Levitating Water

Check this out:



Not only is this awesome looking, but it looks like a totally do-able DIY project. If it is as simple as is explained, all it would take is a strobe light and one of those little fountain pumps.

Infusion

I finally found something interesting and worth posting - The Edible Martini.

In case you don't watch the video first, it's about a technique for rapid pickling in which a slice of cucumber is infused with a gin martini. The result is a translucent, crispy slice of cucumber that apparently tastes like a martini.

There are a couple things about this that interest me. First, the use of a vacuum machine to do the infusing/pickling. My brother and I have talked about making our own vacuum machine to do some vacuforming. So seeing another use for a vacuum machine is very amusing. Second, I recently experimented with making my own blackberry infused vodka. The experiment turned out mostly unsuccessful, but after doing a little more research and getting some advice, I think I can manage a much more pleasing vodka infusion in the near future. I had never thought of leaving the alcohol in the veggie or fruit, so this could possibly open up a whole new world of experimentation (if/when we ever get around to building ourselves a vacuum machine). Maybe a bloody mary tomatoe if that's possible. . . 

Absenteeism

So I haven't posted anything since June. When I started this thing, I didn't really commit myself to doing much with it, and I didn't think I cared whether or not anybody followed it.

Well, I'm still not committing myself to doing much with the blog, but apparently I do care about who reads it. I'm not sure why, but I got a little bit upset when I found out that no one I know seems to care much about my blog. It's not that I don't understand why they don't care, but I guess a part of me felt like they SHOULD care just because it's something I'm interested in. Anyway, I'm going to get over it. My original purpose for starting this blog was to keep a record of the things I find interesting and, because I'm not a very good communicator, to help my friends and family get to know me a little better. Regardless of who and/or how many people decide to watch, the purpose can and will be the same.

So, to be continued. . . (Hopefully with more fun and less emo.)

Ukulele

My latest thing I'd like to learn but probably never will is the ukulele.

I've been interested in the ukulele since age 12 or 13, when I saw a movie or interview or something with Steve Martin playing one. But I've had a renewed interest after deciding that I want to learn something musical, and too many people I know play the guitar so I'd like to learn something different.

My desire to learn was heightened after I bought the new Panic at the Disco album, Pretty. Odd., and heard the song I Have Friends in Holy Places. With this heightened interest I took to the interwebs to find some more ukulele songs. Here are a couple that really stood out:

Jake Shimabukuro - While My Guitar Gently Weeps

via videosift.com


James Hill plays Super Mario

The Phaaantom of the Op-er-a is here, in Sacramento!

I just want you to know that I really amuse myself with these titles. I wonder how much of a bother it would be to have it play music when you mouse over them. . .

Anyway, as the title so clearly states, The Phantom of the Opera is now showing in Sacramento. It will be in town from May 21 to June 14, 2008. Apparently this is VERY exciting news. -= For tickets and information, click here. =-

My wife and I were invited to go see it with a pretty large group of friends back in November and our show date was this last Saturday. Of course we saw it, and I must say I was very. . .

Bored. Darci really enjoyed it, but it just wasn't my thing. I like the music for the most part, but I was forced to listen to it so much growing up that it's just not very impressive anymore. The costumes and "special effects" were good, but nothing more than I expected. The scenery was very nice though. But I just really don't like the story. I would be a lot more interested in seeing it with the Phantom, instead of Christine, as the focus. I think the play makes him seem too much like a creepy, voyeuristic, old man and it makes it hard to for me to feel for him. I know there is a lot more to his character. Let's get a bit more of his history in there.

Anyway, here's how I would place all of the stage plays I've ever seen, starting with my favorite:
1. Disney On Broadway's 'The Lion King'
2. Disney's Aladdin - A Musical Spectacular
3. The Phantom of the Opera

Animated Header

Yesterday I spent most of the afternoon illustrating a custom header for this blog. I used Adobe Illustrator to draw the radio tower and Photoshop for everything else. Today, I've spent a couple hours learning how to make animated .gifs and then animating the header. I felt that the concept works well for what the image portrays, but it's a bit too busy. I have it set to loop only 10 times so if you missed the animation just refresh your browser. (Check out the poll on the right to let me know what you think of the animated version. - POLL CLOSED)

UPDATE - Dec 17, 2008: For everyone coming here to find my animated header, I'm sorry but it just didn't work out. It looks like blogger does not allow or cannot function with an animated header.

FLASH! Ah Ahhh!

#1: So Larissa Kelly didn't move on Wednesday night. She just didn't have a very good game and then lost most of her money on an $8000 Double Jeopardy! question. She ended her game with $1800 and last to a guy named Pat Roche. Oh well, it was fun to watch and at least she went out with a bang.

#2: FLASH GAMES!
I occasionally find some really fun and cool flash games, but can never find them again after the first few days. I thought this blog would be a good place for links to those games so I would stop losing them. So here are a few games that I really enjoy and hopefully you will too.

Arachnophilia - This is a game that's a little bit educational (click Facts in the Help box), but mostly lots of fun. Play as a web-slinging spider. . . That's it, you're just a spider. No skin tight, brightly colored, spandex costume and definitely no upside-down kissing. Just spin a web and eat what you catch. Not only is the game fun and addictive, but the audio creates a great atmosphere. The music and background noise is very simple and relaxing. If you want to get a really high score, you will also have to employ quite a bit of strategy. If you are having trouble, just read through the comments section on the page. My only real complaint is that I don't think there's a pause button.
8.5/10


Platform Racing 2 - A fun, running game. Get power-ups, dodge mines, customize and upgrade your character. Play as a guest and your experience points accrue as long as you stay in the session, or create an account and come back to your character as often as you like. There appear to be only 9 levels in the "Campaign" (which you will play over and over and over and over. . .), but you can also build your own levels and try out other people's creations by navigating the tabs at the top of the game window. There is a lot of game to be played here. On the downside, as I mentioned, it's very repetitive. Also, there are a large number of people who will forfeit a race if they are obviously not going to win. On the upside though you still get the experience points for winning against them as long as you finish the level yourself.
7.5/10


Ikariam - This one is not actually a flash game. You start with a tiny city, with the goal to grow and expand. It's not going to be fun for most people, I'm sure as it is extremely slow (it can take days for a particular action to finish) and pretty difficult. But you only have to give the game a few minutes of attention per day, and that's a big plus for me. It's still in Beta and there are rules that you will only know about if you check out the Rules forum post. Also, it's originally a German game and quite a bit of text has not yet been translated to English, so you may have to refer to a Babelfish every now and again.
7/10

Who Is Larissa Kelly?

My brothers and I have been fans of Jeopardy! since we were quite young. After getting a DVR from Comcast (I might talk about that more in a later post), I have not missed an episode. Most of the reason I watch is to play the game with my brothers, so we/I typically don't watch everyday. A lot of the time, a week or two will pile up on the DVR and we'll watch two or three games a night.

Of course our favorites to watch are the tournaments, especially the teen and college tournaments, since they are usually easier and we can get quite a few correct answers. I was left a bit disappointed after the most recent College tournament, though, as the questions seemed harder and there weren't really any standout players. In fact most of this season's questions seem a bit harder than in the past. That being said, I haven't really been looking forward to Jeopardy! That is until last week.

On Tuesday, May 20, 2008 Larissa Kelly defeated one day champion Mary Kay Schmidt with a final score of $45,200. While that number is impressive, what is more impressive is how she got there - a $7000 Double Jeopardy! wager followed by an $8000 Double Jeopardy! wager. Now I'm not easily excited, but that nearly did it for me. I hate the typical small, strategic wagers you see from most contestants. I say, if you get on Jeopardy, go for the glory! And that is what she has done for a total so far of 6 wins and $222,597.

With a record like that, one might wonder if she could beat Ken Jennings' record of 74 wins. I didn't watch much of Jennings' games as I did not have a DVR then, so I can't make my own comparison between her game and his. Earlier today, I set out to find a good comparison and found a great one here at andysthoughts.com.

In his blog post leading up to the chart, Andy considers the possibility of Kelly beating Jennings, but goes on to say, "I don’t think that’s going to happen. In fact, I don’t even think that she will pass David Madden’s total of 19 games." You can read his reasonings here.

While he presents some strong arguments, I don't like to agree with his conclusion. As I've already stated, I don't like strategic wagering. It's just not exciting. Unfortunately, what he says makes sense and in all likelihood, she will be finished soon enough. I hope she can go on to dominate with her big wagers, but only time will tell. In fact tonight's episode will air in about an hour so I'll be able to see if she makes it very any farther soon.

Another great Jeopardy site I found today is j-archive.com. It is a fan operated site that has all the questions and answers and results for a great many of the episodes.

New Blog.

Welcome to my blog, Faintly Glimmering Radio Station. I realize it's a bit of a strange name; it comes from a Cake song called Frank Sinatra -- here's a sample of the song. Anyway, I really liked the song in high school (and still do), and before the whole blog thing even got started I was working for my dad doing the company website and had my personal page on Tripod (that I never did anything with) with the same name I'm using here. I will probably never do anything with this one either, but we'll see. Whatever I end up posting, I hope you enjoy it.