Saturday, August 29, 2009
Thursday, August 27, 2009
NYT - UR DOINIT RITE!
Even though four or five years ago, Mary-Kate and Ashley were the biggest names in tween clothing, thanks to a deal with Wal-Mart, today they’re practically aesthetes.
Ha! This isn't about Mary-Kate & Ashley ... This is about the last word in the paragraph, "aesthetes". More specifically this is about my not knowing exactly what that word meant. (I did recognize the root structure, aesthetic. I may be a bumpkin but...) So, I did what I always do when faced with my own ignorance... I swiped the word and was about to do a Search Google for "aesthetes" when a little question mark appeared automagically. When I clicked on it I was taken... HERE
Now I am a bit of a bumpkin (albeit a bit erudite at times) but I find some of the NYT writers use vocabulary that broaches on pretentious. O'course that there's pro'ly just 'cause I'm from Kin-tuck an' they'all don' talk like that in these parts. T'any rate, havin' that there auto-magic question mark appear just when I was gonna Google that there word - shoot-fire, New York Times, yer doin' it right. (Even iffen y'are one of them east-coast-intellectual-liberal-newspapers. Dang!)Dictionary
aes·thete or es·thete (ĕs'thēt)
n.
- One who cultivates an unusually high sensitivity to beauty, as in art or nature.
- One whose pursuit and admiration of beauty is regarded as excessive or affected.
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Health Care Reform: The Flowchart - Sent using Google Toolbar
[Hat tip to Sister Beth, who doesn't blog, yet!]Only $2.2 million
Second Degree Murder and Six Other Crimes Cheaper than Pirating Music - Piracy - Gizmodo
Second Degree Murder and Six Other Crimes Cheaper than Pirating Music
• Child abduction: Fine of $25,000 and up to three years in prison, which can be accounted as $50,233 per year (that was the median household income in 2007, probably down because of the economic crisis). Total: $175,699.
• Steal the CDs: A total of $275,000, $52,500 fine for the CDs.
• Steal a lawnmower from your neighbour: A total of $375,000.
• Burn someone's house while playing The Doors: Another $375,000.
• Stalk a Gizmodo editor (yes, you know who you are): A Class 4 felony that will result in just $175,000.
• Start a dogfighting ring: $50,000.
• Murder someone on the second degree, a Class 1 felony: $778,495, which accounts for a $25,000 fine and four to 15 years in prison.
Heck, you can do all these crimes, and the total amount will be only $2.2 million. Of course, you can't really quantify years spent in prison using dollars, but I don't care. The case of Jammie—and many like hers—is still absolutely outrageous.
Monday, August 24, 2009
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Booting and rebooting
Got to the office at 07:30 this morning... Yeah, Sunday morning...
There is a certain quiet at that hour of the morning. Not a real audible quiet but rather a people-less-ness. The reduced number of people, even in a 24x7 facility, means that technologically speaking the network is as quiet as it will ever be. Which makes it the best time to do maintenance on the Servers. So for two luxurious hours I got to take my time and reboot Servers. As with any system and particularly with Microsoft Servers rebooting them is a near-mystical exercise. It is somewhat akin to killing a living a fragile, helpless entity and thenSaturday, August 22, 2009
Fueling the future...
PR-CANADA.net - Aurora Biofuels Breakthrough Doubles CO2 Uptake and Fuel Production
| Aurora Biofuels Breakthrough Doubles CO2 Uptake and Fuel Production | | | |
| Posted by marin2008 |
| Thursday, 20 August 2009 |
| Today, Aurora Biofuels announces a technological milestone in the company's path to becoming the premier producer of low-cost advanced biofuels. Through a series of biotechnology achievements, Aurora has succeeded in optimizing its base algae strains to more than double CO2 consumption and fuel production, and has proven these results in an outdoor open system over the last several months. Using tools developed in the fields of molecular biology and biochemistry, Aurora Biofuels scientists have developed a proprietary process which allows for the superior selection and breeding of non-transgenic algae. With this novel technique, the company has optimized its base algae strains with an increased ability to process sunlight and carbon dioxide into algal oil. As a result, these algae strains can produce more than twice the amount of oil. Optimized algae have been producing oil in Aurora Biofuels' outdoor pilot ponds for several months, providing strong evidence that these strains will remain robust at the industrial scale and remove more carbon emissions than previously thought possible. |
The grass thus far is not proving to be greener...
The grass thus far is not proving to be greener, but I can sleep with my truth in the weeds.
Friday, August 21, 2009
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Captain Beefheart and His Magic Band
Captain Beefheart and His Magic BandIf Charlie Parker Was a Gunslinger,There'd Be a Whole Lot of Dead Copycats: They Were Collaborators #589
Winter smoke...
“Winter smoke is blue and bitter:
women comfort you in winter.
Scent of thyme is cool and tender:
girls are music to remember.
Men are made of rock and thunder:
threat of storm to labor under.
Cypress woods are demon-dark:
boys are fox-teeth in your heart.”
— Tennessee Williams
The Business of Health Care (a compound fractured fairy tale)
Having been closely associated with the health care industry, albeit many years ago, I feel that I can speak to the Business of Medicine. The majority of our difficulties with the current health care system stem from a central point of failure: the extremely high cost of medical education. Put in the simplest terms a fledgling physician, encumbered with many hundreds of thousands (perhaps millions) of dollars of debt, must earn hundreds of thousands of dollars just to break even. This is the beginning of the slippery slope.
For the sake of discussion lets say that Josephine-the-Doctor hangs her shingle and begins her practice. On the very first day, in addition to repaying her student loans, Dr. Jo has to have resourced an office (exam tables and a few bandaids), employed one or two Nurses and/or Physician Assistants, and a Business Manager (who does the HUGE paper choked billing procedure). This Business Manager, being an adept Accountant, will quickly determine how many patients Dr. Jo will have to see, at "regular rates" in order to just keep the doors open (and the pay checks flowing). This explains why a patient gets only 10-15 minutes with a Physician at any give appointment. In addition to the base costs of opening her practice Dr. Jo and all of her staff have to carry Insurance. We can be well assured that this is not PL/PD with a 500.00 dollar deductible. While this is a necessary business expense it is the foundation for a social or cultural problem with our health care system. We will hear more as Dr. Jo's story unfolds. Being the good Doctor Josephine's popularity increases and so does her patient load. In our simple story the Business Manager's answer is to simply multiply everything by 2 and divide Doctor's time with each patient in half. Kindly Dr. Jo gets to see twice as many patients but also incurs twice the cost. This goes along fine until Dr. Jo puts her foot down and says she has to have a life outside her practice. The Business Manager ponders the situation for a fraction of a second and says, "Ok, we'll be more selective about who we accept as patients and we will charge higher fees. That way you will make the same amount of money and have more time for your family." Dr. Jo immediately notices that she is seeing fewer Medicaid/Medicare patients. Dr. Jo's newest patient, Bill, is an ideal candidate according to the Business Manager. Bill's Health Insurance is first rate. The Business Manager says, "We must see that Bill gets the best Health Care possible." It turns out that this is office code for 'perform every service allowable under Bill's Health Plan'. While Dr. Jo only gets to see Bill for the allotted 12.5 minutes her staff, at the direction of the Business Manager, makes sure that Bill is scheduled for all of the "proper" diagnostic exams and evaluations, on a regular basis. Bill doesn't realize the cost of his health care because his "Insurance" dutifully pays to the plans limits and schedules. Only the Business Manager knows that real costs. Then one day, out of the blue, Bill drops dead. The Coroner determines that Bill died of a rare but treatable condition. Upon hearing this Mrs. Bill calls her neighbor Larry-the-Lawyer. Tearfully she poses the question, "If Bill had such a great health care plan and was scheduled for all of those exams and evaluations on a regular basis then how come Dr. Jo missed this treatable condition?" Larry-the-Lawyer consoles the widow Mrs. Bill and assures her that he will look into the matter. This is where Dr. Jo's very expensive insurance re-enters our little story. Dr. Josephine is an upright, caring, feeling, conscientious practitioner of the Medical Arts. Unfortunately she and many other Doctors are subject to the forces of an economy which cares more about budgets and costs than it does about care.
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