Game: July 2009

Friday, July 31, 2009

Week 12: Pageant of the Transmundane

A man was arrested this week after assaulting another player during a Monopoly game. As someone who has played that game, I think the man has a rock solid defense... I mean, Monopoly would make a game between Martin Luther King, Ghandi and the Dalai Lama break out into fisticuffs and rowdyism.

Anyway, this week's winning entry comes to us from a blog that as of late, has really been throwing the heat.

I am of course talking about Funktards.

And if you've seen some of the other things that have won from that site, you know that the winning entry is going to be weird, and this one lives up to that standard.

You see, someone got it into the mind to superimpose Hank Hill's head on a picture. A SFW picture mind you... and it became creepy. Creepy is underselling it really. Stuff of some wicked television inspired nightmare. Yeah, I think that conveys the horror that particular picture elicits.

I know that I'll never be able to watch King of the Hill the same way again.

And since this week's winning entry has to do with King of the Hill, well, it seemed fitting that I have an image with the Simpson and the Hill families hanging out. I wanted to get a shot of Hank Hill sitting in the stands of a football game in Springfield, but Homer wasn't in the shot for any of those frames, so this is the next best thing.

And here is your badge Dalton and Duke.

And since this is Funktards third Transmundanity Award in less than a year, they have also won the Transmundanity Triple Crown. Congrats.

The rules of this little contest: Every week I will be selecting one blog post that I have seen from the vast reaches of the blogosphere to bestow with the Homer Simpson Transmundanity Award for being one of the freakiest(in a funny way) things I've seen or read during a 7 day period. It doesn't necessarily have to have been written during the week, I just had to have encountered it. That means that if you find something interesting and repost it like a movie or whatever, if I saw it at your blog first, you get the prize. Of course, creating your own content is also a very good way to win.

Now, if you see a post that you think is worthy of this illustrious prize, just drop me a line at campybeaver@gmail.com and we'll see if we can't get your suggestion up and award-ready while giving you some credit and a link to your own blog.

Thursday, July 30, 2009

NBC/House Creator Hellbent on Bringing Remake to TV

NBC and House creator David Shore want to redo the television classic The Rockford Files.

Now, if you've ever read my blog, you know how I feel about remakes, so you can probably guess what my reaction to this news is.

I mean, yes House is basically a police procedural with a medical setting featuring an eccentric genius lead detective and his subordinates (with a police captain that doesn't like how his team breaks the rules, despite the results), so in theory, redoing a show centered on a private detective ex-con often working at odds against the police might work. Again, in theory.

In practice, I don't think it will. James Garner made that role and he brought a lot of the same qualities to it that made Maverick such a success, and it is one of the centerpieces of 1970's television for me.

And you would have thought that NBC would have learned their lesson from the disastrous reboots of The Bionic Woman and Knight Rider, and ABC's failed attempt at bring back Dragnet.

Yes, Battlestar Galactica was a huge success. But that was like discovering gold on your property after all the oil has run dry... how often does the same property yield treasure twice.

I am not adverse to a new series being put on the air about a private investigator with a criminal past... I just don't like the idea of such a series trading on the cache of The Rockford Files. I guess I am weird like that.

The Cooling

4 PM Update...the Hoquiam-Seattle pressure difference is now 3.8 mb. A strong onshore push is thus guaranteed. Put up your wind chimes. It is coming. If anyone is planning on hitting the water...particularly in sail boats...please be prepared and careful. The winds will pick up later and get quite gusty.

We had a minor intrusion of cooler air at low levels last night into the interior, but this thin veneer is rapidly getting mixing out...so temperatures will surge now back into the 90s...sorry. The coast is much cooler (60s). There should be a modest onshore push of marine air tonight...watch the difference in pressure between Hoquiam and Seattle...when it gets above 3-3.5 mb you know it is coming. The thermal trough should jump into eastern Washington with the push and temps tomorrow should only get into the mid to upper 80s. Hard to believe that 80s seem cool.

Wednesday, July 29, 2009

Update III (Updated 10:45 PM)

The 5 pm observations are in. Sea Tac got to 103F. Thunderstorms have developed and the clouds are spreading over the crests and foothills...beautiful anvils from space (see image). And low clouds have spread to the coast.

Temperature Readings

Several of you have been sharing temperature readings, which I and others really appreciate! But keep in mind the following:

(1) Bank thermometers are notoriously inaccurate. (I will refrain from generalizing this to the reliability of banks in general)

(2) Temperatures measured in cars driving over asphalt during the day are often too high and not representative of the true air temperatures. Air temperature should be measured in the shade over a vegetated surface. Roads can heat up to 120-140F and thus can inflate car temperature readings. So drive your car over grass or vegetated surfaces if you want a dependable reading.

That said, there have been a number of reports of western WA temps over 110F. Here is a report from Mark Albright, research scientist at the UW:

The highest temperatures in western Washington today (29 Jul 2009) seemed to be between Portland and Olympia. Check out this map for 2009073000 UTC:

http://www.atmos.washington.edu/marka/sfcplot.hot.gif

High temperatures reported today: Chehalis MS (CHHLS) reported 111F, Winlock (WINLK) 110F, and the Chehalis RAWS site reported 2 hours at 114 F (someone should check this thermometer for accuracy before we believe this one):

UPDATE II: The Record is Broken!

It happened...Sea Tac is now 101 and STILL CLIMBING. Everett is an amazing 98 and Renton 102. And this is not over yet. We will not only break the record but smash it. Locations near the foothills are reaching 104- 106. This is an extraordinary event. Many stations will break their all-time record temperatures today and even more their daily values. Ballads will be written about the heat experienced today.

Convection is forming over the mountains. Today I noticed altocumulus castellanus...midlevel convection... on this side of the Cascades. The focus of the convection may shift our way.... In fact, looking at the radar and satellite imagery...it already has.

I went outside before...when I walked over asphalt or concrete my face felt on fire from the combination of high air temperature plus radiation emitting from the surface. Some students in my dept measured the surface ground temps with an infrared thermometer...they found 120-150F in some locations.

And did I mention that tomorrow will be almost as hot in the interior? Low clouds are pushing to the coast now...so go there if you want relief.

For those interested, I will be talking on the Weather Channel late this afternoon about the situation at 5:40 PM

Midweek Video: I Kissed a Girl (weird cover)

I am not a fan of Katy Perry's I Kissed a Girl... but because I've had a pretty strong love affair with cover versions, I thought, there must be another perspective on the song... you know, like a guy playing the song and keeping it lyrically intact while bringing new meaning to it... like a gay man who is struggling with heterosexual feelings.

Well, Fran Healy from Travis got exactly what I was thinking. I was hoping for maybe Harvey Fierstein, but what are you going to do.

And I must say, without all those crappy touches from circa 1992, it actually sounds like a decent song. Not a great song, but a decent one now.

Update

I don't know if I have ever seen temperatures rise this fast around here before. We had very warm air aloft and a very shallow inversion above the surface. This inversion was rapidly mixed out by surface heating and the easterlies aloft...thus, the rapid temp rise. Some of the warmest temps are in the foothills (e.g., North Bend) due to the downslope flow off the Cascades. In fact, with offshore flow the foothills can be the warmest locations in the whole region. The north Sound is much warmer today (now 93 in Everett)

Probcast (www.probcast.com) is back up....the power outage on campus is over. I bet it was heat related (it was a transformer failure)

Sea-Tac actually went down last hour (93 to 90), as weak northwesterlies reached the airport. If the temps continued to rise at the rate they were going we would have been 120F today. So the pause is expected...don't worry, it will start up again next hour.

One Record Down, One to Go?

Looking at the hourly data at Sea-Tac Airport, it appears that we have broken the record for highest minimum temperature in Seattle history. It was 69F and so far today the airport has only dropped to 71F, and it has subsequently rise...so that is probably it. This is a major record to break. At 9 AM Sea-Tac is 88F, 10F ahead of yesterday (due to the downslope flow). We are probably going to break the all-time record high--will be hard to stop it now.

Now, what about the high temperature record--of 100F. Yesterday probcast was giving the most probable maximum for the airport of 101F (by the way, so many of you have hit the site that it appears to be unavailable now--there is a major power failure on campus, probably heat related, and the building with the computer server is affected). If we do this, it will be close.

The sand point profiler and surface observations indicates that temps are warmer the lowest thousand feet or so, but slightly cooler air has moved in aloft (see figure, time in UTC, 2912 is 5 AM, heights on left in meters, red lines are temps in C). This air is associated with southeasterly flow that has developed aloft. This was forecast yesterday--high pressure building in east of the mountains has reversed the east-west pressure gradient, producing offshore and downslope flow. Downslope flow produces compressional warming and works against the cooling northerlies that often develop in the afternoon over the central Sound. But cooler air aloft obviously works against it. The models and probcast suggest the balance will be towards warming today. Below is the latest night's high resolution (4-km, WRF model) run for this afternoon at 5 PM, showing temperatures at 2 meters (surface temps). Note the zone of above 100F than includes Sea-Tac.
The Willamette Valley is much hotter--several locations will get to 105F. Their lack of proximity to water makes that area an oven in these situations and they are often 5-15F warmer than the Puget Sound region.

Anyway, more later...this is going to be close.

Tuesday, July 28, 2009

A License to make me laugh

I've been meaning to write about this for a few days now, and I just couldn't figure out the best time to do it, and I just decided to hunker down and do it today.

I ran across a funny little ad at a site called fixR.com, which is in the business of getting people with home improvement needs together with people who do that kind of work. It is all very Web 2.0.

It is a rather unusual client looking for some Home Security renovations done.

A certain British secret agent with a not so secret name or number.

I am of course talking about James Bond, 007... (the man of 6 faces so far).

I love finding stuff like this! It feels almost like finding an easter egg.

Google Apps + OpenID = identity hub for SaaS

We're happy to announce that the Google OpenID Federated Login API has been extended to Google Apps accounts used by businesses, schools, and other organizations. Individuals in these organizations can now sign in to third party websites using their Google Apps account, without sharing their credentials with third parties.

In addition, Google Apps can now become an identity hub for multiple SaaS providers, simplifying identity management for organizations. For example, when integrated with partner solutions such as PingConnect from Ping Identity, the Google Open ID Federated Login API enables a single Google Apps login to help provide secure access to services like Salesforce.com, SuccessFactors, and WebEX — as well as B2B partners, internal applications, and of course consumer web sites. See Ping Identity's post to learn more about their implementation and view the demo.

Another early adopter is Manymoon.com, a SaaS project management vendor that implemented the Google Open ID Federated Login API directly to make it easier for any organization using Google Apps to sign up for and deploy Manymoon to their users:

In the Manymoon Login page, the user chooses to log in using a Google Apps account

The user types in his Google Apps email address. The user never gives away his Google Apps Account password to Manymoon.

The user is redirected to the Google Apps domain to approve sharing information with Manymoon.

Once approved, the user is redirected to Manymoon and is signed in and ready to work with selected accounts.

If you prefer an out-of-the-box solution, we have been working with JanRain, a provider of OpenID solutions that already supports the new API as part of their RPX product.

Supporting the API for Google Apps accounts is exciting news for the OpenID community, as it adds numerous new Identity Provider (IDP) domains and increases the OpenID end user base by millions. In order to allow websites to easily become Relying Parties for these many new IDPs and users, we defined a new discovery protocol. The protocol is designed to allow Relying Parties to identify that a given domain is hosted on Google Apps and to help provide secure access its OpenID Provider End Point. The current proposal is an interim solution, and we are participating in several standardization organizations, such as OASIS and the OpenID Foundation, to generate a next-generation standard. Since the current protocol proposal is not supported by the standard OpenID libraries, we provided an implementation of the Relying Party pieces at the Open Source project, step2.googlecode.com. Google is also offering a set of resources addressing the issues of designing a scalable Federated Login User Interface. You are welcome to visit the User Experience summary for Federated Login Google Sites page, where you can find links to demos, mocks, and usability research data.

You can find more details in our API and Discovery documentation, or join the discussions in the Google Federated Login API Group, where you can ask any question and get answers from other Identity Providers, Relying Parties and Google engineers.

The OpenID Federated Login Service is available for all Google Apps editions. However, it is disabled by default for the Premier and Education editions, and it requires the domain administrator to manually enable it from the Control Panel. We've enabled the service for our employees here at Google, and domain administrators — you can also enable it for your domain.

By Yariv Adan, Google Security Team

Heat Update

What is happening now is really amazing. The atmosphere above us has warmed substantially during the past 24-h. Seattle is 5F warmer than it was a day ago and the air aloft (measured by the Sand Point profiler) is about 6F warmer. The minimum temperatures this morning are considerable warmer this morning compared to yesterday morning. Clearly, today will be substantially warmer and SEA-TAC will get close to 100F today. Some warmer Puget Sound locations will get to the century mark. And remember, the Willamette Valley got to 100F yesterday...although they have done that many times (they don't have the cooling influence of the water that the Puget Sound region enjoys. My book has a section on the heat of the Willamette Valley and the major temp records around here)

We way well break another major record....the high low temperature record...which until now has been 69F. Will know in a few hours whether that record is gone.

Probcast is still going for over 100F tomorrow...and Thursday as well.

One unusual aspect of this heat wave...and something that has made it feel much worse....is the humidity. Dewpoints are very high for around here...generally in the 60sF and in some places close to 70F. Feels like an east coast summer. Dewpoint is a good measure of the amount of moisture in the air (much better than relative humidity which varies during the day as temperature changes). More moisture in the air makes us feel warmer by lessening our ability to evaporate water from our skin (sweat) and the moisture partially blocks the infrared radiation leaving the surface....thereby keeping the temperatures up.

Anyway, this is a very serious weather event, and the National Weather Service has upped their predictions to the century mark. People don't think about heat waves in the same vain as storms, but heat kills more people around the world. So drink lots of liquids and check on the elderly, who are particularly vulnerable. Another risk is for kids in sports camps, where heat prostration can strike even the young. I am going to bike to work as usual, but will go early and my route is in the trees.

Monday, July 27, 2009

My Enemies List: Addendum One

When I originally put together my enemies list, I also said that I would be adding entries to it as I went along and thought of new people and groups that have raised my ire. I will admit that when I do an addendum, the entries are going to be longer... so you have a heads up about that.

Collectors: Now, I am not talking about people who merely buy lots of related things because they enjoy having them. No, I am talking about the people who collect things as some warped form of investment. And because they consider their hobby one which has financial motivations, they set an artificially high price for whatever they own. I am sure a lot of you out there have been in a situation where you wanted to watch, read or play something and the only people who have that item want an unrealistic amount of money for it... a price that is so far out of whack from either its original value or the value such an item would dictate on the open market. Now there are some that would argue that the laws of supply and demand dictate those prices, but that is not true. What has happened is there are some people who have set a high price, and someone made a choice to buy it at that price, and others seeing that it can be sold for that get all nutty and set their prices that high too. And when you see prices that high, when you are trying to buy the item in auction, well, even if you pay more than it was worth otherwise, you still aren't paying that premium price that everyone seems to want. I'll give you an example from my own life. I bought a copy of Ico for the PS2 at a Blockbuster late last year for 10 dollars because I wanted to play it. But after I bought it, I tried and did not like Shadow of the Colossus, which was made by the same team, so I listed it at a game trading website. Someone offered me a sealed game and 50 dollars for said item (the sealed game, if you went by Amazon.com's marketplace was worth 77 dollars... but if you bought it at the manufacturer that same day, it was 30). I then decided to look up Ico (which sold 250K units in the United States/Canada, so it isn't even super rare) at the Amazon marketplace, and there are people who are trying to get over 100 dollars for it. And one person in particular wants 194 dollars for it. I will say that again. One hundred and ninety four dollars. It makes me question the sanity of the world really. Though I am guilty by association because someone offered me a deal which was insane, and I took it, so I am complicit with this, but honestly, I think someone would have to be pretty low to demand 194 dollars for something which at best should be 50... at best.

The Entertainment News Media: Yes I have problems with most of the news outlets, but there are things that I need to say another day about them. So, I thought it would be better to start with something which is near and dear to my heart. Do you remember when you would turn on Entertainment Tonight and they would be talking about an upcoming movie, television show or musician about to go on world tour? I do. Oh, the 1980's, how I hate your fashions and hairdos, but I did appreciate what you were bringing to the party in terms of coverage. And I realize that a lot of the things I want from the entertainment news media are now online, but there was something almost heartwarming about tuning into a show just to see some exclusive scenes from a hotly anticipated film. Now, what are we left with? A lot of celebrity gossip about breakups, drug abuse and weight gain and loss. Or we get TMZ which is basically a half-hour of people with a camera harassing celebrities on the street, at the airport and in front of clubs with various snide comments from the team in the office. These two versions of entertainment reporting almost work as a microcosm of the news media in general, but that would be letting the latter off the hook too easily. There used to be a time when there was an unwritten rule that the private lives of celebrities were pretty much off limits for the legitimate entertainment press. I sort of wish we would go back to that standard, because my needs as a pop culture junkie are really not being served by what passes as coverage these days.

There is more to come... there will always be more to come.

Major Heat Wave and Possible Record

Today is running 7F ahead of yesterday, which got to 89F. It is clear that temps will get into the lower to mid 90s around the region today. Our most skillful tool for predicting temps...probcast..is now forecasting 102 for sea tac on Wed...this would be the all time record for any date in any year. Above is the probcast forecast for the max temps on Wednesday (you can see it yourself at www.probcast.com. The purple colors indicate where temps should be higher than 97F). Amazingly, this heat wave could last into the weekend (although the temps should modify a bit on Friday into Sunday, but still in the 80s). And remember, it will be hotter in Portland and the Willamette Valley, where temperatures well into the 100s will occur.

The heat wave is made worse by the high dewpoints today. Many locations are in the sixties, some in the upper 60s and near 70F. Dewpoint is a measure of the absolute amount of moisture in the air..we are usually in the lower 50s in the summer. High dewpoints keep nighttime temperatures up--which makes a heat wave much worse.

In short, we are about to enter an historic heat wave for our region. One day, your grandchildren will ask you... did you really experience the temperatures of July 29th, 2009? What was it like? How did you survive it?

Sunday, July 26, 2009

Sunday Video: Pass the Mic, Tom

I didn't set out to find another Beastie Boys mashup, but dammit, it seems like everything they get mashed up into is just sweet.

In this case, it is Tom Sawyer by Rush.

And while I am writing about the Beastie Boys, I hope Adam Yauch has successful treatment for and a speedy recovery from his recent diagnosis of cancer.

Thunderstorms and the Upcoming Major Heat Wave

Last night there was some thunderstorms and rain from the central Sound northward associated with an upper level low/trough over the region (see upper level chart and radar image above and below). The action was greater to the north, particularly over southern British Columbia. Air rotates counterclockwise around lows and convection forming to the northeast rotated into BC and northern western Washington. But there wasn't enough rain to make a difference. As the trough/low moves out it sets the stage for the big action this week--a major, multi-day heat wave (my book has several sections on thermal troughs and their importance if you are interested). As I will describe below, we could have several days in the 90s and some locations in the south Sound could hit 100F.

Heat waves actually are the most dangerous weather phenomenon around the world...many more people die from them then hurricanes, tornadoes, and windstorms. And the elderly are the most vulnerable...particularly those without air conditioning (which includes most people in our region). So if you know some older folks in a hot apartment or house...it will be good to check on them. Long heat waves like this week allow time for buildings to heat up...which makes it all worse. But we have an advantage over most regions...our water stays cool and going to the shore of Puget Sound, the Strait or the Pacific brings cooler temps. And we don't have the high humidities like the eastern U.S. so sweating works well. And the dry air allows temperatures to cool at night. Another good reason to live in the NW!

Today (Sunday) will see temperatures getting into the upper 80s F for most of western Washington away from the water. During the week an upper level ridge will build over the region and high pressure will be strongest to the east. This will bring warm air aloft AND offshore (easterly) flow.....much more easterly flow than we have seen the past several weeks. This configuration brings downslope warming on the western slopes of the Cascades as air is compressed. With warm temperatures a thermal trough will build northward into western Washington...this is the pattern that gives us the highest temps. (see graphic for pressure prediction for Wednesday)

Looking at the latest computer models, it appears that we will warm progressively into mid-week and Wednesday or Thursday will be the warmest. High 80s today, lower 90s tomorrow, mid nineties on Tuesday, and upper 90s on Wednesday and Thursday--with some locations even higher each day (central and southern Sound on the east side). We could easily have five 90+ days in row--if we do so, we will tie the record for consecutive days above 90F in the Seattle record. If we beat 90F today, we could establish the record this week. (I am NOT hoping for this, I have to sleep at night too).

To get you "warmed up" for this event, I have placed below the computer forecasts for 5 PM on Wednesday and Thursday. The lightest colors are temps of 96-100F!

The surface is extraordinarily dry. I did not talk about the other issue...wildfires....but this is the kind of situation that can produce big fires west of the Cascades. People forget that the west can get huge fires...hopefully not this time. And there is one more threat in this purgatory of heat...high ozone values. Sustained warm temps in the 90s can produce very high ozone values...particularly on the lower slopes of the Cascades, which the nitrogen oxides of the city mix with the volatile organics emitted by vegetation (terpenes). Enumclaw and Pack Forest are often the worst spots.

The bottom line of all this is this is a very serious, and perhaps historic, heat wave.

Finally, let me note I will be speaking in Leavenworth on Friday evening if anyone is interested...see info on the side panel.

Friday, July 24, 2009

Week 11: Pageant of the Transmundane

This week in weird now, a guide dog who went blind received a new lease on life by getting its own seeing-eye dog. So wait, the owner now has to feed two dogs instead of one. And how to you get a guide dog to effectively use another guide dog. It is all so strange and oddly wonderful, like something out of a Disney cartoon.

Anyway, this week's winning entry comes to us from
Hey Okay and the entry in question displays an image of a rather strange set of diagrams on an Outback Steakhouse whiteboard. I didn't know that was on the menu, but I am sure Fat Bastard would be pleased and be a daily partaker in meals like that.

And because this week's winning entry has to do with a Steakhouse, well, an image of Homer looking down upon a huge steak was the order of the day. Unfortunately, the places where I find images like this were unable to provide me with a good quality shot of this activity (I knew the episode I wanted and everything... Maximum Homerdrive), I had to go with a much smaller substitute. My apologies to anyone who was expecting something grand.

Congrats Curtis. Here is your badge.

Dealing with tough stuff

This is one of those posts that might conform more to the traditional weblog version of blogs (that is, a personal account or journal) than something that might suit general consumption. As I am want to write here all about difficult parenting issues (well, at least those that are fit to print), I didn't want to shy away in this post even though the subject matter is difficult. As hinted at last year, my wife's mother, my children's Grandmother Helena has been ill for sometime. She was diagnosed some time ago with breast cancer and years of treatment did not turn it around. She passed away last week.

As you can imagine, our children were prepared for this as it was some time coming. Throughout the whole process our philosophy was to set out the truth and the probabilities of recovery as we knew them throughout. Last year, it was apparent that that probability had fallen to zero. The children knew it and they knew it during the several visits to their grandmother after that. They were able and free to talk openly about it all with all and sundry and this, we think, ultimately helped them understand and work through it all.

Two bits of background. Helena was relatively young (61) but also lived in another city, Sydney. So she wasn't a part of day-to-day lives but there were regular visits. It took her a few years to work out how to be a grandmother but when she did a solid relationship, particularly with our eldest, was built up. She taught her to play chess and to knit. When she visited, she shrewdly brought enough cheap toys so there were presents each day. The relationship was cherished and we knew that her passing would be mourned.

To a great extent the mourning began a year ago when the visits stopped and the illness took over. She was no longer the same person. But my daughter still worked towards the days of old. She took over the role of knitting her niece and nephew scarves and she built a chess set for her grandmother. I was proud of the way she tried to make the best of all of this.

Inevitably, philosophical issues took hold. I recognise that for many our approach would not be their way but we were strictly of the "when you are dead you are dead" variety. And, again, by way of information, the children did not appear distressed at that notion. A pet had died before and somehow the thought of finality was consistent with their view of the world. As of today, they do not expect to see their grandmother again.

Similarly, we did not shield the two eldest from the funeral and ceremonies. My 8 year old son joined me as a pall-bearer and both of them took their place in shovelling dirt into the grave. To them, there was intense curiosity at the whole process, in particular, at the open grief from adults especially, Helena's husband and also both of her parents who outlived her.

Perhaps the major issue with something like this is that there is a need for parenting resources and attention at precisely a time when those are in scarce supply. The children's mother was understandably occupied, and away during the final weeks, and I could have used her in discussions with the children. But we had had time and so the issues that needed to be sorted out were given time (especially with the help of the whole Michael Jackson thing that provided a warm up. That said, during the precise moment I was need most immediately I was out of the country, a calculated risk at the time, and had to rush -- only took 20 hours! -- back after just one day abroad.

Helena died of breast cancer; a disease both her mother and grandmother had. You won't be surprised when I tell you that the first time I heard about it my immediate thoughts were for the my three women and girls in the direct genetic line of fire of this. But there are actually four sisters and so currently seven in total who face the high probability of this occurring during their lives. And what is more, it is of a currently unknown gene. Diligence in early detection is our treatment now but hopefully for my children, the progress of science might yield something more comforting.

To complete the story, my wife gave an outstanding eulogy for her mother. It was perhaps the best speech I had ever heard at a funeral and prior to the fact I didn't know she had it in her. I was both amazed and proud to hear it and it moved so many of the 150 people there. Perfection.

She wrote the speech out and I'm going to post it now (with permission) to complete the log of these events. Two of the children were long asleep when it was given but I hope one day they will read it and see it for what it is. It says so much about the strength of their own mother.

In celebration of our mother’s life, I’d like to talk about what Mum left behind. There is a huge Mum-shaped hole in our lives. And I think a huge Helena-shaped hole in all our lives.
I’m going to talk about three things: our memories of Mum, the values she left us with and finally the people she left behind.
We remember our mother as a wonderful and unique person. She was caring and patient when we were young and provided us with a good model for us with our children. She always wanted to hear the truth and always valued and respected our opinions. She didn’t always listen to our opinion, but she wanted to know what it was.
She wanted what was best for her children and when we were growing up there was never a dull moment. We never quite knew what was going to happen next.
I shall remember Mum every day as I read to my children, as I hear her voice in my own and see her hand when I look at mine. Those hands taught us how to tie our shoelaces and how to win at chess in three moves.
She did not suffer fools, a trait which she shared with us. Which brings me to the values she gave to us.
The strongest value she gave to us was the importance of family. She was the most doting and beloved grandmother imaginable.
She taught us the value of independence and this is an aspect that we all hold very dear.
She had a high regard for intellect, which we are passing on to our children.
Although I’m sure she did not intend it, she taught us the very importance of integrity.
Finally the people she left behind:
It’s very difficult to know how to thank the person who gave you life. Because as my 8 year-old son tells me: “there is nothing I like more than my life”. Well, actually there IS something I love more than my life and that is his life and that of his sisters. My mother gave to me the things I love and cherish most. She gave me my sisters and she by extension gave me my children. And for that I’m eternally grateful.

Harry Potter's Uneasy Relationship with Academia

Last weekend marked the launch of the 6th in the now 8 part movie saga that is Harry Potter. As is surely apparent by now, the movies sit not as a substitute for the books but a complement to them. They succeed where they can visualise magic that cannot be done in words -- the creatures, the castle and a large part of the action. But they fail where the books have their most significant: in the complex characters and the deeper moral issues.

But in Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince one of those deeper but unstated moral issues arose neatly and somewhat humorously in the movie: the role of academia. It came in the form of Professor Slughorn, a marvelously imagined character who is a teacher who cares only about the best in the class and seeks them out to the exclusion of all others. He, in turn, is a character that is perhaps the most instrumentalist of at least the 'good' guys in the saga. Slughorn at various points commits self-interested acts claiming 'academic purposes.' For instance, he is caught removing valuable leaves from a plant, claiming their scientific merit but we know being motivated by the black market value.

That, however, is not where this issue comes to the fore. It is hard to describe it without giving away too much of the plot but Slughorn cites the very same 'academic' disclaimer when handing over clearly dangerous knowledge to a young Voldemort. Slughorn later clearly realises his error and attempts to cover his tracks but the message is clear: there is a danger to the academic shield.

Now I am not going to opine about that dilemma although being an economist who routinely puts research into the public domain, I have faced Slughorn's choice and have worried about it. But what is more interesting is the entire subtheme in Harry Potter of an anti-academic bias. This might seem funny with so many respected characters being affectionately and authoritatively titled 'Professor' but let's look at the evidence.

First, why is a High School education considered enough in the wizarding world. It would seem to me that having to learn magic as well as standard fare would put a greater premium on a longer period of education. Where is the secret college at Oxford that surely must come next for the academically-gifted Hermione? Can a secondary education really be enough for the career paths the students started choosing early on?

Second, dropping out of high school is something not treated with concern. Fred and George fly away on brooms out of school and into a flourishing retail business. But by the seventh book, and I am not giving too much away here, all three main characters have dropped out of school -- yes, to pursue the greater good -- but what other childrens' novels would have ever contemplated such a message?

And then finally, there is an underlying current of what all that magical knowledge is good for. Wizards know how to cure the ill, repair efficiently, and also a variety of psychological enhancements we need not go in to. But somehow, all that knowledge remains tightly held apparently to protect the Muggles from greater disruption but surely some leakage could do a world of good.

Standing back, there is an uneasiness with academia and knowledge throughout the series. But unlike other issues they remain unstated as an undercurrent. One wonders whether the apparatus of the saga could actually have been put to good use opening them up to debate.

By the way, we took all of our kids -- ages 5 - 10 -- to the latest movie. All enjoyed it. No really scary bits.

Friday Favorite: Mouthwash for your musical soul

I wrote this back in July 2006, and for the most part the items contained within still work well for me as antidotes for earworms.

However last October, I would be tormented by an unrelenting earworm, and most of the stuff on this list didn't do the trick, so your mileage may vary with these suggestions.

---

After my own post yesterday and the Fergie abomination that D. Prince posted last night, it made me remember advice that I've stated time and time again on blogs and chatrooms all over the internet.

When it comes to those awful songs that you can't get out of your head, you need to have a group of songs at your disposal that are a) catchy or really memorable and b) something you can live with. With me, I have a few songs that I can call upon to get rid of one of these nasty lingerers. In general, I employ a lot of TV theme songs because they are generally memorable, relatively short and after a few times around your head, they will eventually remind you of another tune and then they are cleansed from your mind too. You can get a lot of these songs online at places like The 80's TV Theme Supersite and TV Cream, so develop your own set of goto song erasers.

My set:

1) The Theme to the Wide World of Sports
2) The Oakland Raiders Theme(or anything else from the NFL Films collection). I suppose that the theme from Raiders of the Lost Ark would work similarly though.
3) The Equalizer/The Rockford Files/Sanford and Son/The Fall Guy/CHiPs

Though I've found these to work too:

4) Portland, Oregon by Loretta Lynn f/ Jack White
5) L'America by the Doors
6) Green Onions by Booker T and the MGs

Commercial jingles should not be used in these situations, as they were designed to stick in your mind, and you will be trading one problem for another.

In extreme cases, you can use one horrible song against another if it is slightly less likely to cause your brain to bleed. For example, after hearing Fergie's new single "London Bridge", I knew that my goto songs just couldn't defeat that beast. The theme songs are like Scope and Listerine, and I really needed something akin to kerosene or a flamethrower to burn that tune out of my head. So I had to turn to my old nemesis and one of the songs that made me develop my system in the first place, Gwen Stefani's "Hollaback Girl", and I can honestly say that I cannot remember "London Bridge" at all today.

However, Banana Phone or Badger Badger Badger is never the answer and should never be applied to your mind at anytime. That is why I haven't linked to them here either, because those are the equivalent of whipping out the nuclear weapons. Yes, whatever was floating around in your mind will be gone, but so will everything else, and that isn't the best of outcomes.

So hopefully, I have not only undone the damage that I did yesterday, but given you all the techniques to survive this age of appallingly catchy music.

The Noctilucent Clouds Return and the Upcoming Heat Wave

Many saw the noctilucent clouds again last night and a few of you sent some pictures. Above are some pictures provided by Reid Wolcott (top) and Dennis Bell. The "tendrils" of white and blue-white structures of these extraordinarily high (roughly 50 miles up) clouds are other worldly.

The number of observations of these clouds seem to be increasing and some suggest that global warming is to blame. Global warming? Strangely enough, global warming warms the lower atmosphere (the troposphere), but cools the upper portion of atmosphere in which the noctilucent clouds reside. Very cold temperatures are needed to produce these ice clouds, since so little moisture is available at those levels. Interesting idea, but not proved at this point.

We are on track for an extraordinary heat wave next week...or so the models suggest.We will have very warm air over us. However, to get the real record-breakers, strong offshore and downslope flow is needed and it doesn't look that such easterly flow will develop until mid week. One unusual feature of the predicted heat wave is its duration. Normally, our really hot (above 90F) periods are brief...this could last for days. The warmest days look like Tuesday through Thursday. Some of the media jumped the gun going for the 90s over the weekend. More on this over the weekend...but be ready.

HOT TIP: Nothing does better getting the future temps right than the UW probcast system that uses post-processed ensemble predictions. It always beats other forecast guidance during such warm-up situations. Check it out at:

http://www.probcast.com/
Right now it is going 89F on Sunday. I bet it is on the mark for this!

Thursday, July 23, 2009

Presentations from Google Developer Days in Asia are now live

Videos, presentations, and photos from our Google Developer Days in China and Japan are now live. China's event kicked off our 2009 GDDs in Beijing on June 5 and Japan's GDD was a few days later on June 9.

At each event, attendees had the opportunity to learn about products such as Android, Chrome, OpenSocial, and App Engine and interacted with Google developers during office hours. Developers even got a sneak peak of Google Wave!

By Alyssa Sachs, Google Developer Programs

My Top 10 Movie Characters

Lee did this meme a few days ago, and while he didn't do any tagging, I thought it was an interesting exercise and I thought it was worth doing myself. The only problem with me doing stuff like this is it is supposed to be some quick thing, and what ends up happening is I end up thinking about my choices like they are chess moves. Case in point, I started doing this thing on Tuesday, and I just couldn't narrow down my choices until I had given it some thought.

The basic premise as you've likely gathered from the title, is that I am supposed to choose 10 characters from movies which really resonated with me. If it was just a matter of picking one, well, this would have been up on Tuesday, but making me choose more than that leads to problems.

But enough yakking about me and my meme neuroses... it is time to look at the list.

1. The Man with No Name (Clint Eastwood) from Leone's Dollars Trilogy. A man of few words, but huge actions. Very grey in terms of morality, but generally his actions end up having a positive outcome... a great anti-hero all around. I almost went with Tuco, but well, with The Man with No Name, you have the cinematic predecessors of a lot of action stars in the 1980's and 90's.

2. The Dude from The Big Lebowski. As a practicing Dudeist, this one is a given really.

3. James Bond. Do I need to explain this one?

4. Henry Hackett from The Paper. Now, this is an unusual choice I admit it. But the first time I saw The Paper, the character of Henry Hackett, played by Michael Keaton, really appealed to me. He is a man who was so anxious to break a story that during the middle of a job interview for a higher-prestige paper, he stole leads from the editor-in-chief's desk and had various other adventures while trying to do the right thing as a journalist. If there was a movie that I would have loved to have seen a sequel for, this was it.

5. Pai Mei from not only Kill Bill, but from a myriad of kung fu movies. I mean, the guy is bad ass, and as villains go, well, he is one of those figures that just transcends the genre, much like Dracula and Frankenstein have done in horror.

6. Snake Plissken from Escape from New York and unfortunately Escape from L.A.. Kurt Russell with an eye patch, kicking ass and taking names without saying a lot... what more do you need?

7. Grimm in Quick Change. There were a lot of Bill Murray characters I could have gone with, but somehow his turn as a first time bank robber who is stymied in his attempts to escape from New York, a problem which of course was a major stumbling block for another selection.

8. Danny Ocean from the Ocean's Eleven movies. George Clooney usually has that suave thing going, and given my penchant for scams, cons and frauds, especially perpetrated against bad people, well, I had to go with this choice.

9. Mitch Henessey from The Long Kiss Goodnight. Now, there were a lot of Samuel L. Jackson characters I could have gone with, but somehow, his turn as a low rent private detective who takes a job that has some really unexpected perils and some nice opportunities for some solid quips. He is a relatively unimportant man thrust into a situation which is really beyond his talents or experiences, and that's what makes it so great.

10. Robocop. Hmmm... Peter Weller playing a mechanized bad ass with a mind and soul. Yes, that is some compelling work, and given his experience with somewhat strange fantastical and science fiction movies, well, he really makes the character work.

Well, that's all from me on this topic. If you want to give it a whack, go for it... no pressure from me to do so.

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Midweek Video: Matrix Club

Some enterprising individual came up with the wondrous idea of combining two of the mind-bending movies of 1999, The Matrix and Fight Club. It comes together remarkably well.

And it also follows the rule that I always appreciate in this sort of thing... having one actor playing one role in the revised trailer.

Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Drought and Heat

This morning, Mark Albright of the UW shared these numbers with me:

2009 is the driest 20May-19 Jul period on record using the combined SeaTac/downtown observations:

2009 60 0.24
1925 60 0.42
1938 60 0.57
1922 60 0.61
1945 60 0.67
1911 60 0.72
2003 60 0.77
1965 60 0.79
1926 60 0.83
1927 60 0.87

This is really an extraordinary drought we are in. And the surface "fuels" are tinder-dry in eastern Washington and in the Cascades.

Tonight we will have a minor onshore push of marine air. The pressure difference between Seattle and the coast is now 2.7 mb and southwest winds are pushing through Shelton. It got to 87F today at Sea-Tac--tomorrow should be in the lower 80s.

I took a look at the long-range forecasts and was shocked. The temperature climbs through the weekend...into the lower 90s on Sunday and mid 90s at least on Monday and Tuesday. Too far out to be sure now....but be ready for real heat.

Above and Beyond the Call of Duty, with Permission

Project Hosting on Google Code is a beehive of activity, with many large and active projects and even more that aspire to that level. Now it will be a little easier for project members to sort out who should be doing what by documenting each member's duties in plain language on the new People sub-tab. Here's an example from the zscreen project:

Duties describe what each member is expected to be doing. Project owners can grant permissions that control what each member is allowed to do. While permissions can be fairly fine-grained, it's usually best to grant broad permissions, and then trust your project members to do their duties or go above and beyond them when the situation calls for it.

In open source software development, anyone can access the source code of the project, and it's important to allow anyone to access issues and project documentation. But in some projects, there is a need to restrict some information to a subset of project members for a limited time. For example, you might want to quickly patch a security hole before publicizing the details of how to exploit it. Project members can now place restrictions on individual issues to control who can view, update, or comment on them.
Here's some of what our new permission system allows project owners to do when they need to:

Acknowledge the role of a contributing user without giving them any additional permissions
Trust a contributor to update issues or wiki pages without letting them modify source code
Restrict access to specific issues to just committers, or to a specific subset of members
Restrict comments on specific issues or wiki pages when another feedback channel should be used instead
Automatically set access restrictions based on issue labels

Getting started is easy, just click the People sub-tab and start to document what you and your project team are supposed to be doing. If you need to mess with permissions, see our permission system documentation for all the details.

If you'd like to meet some of the people behind Google Code, please drop by the Google booth at OSCON 2009 this week.

By Jason Robins, Project Hosting on Google Code Team

A Little Luck based word problem

I've always wondered who gets the bad luck in situations where two people are fighting and one combatant throws or pushes his/her opponent into or even through a mirror.

I mean, I know the person who went into the mirror has the bad luck in the short term, and the person who put them through it eventually gets some form of comeuppance, but is there some book of superstition rules that one who believed in such things should consult.

You know, something akin to the work Emily Post did for etiquette. There has to be some giant book of canon on this sort of thing to help people watching movies and reading books and the like keep up with who has given themselves or their foe some bad luck (like what if you ran under a ladder to push someone you were fighting against into the path of a black cat and through a mirror, but they managed to pick up a four leaf clover and clobber you with a lucky horseshoe... whose luck would be worse)? Sort of like a form of luck algebra or something like that.

Not that I am superstitious mind you... but I still think that would be an interesting book nonetheless...

Sometimes I have too much time on my hands.

Gmail for Mobile HTML5 Series: Autogrowing Textareas

On April 7th, Google launched a new version of Gmail for mobile for iPhone and Android-powered devices. We shared the behind-the-scenes story through this blog and decided to share more of what we've learned in a brief series of follow-up blog posts. This week I'll talk about autogrowing textareas for entering large amounts of text.

When composing a long message in a web app, regardless of whether it's on a desktop or a mobile device, you really want to see as much of your draft as possible and make use of all the available screen space.

One of my biggest gripes are fixed-size textareas that restrict me to only a couple lines of visible text when my screen is actually many times larger than the size of the textarea.

In today's blog post, I'll share a JavaScript solution for textareas that automatically grow (vertically) to the size of the content. They make composing long messages much easier and, for all those iPhone users out there, takes away the need to scroll with the dreaded magnifying glass! We're working on getting this into Gmail for mobile but here it is now as a teaser of things to come.

Measuring the height of the content

The first step is to detect when the content has changed. Some solutions on the net recommend using a timer (see our previous post to find out more about timers) to check if content has changed. However, that approach is not ideal on a mobile device, where both battery life and processor power are limited.

Instead, we will listen for key-up events from the browser. This guarantees that we only measure the textarea when the content has actually changed.

<textarea id="growingTextarea" onkeyup="grow();"></textarea>

The second step is to actually measure the height of the content. There are solutions on the net that recommend keeping a copy of the content in a div and measuring the div to get the height; however, due to memory and processor limitations on a mobile device, those solutions don't scale well when the content gets large (and it's also hard to replicate textarea line wrapping behavior exactly in a div).

Therefore we will make use of the scrollHeight and clientHeight properties. For our purposes, scrollHeight is the height of all the content while clientHeight is the height of the content that's visible in the textarea (for more precise definitions, see scrollHeight and clientHeight)

function grow() {
  var textarea = document.getElementById('growingTextarea');
  var newHeight = textarea.scrollHeight;
  var currentHeight = textarea.clientHeight;
…
}

One limitation of using scrollHeight and clientHeight is that we aren't able to shrink the textarea when content is deleted. When all the content of a textarea is visible, the scrollHeight is equal to the clientHeight. Therefore we aren't able to detect that our textarea is actually larger than the minimum size required to fit all the content (please do leave a comment if you think of a solution that doesn't require re-rendering the page).

Growing the textarea

To grow the text area, we modify the height CSS property:

if (newHeight > currentHeight) {
  textarea.style.height = newHeight + 5 * TEXTAREA_LINE_HEIGHT + 'px';
}

Notice how we only change the height if newHeight > currentHeight. Depending on the browser, changing the height (even if it's to the same value) will cause the page to re-render. On a mobile device, we want to try our best to minimize the number of operations.

Also, we grow the textarea by five lines every time we grow. From a UI perspective, this reduces the amount of jitter when composing a message but, from a performance perspective, this reduces the number of times we need to re-render the page.

(Quick note for developers implementing this for a browser with scrollbars: you might want to modify the CSS overflow property to preventing the scrollbar from appearing and disappearing as you grow your textarea)

The complete solution

Growing textareas are easy to implement and they make composing long messages infinitely more usable. So go out there add it to all your web apps!

<script>
// Value of the line-height CSS property for the textarea.
var TEXTAREA_LINE_HEIGHT = 13;

function grow() {
  var textarea = document.getElementById('growingTextarea');
  var newHeight = textarea.scrollHeight;
  var currentHeight = textarea.clientHeight;

  if (newHeight > currentHeight) {
     textarea.style.height = newHeight + 5 * TEXTAREA_LINE_HEIGHT + 'px';
  }
}
</script>
<textarea id="growingTextarea"
          onkeyup="grow();">
</textarea>

Previous posts from Gmail for Mobile HTML5 Series

HTML5 and Webkit pave the way for mobile web applications
Using AppCache to launch offline - Part 1
Using AppCache to launch offline - Part 2
Using AppCache to launch offline - Part 3
A Common API for Web Storage
Suggestions for better performance
Cache pattern for offline HTML5 web application

Using timers effectively

By Casey Ho, Software Engineer, Google Mobile