|
Thursday, 23rd August 2007
UberGeek's dream house (where the future is now!)
Prospect of "Peak Oil", dwindling resources and global warming got you down ?
Take a look at what my house is going to look like in three years...
To start, it's going to have roof shingles made out of this,
a tethered above it (that is if my home owner's association doesn't have a fit) and (or in the driveway if they somehow combine the solar cells with the actual body of the car !!).
>brushing hands together< Ta-Da ! Problem solved.
Now what's for dinner ?
—— (DK) ÜberGeek
Tuesday, 14th August 2007
Want some Google fun ?
Tired of searching Google in your native language ?
How about trying one of these :
Elmer Fudd
Hacker
Klingon
Pig Latin
Bork, bork, bork!
—— (DK) ÜberGeek
Monday, 13th August 2007
Disabling the Overtype Key in Word
Word Insert Mode — Hmmmm. Word Overtype Mode : grrrrrrr. Word Insert Mode
— Ahhhhh. Word Overwrite Mode : grrrrrrr.
Annoyed ? Snarling ? Frustrated ?
No worries, we now have a document for you to solve this once and for all.
—— (TUT) SpaceMan
Friday, 10th August 2007
Some of that lovely space stuff again
On Wednesday my favourite TV programme was back on as prime time Internet TV. Nope, it wasn’t Larry King, nope, it wasn’t Survivor, and it wasn’t
Battle at Kruger either (did you see that; wasn’t it goooooood!). It was...... the Space Shuttle again !
This time it was Space Shuttle Endeavour’s turn to hurtle through the sky towards the International Space Station
— Flight STS-118.
This time, also, NASA TV got their act together. I am certain they got a lot of complaints for the coverage of the return to Earth of STS-117. That coverage was appalling : it was obviously that commentator’s first commentary; she was racked with nerves and the result was endless confusion, such as, for example, random changes of measurements, one minute telling us the Shuttle was travelling at X mph, and the very next minute telling us it was travelling at Y feet per second, then she would stop midway through a sentence and sometimes finish it and other times leave us hanging for the end. I decided not to write a blog then because it had to be that NASA TV would get thousands of complaints, and I didn’t want to add to her misery. I hope they try her again, but after some significant training...
Anyhow, on Wednesday NASA TV put on a top show. I guess recent stories of a sabotaged laptop and possibly drunk astronauts probably had a lot to do with it as well. We got a pro on top form with expressions of his own
— that guy was exciting and made it HIS show :
“Straight as an arrow”, “Kick in the pants”, “Fairly uneventful launch" (ie. no problems). It was fun just wondering what colourful expression he was going to come up with next, and he was brilliant at explaining what was happening in plain English. Top marks. My favourite commentator, though, is still the one who talked us through the launch of Eileen Collins’ STS-114. But this guy on Wednesday was very good still.
And I learnt a lot more interesting Space Shuttle Facts and Statistics, yet again.
Did you know :
-
There is a special collar shaped device at the base of the helmet, fixed to the suit and wrapping around the base of the helmet, whose prime role is to ensure there is always fresh air in the helmet.
-
The astronauts lie on their back at take-off. OK
— you knew that ! But did you know that the Closeout crew who strapped them into their seats, are actually walking on a strong curtain when they’re strapping the astronauts down. Once the Shuttle gets into space and levels up, that curtain is removed and reveals......... a vertical wall full of instruments !! It makes sense once you realise, but until you see it you never realise (did you get this ??).
-
The astronauts lie in this position, on their back, talking to the Houston Space Center, with their legs in a seated position but up in the air (!), for a full 2 hours and more until they launch.
-
There is a Mission Specialist whose main role is to track everything that goes out from the Space Shuttle and into the International Space Station, everything that comes in from the Space Station, and everything that should stay behind, whether in the Space Station or in the Shuttle. That’s that Mission Specialist’s prime purpose in the flight
— fascinating !
-
There is another Mission Specialist who I personally call the
Multitasking Specialist. The sole role of this specialist is to ensure that the pilots and flight engineer do everything they are meant to do, particularly when they have more than one task to do. Evidently some of the tasks are pretty complex and intense and one can easily get drawn into a particular task and forget that other tasks also need to be done
at the same time. The Multitasking Specialist’s job is to make sure everything happens at the time it is meant to do.
-
The crew in the International Space Station always try to watch the launch if they can, either through a satellite feed, or through their windows (!!), or later through a delayed video feed (their ability to get a Live video feed of the launch depends on where they are in orbit around the Earth).
-
They have laptops and.... printers onboard.
-
Once they have
reached orbit the main goal of the Shuttle for the next 3 days is to
ensure its safe return to Earth. During that time the Space Shuttle
is photographed from all angles by way of various manoeuvres
(including a back flip) by the International Space Station and that
information is relayed back down to Earth for engineers to pour over
and ascertain if anything got damaged during launch and repair
requirements if necessary. The Space Shuttle also photographs the
International Space Station. Once all those checks, photographs,
etc..., are complete, the Shuttle makes its way to the Space Station.
Ahhhhh
— my favourite Internet TV show........ I could eat those Space Shuttle Facts for breakfast, lunch, and dinner !
—— (TUT) SpaceMan
Thursday, 2nd August 2007
Sometimes English makes my head hurt !
We recently attended a marketing conference. Since it’s something we do, we figured it was worth our while seeing if we could be doing it better. However within thirty minutes of arriving we felt like we were in the Monty Python RAF sketch; ‘Sorry old chap, don’t understand your banter’.
One company offered
“unique technology that has solved all invisibility and natural search engine optimization challenges”.
(Hmmm, all well and good but what about visible challenges and those nasty unnatural search engines?)
Another stall told us they could
“bypass brand noise” while
“building and maintaining Natural Search visibility throughout (our) customers' buying cycle".
(Phew, that’s a relief, I hate all types of noise!)
A little further down the aisle we met a man whose job it is to
“enhance working practices to better achieve the modern client’s goal
(that could be us)
as well as facilitate new business and syndication opportunities”.
(I felt rather uneasy that I might not qualify as a “modern client”!)
Not only that but his colleague
“enabled mature managed internet communities to support multi-national research programmes” and then
“leverages insights gained therein to tailor appropriate, incremental digital strategies for the specific needs of the client”.
(I don’t get it, but it sure sounds good!)
About an hour after we signed in we still didn’t understand what
most of the exhibitors actually did but we
had found a couple of companies who spoke
(almost) jargon free English and we’re
exploring possibilities with them.
For the
rest of you, the UK Plain English Campaign
started in 1979, their website is
and they have free guides you can download.
Do check them out — they enhance the reader’s invisible natural awareness of linguistic implements in a leveraged fashion designed to bypass the modern reader’s vocabularistic noise in
his search for language opportunities tailored for today’s digital and oral interactions. Trust me !
—— MM2, aka The Terminator
|
