Geoff said about 5 hours later

Well...I'm not exactly sure what synthetic biology is....I guess building biological material from scratch? Anyhow, it sounds interesting and I'm sure everyone but the scientific community will hate it. I will say, he has some other cool stuff on his blog.

I'll have to read it again, my head hurt after the first review...

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Steve said about 6 hours later

You head hurting was God telling you that you shouldn't be enjoying that website so much...

LOL

Anyone ever wish that they lived in earlier times, when things were much simpler? Somedays, I wish electricity was never figured out. Darn that Ben Franklin...

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Geoff said about 7 hours later

Then what would you race? Bicycles? :P

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Steve said about 10 hours later

Hey, if I didn't know about cars, then I couldn't miss them. It would certainly have made my life easier. Who knows, I might have even had a chance to have a real life, maybe a wife...

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GJ said about 11 hours later

Simpler times always sound good, but people in "after the fall" movie never seem to be enjoying themselves. Remember, when times were simple, a whole lot more people's lives were miserable.

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Kristen said about 12 hours later

So before long, we'll be able to produce life in a lab. I think millions of women will soon get 'headaches' from this new information, especially after they put the kids to bed (who were created in a lab). The dishwasher and laundry machine made life easier for women, I guess we'd be happy to let advanced technology eliminate another chore!

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GJ said about 13 hours later

Methinks growing babies is far in the future. We're talking very simple lifeforms--who, no doubt, will become sentient and wipe us out. I for one welcome our new synthetic biology masters. ;)

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Abby said about 23 hours later

Ooh... wipe us out?

I like the sound of that. Than I will have my work cut out for me when I rule the world!

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Geoff said about 23 hours later

That's if Hillary doesn't beat you to it!

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Abby said 1 day later

But the world is mine!

Me, my alien army, my spider army, and my undead army have already claimed it!

Besides, if I don't rule the world, the Irkens will get it, one way or another. ^^

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Kristen said 1 day later

Hillary already ruled once. We just need to reinstate her.

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Geoff said 2 days later

Well...I've got a crush on Obama

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GJ said 2 days later

The only reservation I have with Clinton is the following:

1988 winner: Bush
1992 winner: Clinton
1996 winner: Clinton
2000 winner: Bush
2004 winner: Bush
2008 winner? Clinton

I'm pretty sure the founding fathers weren't interested in having dynasties run the presidency.

GJ said about 9 hours later

I simply don't know where to begin. This article is just chock full of crap. Mentioning George Noory's Coast to Coast AM show right off the bat was not a great start, either. :)

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Marc said about 10 hours later

I think the article could have been about 1/4 the size...I noticed the "I digress" coming up a lot. But hey, it was something to read while doing my laundry last night. :)

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Geoff said about 10 hours later

I don't know man, those spaceships look pretty real...and freaky. I wonder how they travel so fast with all them spikes! :)

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GJ said about 12 hours later

Had all the hallmarks of a nutjob's creative writing exercise.

GJ said about 3 hours later

Meanwhile, here in the Capital Region of NY, we are still Wegmansless. Price Chopper sucks!

GJ said 6 minutes later

Captain Slow rocks!!

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Geoff said 31 minutes later

Nice!

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Steve said about 3 hours later

BTW, I have Top Gear seasons 1-9 burned in Mpeg or avi format, in case anyone is interested.

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GJ said about 7 hours later

VERY INTERESTED. I assume you've heard that they're headed to the States, right?

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Steve said about 8 hours later

They've already shot part of one episode here. Are you meaning to say the show is coming to the states full time?

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GJ said about 23 hours later

They are producing a version for the states. Not sure how many episodes this will entail, and I'm sure it'll stay on the air only as long as it's popular. Pretty sure this is being done for the Discovery Channel.

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GJ said about 23 hours later

There were talks between Discovery Channel and BBC Two in April that focused on bringing the series to the USA, keeping Clarkson, May, and Hammond as the presenters. There was some noise shortly after that announcement that the deal was made...but I don't see anything further about it online.

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Steve said 1 day later

It would only succeed with those guys, but I'm not sure how well it would work, because, aside from the Ford GT, I've never heard them say much of anything good about an American car, or American drivers, or American people in general. Of course, I find that humorous, but more mainstream people might not. And if they have to change the things they say in the show to appease the new market, they may lose most of the reason the show is so popular in the first place. It's not the cars, but the people and the comedy that make the show so good.

I'd rather see the show stay over there, but just include a few more American cars in it, and broadcast it regularly on Discovery.

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GJ said 1 day later

Dunno. They could make a show here work, but you are right--it would be different from the British show. I'd be all for regular broadcasting here in the states--I mean, come on, they rebroadcast all kinds of lesser crap all day long.

Steve--did you get your TG seasons from FinalGear.com?

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Steve said 2 days later

Nope, TVtorrents.com

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GJ said 2 days later

TG has episodes going back to 1987, I think.

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GJ said 2 days later

oops, I meant Final Gear has TG eps back that far.

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Steve said 3 days later

I have 9 seasons, not sure how far back that really stretches years wise though. The first episode of Season 1 is the first top gear episode, at least the first one with the current three stars on it. I'll try to burn seasons 1-9 onto DVD for you this weekend, and send them out when I get a chance.

GJ said 15 minutes later

I did the rating for the month of April and we got an R. Imagine that.

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Marc said about 1 hour later

What is even more interesting is the stats per person. Here's how people rank based on their posts:

Steve - G
Eric - G
Darcy - G
Mom - G
GJ - PG
Marc - PG
Geoff - R
Kristen - NC-17

So it's evident, that Kristen and Geoff are the contributing factors to this blog's nasty ratings. :)

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Kristen said about 2 hours later

NC-17!! Whoah! Was it something I said? Sorry Abby!

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Geoff said about 3 hours later

That's what I like to hear baby!

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Abby said about 3 hours later

I don't mind. Not at all. ^^

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GJ said about 19 hours later

Kristen, it was your post on the VA Tech Massacre that did you in. And keep in mind, it counts comments, too. So, I just made this month at least an R with this comment. See? Kill. Death. Death. Sex. Sex. Sex. Murder. Gun. Gun. Gun. Gun. :)

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GJ said about 19 hours later

Yup, confirmed, we're now an overall R. That was easy.

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Geoff said about 21 hours later

These ratings must not be based on today's standards. It's amazing what you see on a PG-13 movie today...never would have seen the same material back when I was a kid.

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GJ said about 22 hours later

It's a simple rating based on the words found. Click the image for details.

GJ said about 2 hours later

That's hilarious!

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Abby said about 2 hours later

Lol.

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Geoff said about 4 hours later

I thought you guys would get a kick out of it

Kristen said 1 minute later

Opps, I mean #15.

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Steve said about 24 hours later

Hey Kristen, I'm in the DC area again, are you busy Saturday evening? Want to meet up for dinner? I'm staying in Greenbelt, MD, again, and am racing at FedEx Field, but can meet up with you somewhere in VA if you want. It would probably be later, like 7:00 PM or something. Let me know if you're around.

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Kristen said 1 day later

Oh man, I have a wedding down in Va Beach and we're staying overnight so we can hang out at the beach on sunday! Bummer! Good luck on your race though, let me know how you do! It's been hot lately so be prepared!

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Steve said 1 day later

Thanks Kristen, have fun at the Beach, er, I mean wedding!

Marc said 6 minutes later

Comment deleted on 6/20/2007 at 10:31AM

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Marc said 8 minutes later

4. Thou shalt use your blinker whenever changing lanes or *gasp* turning. (This commandment is not for just the North, people in the South must follow it as well).

5. Thou shalt use the correct blinker depending on which direction you are changing lanes or turning. (This commandment is just for the South).

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GJ said about 1 hour later

6. Thou shalt keep your emissions in shape on your car, thus not subjecting the rest of us with your sulfur smelling exhaust.

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Geoff said about 4 hours later

7. Thou shalt not pollute the air with obscene rap music, or worse, country.

8. If one must blast thy music, only bands that start with "r" and end in "ush" may be played.

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GJ said about 5 hours later

I didn't know Roush Racing started a band.

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Geoff said about 5 hours later

Yeah, I hear their new hit single is called "Spark Plug"

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Steve said about 8 hours later

9. Though shalt remain in the right most lane unless passing a slower moving car.

10. Though shalt complete a pass of one car in 30 seconds or less.

11. Though shalt not pull out in front of faster moving traffic to allow another driver to merge onto the highway.

12. Though shalt turn off turn signal after completeing lane change or turn.

13. Though shalt turn on headlights during rain storms, as well as within +/- 4 hours of sunrise/sundown.

14. Though shalt not use a cell phone, hands free device, navigation system, read a book, paper, or be significantly distracted in any other manner while driving.

Amendment to #2 - Though shalt only brake hard when seeing a police vehicle if though are travelling at an obscene speed. Though shalt use the brake pedal to flash brake lights when a cop is spotted, to warn other motorists to slow down a touch.

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Kristen said about 10 hours later

Amendment to #7 - Thou shall only blast country music if thou is traveling south of the Mason Dixon line, or anywhere in the Central Time Zone.

15. Thou shalt not paint one's own car, unless one is a professional. Camouflage is strickly forbidden.

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GJ said about 22 hours later

Does #14 mean I should stop with the donuts while driving? It's my trick to avoid speeding tickets--I look like a undercover cop.

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Abby said 1 day later

16. Thou shalt not run over the middle schoolers at the bus stop.

It's nearly happened to me how many times now? :\

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GJ said 1 day later

17. Pedestrians shall remember that the road belongs to the cars. :)

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Abby said 2 days later

18. Cars shall remember that us middle schoolers aren't allowed on the grass because it's private property of a high schooler.

Ha.

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Kristen said 2 days later

You tell em Abby!

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Abby said 3 days later

Wahaha. Fear me and my army of spiders.

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GJ said 4 days later

I'm going to make you watch Kingdom of Spiders....see how much you like your spider army then. :)

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Abby said 5 days later

What the heck is that?

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GJ said 7 days later

Go to imdb.com and look up the movie. The main star is the dude you see in all those PriceLine.com commercials--you know, the fat obnoxious guy? It's a classic monster movie...and this one has hordes of spiders. After watching it, you probably won't like spiders much anymore. :)

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Abby said 7 days later

Yeah right.

Geoff said 2 minutes later

This posted twice as a result of me getting a "Rails Application Failed to Start properly." If someone could delete this post, that would be great. Also, why in the heck do I get this message, Marc? I get this from Baumblog often, and from our BushServer.net too!

Perhaps Rails isn't as good as we thought, at least not for reliability?

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Abby said about 1 hour later

I got that "Rails Application" message too-- twice today. Never seen it before, though.

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Marc said about 4 hours later

The reason we get the error is a result of Site5 not setting things up correctly. They have Rails set to restart every certain time frame, so you're probably catching it at that time.

I've never seen the message on BushServer.net and if you want an example of how reliable Rails is...look at GoSupport, that hasn't gone down since I deployed it.

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Geoff said about 11 hours later

True, but GoSupport doesn't quite run in the browser the same as regular websites. It may very well be getting that error, but Flash makes a call to the script every 5 seconds so you probably wouldn't know...perhaps that is why we have some totally random disconnects? I just know every rails app we've built, I've seen that error. I'll have to ask Nicoform is they see that message on the new server.

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GJ said about 12 hours later

Never saw any Rails error messages in my Java based web sites. Go figure. ;)

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GJ said about 12 hours later

harbor freight tools web sites appears to sell a lot of crappy tools. I'd stick to sears, home depot, and lowes myself.

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Geoff said about 20 hours later

As would I...I haven't had a problem with most of the tools from the big 3.

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Steve said 1 day later

As you said, Geoff, you get what you pay for. Consider anything you buy from Harbor Freight disposable.

I do shop Harbor Freight for certain things. Hand tools especially. You can't find wrenches and sockets any cheaper than what they sell. I haven't bought much in the line of power tools from them (I stick with Dewalt for my corded drill and my 1/2" drive battery powered impact wrench - all 300 ft-lbs of it!). Joe has bought tons of power tools there. For the most part, they have worked ok. I think he's had to return one or two things, but he's not had as much bad luck as you.

Both Joe and I consider Harbor Freight power tools "one project only" tools. We only expect them to live through one project. If you are looking to use a tool often, buy higher quality. They have a 7" tile saw that works very well, Joe and I used it to cut tiles for the backsplash in his kitchen, and that's after he used it for retiling the kitchen and dining room in his old house.

Anyway, sorry to hear you've had such bad luck.

I've joined Mom and Dad in their boycott of Sears. They have treated me rudely one too many times. Their tools aren't the highest quality either, particularly their power tools. You can buy better tools elsewhere. Also, don't forget about the internet when shopping for good power tools. I got my 1/2" drive impact from Amazon for $240. Cheapest you could find it in stores was over $300.

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GJ said 1 day later

Sears may treat you like crap (after all, they pay their people crap, so what do you expect), but there's one reason why I buy things there, especially lawn/garden equipment. No one else gives you part lists / diagrams, and an easy place to order them from. You're dead on about the hand tool quality, though--lifetime guarantee is useless when I have to replace them every 2-3 years, and I don't exactly use them all that often.

Speaking of buying crap from Sears, I bought a reel mower the other day from them. Doing my part for the environment (nah, it actually does a nicer job of cutting the lawn). Also takes a bit more time and a lot more calories. Method to my madness, eh?

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Geoff said 1 day later

See, that's weird. I've had good experience with Sears. Both people I've talked to about Miter Saws and Tables saws were quite knowledgeable and friendly (granted they were both 50+ years old). The miter saw I bought from sears has really done a great job, and I've used it a few times a week for the past year almost. I will say the laser in it is acting up a little, but it's an easy part to replace.

The quality may be better at Lowes and Home Depot...but the people aren't, at least not where I live. Lots of college kids or young folk who haven't a clue about how a tool REALLY works, but they can read the specs off the price tag for me. It's a hit or miss at those places. Sometimes you get knowledgeable people, many times you can't even find someone.

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GJ said 1 day later

After a while, you know who to look for in these stores. Geoff, you pegged it...males over 50 are almost always the knowledgeable type in any of these environments.

GJ said about 15 hours later

Duh--got the card in time, and keep forgetting to send it.