Thoughts in Veeberland

So we are now Day 3 into our trip.  I woke first again, but wasn’t really up to actually getting out of my sleeping bag.  It was a bit chilly last night and my bag was still nice and warm.  Sam eventually woke, and made his way outside and “encouraged” us to all get out of bed.  After we finally got up we started breakfast and we weren’t really up to anything particular.  I think that activities from the day before really wiped us out, but Sam was intent on doing something.  We headed out for a random drive on the western lobe of Mt. Desert Island.  We kindof didn’t get out until 1100.  We found the coastal seawall and enjoyed watching the waves run up the shore.  We then kept going south along 102 and after some looping found our way to the lighthouse .  It has some wonderful views down there, but it’s mostly private property (belonging to the commander of the Coast Guard or something like that.)  We kept circling around looking for stuff and ended up travelling through this small dirt road and found ourselves at Seal Cove Pond . read more »

[Originally posted August 18, 2006]

I think I woke up first this morning.  I ambled my way to the restroom to cleanup and lit the citronella candles on the way out.  As I come back to the tent the rest of the party is gently rising from the tent, hungry.  We broke out some eggs, bacon, sausage, onions, mushrroms, and peppers.  While we ate we decided that we wanted to go kayaking.  We called one place and they said they were all booked up.  Now here’s the thing, instead of hanging up, he asked us to hold and CALLED the other kayaking companies around the island and found us a slot for 7! read more »

[Originally posted August 17, 2006]

So we’re back in Maryland now.  It’s good to be home, back to civilization.   The trip overall was great.  Good to be away from TV and computers for awhile and spend time with family and friends.  I think I’ll break up my posts so that each covers a day.  Hopefully this gets me in the habit of posting every day or so.  read more »

[Originally posted February 10, 2006]

I’ve been reading the book Why Not? by Ian Ayres & Barry Nalebuff.  They brought up a really good idea, in light of all the scandals we’ve had recently in politics.  So the basic problem is that it costs a lot of money to run a campaign, especially for a federal office.  People who donate a lot of money tend to get favors.  We’ve seen this with the recent Duke Cunnigham and Tom Delay prosecutions.

My initial idea was to just limit all campaign financing to public funds.  So there’d be a fixed amount that each candidate is alloted and they could not spend more than that.  There are some concerns with limiting free speech.  Plus no one in goverment would vote for that proposal because of their self interest.  Well what if we instead require that all donations be anonymous.  The candidates would not be allowed to know who contributed money to their campaign.  If we have a central trust fund through which all donations must be processed then we could just earmark each donation for a candidate.  read more »

[Originally posted August 9, 2006]

I saw this recipe in Gourmet.  It’s really easy to make and multiplies really easily.  I usually use wingettes, but sometimes you can’t find this in the store.  If you can only get regular chicken wings, cut off the wing tip at the joint and discard.  Then cut the wing in half at the elbow.  Now you’ve got two nice little wingettes.

Gourmet lists this as an entree, but I always think of chicken wings as a side dish.  So if you want to serve it as a main it’ll probably make four servings instead. In terms of tasting the sesame seeds.  Toss them into a dry skillet over medium heat until the seeds get darker by a shade or two. read more »

[Originally posted September 9, 2005]

Here in Maryland we have had the right to a free credit report, once a year , for quite a while.  I’m having difficulty finding the actual statue, but I’ve taken advantage of it once before.  Companies like Experian have always made it very difficult to get that free report.  Their phone system never suggests where to get it from, or allow you to speak to someone about it.  I finally found someone who mentioned it on a forum to track down the website.  read more »

We decided to take a last minute trip to Split Rock Resort and Golf Course over the July 4th weekend.  We took Sarah’s parents with us and thought it would be a nice little weekend.  The resort is large and spread out.  We got there in time for the fireworks on Friday.  They have quite a bit to offer but things didn’t really turn out as nice as I would have liked.  The hotel/time share is a little run down, looks like it hasn’t been updated since the 80′s, with the big mirrors, patterned carpet, gold colored trim.  The bathroom tiles were marred, sort of what you would normally expect from an old hotel.  Connected to the facility is a recreation center, with indoor tennis courts, a bowling alley, arcade and even a movie theater.  The opposite end has an indoor water park and pool.  Outside the facility is a golf course, a private beach, more tennis courts …

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[Originally posted September 16, 2005]

Elliptic Curve Cryptography.  So I’m still writing the glossary to my term paper, but I just had to put this up.  ECC is making my head spin, since I haven’t done math in awhile.  But I ran across this really cool song created by Eric Hughes about the strength of encryption.  It is sung to the tune of Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious.  All the more power to you if you understand what they’re talking about.  Took me awhile…. read more »

[Originally posted June 2, 2006]

I can’t take credit for this recipe, but it really makes a great waffle.  Sarah loves waffles, and I wish I was energetic enough to make these on a regular basis.  The main problem I’ve found is having buttermilk on hand.  If you don’t use it right away you can freeze it in single use measurements.  It’s generally not a good idea to refreeze after a defrost because the milk tends to separate.  So if you tend to make a double recipe freeze 2 cups worth.  If you have time, give the buttermilk a good stir to try and homogenize it again. read more »

[Originally published July 11, 2006]

So we had an eventful July 4th.  We went up to NY to see my dad on Sunday and drove down to Philly to see Sarah’s parents on Monday.  We went shopping for supplies on the 4th, and on the way back got into a traffic accident.  I probably shouldn’t go into details since, as the TV cop says, “Anything you say, can and will be used against you in a court of law.”  Suffice it to say my right passenger door was smashed along with minor damage to the surrounding panels, trim, windows …  Good thing is no one was really hurt, some bumps, bruises, and minor cuts.   read more »