The Flying Nerd

With fuel prices spiralling, a young man’s fancy turns away from V8s and four wheel drives to hot hatches.

Mazda’s new Mazda3 MPS looks liks a piping-hot hatch, with its 190kW turbo engine. Most reviewers comment that this is far and away the hottest of the current breed of hatches – and there’s plenty of competition. But check out the speedo…

With a range of 0 – 280 km/h spread over only (about) 200 degrees of the possible arc of pointer travel, this crazy instrument would make it almost impossible to accurately read and maintain speed at (say) 40km/h in a School Zone.

Surely the most sensible design approach would be to:
* maximise the use of available instrument space by placing the top speed as far as possible in the clockwise direction of rotation
* use a non-linear graduation of the instrument (easy in an electronic speedo) so that (say) the first half of the needle’s travel shows speeds from 0 – 100km/h, and the second half of the travel shows 100 – [maximum] km/h
* show a sensible maximum speed (there’s no way this car would ever get to 280km/h – even down hill with a tail wind!).

Frankly, Mazda, this is just silly.

In about 1984 I put myself on the waiting list to become a Member of the Sydney Cricket Ground. For the cricket, you understand, not the footy.

Ten years or so later, I finally became a member. Since then, I’ve attended as many international matches as possible at the SCG. I’ve always paid extra to receive a guest ticket, and I have enjoyed taking my friends and familiy with me for a relaxing day watching the flannelled fools.
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In the movie Forrest Gump, Forrest (Tom Hanks) says…

My momma always said, “Life is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you’re gonna get.”

… which sometimes feels pretty real to me.

In the book, Forrest Gump opens with…

Let me say this: bein’ a idiot is no box of chocolates

… which is a very different perspective.

I prefer Jesus’ comments:

“Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.

Jesus reminds us that amidst the uncertainties that spring from the tumult of life, we can have absolute certainty about our standing with God and our future.

Just watched this week’s ep of Top Gear (shown on SBS on Monday evening). Haven’t laughed so much in a long time. Highlights included:
* Jeremy Clarkson’s face being deformed driving an old Maserati F1 car (without a helmet!)
* the STG1,500 sportscar-but-not-a-Porsche challenge (won, despite expectations, by the mighty XJS Jag)
* dropping a skip full of junk onto a Maserati Biturbo.

Neil was right. Being a Top Gear presenter would be the best job in the world – a notch above being a Mythbuster.

By popular demand (well, two people asked), I’ve added a photo of The Deck to my article about rainwater tanks.

Enjoy.

Diet Coke + Mentos = ?

Check this out.

See?

Here’s a new topic for the Flying Nerd.

You’ve probably notice that I enjoy writing about technology. Formula 1 sneaks in as it’s probably the sport that uses the highest level of technology.

Well, here’s a change of pace – but it’s an interesting use of a combination of simple technologies.

[Lots of pictures on following page - may load slowly...]
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Well, I’m doing something about it. What about you?
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Click here.

(Don’t ask…)

Jamie (of course).

Went for a long walk with my girls this morning (we go to church at 5.00pm). On arrival home, we decided to watch Monday night’s ep of Mythbusters, in which Adam and Jamie undertake a series of tests to determine which one is the Ultimate Mythbuster.

Needless to say, Jamie won (three tests to one, with one drawn).

Did you really expect anything different?

Jamie’s an interesting guy. Bio here.

[Update: the referenced video is no longer available on Google Video.]

Nerds (flying or otherwise) love Top Gear. Right Neil?

I stumbled across the fact that the fabulous British TV show about cars has some episodes on Google Video. The Top Gear team, led by the ever-manic Jeremy Clarkson, made a special show with a Winter Oympics theme. You can view it directly on this site, below.

I haven’t had time to view the whole episode yet, so I won’t comment on the MANY silly things that they do with cars and ice. But if you scroll through to about the 50th minute, you can see the Top Gear attempt at sending a Mini Cooper (a real one, not the recent BMW version) over a ski jump. With rockets attached.

Here’s a screen grab.

Enjoy!

The Flying Nerd tries to bring you new and interesting content. Things to brighten your day. Little gems that sparkle amidst the gloom and dross of the internet…

I don’t know where this video came from originally. It was sent to me by the man I am currently working for. This really is some amazing footage.

When I first saw it, I had no idea what I was looking at. I heard lots of loud bangs and thought there was shooting going on. I didn’t really want to watch. Then I realised that the bangs were (wait for it…) FISH!

This video shows a couple of (Mexican?) men on board what we would call a ‘tinny’, amidst a veritable swarm of jumping fish.

There’s really not much more I can say about this. Go on — use a bit of bandwidth. Take a look. Tell me what you think.

I received this link in an Southern Cross Gliding Club group email. The link takes you to a moving hand/eye coordination and reflex testing puzzle.

To ‘play’ the puzzle, click on the red square and ‘hold’ it. You must drag the red square around in such a manner that you don’t touch any of the moving blue shapes or the black borders. It is said that 18 seconds is a pretty phenomenal result. It’s also suggested that the US Air Force uses the puzzle to test out fighter pilots — and that they are expected to achieve two (2) minutes!

I got to six seconds before having a minor freak-out.

My boss has managed 21 seconds. I know this because he called me to his office to show me!

Have fun.

The Flying Nerd operates at (and sometimes beyond) the bleeding edge of technology. I always like to bring you news of new technology that will enhance your life and make the world a better place.

This is NOT such a technology!

I suppose if you were amongst the laziest 1% of the population, this device (a gun that fires specially designed biscuits for your dog to chase) may have some value. If not, you will probably be asking the same questions that I am. Questions like “Why?”, or “Why?”, or maybe even “Why?”.

Now if the Snackshotz people could just invent something that would help to get a good game of fetch going with a cat, then I might be interested.

Nothing happening here — move along now.

KonicaMinolta is exiting the camera business. This article describes the various steps that KM is taking to close down and divest itself of its own-brand digital camera business, and its film and paper manufacturing operations.

I remember fondly my old Minolta Dynax 3si SLR (a film camera) that I owned in the late 80s and early 90s. It was a good piece of kit that took nice pictures. In recent years, the high end KM d’Image cameras have been pretty decent units — usually leading the megapixel charge.

So, watch out for some KM bargains over the next few months. If you don’t expect to need a lot of long term manufacturer support, good buying awaits.

We LOVE Mythbusters at our house.

Who’d have thought that 11 and 8 year old girls would love to sit down with their Dad and watch a couple of well-paid septic Nerds try to prove or disporove urban myths? Well, they do. And, like me, they especially enjoy blowing things up at the end.

This site contains a collection of out-takes and other unusual happenings during the production of Mythbusters. Well worth a look if you are a Mythbusters fan (and even if you are not). Thanks to Neil for the link.

By the way, Top Gear, which has replaced Mythbusters at 7.30pm on Mondays on SBS is also a lot of fun for rev-heads.

Here‘s a good article containing links to sites that have free or low price stock photos (for use in PowerPoint presentations, for example).

Updated 10 Oct 05: Gravatars are, how shall I put it, INTERMITTENT. Sometimes your lovely Gravatar will show up. Sometimes you will be a grey or black box. The man from gravatar.com is trying to fix things as quickly as possible.

Updated: 30 Sep 05. They’re fixed.

There’s a problem with displaying Gravatars (globally recognised avatars) at present.

Sounds like the folks at gravatar.com have a traffic volume issue with their hosting provider. Until they work it out, I guess we’re stuck with black boxes in the comments section.

See here for details.

Stay tuned.

Friends and fans of One Eyed Jim, Macquarie Anglican Churches’ resident pirate, will be pleased to know about Talk Like A Pirate Day – September 19.

By the way, do you know why he’s called One Eyed Jim?
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Your friendly Flying Nerd is now (more-or-less) back on deck after a week of unpleasantness in the throat (hoarse as a horse and barking like a dog).

As ever, the Flying Nerd welcomes your comments and fedback on anything you read here.