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I just got a giant 65 watt compact fluorescent to fend off Seasonal Affective Disorder. So far, so good.

The light has good color rendition and it’s bright as all get out. I’ve still got to find a good way to mount it. A local video store uses these lights in their shop, their lights are labelled “Bright Effects 65 Watt Soft White CFL”, and they got them from Lowes. I went to Lowes and (apparently) they’ve been rebranded as “Utilitech 2600 Series 65 Watt Soft White CFL product 0046931”.

Right now it’s mounted near my computer monitor, so I might just start getting a suntan as I geek. I’ll figure out a less obtrusive mounting method. Charlotte told me about a study where people successfully received light therapy on the backs of their legs, so I shouldn’t need to put the light on my face.

The light in action. Notice how everything else is freaking black? My camera couldn’t handle how bright it was!

I’ll be travelling to Boston Jan 11-16 for some R&R with friends before my next big school semester starts up. If you want to spend some time with me, give me a buzz.

I want to write my posts in WordPress and have Google+ display them. It looks like this functionality doesn’t exist. Am I correct?

I want to get excited about G+ but I still can’t find any reason to use it. Oh well.

We had a great roll at Cal Academy last Thursday night

Here’s a totally sweet video of the event from Octotod

local version:

I submitted this to the Gmail team:

Here is a bug in the new version of Gmail. I don’t know if this was a bug in the previous version.

1) Go to your Gmail contacts list
2) Click the checkbox to the left of a contact’s name, let’s call him “Adam”
3) Scroll down to the next page of contacts
4) Click the checkbox to the left of a contact’s name, let’s call him “Bob”
5) Click the “Email” button near the top of the screen
6) Notice that Bob’s email address is in the To: field but Adam’s is not. :-(

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?