I remember selling candy when I was a kid in school. We had a ban on anything that was called unhealthy too, but specifically gum. I would buy gum balls like the kind you would pay 25 cents for in a candy machine from a grocery store at bulk prices. I made about 20 cents a ball from them. I usually kept a tub full of gum, sugar sticks, cinnamon candy (really popular where I was), and licorice. I could usually charge about what they would charge in a convenience store and make healthy profit. I never did much accounting back then but I made about a thousand bucks and I had candy to last me all the time. I remember vividly the time a teacher caught me doing it, she made me throw all my stuff out. After school though, I went into the garbage and fished out all the stuff that was still sealed in wrappers and resold it. All she taught me was to be more careful and out of the open when selling things.
Its amazing how much I learned doing the candy trade about profit margins, supply and demand, inventory management, customer service, and just general business from that. I also remember moving onto harder things after the trouble selling candy with the rules with slim profit margins brought that enterprise to an end. By the time I was done with school, I was the guy people would talk to to get anything at a fair price. I could get concert tickets, credit cards, custom cds, homework, energy drinks whatever. I can honestly say that I learned more about life buying and selling, taking profits and reinvesting it and absorbing losses in grade six than I did from any of my class work.
Well, as always, it depends on your definition of being cost effective. To get a nice cheap Skystream Windmill would be about $15,000 taxes in. This would produce enough power to comfortably provide electricity for a house or a small business (around here around 500kw a month). With proper battery and storage, one could go completely off the grid saving about 100 bucks a month. Doing that, it would take just over 15 years to get ones money back, but you can find that good will comes putting up wind towers, price of electricity doesn't go up over the years, and that your initial investment doesn't have much concern about spending 15 grand in one shot. If you are creative the rotor itself is about $5,000.00 without mounting or foundation, but if you were to basically put a hole in the ground with a giant pipe sticking up 60 feet for less than $10,000 you can save some serious money there. People might wonder why I know this, and it's because I just ordered a couple for my company.
I'm the head of IT for a trucking company, and I like to think we are at the forefront of technology. We have built into our GPS systems all those sensors that will phone back home and anyone in the main office can track all those sensors. A big thing that we like with the auto phone back, if the truck gets into an accident it will automatically contact rescue and get ambulances on the way. We have been lucky, our company averages about 10 million km a year and we have never had the thing have to phone for help yet other than testing the system to see if it work.
My favorite bit of technology that we have are multiple screens. Our bigger trucks have at least 3 or 4 cameras on them routed the the cab of the truck to an LCD screen that allows the driver to avoid blind spots and drive with precision and accuracy that was unheard of years ago. With our specialty hauling of oil field equipment, we find that items need to be loaded and unloaded to within 10cm based on engineers and geologist's recommendations.
I never really thought that our technology was that interesting or unique, but looking at the positive response to some of the mundane technologies, I should put a technology section on our companies website to show off some of our biggest and best trucks and the technology in them.
I started playing games back when I was about seven years old. It all started with my NES, and man did I love it. I played it hard for a while, about 3 or 4 hours a day. Not much longer, we got a computer, and I started playing Dune 2, I lost so much time to those games. By the time I got to high school, I was the biggest gamer in my school.
I remember back in grade eight, the teacher had us all write something nice about each of us on a piece of paper. Out of about 25 people, 15 or so all said either, he is good at nintendo or video games. I never realised that this was bad. I am naturally intelligent, and I did no homework or notes or studying for tests. I was able to pull about an eighty average, while playing these games.
Once I got to high school, I started to get more advanced games, I had an N64, SNES, and a powerful computer (heck, I am typing this on that computer) I was playing hardcore my Command and Conquer and zelda on the nintendos. My marks were slumping a bit, but I was not challenged by the classes and I didn't care. Then in grade eleven we got the internet. I started downloading so much junk, and playing online games like a crazed heiena on crystal meth. My marks were about eighty because I was "learning" so much from the internet. Then I discovered pokemon, Final Fantasy, and a few other games that I hardcore played.
I was logging on about eight hours a day on those things, that and downloading music. I never did any homework, all I was doing was playing games of half-life, and Total Annihilation. It was about halfway through my final year, and I started to really think about what I had been doing.
I was by far the most intelligent person in the school, but I wasn't going to get any scholorship because I did not work in the classes and that brought down my grades. (I ended up second in the class by about 1%) I have never had a girlfriend. I was drastically overweight. I had spent tons of money on games and internet connections. I had never learnt how to do homework or to study. My grammer and language skills were degrading and as were my skills in the real world.
After that I entered university, and I made a promise to myself. No more video games. I packed up my nintendos and my computer games and left them at home, while I went off to the university. Now in my second year, I am faced with the aftermath of my life I had when I was younger. I have already lost about 50 lbs in the last year and a half. I have made numerous friends. My self-esteem has skyrocketed. I will freely admit that I was addicted, but I have worked with it and now have it undercontrol.
Like all addictions, one never gets over it. I have on this computer very few games, like solitare, and I catch myself playing them, even though I try not to. I surf the web far to much, like right now, I am typing on slashdot instead of studing for my econ final tomorrow that is worth 100%. They are hard to deal with, and when I first stopped the games, I felt strange.
I still to this day have problems stemming from the games I played in my youth. I have poor workhabits, and at university that causes failure. I have never had a girlfriend. However, I do have some good things that came from the video games. I am a CS major, learning how to program in C++ probably inspired from all my computer games. I can hold my head up high and say to all my friends that I am a better game player than them. When I hear them talk about everquest, I laugh inside because I can see their addiction and they can't. They still get to beat thiers. I don't have the added wasted time here in universtiy of playing games, unlike some of them. I never watch TV, because I never got into it, and since I don't play games anymore, I have more free time than ever before. My work ethic is slowly growing better here in the University. My collection of video games it worth a lot.
True games have cost me alot, financally, physically, and mentally, but I have started to get out of the hole. I feel t
Back when Valve released its Half Life demo it was a stand alone game. The engine was the same as the normal game, but they made a new story that was far shorter and still a great deal of fun. I am hoping that the new Half Life 2 will also have a demo that will be unique and seperate from the real game.
I am wondering what this demo is like; will it be Doom 3 but only the first 10 minutes of game time or is it too a complete different game with different maps and story.
The strangest for me: the top of a power generating windmill. We have dial up internet up at the top, and we wanted to see if it was working and so, I pinged the main server. Well, later on that day, we needed a rather specific tool, so I got a guy to bring it up to me, and while I waited, I logged on to slashdot and read the headlines.
I always have a couple of nice pens on me, my TI-89 for the off chance I need to find the tax on an item, or a mugger demands all my money unless I can do a really tricky trig integral. An extra set of headphones in case an impromptu lan party were to spring up. My green laser to point and laugh at the people with the lesser red lasers. On my hand is my LAKS 256mb watch, filled with all sorts of neat stuff. I also carry a big package of mints in a Dilbert tin, for both my breath and others. And, finally in my pants pocket, the most versitle and usefull tool of them all, a wallet with cash and plastic.
I am going to get modded down for this, but this has pissed me off for ages.
It's the imperial system for gods sake! There are no decimals! 3.75 inches? What the hell does that mean? Do you mean 3 inches and 3/4ths? or are you talking some other crazy number!
If you want to use decimals go to a real system of measurement. Its the imperial method of measurement that causes problems. Hey lookit the mars lander that went off course because someone was too stupid to use metric. That person should be looking for a job where asking do you want fries with that is the only chance to interact with society.
Why couldn't you have just said having a diameter of ~3 cm? Its not that hard! People understand cm. A circumference of 3.75" what does that mean? Are you going to go out and find a cloth measureing stick and see how big around Captian Winkey is?
Every time I do tech work for my friends *sigh* I usually end up haveing to reinstall windows xp. God forbid they move to a different OS, but I digress... The first thing I do when the machine is on is turn off MS Messenger. I have met people that have no idea what it is and how to turn it off, including high level CS students here at university
This is how you turn off MS Messenger: - Go to your main directory - Then WinNT - system32 - then find the file called services.msc - you will have a list, find messenger on it - disable it
While there, take a close look at what else microsoft has running, and see if you need all of it - perhaps remote PC access?
This is the first thing I do when turning on a cmoputer for almost anyone running XP; there is never any need for it. I've done it for families with kids, and have had the parents genuinely thank me for getting rid of the lewd popups their children are bombarded with.
People talk like the levey is extremly high, but when you consider 21 cents, it's not to much. By the way, that 21 cents is Canadian, so it's about 14 cents US.
Just yesterday, I went out and bought a 50 CD spindle of CD's, with tax, it cost me $29.64 CND. I fyou the math, that is about $20.00 USD for a 50 CD spindle. I don't often get down to the USA, but the last time I was there, a 50 pack of CD's cost ~20 plus tax.
It's simple economics, our exchange rate is about 65% and the purchase price parity is at about 85% (real exchange rate), the levy for the Canadian Recording Industry is about %20, so for the same price as Americans, we get CD-R's with the freedom to burn music.
Back when I was in Grade 4 (now in 3rd year of University) my teacher put up a camera to watch me because I was a little terrorist. Well, I started to behave well - for about an hour. Then I was back to before, and soon enough, I was worse then ever.
I started to make mock fights in front of the thing and do all sorts of stupid stuff. Anyway, after about of month of the thing constantly being on, I stopped noticeing it and I behaved just like before.
Finally, towards the end of the year, my teacher pulled me out of the class room, and made me sit and watch myself for hours. Being about 9 years old, that really sucked. I realized the punishment wasn't being taped, it was having to watch the tape.
Only now do I realize that my teacher was a sadist.
In the early seventies, I had a calculator, and it cost $150. It had the basic 4 functions and no more. It also had a very crude memory. It was able to remember the last number entered, ie I could do a string of calculations with that number. The thing had a rechargable battery. It was quite a nice calculator, and I used it until it wore out. Currently, I swear by a TI 89.
I live in a small town, about 100 km from any city, and about 300 km from a real city (ie >5000). Our theater is finally getting the matrix reloaded in two days, and I am dying to see it. I am now contemplating not going, but buy the DVD and go and see the movie about ten minutes later. Besides, I have a number of friends who haven't seen any of the matrix movies - they absolutley have Reeves, and refuse to support him in any way.
Back when I was in elementary school, I played games and read books, exclusively. I never did any homework, and barely watched any TV. I played a game, and then I read a book or two that the games were inspired from. My parents, luckily, have a library that makes most school libraries pale in comparison.
I remember playing Dune 2 when I was ~8, and then reading the book. I enjoyed reading Frank Herbert's "Dune" and his sequels, but I fear I didn't understand the nuances of the books untill I reread them in high school.
It was fun reading that book when I was young as well. All my friends were reading Goosebumps books, or Babysitter Club, or books that still had pictures in them, and I was here with a book that I could hardly hold from an entire hour because it was so heavy!
We already have T'Pol. She is filling the niche that 7 of 9 filled in Voyager.
Jeri Ryan played a woman in a tight jumpsuit that played a character that didn't quite catch on to humanities finer points like emotions and social interaction.
Jolene Blalock is a woman in a tight jumpsuit that plays a character that doesn't quite catch on to humanities finer points like emotions and social interaction.
I am currently working on a degree in CS, with a secondary in economics. With those two degrees, I imagine I could do a lot of stuff, most economic people I know don't know what side of a computer to press to get it to turn on.
Aside: My prof was showing us how to us a Microsoft product, and she said open a new document, and then a guy in the back asked, "How do we do that?"
Anyway, I have been looking for jobs in related fields, and can't find any. They are all just camp councilers and swimming teachers (which I refuse to do again).
However, I found a job out on the oil field. Long hours, but great pay. Even if I do get a degree, I will be hard pressed to find a better job to start out with. A good programmer just out of university would make about $15.00 an hour with about 40 hour weeks. The oilfield pays about $20 and about 65 hours per week. Its nice when you come home after a day of work and say to yourself, I made $300 bucks today, while I have friends that have phD's that only get about $150.
A degree is nice, but you would be suprised just how much money is in blue collar jobs.
Back when I was little, I was sitting beside the computer my sister was working on with a water balloon bouncing on my knee. It was a full birthday sized balloon, about 4 liters of water, and it exploded all over the box.
The computer was completly soaked and we freaked out. We quickly shut off the computer, started cleaning up the water, and prayed that mom and dad wouldn't kill us.
Well, about an hour later, the ground still soaking wet, we turned that thing on and she worked perfectly. The worst part was having to explain the wet spot on the rug.
A snow melting gun... I can tell you how to make one of those. It is a flamethrower that burns at a lower temperature and for much longer to help get rid of the snow.
Here is what you need: gasoline lighter (zippo) styofoam water gun (super soaker works best) balls of steel
You take the styofoam and mix it with the gasoline, and in doing create a much more viscous subtance that has a lower burning temp, but burns for much longer. After adding about 5 times as much syrofoam as gas, you should have some goo that will be perfect for snow removal.
Take the goo and put it into the water gun. Now you have a way of dispersing the propellent, but in order to light it one should place the lighter right past the nozzel and light it up. That will help melt your snow. Be warned, this can burn for a long while, so make sure you have a lot of snow.
This is great for cleaning off a sidewalk or making a quick snow fort, just point to where you want no snow, and in a period of a few minutes, there will be none.
This is what I do. I buy CD's rarely from a store anymore, but I do download a lot of music. When I check over my list every once in a while, and I see a large number of one group, I send the group some cash. Not much mind you, but way more than they would get per CD that I would have bought. If I send a band 5 bucks, that is like buying about 100 of their CD's from a store. I feel better because my music is legal, the band feels better because they got paid (and very well!), but the RIAA doesn't like me because they don't get thier cut. But me personally, the RIAA can go to hell.
I personally think that the BMW 7-series shout be on the list. It has some of the best and new technology on the market right now.
First it has the I-Drive system which is single button on the center console that controls almost all the systems on the machine. It is really cool, but a lot of people don't like it. I personally love the little thing and wish I had one of them in my car. (Heck, I wish I even had one) A large number of people have been annoyed with it because unlike most of us on/. they are techincally unenlightened:) and don't like having to use any computers of any kind. I found the system intuitive and easy to learn.
However, the BMW has a number of other features that are way better than anyone else on the road. They have the first, and currently only, six speed automatic. They have electronic fly by wire throttle control, Direct fuel injection, traction and yaw control, auto leveling headlamps (for hard acceleration and braking), electronic braking and throttle, and so many other little feautres that no one else has.
They also have spent millions of dollars on developing some of the best parts for this machine. The fans in the car have been heavily engineered to be absolutely quiet and perfecty balanced. They did this by taking a fan and increasing its size by over 50 and looked for imperfections. I know if I wanted a sweet fan for my computer's CPU, it would be straight from BMW.
The car also have the most advanced suspension on the market right now. When body roll is detected, the car levels itself so even under heavy connering the car won't tilt. The suspension firmness can be changed by a push of a button within the car, making it firm or soft at the drivers will.
There are numerous other things that makes the BMW the most technologically advanced, and cool, cars on the road. I only wish I could afford one...
Your post leads me to ask another question, what good it the space elevator at all. If it spins around the earth via centripedal force, the top would have as much gravity, or more, than earth. So all we would have created would be a clean lab up in the sky. We can do this in mines underground far cheaper.
If the top is in geosync orbit with us, then we face other problems. If the timing is out by even 1 cm over a year, the tension created would cause detrimental effects (like gravity, cable snapping, etc), and to fix would cost a fortune.
My valentine's day is going to be excellent. I am organizing the biggest lan party I have ever been to, it will be sweet. Over twenty guys on a friday night, valentines no less, and nary a girl in site.
Actually, I have heard unsubstantiated rumors that one might show up, but I will believe that when I see it - then kill her.
I worked for a company up here in Canada, and we had random drug testing. I didn't mind because I don't do drugs, but there was a local worker we all called Geo, and he is the biggest pot head I ever met. He would spend well over 3000 dollars a month on weed, but he was one of the best damn workers we ever had. Well, he was selected to do a random drug test, when we got the results back, the conversation went like this:
Boss: Geo, we got your drug tests back. Geo: Oh.. Boss: Yeah, you passed. Geo: No shit!
He almost fell over in shock. When the boss left the room, we all laughed like idiots and congratulated him on the tests.
Slashdot Mirror
I remember selling candy when I was a kid in school. We had a ban on anything that was called unhealthy too, but specifically gum. I would buy gum balls like the kind you would pay 25 cents for in a candy machine from a grocery store at bulk prices. I made about 20 cents a ball from them. I usually kept a tub full of gum, sugar sticks, cinnamon candy (really popular where I was), and licorice. I could usually charge about what they would charge in a convenience store and make healthy profit. I never did much accounting back then but I made about a thousand bucks and I had candy to last me all the time. I remember vividly the time a teacher caught me doing it, she made me throw all my stuff out. After school though, I went into the garbage and fished out all the stuff that was still sealed in wrappers and resold it. All she taught me was to be more careful and out of the open when selling things. Its amazing how much I learned doing the candy trade about profit margins, supply and demand, inventory management, customer service, and just general business from that. I also remember moving onto harder things after the trouble selling candy with the rules with slim profit margins brought that enterprise to an end. By the time I was done with school, I was the guy people would talk to to get anything at a fair price. I could get concert tickets, credit cards, custom cds, homework, energy drinks whatever. I can honestly say that I learned more about life buying and selling, taking profits and reinvesting it and absorbing losses in grade six than I did from any of my class work.
Well, as always, it depends on your definition of being cost effective. To get a nice cheap Skystream Windmill would be about $15,000 taxes in. This would produce enough power to comfortably provide electricity for a house or a small business (around here around 500kw a month). With proper battery and storage, one could go completely off the grid saving about 100 bucks a month. Doing that, it would take just over 15 years to get ones money back, but you can find that good will comes putting up wind towers, price of electricity doesn't go up over the years, and that your initial investment doesn't have much concern about spending 15 grand in one shot. If you are creative the rotor itself is about $5,000.00 without mounting or foundation, but if you were to basically put a hole in the ground with a giant pipe sticking up 60 feet for less than $10,000 you can save some serious money there. People might wonder why I know this, and it's because I just ordered a couple for my company.
I'm the head of IT for a trucking company, and I like to think we are at the forefront of technology. We have built into our GPS systems all those sensors that will phone back home and anyone in the main office can track all those sensors. A big thing that we like with the auto phone back, if the truck gets into an accident it will automatically contact rescue and get ambulances on the way. We have been lucky, our company averages about 10 million km a year and we have never had the thing have to phone for help yet other than testing the system to see if it work. My favorite bit of technology that we have are multiple screens. Our bigger trucks have at least 3 or 4 cameras on them routed the the cab of the truck to an LCD screen that allows the driver to avoid blind spots and drive with precision and accuracy that was unheard of years ago. With our specialty hauling of oil field equipment, we find that items need to be loaded and unloaded to within 10cm based on engineers and geologist's recommendations. I never really thought that our technology was that interesting or unique, but looking at the positive response to some of the mundane technologies, I should put a technology section on our companies website to show off some of our biggest and best trucks and the technology in them.
Here is my story
I started playing games back when I was about seven years old. It all started with my NES, and man did I love it. I played it hard for a while, about 3 or 4 hours a day. Not much longer, we got a computer, and I started playing Dune 2, I lost so much time to those games. By the time I got to high school, I was the biggest gamer in my school.
I remember back in grade eight, the teacher had us all write something nice about each of us on a piece of paper. Out of about 25 people, 15 or so all said either, he is good at nintendo or video games. I never realised that this was bad. I am naturally intelligent, and I did no homework or notes or studying for tests. I was able to pull about an eighty average, while playing these games.
Once I got to high school, I started to get more advanced games, I had an N64, SNES, and a powerful computer (heck, I am typing this on that computer) I was playing hardcore my Command and Conquer and zelda on the nintendos. My marks were slumping a bit, but I was not challenged by the classes and I didn't care. Then in grade eleven we got the internet. I started downloading so much junk, and playing online games like a crazed heiena on crystal meth. My marks were about eighty because I was "learning" so much from the internet. Then I discovered pokemon, Final Fantasy, and a few other games that I hardcore played.
I was logging on about eight hours a day on those things, that and downloading music. I never did any homework, all I was doing was playing games of half-life, and Total Annihilation. It was about halfway through my final year, and I started to really think about what I had been doing.
I was by far the most intelligent person in the school, but I wasn't going to get any scholorship because I did not work in the classes and that brought down my grades. (I ended up second in the class by about 1%) I have never had a girlfriend. I was drastically overweight. I had spent tons of money on games and internet connections. I had never learnt how to do homework or to study. My grammer and language skills were degrading and as were my skills in the real world.
After that I entered university, and I made a promise to myself. No more video games. I packed up my nintendos and my computer games and left them at home, while I went off to the university. Now in my second year, I am faced with the aftermath of my life I had when I was younger. I have already lost about 50 lbs in the last year and a half. I have made numerous friends. My self-esteem has skyrocketed. I will freely admit that I was addicted, but I have worked with it and now have it undercontrol.
Like all addictions, one never gets over it. I have on this computer very few games, like solitare, and I catch myself playing them, even though I try not to. I surf the web far to much, like right now, I am typing on slashdot instead of studing for my econ final tomorrow that is worth 100%. They are hard to deal with, and when I first stopped the games, I felt strange.
I still to this day have problems stemming from the games I played in my youth. I have poor workhabits, and at university that causes failure. I have never had a girlfriend. However, I do have some good things that came from the video games. I am a CS major, learning how to program in C++ probably inspired from all my computer games. I can hold my head up high and say to all my friends that I am a better game player than them. When I hear them talk about everquest, I laugh inside because I can see their addiction and they can't. They still get to beat thiers. I don't have the added wasted time here in universtiy of playing games, unlike some of them. I never watch TV, because I never got into it, and since I don't play games anymore, I have more free time than ever before. My work ethic is slowly growing better here in the University. My collection of video games it worth a lot.
True games have cost me alot, financally, physically, and mentally, but I have started to get out of the hole. I feel t
Back when Valve released its Half Life demo it was a stand alone game. The engine was the same as the normal game, but they made a new story that was far shorter and still a great deal of fun. I am hoping that the new Half Life 2 will also have a demo that will be unique and seperate from the real game.
I am wondering what this demo is like; will it be Doom 3 but only the first 10 minutes of game time or is it too a complete different game with different maps and story.
The strangest for me: the top of a power generating windmill. We have dial up internet up at the top, and we wanted to see if it was working and so, I pinged the main server. Well, later on that day, we needed a rather specific tool, so I got a guy to bring it up to me, and while I waited, I logged on to slashdot and read the headlines.
I always have a couple of nice pens on me, my TI-89 for the off chance I need to find the tax on an item, or a mugger demands all my money unless I can do a really tricky trig integral. An extra set of headphones in case an impromptu lan party were to spring up. My green laser to point and laugh at the people with the lesser red lasers. On my hand is my LAKS 256mb watch, filled with all sorts of neat stuff. I also carry a big package of mints in a Dilbert tin, for both my breath and others. And, finally in my pants pocket, the most versitle and usefull tool of them all, a wallet with cash and plastic.
I am going to get modded down for this, but this has pissed me off for ages.
It's the imperial system for gods sake! There are no decimals! 3.75 inches? What the hell does that mean? Do you mean 3 inches and 3/4ths? or are you talking some other crazy number!
If you want to use decimals go to a real system of measurement. Its the imperial method of measurement that causes problems. Hey lookit the mars lander that went off course because someone was too stupid to use metric. That person should be looking for a job where asking do you want fries with that is the only chance to interact with society.
Why couldn't you have just said having a diameter of ~3 cm? Its not that hard! People understand cm. A circumference of 3.75" what does that mean? Are you going to go out and find a cloth measureing stick and see how big around Captian Winkey is?
Sorry for the rant and see ya karma!
Sounds like someone with an older edition of the text wanting the password went into the bookstore, took the password, and used it.
Every time I do tech work for my friends *sigh* I usually end up haveing to reinstall windows xp. God forbid they move to a different OS, but I digress... The first thing I do when the machine is on is turn off MS Messenger. I have met people that have no idea what it is and how to turn it off, including high level CS students here at university
This is how you turn off MS Messenger:
- Go to your main directory
- Then WinNT
- system32
- then find the file called services.msc
- you will have a list, find messenger on it
- disable it
While there, take a close look at what else microsoft has running, and see if you need all of it - perhaps remote PC access?
This is the first thing I do when turning on a cmoputer for almost anyone running XP; there is never any need for it. I've done it for families with kids, and have had the parents genuinely thank me for getting rid of the lewd popups their children are bombarded with.
People talk like the levey is extremly high, but when you consider 21 cents, it's not to much. By the way, that 21 cents is Canadian, so it's about 14 cents US.
Just yesterday, I went out and bought a 50 CD spindle of CD's, with tax, it cost me $29.64 CND. I fyou the math, that is about $20.00 USD for a 50 CD spindle. I don't often get down to the USA, but the last time I was there, a 50 pack of CD's cost ~20 plus tax.
It's simple economics, our exchange rate is about 65% and the purchase price parity is at about 85% (real exchange rate), the levy for the Canadian Recording Industry is about %20, so for the same price as Americans, we get CD-R's with the freedom to burn music.
Expecially when you consider just how many experiments they have to run on us, those devious little rodents...
Back when I was in Grade 4 (now in 3rd year of University) my teacher put up a camera to watch me because I was a little terrorist. Well, I started to behave well - for about an hour. Then I was back to before, and soon enough, I was worse then ever.
I started to make mock fights in front of the thing and do all sorts of stupid stuff. Anyway, after about of month of the thing constantly being on, I stopped noticeing it and I behaved just like before.
Finally, towards the end of the year, my teacher pulled me out of the class room, and made me sit and watch myself for hours. Being about 9 years old, that really sucked. I realized the punishment wasn't being taped, it was having to watch the tape.
Only now do I realize that my teacher was a sadist.
In the early seventies, I had a calculator, and it cost $150. It had the basic 4 functions and no more. It also had a very crude memory. It was able to remember the last number entered, ie I could do a string of calculations with that number. The thing had a rechargable battery. It was quite a nice calculator, and I used it until it wore out. Currently, I swear by a TI 89.
I have not seen it yet.
I live in a small town, about 100 km from any city, and about 300 km from a real city (ie >5000). Our theater is finally getting the matrix reloaded in two days, and I am dying to see it. I am now contemplating not going, but buy the DVD and go and see the movie about ten minutes later. Besides, I have a number of friends who haven't seen any of the matrix movies - they absolutley have Reeves, and refuse to support him in any way.
Back when I was in elementary school, I played games and read books, exclusively. I never did any homework, and barely watched any TV. I played a game, and then I read a book or two that the games were inspired from. My parents, luckily, have a library that makes most school libraries pale in comparison.
I remember playing Dune 2 when I was ~8, and then reading the book. I enjoyed reading Frank Herbert's "Dune" and his sequels, but I fear I didn't understand the nuances of the books untill I reread them in high school.
It was fun reading that book when I was young as well. All my friends were reading Goosebumps books, or Babysitter Club, or books that still had pictures in them, and I was here with a book that I could hardly hold from an entire hour because it was so heavy!
We already have T'Pol. She is filling the niche that 7 of 9 filled in Voyager.
Jeri Ryan played a woman in a tight jumpsuit that played a character that didn't quite catch on to humanities finer points like emotions and social interaction.
Jolene Blalock is a woman in a tight jumpsuit that plays a character that doesn't quite catch on to humanities finer points like emotions and social interaction.
I am currently working on a degree in CS, with a secondary in economics. With those two degrees, I imagine I could do a lot of stuff, most economic people I know don't know what side of a computer to press to get it to turn on.
Aside: My prof was showing us how to us a Microsoft product, and she said open a new document, and then a guy in the back asked, "How do we do that?"
Anyway, I have been looking for jobs in related fields, and can't find any. They are all just camp councilers and swimming teachers (which I refuse to do again).
However, I found a job out on the oil field. Long hours, but great pay. Even if I do get a degree, I will be hard pressed to find a better job to start out with. A good programmer just out of university would make about $15.00 an hour with about 40 hour weeks. The oilfield pays about $20 and about 65 hours per week. Its nice when you come home after a day of work and say to yourself, I made $300 bucks today, while I have friends that have phD's that only get about $150.
A degree is nice, but you would be suprised just how much money is in blue collar jobs.
Back when I was little, I was sitting beside the computer my sister was working on with a water balloon bouncing on my knee. It was a full birthday sized balloon, about 4 liters of water, and it exploded all over the box.
The computer was completly soaked and we freaked out. We quickly shut off the computer, started cleaning up the water, and prayed that mom and dad wouldn't kill us.
Well, about an hour later, the ground still soaking wet, we turned that thing on and she worked perfectly. The worst part was having to explain the wet spot on the rug.
A snow melting gun... I can tell you how to make one of those. It is a flamethrower that burns at a lower temperature and for much longer to help get rid of the snow.
Here is what you need:
gasoline
lighter (zippo)
styofoam
water gun (super soaker works best)
balls of steel
You take the styofoam and mix it with the gasoline, and in doing create a much more viscous subtance that has a lower burning temp, but burns for much longer. After adding about 5 times as much syrofoam as gas, you should have some goo that will be perfect for snow removal.
Take the goo and put it into the water gun. Now you have a way of dispersing the propellent, but in order to light it one should place the lighter right past the nozzel and light it up. That will help melt your snow. Be warned, this can burn for a long while, so make sure you have a lot of snow.
This is great for cleaning off a sidewalk or making a quick snow fort, just point to where you want no snow, and in a period of a few minutes, there will be none.
This is what I do. I buy CD's rarely from a store anymore, but I do download a lot of music. When I check over my list every once in a while, and I see a large number of one group, I send the group some cash. Not much mind you, but way more than they would get per CD that I would have bought. If I send a band 5 bucks, that is like buying about 100 of their CD's from a store. I feel better because my music is legal, the band feels better because they got paid (and very well!), but the RIAA doesn't like me because they don't get thier cut. But me personally, the RIAA can go to hell.
I personally think that the BMW 7-series shout be on the list. It has some of the best and new technology on the market right now.
/. they are techincally unenlightened :) and don't like having to use any computers of any kind. I found the system intuitive and easy to learn.
First it has the I-Drive system which is single button on the center console that controls almost all the systems on the machine. It is really cool, but a lot of people don't like it. I personally love the little thing and wish I had one of them in my car. (Heck, I wish I even had one) A large number of people have been annoyed with it because unlike most of us on
However, the BMW has a number of other features that are way better than anyone else on the road. They have the first, and currently only, six speed automatic. They have electronic fly by wire throttle control, Direct fuel injection, traction and yaw control, auto leveling headlamps (for hard acceleration and braking), electronic braking and throttle, and so many other little feautres that no one else has.
They also have spent millions of dollars on developing some of the best parts for this machine. The fans in the car have been heavily engineered to be absolutely quiet and perfecty balanced. They did this by taking a fan and increasing its size by over 50 and looked for imperfections. I know if I wanted a sweet fan for my computer's CPU, it would be straight from BMW.
The car also have the most advanced suspension on the market right now. When body roll is detected, the car levels itself so even under heavy connering the car won't tilt. The suspension firmness can be changed by a push of a button within the car, making it firm or soft at the drivers will.
There are numerous other things that makes the BMW the most technologically advanced, and cool, cars on the road. I only wish I could afford one...
Your post leads me to ask another question, what good it the space elevator at all. If it spins around the earth via centripedal force, the top would have as much gravity, or more, than earth. So all we would have created would be a clean lab up in the sky. We can do this in mines underground far cheaper.
If the top is in geosync orbit with us, then we face other problems. If the timing is out by even 1 cm over a year, the tension created would cause detrimental effects (like gravity, cable snapping, etc), and to fix would cost a fortune.
My valentine's day is going to be excellent. I am organizing the biggest lan party I have ever been to, it will be sweet. Over twenty guys on a friday night, valentines no less, and nary a girl in site.
Actually, I have heard unsubstantiated rumors that one might show up, but I will believe that when I see it - then kill her.
I worked for a company up here in Canada, and we had random drug testing. I didn't mind because I don't do drugs, but there was a local worker we all called Geo, and he is the biggest pot head I ever met. He would spend well over 3000 dollars a month on weed, but he was one of the best damn workers we ever had. Well, he was selected to do a random drug test, when we got the results back, the conversation went like this:
Boss: Geo, we got your drug tests back.
Geo: Oh..
Boss: Yeah, you passed.
Geo: No shit!
He almost fell over in shock. When the boss left the room, we all laughed like idiots and congratulated him on the tests.