A few weeks ago I planted the first of our seeds; two kinds of heirloom organic tomato. We got the seeds out of some local tomatoes we really liked last summer.

Magda’s cousin recently worked on a local seed farm, and sent us some of his seeds. So we’ve added three more kinds of tomatoes, and several other veggies. So far we’re planning:

• Tomatoes
• Carrots
• Beets
• Fennel
• Radish
• Rutabaga
• Strawberry (planted last year, cloned about 20 daughters)
• Bell pepper
• Hot pepper
• Snow pea
• Lettuce
• Herbs
  • oregano
  • parsley
  • cilantro
  • basil
  • sage
  • chive
  • thyme
  • rosemary
  • mint
  • lavender

As soon as I can work the ground I’ll be regrading the yard, and building the raised beds. Apparently lettuce and radish like cooler soil to concentrate flavor and prevent bolting.

This is the guy who brought us the iBot and Segway.

As the Google video says:

Drexel University’s Engineer of the year Dean Kamen is working with the government to create a fully robotic arm for amputees. This is an … all » amazing accomplishment and on behalf of NSBE, I commend his work on this and other projects.

This is amazing. I believe it will be disabled people who will spur the technology that will enable the merging of man and machine. Cochlear implants {provide hearing to the deaf} are blunt versions of the human ear today, but it won’t be long before they offer fidelity and range that would be considered superhuman today.

Double-leg amputee runners are quickly catching up to non-amputee athletes, and will probably surpass them soon. imagine that soon you’ll be hearing how amputees will be disqualified from the Olympics because their prosthetics are too much of an advantage. The special Olympics may someday draw a larger audience than the normal Olympics. Don’t you want to see a man with no arms and no legs run the 100m dash in under 9 seconds… how about under 7 seconds?

Dr. Snuggles

I used to love this show. HE traveled the universe with talking animals in giant spaceship made of a barrel. The sound effects were the best. Here’s more!

The Edison Twins

Crime fighting teens. Hells yeah! Theme song brings it all back…

Much more after the jump

Spider-Man

If I see that same oops-I-spilled-the-ink background… Worst animation ever. I still loved it.

Danger Bay

So Awesome. Good times.

Airwolf

I would beg to stay up to watch this. BEG. Night Rider in the sky. Speaking of which…

Night Rider

Oh yeah. We got the first season for Laura, and watching it… 100% hoffmeat.

You Can’t Do That on Television

Alanis Morissette got her big break on this show! I would watch this every day after school… Hehe

GI Joe

This looks like it could be from a parody! So funny.

the A-Team

A TV show about mercenaries! Family fun.

Transformers

This intro music always got me so pumped. I recently got the first season and discovered it’s crap!

The Facts of Life

So many wasted hours… Don’t you think Nancy McKean looks a lot like Val Kilmer….

Family Ties

Alex P. Keaton and Marty McFly. Michael J. Fox gave me so much… Sha la la la….

He-Man

So amazing. I would interchange all the limbs of the toys… “Fabulous secret powers were revealed to me the day I held aloft my magic sword and said ‘By the power of grayskull…I have the power!’” – how is this not gay.

Quantum Leap

Time-travel drama with a message….

The Mighty Hercules

This video is the whole episode The Mighty Hercules: Medusa’s Sceptre – Why didn’t 11 guys get together and take him down… Those sound effects are great!

Doctor Who

Tom Baker was the first Doctor I was exposed to. I loved those old cheesy shows…

Magnum PI

My mom loved this show.

The Beachcombers

You know…. I watched too much tv as a kid.

An interstellar ark.

Here’s a synoptic intro

Wouldn’t it be cool to travel to exosolar planets?
Being able to travel instantly between any point would be ideal.
It sucks that the speed of light is the fastest anything can go.
Space is big. really really big.
There is two realistic options. The short strategy and the long strategy.
Short Strategy : the relativistic rocket
You cant accelerate any faster than 1g, or 1 earth gravity {9.8 meters per second per second}. The alternative is being crushed for years and years.
When you get near the speed of light time slows down for you, while the rest of the universe keeps going at it’s normal speed.
Accelerate at 1g constantly for 2 of your years, and 3.75 years will have passed back on Earth.
Accelerate at 1g constantly for 12 of your years, and 113,243 years will have passed back on Earth.
Cool. Really puts the Relative in Special Relativity eh?
Oh, you can only brake at 1g as well, so to travel 100,000 light years, or the farthest point in the galaxy, would take 22.4 of your years.
The problem is, this plan takes a lot of energy. A whole lot.
You cant have your cake and eat it. You can go fast expensively or slow cheaply.
The best realistic idea we have now is a matter-antimatter powered gamma ray laser rocket.
Even with this ultra efficient rocket, you’d need 10 billion kilograms of fuel for each kilogram of spaceship.
So we can set aside the short strategy until we learn some more physics.
But how many good planets could there be?
They should be pretty comfortable, mostly rocky, and relatively close by.
We should start to see some earth sized ones with the next generation of space telescopes.
Only about 20% of nearby stars are nice enough to live next to.
About half of them are pairs, and too unstable to keep nice planets.
Assuming about 10% of the rest have rocky planets then there’s about 1664 of them within 100 light years.
If 1% of those are Earth-or-better, that’s at least 16 great places we can go to…

Read onto to find out about the much more practical Long Strategy…

There’s a frost-bite warning in effect. Exposed skin will freeze in 10 minutes.

I have to go take the dog for a walk… It’s going to be a short one.

I was just getting used to winter and starting to enjoy it, and then we get kicked in the face. Looks like it won’t let up until next week.