I’ve just spent the last half hour or so laughing my ass off and playing everything from Galaga, Asteroids, BurgerTime, Elevator Action, Joust, Missile Command and, of course, Pac Man. Some of these games may be harder (or easier) than many of us Gen Xers remember but most are every bit as fun.
95 Old School Games You Can Play Online
It’s the first few hot days of summer arrived early this week and I’m loving it. I really needed the sun and some nice sittin-outside kind of weather.
Someone else who likes this time of year is obviously Gus, an English bulldog who just got a new pool of his very own:
Enjoy the sunshine!
I occasionally browse through my playlists of 80s hard rock and this particular song is one of those that I still love cranking up. Despite a number of great hits from that era, I feel this is the one WASP track that will continue to stand the test of time.
Turn it up loud for another great entry in the Jukebox!
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From Oak Ridge Associated Universities: “This was the most elaborate Atomic Energy educational set ever produced, but it was only only available from 1951 to 1952. Its relatively high price for the time ($50.00) and its sophistication were the explanation Gilbert gave for the set’s short lifespan. Today, it is so highly prized by collectors that a complete set can go for more than 100 times the original price.
The set came with four types of uranium ore, a beta-alpha source (Pb-210), a pure beta source (Ru-106), a gamma source (Zn-65?), a spinthariscope, a cloud chamber with its own short-lived alpha source (Po-210), an electroscope, a geiger counter, a manual, a comic book and a government manual ‘Prospecting for Uranium.’”
Gilbert U-238 Atomic Energy Lab [via Boing Boing]
Here are five 30-second “character profiles” from the upcoming move X-Men Origins: Wolverine. They are quick jump-cut introductions to the main characters of the film – Wolverine (Hugh Jackman), Sabretooth (Liev Schreiber), Gambit (Taylor Kitsch), Wade Wilson (Ryan Reynolds), John Wraith (Will i Am).
X-Men Origins: Wolverine hits theatres May 1st, 2009.
“The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not.” – Thomas Jefferson
I haven’t devoted too much attention to the whole “tea party” movement going on right now in America. It always seemed cheesy and contrived, like too many of the gimmicks employed by the Right in recent years (“Joe the Plumber”, Freedom Fries, etc.). I’ve always been of a mind that you beat the other guy with ideas, not fads and forced pop-cultural memes.
But what do I know? Turns out they had an inspired event recently – the Alabama Tea Party at Veterans Park in Hoover, Ala. Stephen Gordon has a good article on the whole shebang. But what seems to be getting everyone’s attention is the following speech by Stacy McCain:
First Ion drives, now magnetic shielding? At this rate, I’ll have my Millenium Falcon before the end of the year.
Researchers from the U.K. and Portugal are developing a portable miniature magnetosphere to protect spaceships from high speed particles traveling through space, such as plasma from solar flares or cosmic rays. The Earth’s magnetosphere protects our planet from many of these particles, deflecting them harmlessly into space; a miniature magnetic field surrounding a spaceship could serve exactly the same purpose.
Researchers from the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, the Universities of York, Strathclyde in the U.K., and the Institutio Superior Technico in Portugal have created a simulated solar wind inside their laboratory and successfully deflected it around a central spot using magnetic fields. The result is a hole in the middle of the solar wind free of all harmful particles. They managed this small-scale test – creating a one meter area devoid of particles – using a plasma jet and a simple $20 magnet. The experiment was successful on the first attempt and the generated hole was observed to adjust itself based on the strength of the solar wind. Stronger winds resulted in a smaller but more intense magnetic field, resembling their behavior in the real magnetosphere.
While wholly successful, these tests are just the first step to creating a successful magnetic shield for a spaceship. It’s unclear whether it’s best to simply include a magnetic generator inside the spaceship or to use secondary ships accompanying primary (manned) spaceships to allow finer tuning of the field strength and direction. It may also be possible to cycle the magnetic generators on and off in order to conserve power on a long journey where power may be at a premium. The project head, Dr. Ruth Bamford of the Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, believes they are 15 to 20 years away from practical implementation of these magnetic shields.
In addition to protecting astronauts from long-term effects of exposure to these particles, a magnetic shield would also protect the spaceship itself. There has already been one documented case of a solar flare damaging the electronic systems on a spaceship (the Japanese Nozomi Mars mission in 2002); protection against such damage may be the difference between successful future missions and expensive failures.
TFOT has previously reported on innovative space technologies currently under development or in their testing stages. Among others, you can find articles on the VASIMR plasma rocket, which is being developed by Ad Astra Rocket Company, the NanoSail-D solar sail developed by NASA, and the Lemur robots that were designed to aid astronauts in spaceship and space station maintenance tasks.
You can read more about the magnetic shield in the Science & Technology Facilities Council (STFC) press release. You can also read the abstract of the paper written by Dr. Bamford and her colleagues here. The paper was published in the December 2008 issue of Plasma Physics and Controlled Fusion.
Image icon: Diagram showing the shielding effects of Earth’s magnetosphere (Credit: NASA)
I’m sure it’s happened to everyone: that moment when you hear a song in the context of a film or episode of a TV series and become consumed with finding a copy somehow. Sometimes there isn’t even an indication of who performed it and all you have to go on is a patch of lyrics in your head.
Thank God for the Internet at times like these, as I have found countless songs that stuck in my head — later to share them with you. A few months ago I heard this song and searched and searched until I could get a copy of the last single released by the late Warren Zevon.
Needless to say, it has a resonance…
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Sports is just one of the instruments used by disillusioned mothers to make their children feel special. Whether it’s giving everyone a trophy at the end of a winless season or even not keeping score during games, children today are being isolated from true competition. The Minnesapolis Star-Tribune asks an obvious question — are America’s children spoiled little punks? At least today we get the right answer.
Dr. Ernie Swihart, an author and behavioral pediatrician at South Lake Pediatrics in Minnetonka, decried the self-esteem movement from its inception. Then, as now, he believed kids should be taught to be inwardly focused, self-sufficient creatures able to shift their own gears.
Real self-esteem — for all of us — comes from overcoming an obstacle-laden challenge, he believes, with hard work. Lavishing praise, he contends, is counterproductive and, if anything, makes kids needy and voracious for that other self-esteem-movement buzzword: validation.
“It’s had serious repercussions,” Swihart said. “These young adults who were raised in the ’80s, now in their 20s and in the workplace — those who received praise, rewards and prizes for everything they did without working very hard — often are very entitled and self-absorbed.
Crybaby children produce crybaby adults? Who could have seen that coming? Aside from everyone not insulating their children’s lives. And I realize many parents don’t do that, and I salute them. Whenever I see a child getting spanked in a grocery store, I just turn around and politely applaud. Usually, they let me take a swing at the little brat, and who’s gonna turn that down?
