bear hat
By ryan | June 1, 2009
I’ve been playing Dungeons and Dragons recently (4th ed), and my character has the ability to turn into a bear. This has had an interesting side effect of increasing my affinity and disposition towards all things “bear”. My wonderful wife made me a bear hat (which turned out to be more of a bear cloak) while testing out some new sewing equipment. Behold, my bear hat!
rawr
grasping claws
Awesome.
Topics: family, get a load of this | No Comments »
stem cells
By ryan | May 17, 2009
The NIH is asking for comments from the public:
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is requesting public comment on draft guidelines entitled ``National Institutes of Health Guidelines for Human Stem Cell Research'' (Guidelines).
The form to submit your opinion is here: http://nihoerextra.nih.gov/stem_cells/add.htm
I’ve heard rumor that so far most comments have been negative, a vaguely scare-mongering email is available here: http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dd5vs2xt_0hkwp6xd8
I recommend you fill it out and have a chance of your opinion being heard. Here’s mine:
I support embryonic stem cell research, and am glad some of the restrictions are being loosened. I’m young enough that I could benefit from this research in my old age.
I understand there are moral and political considerations, but my guiding question on these sorts of things is: “will it reduce human suffering?” The answer in the case of stem cell research is yes. People (and their families) with diseases like Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s will suffer less, even if there isn’t a cure. The simple fact that promising research is being funded will be of comfort. The potential to heal grievous wounds would reduce immense suffering, which is doubly important as our recent wars have produced a lot of maimed young soldiers. Don’t we owe it to them to try and find the best treatments for their injuries?
There will be some who choose to suffer, that vocal segment of America that seems to think life doesn’t matter after birth at all. I don’t factor that suffering into my equation because that vocal segment always chooses to suffer about something, so I consider it a constant. An embryonic stem cell is not a human.
They are accepting comments until 11PM EST on 5/26/2009, please take a few minutes and Uncle Sam know what you think.
Topics: civics, health, politics | No Comments »
Dem bones (Part V)
By ryan | May 5, 2009
New xrays:
view from the front
looking up
Doc says all is looking good. The bone has a pretty sharp point still (visible at the top of the lower image), but that should round itself out over the course of 3-6 months. It’s gonna hurt to wear backpacks and such, but I’m free to take on any activity.
My strength was good, and he interpreted the xray to mean the bone was strong. Apparently when bones heal back together they become as strong or stronger. I’m more likely to break other bones now, or at least other segments of my collar bone.
Hopefully this will be the last of the “dem bones” series for some time.
Topics: health | No Comments »
Dem Bones (Part IV)
By ryan | April 14, 2009
Another visit to the doc, another light dose of radiation, another blog post:
The bones have made a good connection, and it’s very solid for this stage in the healing process. Doc Parr was impressed that I had the range of motion I did, and the weird tightness and numbness are all expecting things that should go away in time.
The only remaining possibility for surgery is if the broken bone doesn’t round itself off, then I might need to get opened up and have it ground down a bit so it’s not trying to escape my body so much.
I’m set to start slowly excercising with light weights, which sounds good to me. I get one more xray in another 3 weeks.
Topics: health | 1 Comment »
light construction
By ryan | March 29, 2009
A few months back I had a little problem: Heather’s dress-form (essential for costuming, similar to this one) was getting in the way of our roomba. The costumes frequently had drapey bits that might get snagged, and the whole contraption probably wouldn’t hold up against a good robotic head butt.
So, the solution was to build a small platform for the dressform. Here’s the completed platform:
the final product, lifting the costume to safety
Of course, there’s time-lapse to go with this:
After getting that bit done, I put on some non-skid feet to prevent sliding and protect my floors:
Now there’s plenty of space for the roomba (with bonus dog):
Topics: home, time lapse | 2 Comments »
Dem bones (part III)
By ryan | March 19, 2009
My latest injury was breaking my clavicle. The actual accident was pretty mundane: diving to catch the game-winning pass in ultimate frisbee. Unfortunately, instead of winning the game, I hit the ground hard and broke my clavicle. I wasn’t surprised, as Ross and Dad have both broken this bone. I figured it was mostly a matter of time.
At any rate, I just got back from the doctor, and have some awesome xrays:
The bone fragments in there actually serve as bone-grafts. The doc now has my meds sorted out, so hopefully I’ll be on a vomit-free road to recovery.
Topics: health | 1 Comment »
Mr. Moneybags
By ross | March 2, 2009
After replacing my garage door opener I decided to sell my old remotes. I knew that they had value because I had purchased one off eBay when trying to debug my old opener. It’s the natural thing to do when Sears charges an absurd $40 for 20-year-old technology. Anyway, here is the breakdown:
Sales: $21.50 + $15.00 = $36.50
Now here are my costs:
My original eBay remote purchase: $20.49
US Priority mail shipping + mailer: $6.00
UPS Ground shipping: $10.00
Total costs: $36.49
I MADE A PENNY!
Of course, I’m neglecting the eBay charges which put me slightly in the red. Actually, it’s probably better if I look at it from the perspective that I didn’t lose $20 from my original debugging experiment. Shipping was pretty costly for me… in the future I’ll go with US Postal and make sure to supply my own packing materials.
As always with eBay, the question is whether the time you spend doing this is worth it. Discounting the remote I purchased, I made about $20 for about 1.5 hours of time invested. Eh, could be worse.
Topics: dreams of avarice | No Comments »
MLK 2009
By deza | January 30, 2009
Here are the pictures from the trip that I took on my iPhone. Enjoy!
Topics: bits, muse | No Comments »
“Have some sack, dude”
By deza | January 30, 2009
Andy Roddick getting ticked at the court judge during his match against Federer. Hilarious.
http://bobsporch.blogspot.com/2009/01/have-some-sack-dude.html
Topics: Arena of Sport, get a load of this | 1 Comment »
News Article of the Day
By deza | January 22, 2009
This has to be one of the better news articles I’ve read in awhile. My favorite part is the very last line. But personally, I believe they should’ve called the new smartphone: “BarryBerry”
http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/01/22/obama.blackberry/index.html
Topics: politics, tech | No Comments »