((little fat notebook))

Human hamsters

laelene Post in general blog，Tags: exercise, fitness, green, health, pictures

15 September 2009

photo credit: allellipticals.com

College students love to work out. Go to the campus recreation center and you’ll find students engaging in a variety of activities. Some of the most popular are running on the treadmill and “cycling” on the ellipticals (or whatever you call that motion). All that energy exertion is great for those looking to burn calories and build endurance and slim down, but it’s lost in the power used to operate the machine. So it’s not surprising that the students of Cal State San Bernadino are now a part of a new concept: using that energy to power a building. After all, if they can make hamsters run around in wheels to generate electricity, why can’t humans pump ellipticals to do the same?

When I first heard of this idea, I remembered actually thinking a similar thought before. I don’t know about the resources needed to set up the infrastructure so that the energy used is directed to a power grid, but if it’s not too much, this is certainly an interesting way of getting your electricity! For the CSUSB students’ fitness center, equipment cost $15,000. Not too bad. There’s a one-to-one ratio of how many minutes a typical workout can power a laptop for – imagine that: you use your laptop for five hours a day and you have to work out for five hours to power it. That would certainly teach you to conserve energy. The same time will power a flourescent bulb for three times as long. It really is hard work to create electricity, but the students at the CSUSB fitness center manage to provide that building’s power.

photo credit: thaisilvestre on flickr

This reminds me of a product I saw once, which was only a concept at the time. You know those Chinese stress balls (baoding balls)? They’re two stone or metal balls that you roll around in the palm of your hands. It works muscles in your hand that don’t get used much and improve dexterity and flexibility of your fingers. Well, one guy decided to fit batteries inside them, then using the kinetic energy created by moving them around, charge the batteries. Not a bad idea, if it’s effective. Then going for a bike ride could mean more than just exercise, but could potentially power the very light on it that blinks in the night. Hula hooping would be more than child’s play or a test of skill and could charge batteries for your camera or alarm clock. When you start to see the world in those terms, every form of kinetic energy becomes a potential way to convert it to stored energy.

The question is, is it effective? Would making a bicycle that can power its own lights, and perhaps some batteries, be worth the extra cost in design and manufacturing? I hope it is. It’d be a great way to encourage a fattening population to stay active. Something as simple as having one of those ab roller machine-type things that powers batteries can keep people moving by putting their feet on the handlebars and rolling it back and forth. Talk about a lazy man’s workout.

The language of nature

laelene Post in general blog，Tags: beliefs, numb3rs, opinion, pictures, quote, technology

14 September 2009

“We all use math everyday – to forecast weather, to tell time, to handle money. We also use math to analyze crime, reveal patterns, predict behavior. Using numbers, we can solve the biggest mysteries we know.”

~Numb3rs

photo credit: u-kult.de

I saw a commerical for Numb3rs and decided to start watching that now that show I’ve completed all seasons of NCIS. As I went through the first episode, I noted how often referrals to natural occurrences were made. The entire philosophy is that through the language of mathematics, we can find the equations (or “sentences”) that explain natural phenomenon. Add all that up and you have the backbone of mother nature’s workings. It makes me wonder if math is the language that she speaks in and expresses herself in.

Let me draw some parallels. To start with, numbers, letters, and symbols comprise the alphabet of complex mathematical equations, just like letters and accents comprise the alphabet of human words and sentences. Each one has a unique meaning and depending on how you combine them, meanings change drastically. From there, words combine to become sentences and sentences combine to express ideas, just like variables combine to create equations and equations aggregate to matrices (or something like that). I’m not exactly a mathematician, so forgive me if this metaphor is slightly inaccurate. I think you get the point though.

$A romanesco broccoli. Fascinating example of a fractal occuring in nature. photo credit: tiger.towson.edu$

A romanesco broccoli. Fascinating example of a fractal occuring in nature. photo credit: tiger.towson.edu

And it’s true, math is found all throughout our lives. Probability, percentages, the Fibonacci sequence, fractals… the list goes on. Everywhere we turn, we are unknowingly interacting with numbers or in ways that mathematics can explain or predict. Take the very computer you are using to read this now. Though it’s all nice and neatly presented to us in visually appealing ways, computer programs use binary code. Imagine trying decode 01110100011010000110100101110011 in binary. What does that turn out to be? Well, try it out yourself. So then binary would be a subset of mathematics, or a “dialect” of the language of nature, if you will. Of course, we use it ourselves on a daily basis when we make financial decisions (is 3% interest better or 2% interest with handling fees better?) or compare differences in our lives (is he more likely to agree to a lower price with free gifts or a higher price with no hidden charges?).

It’s no secret that the physics we encounter everyday abides by certain principles, guided by equations. So I guess it’s not shocking to posit that math explains nature. I guess it’s just strange to think that all those equations you began to learn in school are the building blocks for finding the patterns that we see in our lives. However, math is all about predictability and people generally want to find a definitive answer from the calculations they make. In life, there are just too many variables to consider and I don’t know if humans have the capacity to fully comprehend the immensity of the language we would need to master. No doubt as with non-native speakers of any language, we are bound to make grammatical errors that may give the gist of what we’re trying to express, but don’t do so so beautifully and elegantly as the one native speaker of that language: physics, the master of nature. I do believe that the physical world follows the guidelines of physics and that rulebook, though we have cracked much of, is still much a mystery to us.

[edit] A few episodes later, they actually said that mathematics is the language of nature in the show! Yup.

Funny animal sightings

laelene Post in photo blog，Tags: amusing, animals, pictures

13 September 2009

Ah, the interesting things I run into!

I have no clue if this serves a purpose. Kinda creepy.

Aww, it's like a panda+horse=porse?

The benefits of being a night owl

laelene Post in general blog，Tags: behavior, habits, pictures

12 September 2009

I came across an article that yet again confirms my sleeping habits as not bad, if even good! 🙂

Hahaha this was just too funny. Lighting has changed our way of life! photo credit: gearfuse.com

Sure, there are all those sayings about how sleeping early and getting up early is good for you and certainly that’s how people have lived for centuries, but it’s a new age now, with new rules. After electricity became common and staying up past sundown was no longer an issue, a whole world opened up to us humans. We can now operate continuously throughout the night with little inconvenience, thanks to our friend the light bulb. Artificial light allows us to do things at night and I see no reason why we shouldn’t take advantage of it if our biological clocks don’t complain.

I’ve always been a night owl, staying up until the early hours of the next day, then sleeping in until the afternoon. It’s just how my body functions and I, as a fan of what is “natural,” feel that I should just listen to my body. It’s nearly impossible for me to get up in the early morning without multiple alarms and a few minutes of extra napping. I also tend to tire out in the middle of the day and have a lull after eating lunch. I also can’t fall asleep before about 1 AM, tossing and turning impatiently if I try. On the flip side, sleep comes easy by 2 or 3 and I wake up on my own around noon (or even earlier at times). My body is happier with me, I feel well-rested, and I can stay active through the night again.

Now here's a fellow who looks mighty alert! photo credit: telegraph.co.uk

This study confirms this behavior, where early birds tend to crash earlier after waking up than night owls. Those who naturally wake up early got tired ten and a half hours after getting up, whereas those who naturally wake up later got more alert! Late risers’ circadian clocks gave them a boost around that time to keep them going, but early risers didn’t get that. So certainly if you’re naturally a late riser and forced to be up early in the morning, you’re going to be crashing sometime in the afternoon as you fight your circadian rhythm and the afternoon heat (and likely food coma from lunchtime). I also found an article explaining why some people may be night owls – it’s a mutation of a gene. It seems that night owls are on a cycle longer than a 24-hour day (mice that exhibited night owl tendencies were found to have up to a 27-hour day). Yet another thing that supports the idea that night owls’ energy levels last longer. I guess we just weren’t made for the rotational speed of this Earth!

All in all I’m not looking to say that getting up later is better, but I just like when I find justification that it’s fine for me to go on my own schedule. Where did this whole idea that early birds are healthier come from anyway? The only way I can see that is that when they wake up, the air is cool from the night and more encouraging for exercise. By the time I wake up, it’s far too hot out to reasonably work out outside, so then I’d have to wait until after dinner sometime, when I get lazy. Other than that, does it really matter? Feeling well-rested and alert is what is most important, whatever you need to do to obtain that.

Never underestimate the power of oversight

laelene Post in general blog，Tags: experiences, panda, pictures

11 September 2009

photo credit: travelizmo.com

Yesterday I joined Panda on a run to respond to a lockout and let someone back into their apartment. We were planning on going on a run to Ralph’s and I didn’t want to wait alone, so I went with him. As Apartment Coordinator, he gets a GEM (Global Electric Motorcar) car (or cart) to use on days that he’s on duty, to get between apartment complexes. It looks somewhat like a golf cart and runs completely on electricity. There are no doors and the maximum speed is 25 mph, but even that seems fast. It doesn’t help that the roads are super rickety and full of potholes. I was pretty terrified the whole ride and thankful when we reached our first destination: the rental office.

I waited as he went inside to make a key that would open the appropriate doors and then we went to find the lady who had locked herself out. After that, we returned the cart and left it charging, then went to try to get to Rite Aid before closing. I wanted to get some candy they had on sale, but unfortunately, they were already packing up by the time I arrived. We then went over to Ralph’s and got some groceries before heading back to the rental office so Panda could deactivate the key he had created. I got a cup of water to drink in there and we returned to the apartment. I settled in to do the normal things I do online, suffered through some spotty internet service, and eventually got ready for bed. As I was looking for my phone to set an alarm, I finally realized that something was wrong – I couldn’t find my phone.

I was having nightmares of finding something like this lying on the side of the road. photo credit: gammoth.com

Thinking back to what I did, I tried to look everywhere I had been in contact with. The search was limited to just the dining table and kitchen. I hadn’t sat on the couch or gone into the bedroom at all. I tried calling it, but didn’t hear a thing. A thorough search returned nothing, so we headed out to look in the rental office, where I thought I might have put it down to get water. With no luck, we checked the apartment once more and then went out to Ralph’s and Rite Aid again. The lost and found at Ralph’s had nothing and we didn’t see a thing along the path that we had taken earlier. I kept calling the phone, but it started to revert straight to voicemail, which worried me. Had it been run over?

We tried the apartment again and were getting ready to give up for the night, but then decided the apartment complex we had visited. It was the only place left. This time we took the GEM cart again, so Panda could return it to the office instead of having to wake up early in the morning to take it back. We scoured the place and even tried the rental office once more, with nothing. Reluctantly, I had to admit defeat and we went to the parking space for the cart. In a desperate attempt, I tried calling again on the drive and at a light, we heard a strange beeping sound. Panda said that it was not his phone, so I tried callign again. When he slowed down enough for us to listen for a sound, I heard it! Confused and disoriented, I tried to pinpoint its location and discovered it underneath my seat! There’s about an inch of space between the seat and the box thing it’s on and somehow it had slid there.

Just had one of those moments... photo credit: gigacrate.com

It turns out that there was no signal at one point because the cart was parked in the garage and couldn’t receive one. Then when we were out and about, the signal returned, but I never called when we were near the car itself. We checked every single place I had been and explored every single option. I even looked in places I knew it couldn’t be! But alas, in the end, I still got trumped and it truly was right under my nose the entire time. Amazing how you think you’ve thought of it all and checked everything only to find the one place that never crossed your mind was the very spot you should have looked first. Thank goodness for that timing that worked out just right, so we’d hear it. Otherwise who knows if my phone could have stayed there for so long.

Closing time

laelene Post in general blog，Tags: advice, experiences, food, ninja, panda, pictures

10 September 2009

I’m often disappointed with the all too prompt closing times that stores and restaurants have. I remember one time nearly two years ago when Ninja and I rushed down to a Japanese restaurant in Westwood, arriving 20 minutes before they close only to find they were turning in early for the night. I understand that by that time, everyone is eager to call it a day and close up shop, but if you claim to be open until a certain time and don’t stick to it, that’s just poor customer service. Sadly, this seems to be a common occurrence, as I found today when I showed up to a drug store just as they were supposed to be closing only to find the doors were locked and the people inside were just cashiers cleaning out.

Good service would be the restaurant that doesn’t close its doors and stop serving food until the very minute they claim they are open until. Good service would be the store that allows that one last customer to sneak by and buy something at closing. Good service is going that extra step to make sure that people who want to be a customer get to be. Otherwise, you risk losing your customer base to your competitors, who may be treating them better by staying open longer or being more flexible with closing. One thing’s for certain: I lose respect for companies that are so overly eager to close up shop each night, inconvenicing me after all my effort to get there on time.

They know how to do things right.

Once two summers ago, I even called a frozen yogurt store just before going and got there but two minutes too late. Had they told me on the phone, don’t worry, we’ll wait a few minutes for you, they could have made one more big sale and kept me a happy returning customer. I opt for their competitors now and that shop has closed down anyway. There’s no better way to make a good impression than to stay open a little longer to make your customers happy. It’s like Kohl’s sales – they say it lasts until 2 PM, then as the time nears, they make an announcement to prolong the sale until 4 PM if it’s still going strong, then again if they’re still getting a good response. That makes customers feel valued and they get to enjoy more time to buy more things. Win-win, isn’t it?

Quality (and satisfying) service. That's what I'm talking about!

You can really tell a good company by their willingness to keep their doors open and their registers on. It’s also reflected in the employees’ attitudes, which is a major reason for whether or not you can sneak in the last purchase. Panda and I had a great experience at Chick-fil-a on Labor Day, when we went in to get the free chicken burger offer for wearing our favorite team’s logo. Arriving just past 7, we found the entire mall shutting down, much to our surprise. We rushed to find the Chick-fil-a in the food court and saw that their lights had been turned off and it looked like they were closed. Desperate, we decided to go check it out anyway, since we saw some people loitering by their registers and we didn’t drive all that way to leave empty-handed. Thankfully, the ladies working there were still taking orders and serving customers, all of whom left with happy hearts. Now that’s some great service! They were still serving us after closing time even though all we were getting was free food! Panda was telling me how they are a respectful company known for their good practices and I don’t doubt it. I’ve definitely gained an appreciation for them, both because of their food quality and superb customer service.

So to all you out there who might work for or run a business that involves customers visiting, a word to the wise… keep your doors open at least until the time you say they will be! You’ll build a much stronger customer base that way.

Forever “beta”

laelene Post in general blog，Tags: doc, internet, mommy, observation, pictures, technology

09 September 2009

Is it just me or does beta scream cop-out to you too?

photo credit: theproducersperspective.com

At first it was a great idea. Have a beta version and allow exclusive access to dedicated users/customers so they can use it and help you figure out all the glitches. It’s like getting free manpower to test out the functionality of your product! Then you could open it up to the public with minimal complaints. Plus, your customers feel good about themselves because they got a sneak peek at your new product. You get valuable feedback and they get to feel special. Pretty good solution all around, huh?

Unfortunately, all good ideas can be misused and morph into something it wasn’t intially meant for. At times, unforseen uses and changes can be good, but often it is not. Nowadays, it seems companies use beta just as an excuse for any glitches that their product may have. How many sites do you see that still have beta listed on a corner of the logo, even after weeks or months of being up? At that point, beta is just a crutch for the companies so they can’t be blamed for malfunctions. That’s how I see it anyway. Would you ever buy a computer or car that was still considered beta? It signals a certain higher risk rate and I know I wouldn’t go for something like that.

For the same reason, my mom doesn’t want me to buy new technology as soon as it becomes available. I mentioned the new solar panel on the Prius 3rd generation and she warned me against using that sort of technology too soon (not that I wanted to buy such an ugly car, but the technology sure is awesome). I mentioned this when with friends and Doc agreed – his family had bought a van with automatic sliding doors as soon as they became commerically available and ran into a lot of problems with that vehicle. For the majority of people, it’s better to let others try something new first, then get it after it had reliably performed well for a period. I guess that explains why there are so few early adopters out there!

Reusable toting

laelene Post in general blog，Tags: environment, goals, opinion, panda, pictures, shopping

08 September 2009

photo credit: ecopromosonline.com

Everywhere you go now, you can find those “eco-bags” available around every corner, in every shop. It’s one of those fads that everyone seems to buy into, but it makes me wonder if it’s worth all the hype. Sure, it’s great to have sturdy bags like that that you can use and reuse time and time again. But the problem is, a solution like that doesn’t quite work without the full commitment of the people as well. They’ve got to change their behavior to match the goals of producing those reusable tote bags: conservation. If everyone used just one or two of those bags with every grocery run (or even any sort of shopping), a lot can be saved. But the problem is, people are getting these things, then forgetting to bring them along to use each time they go out. Every now and then they may decide to just get another one and use them all the next time. But of course, without a change in habits, you’ll never get around to it.

I was reminded of this when I read about a lady who has reached the brink and decided she has enough of these bags now. It’s more harmful to overproduce these bags than the cheap plastic ones we’ve grown accustomed to. After all, they require more material and certainly more energy to create. If people still use too many of them, the problem we have doesn’t go away – it merely mutates. So, recently, I have made sure that whenever Panda and I go shopping for food, we bring our collection of reusable bags or suffer the consequences of having to carry everything we bought with no bags (or maybe just one to be used for collecting trash in). We also walk to the store, which is a 15- to 20-minute trip by foot. After spending the time and energy to get there only to find we forgot to bring bags, it’s a personal punishment to not use bags as a way of drilling that habit into our routine. Lately I’ve begun to hang the bags on the door so it’s harder to disregard them as we head out the door and it’s been working! I’ve become more conscious of the steps to take before going out to buy some food.

photo credit: ilovecostco.com

Costco’s a great place that does away with the whole bag concept and uses boxes, if anything, to pack up your cart. Though it never hit me until Panda mentioned it, perhaps I like that place for that very fact (and of course the fact that they offer bulk items). It works really well because the type of bags they’d have to get to hold the items they sell really isn’t worth all the waste it would create (though I’m sure they’d make great doubles as large trash bags). I think all stores should either do away with bags or start charging a premium that will really make people rethink (what would that take? A quarter a bag? A dollar a bag?). Any bags used should also be biodegradable, so people can take them home, use them for trash, then not worry about them clogging up the landfills permanently. The SunChips people have this great new compostable bag coming out that is completely biodegradable within weeks! Wouldn’t it be awesome if supermarkets used that kind of material?

Next step is to start bringing my own mugs and bottles to be filled when I get fast food.

Scenes from a county fair

laelene Post in photo blog，Tags: county fair, food, games, los angeles, pictures

07 September 2009

Hordes of people enjoying a beautiful day out.

For those too lazy to walk.

Oh the things to do!

The games to play!

The prizes to win!

And the snacks to eat!

Some curious offers...

...and some strange selections.

Large families

laelene Post in general blog，Tags: environment, future, observation, opinion, pictures

06 September 2009

photo credit: babybowsonline.com

You know, in thinking of family size, most people think of the social or psychological impacts, but rarely do they consider the environmental impact. When you do, a whole new world opens up, with red flags popping up everywhere. By default, more people means more consumption, more waste, and more pollution. A big family has a huge carbon footprint, not only because they eat a lot, but even just the amount of air they breathe and carbon dioxide they exhale!

This is an interesting perspective brought on by Alan Weisman as he commented on the Duggar family and the wisdom (or lack of) in having so many children. As he points out, we’ve only got one planet and a limited atmosphere. Our resources are not getting bigger, but the population is and families of this size are just exacerbating the problem.

A number of factors have caused much of the population to delay or even give up childbirth, but I’m quite sure most people don’t do it because it can be bad for the environment. I think this should be considered though, and would be good reasoning for limiting the number of children you choose to have. After all, the more children you bring into the world, the more you are indirectly contributing to all the climate problems. Especially if your family is big on meat consumption and gas-guzzling activities. Funny how environmental health is harmed with greater Darwinian “fitness.”

photo credit: bioinfo.mpg.de

I wonder if our genes will ever mutate to a point that will make us want to propagate, but not too much, since we could potentially run our own life source into the ground. After all, they just want to survive generation after generation, but with no other way to continue on, what will they do? It seems more likely that species that can continue living even if humans cannot will just go on and those genes will become the new super genes that have managed to survive all catastrophes.

I guess it’s unfortunate that evolution has pretty much come to a stop for us, what with all kinds of unnatural ways to keep people alive and help them reproduce when they otherwise would have been “weeded out” by the system. Not that it’s bad that we can keep more people alive against previous odds, but it could mean doom for us as a species, or even a planet, if we don’t change our ways and continue to be so wasteful. As every gene selfishly does whatever to get us to reproduce, it is blissfully unaware of how it could be destroying the very vessels that they use to survive down the line.

I guess it begs the question: should having big families be considered irresponsible to the environment? Technically it is… though I suppose creationists would argue that every child is a gift of God, etc. I’m sure you’ve all heard that line before. Is this a case of creationism and evolution teaming up to produce a dangerous outcome? Both doctrines basically say that the more children you have, the better. Environmentalists may be wary of the legitimacy of that claim though. I think, as with all things, it’s good to take it in moderation. It may not be a perfect bell curve, but it sure resembles more of that than a straight line going up to infinity. Certainly there’s a range that is “optimal” (if there’s even such a thing) and 18 is way over. At the same time, if everyone had NO children, we’d die out in a single generation. How thin is the line we walk?

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