They Can't Do This To Me!

There's another set of Lord of the Rings DVDs coming out. The "Limited Edition." The theatrical and extended movies on a single disc, with new "making of" footage.

August 18

Next weekend, I want to go up to the Black Rock Desert again. Probably drive up Friday after work, and return home early Saturday morning - though I might choose to actually sleep in instead of trying to stay up all night... though then again, the pre-dawn sunrise was perhaps the best part. Anyone else interested?

For the Record

I love Nevada. The mountains, the lakes, the rivers, the weather, the people, and a great many other things about it. I even like that we have casinos, not that I am a gambler (if I found that the sum total of random coins I've dropped in a slot machine exceeded $10, I'd be very shocked) but because... it feels like home.

It hurts when I read what some people think of my state. From this account, you'd think that Nevada was devoid of life, except for the sex parade of the Las Vegas Strip, a shameful place, with nothing useful to say, deserving only to be shunned and ignored.

For me, Nevada is an Awful Awful at the Little Nugget, swimming in the Truckee river, Shakespeare at Sand Harbor, stargazing on the Black Rock Desert, snow-tubing at the Tahoe Meadows, climbing Mount Rose, sleeping in a hammock, walking the streets of Virginia city, screaming for University of Nevada athletics, sunsets over the Sierras, and cows blocking a dirt road I need to drive down.

Immigration

I'm highly in favorof it. The only argument made concerning a need to restrict immigration is that of security. If we had a system where as many people as want can come, provided they do not pose a threat of physical harm to American workers, I'd love to throw open the gates.

One reason is that population growth leads to economic growth. More people earning wages and buying more things is how the country works. People want to come here for a better life, and their coming here would make a better life for all of us.

This New York Times article gives a couple hard facts along these same lines.

Billy Graham In Twilight

That's the name of a Newsweek cover that I saw. I couldn't help but think that the magazine is horribly backwards. It is not near the sunset of life for this man; on the contrary, it is just before sunrise, on a day which will last forever.

28

As of about 3:15 yesterday, I started working on my 29th revolution around the sun. The last one sucked. This one doesn't look much better, but I'm going to go home and have leftover ice cream cake, leftover chocolate cake, watch an episode or two of Animaniacs and then wipe out an opponent's armies with a swarm of Chinook helicopters. To waste another year wishing I could alter time and space and not waste so many years trying to get to know a girl that wanted nothing to do with me while watching one who actually appreciated my company marry someone else is something I don't plan on doing. What's done is done, and I accept that I'm a damned fool. If I'm going to waste more time, it's going to at least be while doing something enjoyable.

Who Wants to be a Superhero

Do you love over-the-top superheroes? Can you occasionally find a reality show that you like? Then get this.

Stan Lee is the host and judge. People audition in their own costumes, 12 (ish) get picked, they are put through challenges, they get eliminated. Pretty basic reality fare. But it's worth it to watch people prance around in spandex using cheesy superhero one-liners.

If you have iTunes, you can download the pilot for free. There's been two episodes so far, the third is next Thursday. The website is here.

A Sign of the Times

Does it say something about our society that if I ask you what horrible thing Mel Gibson did this weekend, you will probably say "He said naughty racial things about Jews" before you say "He was drunk and speeding through his neighborhood in his car."

Two actions. One insensitive and possibly an indicator of deeper racial prejudice. One that could result in real death and destruction. The former has society up in arms. The latter is hardly noticed.

Strings and Branes

The current rage in physics is String Theory, where the fundamental particles of matter and energy are all multi-dimensional strings. There was a show about it on PBS last night. It is head-melting stuff, like M Theory which united the 5 versions of string theory into a single explanation. The only difference is that, unlike the 5 versions which allowed strings freedom of movement in 10 dimensions, this used 11. In this extra dimension, strings can stretch and stretch into a sort of 11-dimensional membrane, which is how the seem to view the structure of our universe - a giant 11-dimensional membrane, as thin as 3-dimensional space. We are anchored to this membrane (stuck in only 3 dimensions) because most particles and energy are open-ended strings, whose open ends are tied to the Brane.

Gravity, however, is seen as a closed string, like a rubber band. With no loose ends to anchor it, gravity is free to move in more dimensions than other things. In an attempt to validate this theory, physicists smash atoms, hoping to observe a graviton leaving our known dimensions.

A Democratic congressman, in a recent attempt to liken global warming to gravity (As an obvious and incontrevertible fact) accused a statistician at a recent hearing for having an agenda, because "since Newton published his Principia, we don't go around questioning gravity, do we? (point: gravity is obvious, and we don't waste our time studying it, neither should we with global warming)" As a retort, a Rebublican asked a physicist in attendance whether anyone actually studies gravity anymore. He replied that they, in fact, do - and that it is a thriving area of research where questioning accepted ideas is welcome. This PBS show helped me understand why.

Not Alone In The World

Ideologically, at least.

New York Times Article