Chuck Wendig want to know your NaNoWriMo experience, and has a line up of useful "25 Things" posts.
The windcatchers of Persia. Both and interesting survey of functional architecture and some good world building details. Before modern heating and air-conditioning buildings needed to be positioned correctly and build in such a manner as to allow cooling or heating as necessary. At this time, in our "advanced" civilization, it is becoming a lost art. Although with the advent of "green technology" some of these are making a come back. So expect to see some of these in the southwest and they join other architectural details such as light wells, south facing windows with tile flooring, interior water features and gardens, verandas and court yards. Also I expect to see these coupled with modern technology such as solar water heaters, mini turbines and solar cells. (Grokked from Jay Lake)
Because it's that time of year, Faith Hunter giver her top 10 way to know if your girlfriend is a vampire. 'Cause, you know, you never know. I mean, everybody keeps secrets, like if they put the cap back on the toothpaste or stack bodies in the back closet like a wolf spider. And it's only after you move in you find out all those little idiosynchronicities. (Grokked from Tor.com)
Space-X launches Falcon 9 sending Dragon capsule to deliver supplies to the ISS. Go, Dragon capsule, go. Gee, I wonder if those Tea Partiers for Commercial Space Flight are either celebrating their victory or are now just saying, "Oh, never mind." Although I guess the launch wasn't completely without mishap. (Grokked from Tobias Buckell)
In other aerospace related new, Air Force Project 1794. The flying saucer, if you like, designed for the US Air Force in 1950, which later became the research behind the Avrocar. It'll be interesting to see what all is in the "box" these images came from, like if they ever made it to the prototype stage. Just keep in mind that lots of things were proposed back then, and even now, which never had a chance of ever working or getting beyond the drawing stage. (Pointed to by Dan)
There has been much hype and rending of garments over last week's jobs report. First off, if you're listening to Jack Welch on any advice, you're fucking stupid. Welch took GE, a powerhouse of an organization, and gutted that company until they don't even make their own consumer lightbulbs anymore. They only thing that made him look good was the performance of GE Capital during the 90's and early 2000's. A time where everybody in the lending business made money no matter how badly they screwed the pooch. Anyone who says these stats were "cooked" is an idiot who doesn't understand how things are done. These are people who, if in power, would cook the books themselves if they could (and hey, Jack did for a few years, causing GE to "restate" many years of performance). If anybody attempted to force the BLM to move the numbers in any direction, you would know by the number of people in that office who would be applying for early retirement or just leaving. Because the people who work in government, the career employees, have more integrity than many of these pundits have in their whole extended families.
"Providing birth control to women at no cost substantially reduced unplanned pregnancies and cut abortion rates by 62 percent to 78 percent over the national rate, a new study shows." This comes as no surprise to those who live in the reality based world. And this one of the reasons why Right to Life is demonstratively not an anti-abortion organization. If they were, they would support sex education and access to birth control. Instead, they have platforms and a doctrinal position in direct opposition to the very things that reduce the need for abortions. Also, this isn't the first study to show this correlation. And now you know the reason why providing access to birth control as a part of the ACA is both 1) a Good Idea™ and 2) so controversial. (Grokked from Jay Lake)
"That’s why fellow Republican, fellow Mormon, John Huntsman called Romney 'a perfectly lubricated weathervane on the important issues of the day.'" I guess Mitt Romney is now saying that he was lying when he made the comments about 47% of lazy slackers who are going to vote for Obama because of the free food cards. If I had gone to that $50,000 a plate dinner, I'd be asking for my money back. However, and I can't stress this enough, those people at the dinner live in a world that it is perfectly acceptable to lie to the rest of us as long as you "keep them in confidence." That is, they don't care that Romney is saying he lied to them, because they know Romney is lying to the rest of us now. (Grokked from Jay Lake)
Paul Ryan comes out with his own statements on the "maker" and "taker" philosophy. Although his number is higher at 60%. Considering the Romney/Ryan ticket is polling at 47%, that means he is dismissing 7% of his supporters at the very least. But then, math and science are not conservative values.
Tweet of my heart: @Pres_Bartlet: TLC was founded in 1972 by NASA and the Health Department as an educational channel. It was privatized. Now it shows Honey Boo Boo.
Alligator Quotient: Can't get a rise out of them today.
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