That’s right, it’s Wallpaper Tuesday! Today’s choice is titled and in my Dream, and I found it on DevianArt.com. Lots of great photos and artwork there.

If you have a favorite site for Wallpapers, post it in the comments and let me know.

Posted in Distractions, Wallpapers, WebSites 2 Comments »

I wonder if you can order these. With my luck, I would probably get arrested.

These came in a random email, so I don’t know where they originated from.

Posted in Distractions, Funny 3 Comments »

Growing up, I always wanted to shoot rockets, and I just never did. I can’t complain, there were a lot of things I was able to do that most kids don’t get to. Rockets would have been great though. Then again, I did have that tendency to set things on fire…

Now, I’m all grown up, with kids of my own, and recently I realized that I should just go out and buy a rocket.

We started with water rockets, but they weren’t in great supply around here. I found some plans on NASA’s web site to build your own water rocket out of 2 liter bottles, if you are interested.

Anyway, we bought a $16 dollar kit from a large retailer, it was made by Estes, and included a pre-built rocket, a couple of engines, and a launch platform. There were some other things included, basically everything you need to launch the thing a couple of times.

Let me tell you, it was a little overcast, and a little windy. Sure, we spent more time chasing the rockets than actually launching them, but I don’t know if you could put a dollar value on that type of fun.

My oldest currently wants to be a Scientist when he grows up, I just don’t want to grow up. I want to try and get my guys interested in Science. I hope to give them enough real world examples so that when they are sitting in math class, they don’t have to think that they’ll never need to know this stuff.

Now I just need to find the formula that tells you how much thrust you need to launch a specific height, or maybe how many feet per second an object of a particular weight will fall.

Oh wait, the oldest one is 6, well it doesn’t hurt to be prepared, right?

Wait, there was almost something really interesting to write about.

I didn’t mention the day that we did this. It was memorial day.

The following Wednesday is the day that the Air Force Academy graduates, so in preparation, the Thunderbirds (the aerial stunt team of the Air Force) was practicing.

I was launching my rocket just North of the Air Force Academy, and those planes were flying pretty low.

OK, of course I was making sure that the multi-million dollar planes were no where near me when I was launching the rocket, but in this paranoid day and age, you never know what could have happened. Can we say SWAT team?

What would have been even worse, is that after we were finished with the rockets, we were going to meet some friends to target shoot. So I also had a couple of hi-powered rifles and several hundred rounds of ammo in the Jeep.

I can imagine the headlines now.

I thought it was really fitting though, making use of my freedoms on Memorial day. A belated thank you to all of our Men and Women in the Armed Forces, and the Men and Women who support them. Thanks guys!

Posted in Distractions, Fun, Rocketry 2 Comments »

I’ve pretty much always planned on doing a weekly post with some interesting sites that I’ve run across.

With that intent, I have been marking sites that I bookmark with a "@ThisWeek" tag, so that I could come back at the end of the week and pick the best ones for a post.

As you can probably guess, I haven’t been doing this, so now I have just over 200 bookmarks tagged like this.

I figured that I could start going through them, and post the good stuff. So, here goes:

What’s life really like at Google? This post is pretty old, but I thought it was a really good read. It’s supposed to be based on feedback from an employee who used to work for Microsoft, who then left to startup his own company, and then worked for Google. Basically, some comparisons between the environments at Microsoft and Google.

I thought it was really interesting how college grads can step into the company, and have all of their needs met. Food, cell phone, clothes, and other stuff. Get them all wrapped up in the Google universe, that leaving the company gets too complicated. Kind of Borg like, but hey, who am I to judge?

100 Blogs We Love – Not yet a year old, but still good reading. PCWorld did a list of 100 Blogs that they like. There is a short description about each, and near the bottom of the article, you can choose the category that you are interested in.

You may be surprised to see that Port 16 isn’t in the list. I didn’t start this blog until July of 2007, so it isn’t an oversight on their part. I’m sure if they do one in 2008, Port 16 will be on there, maybe even Two Guys Tech will get a mention.

Hackszine – The title should give it away, but this is a blog / online magazine about hacks. Not always the traditional software and security hacks, they also have some neat things like how to sharpen scissors with aluminum foil, how to beat jet lag, and how to make custom fonts. Some great reading.

Printfection – Just about everyone in the free world knows about Cafe Press, where you can put your logos on merchandise that they make, on demand, and you make a little money on each sale, depending on what you price your merchandise for. This is the same thing, except that it looks like you can create a little more customization on the products. You can use this site to inspire get rich quick schemes revolving around your own product line.

The Mattress Police – Not as perverted as you might (or I might) think at first. The reference is to the police who arrest people who have torn off the tags on their mattresses. Either way, they have some funny shirts. This is kind of cheating, since they use Printfection (see above) for their store.

Posted in Distractions, LinkLove No Comments »

Sorry, I had to share this one, I thought it was hilarious!

A friend Forwarded this to me, so I don’t know where it came from.

Posted in Distractions, Funny No Comments »