Electricity Generation

I want to start off a thread of blogging here on the subject of electricity: on generation, use, storage, transportation, etc. I would like to build a set of posts and links on these topics, and I will use what people send me. I hope that my coblogger, who is interested in this same subject, will also join in with what he knows.
To kick this off, I would like to talk about cars: electrical cars to be precise. To make electrical cars useful, there are, I believe, three things needed: lots of cheap power readily available, a motor that is powerful as necessary for the job (while also being as efficient as possible), and a better battery capable of driving that motor for many miles. What developments exist on these fronts?

Firefox and Tablets.

Ok. I have a tablet computer. A toshiba m400. It is a nice computer, and it has a tablet mode. I use firefox (firefox 3.0.1 I believe), and I want it easy to use in tablet mode. So here is what I did.
Set icons to be small.
Add a number of icons to to the upper bar.

From left to right. Top: NextPlease! buttons, Firebug, ScribeFire, Stealther, history, downloads, extensions, Open closed tab, new tab, new window, close tab. Bottom: search, adblockplus, read it later.

This gives an overall effect like this:

Useful for tablets

A nice day.

Finally, the storms have gone. They lasted from about 15:00 yesterday to about 11:00 today. I’ve been working on one of the jigsaw puzzles that my great-grandmother bought many years ago. I’m going to run today, which is good.
I installed FireGPG earlier so that I can have more secure emails if I need them. I use gmail, because I figure, email is insecure as it is, so why get stressed out if just one more group is looking at my boring emails? So there.

Storms = Exercise FAIL.

Yeah. Summer is either too hot, or storming. Gar. Second day in a row without getting to run.

Not running today.

My knee started hurting last night, so I’m not going to run today. I’ll do pushups and crunches before bed tonight instead. To admit the truth, I just can’t get motivated to run today. Oh well.

Screenshot of KDE 4.1

Like I promised:

A screenshot of my KDE 4.1 desktop

The view is of the plasma desktop shell. You can see the panel on the bottom, with plasmoids, and you can see several plasmoids on the desktop area, including the folder view plasmoids, which are awesome. Apparently, there will be a release of this for both Windows and Mac. If you want more details, ask.

Nutcases out there.

Ok. Here is a slightly amusing article that (not seriously) presents the argument that Obama is too young to be president (through a “loose” or “evolving” interpretation of the constitution, haha). Read the whole thing, it is a subtle humor. Then, if you dare, look at the comments. It seems that most commenters did not finish the article before moving straight into dashing off their fulminating vitriol. The rest seemed not to get the joke about “evolving interpretations” of the constitution.
I guess the moral is, if you are going to be funny on the internet, do it quickly. Or prepare for a swarm of nutcases.

Workout, Books, etc.

Ok, post-weekend etc. update.

The only day I did not run since last Wednesday was Sunday. The soreness has subsided, which is good, because I can run harder.

I’ve been rereading Cryptonomicon. My grandparents are going to get me some new books (thank you grandparents) including some books on Ruby.

I’ve begun using the prerelease version of KDE 4.1. It is really awesome. Maybe I’ll do some screenshots this week.

I helped install a sundial here yesterday. My grandfather designed it, we went out and purchased stone that was then cut to hold the metal pieces following the design, and then my dad and I cut a flat area into the side of the hill (dig a shallow hole, move dirt so that it is generally level, fill with pea gravel, level gravel that sundial will go on, put sundial on top, level it, align it. Not easy).

I bought some new boots over the weekend. They are black and steel toed. They go up higher on the leg than my old boots. They are awesome.

There you go.

Economics and Ethics

Here, read this, and attempt to understand the true nature of our economy, our market, before calling for regulation. Everything that we see in American business is the result of government distortion. The structure and operation of a corporation are restricted and shaped by the tangles of federal and state corporate laws. The boom/bust cycle of the dollar is the result of socialized central banking. The problems everyone complains about are what we get for allowing a group of people to commit massive violations of the basic ethic of the non-aggression principle. Read this writing on the non-aggression principle. Not only are the current regulations unethical, they also cause most of the problems of our economy. This is no free market. Unfortunately, we seem bent on learning that “Middle-of-the-Road Policy Leads to Socialism” the hard way.

Working out again.

Yesterday, I did my first run. Yes, I probably should have started a month before, but whatever. I’ve figured out a loop that is about 1 mile here, and I ran 3 of those yesterday. My plan is to run 3 loops again today and tomorrow, do a speed workout and then a jog over the weekend, and go up to 4 loops throughout next week. If I can keep moving up 1 loop every week, I am doing well. Hopefully, by September, I will be in good enough shape to have a good final Kent cross country season.

Update:
Storm clouds are moving in, and I don’t know when they’ll get here. This could be either good (rain comes in, cools things, and leaves quickly so that I can go run) or bad (thunderstorms that last for a while, meaning I won’t be able to run before dinner).

Update 2:
Yes, I got my running in. Good. I suspect that the loop I described may in fact be quite a bit longer than 1 mile. Also, I am thinking about posting something about my working out every day, just to keep myself dedicated. Not that anyone really cares about me working out. My coblogger may have some more interesting things to say on the subject of exercise, though…