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random weirdness
Jan. 7th, 2009 01:09 pmSo I use google for units conversion a lot. I just searched for "1/2 mile in yards." As expected, the unit converter came up telling me that 1/2 mile is 880 yards. The weird part is the actual web search results -- they're mostly ads for beachfront vacation rentals! Plus a few workout plans.
For my own future reference, 1/2 mile is 880 yards, which is 17.6 laps at my pool (too bad google doesn't have a "miles to laps in your local pool" converter). One mile is 35.2 laps.
For my own future reference, 1/2 mile is 880 yards, which is 17.6 laps at my pool (too bad google doesn't have a "miles to laps in your local pool" converter). One mile is 35.2 laps.
This weekend, I . . .
- learned that Carter loves to swim, but hates baths
- had my car get sideswiped by a deer
- ate nearly half a dozen muffins in one sitting, proving to myself yet again that I have no restraint and need to get things in smaller quantities
- had a tick try to attach itself to me for the first time (it failed, I found it before it got hooked in, although I still don't know how it got in my shirt)
- wore a new summery dress (strapless and about knee-length) without being freezing cold
- had a nice family group-hug with Ben and Carter
- managed to do 8 wrist curls (flexor side) with a 3-lb weight without increased pain
- ate nearly 2500 calories in a single day without realizing that I was doing so (I felt like it had been a pretty healthy day! That just goes to show the damage a 500-cal bowl of ice cream can do). For the record this was not the same day that I ate all those muffins.
- pre-ordered Lynn Flewelling's new book and Jacqueline Carey's new book, plus the paperback editions of Sarah Monette's "The Mirador" and "A Companion to Wolves,"
- ordered the third book in the gay pirate romance series
- spent $40 at Half Price Books and came away with about 15 books, some of which are mint-condition hardcovers
My OT says that the perfect keyboard would be one that drastically changed configurations every hour, so you wouldn't get stuck in a repetitive pattern too long. I have been saying for a long time that keyboards need to come in different sizes depending on the size of your hand.
So my OT and I joke that I have "enteritis" -- inflammation along the pinky side of my right wrist, caused by reaching for the enter key. It occurred to me that shift and control are also ones that require extension of your pinky. In many disciplines, you avoid using that finger heavily because it is the weakest finger -- for example, I might find a new fingering for a piece of violin music so I could use a different finger. So why is it that when I'm typing I am constantly pressing things with my little finger? I type with the "proper" alignment -- index fingers on F and J and the rest lined up next to them. If I then look at my left hand, there aren't too many characters to the left of my pinky. I primarily use it for control and shift, and I swapped my control and caps lock to make it even easier. I actually use my ring finger for Q and tab which I suppose is a little unusual. Then if I look at my right hand, there are a whole bunch of keys lined up to the right of my pinky! I use my pinky for enter, ', shift, |, control, and shift, and when I'm writing a lot of code my pinky will often be on the shift key while my ring finger is on { or }. Why should there be so many more keys that I use my pinky for on the right side? Why should pinkies be used for such frequent characters as enter, shift, and control?
I will admit I don't know where they should go instead, since obviously the letters are all used pretty frequently. I wouldn't mind replacing the row of number keys with them though . . . I always use the number pad for number entry anyway. OTOH that's a bit hard to reach.
So my OT and I joke that I have "enteritis" -- inflammation along the pinky side of my right wrist, caused by reaching for the enter key. It occurred to me that shift and control are also ones that require extension of your pinky. In many disciplines, you avoid using that finger heavily because it is the weakest finger -- for example, I might find a new fingering for a piece of violin music so I could use a different finger. So why is it that when I'm typing I am constantly pressing things with my little finger? I type with the "proper" alignment -- index fingers on F and J and the rest lined up next to them. If I then look at my left hand, there aren't too many characters to the left of my pinky. I primarily use it for control and shift, and I swapped my control and caps lock to make it even easier. I actually use my ring finger for Q and tab which I suppose is a little unusual. Then if I look at my right hand, there are a whole bunch of keys lined up to the right of my pinky! I use my pinky for enter, ', shift, |, control, and shift, and when I'm writing a lot of code my pinky will often be on the shift key while my ring finger is on { or }. Why should there be so many more keys that I use my pinky for on the right side? Why should pinkies be used for such frequent characters as enter, shift, and control?
I will admit I don't know where they should go instead, since obviously the letters are all used pretty frequently. I wouldn't mind replacing the row of number keys with them though . . . I always use the number pad for number entry anyway. OTOH that's a bit hard to reach.
Okay, so I was going to give more detail on my last post, but I think I already hit the important points, so unless someone asks about anything specific I'll just leave it at that.
I am almost done with MFC at work. Yay! But of course I left the hardest task for last. :P
TripAdvisor.com put out their annual best places to visit list. I've been to an okay number of them (particularly the ones in the US and Asia), but here's a list of some I would like to go to:
There are many more places I'd like to go, but those are all ones listed in the TripAdvisor guide.
While I was in the archaeology museum at UPenn, looking through the African and Polynesian artifacts, I was thinking how cool it would be to learn one language from each language group. One romance language, one germanic language, one polynesian language, etc. I suppose the place to start would be brushing up on my Japanese, and then probably trying to learn Spanish. If I could, I would learn the following languages:
and many more. At least I think I ought to be able to learn Spanish okay on my own (with the help of language CDs, TV, and textbooks). That would be the most useful one. Sometimes I really regret taking Latin in high school, despite how much I loved it.
I am almost done with MFC at work. Yay! But of course I left the hardest task for last. :P
TripAdvisor.com put out their annual best places to visit list. I've been to an okay number of them (particularly the ones in the US and Asia), but here's a list of some I would like to go to:
- New Zealand
- Lake Louise (Alberta, Canada)
- Sedona, AZ
- London
- Barcelona
- Machu Picchu
- Hawaii
- Agra, India (Taj Mahal)
- Santiago, Chile
- Egypt
- Marrakech, Morocco
There are many more places I'd like to go, but those are all ones listed in the TripAdvisor guide.
While I was in the archaeology museum at UPenn, looking through the African and Polynesian artifacts, I was thinking how cool it would be to learn one language from each language group. One romance language, one germanic language, one polynesian language, etc. I suppose the place to start would be brushing up on my Japanese, and then probably trying to learn Spanish. If I could, I would learn the following languages:
- Spanish
- German
- Welsh or Gaelic
- Hawaiian
- Hebrew
- Russian
- Swahili
- Hindi
- Mandarin Chinese
- Malay
- Arabic
- Swedish
- French
and many more. At least I think I ought to be able to learn Spanish okay on my own (with the help of language CDs, TV, and textbooks). That would be the most useful one. Sometimes I really regret taking Latin in high school, despite how much I loved it.
At some point (hopefully today) I will post about the past couple weeks. For now, the quick run-down of what I've been up to (other than work):
- Got a dog. Signed up for private training sessions. Had one session, another scheduled for tomorrow.
- Rachel came to visit the weekend before last, yay! We discovered several war museums that Ben and I didn't know existed underneath the war memorials downtown.
- Took Friday off last week and went to Philly to visit Nick & Rob. Had lots of fun!
- Ben put in a veggie bed in our yard. Now we have veggies growing, plus our peach tree has teeny little peaches on it.
- Wrist therapy = yay! Things are much improved.
- Synthetic thyroid hormones = best invention ever. I cannot begin to express how much my general health has improved these past few months.
- Finally met Joyce! Had a very enjoyable evening reviewing embarrassing moments from our pasts.
foodscapes with miniature people
I think my favorite is the guy mowing the "lawn" on a kiwi. That and the excavation of seeds from the watermelon!
I think my favorite is the guy mowing the "lawn" on a kiwi. That and the excavation of seeds from the watermelon!
