I think it's something in the water.. Male fish in the Potomac River have begun to bear eggs. Looks like it's some sort of pollution in the water spreading downstream from West Virginia. full story linked to cnn.com

Yeah, maybe it wasn't such a good idea. How NOT to tow a boat. Mental note- leave the helicopter at home.

The Real da Vinci Code- da Vinci was a Renaissance roboticist! A new look at some of his sketches reveal that, mayhaps, he had built and designed automatons. Amazing.

With arm wrestling, Internet gets physical. In the Internet Arm Wrestling Challenge, visitors to science museums in New York, Anchorage, Des Moines, Bethlehem, Pa., and San Jose, Calif., are paired off over the Internet. One feature of the system is that it allows two people to arm wrestle even if one is right-handed and the other left-handed. Nifty. The link takes you to the whole story.

Israel hit with plague of locusts - November 2004 - In what is described the worst infestation of locusts since the 1950s, Israel has been fighting and losing the battle for crops and mental health since Sunday (Nov 21,2004). Some of them are as long as 10 cm. The title of this entry used to link you to the CNN story, but the story has since moved off the site.

H A L F - L I F E 2 I have it.. Half Life 2... finally.. I preordered this back when preorders were just beginning to be accepted.. The first one was the greatest gaming experience I've ever had and the followup is just... outstanding. Incredible. Life-real environments.. incredible gameplay.. Amazing. The only regret that I have is that I didn't pick up the DVD version with the extra goodies. Outstanding game. I can't believe I'm taking the time to type this when I could be playing HL2... *returns back to the game*.. :)

The bloom is off the rose dept: Woah, just saw Bon Jovi perform this eve on the 32nd American Music Awards- what an anemic performance. Almost a shadow of their original sound- a shame.

Microsoft to release three versions of Xbox 2 Interesting- looks as if Microsoft is taking the xbox into a new direction- one that I think has traction.. a more of a 'media device in your living room' approach. Three xbox editions- one is basically a full fledged pc with Media Center capabilities. I don't get the 'non hard drive' edition one though- why would that one appeal to people? More details in the article I've linked to.

Er.. the dog is ringing.. So, this guy lost his cell phone. He did what most of us would do- call it. The next thing he knows... his dog is ringing. Read the full story for details. ;-)

A genetically modified cat? I gotta ask.. Why? Well, I suppose if you are one of those "poor unfortunate souls" who because of allergies is unable to fully experience the whole 'cat' thing.. Like me. Of course, I consider myself 'lucky' not unfortunate.. Never been one for cats. However. Do you still want a cat but are highly allergic? Really, really want a cat? Do you have $3,500 burning a hole in your pocket and a couple of years to wait? Then place your order now for a genetically modified hypoallergenic kitty, fresh from the labs of Allerca. Of course, if you ask me, those 3500 bucks would buy an awful lot of allergy meds instead. :)

Cats... In.. Space!! How does a cat handle zero-g? Well, now you know. Not very happy about it. This is an Air Force video in .mov format.

Jet engine powered cell phones? Could it be? Someday our cell phones, ipods, notebook computers etc could have miniature jet engine on a chip power sources? Someday isn't that far away - New research: silicon combustion chambers capable of burning diesel + teeny-tiny silicon turbines that generate electricity = ultra light power sources that could run for 10+ hours on a diesel fuel cartridge the size of a small battery. Lighter, no 'plug in recharge' restriction. The engine is the size of a postage stamp. Not there aren't drawbacks.. there is a small exhaust and other things.. We could be using these within five years. Read the article for more.

Google Desktop Search Launched! From the 'Bill Gates not happy' department- Google launched their thin client search tool to allow users to search their local machines (it scans office documents, emails and text files) for stuff. Microsoft was improving their local search but wouldn't be released till the long delayed 'Longhorn' version of Windows.
"Microsoft has to be worried,'' said Jupiter Research senior analyst Joe Wilcox. "If Microsoft can do the research and catch up, then anything can happen. ... Microsoft can improve search in two years. But if people are already using Google, it will be hard to get them to change."

Google Print A new service from Google- your search results now can include within the pages of books! Pretty nifty. Of course, this doesn't hurt Google- they now have many many more pages on which to place search result ad placement. ;-) The do allow you to click through to purchase the book and they state they make no profit from the click throughs however.

US outsourcing prayers to India - No, I'm not kidding. With a shortage of Roman Catholic priests allowing only so many hours in the day, something had to give. *sigh*

Court: Disabilities Act doesn't cover the Web Interesting decision upheld by a federal appeals court- the judges did note however that there are many further discusssions regarding this issue that need to be had. The ADA states that any "place of public accommodation" has to be accessable. It does list 12 categories (i.e. schools, restaurants, hotels). How should the Internet / World Wide Web fit into this picture?

More and more, an online presence is an extension of a brick and mortar company's business operations. I'm predicting that we'll see further legislation requiring firms to comply with the ADA as it applies to their web presence. Ensuring that a site can be 'read' via text-to-speech converters is a good start. Of course, you can see some surprising results in this story when sites that are run by organizations that are focused on the disabled actually fail accessibility tests!

ER Season Premiere - What a great episode! For those of you who are fans must have been watching. A great wrap-up of loose ends and opening new ones. If you ask me, the 'preview of the upcoming season' they added to the end of the show was worth the wait. Looks good!

Next month Verizon will begin offering a broadband-over-fiber service for $35 to $50 a month. Marketed as "Fios", the service is four to 15 times faster than digital subscriber lines that deliver Internet access over copper. For $34.95 per month, you get 5 Mbits/s down and 2 Mbits/s upstream; $49.95 gets you 15 Mbits/s down and 2 Mbits/s upstream. The company plans to offer 30 Mbit service as well, but hasn't yet decided on pricing. Verizon's first fiber-to-the-premises networks are being built out in Texas, Florida, and Southern California. Once they're up and running, six more states will be added to the roster, although the Verizon hasn't yet named them. Come on PA! Wooo hoooo! This will certainly change the face of broadband to the home - I wonder what Comcast will do to respond to this. I forsee a major change in pricing schedules coming down the pike.
 

Looks like the Department of Defense finally has its directed energy weapon. Christened the Active Denial System, the weapon uses beams of electromagnetic energy to heat water molecules just below the skin to 130 degrees in less than a second. End result: astonishing pain. "It tricks the pain sensors into thinking they're on fire," said Air Force Research Laboratory spokesman Rich Garcia. Garcia should know. He was among hundreds of volunteers on whom the device was tested. "They did a full body back shot," he explained. "It hit in the small of my back first. For the first millisecond, it just felt like the skin was warming up. Then it got warmer and warmer and you felt like it was on fire. ... As soon as you're away from that beam your skin returns to normal and there is no pain. I thought to myself, 'Why you wimp. You know it's not causing any damage. You'll be able to override it.' Each of the next three times, I was on there a little bit longer. The fourth one was the longest. It was about two seconds. It felt like my hair was on fire."

Hey all! I'm 'unshackled' - after a long stint at MBNA in DE (aka 'locked down') without any sort of internet access at all (yes, it was painful, but I survived).

I've now started a new job just a few minutes away from my house -> going from an hour and fifteen mins to a brisk 12 minute drive!