Beer Bash 2006-2009

Dear friends and family,
It is my sad duty to inform you of the passing of a friend, brother, and warrior. Beer Bash passed last night at the age of 4 years. For a robot, 4 years is a long life, and Beer Bash lived them richly. He fought in 9 tournaments in the United States and India. He did not win many of his fights, but he always fought hard. And when he did win he won decisively. Win or lose his over 20 fights only went to the judges two times.
Beer Bash died as he lived, fighting. He suffered fatal injuries in his first fight of Combots 09 against the Mortician, a foe he has fought before. However this time he could not keep the Mortician's blade away from his shell, and took almost 10 massive hits, and overheated his speed controllers and had to tap out.
However Beer Bash's indomitable spirit could not be killed so easily. He limped back in to the ring against Pipe Wench with a bent frame, loose motor and his keg literally torn open (bandaged to keep his flame out). He did not win this fight. But he did FIGHT! Even when his gear box completely stripped, he was able to hold his flame on his opponent and make her hurt, but once he was in the corner with only one motor he just could not escape, and was counted out. This was to be his last fight.
Beer Bash is survived by 5 parents (Avish, Bruce, Josh, Phil, and Susan), 2 children (The suicide bots), and an unborn sibling on the way.

An announcement will be made with regards to a memorial service.

Beer Bash's last words were "Drink, then fight"

Uncle Eel's 36 Hour Switching Trowie

So, I wanted to make some throwies for pumpkin carving but don't like a few things about them.
1) I measured the LED hooked up to my 3V batterie at 50mA. For my 180 mAH charge that would only give 3.6 hours

2) Pumpkin carving will be the day before Halloween, so I wanted a switch.

3) Using tape to preload the LED wire to a flat surface is not reliable.

So adding a 220 ohm resister should give a 36 hour light, I measured 5 mA (From Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories).

Solving the other problems went something like this:

Placing 2 pennies over the LED/resister leads to preload them to the battery


Using a rubber band to hold the LED lead against the resister with the penny backing it up.

Anyway, that's just my 2 cents.

There is an elephant in the room

Everybody is talking about Obama and the peace prize. Did hie deserve it, did he not. What has he done, what has he not done.

Ok, let me help here. A black man was elected the president of the United States of America.
Let me repeat that: A black man was elected the president of the United States of America

One year ago today, most people would have thought that impossible. One year ago.
Now it is a fact.

America. I love this place, but lets be honest here, it is racist as hell. And now, a black man is president. President!

So, when we wonder what he has done to earn the peace prize, don't look outside of the U.S. Look in.

Yes we can!

So I Reached Down in the Shower

To wash my calf, you have a very sick mind. Anyway, as I was washing my calf, I suddenly realized: Holy cow, I have a calf!!

To put this in perspective conversations with my friends used to go some thing like this:
Josh: “My calf hurts.”
Josh’s friend: “You don’t have a calf.” *Rabbit Punches me in the back of the head* “Now give my your iPod, trick.”

Now I look forward to having conversations like this:
Josh: “My calf hurts.”
Josh’s friend: “Hay, nice calf.” *Rabbit Punches me in the back of the head* “Now give my your iPod, trick.”

You know, I think I need new friends.

I Just got off of an Airplane

And having gotten off of the airplane meant that at some point in the day I got on the plane. Furthermore, given that today is a Wednesday, I was traveling for work.
Traveling for work is hard, tiring, and you don't eat regularly.

On the plane, at some point, the flight attendant brought me two tiny bags of honey roasted peanuts.

This made it all better. Just a few peanuts. So sweet, so salty, so good after I am tired.

Then I remembered, as I fished the last nut out of the first bag, when my dad went on trips he would always bring back two bags of nuts. One for me, and one for my sister. This was a treat for us and we liked them ok, but it was nothing huge. But as I opened the second bag, I realized that it was huge.

My dad, who likes a good salty crunchy as much as the next guy, did not eat the nuts. He, when he was tired and hungry was handed two bags of peanuts, thought of his children and instead of eating them, put them in his briefcase.

Anyway I get it now. Thanks dad.

I Would Almost Rather Frame It

I am Officaly a Bachelor