Categories
Sparky

Sparky has a slumber party, part zero.

Sparky wants to have a slumber party with his friends from summer camp, so I am prepping the battle space.

Categories
Projects

Watching the grass grow.

Getting grass to grow always seems like a hit-or-miss deal.  It worked this time, so here’s what happened.

Categories
Government

President Trump is running the show.

Categories
Engineering Science Technology

Science Fiction isn’t easy.

Guardian:  The AI future is too scary even for James Cameron. Where can the Terminator franchise go from here?

“I’m at a point right now where I have a hard time writing science-fiction,” Cameron told CNN this week. “I’m tasked with writing a new Terminator story [but] I don’t know what to say that won’t be overtaken by real events. We are living in a science-fiction age right now.”

Categories
Engineering Technology

Humanoid robots are trash.

Humanoid Robots Have a Serious Design Flaw, And We Need to Fix It

Watch Boston Dynamics’ Atlas robot doing training routines, or the latest humanoids from Figure loading a washing machine, and it’s easy to believe the robot revolution is here.

From the outside, it seems the only remaining challenge is perfecting the AI ( artificial intelligence) software to enable these machines to handle real-life environments.

Humanoid robots won’t be attending the robot revolution.

Categories
Education

Shop class is fun and dangerous.

Sparks in the Schoolyard: What We Lost When Shop Class Disappeared

There are two ways to look at the approach my parents took to academics. 

“We trust your judgement” or, “so long as the school isn’t calling with problems, everything is fine.”

Either way, I could choose my own classes and graduation requirements weren’t as stringent.  I took every shop class that North Olmsted High School offered, and avoided academic classes.

Categories
Sparky

Sparky knows how to have a good time.

Friday nights used to be a big deal.  Now, I’m watching King of the Hill and eating popcorn with Sparky.

Categories
Government

DC crack-down is already yielding some good video.

Categories
Culture

The WNBA needs to be fun.

A trending prank is to throw a green marital aid onto the court at WNBA games.  WNBA officials are taking this very seriously.  That’s a mistake.

Categories
Physics