June 29, 2004
I'll Fly Away
This past Saturday, Chris, Jason, Robin, Sacha, Thomas, and I visited the National Air and Space Museum's Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center, located next to Washington's Dulles International Airport (IAD). IAD is an airport. There is only one IAD. An IED is an improvised explosive device. There are many IEDs. An IUD is an intrauterine device. If you put one in your uterus, it will probably prevent you from getting pregnant. Here is a picture of some IUDs. There are many IUDs, too. There may have been some IUDs at the Udvar-Hazy Center, but if there were, they were inside people, and I couldn't see them. Human Beings are very interesting creatures. You and I are fortunate to be human.
During my visit, I saw several famous airplanes, including the Enola Gay, which dropped the first nuclear weapon ever used in war; a Concorde SST, which has very very tiny windows; and an SR-71A Blackbird. In the gift shop, they sell stainless steel SR-71A shot glasses. I don't know whether these are the same shot glasses that were used on SR-71A missions, but they do have a picture of the SR-71A on them. I did not purchase a shot glass. I did purchase a Fisher Space Pen. What you see there is an example of "The Pen That Went To The Moon." I do not know whether my $6 chrome and plastic Space Pen went into space. I would like to believe that astronauts use "Smithsonian Institution National Air and Space Museum" souvenirs on their missions, but our Earth pens would probably make them homesick.
I saw the Space Shuttle Enterprise, which was a test vehicle. The Space Shuttle Enterprise and I have made the same number of visits to space. I am not in a museum, though.
If you visit the Center, be sure to bring your historical-aircraft-engine-appreciation cap along, so that you can appreciate the many historical aircraft engines on display. After you see your fourteenth or fifteenth radial engine, you may begin to wonder how the hell they work, but don't worry, the museum has a motorized break-away radial engine model that takes all the guesswork out of answering that question. The model has lights, color coded parts, a shiny counter-weight, and a confident male voice which mysteriously refers to a diagram that is not there.
In the end, though, I was most moved by an aircraft with no motor at all: the Grob 102 Standard Astir III in which Robert Harris broke the glider altitude record on February 17, 1986. Imagine the frigid isolation, stark beauty, and vast emptiness as the sailplane gradually soared to 49,000 ft.
As we were leaving the museum, I told Jason about the glider. He stood pensively for a moment, looking up at the blue Virginia sky, and then he said something I still remember to this day: "You know, David, if one man, alone, can reach such magnificent heights, think what we all can do, together, to make the world down here a better place."
June 24, 2004
Never Again
As many as 10,000 people have died and more than a million more have been driven from their homes in the Darfur region of western Sudan in a growing humanitarian crisis.
More information (and donation information):
From the New York Time's Nicholas Kristof:
Collin Powell will be visiting Darfur next week.
June 23, 2004
Miracle and Wonder
We live in a marvelous time, friends. Thirty minutes ago I walked into Rite Aid to buy toothpaste. Fifteen minutes later I walked out with some toothepaste . . . and a digital alarm clock that sets itself to the NIST Atomic Clock in Boulder Colorodo! It was pretty cheap, and it has a thermometer to boot. I'm told that the NIST radio signal "is at its maximum strength from 12:00 am to 3:00 am . . . In most cases the clock will not receive and update its time until this time." I hope it works. Stay tuned!
Update: It worked! I had to take it to the back porch, though.
June 21, 2004
Say it isn't so
From today's Post (and quoted so that Big Brother won't know you're a dirty hippie):
Noted without comment.
June 17, 2004. Vice President Cheney talking to CNBC's Gloria Borger.
Borger: "Well, let's go to MohamedAtta for a minute, because you mentioned him as well. You have said in the past that it was, quote, 'pretty well confirmed.' "
Cheney: "No, I never said that."
Borger: "Okay."
Cheney: "Never said that."
Borger: "I think that is . . . "
Cheney: "Absolutely not. What I said was the Czech intelligence service reported after 9/11 that Atta had been in Prague on April 9th of 2001, where he allegedly met with an Iraqi intelligence official. We have never been able to confirm that nor have we been able to knock it down."
On Dec. 9, 2001. Cheney talking to NBC's Tim Russert.
Cheney: "Well, what we now have that's developed since you and I last talked, Tim, of course, was that report that -- it's been pretty well confirmed that he did go to Prague and he did meet with a senior official of the Iraqi intelligence service in Czechoslovakia last April, several months before the attack. Now, what the purpose of that was, what transpired between them, we simply don't know at this point, but that's clearly an avenue that we want to pursue."
Libertarian Wet Dream
MOJAVE, CALIFORNIA – The first non-governmental rocket ship flew to the edge of space today and was piloted to a safe landing on a desert airport runway here.
June 18, 2004
Floppy!
I just used a 3.5" floppy disk! As I copied a file to it, the floppy drive made that floppy drive sound, and I got all nostalgic, like it was 1990 or 1991 or some year like that.
June 17, 2004
Shioot
If this is legit, Iran is now blocking Movable Type's web site. Didn't they get the memo about the Democracy Bomb we dropped on Iraq?
June 15, 2004
Anatomy of a Rumor
Remember that John Kerry adultery rumor from February? In this week's New York Magazine, Alexandra Polier, the alleged mistress, tells her tale.
A journalist by training, Pollier resolved to find the source of the bogus story.
Good stuff.
By the way, this is what she looked like before the magazine's stylist got to her. And that man in the first photo is her fiance: Yaron Schwartzman, international man of mystery. "Do jzhoo know who I am? Hmm?"
Gee Mail
I guess the G Mail accounts aren't l337 anymore: I have a few invites to spare, if anybody I know is interested.
Do you think Google is storing the social network formed by the invitation history?
June 10, 2004
Wikipedia
I am a big fan of Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia created by the people, for the people. Anybody can edit it, even you. You'd think it would result in chaos, but it doesn't.
I like Wikipedia's snazzy new look, too, but I have a complaint: they are abusing the Tab Metaphor. Yep, that's right, I said it. Allow me to explain.
Here are the tabs at the top of a typical article in Wikipedia:
As you can see, there are tabs for the actual article, discussion (of the article), editing, and history. It's the last two tabs with which I have a beef. Take the history tab for example. If you're looking at the article, and click the history tab, you get a history of changes made to the article page. But if you're looking at the discussion and click the history tab, you get a history of changed made to the discussion page.
I find this confusing. My expectation is that by clicking any of the four tabs I can see four specific pages (for a given article). Instead, the pages referred to change depending on my "use-hysteresis". Imagine if you were looking through your filing cabinet, and the contents of the folders changed depending on the order in which you looked at them!
You can see they were at least aware of this issue, because the edit and history tabs are separated with a little extra space, but that's just a band-aid. The real problem is that they're using the wrong UI metaphor.
History and Edit should probably be buttons, or even unobtrusive links in the upper right of the article box.
To my way of thinking, anyway.
June 8, 2004
Reporting Under The Gun in an Ambush Zone
Today Daniel Williams gets a chance to report on the attack in harrowing detail.
OK, OK
It appears that I must say something about Ronald Reagan's passing. The unending Media coverage should have tipped me off, but now that Congress has set aside its business for the rest of the week to pay tribute to our fortieth President, it occurs to me that this man was important. Long after history has forgotten the likes of Millard Filmore, Chester Arthur, Franklin Pierce, and Abraham Lincoln, the name Ronald Reagan will continue to invoke strong feelings in the hearts and minds of Americans of all political persuasions.
And so, my fellow countrymen, allow me to take the opportunity presented by this solemn occasion to make a joke: a bad joke, and one in poor taste. To wit:
If Bill Clinton were Ronald Reagan:
A few months ago I told the American people I did not have sexual relations with that woman. My heart and my best intentions still tell me that's true, but the facts and the evidence tell me it is not.
*cough* I yield the floor.
June 7, 2004
Among The Settlers
Depressing, but worth reading: Among The Settlers: Will They Destroy Israel?
If you'd like to see the photographs, maps, and witty cartoons, I can lend you my copy.
Bad Timing
I feel sorry for Washington Post reporter Daniel Williams. Were it not for the endless Reagan hagiography, this story might not have been burried on page A15.
Fallujah byways are a hell of roadside bombs and ambushes. On Friday, an armored sport-utility vehicle carrying this Washington Post reporter and his driver was attacked close to Fallujah on the main highway to Baghdad. Four men in an orange-and-white taxi pumped dozens of bullets from AK-47 assault rifles into the vehicle for more than two minutes, each round causing a loud thump on the vehicle's metal plating and reinforced windows. They shot from behind, from in front and from the sides, where their determined frowns and mustached faces were clearly visible, as they and we weaved down the highway at 90 mph. The fusillade stopped when the SUV, its back tires missing and its rear windows shattered, spun out of control. The gunmen sped down the road, evidently thinking their mission was accomplished. Neither the driver nor the reporter was injured.
Had I been there, the paragraph might have concluded, "One occupant soiled himself, however."