GMDesk/fat cats
March 25, 2009
Today is a slow day for whatever reason. The most interesting thing I’ve come across (I actually first came across it yesterday at Yewknee) is the new application called GMDesk. It’s a standalone app that displays all your google stuff in one place, outside of your web browser.
GMDesk is an application that lets you run Gmail, Google Calendar, Google Docs and Google Maps as a stand-alone application to do all your mail handling, calendar event reading etc with. No need to open it up in a web browser, or have it clutter your workspace.
I will be giving it a try in the next week or so.
Apparently a really drunk dude tried to buy beer in the nude last night. He just “didn’t realize it would come to this.” Via Nashvillest.
Oddee has 8 of the most bizarre body manipulations. WARNING: These are pretty intense and not for anyone with a weak stomach.
Finally… fat cat attempts to get through door flap.
SXSW coverage/mosquito-killing lasers
March 24, 2009
I originally planned to resume posting yesterday, but we encountered some traffic issues on the way back from Austin which resulted in us not getting back till 6am monday morning. I had to be at work at 7. Needless to say, I did not feel like blogging yesterday. More on that later…
Mostly quick links today:
First of all, be sure to check all my slideshows of pics from SXSW over at Nashville Cream. I had a blast, even if I did catch the SXSW Cold Virus of Death on saturday.
Also on the Cream, round one of the Mercy Lounge’s Road to Bonnaroo 8 off 8th contest happened last night, and apparently the Features won by one single vote, edging out Kindercastle. Phew. I do like Kindercastle, but I have to say that the Features deserve it more, even if they do get stuck in some tiny side tent playing at noon while everyone’s still nursing their hangovers. They’ve been at this since 1994, and are probably the tightest, best live act in this city.
The New York Times has an interesting article about the extreme branding/marketing/advertising involved with SXSW.
Those Darlins did a Daytrotter session back in January. I guess they don’t always post these right after they’re recorded… I honestly never paid that much attention before though.
Local bloggers Janet Timmons (Out the Other) and Glenn Peoples (Coolfer.com) were both mentioned in a Reuters article about the blogging panel held on Thursday of SXSW.
Ok enough SXSW junk….
Kottke.org highlights a survey that reaveals the average American citizen’s ignorance of basic science. I find it absolutely pathetic and appalling that only 53% of Americans know how long it takes the earth to complete one revolution around the Sun. But it doesn’t surprise me.
Alaska’s Redoubt volcano finally erupted last night after weeks of rumbling. Seismologists have been expecting an eruption for at least a month now. It’s good to see that our prediction methods are at least somewhat accurate.
The entire Cosmos Series, hosted by Carl Sagan, is now available on Hulu. I will be watching them soon. It’s sad that I can only recall seeing one or two episodes…
I hate mosquitoes. They are the bane of my existence. In my opinion, the world would be a better place if they did not exist at all. They do nothing but reproduce uncontrollably and bite people… and animals. That’s why I was very pleased to read this article about a high-tech laser system that targets and kills them. Yes, you heard right- a mosquito-killing laser weapon. This will probably only be used in areas where mosquito-spread disease is a major problem, but we can hope for it, right?
The Space Shuttle Discovery has been attached to the ISS for several days now, and the astronauts have successfully attached the final set of solar panels, which will give the station enough power to support the new crew size of 6-7 astronauts. You can watch live coverage, including footage from onboard the shuttle and the space station, on NASA TV.
Finally, I have some sad personal news to report. My cat Sherman had to be put to sleep this morning. I know it seems lame, but to avoid having to explain the whole story over and over again, I posted a facebook note about it that read as follows:
I’m sad to say that my cat Sherman had to be put to sleep this morning. I’m telling this story on here so that I don’t have to do it 100 times for everyone I know.
We arrived back in nashville from my SXSW trip at 6am monday morning, just barely in time for me to get ready for work at 7. I found him lying on the floor unable to move. He was still yowling, however, so I rushed him to the vet. We discovered that he had a urinary blockage and had been unable to urinate for at least a few days. (Probably since friday, because that’s the day Megan checked on him & he was ok.) This caused his kidneys to malfunction and thus his body was unable to get rid of toxins. He was so near death when I found him that the vet told me there was little hope for him, but I had to at least try to save him. They put him on an IV, relieved the blockage, and put him on a heating pad. His condition improved slightly, but this morning he was unable to control his bladder, showed no interest in food or water, and was still unable to walk or stand. It was obvious that the odds of him recovering were too small for it to be worth the continued suffering it would put him through. So I made the decision to end his suffering. It was a hard choice but it gives me relief to know that he’s no longer suffering.
If you have a male cat 3 years or older, be wary of their urinary habits. This only occurs in male cats, and it’s due to the chemical makeup of cat urine and its tendancy to crystallize. When that happens in their urethra, it causes a blockage. When you can’t pee, it causes major problems VERY quickly. Can you imagine not being able to pee even for 12 hours? If your male cat constantly goes to the litter box but seems to just scratch around a lot, or you notice him squatting but not really doing much, that’s a sign that he might have a blockage problem, and it needs to be treated FAST.
Off to Austin/global warming
March 17, 2009
So tonight I’m heading off to SXSW with my bandmate Seth Graves, Ryan Bruce from the Deli Nashville, and possibly Seth’s friend Carmen. There have been a lot of last-minute plan changes, which is par for the course in all things SXSW-related. But if travel goes as planned, we’ll be driving all night and arriving Wed. morning. We’ll drop some shit off at the house we’re sub-letting for the weekend and then the festivities shall begin. I have no idea how much or often I’ll be able to blog, so don’t expect too much. I will be updating my facebook and twitter stati, so if you’re my friend on facebook or follow me on twitter, those are the way to go. I will be, as usual, photographing for the Scene, and slideshows should be appearing on Nashville Cream daily, so be sure to check there first for pics.
Now for a few quick links:
You can buy a LOST Dharma Initiative jumpsuit on Ebay. For the obsessed LOST fans only. I sure as hell don’t have 85 bucks to shell out for something like that.
The Pixies are back. Though, I must say I really don’t understand this band photo. They look awkwardly posed, and… is Frank Black about to go to the gym for a workout? Head to the park for a jog? WTF?
In all the doom and gloom predictions of global warming, there is one discovery that’s slightly comforting- the Greenland ice sheet may not pass the proverbial “tipping point” quite as soon as they originally thought. The tipping point is the point at which the sheet is 100% guaranteed to melt completely. The research shows that the ice sheet should be able to withstand a global temperature increase of more than 3 degrees Celsius. Of course, some of the ice will still melt and contribute to overall sea level rise. Via the Daily Galaxy.
Photo mouse trap/Twitter/Lesbian Vampires
March 16, 2009
Lot’s of quick-hitters today. I have too much crap to do at work and a bunch of preparation for SXSW. The main thing to note today is that I’ve finally joined the Twitter party. Follow me and I’ll follow you!
Strobist has a cool post about a fascinating mouse trap devised by PocketWizard inventor/engineer Jim Clark. It first captured images of the mouse in action, then captured the mouse’s descent into the humane trap devised by Mr. Clark. He then kept the mouse as a pet during the winter months, and freed it in the spring. Awww…
For some more “awwww-ness,” check out Oddee.com’s post about 10 amazing dogs.
Hipster Runoff tells you exactly what SXSW is gonna be like. SRSLY.
THE MCGANGBANG. Enough said.
Apparently a bat tried to hitch a ride on the Space Shuttle’s external fuel tank just before launch Sunday. It posed no threat since it was on the side opposite the shuttle. In case you live under a rock, Discovery did finally blast off Sunday night and is now on its way to the ISS to put the final major US component in place.
And finally…. LESBIAN VAMPIRE KILLERS!!!!
ISS nearly gets whacked/weekend stuff
March 13, 2009
You’ve probably already seen this by now, but the astronauts on the International Space Station had to prepare for a possible emergency evacuation yesterday as a piece of space junk flew with 3 miles of the station. It was all over by the time it hit news headlines. It did not hit, thankfully, and everything is back to normal. Apparently the debris was about 5 inches, and traveling at over 20,000 mph, and was part of spent satellite rocket motor, not a piece of the two satellites that collided a few weeks ago. The crew has a Russian Soyuz capsule constantly attached to the station that they can use as a lifeboat should they need to evacuate the ISS.
Well-known music blog Largehearted Boy mentions Nashville’s own The Non-Commissioned Officers today, and has a link to download their free EP, which is part of the soundtrack to the locally-made film Makeout With Violence, which has 3 showings at SXSW this year. (None of which I can make, unfortunately…)
Another cool link via Largehearted Boy is the Top 10 Most Overlooked Band members on Spike.com. This is probably the only thing I’ll ever read on that website, as it’s mostly geared towards douchebag bros.
It’s friday. The weekend is upon us. Here’s where I’ll be:
Tonight: King Khan & the Shrines at Exit/In. I saw KK with BBQ show back in Nov. and it was amazing. Can’t wait to see him with “big” band. There’s also a lot of other shit going down tonight. Too much to mention here.
Saturday: Superdrag album release for Industry Giants at Exit/In. The 90’s powerpopsters are back in full effect, original lineup and all!
Sunday: I’m DJing (as DJ Burgers) at the Rock Swap in East Nashville. I’m doing the “after party” segment starting at 6pm after the official events/bands are over.
Wolfram/Turmeric/Pitchfork lineup
March 9, 2009
Wolfram has apparently been in the works for quite some time, but has been a really well-kept secret. To paraphrase developer Stephen Wolfram’s ideas, people once thought that some day we’d simply be able to ask a computer any question and it would compute an answer. No matter what the question may be. We all know that computers don’t really do that… at least not until now. WolframAlpha is set to launch in May of this year. I’ll be interested to see just how well this actually works. If it does, it will change the world. Via Think or Thwim.
Like Indian food? I do. If so, you probably know that one of the most common spices used in it is Turmeric. However, this bright yellow stuff is good for more than just its flavor and color, according to this article in Science Daily. A chemical called curcumin is responsible for the healthy effects of this tasty spice. It helps cells be more resistant to infection and malignancy. Read more about it here.
Space Shuttle Discovery is officially set to launch on March 11. Engineers finally got in enough testing to confirm the safety of those pesky fuel valves that kept causing delay after delay.
From the department of “whoa that’s scary!”…. Several sticks of dynamite were discovered next to I-40 near the Briley Parkway ramp. It was determined that the dynamite had been buried there for 2 years. That’s scary!
There’s a new music blog aggregator out there now. It’s called Whole Lotta Blog, and it could give Hype Machine a run for its money.
Finally… this is probably old news to you by now, but Pitchfork announced the initial lineup for their annual festival in Chicago. Among the headliners are Jesus Lizard, Built to Spill, Grizzly Bear, The Walkmen, and the Pains of Being Pure at Heart. The coolest thing about it is their new novelty called “Write the Night: Setlists by Request.”
Starting on Friday night, we’re kicking off a new series called “Write the Night: Set Lists by Request.” You, the audience, vote on which songs all four bands– Built to Spill, the Jesus Lizard, Yo La Tengo, and Tortoise– will play. It’ll work like this: When you buy your ticket, you’ll get a confirmation email. That confirmation email will include a link to a page where you can vote on which songs from each band you want to hear. The bands will tailor their set lists accordingly. Oh, and did we mention this is the Jesus Lizard’s first American show in a decade? Righteous, yes?
New hope for life on Mars/Robots on the moon
March 6, 2009
Olympus Mons is the largest volcano on Mars (though no longer active), and is also the largest volcanic feature we’ve ever discovered in our entire solar system. It’s so big that you wouldn’t even know you were on a mountain if you were standing on it- it would just look like a vast gently sloping plain, as far as your eye could see. Well, not only is it the most badass volcano ever… it’s also the latest location to exhibit the possibility for life on Mars. According to this Universe Today article, a couple of scientists from Rice University have found evidence that liquid water may be trapped in clay deep underneath the giant moutain, and is the only explanation for its assymetry. The only life that could survive there would be heat-loving microbes called thermophiles, much like the algae that lives in the thermal pools at Yellowstone.
NASA is seriously considering sending a fleet of robots to the moon to do some preparatory construction on what will eventually be a manned moon base. There are some who think going back to the moon is pointless, and that we should just shoot straight for Mars, but I tend to agree with the government that we should take our expansion into the solar system one step at a time. Yes we’ve been to the moon, but we haven’t built a base there, and I think we need to build a base somewhere close before we try to build a base on Mars.
Speaking of robots, The Boston Globe’s “Big Picture” has a series of awesome robot photographs. My favorite is the very last one, which shows NASA’s next Mars mission, the Mars Science Laboratory. The cool thing about it is that there’s a woman in the photo, giving you perspective on the actual size of the thing, which is much bigger than anything we’ve sent to Mars before.
Now for some music-related news…
Wired.com reports that Ticketmaster and Live Nation are running into some problems with their proposed merger (thank god). In a recent hearing they were unsuccessful in convincing Sen. Herb Khol (D-Wisconsin) of the legality of the merger. One of their biggest arguments for the merger is that it will result in lower ticket prices. I’m no economic expert by any means, but even I know that the only thing that really keeps prices low is competition.
Check out this Rolling Stone blog post with a clip from Michael Jackson’s “comeback announcement” yesterday. I wonder just how many shows he can make it through… I’m betting not as many as he promised.
Lastly, if you’re in Murfreesboro this weekend, be sure to check out the YEAH benefit show at the Vine, featuring JEFF the Brotherhood and And The Relatives, and then head over to the Grind for a FREE show featuring the Tits, my band Tigers Con Queso, and Mean Tambourines. Have a great weekend!
Daft Punk scores Tron 2/SXSW/LOST timeloop theory
March 5, 2009
Just a lot of quick links today. No time to really delve into anything. But first, some awesome news: I’m gonna have a wristband and photo pass for SXSW! I’ll spare you the gory details, but let’s just say it never hurts to go straight to the horse’s mouth. That old addage “ask and ye shall receive” is sometimes very true. Now if my old Jeep can just make the trip…
Daft Punk is going to be scoring the soundtrack for the upcoming Disney film Tron 2. Awesome. I can’t think of a more perfect combination of musicians and film.
Hipster Runoff discusses picnic fashion. No, literally… we’re talking about a picnic being worn as a dress.
Stereogum had two great posts last night… One about the upcoming Zooey Deschanel film (500)Days of Summer (including a trailer), and another about the newly developing war between the Flaming Lips’ Wayne Coyne and Arcade Fire’s Win Butler.
So apparently the blogosphere’s buzz/hype and my taste are actually in sync for once… The Pains of Being Pure at Heart’s new self-titled album has been on repeat on my iTunes lately, and come to find out they’re playing 10, yes TEN shows/showcases at SXSW this year. A few of which are day parties thrown by bloggers. Count them- 2 shows on the 18th, 3 on the 19th, FOUR on the 20th, and 1 on the 21st. SXSW is basiclly a POBPAH-gasm! Then they’re hitting the road for even more tour dates in April and May, one of which is right here in Nashville at the End on May 2nd. THAT will be an interesting show… since they’re probably big enough to play Mercy or Exit/In.
If you’re a fan of LOST, you might be interested to see the latest update on the Time Loop Theory. I’ve seen this before… about a year ago, and they keep updating it as more is revealed. Warning though, this could taint your experience of the rest of the series. If you do read this, I recommend that you try your best to keep watching the show from an objective perspective, as if you hadn’t read this. Also be sure to check out the timeline diagram. It helps make the whole theory make more sense.
And finally, a talking goat. Via Courtney Wilder’s facebook.
New Robert Schneider project/drawing sound on film
March 3, 2009
Megan and me with Rob at the Brian Wilson show last November.
After hearing the song “Energy” on the last Apples in Stereo album, I thought to myself “man, Robert Schneider could easily follow in the footsteps of They Might Be Giants and make children’s educational albums.” Well, turns out he’s doing just that. Billboard reports that he’s started a side project called “Robbert Bobbert and the Bubble Machine,” and released a self-titled album last week through kiddie label Little Monster. I have a feeling the songs will still be enjoyable to us grown-ups, just like the TMBG kids’ songs are.
Another little tidbit from Billboard- that big Jonas Brothers 3D movie event that was supposed to be huge, turned out to be a bit of a flop… Ha. Ha ha.
& I took a picture of u & U took a picture of me. He really should turn this into a short film or something. I would hope it would come out feeling a bit like an SNL skit… but maybe with the irony a little less obvious.
The Strobist is a great blog for photographers. The guy knows lighting very well, and if you’re even remotely interested in photography I highly recommend checking it out. Today I had complete jealous-gasm when I saw his post about traveling to the Large Hadron Collider to do some photos of the engineers and scientists there. I can’t even imagine what it was like to get to shoot in there. Just to be inside it…. I would probably just freeze up in utter awe & amazement.
Back in those good ole days of cinema, they used an optical track on the side of film to record the sound. It was literally an optical representation of the waveform, painted in a black stripe alongside the picture. Nowadays that analog waveform has been replaced by either DTS or Dolby Digital. In the case of DTS it’s a timecode of dots and dashes to sync up with a separate CD containing the audio. In the case of Dolby Digital it’s a gray area between the sprocket holes that, when magnified, shows millions of tiny dots in a pattern, which is read by a digital optical sensor, converted into a digital signal of 1’s (represtented by a dot) and 0’s (represented by a clear space), representing the actual audio. This is a very simplified explanation, and I’m also recalling all this from my Audio for Media class waaaaay back in 2000, so if you’re reading this and you know I’ve mis-stated something, please leave a comment correcting me! Anyway… this all leads to the following video from 1951 showing film artist Norman McLaren, who literally draws sound by painting a series of dashes and shapes on the film, then running it through and optical audio reader. I’d love to try this sometime… it would be fascinating…. Via Clusterflock.
Copyright Vanderbilt University
The initial shortlist of artists playing at this year’s Rites of Spring festival at Vanderbilt has been released. The Flaming Lips will likely be headlining friday night, with another yet-to-be-announced headliner that will likely play saturday night. The friday/saturday thing is purely an educated guess on my part. Also announced: Okkervil River, N.E.R.D., Santigold (formerly Santogold), Q-tip, Black Joe Lewis & the Honeybears, and Grand Ole Party. Personally, aside from Flaming Lips, I’m looking forward most to Santigold and Okkervil River. Source: the Vanderbilt Hustler.
MGMT is apparently suing French President Nicolas Sarkozy because his campaign did not compensate them properly for usage of their song “Kids” as the Sarkozy campaign soundtrack.
Remember those literal music videos of “Head Over Heels” and “Take On Me?” Well they’re at it again, this time with Billy Idol’s “White Wedding.” I must say, it’s really hard to top “Take On Me.” I don’t think it’ll ever be done. It’s one of those things where the humor just is never the same after the first time.
The Explorer’s Club did a session on Daytrotter. These live takes are pretty good, but I must say that these songs need the polished production that’s present on their full-length album. It’s evident that some of the vocal harmony arrangements are VERY difficult and they guys hit some odd notes on these live recordings. But the fact that they’re even able to pull off any of those harmonies is utterly amazing, and these guys deserve major kudos for even being in the ballpark. I highly reccomend seeing this band live because they are a lot of fun, and you will thoroughly enjoy it.
In the science world, some good news for NASA comes from Obama’s first budget propsal which was released yesterday. Overall, NASA will (hopefully) see a $2 billion increase in funding in 2010. I’m quite pleased to see this, even in these tough times. Cutting-edge science and research is one area that should be way down on the list of things to get cut when facing tough economic times. Don’t get too excited though; this is not the final version. It was also evident that Obama plans to go ahead with the retirement of the Space Shuttle next year, and continue with Bush’s vision of returning to the Moon by 2020. (The only thing on which I actually agreed with Bush.) Source: Universe Today.
steve cross loves music and science 