The other day I opened at work, which, even though I much prefer it, is something I almost never do - in the morning though they always make an 'opening announcement', which consist of: yesterday's sales vs same-time-last-year sales, safety message and [the only part I really listen to] the environmental message. 9 out of 10 times they aren't that impressive... but this particular message surprised me:

"If everyone recycled their sunday newspapers, we would save a half-million trees each week".

That's a crap load of trees for one week - and especially just one paper. Which reminded me of this website... this company uses non-wood materials to make paper that looks, feels, and acts exactly like paper made from wood. Apparently companies like Nike, Mitsubishi Motors and Staples are using their stuff... along with the University of Oregon and the Red Hot Chili Peppers. I guess it's a start.

I while ago I read an article reporting that scientist have developed robots that are able to "repair themselves if parts fail, reconfigure themselves to better perform the task they have been set, or even to make extra helpers". Even more interesting/ frightening: "In a little more than a minute, a simple three-cube robot can make a copy of itself".

Then this morning I found an article that talked about "Japanese scientists unveiling the most human-looking robot yet devised - a "female" android called Repliee Q1". There are two pictures of this android... she/ it does look very close to being life like.

Now am I just being paranoid to wonder how much longer before these two technologies are introduced in the same machine/ android? A human-like robot with the ability to repair itself, advance itself, even duplicate itself.

Just out of curiosity I searched BBC for "artificial intelligence" and found this article:

In June 2002, a robot called Gaak gave an alarming demonstration of its independence. It made a dash for freedom from an exhibit at the Magna science centre in Rotherham. Gaak crept along a barrier until it found a gap and squeezed through. Having left the building, it reached Magna’s exit by the M1 motorway before it was rumbled.

It's all falling into place...

These are three random clips from our two days relaxing at her uncle's house. The first clip is me swimming alone at two in the morning... the pool was still 88 degrees, if I hadn't been so tired, I would have swam all night long.

The second random clip is a battery powered toy-fish, that thing provided hours of mindless entertainment.

And the last clip is fairly self-explanatory... Amanda and I hanging out by the pool watching "The Day the Earth Stood Still" and playing fetch with Brimley. Enjoy.

I know, I know, the title for this post is [imitating Vince Vaughn in 'Old School'] "cheeeaeeesy". Except he just says "cheese", but you get the idea. I don't have much time to post - I'm too busy logging 8 hours of footage and sitting in a puddle of my own sweat... I'm about to go steal an a/c unit for the bedroom out of desperation.

Right, back to the "links", if you click on my name - mike - above my picture to the right of this post, a drop down menu will appear full of brand spanking new links for your enjoyment.

Also, I don't think I ever mentioned that we added a "knowledge is power" link-list underneath our 'just-for-show' tip jar. Ahem... that's for you mom - the links, not the tip jar... I thought you could use a good grossing out. Although I do feel bad considering Onsted doesn't offer a lot of alternatives to buying meat that doesn't have a 98% chance of being laced with road kill and chicken shit. Hmm. I'm hungry. No, really, I'm hungry... I'm going to go eat some Superman icecream now.

and sticky. i've been working like crazy. pretty much everyday. if i'm not at both jobs i'm at at least one of them. on top of all of the house/dog sitting we've been doing... on top of my covering a couple of extra shifts at ikea for people on top of the 9 hours i spent at jury duty the other day.... it's never ending. plus my list of 'things to do' just keeps growing and i dont' seem to be crossing anything off. i'm exhausted.

anyhow. if i could forget about all of it and just get back on my bike right now - headed for who knows where - i would.

i sat down with all of our bike maps and state maps and an atlas and looked at the routes we took and got an exact count for all of the miles we rode each day. it turned out to be a total of 1140 miles that mike and i biked (and for 325 of those nick was also with us).

i had a pretty pleasant surprise when i got home... apparently my family (mom, ray and grandma) each decided to pledge 10 cents for each mile i biked, but didn't tell me about it until i made it back home. sneeky. but it couldn't have come at a better time, since mike and i went a bit over our budget and didn't quite have enough money left over for rent by the time the trip was over.

it was nice to know that they all were really that proud of me. and that they were all that interested in what i was doing. i have the greatest family.

mike and i are shopping for some used cardio machines. it sucks... i was just starting to tone up and now i'm all flabby again. damn. i month just wasn't long enough.

I keep trying to remind Amanda to sit down and write a post - but I admit, she has been very, very busy lately. On top of working her usual 35 hours a week, she is baby sitting 15 hours a week and we've been house and dog sitting for everyone we know it seems like.

Right now I'm home alone - it's still unbelievably hot inside the apartment - I've spent the last nine hours importing the footage from our bike trip in my mac. I've got tonight and tomorrow [with the exception of a meeting with Stefanie in the morning] to finish logging the footage and pull it into Final Cut Pro to begin editing. It's all very exciting and nerve-wracking at the same time.

[note: I meant to write more here... but it's now 1 in the morning and I'm dead tired, so I decided to just go with what I had].

Not the country... the book by the team from 'the daily show'. I'm over at Amanda's Uncle Dennis's house right now, we are once again house & dog sitting for them. Unfortunately it's only for two days and not a week like before... right now the temp' in the pool outside is 88 degrees, it's like heaven on earth. Last night around 2 in the morning I took a dip while Amanda watched the end of 'In Good Company'.

So, back to the title of this post, I'm sitting outside by the pool working on getting rid of my extreme farmer's tan from our bike trip - and reading through 'America (the book)'... I'm trying to read over the parts of the book that I didn't get a chance to before - but I keep thinking about one of my favorite clips in the book by Stephen Colbert called "Of Course Your Vote Counts!", it reads:

In ever election, many people grapple with the nagging suspicion their vote doesn't count. As a citizen and someone who is always right, it is respectively my duty and my pleasure to tell them they are wrong. In fact, our democracy depends on every citizen recognizing the value of his or her vote.

And here is the value of that vote. In the most recent presidential election 105,360,260 people cast ballots. That means each person's vote counted .000000949%. I defy you to find a mathematician who will tell you that number is less than or equal to zero.

Swish that around in your mouth for a while. How does it taste? Taste like freedom?

Ahh *wiping away a single tear from eye* that's good stuff. Anyways, Amanda last night had me grab the camcorder on our way here - so I've been trying to walk around and tape some things I can later post here when I get back home. It's been far too long since we've posted a random video clip... maybe we should do a few 'video post'. That could be fun. Okay, well I'm going to take a dip in the pool now.

[ Originally posted at Project Pedal ]

Our air conditioner is a piece of crap. The only way it cools the apartment outside of it's five foot "personal bubble" is if you put a fan in front of it and crank it full blast. And even then you have to stay in either the living room or kitchen to cool off... and since I'm in the bedroom - which is very, very far from the a/c, even with the fan - I'm sweating just sitting here. Which is as a attractive as it is comfortable.

Okay, so - the point of this post, I'll be busy all day importing and logging footage, to keep the site moving I thought I'd post the 2nd [of 7] bike trip slide shows. Enjoy.

note: right click here to "save target as".

Funny... yet a little sad at the same time. But mostly just sad.

[update: Clip removed or missing from host's server]


Click the image above to watch this 3 minute clip from the Daily Show - thanks to onegoodmove for the clip.

Amanda found this stuck under the windshield wiper of her car outside the 'food4less' store. The two strange things are one) the letter doesn't look photocopied, so this person sat their - probably using Amanda's car's hood as a table - writing out this letter... then went back through it with a red marker, highlighting key points just to be safe. And two) Amanda said she didn't see any of these "God's hit list" letters on anyone else's car.



The whole thing makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside - I think I'll go to the church down the street and bring my "inspiring letter" with me.

[ Originally posted at Project Pedal ]

I've decided to use 'keynote' to build an interactive quicktime movie slideshow for the bike trip photos... I've grouped them into 100 each to cut down on file size for readers with slower internet connections.

Now, this is a bit experimental - I'd like to hear some feedback on this decision. Should I instead just post them 20 pic's at a time? Should I upload a large PDF? Should I try something I haven't thought of?

Okay, without any further procrastination - here are the first 100 random pic's from our pacific bike trip. Enjoy & don't forget the feedback. I've got 500 more of these things to share.

note: For those of you out there still dragging your feet with 56k, I recommend you right click here and "save target as".

[update] I've tried to find a way to save the slideshow mov' file as a streaming quickstart, but I'm not having any luck. So unfortunately the whole 13 MBs have to download before you can start clicking... please be patient.