New Music: St. Paul and the Broken Bones

Good sound, but it's kind of unbelievable to watch.  Take a look at the links and see what I mean:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Paul_and_The_Broken_Bones

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Y_eiyO77b4

http://stpaulandthebrokenbones.com

https://www.facebook.com/St.PaulandTheBrokenBones

The singer... it's as if Al Green and Drew Carey had a a love child and gave it to John Belushi to raise.  Man, but he can sing!  Hmmm, think I'll pull their album off iTunes and go have a listen in the living room.

Rat Brain Minivan

Every couple of years it seems, some robotics researchers wire up one animal brain or another to a mechanical device: here a few neurons from a rat brain in a cart, there a monkey brain to a robot arm, here's another money-robot amalgam, the list goes on.

So I was driving back from Apalach last weekend, and was at a stoplight in what is more-or-less the automotive heart of Panama City, the junction of Hwy 98, Harrison Ave, and Hwy 231, which naturally has a railroad track running through the middle of it just for added hilarity.  (Tally-Ho Corner, if you're local.)  Naturally a text message came in, and I was about to reach for it (being stopped and all), but the light was getting ready to turn, so I only glanced in its direction then put my eyes back on the road.  As if on cue and right in front of me, a minivan came scampering up Harrison out of downtown, through the yellow-changing-red light, did a U-turn, and scampered back down the way from which it came.  "Scamper" is the exact word for what that van was doing because it had a comical wobbling motion to it the entire way through this maneuver, almost exactly like that rat brain-controled robot cart in the first video.  To the best of my knowledge, nothing was hit by this careening collection of four wheels of trouble, but when it started going the other way I got out of the area fast.

I know, long story.  But it was both funny and slightly alarming to watch.  Can't be too careful on the road out there, folks

Great News: More Beer, Less Cancer!

As seen in this video article over at Fox.  It turns out, marinating meat in beer – the darker, the better – before grilling it dramatically reduces formation of several cancer-causing compounds.  At least, according to this one study.  That's some all-round good news to start a Monday.

Insert your own beer-and-meat joke, I'm worn out from the weekend.  Oddly, I don't have an appropriate tag for this post.

An All-Robot Band: I suppose it had to eventually happen.

Here's the article over at NPR.  I suspect we'll be seeing more and more of this in coming years.

Opening of The Shop

Just a picture dump.  If you know the place, it'll mean something.  If you don't, it won't matter.  Enjoy!

Good sangria, but the crowd didn't get too rowdy.

Full house!

Cool shelf that I had to get.  Too bad it won't fit in the back of the Mustang, guess I'll have to make the next trip in the F150.

Still a little more work to do on the backside of the building, however.  Stay tuned!

Another Beautiful, Shiny Object

1973 Mach 1 convertible, 351 Cleveland (carb and any upgrades unknown), auto, fully restored, $21k.

Here are the specs for that year.  H or Q model (177 & 266 hp, respectively), or something upgraded since then?  Dunno.  But it is a very beautiful car either way.  It's on display at the Ford dealership here in town, if you just have to.

And if Pirate Shortwave Isn't Strange Enough...

... then take a listen to this zoo of Shortwave Oddities.  Spy stations, various radars, jammers, etc. – all mysterious signals of largely unknown origin.

What a wonderfully weird world we live in.