tucson

Tucson is a weird town.

First the good part: it was over 80 degrees here on Christmas day. Rusty and I drove around town with the top down, we ate breakfast out on the patio, and we went and hit golf balls on Christmas day at the local golf course. That's just insane. It's hard to understand that it's actually Christmas when you're sweating in a t-shirt.

Also, I got a harmonica for Christmas. I'm going to be annoying people for weeks with it as I try to learn to play. My grandmother gave me a can of beef broth for Christmas. She's not quite right in the head.

The bad part: I know I rant about this every year, but Tucson drivers make me want to start killing people.

There's an unwritten law here that you have to drive 5 miles below the speed limit, no matter what it is. That means that if you're on a three lane, straight road, and the speed limit is 45, you're going 40. I can't even get around people because EVERYONE drives like that.

And the worst part is that drivers are really "sticky". What does that mean? It means that if the speed limit is 45, and one person goes 30, EVERYONE goes 30. So you can be stuck on a three lane road, driving through the desert with nothing around you, going 30 miles an hour, screaming and pounding your steering wheel.

Rusty and I call it "driving like you're just waiting to die", which is what it seems like a lot of people around here are doing. I swear to you right now, when I'm 70 years old and driving around, I'm still going to be going fast, because going slow is for freaking pussies. I want to GET where I'm GOING, not cruise along for several hours in awful traffic. Gah.

Yeah, so that's my rant. Tucson, speed the fuck up, or I'm coming after you with pointy sticks. Or better yet, I'll take your medicare and blow it on hookers and booze. Or I'll cancel Matlock. God damn old people.

last minute podcast request

I'm going to be driving about 15 hours to Tucson tomorrow. And then 15 hours back next week. I'm filling up my ipod nano with podcasts to keep me entertained, and I want to know what you guys are listening to.

I grabbed a few that looked cool, like slacker astronomy, pc gamer, engadget, nerd tv, the ricky gervais show, and some political feeds. But if there are some good ones out there, let me know. I'm down for anything, especially stuff I wouldn't normally think to add (look at my choices. tech, science, and politics.) like good music, good discussions, etc.

So yeah. I'm heading out Thursday morning. Chop chop, make it quick.

random thought

I still get weirded out sometimes by the pace of technology.

I was watching the Hitler Channel tonight, and they were talking about the massive rocket bombing of London by the Germans.

The most amazing part about that is that 60 years ago, one of the most powerful nations on earth was temporarily brought to its knees because no one else in the world *knew how to make rockets work*.

Man, that's weird. Rockets are a freaking hobby now. Scientists in London 60 years ago would have killed their own mother to get their hands on the technology that we can buy in hobby stores.

This got me thinking about things that have been invented since I was born, that I can't imagine the world without. I mean, kids will be saying, "Jesus, Tobin was alive when there were no X" someday. Here are some interesting ones:

I was born in 1977.

1979 - cell phones and walkmans. and roller blades.
1983 - term "virtual reality" invented
1985 - Microsoft Windows
1986 - disposable cameras
1990 - HTTP and HTML

We already take these things for granted as if they've existed forever. And that's just in my lifetime.

sometimes i remember why i live here

I'm sitting on my back porch, having a beer and surfing the intarwebs.

It's December 21st.

It's SIXTY ONE DEGREES AT 1:30AM.

As much as I hate lots of things about California, moments like this make up for it.

Also, this is pretty interesting:

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2005/12/less_silver_pol.php

Apparently digital photography is saving the environment by massively reducing silver pollution in our water, which is a byproduct of making film. Who would have thought?

supply and demand

If I was in charge of marketing for the Xbox 360, I would have insisted that the Japanese and American Xboxes were in the same region, and could play each other's games interchangably.

First off, there isn't nearly as much piracy in Japan as there is elsewhere in the world, which is usually what region encoding is meant to stop. There's really no reason not to have the boxes be interchangable.

However, the SECOND reason would have avoided the massive PR failure that the Xbox has become in Japan. Imagine if everyone in Japan could have gone out and bought an Xbox and then sold it to an American on ebay. Suddenly, it would look like the console was massively popular worldwide, not just in America and Europe. There would be no boxes on the shelves anywhere in the world, because the demand would have been globalized.

Hell, it would have probably had a knock-on effect in Japan, because if the damn things are selling out and hard to get, Japanese people would probably want them more. Things in high demand are always more attractive.

Instead, you get a massive shortage here, and a surplus there. That benefits no one.

Dumb bastards should have hired me for consulting.

can't afford the car, named her daughter Alexis

If anyone's looking for a good xmas gift for me, this would be a good one:

http://www.jamesmcadam.co.uk/portfolio_html/sb_table.html





Yeah, it's a table. That turns into a home defense item. A SHIELD AND SWORD. I'm gonna take that with me on a plane, because I've heard that there's a high danger of Snakes on a Plane. Oh noeees!