Monday, December 31, 2007
She's not a perfect angel
Even when she's bad it's hard not to love her. :)
PermaLink / Posted by: Tony
The sadness of the loyal dog
This photo was just hosted on imageshack so I don't know who actually took it or I would give credit, but it appears to have been taken by a police officer. This picture is both unbelievably sad as well as revealing to those who do not understand the loyalty of a dog for his master. Not to get into a debate on cats vs. dogs, but you'd be hard pressed to find a deceased owner with a sad cat nearby.
A cat will run away at the first sign of danger, a dog will give his life to defend yours.
As dog owners we can only attempt to be worthy of such devotion.
PermaLink / Posted by: Tony
Thursday, December 27, 2007
Savanna chimps make spears and hunt with them
Jesus... I don't know how I missed this in the news from earlier this year but wow, both insanely awesome and unbelievably creepy at the same time. Evolution witnessed in real-time.
Now what would have been creepier is if they came after the observing scientists with the spears! lol
Google it.
Link to article.
Two anthropologists watched in mixed amazement and horror as several female chimpanzees crafted spears and used them to somewhat brutally hunt smaller mammals. Following a troop of the primates in a Senegalese savanna, Jill Pruetz of Iowa State University and Paco Bertolani of Cambridge observed them breaking the branches off of trees, picking leaves from the sides, and sharpening the tips to deadly points. In the March edition of Current Biology, the scientists explained that such sophisticated animal behavior could reveal a great deal about how early humans used primitive tools.
Although tool use is known to occur in species ranging from naked mole rats [1] to owls [2], chimpanzees are the most accomplished tool users [3, 4, 5]. The modification and use of tools during hunting, however, is still considered to be a uniquely human trait among primates. Here, we report the first account of habitual tool use during vertebrate hunting by nonhumans. At the Fongoli site in Senegal, we observed ten different chimpanzees use tools to hunt prosimian prey in 22 bouts. This includes immature chimpanzees and females, members of age-sex classes not normally characterized by extensive hunting behavior. Chimpanzees made 26 different tools, and we were able to recover and analyze 12 of these. Tool construction entailed up to five steps, including trimming the tool tip to a point. Tools were used in the manner of a spear, rather than a probe or rousing tool. This new information on chimpanzee tool use has important implications for the evolution of tool use and construction for hunting in the earliest hominids, especially given our observations that females and immature chimpanzees exhibited this behavior more frequently than adult males.
Labels: opinion
PermaLink / Posted by: Tony
Monday, December 24, 2007
Logitech Playgear PSP case
If you have a PSP, you really should have some sort of case to protect it with. I mean, the whole idea is that you're toting the thing around and potentially subjecting it to being knocked around. In stock form, the little sock they give you with it to put the PSP in really doesn't offer much protection and I'd be a bit too nervous to toss it in a backpack with books, or anywhere else for that matter. Logitech knocked out a PSP case pretty quick that fits the PSP like a glove and offers superior protection.
The case itself is made out of polycarbonate which, if you're not familiar with, is a plastic that is practically indestructible. The case also has a rubber lining on the inside so that when seated in the case, your PSP has a good shock absorber. Since your PSP doesn't actually attach to the case itself, it just sits inside it so it is easy to pull it out of the case at any time, but it also sits in the case firmly enough that it is no problem to play with the PSP as the case gives you access to the top buttons and you can still plug in headphones/etc; in fact, if you've got non-child sized hands, it makes playing your PSP much more comfortable as you've got something a little more substantial to hang onto and the case itself keeps that hot battery off your palm.
In addition to protection and easy button access for gameplay while the case is in use, the clamshell design also gives you a sun/light shield to prevent glare, and when flipped all the way back it acts as a stand so you can watch a movie or whatever without having to hold the thing up for 2hrs. One other cool little feature is that you can use your color printer to edit a template that will let you print out a graphic of any sort so you can customize your case. Check out my NIN case theme I'm currently using. (Yeah I know, I forgot about the Logitech logo when I made it, I should have moved the NIN logo to the left.) It only takes a few minutes to make one for yourself, and if you just do a quick google search you'll find hundreds of them that others have already created, just print, cut and insert. 
Anyway, I've been using my PSP with this case for about a year now and I've got to say it does exactly what I wanted. It is still relatively slim, it offers good strong protection and you can get one for next to nothing. I think I saw the low price of $12 for these things, but even at full retail you're looking at a measly $20 so you don't have much excuse to not get one. Besides, now you can stick your PSP in your back pocket and not flip out if you accidentally sit on it. :) 
PermaLink / Posted by: Tony
Friday, December 21, 2007
I love my dog
So in spite of the fact that I robbed her of all her dignity by putting that jester elf collar thing on there and propped her up with Santa; Flora patiently sat while pictures were snapped away. She's the best.
I kinda wished Santa had his beard pulled up a bit and maybe smiled, but hey, it was only $9 and it included a frame, as well as a $5 portion of the sale which was rolled over to a dog shelter fund. :)
Merry Christmas everybody!
Labels: dog
PermaLink / Posted by: Tony
Monday, December 10, 2007
XT225 in the dirt finally, learnings, pictures and video
Well I finally had a chance to get my XT out in the dirt, to make a long story short I'd been going back and forth with it to the shop for the last month and a half over absolute bs, but with that resolved, I had to take her out.
Light mods:
Since this is a bike for commuting and putting around town, I needed some sort of decent rack so I got one of the Turbo City racks, which I highly recommend. Super easy to install and super strong. In addition to the rack, my hands were getting cold and I figured if I was going to ride off road I better add some sort of handguards to protect both my hands and my levers. It's a good thing I did too because I can't even tell you how many times I went down on Sat lol. The weight of the bike was on the rack a few times and it didn't flex one bit, in fact, lifting the bike back up (something I did more times than I care to) was no problem via the factory handles or by grabbing the rack. (my arms/back/legs are sore today)
You'll also notice my GPS attached to my handlebars via a nice solid RAM mount, which was super handy both in getting me to the trail and verifying where I was on the trail with the US Park Service map. I considered printing a topo, but I didn't see much point since I was going to be riding clearly marked trails and I had a trail map which ended up being just fine. Anyway, this was my first time offroad with my XT and my second time off road ever so it was a learning experience all around.
Here's some things that I took from that trip.
- Holding freeway speeds is no problem, however when it is 28deg out since there is no fairing it is friggin COLD, drafting big rigs really takes the edge off.
- 80/20 tires are not good in mud.
- My A* Bionic knee guards totally saved my knees as they were on the ground often with the bike on top
- I really do not like riding in mud, riding on snow was ok, kinda squirrelly when headed uphill however.
- Mud makes an easy trail hard, it was almost impossible for me to get very far onto trail 5 because of it so I had to bail and stick to the less steep trails.
- Green trails are worthless, might as well ride on the sidewalk
- Blue trails were fun except for said mud and ice water puddles
- My boots are not waterproof
- I need better tires
- The handguards I installed saved my levers and hands as I ate it countless times in the mud
- Almost going over the edge in a totally remote area when completely alone was strangely amusing
- Sliding out into a mud puddle at 25mph royally sucks when it is 30deg out
- I hate mud.
- Did I say I hate mud? Give me rocks any day. The few rocky parts were awesome. I've got to find a rocky singletrack.
Bike all loaded up and ready to roll, it was a COLD morning.
Once I got into the Sac area there were a few odd things. 1- There were a TON of wild hogs everywhere, 2- it was ARCTIC cold, I don't know what they were thinking. I got so cold riding up there (135mi one way) I felt like I was going to hurl, coldest I've ever been in my life. Had to draft truckers just to stay alive thanks to no wind protection.
Quick stop before hitting the trail to make sure all was in order. 
And theeeeen... freakin' ice puddles everywhere. I was obviously the first one up there.
This isn't the best picture of it, but the mud was frozen solid and actually kinda slippery. My camera died before I could get pictures of some of the other frozen mud that literally looked like it was the superman ice caves.
The parts of the trails that didn't have snow or mud or huge icewater puddles were pretty fun and scenic.
I really had to work to try to keep dry since I would have to ride back home wearing what I was wearing.
Back at home, I was a bit dirtier than when I left :)
Hardly mud bogging, but I've got some cleaning to do.
Last but not least here's a little video I recorded while riding. Sorry, I had the camera attached to my bars so it is bouncy but it works anyways I guess. I know I'm slow... second time out remember? :)
PermaLink / Posted by: Tony
