Paperhand 14th annual summer show kickstarter

The good people of Paperhand Puppet Intervention have launched their fundrasier via kickstarter for this summer's show.  Last year was the first year they raised funds with kickstarter, and it was a big success -- the show was fantastic.  This was the group that put on "Love and Robots" a few years back

They're looking for $8,000 and as of this writing they have raised almost $2,500, with two weeks left to go!   As is usual with kickstarter, you can get rewards depending on how much you pledge.  A $40 pledge gets you a ticket the the show, which was $20 last year if I remember correctly, so it's like contributing $20  to help support production, and preordering a ticket.

If you intend to see the show or are interested in attending, consider supporting Paperhand's summer show.

 

Share It Maybe

Much better than the original song (which a disturbingly large number of radio stations seem eternally tuned to):

^ "Please someone call the girl scout!"

Rascal, 1995-2013

Species: Felis catus

Color: Marmalade

Disctinctive features: a magnificent tail, "M" marking on forehead

Disposition: Mellow

Nicknames: El Senor don Gato, Macavity

 

Macavity's a Mystery Cat: he's called the Hidden Paw -

For he's the master criminal who can defy the Law.

He's the bafflement of Scotland Yard, the Flying Squad's despair:

For when they reach the scene of crime - Macavity's not there!

 

Macavity, Macavity, there's no one like Macavity,

He's broken every human law, he breaks the law of gravity.

His powers of levitation would make a fakir stare,

And when you reach the scene of crime - Macavity's not there!

You may seek him in the basement, you may look up in the air -

But I tell you once and once again, Macavity's not there!

Memories of Rascal:

 

• When we brought him home, he was small enough to fit in my shoe.
• He would follow us everywhere, even out to the school bus stop, and we worried he wouldn't be able to find his way back.
• My sister Amy was his special person, and when she lived at home he preferred to sleep on her bed.
• Once leaped on the back of a dog to "protect" my mother.  The dog was confused.
• In his youth, was a Mighty Hunter who brought back rabbits, birds, moles, dragons, etc. as gifts for us.
• Enjoyed getting stoned on catnip grown by dad in the front garden. He'd sit on top of it for hours and hours...
• Loved being picked up and held, and especially enjoyed being scratched under his chin.

I'll miss Rascal and his late brother, Smudge.  They were both loved very much.

My Top Free Android Apps, part 1

~I’ve had an Android smartphone for over a year, so here’s a quick list of my must-have Android apps.  All are free and available from the Google Play Store.  This list doesn’t include applications that are built into the operating system (such as Voice Command or Google Maps). 

These are presented in no particular order, so without further ado:

1. Dropbox by Dropbox, Inc.

Oh Dropbox, how do I love thee?  Let me count the ways!  This is a file-synchronization program that vastly simplifies the process of moving files between computers, including my phone.  After registering for a free account, on each computer Dropbox is installed on, it creates a special folder. Any items you place in the folder are automatically downloaded by the other computers you have Dropbox on, and if you delete something in the folder, it will be deleted on the other computers as well.

I found this program immensely useful at work for sharing documents among my colleagues, avoiding the tedious hassle of emailing large files back and forth.  I simply created a folder and electronically shared it with my colleagues, and we were all able to add and remove items in the folder. But what good is it with a phone?  Here’s how I have it set up: every picture I take with my phone is automatically uploaded to Dropbox, so when I turn on my PC at home, the files download in a few seconds and are now on the computer.  Handy!

You get 2 gigabytes of space for free after registering; if you need more space, you can refer other people to use the program, or pay for more.  2 GB is more than enough for my photo-sharing needs.

2. GPS Essentials by mictale.com

By itself, the GPS function on the phone can be used to locate your position on a map and can be used for navigation, but the free GPS Essentials vastly expands the capabilities of the phone’s GPS.  Among other things, it includes a digital compass and its own mapping program, but the most useful feature is “Tracks”.  When enabled, the Tracks function will take a GPS reading every so often, and when you’re done with your hike/bike ride/car trip, you can get all sorts of fun information about the trip such as distance traveled, duration, top and average speeds, altitude changes, and even a map showing the route you followed.

There’s also a waypoint function that allows you to enter coordinates, and the compass will guide you to them and display the waypoints on a map along with your current position and distance.  I’ve been using this lately for finding geocaches.  A good free app to pair with this is GPS Status, which displays your current coordinates and some other useful information.

3. Volume Sync by Jesta’s Funhouse

For a phone running on Android, there are actually two completely separate volume settings: the ringer volume, and the media volume. If you’re in a media application, adjusting the volume will adjust only the media volume, and if you’re not in an application, the volume keys only affect the ringer. This can get annoying when you want your phone to shut up completely. This application runs in the background, and whenever you mute the volume, regardless of which volume is muted, the other volume will automatically be muted as well. When you un-mute the current volume, the other volume setting will be restored back to whatever it was before.

4. Evernote by Evernote Corporation

After playing around with my phone for a bit, I was irritated to find that there was no simple note-taking program, unlike my previous “dumbphone”.  Fortunately, Evernote more than fills the gap.  It’s basically Dropbox for notes, synchronizing notes across multiple devices that have Evernote installed and linked to the same account.  So any notes I take on my phone are automatically synchronized with Evernote on my home computer, and vice versa.

 

5. Unlock At Home Using Wifi by Khroma Labs

My phone contains a lot of personal information (email, phone contacts, etc.), so I have it locked with a passcode that I need to enter every time I turn the screen on, unless I’m receiving a call.  This can get tedious when I’m at home, which is where this app comes in.  When you’re connected to a WiFi network and open the app, you can designate one or more networks as “Whitelisted”; henceforth, when the phone is connected to those networks, the phone’s lock screen is disabled.  Once the phone looses contact with the network (i.e. when you leave home), the lock screen functionality is restored.

I’ve had occasional glitches and shutdowns of this app, but overall it’s very handy and has saved me hundreds of times from having to enter my passcode when I use the phone at home.

Come back later for more of my favorite free Android apps!

Meanwhile, in Russia…

~On the distant Kamchatka peninsula (an area the size of Germany), four volcanoes are currently erupting that happen to be near each other. Using a helicopter, a film crew captured an amazing flyby of the Tolbachik volcano.  But best of all, the video is fully panoramic: by clicking and dragging in the video, you can change the direction you’re viewing, and you can even scroll to zoom in and out! 

Give it a try here:  http://www.spiegel.de/static/360grad/kamtschatka/

Habitable Exoplanets

~The Kepler Space Observatory has had a very busy and exciting last couple of years.  By detecting the infinitesimal dimming of distant stars as objects cross in front of them from our perspective, it’s been able to locate thousands of potential planets orbiting other stars. 

Most of these planets are “Hot Jupiters” -- massive gas giants orbiting very close to their primary stars – presumably because with their rapid revolutions and large sizes, they’re the easiest to detect.  However, a number of these planetary candidates have been found in the fabled “goldilocks zone”: an area of the stellar system where liquid water can exist.  Even more exciting is that some of those planets are “Earth-like”.

Don’t get too excited: in this case “Earth-like” means that the planet is small and rocky, as opposed to large and gaseous.  Still, the prospect of liquid water on a planet in the habitable zone is both thrilling and tantalizing.  Here’s a handy chart of planetary candidates found by Kepler so far, sorted by sizes and distances (that is, distances from the star they orbit):

For a more complete breakdown of the potentially-habitable planets, check out the website of the Planetary Habitability Laboratory at the University of Puerto Rico at Arecibo (yes, that Arecibo).  Although you can find an explanation for what the data in each column means by looking at the bottom of this page, the key measurement is the last one: the ESI, or Earth Similarity Index, which combines and weighs all the numbers to estimate how similar the planet is to Earth. 

Look how many there are over 0.90 (90%)…how exciting!  Hopefully the James Webb Space Telescope and other future space observatories will be able to discover more about them.

Bane Outtakes

~The first of the latest Batman film trilogy, Batman Begins, is one of my favorite movies.  The second film (The Dark Knight) is, as the title suggests, much darker, but Heath Ledger gave a fantastic performance as the Joker.  But I don’t much care for the final film in series, The Dark Knight Rises.  It was enough to make me wish I was watching the old Adam West Batman series from the 1960s.

Fortunately, The Dark Knight Rises can be vastly improved by substituting some of the dialogue of Bane (the main villain) with this dialogue created by youtube user Auralnauts:

^ “Not sure about the lettuce…I would have gone with the mixed greeeens.”

Here are the full lyrics to Bane’s (apparently undefeated) freestyle rap:

I'm Bane, yes, that's my name.
When you hear the name Bane, I guarantee the pain.
I'm coming after you, Bruce Wayne.
I'm stronger, smarter, and clinically insane.

I'm Bane, yes, that's my name.
Bruce Wayne and the Batman are totally the same.
I broke his back mortal comBAT smack,
then I cracked my '28 Krug champagne.

I'm Bane, yes, it's a shame.
I declare martial law, and you all complain!
I laugh when you ask why I wear the mask.
I'll explain. It's because.....

I'm Bane, yes, that's my name.
You say it too much, the name becomes inane.
Of course! Some think my plan lacks gain.
If you say it too my face, I'll crash your plane.