Lee.org

I’ll probably be teaching a class with WhatWillYouLearn.com on December 10th or 11th. Stay tuned for more details!

Here’s the class description as it stands right now:

BeetleBots Zooming Everywhere!

In just a few hours we’ll take some motors and switches and turn them into living, scampering, skittering BeetleBots! It’s a robot that zooms around your kitchen floor in the cutest/creepiest(?) way you’ve ever seen!

When you’re done, you’ll know how to build more of these little guys (did I just say Holiday Project with family?)

This relatively easy robot project gives great food for thought on the nature of artificial intelligence, robotic mobility and… nah, they’re just awesome to play with!

If you don’t have these skills already, you’ll learn how to use a soldering iron and hot glue gun. But the magic isn’t in the legerdemain, it’s in how we put these little guys together and make them go!

From a frenzied evening of studying Medical Terminology and then going out with friends…

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Please apply suction to my midventral subpelvic acral epidermis.

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Here, let me give you a dorsal view of my third distal phalanx.

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I just got a set of personal cards (as opposed to business cards) made at Vistaprint.com. I must say that they look totally sharp. $10 for 500 high quality cards, delivered.

Do you like the Fleur-de-Lee?
The font is Aetna JY Newstyle

SWARM is presenting at California Academy NightLife this Thursday night. They gave us a stack of free tickets to the event. Email me by Wednesday afternoon and I’ll get you on the guest list!

Their aquarium is completely amazing!

The day D and I brought home my new '98 Sebring!

With Charlotte in Seattle, I’m tightening up my expenditures and dumping my car & garage. It’s startling how expensive my car is… $7320 per year! Of course, I need a car to get around, I can’t just say something like, “food is too expensive, I’m not going to eat any more.” So I’m getting a Zip Car membership.

car costs per month

$200 garage – it also doubles as storage, now squished into the apartment
$90 insurance – $1,000/year
$120 gas – 10,000 miles/year, $4/gallon, 27MPG
$120 depreciation – $20,000 new in Sept 1998, worth $1,000 now, that’s 13 years
$50 maintenance – car repairs, oil
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$610/month… $7320 per year!

Zip Car by comparison
if I don’t change my driving habits:
10,000 miles/year if driven at an average speed of 20MPH is 500 hours. * $9/hour = $4,500/year

If I drive less:
6,000 miles/year = $2,700/year

Update 1-26-12: the above isn’t correct because it doesn’t account for the hours and days that a car sits. With Zipcar I am paying whether the car is moving or not. So I’m not sure what Zipcar really costs.

I can rent a truck or a Mini Cooper when need be, it’s always clean, it’s always new, never any fuss, and it’s parked directly across the street. Ask me again in 6 months if I still love it.

How much does your car cost?

Symphony of Science – Onward to the Edge!

local version:

Darn if this isn’t good music.

Went to Come Out And Play SF today. Great fun!

Sunday (tomorrow!) is the last day. I highly recommend you go out to play!

My upcoming Flame Effects class in LA topped BoingBoing.net on October 24th :-). Thanks to Mark Frauenfelder for posting and asking me to bring the class to LA in the first place. (The class)

This class has sold out. If you want to be alerted to future flame effects classes, please drop me an email at Lee at Lee dat org.

Learn several awesome things this weekend. Hang out with a coolio maker crowd in the Bay Area!

It’s 2 things: classes and hanging out between classes with people into learning and making. The format kinda reminds me of a science fiction convention.

Here’s the list of classes go look!
– Learn to Solder
– How to use the Arduino Tinker Kit
– Make a Tin Can 2-String / Intro to Instrument Making
– Sewing Circuits
– Build a Camping Stove
– Marble Roller Coasters
– Basic Electroluminescent Wire Workshop
– Flow-Wand
– An Introduction to Poi Spinning
– Going from Idea to Product for the Small Time Maker
– Beginning Web Development with PHP
– Wet Felted Flower Workshop
– Introduction to PCB Layout
– Fusing Plastic Fabric
– Conductive! Sew a Soft Circuit
– Spontaneous Magic
– The Internet & Computer Networks

Go trick or treating. Get candy. Eat it. Get that sugar buzz! Enjoy life.

Nobody has ever poisoned anybody with candy at Halloween. Really.

Read up:

Poisoned candy turns out to be a Halloween myth

Snopes: Halloween Poisonings (False)

Snopes: Pins and Needles (True but very very very rare)