The Daily Adventures of Mercat

This is me still catching up on shit. And needing to clean out my tabs like serious

I did get my taxes done, though. (Woo!) And my dad and I took apart a lawnmower engine today, that was awesome. I learned that the engine bodies are just aluminum and there is quite enough force on broken parts to shoot them through the sides. (Hot damn) That's what my sister did to her car engine back when she killed it (not when she wrecked it, but when she blew the engine quite dramatically). Goddamnit, I keep forgetting the term and calling it the crank shaft. But it was some arm in this engine that snapped, flipped around and locked the engine and flywheel and sent pieces shooting into the wall (and into the wall of the piston area, jamming that too).

Was George Lucas wrong? Unfortunately, this is not about Star Wars or Indiana Jones. But anything where we're taking credibility away from him is a-okay with me. Kind of like ALW. They both had their times but they need to take a step back from their involvement now. (Wicked and Phantom are coming to the Schuster next year and my mom thought I meant "Phantom 2" because I kept saying "Phantom too". I have absolutely zero faith in his sequel, letmetellyou.)

They're making a 10 Things I Hate About You tv show? I... uh... I dunno. I don't have much faith in that, tbh, because I don't have much faith in general television. Especially decade-old not-quite-remakes.

Goddamnit, this is the kind of shit I wanted to be doing in science fair. Instead I had rather shitty science teachers who never actually helped me accomplish anything with my projects, and thought my stuff was way too off-the-wall because I ACTUALLY ADDRESSED FUCKING QUESTIONS I HAD WITH SCIENTIFIC PRINCIPLES AND DIDN'T LIE ABOUT THE RESULTS, godfuckingdamnit. (No, I'm not bitter. Have I mentioned I'm really good at holding grudges?) Other than my eighth grade project which I can't remember, I did one testing people's ability to actually differ between Coke and Pepsi and knockoff colas, one testing backpack weights compared to body weight, one testing cat saliva killing bacteria, one testing wine cork tainting, and one testing the vitamin C content of edible flowers. Which I think are pretty damn legitimate questions, even though my procedures weren't anything great or advanced. WELL I'M SORRY YOU NEVER TAUGHT ME OTHER STANDARD PROCEDURES AND MACHINES. If I'd known what was out there for me to use, I could have come up with a test using them. I promise you. So yes, once again I'm blaming GOD DAMN FUCKING MS. WISE and ugh Mrs. Levy (she hated me) and rather clueless Ms. Keller. What is it about the science teachers I had that made them completely unhelpful (or just plain idiotic... Ms. Wise ohmygod, we actually made her cry once. I don't even remember why, but I remember she was an idiot)? And so many other people got away with completely unoriginal tests or just plain LYING about their data or having their parents come up with and design and basically build their project. God fucking damn, people have no respect for the scientific process.

Yeah, I know, I'm crazy.

Housing drunks and letting them drink saves millions, interesting. I always like when alternative solutions are actually able to get permission to test (somehow) and are able to show results. YAY PEOPLE ARE THINKING (unlike my science fair peers yes I'll be bitter about this for the rest of this post for the sake of hilarity)

This may just be one of the best articles I've ever read, "The different kinds of people that there are". ( the text in case it disappears )

OH GOD ROBOTIC OVERLORDS Well kinda. Not AI but critical thinking skills. Hot damn. We're a few steps away from the computer in Eagle Eye (did I ever get around to how ridiculous that film was?) which I think would have been a totally better film if it decided it needed to destroy itself again. OOPS I JUST SPOILED THAT MOVIE KINDA BUT OH WELL. It's not really worth your time unless you have nothing better to watch (it's not awful) and you are a trumpet player flying from Denver to Dayton who wants to be kind of surrealistically freaked out. Yeeeaaaaah.

Oh man, speaking of technology, they (I'm not exactly sure who) invented a table saw that's attached to a circuit and a brake drum and in ONE TEN-THOUSANDTH OF A SECOND if it senses a change in electrical resistance (aka wetness or in this specific case, flesh) it stops and retracts the blade. Of course doing this costs you a $200 brake drum each time but it's better than losing your fingers and paying $10,000 to maybe having them reconnected.

But I am just consistently amazed by the mechanical and electrical things people are able to design. I just... have no mind for mechanics. If you give me the pieces I can put them together, but I am a static person. At best I can give you a Rube Goldberg, but that's about it.

A really fun and simple word game.

Goddamnit I love RFID. This isn't even a particularly exciting application! It's just so awesome.

10 Amazing Living Walls. Just trying to pay more attention to sustainable stuff because I'm going to the Stander Symposium on what UD should do about energy stuff, and I want to be able to see us do something fucking awesome.

On that note, the 10 Worst Greenwashers. That'd be people who lie about having an earth-friendly business. FUCK YOU AND THE HORSE YOU RODE IN ON.

Okay yay done links for now fuck I'm really tired and hungry goddamnitall

[EDIT] Oh, I almost forgot. Things I learned today: you know why older cars were designed with such long fronts? Not just style, but because the pistons were all in a line before they did the V-design. Cool beans. :D

I'm having a good week, all things considered. Other than totally bombing my 5 minute speech last night due to nerves, my ethics test got pushed back to Monday and my Shakespeare paper, which I thought was due Thursday is actually due in a few weeks. So... yay. Breathing time.

Speaking of breathing time, camp went really really well. I am so excited for this summer.

Anyone watch Big Bang Theory last night? So I may have told this story before, but my mom and I like to poke fun at each other by calling each other Sheldon. for example, my mom was teasing me that when we went to a gigantic art show, I suggested we just go row by row so we don't get as lost as we do every year. (It's a lot to take in in just a few hours.) And I was mocking her for being anal about how I put her books away on the shelf because when she was in gradeschool in California, she worked at the library, and I guess libraries like to have it such that all the spines line up towards the front of the shelf, whereas my personal library is pretty disorganized and forget empty space, I try to fit on there as many books as I freaking can.

Anyway, so last night when BBT was on, my mom texted me and told me I needed Sheldon's tagging system because then I could find the jacket I lost. (My corps jacket for SW. I'm really upset about that.) Which, technically you can't, because rfid tags can't tell you location, only a sort of "yes" or "no" if it's there or not, but I had to remind her that that is the exact system I have been planning for several years to keep track of my future library. :D

So yeah, I'm kind of a Sheldon.


UGH, you fucking know what? So that Indiana Jones game is finally coming out after being in development for a million years, and they said "late spring 2009", but YOU KNOW WHAT, IT COMES OUT THE DAY I LEAVE FOR EVERYDAYS. fml. Soooo I'm gonna have to try to get an early copy or just get it and... ugh, let it sit all summer... That's bullllshiiiiit. I definitely won't have time to play it in the fall...


So even though my last pair of "good jeans" (aka the comfy, well-fitted ones I live in every day) decided to die and my new pair needed to be hemmed, I forgot I had a pair hiding in the back of my drawer with side cargo pockets (no hammer pocket/loop unfortunately) and SUPER deep top pockets (holy shit I can fit my whole hand in them) and I am a happy camper because today was warm despite it looking like it was going to rain and me being way tired and losing m corps jackets and YAY I HAVE CARGO PANTS AGAIN. Shupa shweet.

I really love homestar runner. Haven't sat down and watched a whole bunch in a long time, but they had a new toon out recently with Strong Bad saying "T minus heck outta Dodge". Excellent. Added to book of quotes. *check*

Okay firefox is acting up and being very slow sooo I'm going to post this and come back with links later.

I feel bad because I haven't updated much lately. I think I feel worse because I've had some good philosophly thoughts in class and just haven't bothered to get them down. BUT next week is camp (le sigh) and I'm planning to being my eepc and write a paper and get some writing done.

Otherwise I had a very good weekend. Just in a good mood, enjoying stuff... Watched Kingdom of the Crsytal Skull, watched some Jurassic Park, talked philosophy, spent some time looking up Adventure stuff, watched a good chunk of Firefly.

I'm not sure what to think about my Adventure stuff; I found some new photos (always a plus) and saved some info in case the pages disappear later on (can you believe it's been 10 years since the new building opened?), but I didn't really get anywhere on the code-cracking because looking at Candice's pictures, she didn't have the macro on and some of them she didn't even get the whole thing in the photo. Bleh. BUT I'm hoping I can find someone who's going next weekend to take my camera and take a bunch of photos (with macro) and maybe even some videos.

The real confusing thing is that JPI Design, the group that designed Adventure, redid their site awhile back but it has not been up in the past year; I'm wondering what happened because I found a NEW site (Roto-something) taking credit for it, with a different design team (or at least, lacking the head guy, I didn't check on anyone else), AND with other pictures of the design I'd never seen before. (LIKE A MODEL! *eeeee*) But unlike JPI which was out of California (although the stuff I found today said Oregon?!) Roto is out of DUBLIN (OH) which means that if I got an internship there or ended up working there I wouldn't really have to Never See Anyone Again. (Unless I get a job working for Disney.) But as things stand I don't know exactly where I'm headed, just kind of see myself somewhere all-over traveling when I need to.

Also, they set up a Ning network for overnight "alumni", which is exciting. Opportunities to see if Adventure talk crops up or if pictures do, AND ALSO THEY ARE SETTING UP AN OVERNIGHT FOR ALUMNI :D In April, I'm hoping maybe I can go...

:D

Okay, linkspam. There is plenty of it.

The snake was a fake! Not at all surprised. And on a related note, What Happened to All the Weird? On one hand, I agree, we need weird. Part of it, I think, is that we are getting more educated, in which case lack of weird is a good sign. But at the same time there is GOOD weird like Neil Gaiman, which "normalcy" kind of looks down on... Not completely, but I just feel like there are a lot of people like my dad who just don't like weird stuff. He says it's too dark, and he wouldn't like Gaiman and refuses to watch Nolan's Batmans, so... I dunno. It's funny though, because he likes funny weird, like Monty Python and Gilliam's stuff, but he doesn't like serious or semi-serious weird. *shrug* I dunno. I like weird. I blame it on my young exposure to the Marx brothers, Ernie Kovacks, Monty Python, The Seven Faces of Dr. Lao, The Point, all that jazz...

Oh, but the giant snake fossil in Colombia is awesome, and I think I posted it before, but YAY it gives me further faith in KotC. (AAUUUUGHHH JESUSFUCKINGCHRIST that's a big damn snake.)

Entrance to the Garden of Eden? Didn't really read the article, but the idea is intriguing.

A bunch of viral-ad stuff from the WB for Watchmen... Cool beans. I LOVE viral ad systems. And I suspect, despite some of the awfully-cheesily-designed costumes, Watchmen will be very good.

A brief recap of the Dark Knight viral campaign. Doesn't get into the details, but fun nonetheless. =)

Maybe I posted this? Five companies developing the "Internet of Things"... I'm just excited because maybe by the time I can afford it, there will be an RFID system (or I can develop one, HOW COOL WOULD THAT BE) to organize a library.

An old story, so I probably posted this awhile ago, but "Indy V Underway".

Cool article on the direction of Raiders, too.

OMG NEXT GEN INDIANA JONES GAME OUT LATE SPRING 2009 HERE HAVE A PREVIEW DID I POST THIS YESTERDAY I THINK SO BUT GO AHEAD AND WATCH IT AGAIN YAY YAY

I have a good pile of links, I've been trying to clean up my googlereader. Blech. The bad thing is that when I sit down and read through Gizmodo and Make... I get all psyched up about electronics. Bleeeeh.

This is pretty cool, and be sure to look at the photos. This guy was able to urge bees to build in nonstandard patterns... It's pretty wicked art/architecture/sciene. I don't know what to call it. It's just fascinating.

Did you know there's a Mars simulation station in the desert? They have people live there as if they were on Mars and then study them. Pretty effin' cool.

They are planning to reboot the Tomb Raider series. I actually had no problems with Jolie, but then again, I have never even played a Toomb Raider game. I just enjoy them as the modernizing-Indiana-Jones-popularity thematic things that they are. So... anything with a good set and maybe some good artifacts, I'm in.

So I don't have a particular link for this, but apparently in the past few months passports have started to been distributed with RFID tags included, for easier data reading. However, it's been shown that someone driving by up to thirty feet away with an RFID reader can steal your data; so make sure if you get a new passport (and probably, some ID's already have RFID tags) that you get an RFID-blocking wallet/passport case for it. They usually just have a layer of aluminum foil added, as that's enough to block it. So yeah, it'd be relatively easy to make your own, too; there's some good how-tos on Instructables.

So this is only a design concept, but it actually looks like a very good design to me.

Finally, looking for a good insult? At your fingertips...