Rabies and Bats

A public service announcement:
Some people that know me know how I feel about bats and rabies.
I heard a piece on NPR's This American Life show which told the story of a woman who was attacked by a rabid raccoon. In it, he mentioned the fact that bats can carry rabies and that if you sleep in the same room with a bat, you need to consult a doctor about getting a rabies shot. One thing I did not know is that you don't even have that long to get a rabies shot, only seventy-two hours. I did know that if you wait for rabies symptoms to occur, it's too late and you will likely die. The discussion of rabies in bats starts at 14:40. The discussion of the rabid raccoon starts at 6:10.
If you use iTunes, this is a link that will allow you to subscribe to the This American Life podcast.
If you just want to download the episode as an MP3 file, this is a link.

My Foolishness on a Halloween Past

So, I don't usually blog about personal stuff, but I figure that since this incident happened eleven years ago, it's ancient history.
The Halloween that I was in grade nine I went trick or treating with three of my friends from high school. We went around the neighbourhood and collected candy from the various different houses. One house had a box of candy out front that said "help yourself" Surprisingly, there was still candy left in this box, and we each took a snack bag of M & Ms. That's not the main part of the story.
After this, we continued to trick or treat in the neighbourhood until we eventually came to a house, knocked on a door and a man answered it. I do not think any of us knew him. He then told us that he had crystal figurines that he wanted to show us and that we should come in and look at them. Foolishly, the three of us went in. The crystal figurines were pretty neat, and he did have a lot of them. I don't remember that much of them because as soon as I went inside I realized that I probably should not be going inside. There were four of us and one of him, but he could have pulled a gun on us and held us for ransom if he had wanted to. Nothing happened, and perhaps this man just wanted to show us his crystal figurines.
Entering the house was probably an error in judgment on my part.

MySpace vs. Facebook

I've been using MySpace and Facebook for awhile now. As some people know, I have only been on MySpace for a little while.
I can say that, as of right now, I like Facebook much better. It doesn't have garish advertisements, and also works more reliably. I've had a number of instances where various parts of MySpace did not work properly. I also get spam on MySpace. The only thing I get on Facebook is requests to join groups, but these appear to be legitimate groups and not webcam groups. The webcam group emails are really annoying. Lately MySpace has been assassinating the accounts of people who have been sending out spam, so that's good.
The other thing that I don't like about Myspace is how people use it as a subsititute for email. It's hard for me to keep track of MySpace emails because they don't stare me in the face like emails do. Plus, I sometimes like to flag messages for follow-up, and Myspace doesn't let me do that.

Despite René's post...

(I obtained permission prior to posting this conversation)
A conversation that I just had with Thomas on AIM:
Me: just so you know, you're on rene's blog
Me: [Link to René's blog]
Thomas: haha.
Thomas: You don't call me Tom though.
Thomas: So tell her to give you a break.
Me: do you mind that i don't call you Tom?
Thomas: No.
Thomas: It would be weird if you did.

So there.

Finding contacts by phone number

One of the features that I liked on my Virgin Mobile phone was a feature that you could use to find a phone number's associated contact that you had called if you wondered why you spent half an hour on the phone with that number. My Verizon Wireless Nokia did not have that feature and I missed it. However, I just discovered that my new (Samsung) Verizon Wireless phone has it and thought I would post instructions on using it. These instructions should work on a lot of Verizon Wireless phones because Verizon uses the same operating system (if it can be called that) for a lot of its phones.
To do this:
From the main screen of your phone:

1. Type in phone number you are searching for.
2. Press the options soft-key.
3. Select search and press ok.
4. It will list the numbers that it found.
5. Press ok to view the contact information for the phone number.

You can also see all of your contacts in a given area code by typing in only the first three digits.

L.L. Bean in Hagerstown

I went to the L.L. Bean outlet in Hagerstown yesterday. It is hard to find clothes there that actually have the L.L. Bean logo on them. If I'm going to be buying clothes from L.L. Bean, I'd like to have my jacket/fleece/whatever actually have the logo on it, so that it is not some non-descript jacket. I did not buy anything because nearly nothing fit me, and as far as stuff that did, it did not have a logo on it.

I added (to the sidebar) a listing of blog posts that I think are interesting. I had done this before, but when I had to redo my template, I lost this. Now I have it set up again, though.

Puff the Magic Dragon and Pachelbel's Canon

Did you know what Puff the Magic Dragon (besides talking about marijuana) also is based on the same chord progression as Pachelbel's Canon? Neither did I. Up until I heard the story on NPR, I could not sing Pachelbel's Canon if you asked me too, even though I had heard it before (as you probably have too). It's neat how music is interconnected.

Googlers Use Flickr

I was surfing the Google Reader Blog today and discovered a picture of them launching the newest version of Google Reader. They used Flickr to post the picture. Flickr is a competitor to Picasa Web Albums. Flickr is much better than Picasa Web Albums, so I am glad to see that the Google Reader Team is willing to use a competitor's product. I also like how the phone has the Google primary colours on it.

More monarch butterflies

There was an article in Tuesday's Times about Monarch butterflies. They are pretty neat, because they migrate across the country, and are the only animal (other than humans) who can navigate by both longitude and latitude. Bees, incidentally, can navigate based on the sun, they do a dance when they return to the honeycomb to indicate where good flowers are. The butterflies are even neater, I think, because they are able to navigate across the country. If you move them (say, from Kansas to Washington, DC), they are still able to reorient themselves and figure out where they are and fly off in the right direction.

Flying on Three of Four Engines Across the North Atlantic.

There was an article in the Wall Street Journal two Fridays ago about a British Airways Boeing 747 plane that, after departing Los Angeles, had a flame shoot out of one of its four engines. The engine then stopped working. I am not an airplane pilot, but I think this is a Bad Thing. If I were the pilot, I would have turned around and returned to Los Angeles. Instead, the pilot decided (after consulting with British Airways) to continue on, across the continental US, and then onward across the North Atlantic to Heathrow. Apparently British Airways did not want to dump fuel in order to land the plane safely in Los Angeles. There was also some concern that they would have to compensate passengers for failing to get them to their destination on time. I think that they should have landed in Los Angeles. So did the air traffic controllers, they said: ""If you would have saw what we saw out the window, you'd be amazed at that."
The passengers were delayed anyway when the plane had to land in Manchester instead of Heathrow because the crew did not know how to manage the fuel so that it was spread evenly across the aircraft. The Wall Street Journal charges to access its archives, the BBC does not, so I am posting a link to a BBC article which summarizes it.
It was not just as safe to continue on three engines, because if a second engine on the same wing failed, the plane would still be able to fly, but would have to use its rudder to steer. A rudder creates drag, and the plane might not have been able to reach an airport safely if an engine had failed while they were over the middle of the North Atlantic. It also has to fly lower if it has fewer engines, and so cannot cruise as efficiently because the air is denser. In any case, here is a link to the report, published by the United Kingdom's Department for Transport, Air Accidents Investigation Branch. There is a brief one page summary, and if you would like to read the whole thing in all its detail, there is a PDF of it which you can download from that page as well.

A New Driver License

New York State sent me a new driver's license the other day (even though my old one is still valid). They are changing their driver licenses to make them more secure. These new licenses have a wavy line that goes across the whole license that appears to float above the picture. If you are under twenty-five, they are mailing you new driver licenses even if your old one has not expired yet. I guess they want to make it more difficult for people who are underage to get alcohol. I actually like the new one better. The old ones had pink as their predominant colour. If you're curious, you can see the old ones and the new ones here. The old one is at the bottom of the page in the fan of licenses. And speaking of old licenses, this new license still has my picture from my sixteenth birthday on it, so don't worry if you are worried you won't be able to see that picture again.

India Bans Rickshaws, London Licences Them

I was listening to the BBC last night and heard a piece about how New Delhi is banning rickshaws from certain areas because they slow down the traffic. The people who use these rickshaws for their livelihood are (justifiably) upset. On the other hand, London is licencing rickshaws. This link has information for it. I wonder if they will make the pedicab drivers take the Knowledge.

Some Free British Folk Music

I found a website (owned by an artist) that has some free music by him on it. It's British folk music from the 1960s, but the quality is decent. The link is:
http://www.andyirvine.com/disc/sweeney-disc.html

I think the song is older than the 1960s. I suggest Raynard Fox and Sally Brown if you're going to download either of them.

Fresh bagels at Weiss Market

So, unlike Giant, Weiss in Chambersburg says that their bagels are baked fresh in the store. That makes it pretty clear that they are not frozen bagels.

I'm going to post about the Facebook controversy. I think it is a bit creepy to have all of this information so readily available. Before, it is true, as this Facebook blog entry points out, that all of this information is visible to a person viewing the profile of the person that it is reporting. The big difference, though, is that now the user does not have to make any effort, the information is sitting there in front of him or her. It makes it a bit too easy to find out information about people, in my opinion.

A trip to Ikea

My new apartment does not have overhead lighting. So, yesterday I went to Ikea and picked up two Basisks for it. I got a floor uplight and a table lamp. The only problem with them is that they have glass shades, which will make them difficult to transport if I move. Otherwise, they are very nice.
The only thing I don't like about Ikea is that sometimes they only stock things for a little while. For example, I have a case that I use for my CDs called a Brana, but they don't make it anymore. It's a fabric case that is rigide which opens so you can use it to hold CDs but also zippers for easy transport (like if I move)
I really like Ikea, because many of their items are priced cheaply. I also enjoy assembling the products I get from them.

It's that time of year again...

It's the Jewish holidays again, and that means that, as far as Giant is concerned, everything that is Jewish is on sale. Matzah? On sale. Gefilte fish? On sale. I don't eat matzah for Rosh Hashana, and you're not supposed to eat anything on Yom Kippur. Both matzah and gefilte fish are for Passover.
I do like that they have Kedem chocolate tea crackers on sale though...they're good, and low in calories, sixteen calories each.
I'd by matzah ball soup mix (it's on sale too), but I have about five boxes of it in my cabinet right now, so I don't think I need any right now.

Monarch Butterflies

Another picture of a Monarch Butterfly
Originally uploaded by djboorstein.

This summer I've seen a lot of monarch butterflies, including this one in a garden outside the Assemblee Nationale in Quebec City. I looked, and according to this website, http://www.monarchwatch.org/index.html , this has been a big year for monarch butterflies. This has more information than you would probably ever want to see about Monarch butteflies.

PMBR Found Liable for Copyright Infringement

Disclaimer
This post has something to do with the bar exam.

PMBR was sued in the Eastern District Court of Philadelphia for copyright infringement. The judge (in a non-jury trial) found them liable for copyright infringement.
http://www.paed.uscourts.gov/documents/opinions/06D1065P.pdf
The judge says that: "This is the rare case in which there is direct evidence that [PMBR] copied [the National Conference of Bar Examiners]'s work.
And no, I am not so geeky as to surf around the Eastern District Court's website looking for opinions. I saw an AP posting on the New York Times's website, found the opinion online, and then decided to blog about it. The opinion is actually interesting reading, although it does contain at least one multiple choice question, so for people who want to avoid flashbacks to the bar exam, this might not be a good thing to read.