1964 MODEM demo

1964 MODEM demo (YouTube)

The Jones Hall marquee caught my attention with “Music of Star Trek and More Sci-Fi”. They’ll be playing themes from the various Star Treks, including the new movie. They’ll also play the themes from 2001: A Space Odyssey and Battlestar Galactica. I wonder if they will play the theme from Red Dwarf.

If music isn’t enough, there’s a costume competition.

And the Houston Chronicle Dollar Concert will be playing Holst’s “The Planets”

If you prefer music from video games, see the Gamer MusiCON 09.

The Terra Cotta Warriors are on exhibit in The Houston Museum of Natural Science

From yesterday’s 365 Days of Astronomy Podcast podcast:

…if an object were to fall into a black hole it would actually get stretched out and then ripped apart. There’s a great word for that; do you remember what the word for that is, Cameron?

Cameron: I believe it has something to do with Italian cooking…

Robert: It does — spaghettification,

article with videos at Wired.com.

Doctors who work in Houston’s busiest maternity ward say they’re expecting an especially bustling June, leading some to conclude that Hurricane Ike was the perfect storm for making babies.

It’s been eight months since Ike knocked out the region’s electricity, leaving many with no television, Internet access or other distractions for days, if not weeks. Now there’s a curious bump in the number of women who are rounding out their third trimesters of pregnancy.

– Chron

CNN has an article on visualizing the inside of a black hole.  It references a website with AVI and MOV video files, so I dropped the Flash video from CNN.

Now, if the LHC really could generate black holes, they could make a little side profit offering self guided tours inside the man black holes.  How long would it take to find the exit considering the effects on time?

Anyone who’s dropped a stack of balls sized small, medium and large will understand the inevitable importance of size in collisions. These IISH videos illustrate with small and mid-size cars. The second focuses on the Smart Car ForTwo. It spins more than a whole turn after the frontal offset collision, but handles that scenario well for such a small car. Because of the emphasis on affordability, many small cars don’t perform in collisions as wells as the Smart.

IIHS also provides a few other videos. Understanding Car Crashes demonstrates inertia with a dummy seated on the back of a pickup that drives off. The same video demonstrated inertia with the tablecloth yanked out from under a stable setting, a trick that appeared in Ratatouille.

And for good measure I include the Chevrolet Volt.  Since it’s engine is just a generator for the electric drivetrain, I wonder if it’s be accessorised for using the car as a generator.  Why buy one when you can just use the cars engine? (Generators: Walmart, Home Depot)

Telsa has electrified a ForTwo.

Yes, this post’s title parodies atom smashers. Well, cars are made of atoms.

Intrigued by the user of fire in this cocktail, I watched the video. Oh, that a very involved recipe.

Air Force One over NYC

Yesterday, CNN reported on the Air Force One photo op.  I passed by the TV at the office with my headphones on and saw the footage.  The big swath of blue on the airplane certainly looked like the presidential airplane.  There’s a video online, also at the CNN article, showing a thin crowd of people running as the plane passes.

I imagine a conspiracy theory for doing this is to gauge America’s paranoia.  A quick Google for conspiracy theory around this stunt turned up nothing, but the present outrage and material about 9/11.

The swine flu is a pressing concern now with discussion of centralize planning to address this, rather than letting the pharmaceutical industry distribute products without prescription.  The employers or stores make arrangements for shots for the seasonal flu.  Why not sell those products OTC? Leaving the problem to the market diversifies the solutions and task force, rather than relying on a one-size-fits-none approach.

Bacon fans at the office call the swine flu bacon flu in jesk.

With a huge tax hick on cigarettes, a USB cigarette (Google translated Product page) is inevitable. Wired offers a vivid antagonists opinion:

Smokers are pariahs. Evil, stinking polluters of the sweet city air, the smoke from a single cancer stick is worse for the lungs of passersby than the exhaust fumes of a thousand SUVs. Or so say non-smokers (and the Californian authorities).

Uh, Star Trek icons. Now where can I get a Federation ring? ThinkGeek is offering a Star Trek spork. I want one…for my Wolf Brand Chili. However, the plain one is cheaper and appeals to my inner Scrooge. Now these icons are free.