deguspice

A problem with hosting a party is that sometimes you have leftovers perishable that you need to get rid of as soon as possible. So that's why I had a chocolate cupcake with breakfast this morning.

The singer Sarah Brightman is scheduled to go to the International Space Station in 2015
( Read more... )
(If you've watched both videos, for extra amusement start watching the first video in full screen mode with the sound muted and then start the second video with the music playing in the background).

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p01fr9py

"A new drama from legendary playwright Sir Tom Stoppard, to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Pink Floyd's The Dark Side of the Moon. [...] he's created a fantastical story about fear, philosophy and madness, which is woven together with the original music."

The radio play is about an hour long and it's accompanied by a ~10 minute long loop of interesting visuals made by the folks at Aardman Animation.

I'm not sure what I think of it (I'll probably listen to it again), but it's worth checking out.

It aired for the first time this evening and it'll be up on the BBC website for a week.

This afternoon, I bought a cheap furniture dolly and then used it to roll the A/C from its closet in the bathroom, down the hall and into the room with the computer. My back really appreciated it.

I still had to lift the A/C onto the dolly, and then lift it from the dolly to the window (with A's help), but those were brief exertions.

Next fall, I get to figure out if I can roll the A/C into the closet on the dolly (the closet has a small threshold). If I can, that will eliminate the struggle to get it into the closet.


(by cheap, I mean for the price I paid, it was well worth it, even if I only use it for moving the A/C)

This is a friend from high school. I don't think I've seen her since I graduated.

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http://www.umb.edu/news_events_media/news/white_house_honors_umass_boston_professor_as_champion_of_change

White House Honors UMass Boston Professor as “Champion of Change”

On Monday, May 6, the White House will honor fifteen Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) women as “Champions of Change.” Among them is Karen L. Suyemoto, an associate professor of clinical psychology and Asian American studies at UMass Boston.

A part of the White House’s observance of AAPI Heritage Month, this event will recognize Asian American, Native Hawaiian, and Pacific Islander women who are doing extraordinary things to create a more equal, safe, and prosperous future for their communities and the country.

[...]

Suyemoto has conducted research and taught undergraduate and graduate classes focused on racial justice for almost 20 years, receiving particular accolades for her teaching and mentoring work such as the first annual Liem Award for Graduate Mentoring.

[...]

The ESA just released a "cosmic microwave background" picture of the Universe from when it was less than 380,000 years-old.

Not only does the picture show the evolution of the Universe, it also shows the evolution of the technology used to map the Universe soon after the Big Bang. In 1989 NASA sent up COBE to examine the early days of the Universe, then 10 years later, NASA sent up WMAP. And now, ESA has the Planck space telescope. The pictures appear to show the same image, but the resolution has gotten much better.


2013: http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Space_Science/Planck/Planck_reveals_an_almost_perfect_Universe

http://www.esa.int/var/esa/storage/images/esa_multimedia/images/2013/03/planck_cmb/12583930-4-eng-GB/Planck_CMB_large.jpg

2001: http://map.gsfc.nasa.gov/media/121238/index.html



1989: http://aether.lbl.gov/www/projects/cobe/

Is this a pizza I see before me,
The crust towards my hand? Come, let me eat thee.
I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.
Art thou not, tasty vision, sensible
To tasting as to sight? or art thou but
A pizza of the mind, a false creation,
Proceeding from the heat-oppressed oven?
I see thee yet, in form as palpable
As this which I now slice.
Thou marshall'st me the way I was going;
And such a pizza wheel I was to use.
Mine stomach is made the fools o' the other senses.
Or else worth all the rest; I taste thee still,
And on thy blade and dudgeon gouts of cheese,
Which was not so before. There's no such thing:
It is the cheesy business which informs
Thus to mine tongue. Now o'er this one half-pizza
Nature seems dead, and wicked pizzas abuse
The curtain'd table;



My sincere apologies to William Shakespeare

http://www.shakespeare-navigators.com/macbeth/T21.html

Here are some more tidbits from NPR's news quiz show "Wait Wait ... Don't Tell Me!"

This week's show had a lot of odd bits of news, so I found it difficult to pick just a few to use.
( All the News that Fits )

I think whomever did Wednesday's crossword puzzle for the Boston Globe is a Mac user. One of the crossword puzzle clues was "old computer add-on". I was thinking the answer was something like "modem" or "floppy disk". But it turns out that the answer was "CDROM DRIVE".

It's late January, it's almost 3am, and the temperature outside is 58dF. Last week, the overnight low temperature was in the single digits.

Welcome to New England.