have a short attention span.

i watched a dj doc at pogo+nora’s tonight and ate some good food. gazpacho (sp?) was weird, not bad, just different, but sorbet was amazing. pogo gave me fruity loops which should be fun for summer musical projects but i’ve got to resist installing it while i have other projects to work on. like figuring out what to do with the flashpoint toys i built yesterday. they’ve kept me amused for like 24hrs straight.

94372634

i’ve done some thinking and a little living and i have a theory about why ryan and i battle over the whole having a job thing. i think what it comes down to, is that i’d rather be productive than just sit around, even if the productivity is for someone else’s benefit and not neccessarily very interesting. of course it sucks to have the constrainst of formal employment, but i’m also not super into just hanging out. i’d rather be working on projects and it seems that the sort of nerdy stuff that appeals to me asthetically doesn’t often interest others so to do those sort of projects it just sort of makes sense to do it at a job. sure i could do other projects with the time i spend working, but sometimes it’s nice to have burner projects that aren’t very spectacular but are kind of easy and just keep your brain sharp, teach you new things, or give you a break from a bigger, more intense project that is giving you a headache.

94364470

http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/cwphtml/cwphome.html

94235492

environmental costs of computing

from a /. post about the environmental costs of replacing paper with computers:

ttp://www.goldsmithgroup.com/servfacts.htm

Florida Environmental Report states about Computers and Monitors:

“Out of 175 million computers comes a laundry list of toxins including 650 million pounds of lead, 987,000 pounds of cadmium and 231,000 pounds of mercury.
Each CRT (Cathode-Ray Tube) contains four to six pounds of lead. (New York Times, November 23, 2000)
According to University of Florida tests, color monitors contain enough lead to contaminate ground water if deposited in landfills. “Those monitors would fail the legal standards of leaching lead,” said Susan Mooney of the EPA, Region 5 (Chicago).
These computers also contain 2 billion pounds of plastic. ”

so thats like 1/4 pound of lead per PC on top of the 4 to 6 per monitor. so thats a lot of lead.

http://members.aol.com/Ramola15/funfacts.html

“Americans use 85,000,000 tons of paper a year; about 680 pounds per person.”

so lets say you throw your computer out every three years. thats about 18 pounds of lead versus 2000 pounds of paper over three years. imagine throwing your honda civic, made of paper, into the ground. then cover it with something like 1/5 a gallon of molten lead (crappy math, hey i think its within an order of magnitude).

which do you feel worse about? the honda civic sized paper ball or the fifth of lead?

public service announcement: i have a 10th grade math education

http://www.ilo.org/public/english/protection/safew ork/cis/products/icsc/dtasht/_icsc00/icsc0052.htm