Chris Osgood; Hall of Fame Goaltender?

Discussed a bit...

http://www.thehockeynews.com/articles/16472-THNcom-Playoff-Blog-Osgood-for-the-Hall-of-Fame.html

"The fact is Chris Osgood, 35, will amass more than 400 regular season wins in his career. The only other netminders who have surpassed that total and aren't honored members are still active – Ed Belfour and Curtis Joseph. Belfour is a shoo-in for induction; Cujo is more of a longshot.

...

As another colleague asked: "Other than Ken Dryden’s brilliant run in 1971-72, what’s the difference between Osgood and Dryden? Dryden won all those Cups, but was only facing 18 shots a night.”

One difference is perception and Osgood - whose career wins total (363 and counting) and GAA of 2.43 is better than a good handful of his masked brethren who’ve already been inducted - can't shake a reputation forged around a few memorable, soft goals.

...

Maybe this is where he gets the Mike Gartner treatment. Gartner, a fabulously consistent player over the course of his career, was inducted in 2001 having never won a major individual award."

http://www.kuklaskorner.com/index.php/psh/comments/osgoods_hall_of_fame_case/

"10. Is he the best player at his position who is eligible for the Hall of Fame but not in?

No. In the comments of one thread I once listed ten goalies better than Osgood who are Hall of Fame eligible. There are other goalies that could have made the list as well. Players like Vachon, Barrasso, Moog and Mike Richter are definitely better goalies who are Hall of Fame eligible and are not there. "


http://hfboards.com/showthread.php?s=326c5f94584a28d2c88e2a152e22df4e&p=19713010#post19713010



What happens if Detroit wins this year, again, and he comes out with 4 Stanley Cup rings (three as a starter)? Give him another season or two of playing, and by pure numbers he's in top 5 ever... but, that's probably not enough to go on... I'm 70-30 he gets in eventually if he wins again this year. 50-50 if not... 3 rings as a starter, with all the numbers where they should be is hard to ignore.

This is not happening youtube. : Song of the Day 2: Looper - Mondo 77!

Looper:

Looper are a Scottish indie-pop band, fronted by Stuart David, former Belle and Sebastian bassist... After touring the US for three months with The Flaming Lips in 2000 they signed to Mute Records for five albums... Since then, Looper have been releasing their music free to the public at their Looperama website, funding this experiment by licensing the use of their songs in high-profile Hollywood films and ad campaigns, including the film Vanilla Sky and a Xerox campaign... (!)

Download the awesome original here!

Song of the Day!: Plumtree - Scott Pilgrim

ARE YOU KIDDING ME! I LOVE THESE LADIES!

Wow. What a great song. What a perfect video. Perfect for the song.. the chorus circuses around, as the red and yellow do! And the hare!.. ughhh...

I've like you for a thousand years! - Plumtree : Song of the day.

Download without distortion and enjoy! You can hear the round on the mp3 version!


I've liked you for a thousand years
I can't wait until I see you

WOW~!

Rehearsal dinner

Padre.


Mom, Bride, Pops, practice, foot by foot.


The consistent pedals of twelve.


Groom with fire.


Greek! Auto-focused on the broccoli? Ahh.. the randomness of life!


Cousin Ula!


Gorgeous!


Again with the gorgeous. Mom dancing with two hands around Leonard Cohen.

How to balance a budget:

The federal government plans to put Atomic Energy of Canada Ltd.'s nuclear reactor business up for sale, and will seek private-sector management for the Chalk River research facility that produces up to half of the world's supply of medical isotopes.

Can they be serious?

Song of the day: Tell Sally - Danny Michel

I first heard Danny Michel courteous Jowi during the unforgettable NYC pickup trip this year. I won't, I honestly can't, replicate Jowi's storytelling, but he painted a fantastic and familiar picture. From there Danny took over.



I sat through the morning 'til the morning up and fled
I held up in my bunker, I held up in my head
The fridge in here is empty and all the plants are dead
I pace like a lion all around my bed

Tell Sally I can't see her, it only makes me weaker
Tell Sally I'm 'a leave her unless I'm her only one, only one
Tell Sally that deceiver how can I now believe her
Tell Sally I'm 'a run unless I'm her only one, only one

I sat through the evening 'til the evening left me too
I sleep beside the phone and hope to hear from you
So I take me hostage and demands I have a few
All I need is one thing, for you to be true

Tell Sally I can't see her, it only makes me weaker
Tell Sally I'm 'a leave her unless I'm her only one, only one
Tell Sally that deceiver how can I now believe her
Tell Sally I'm 'a run unless I'm her only one, only one

Have 4 minutes? I want you to meet someone..

One of the people I greatly look up to... a short introduction to the world of Richard Feynman.



This is from a 1981 Horizon Special, "The Pleasure of Finding Things Out".

They'll be plenty more on Feynman when I get the chance... sort from the 'not really about science, science category'.

ps. One of the great things about this video is that Feynman doesn't actually know the bird names in those languages.. he explained once he doesn't know any of those languages at all! But, he knows how they sound... (!)

Fisheye lens

What a fantastic comparison!

Yup, I'm looking into getting a fisheye lens for my D40. Will try to hold out until mid-June for something to pop up used.

This website has some good info on the lenses: http://67.173.243.230/easter-egg/index.html

New on the bike scene...

(http://www.ibiketo.ca/blog/2009/05/26/jarvis-makeover-include-bike-lanes-says-city-council)

We've all heard about Jarvis street by now .. one thing I didn't realize was that Jarvis was being minimized to four lanes no matter what; they just didn't know what they wanted to do with it... seems that bikes should be 'blamed' for taking priority over wider sidewalks and extra trees/greenery, not the loss of a lane on Jarvis.

Interesting article here by Andrew Steele and future voting implications for Miller.

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/blogs/andrew-steele/peddling-for-votes/article1154094/

Also, there is an increased bike locker plan:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/a-place-to-park-your-bike-and-lose-your-excuses/article1154685/

I know there was a small one before... Not sure if it's worth it for me and my bike in the end (isn't getting a good lock good enough?) But, any infrastructure helps the promotion, I figure.

More here:

While we appreciate the attention your publication is currently devoting to cycling, and the needs and concerns of cyclists, we take issue with three things:

• Your incendiary use of the `war' theme to describe city council's recent efforts to improve conditions for cyclists. There is nothing "warlike" about reallocating a small portion of public space dominated by cars to other more beneficial uses such as walking and cycling.
• Cyclists are not freeloaders. Motorists' user fees pay for highways, not local roads, which are paid for by property taxes we all pay. Since bicycles impose much lower roadway costs than cars, bicyclists are actually subsidizing motorists.
• Licensing bicycles is a bad idea. Don't just take it from us. That's what city hall has decided as well – on five separate occasions over the past 50 years: 1) it would discourage people from cycling, 2) the cost of administering the program would be higher than fees collected, 3) it would have no effect on cyclists' behaviour, already regulated by the Highway Traffic Act.

– Nancy Smith Lea
Program Director, Toronto Coalition for Active Transportation
– Yvonne Bambrick
Executive Director, Toronto Cyclists Union

( http://www.thestar.com/news/gta/article/640951)

Furthermore, cyclists in the Netherlands enjoy dedicated signal lights, lanes, tunnels and bridges. Many one-way streets for cars are two-way for bicycle traffic. As I watched an elderly couple leave an opera -- he in suit and bow tie, pedalling, she, in an evening gown, sitting side-saddle across the back rack--I was reminded that cycling need not be a pursuit of the young and athletic alone but can become a cultural reality that is healthier for both the cyclists and the Earth.

(http://www.nationalpost.com/todays-paper/story.html?id=1633909)

Most of this was gathered up from Spacing.ca

UPDATE: Inside the Union station bike parking:

http://torontoist.com/2009/05/this_bicycle_is_leaving_the_station.php

LSAT question!

13. Economist： Money, no matter what its form and in almost every culture in which it has been used, derives its value from its scarcity .whether real or perceived.

　　Anthropologist： But cowrie shells formed the major currency in the Solomon Island economy of the Kwara'ae ,and unlimited numbers of these shells washed up daily on the beaches to which the kwara'ae had access.

　　Which one of the following, if true about the Kwara'ae, best serves to resolve the apparently conflicting positions cited above？

　　（A） During festivals they exchanged strings of cowrie-shell money with each other as part of a traditional ritual that honored their elders.

　　（B） They considered porpoise teeth valuable, and these were generally threaded on strings to be worn as jewelry.

　　（C） The shells used as money by men were not always from the same species of cowrie as those used as money by women.

　　（D） They accepted as money only cowrie shells that were polished and carved by a neighboring people, and such shell preparation required both time and skilled labor.

　　（E） After Western traders brought money in the form of precious-metal coins to the Solomon Islands. Cowrie-shell money continued to be used as one of the major media of exchange for both goods and services.


So, I wanted to figure out if this was actual fact, or more LSAT writers have fun, in their own way...

Turns out it's true!











Pretty cool eh?... Now, this material was taken from Google Books, and more specifically from here:

Money and modernity: state and local currencies in Melanesia
By David Akin, Joel Robbins, Association for Social Anthropology in Oceania. Meetings
Edition: illustrated
Published by Univ of Pittsburgh Press, 1999
ISBN 0822956896, 9780822956891

http://books.google.ca/books?id=JVycwg1hmcIC&pg=PA106&lpg=PA106&dq=kwara%27ae+currency&source=bl&ots=KCMZwGKazx&sig=ix9fGdjdyoOPUAp0TTMmiezwa_4&hl=en&ei=rLocSqyGGoK8M_ffrJsP&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=6#PPA111,M1

And the right answer to the LSAT question? D, of course!

... and sometimes the LSATers lie.

(Ignore the yellow highlights - those were just my search terms.)

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7417186

The effect of alcohol on body heat loss.

Livingstone SD, Kuehn LA, Limmer RE, Weatherson B.

The effect of the ingestion of alcohol on cooling in seminude human subjects was examined at 25 and 30 degrees C in air; in heavily clothed individuals at -23 degrees C in air; and nude subjects in a water calorimeter at 25 degrees C. It was observed that consumption of the equivalent of five bar whiskey drinks did not affect the cooling rate of subjects as measured by infrared techniques or by thermistors. Total heat loss, measured in the calorimeter, was also not affected by drinking alcohol. It is concluded that the ingestion of alcohol does not cause an increase in cooling rate in humans.

Just a myth either way, apparently.

Correct answer? (B)!

Rousseau's happiness.

"I am reminded of the following extraordinary passage from Rousseau’s final book and his third (count them — he still beats Obama 3-to-2) autobiography, “Reveries of a Solitary Walker”:

If there is a state where the soul can find a resting-place secure enough to establish itself and concentrate its entire being there, with no need to remember the past or reach into the future, where time is nothing to it, where the present runs on indefinitely but this duration goes unnoticed, with no sign of the passing of time, and no other feeling of deprivation or enjoyment, pleasure or pain, desire or fear than the simple feeling of existence, a feeling that fills our soul entirely, as long as this state lasts, we can call ourselves happy, not with a poor, incomplete and relative happiness such as we find in the pleasures of life, but with a sufficient, complete and perfect happiness which leaves no emptiness to be filled in the soul.

Rousseau would lie down in (a) boat and plunge into a deep reverie. How does one describe the experience of reverie: one is awake, but half asleep, thinking, but not in an instrumental, calculative or ordered way, simply letting the thoughts happen, as they will.

Happiness is not quantitative or measurable and it is not the object of any science, old or new. It cannot be gleaned from empirical surveys or programmed into individuals through a combination of behavioral therapy and anti-depressants. If it consists in anything, then I think that happiness is this feeling of existence, this sentiment of momentary self-sufficiency that is bound up with the experience of time."

http://happydays.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/05/25/happy-like-god

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reveries_of_a_Solitary_Walker

http://www.associatedcontent.com/article/38290/a_critical_analysis_of_jean_jaques.html?singlepage=true&cat=38

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Jacques_Rousseau

Jean-Jacques had no recollection of learning to read, but he remembered how when he was five or six his father encouraged his love of reading:

Every night, after supper, we read some part of a small collection of romances [i.e., adventure stories], which had been my mother's. My father's design was only to improve me in reading, and he thought these entertaining works were calculated to give me a fondness for it; but we soon found ourselves so interested in the adventures they contained, that we alternately read whole nights together and could not bear to give over until at the conclusion of a volume. Sometimes, in the morning, on hearing the swallows at our window, my father, quite ashamed of this weakness, would cry, "Come, come, let us go to bed; I am more a child than thou art." —Confessions, Book 1

June 1st New Yorker cover created completely on an iphone

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/25/business/media/25yorker.html

UPDATE: here's a bot more of a write-up with some crud video of "him doing it". Not as cool as it sounds.

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/tny/2009/05/jorge-colombo-iphone-cover.html

Just another reminder to use every day....

May 19, 2009: This morning, CARS received the sad news that a long time ralliest, Francisco Pereira, passed away this morning in Portugal from cancer.

Terry had become aware that Francisco had been diagnosed with neo plazias (cancer masses) in his mid section. Francisco did not want the sport to know he was ill and so we are sure this news will come as a shock to very many people in this sport who knew him. Francisco’s wishes were for cremation and that his ashes be spread in the ocean. At this point in time, we have no other details on any planned arrangements or services back here in Canada.

He was only 48. He has left behind a daughter in grade 12.

PDF release.

Raccoons and flowers

So my landlord and I are trying to keep raccoons out of the garage. If you've ever had a raccoon problem, you know why... the MESS! Those fuckers can't keep to themselves. Adventurous to be sure; problem being the enclosed space. They tend to... make a mess! So, the block out; is it possible?

This morning I caught the coon trying to get in...







and the escape...


... and some gorgeous flowers barely alive,


and some growing.

Happy 30th birthday Adam!

It's not so bad.

Stratford tickets sales up...

West Side Story anyone?.. I think I'm gonna have to get some fake I.D.

"

Under 18	$36
16 to 29	$25
30 to 35	up to 50% off
Students	$25 and $35

"



http://www.cbc.ca/arts/theatre/story/2009/05/21/stratford-theatre.html

Mmm.. Stratford will always remind me of Slings and Arrows. Absolutely great series (doesn't hurt one bit that Rachel McAdams is in Season 1!), and worth watching instead of anything else you downloaded/your once a week series...

Download?.. here (I have season 3 when you're ready!). Don't know how to download torrents? Look here.

btw, wtf is up with Stratford and their under 18?? Why more expensive than 16-30? (29).

UPDATE: oh wait... it's "savings".

Web Gallery of Art

So, looking for a place to compare/research cubism... and although this has no touch with cubist art, I thought it should be shared cuz it's fucking amazing.

"The Web Gallery of Art is a virtual museum and a searchable database of European painting and sculpture of the Gothic, Renaissance, Baroque, Neoclassicism, Romanticism and Realism periods (1100-1850), currently containing over 22.600 reproductions. Picture commentaries, artist biographies are available. Guided tours, period music, catalogue, free postcard and other services are provided."



The best part, I find, is their dual-window mode, where you can view two pieces of art at the same time, often with an extensive critique, and sometimes with a music accompaniment!



If you click on the pictures there are full screen reproductions>... obviously not sufficient, but something to feel/learn off.

Ghosterbusters 3?

http://www.cbc.ca/arts/film/story/2009/05/21/ghostbusters-third-movie.html

The new installment, news of which appeared first in industry reports in 2008, will be penned by Gene Stupinksy and Lee Eisenberg, best known as the executive producers of TV's The Office.

...

'"Let's revisit the old characters briefly and happily and have them there as family but let's pass it on to a new generation," he said, adding that he could envision actresses such as Alyssa Milano and Eliza Dushku as part of the new film."'

Really?

Nah...

No...

yeah?

Really?

I would love to believe this has something more to do with other than Dan pushing his wine ungracefully.



Gawd, love Ghostbusters 1 and, meh, 2, and The Blues Brothers, but hopefully Dan has as little to do with Ghostbusters 3 as it sounds like. mmm... Bill Murray.

Ride of Silence

http://newsfix.ca/2009/05/21/cyclist-deaths-honoured-in-ride-of-silence/

For me, this ride was about two main themes; community and awareness. Community in the sense that there has been this basic idea being bounced around lately, perhaps mostly in my own head, but also most prominently by Pier Giorgio Di Ciccio (from a past Agenda), that community is one of the sure fire ways toward sustainability. Sustainability, as most anything I think, is best achieved when there is a strong incentive for the participating individuals to achieve.

Many people are choosing not to have kids, or, when they do have kids they plan to move and raise them out of the city, and when they do have kids in the suburbs there is a general plan to care for them in a certain way as to not let them out after dark, seldom outdoors alone, etc. Individually one could deny this, but just look at the dis-inhabited parks and playgrounds in your area after school hours; people are staying inside.

When building a sustainable community there needs to be interaction within the public realm to build trust, a sense of co-dependence, co-responsibility and cooperation (sustainability does not necessarily equal livability!) within that community, to be able to build that incentive for sustainability, be that economical, social, or environmental. Long term involvement is a good way to increase people's incentives towards long term sustainability and livability, and this ride, like so many other events in Toronto, is a free and easy way to get this idea on the pavement.

Secondly, awareness. People's deaths, caused by city limits should not be ignored. When charges aren't laid in the aftermath of a collision between a cyclist and a vehicle operator - as I understand is the result in most cases - this provides evidence toward consistent systematic errors within the system. If there are systematic errors involved in these collisions, then not only should addressing these errors be a goal of the government, but it is also their responsibility. These deaths should not and can not continue to be ignored and blamed on human error time after time. It is abundantly clear in the data (given that a large number of cities are doing things differently and resulting in intrinsically safer infrastructure) that this is not just human error.

Nathan Abshire (and Happy Fats)

No reason not to speak French...

Short interview and, uhhh, such a great live performance.

Filmed at Fred's Lounge (Fred Tate's) in Mamou, Louisiana in 1976.

Pine Grove Blues - 12-bar blues, accordion, live Cajun, 1976, one microphone.



Biography by John Bush

Nathan Abshire helped bring the blues and honky tonk to Cajun music and repopularized the accordion with his recordings during the 1950s and '60s, but still never managed to make a living from his music. Born in Gueyden, LA, on June 23, 1913, Abshire began playing professionally in the 1920s, and he first recorded in the early '30s with Happy Fats & His Rayne-Bo Ramblers. Abshire went to work at the Basile, LA, town dump around that time, and he held the job for most of his working life.

His fortunes began looking bright by 1936, however, when the Rayne-Bo Ramblers began backing him on sides for Bluebird. After serving in World War II, Abshire cut "Pine Grove Blues" -- his most famous single and later his signature song -- for D.T. Records. He recorded for Khoury/Lyric, Swallow, and Kajun during the 1950s and '60s, meanwhile playing local dances and appearing on sessions by the Balfa Brothers.

A renewal of interest in Cajun and folk music during the '70s gave Abshire a chance to play several festivals and colleges and star in the 1975 PBS-TV Cajun documentary, Good Times Are Killing Me. The title proved prophetic, however, as Abshire fought alcoholism during his last years. Several sessions for Folkways and La Louisienne followed in the late '70s, but he died on May 13, 1981.

Nathan Abshire

More on Happy fats:

http://allmusic.com/cg/amg.dll?p=amg&sql=11:3bfrxqqjldhe~T1

In 1966, however, Fats was the subject of national controversy when he signed to producer Jay D. Miller's segregationist Reb Rebel label to record the underground smash "Dear Mr. President," a spoken word condemnation of Lyndon Johnson's civil rights policies that sold over 200,000 copies despite its appalling racism. "We didn't have any problems with that, not at all," Fats maintained in an interview. "There wasn't anything violent about it -- it was just a joke. I had a car of black people run me down on the highway one time coming in Lafayette, and they said, 'Are you the fellow that made " Dear Mr. President"?' I said I was, and they said, 'We'd like to buy some records.' They bought about 15 records. There was a big van full of black people and they loved it . . . Either side at that time, they didn't want integration very much. They wanted to go each their own way." The commercial success of "Dear Mr. President" launched a series of similarly poisonous Fats efforts including "Birthday Thank You (Tommy from Viet Nam)," "A Victim of the Big Mess (Called the Great Society)," "The Story of the Po' Folks and the New Dealers," and "Vote Wallace in '72." After a long battle with diabetes, Fats died on February 23, 1988.

http://www.answers.com/topic/leroy-happy-fats-leblanc

http://cgi.ebay.com/Happy-Fats-(45)-Reb-Rebel-501---%22Dear-Mr.-President%22_W0QQitemZ350198790414QQcmdZViewItemQQimsxZ20090507?IMSfp=TL090507128007r25316

Remember Google's PowerMeter?

Google PowerMeter, an online widget that monitors your home's power usage in real time, is one of those ideas that really should've caught on by now. Well, it's starting to!



Google has announced its first partners for the project, who either do or will provide their customers with the "smart meters" necessary for Google widget to work:

* San Diego Gas & Electric® (California)
* TXU Energy (Texas)
* JEA (Florida)
* Reliance Energy (India)
* Wisconsin Public Service Corporation (Wisconsin)
* White River Valley Electric Cooperative (Missouri)
* Toronto Hydro–Electric System Limited (Canada)
* Glasgow EPB (Kentucky)

Gizmodo
Here's the press release.

REGISTER WITH TORONTO HYDRO HERE

The Milky Way

At something called the Texas Star Party.. this year. Apparently several newbies were scared off because they thought storm clouds were approaching.

Galactic Center of Milky Way Rises over Texas Star Party from William Castleman on Vimeo.

Wait for it. And then watch it again.

Got Perimeter tickets for June.

Astronomers believe our Universe began in a Big Bang, and is expanding around us. Brian Schmidt will describe the life of the Universe that we live in, and how astronomers have used observations to trace our Universe's history back more than 13 Billion years. With this data a puzzling picture has been pieced together where 96% of the Cosmos is made up of two mysterious substances, Dark Matter and Dark Energy. These two mysterious forms of matter are in a battle for domination of the Universe, and Schmidt will describe experiments that are monitoring the struggle between Dark Energy and Dark Matter, trying better understand these elusive pieces of our Universe, and predict the ultimate fate of the Cosmos.



Brian Schmidt is a Federation Fellow at The Australian National University's Mount Stromlo Observatory. Brian was raised in Montana and Alaska, USA, and received undergraduate degrees in Physics and Astronomy from the University of Arizona in 1989. Under the supervision of Robert Kirshner, he completed his Astronomy Master's degree (1992) and PhD (1993) from Harvard University. In 1994 he formed the HighZ SN Search team, a group of 20 astronomers on 5 continents who used distant exploding stars to trace the expansion of the Universe back in time. This group's discovery of an accelerating Universe was named Science Magazine's Breakthrough of the Year for 1998. Brian Schmidt joined the staff of the Australian National University in 1995, and was awarded the Australian Government's inaugural Malcolm McIntosh award for achievement in the Physical Sciences in 2000, The Australian Academy of Sciences Pawsey Medal in 2001, the Astronomical Society of India's Vainu Bappu Medal in 2002, and an Australian Research Council Federation Fellowship in 2005. In 2006 Schmidt was jointly awarded the Shaw Prize for Astronomy, and shared the 2007 Gruber Prize for Cosmology with his High-Z SN Search Team colleagues. In 2008 he was elected a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Sciences, a Fellow of the United States National Academy, and Foreign Member of the Spanish Royal Academy of Sciences. Brian is continuing his work using exploding stars to study the Universe, and is leading Mt Stromlo’s effort to build the SkyMapper telescope, a new facility that will provide a comprehensive digital map of the southern sky from ultraviolet through near infrared wavelengths.

...ok, now off to the library.

The Discover Magazine blogs...

All excellent blogs, and below just a round-up from what I found interesting this morning.

HIV vaccine?

"“Mother Nature has allowed us a few breaks, in that we know that in a very few cases, people who have been infected for a very long time have been able to naturally develop antibodies that neutralize a lot of the circulating virus,” he said. “So, we thought perhaps we could take the genes that represent these antibodies ‘off the shelf,’ so to speak” [Forbes]. The researchers engineered a piece of DNA that triggers the creation of artificial antibodies called immunoadhesins ... In the study, published in Nature Medicine, researchers found that none of the immunized monkeys developed AIDS and only three showed any indication of SIV infection. Even a year later they had high concentrations of the protective antibodies in the blood [AP]."

-----

When exactly did humans break off the evolutionary chain from monkeys, apes, lemurs... or did they break off our chain?

"The new research adds to an argument over which of two groups of ancient primates was the evolutionary jumping off point for apes and humans: Was it the tarsidae group, which gave rise to the big-eyed tarsiers found in southeast Asia, or the adapidae group, the precursors of the lemurs found in Madagascar?"

-----

I remember being taught that once an egg is fertilized, no other eggs could be (umm, within a given female's single cycle). Apparently that is all wrong, although quite rare.

"Despite the fact that they were born at the same time to the same mother, Justin and Jordan look nothing like twins, besides having the same skin color. In fact, they look so different that James Harrison, the supposed father, decided to request a paternity test. Turns out, his instincts were right: One of the infants is his child, and the other is not."

-----

Apparently there is a gender divide in people's acceptance of global warmin'. Is this more of the "be a man!" syndrome, political inclination, or something else?

Bike Lanes: New York vs. Toronto

I have to agree with Lloyd Alter here... Biking in NYC was a fantastic experience. It really felt like I was not only seen and recognized by the vehicles there, but also that my space was respected. Weird feeling...

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/05/new-york-city-cyclists-paradise.php

Obama introducing national auto emission standard?

Good news indeed!.. Hopefully this one doesn't go by the wayside as so many others have...

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/05/19/business/19emissions.html

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2009/05/obama-national-auto-emissions-standard.php

Another Agenda over breakfast...

Another day of staying at home to study (great of Robert to get a little bit more help in the office for Tuesdays and Thursdays, as I am finding I could really use the study time to work out the kinks... ) but first, over some breakfast, an Agenda...

I don't want to keep on just reposting TVO Agenda's here, and I realize I've been on a little kick, but this is another great one worth watching. All guests contribute with some great ideas (most fascinating and resonating to me was the building of a community that people wanted to make sustainable for the community sake, not for / with their own motivations - Pier Giorogio focused on this quite a bit) and the different ideas of sustainability really sink in here.

Still talking about Chalk River isotopes??

It feels like they've been talking about this for years, without much progress... Why still nothing new? I haven't heard of any upcoming plans, never mind solutions. I mean, I'd get on it, but I'm a bit busy lately...

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2009/05/18/isotopes-chalk-river.html

"The location of the heavy-water leak, estimated to be at a rate of five kilograms an hour, has been identified at the base of the reactor vessel in a place where there is corrosion on the outside wall of the vessel, AECL said."

- wtf?


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Gladwell in email conversation with Bill Simmons

In the, it's not really about sports, sports writing category...

http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/page2/story?page=simmons/090513/part1

GLADWELL

I feel the same way about the attitude of professional football teams toward the no-huddle offense. Right now, great teams (such as the Colts and Patriots) use the no-huddle selectively, as a way to maximize their dominance. But why don't bad teams use it? If you were the Lions, why not run the no-huddle this season? Why not put together a lighter, better-conditioned offensive line and a radically simplified playbook and see what happens? It's not as if you are risking a Super Bowl if it backfires. Your offensive line is lousy anyway, so there's no harm in tearing it down, and your fans aren't going to turn on you if you get killed while you work out the kinks. Last I checked, your fans have already turned on you. On the plus side, maybe the no-huddle exhausts the other team's defense so much you slow down their pass rush in the second half. And maybe giving your quarterback a bit more autonomy helps develop his knowledge of the game, and his leadership skills.

The consistent failure of underdogs in professional sports to even try something new suggests, to me, that there is something fundamentally wrong with the incentive structure of the leagues. I think, for example, that the idea of ranking draft picks in reverse order of finish -- as much as it sounds "fair" -- does untold damage to the game. You simply cannot have a system that rewards anyone, ever, for losing. Economists worry about this all the time, when they talk about "moral hazard." Moral hazard is the idea that if you insure someone against risk, you will make risky behavior more likely. So if you always bail out the banks when they take absurd risks and do stupid things, they are going to keep on taking absurd risks and doing stupid things.

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SIMMONS

Let's wrap things up by tackling LeBron James. As the 2009 postseason rolls on, the King has become its most compelling story, not just because of his insane numbers, that Jordan-like hunger in his eyes, even the fact that he's still on cruise control to some degree. (Note: I would compare him to Nigel Tufnel's amp. He alternated between "9" and "10" in the regular season, and he's been at 10 in the playoffs, but I can't shake the feeling that he has an "11" in store for Kobe and the Finals. An extra decibel level, if you will. In my lifetime, Jordan could go to 11. So could Bird. Shaq and Kobe could get there together, but not apart. And really, that's it. Even Magic could get to 10 3/4 but never quite 11. It's a whole other ball game: You aren't just beating teams, you're destroying their will. You never know when you'll see another 11. I'm just glad we're here. End of tangent.)

Another day, another excellent celebration.

I had the family to my place over the weekend before our traditional birthday / mother's day dinner. It was great to have them all over for a few appetizers and a glass of wine, and we got to chat for a bit here and over dinner. Always lots of fun! And, I finally got a replacement for the broken teapot!










Gorgeous!


Gift certificate to Susur Lee's!




mmm... wide angle shots. Great shot Chris.


A clear glass teapot!


Thanks to Chris for taking the pictures!