Sunday, June 21, 2009
How to decide where to eat.
Per Steve's advice, I have made a flow chart version of the previous post. The biggest hassle is keeping the three lists.
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
various
- Cisco owns Linksys, not D-Link.
- While the yellow (amber) light wasn't deployed until 1920 for auto traffic, about 50 years after the first traffic light appeared, it was in common usage on the crowded northeast rail lines for at least 20 years before that.
- NavyFCU did indeed have a loss last quarter, somewhat due to a 'stabilization' expense by NCUA, the FDIC equivalent for credit unions.
- Chickens don't require roosters to lay eggs, just to fertilize them.
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
How to Decide Where to Eat
First, keep three lists. Where you like to eat, where you've been meaning to eat, and where you've eaten recently. Then, based on your mood, pick either a comfort food from the list of favorites or a new place to suit a spirit of adventure. (Switch back and forth between the two lists, if you like.) Then, look at where you've eaten recently. If you are going for an old favorite, go to the one you haven't been to recently. If you are looking for a new place, go to one that fits in your budget. One exception: if you are in the mood for a specific kind of food, go eat that.
Any other advice?
Any other advice?
Saturday, March 28, 2009
some corrections
- The vocoder and auto-tune are different devices.
- In nuclear fusion, atoms smash together to combine, e.g. two hydrogens combining to produce helium and a spare neutron. However, wikipedia thinks hydrogen bombs use a different fusion fuel than liquid hydrogen (a mix of H-2 and H-3), since that is a hassle to work with.
- Neutrons can break down into an electron, a proton and an antineutrino via 'beta decay.'
- Alpha particles are helium nuclei. Proton emission is much more rare.
- People lose considerable mass through perspiration. I assume that is much more true for elephants.
Thursday, January 15, 2009
geographic and historical errors
- The Marianas Trench is near the Mariana Islands, not in the Phillipines.
- The NGA west gallery was completed in 1941, about 50 years after I said.
- The train station where the NGA is was a B&P station, which would be removed when Union station was built (being the union of the B&P and Pennsylvania railroads, among others).
- The 99-cent thing may have been caused by newspapermen, but probably not. If it was, it happened in Chicago, not New York, and with Stone, not related to the Pulitzer/Hearst thing.
- I haven't been able to find any info about pricing gas to the tenth of a cent, except that it would have made sense a long time ago, when a cent was worth something and you would have needed a lot of gas to get anywhere.
Thursday, December 11, 2008
Friday, November 21, 2008
some notes about Opryland
Opryland was closed in 1997 and sold for parts, to make room for other ventures. Gaylord's current management reportedly has been unable to discover any documentation of the 1997 management team's decision. I tried to track down a few of the rides.
- While the Grizzly River Rampage is gone, and what remains of the track not worth the cost of recovery, its creator, Intamin AG, has long produced and still produces similar rides. Current incarnations are more flume-like, with an emphasis on contraptions, smaller rafts, and more track-like chutes, whereas the River Rampage put more of an emphasis on a natural river experience. Many parks have a similar rides. A contemporaneous example (and likely most similar) would be the Piraña in the Netherlands and the first such ride, the Thunder River at 6 Flags AstroWorld. A more recent version, the Grizzly River Run at Disney California Adventure, has a similar name, perhaps implying similarity, but I can't find a track layout.
- The Wabash Canonball was sold, but the buyer never managed to find a place for it, and scrapped the ride in 2003. However, the original version of the ride, the Corkscrew, is still operating in Idaho.
- Several of the other roller coasters are still in operation elsewhere, including The Hangman in California and the Rock n Roller in New York.
Sunday, July 27, 2008
more corrections
- While I was correct that crudo means raw, cenote doesn't mean well; it is derived from a Mayan word for cenote.
- The Empire State Building is struck by lightning about 100 times per year.
- Roses were often planted in vineyards to indicate rot, mildew, or other problems on the rose petals before they show on the grape vines.
- The underground lunch room is in Carlsbad, not Yellowstone.
- It was North Dakota that wanted to (still wants to?) remove the direction from its name.
Sunday, July 13, 2008
just trying to keep up with my mouth...
- Bactrian camels have two humps.
- Polydactyly occurs in about .2% of births, not 5%, which is a little ridiculous, I suppose.
- On the other hand, breast cancer is more disturbingly common than I thought.
- Dad bought a Rav-4, which, while slightly ridiculous for a commuter car, is less ridiculous than a Pilot. It is smaller and gets better gas milage.
- The primary source of sweetness in most fortified wines comes from the grapes in the wine, not from the fortifier; adding the brandy (or whatever) kills off the yeast in the wine, leaving more of the sugars from the grapes.
Saturday, June 07, 2008
corrections, stale
- There are over 12,400 wild Cheetahs still around in Africa. The current theory is that their lack of genetic diversity traces back to the last ice age.
- Gas taxes are usually priced per gallon, not computed as a sales tax. So, the percent burden of gas tax has decreased with the cost of gas. However, some states apply sales tax to gasoline sales, and 'pay at the pump' fees to credit card companies are usually a percentage of the sale cost.
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