I wrote this months ago and wanted to post it before the election. Then I forgot about it. I still think it’s relevant though. Years ago I spoke with a conservative who told me he couldn’t understand why anyone would get upset about politics. “If I order steak at a restaurant and I really like my steak and recommend it to you but you order chicken instead, I don’t get all mad about it. I don’t see why politics is any different.” My first instinct was to agree because it’s…
Read MoreMonth: December 2020
Snakes on a Plane 2: Bears on a Cruise Ship
Snakes on a Plane was made in 2006, 14 years ago. For some reason we still don’t have a sequel. We have Fuller House on Netflix but no Snakes on a Plane 2. This is a serious problem requiring a creative solution. I decided it was my duty to suggest a few ideas to turn this cinematic masterpiece into a franchise. Ideas include: Ants in a Car, Scorpions on a Bus, Hornets on a Train, Spiders in a Hot Air Balloon, Bats on a Submarine, and Honey Badgers on the…
Read MoreMr. Spock, Bill Hicks, and the Guy Who Gave Us a Tow
It sounds cliché, but one of the most meaningful things I ever saw on television as a child was The Wrath of Kahn where Spock gave his life for the Enterprise and said, “The needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one.” This made perfect logical sense, but emotionally it didn’t truly sink in until much later. In 1996, Tool released the album Ænima, which I listened to almost daily through my junior and senior years in high school. The album features comedian Bill Hicks…
Read MoreBuilding a Problem-Solving Factory
I’ve been following closely the astounding progress in Boca Chica as SpaceX designs and builds their new Starship, all-purpose spacecraft. They’ve built 10 prototypes, 3 of which have already flown, constantly improving on the design and build process. Thanks to Gwynne Shotwell’s inspiring leadership and Elon Musk’s engineering genius, they’ve done this in a fraction of the time and cost that NASA takes for similar accomplishments. They have repeatedly said that they’re not building a Starship. They’re building a Starship factory. The focus is on the factory, not the ship.…
Read MoreMore about Starship Serial Number 8
This is a good, easily understandable overview of everything that happened with Starship Serial Number 8 the other day. Perfect for “amateurs” like myself. Turns out it did reach its goal of 12.5 kilometers and the engine failures during ascent were actually deliberate shutdowns so they could get more data about shutdown and restarts and how the other engines react to problems. There at the end something went wrong with the tank and the engines didn’t get the right mixture of fuel and propellant so it wasn’t able to slow…
Read MoreCongratulations Starship Serial Number 8!
This stuff unfortunately doesn’t hit the mainstream media nearly enough, but SpaceX performed an historic test launch today. Starship Serial Number 8 (the 8th prototype) attempted to fly to 12.5km. I believe there was an engine failure during ascent but it was able to continue on with just two engines. I’m not sure if it made it to 12.5km but it successfully did its “belly-flop” maneuver, which I think is the first time that’s ever been done with a rocket. Then it drifted down for a surprising amount of time,…
Read MoreCustom Data Organizer 0.7 (beta) Release, Themes and Icons
I made another release, 0.7 (beta), of my app. This release has mostly visual enhancements. Improved theming and icon selections. I’m kinda proud of my theme system since I rarely see apps that let users fine-tune the specific colors of the app they’re using the way this does… even though I would not use this feature as a user myself unless I had some brand colors I needed to match. I actually had this working before CSS variables became available, using brute-force javascript on every possible element I needed to…
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