The coldest winter I ever spent
Archive for the ‘General’ Category.
Ben Cowden, Gil Zamfirescu and I are teaching Kinetics classes to youth 8-15 years old this summer at The Crucible in Oakland. Each class is 1 week, 9am-noon or 1pm-4pm, sessions run June 23rd to August 1st. We make gizmos and robots with motors, switches and basic electronics. If you are interested in being a paid ($12/hr) teaching assistant for some or all of those classes, give me a holler! It’s fun, the kids are great.
If you are ready to sign up for Cricket Wireless, send me an email at Lee at Lee dot org. I will write back to you in a day or so with a referral code and we will both get a $25 account credit!
I’ve been on Cricket Wireless since February and I am very happy with it. Originally I was on Aio Wireless but they got bought by Cricket in May. The cell service is every bit as good as AT&T for something like 1/2 the cost.
Over the last few weeks I’ve been building a Rubens’ Tube with Michael Kearney. Mark Rosin of Guerilla Science asked us to build a prototype of a piece that would travel to rock concerts and the like, blinding people with science. It’s an excellent plan.
Just a few minutes after the birth of the tube.
Practicing before the performance.
The view from Isabelle Engler, the pianist’s chair.
Last week we presented the Rubens’ Tube at MSRI, the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute in Berkeley. It went really well.
I’ll try to show you some good video soon.
Ben Cowden, who is an excellent kinetic artist and teacher friend of mine is looking for an apartment with his wife within biking distance of Mission Bay. Possible bonus points for sharing a private machine shop. Any leads, send to me or Ben.
BART is getting new trains. The prototype is travelling around the Bay Area. It isn’t perfect. If you’d like to help make it better, visit it in the next few weeks!
https://www.bart.gov/about/projects/cars
You can submit the online survey here.
I spoke with the guy running the event, (Adam? Aaron?) and his response to my first comment was, “That’s why I go to these things, sometimes I hear about important changes.”
Here are my comments:
The LED “destination” sign on the side of the train is currently behind tinted glass. If it was behind clear glass it would be much more visible. Glass makers can certainly make a glass window that is tinted up to a certain place.
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Inside the train, one of the vertical handrails near the middle of the train has a collar with a sharp edge that should be curved smoothed over. Maybe this was just a problem with the demo car.
To find the sharp collar, find a single chair, look for the handrail that goes from the chair to the ceiling, look for the connector that goes between the chair and tube, look just above the connector for the collar.
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On current trains, the audio “panic” warning (a recorded voice saying “Please stand clear of the doors. The doors are closing”) regularly comes on at the wrong time. The message often sounds while a large number of people are boarding a train. It is very unnerving to hear that message while a crowd is in the middle of boarding at a normal pace. I become worried that the conductor doesn’t see the boarding passengers and will close the door on us. Of course, that doesn’t happen but the purpose of the message isn’t being fulfilled and EVERYONE ignores the message.
Michael Moran at BART Customer Service explained to me that the message is triggered when the normal door dwell period has lapsed. Instead of this, the message should happen when the train operator commands it to.
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I’m sure you’ve gotten this complaint thousands of times before I’m sure. From inside the train, 16th and 24th street station look the same. Passengers need to look very closely to be sure they are getting off at the right stop Here are some easy ways to fix it:– The signs at track level that read “16th Street” and “24th Street” are literally hidden in shadow. If the sign was moved 3 feet closer to the center of the platform, they would be illuminated by the existing station lighting
– The track level signs could be replaced with illuminated signs like at Powell Station.
– The tunnels could be retiled with unique colors like at 12th and 19th Street stations (that’s expensive though)
– A long, narrow strip of unique art could be installed on the tunnel wallsThanks!
I’ve been teaching weekend-long Arduino intensive classes with some friends for the last year or so. It’s gone amazingly well. We’ve got another class coming up April 26-27 at Tech Liminal in Oakland.
If you want a huge jump start, join us. Tell your nearly-dorky friend about the class too. As a teacher, I’ve got a $50 discount code to give you: arduteach888
Check it out at WorkshopWeekend.net
I’ve been using Aio Wireless for a few months now and I like it very much. Cell service is every bit as good as AT&T for 1/2 the cost.
Send me an email and I’ll refer you to Aio Wireless. We will both get $25 from AioWireless. Write to me at Lee at Lee dat org.
That bit of musical cheese poetry comes from facebook and Charlotte!
In 2012 I took an Abnormal Psychology class at CCSF. My honors project was a response paper to the book Crazy Like Us: The Globalization of the American Psyche by Ethan Watters. I loved the book and highly recommend it. Here’s what I wrote about it.
Introduction
Ethan Watters uses four stories to paint a picture about how American culture has a powerful influence on how the rest of the world understands mental illness. Sometimes intentionally, sometimes not, American culture is shaping how these mental illnesses are perceived and treated.
Americans think about mental illness in a very particular way. This thinking depends heavily on biological, genetic, and environmental factors. But largely missing in this view are the cultural factors that shape the course of mental illness greatly. This isn’t how the ill person sees themselves but how their local culture sees them. For example, the stories told about the origins of mental illness, be it spirit possession or chemical imbalance, have a huge impact on mentally ill persons and can alter the outcome of their disease.
Continue reading ‘Crazy Like Us: The Globalization of the American Psyche’ »