techno.blog("Dion")

I was listening to a friends daughter, who gave up learning the piano. One of the most confusing points of the piano was the fact that everything was either black or white. “Why not use colors?”.

This is true. I am sure someone has done this, but it would be great to have a piano learning kit which gives notes different colors, with stickers for the keys on the piano itself to match it up.

It would be a lot clearer to the kids to match colors rather than looking at the height of a note, converting it to a letter, and finding that letter on the keyboard!

My in-laws just nabbed one of the first Ford Escape Hybrid SUVs. It is perfect for them, and then even got a right up in the paper this morning about it!

Paul Rock of Madison, who is more of a bicyclist than a car person and says he has “never had a cool car,” was drawing all kinds of looks from others drivers coming home this weekend from the Twin Cities. Rock and his wife Phyllis were in Minneapolis picking up one of the new Ford Escape Hybrid sport utility vehicles. The Escape is the first gasoline/electric hybrid vehicle from a Detroit automaker and the first hybrid SUV sold in the United States.

“I’m really thrilled,” Rock was saying Monday. “This is the first time I’ve been excited about getting a car.” Rock particularly enjoys being able to put his canoe – he enjoys paddling Wisconsin rivers – on top of the vehicle while the environmentalist in him enjoys the 400-500 miles he can drive on the 15 gallon tank.

Rock said he has not seen any other Escape Hybrids around Madison, and it was through a friendship with the Minneapolis dealer that he was able to get one of the much-in-demand vehicles. Sticker price: $29,450. They will be easy to spot, Rock said. The Escapes say “hybrid” on them three places. …

It is always good when the game is half decent (rare in my experience). Not that it isn’t exciting to watch the commercials :/

New England fans must be wiping their eyes. They go from a curse, to a dynasty. 3 superbowl wins in 4? And, it is harder and harder to build a team which stretches the years like that.

Great stuff!

Since when did reality T.V. get renamed to Human Drama.

I always love seeing the spin guys come up with new catchphrases to spice up an OLD thing.

I feel kinda sad about all of the non-reality T.V. Who is going to look back and syndicate this stuff in 10 years? I hope…. noone.

We should get more REAL reality t.v., A.K.A documentaries.

So, I had to move almaer.com last weekend. I have been wanting to move my domain elsewhere, but it always seems to be the last thing on the list to do.

The problem came when my blog was using up all of my bandwidth.

I thought that it would be simple to just add some bandwidth and be on my merry way. However, the hosting provider wouldn’t let me do this (well they would, but at a ridiculous cost PER MB).

They wanted me to cancel my account, create a new one, and move over to that. Well, if I am going to go to all of that trouble? why not move somewhere else?

So, now I am moved, and hopefully I won’t have the same annoying bandwidth issues going forward!

“A new grid computing climate research project, climateprediction.net, has come up with its first major results, and they’re really not good news for the planet according to the BBC. The simulations suggest that over the next hundred years we could see average rises of average temperatures of up to 11K, more than twice what was previously thought.”

Scary stuff. I talked to someone who worked at NASA trying to work out the effects of our abuse on the planet (were we seeing natural changes in climate?) and after 10 years the results weren’t good then, and these look worse.

The big question: IS IT TOO LATE

I am often blogging about travel nightmares that I encounter.

Something good actually happened today.

I flew from Denver -> Dallas -> Miami. My original flight from Denver was delayed, and they got me on another one (which was actually earlier). The problem was that my bags were already set up, and they couldn’t change where they were.

I was 100% sure that my bags wouldn’t be there in Miami, but I was proven wrong!

It is nice to have a pleasant surprise for once :)

I am often blogging about travel nightmares that I encounter.

Something good actually happened today.

I flew from Denver -> Dallas -> Miami. My original flight from Denver was delayed, and they got me on another one (which was actually earlier). The problem was that my bags were already set up, and they couldn’t change where they were.

I was 100% sure that my bags wouldn’t be there in Miami, but I was proven wrong!

It is nice to have a pleasant surprise for once :)

Bruce Schneieir recently talked about British Pub Hours and Crime.

He has some really good points about the seperation of local power compared to central power.

It has always frustrated me that many areas of the US have very early closing hours, and that if you are in that town at closing time, all hell breaks lose. I think I would rather open up the hours so the rabble would spread out!

I enjoy T.V. shows from the US and the UK (among other places). What really blows my mind is how the utter tripe manages to make it across the ocean.

I know that 95% of T.V. is awful, so the odds are that some of it will mistakenly be moved over. Soap Operas in the US and painful, fake, and the long pauses really get me. Soap Operas in the UK are so depressing that you want to kill yourself.

However, there are some shows which really need to be seen all over. A show called Only Fools and Horses is a CLASSIC comedy from the UK. Why not show that instead of Benny Hill, Are you being served, or Monty Python (not that I don’t like Python.. just not every second).

The latest travestry which has me writing all of this, is a show on Comedy Central.

DISTRACTION: A Game Show

It is very bizarre. It comes from the UK, and it even looks like the host is the same.

How is it bizarre? Picture the techniques in which you have to ring the buzzer and get answers:

1. As a contestant you have to pee in a tin. When you STOP the buzzer goes off
2. As a contestant you have your hands tied behind you, and have to charge over to a large naked person who has the answers stuck to their body. You have to get them off with your teeth.

Why are we getting this? Why are we turning into Japan? :)