Statistics, not Just for Breakfast

Why do we freak out over a 1/30,000,000 chance of getting hit in a terrorist attack, but think a 1/30,000,000 chance of getting cancer is "the price we must pay".

Also, that is not how cancer works. Turn the number around. This means that for every 30,000,000 times this machine is used it produces on the average 1 tumor. So, conservatively, with 25,000 flights per day, with 75 people on each flight, that give us 1,500,000 people flying per day. If everybody got scanned that would be over one person given cancer every month!

It is called math people

I have so many questions...

I know I have not posted in a LONG ass while, and now I am throwing this at you...
Just deal with it...

Mine Eyes

Last Day in Kazakhstan

In early 2010, I traveled to Kazakhstan for business. What was expected to be a 3 week trip ballooned into 45 12-hour days in a row. On the very last day I had two hours of free time to take my camera out by the hotel. Most of the images presented in this show are from those two hours.


Showing From July 1-31
At Cafe Galleria In Oakland
Artist Reception Saturday July 3rd 1pm-4pm (Informal)

Things That Go BANG in the Night

So last night there was a tremendous bang that shook the building. I
sounded like a bomb went off… Or so I am told I slept right through
it. Which shows how tired I am. Then, ½ hour later, around midnight,
there was a lot of knocking at each door and shouting in either Kazic,
or Russian, I have difficulties telling them apart. When I opened my
door, they where already down the hall. A security guard, a hotel
manager, and the girl at the front desk were at somebody else’s door
shouting in English “Open the door!!”

So, I went back to bed…

Then I woke up in the morning and got ready for work. When I attempted
to flush the toilet I discovered that there was no water.

So, while walking to the main building for breakfast (I am in the back
of the hotel… ALL the way back… Next to the dog kennel… and the flood
lights… Away from the internet… Yes, I hate this place) I was thinking
about all I was going to complain to the manager about. No water…
being woken up in the night… the past few days the hot water has been
tepid… the smoking crater in the ground where the boiler used to be…

THE WHAT???

Yeah, the boiler blew up. Literally! The shed that it was in (the
stone shed) was demolished. This thing blew the fuck up!

But no worries, the got the cold water back on about ½ hour after I
got back from my usual 12 hours of hard manual labor.

I don’t mind so much a cold shower… So long as there is bourbon afterwords.



And after they "replaced" it:


P.S. I got my next hot shower about a week later.

So, That Did Not Go As Planed

Between the working 12-16 hours per day/7 days per week, and the Internets not working that well, I did not post shit, or take notes worth a damned. But I did take some pix, and will be trickling them to my Flikr, and I wrote one blog entry, but was not able to post it. So, without further ado...

Ready... Set....

I have packed something like 12 bags (works stuff) and said good by to my kitty and my GF, only thing left to do is set my watch.

Lets see, it is 7:04 here, and turn the dial to the new time which is... Uh.. 7:04.
Done.

Final Countdown

I am supposed to be leaving very soon, though I do not have tix yet...
But I was reading up on the trip and found this tasty tidbit on WikiTravel
"The general rules of safety in Kazakhstan are the same as in any other civilized country of the world. Besides the normal risk of pick-pockets, etc. The main risk is meeting a group of corrupt police; try to avoid being taken to the police station."

uBrew is Shaping up.

I have not shared the progress of the new bot latly, but today she made the transition from a bag of parts to something that looks like a robot!
This is as neat and clean as she will ever be. Next: Electronics!

A Slight Mess in the Basement

So, I have been pestering my bat shit crazy neighbor for about a year about her mess in the basement:


Now, I know what you are thinking. Geezz Eel, chill out. What is the big deal?? I mean, sure she is monopolizing all of the storage space but she has been living here for a long time so that must mean she is entitled to, and I am sure that what ever is in those bags is perfectly sanitary and not moldy at all.

Well, it is true that I really don't need to use the space my self. I just (for some reason) have never collected hundreds of pounds of trash that I need to keep in my life, or under my life. The problems is this:


Ok, so that pile of garbage... er belongings... is precarious and is libel to fall at any moment, but what is the big deal? I mean aside from the fire hazard, health issues due to mold, and that she is (justifiably I am sure) monopolizing the space. Lets look a little closer:


Yup, that is the buildings washing machine and dryer nesseld in the piles of crap... er belongings.

So, to make a long story short every now angain I pester her about it. The last time (about a week ago) she yelled at me:
"Eel, I just can't deal with this right now!!!"
And stormed off.

So, yesterday, (this is what you have been waiting for, and this time I scanned the note!!!) she left a note in my mail box:




And now for the translation:
Dear Eel -
Plez Know i Knocked on your door
couple of
Nites AGo - for I wan't to reply to your inquiry -->
About Things
downstairs
I appreciate
Trying

(underline)(underline)(upsidown)!!Eel!!(/upsidedown)(/underline)(/underline)
-Always
Pata

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I am thinking of putting together a book of her writings.

My Visa Starts... Wait... NOW!

But have no clue as to when I am leaving :(
I have been told by one guy "Late March at the earliest!!" and another "Oh, no Mid March, definitely"

But in other news I ran a roll of film through my 35mm camera and one of the knobs is a little stiff, but other than that the thing is perfect! I forgot how good the light meter and auto-focus on it is.

Hurry Up and Wait

So the trip got postponed, I was suposed to leave Friday.
They are now saying "end of March", sigh.

Virgin no More

I got my passport in 2001 when I was working at Morgan Stanley for the trip to England that I was to take, but the economy started to tank and that trip was canceled. Sad face. With this, that, and the other, I have never had a chance to travel. I have been out of the country 2 times in my life, the first was in 1990 for the eclipse in Mexico (9 minutes of totality!!) the second was riding across Vancouver in a bus (big trip). But now, my passport finely has a stamp in it, and what a stamp!
90 day, double entry Visa for Kazakhstan!

A Fuck Load of Work

So, not only am I working my but off at work, for work preparing for work (Yeah, in this economy nobody should complain about having too much work). But also doing a lot of work preparing for taking pix.
I bought a med format camera for the trip, and had to send it back cuz the lens mount was visibly bent. So, I got a different one and discovered that the light seals were totally degraded :(
I was pissed at the guy who took his camera off the shelf after it had been sitting for years and just assumed it was in the same condition that it was when he put it there...
Hmmm, I should run a roll through my 35mm camera.
So, the plan for this weekend is to scrape off the old light seal, clean the camera thoroughly (probably clean the digicrap too, it is looking nasty), put new light seals in, and run a roll through it to see what is what.
I'll let you know how it turns out.

Frozen Beavers

It is cold in Kazakhstan this time of year. Damn cold! And I may have to be working in the cold.
So, I am considering growing a beard for the trip.

Thoughts? questions? Concerns?

Practice, and Beginning, or 40 Below Zero

So, I am leaving for kazakhstan in a few weeks (I don't know how many, but 3 or 4 is a working number). Don't worry about breaking into my empty house wile I am gone, there will be more people here than there are when I am in town (everybody loves my cat and are queued up to house sit for her). Why am I going? Cuz I am tired of telling people the temperature and having them ask Fahrenheit or Celsius?

But anyway, I will be taking many a photo during the trip and writing about what I see. I will be adding notes as to which camera was used what day and about what I saw (this is for me so I can look back and have an idea as to what I was photographing and why) so you will see the following notes as I blog (I will have internets for most of the trip) and some pix may start showing up on my flickr during the trip. I reserve the right to change my notation.
DC: Digicrap (Nikon CoolPix)
D80: Nikon D80 Digital
F100: Nikon F100 35mm Film
120: Mamiya RB-67 Pro S(120 Film, 60mmX70mm)

Yes, there are a lot of Nikons on the list, I can swap lenses from the D80 and the F100 (Oh, and thieves, if you are trying to steal my cameras, I keep them in my bedroom next to my collection of antique bear traps)

Anyway, I have not taken any pix of the trip yet. But I did go to the doctor to get medically certified for offshore work.

Adulthood

I recently asked my grandmother how was it that I had become an adult. I was feeling frazzled and at wits end with all of the responsibilities that I was feeling like had been thrust upon me. All sorry for myself and full of "life's not fair"

She looked at me and said:
You become an adult when there is something that needs doing; when you look around for a grown up to do it, you find none, so you do it yourself.

The Text from my Toast at Beer Bash's Wake

I would like to raise a glass

We are not here tonight to mourn Beer Bash's passing, but to celebrate his life.

Tonight we remember Beer Bash as a friend.
Tonight we remember Beer Bash as a teacher.
Tonight we remember Beer Bash as a fighter.

To some Beer Bash was merely a fire spewing, fighting beer keg. Nothing more than a mad creation trading incredible hits in the robotic combat arena. But to me Beer Bash was so much more.
For Beer Bash brought me my dear friends Avish, Bruce, Phil, and Susan, and I thank him for this gift.

As we built Beer Bash, Beer Bash in turn taught us. Which I suppose, being a school project, was the point. Beer bash taught us engineering skills, and machining skills. Beer Bash also encouraged us to learn from each-other. This was part of the curriculum at SF State. Beer bash was expected to teach us these things, and we got a grade for it. But Beer Bash taught us more than this, beer bash taught us about taking different paths to victory. Beer bash taught us that you can walk into a competition fully expecting to lose, then lose indeed, lose big, but still be able to call it a victory.

Beer Bash was always very proud of his fighting record. He did not win many fights, but he did win some and this, for his humble beginnings, is something. I think that being made in a public school shop by students taught Beer Bash an important lesson that he carried into the ring for every fight. Nothing is given, if you want to succeed you have to fight for it.
And fight he did. He got in the ring every single time his card was up, no matter what he faced, he fought out of weight class, he fought opponents that out classed him, he fought. It was not until the very last battle that he could not muster the strength to climb into the ring one last time.

After dozens of fights on two continents Beer Bash missed his last fight.

So tonight I raise my glass to Beer Bash's toast:
Drink!! Then fight.

Jupiter: Dinner, Thrusday

Jupiter

Jupiter for beer.
And the salads are not bad,
But 15 bucks? Damn!

Chez Panisse: Monday Dinner

Chez Panisse

Main course salty, but
multiple food orgasms.
Two big bills, well spent

Farmer Browns: Brunch Saturday.

New section "Restaurant Reviews".
I love food! And I go to a lot of restaurants (too much probably). So, I am going to start reviewing restaurants I go to. Here is the format

Farmer Brown's

The coffee is weak,
The biscuits are fantastic,
Hipsters everywhere.