Well, it’s Tuesday, the day we clean out our bookmarks. Maybe it should be some sort of holiday. Everybody else gets a holiday, or even a whole month to celebrate their misery. Why not we poor folks with forty-two browser tabs open? So let it be written. So let it be done!
How 12,000 Tonnes of Dumped Orange Peel Grew Into a Landscape Nobody Expected to Find
The plan, which saw a juice company dump 1,000 truckloads of waste orange peel in a barren pasture in Costa Rica back in the mid 1990s, has eventually revitalised the desolate site into a thriving, lush forest.
The article, and everyone mentioned in it, appears mystified by the way mulch works. City people are strange creatures.
Ultra high-resolution image of The Night Watch
To create this huge image, the painting was photographed in a grid with 97 rows and 87 columns with our 100-megapixel Hasselblad H6D 400 MS camera. Each of these 8,439 separate photos was captured using a sophisticated laser-guided five-axis camera positioning system that can sense the precise location of the painting so that every photo is sharp – an error of even 1/8 mm in the placement of the camera would result in a useless image.
And to think some guy painted the picture with some goo on a stick with squirrel hair on the end of it.
Why are the violins the biggest section in the orchestra?
As increasing numbers of performers and instruments became standard in orchestral repertoire, ensembles became louder, and more string players were needed to balance the sound. The violin is a comparatively quiet instrument, and a solo player cannot be heard over the power of the brass.
I’m from Maine, so I’ve always preferred violas over violins. They burn longer, and throw off more heat.
Car software patches are over 20% of recalls, study finds
While many older vehicles from legacy OEMs require a trip to the dealer to be patched, more and more new models can be updated over the air, meaning that owners can have the recall performed from the comfort of their own parking space, provided they have connectivity. Even this isn’t hassle-free, though, as some Rivian owners found out to their dismay late last year when an update broke some infotainment screens.
Hmm. I’m pretty sure some middle-eastern fellahs got over the air software updates on their pagers recently. I’m not sure I want any of that.
5 Signs It’s Time to Quit Your Job
Forty hours a week – or let’s be real, more – is a lot of time to be unhappy. Being unhappy at work bleeds into other areas of our lives, impacting our physical and emotional well-being and personal relationships. I’m not advocating job hopping – there are always things that you can try to improve your situation – but as a hiring manager, I regularly see people who have stayed in one place too long at the expense of their own growth and overall career.
After decades of self-employment, I once took a salaried job. I couldn’t believe how short and easy a 40-hour week was. I was home every night for dinner. Toughen up, ya pansies.
It’s Now Officially Illegal to Use AI to Impersonate a Human Actor in Hollywood
Together, the bills, which were passed by Governor Gavin Newsom on Tuesday, make it illegal to use an AI-generated digital replica of an actor’s likeness or voice — or technically, any Californian’s — without their explicit consent.
I guess fraud laws weren’t enough. We needed fraudy-fraudy-super dooper fraud laws to protect poor, put-upon actors. No word on when it will become illegal to use AI to shoplift up to $950 in merchandise.
Where has all the productivity gone?
For example, it’s easier to write a novel using Microsoft Word than using a manual typewriter, but not that much easier. MS Word makes the physical work easier, but most of the effort is mental. (And while moving from Smith Corona 1950 to Word 95 is a big improvement, moving from Word 95 to Word 365 isn’t.)
Writing a novel has always been easy. You just start with a blank sheet of paper and think until drops of blood appear on your forehead.
Porsche’s Idea for a Six-Stroke Internal Combustion Engine Looks Brilliant
The added steps would occur between the traditional power and exhaust stroke. The first sequence, then, would be intake-compression-power, followed by compression-power-exhaust.
Adding additional complexity of any kind to a car is malpractice at this point. Every engine in every car should work like the Briggs & Stratton on my elderly lawnmower. I’ve done nothing by pour gas in it and run it for 25 straight years. Take that, Porsche.
Yet Another Reason Why You Should Sleep on it Before Making an Important Decision
“We found that people are strongly biased by first impressions,” said lead author Dr. Allie Sinclair, Ph.D., who did the research as part of her doctorate in the lab of Dr. Alison Adcock, M.D., Ph.D., a Duke professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences.
My first impression on reading the deep thoughts of Doctors Allie and Ali is that they must be handing out Ph.Ds like candy on Halloween at this point. And to make a joke about pre-marital sex regarding the title.
How Often Do Men Think About Rome?
There’s a Twitter meme on how men constantly think about the Roman Empire. Some feminist friends objected that women think about Rome a lot too. To settle the matter, I included a question about this on this year’s ACX survey, “Have you thought about the Roman Empire in the past 24 hours?” (the Byzantine Empire also counted).
That depends. Where is Sophia Loren from again?
4 Responses
Keep the Sophia Loren bookmark, lose the rest.
” the exact mechanisms remain something of a mystery for now,”
Only to people who think “getting back to nature” consists of buying a flower pot and putting some petunias on the balcony of their London flat.
Yeah, basically anyone who’s ever raised some food in a garden is absolutely UNMYSTIFIED.
Adding additional complexity of any kind to a car is malpractice at this point. Every engine in every car should work like the Briggs & Stratton on my elderly lawnmower. I’ve done nothing by pour gas in it and run it for 25 straight years.
Well, pretty much any small 4 cylinder naturally aspirated Toyota, Honda, Mazda, Nissan engine with 5 speed manual transmission fits this description.
If you don’t insist that your economy 4 door sedan have Ferrari level acceleration, if you know how to actually drive (“Stop lugging the engine, damn it!” my old man hollered at me), then you don’t need additional complexity to wring every last HP/ft-lb out of the thing, and you can still get superior fuel economy.
The Briggs engine on my first lawnmower lasted more than 25 years. How many more I don’t know because I gave it to a guy who re-built lawnmowers as a second business in his garage. The problem was the steel deck on which it sat, which rusted out. It first rusted where the wheel axles were bolted through; that was a simple solution to drill four new holes and bolt them through on somewhat more solid steel. The upper half of the two-piece handle broke off, so I sawed off the rusted parts, flattened it out and curved it to shape, and stuck it back on. A little shorter, but then, so am I.
The end came when the deck rusted out and I didn’t have any scrap sheet metal with which to sister over the hole. I thought about using plywood, but didn’t have any scrap of that around either.
That engine still started on the first pull every time. Like yours, I just put in gas after the first year when I realized that I was essentially changing the oil every year just by topping it off about every tenth use. Good oil, though, I used my left-over half-quart of Hondaline Synthetic from changing the oil on my bike.
It would be nifty if you could buy the equivalent of a 1995 bargain-bin Toyota Corolla these days, with zero electronic giz-widgets and a dog-reliable engine and drive train. I’d be very happy to have crank roll-up windows and push-down/pull-up door locks.