Investigation: Replacing Xfinity Gigabit Voice Modem

I recently upgraded to gigabit internet from Xfinity - 1000Mbps down, 300Mbps up - and they sent me an XB7 or XB8 modem.

Unfortunately, the Wi-Fi transmitter on the device cannot be turned off. The home, guest, and xfinitywifi networks can be disabled, but the "Hidden" network used for Xfinity Home Security cannot be. Enabling bridge mode on the modem's router (so it's "just a modem" without the possibility of routing over Wi-Fi), did not turn off the transmitter. 

Here is what I found out about purchasing my own modem.

In order to replace the XB7 modem, you need four devices:
1. A modem - to convert the coaxial signal to ethernet
2. A router - to assign IP addresses and route traffic from the modem (WAN) to the LAN
3. A switch - connect multiple ethernet ports to support multiple devices (most routers include this)
4. Wireless access points - Wi-Fi receivers/transmitters (many routers include this)

Amazon has 3 Xfinity voice modems:
1. Netgear CM2050V: $300 - up to 2.3Gbe
2. Arris Surfboard T25: $104 refurbished - either 950Mbe or 800Mbe download, depending on source.
3. Netgear Nighthawk 1150v: $140 refurbished - Up to 960Mbe

There are a number of good gigabit routers:
1. TP-Link ER605 - gigabit router, cheap, easy. No link aggregation (because CPI can't handle it)
2. MicroTik hEX S - amazing feature set, non-user-friendly. Might support link aggregation
3. Google WiFi - supports mesh Wi-Fi and probably has great software, requires switch
4. ASUS EBG15 - might support WAN link aggregation (according to AI)

For a single gigabit modem, link aggregation is not needed. However, the modems listed above claim to be suited for Xfinity plans "up to 2Gbe", but those are lies. If the modems did support 2Gbe speeds, link aggregation would enable connecting the modem to the router with 2x 1Gbe connections.

Unfortunately, the kicker to that there are no voice modems in the Next Gen Speed Tier in Xfinity's list of supported modems. According to Reddit, modems outside this tier have upload speeds limited to 24Mbps.

If this had of worked out, I would have tried the Arris Surfboard T25 and TP-Link ER605, but it's not worth $200 to test if it would indeed have limited upload speeds. I'll have to try something else...

Investigation: UV radiation

UVA, UVB, UV Index, and SPF.  Here are some things I kind of knew about - UVA and UVB are bad, and SPF is good - but I didn't really understand.  What started me thinking about this was a set of eclipse glasses I bought from Amazon that was later removed, maybe because they were fake.  But why does that matter?  How would I know?

And can I buy a tool to help investigate this?

What is all this stuff

Ultraviolet light is light with wavelengths slightly shorter than that of visible light, with the following ranges:

    UVB: 280-314nm

    UVA: 315-400nm

UVA and UVB cause different kinds of damages to the human body.   As a broad generalization, UVB causes short term issues like sunburn and UVA causes long term issues like skin cancer.  Remember that UVB light at 314nm will affect you approximately the same as UVA light at 315nm, so the effects are not as clear cut as the broad generalization.

The nice thing about sunburn (and UVB), so to speak, is that it helps you and your body know that something bad is happening so that you both can protect yourselves.  You get out of the sun.  Your body builds melanin to protect against UVA and UVB.  Let's remember this for later.

UV Index and SPF

It's probably clear that people learned about sunburns earlier than skin cancer and when we designed our products to prevent the harmful effects of the sun, we designed products to block UVB (sunburns).

Then we, as a society, created the UV Index to measure UVB radiation.  And we created an SPF rating for products that measure how much UVB radiation it blocks.

Here is how the UV Index is calculated: https://www.epa.gov/sunsafety/calculating-uv-index-0

Wavelength		Weight
290nm		15
320nm		5
400nm		3

From the above grid, you can see that the UV Index weights UVB higher than UVA because UVB causes more sunburn.  This indicates that the UV Index is not suitable for determining the long term effects of sun exposure (UVA).  What I find most interesting about the way the UV Index is calculated in the United State is that it uses elevation, cloud cover, and ozone measurements to estimate ground level exposure, instead of actually measuring it.

So if we are relying on high-SPF rated sunscreen to protect us from the sun, what are we doing?  We are preventing our skin from being burned which encourages us to stay outside longer, exposed to cancer-causing UVA rays, all while blocking our natural melanin creation which is supposed to protect us from UVA.  This sounds a lot like a recipe for greater long-term skin damage, which is probably what happened.

Broad Spectrum

What about broad spectrum SPF sunscreen?  That must block UVA and UVB.  According to thesunscreendoc.blogspot.com/2015/08/, which I did not verify, most broad spectrum sunscreens just block a small amount of UVA.  The only ingredients that protect against both are zinc oxide, Tinosorb M, and Tinosorb S.

The writer of this blog has created a sunscreen company, selling the Sun Whip brand sunscreens, so it can't be taken as unbiased, but everyone does seem to agree that zinc oxide blocks UVA and UVB.  But zinc oxide is super white and looks pretty bad.  However, that's "old" zinc oxide; now we have encapsulated zinc oxide, which is supposed to go on clear. 

Excited, I decided to test that claim with derma-e, which the EWG seems to like.  Unfortunately, it's "clear zinc oxide" is still white and difficult to spread on my hairy skin.

This blog seems to like the Sun Whip brand sunscreens from the blog-doctor above, among others: https://beautyeditor.ca/2017/06/19/zinc-sunscreen-for-face.

And, for good measure, here is a list of bad sunscreens for kids, also from the EWG.

The sunscreen doc also says that windshields do not block UVA.  Let's check that out later.

Tools

I found a handful of tools that could measure UV light, ranging from $25 to $250.  Unfortunately, the only brand that published the spectral response graph of their sensors was Solarmeter, the one that costs $250.

The Solarmeter Model 5.0 UV Meter measures UVA and UVB: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01GT4EID0

This graph is nice, because it covers UVA and UVB, with an emphasis on UVA (the high response at the right-hand side of the graph).

Solarmeter also has a Model 6.5 UV Index Meter that tries to calculate the UV Index.  However, it appears to be the same device as above with an added filter that blocks UVA light, further indication that UV Index ignores UVA exposure.

The $250 price tag is unfortunate because all Solarmeters cost $250, even the visible light meter, which is simply a $2 sensor, a chip, a cheap screen, and a button.  So, I did a little search for UV sensors to see if I could build my own meter.  Adafruit has two UV sensors, about $6 each:

GUVA 1918 (Analog): https://www.adafruit.com/product/1918

VEML 6070 (I2C): https://www.adafruit.com/product/2899

Again, unfortunately, the spectral graph of the Solarmeter is much nicer than these two, so that's the one I bought.

Measurements

So now that I have this tool, what science can I do?

First, the noon-day sun where I live measures 4.5 mW/cm2.

Through my car windshield: 0

Through my car windows: 0

Through my car sunroof: 0.2

Through my wife's car windshield: 0

Through my wife's car windows: 2.0  (that's pretty high)

My car has a darkening film, which is probably why my car has higher UV protection.  After taking these measurements, we will likely put film on my wife's car too.

My wife's rather high reading is consistent with the idea that car side windows block UVB but not UVA.  I would like to test this with UVA and UVB band pass filters, but sometimes science is just too expensive and it'll be cheaper to just put film on the car.

My sunglasses: 0

Real eclipse glasses: 0

Possibly-fake eclipse glasses: 0

House windows: 0.4 (but more measurements are needed for different days and sun positions)

Investigation: Jews

I have heard a few things said of the Jews at my Christian church that, when coupled with the messages of the Old Testament, prevent me from forming a cohesive story in my head of "what is a Jew."  I get the impression that many pastors have a very narrow and biased view of Jews, so I thought I'd test this view.

Luckily, a friend of mine happens to be Jewish, rather intelligent, and the son of a professor of Jewish studies.

Roughly, here is the portrait of Jews as painted in the sermons I have attended.  Jews are roughly the same as Christians except:

• They believe in the Old Testament and not New Testaments
• They follow (or should follow) all the rules in the Old Testament

So I asked him two questions.  Or, as it turns out, three.

Question 0

"Can I ask you some questions regarding what Jews believe?"

Aaron immediately responded with "What do Christian's believe?"  I responded with something that roughly encapsulated Catholics and Protestants, but he reminded me of the other Christians I might be implicitly ignoring - Lutheran's, whom I know nothing about, and Mormon's, who non-Mormon's generally ignore. 

And then he asked a more specific question, "How many Christians are pagans?"  I had to admit that I don't know what a pagan is, which was apparently the correct answer.  There are Christians who believe that Jesus was born a man and became divine sometime during his life.  This is Adoptionism, which my have been practiced in the early church before the doctrine of the Trinity was created (in the 2nd century, with refinements through arguments into the 4th century).  His implication is that if someone worships a man, born mortal and made divine, than that person follows a pagan religion.

To top it off, some Christians don't believe in the Trinity.

So what do Christians believe?  Each sub-group has specific beliefs, and believes that the other sub-groups, who have differing beliefs, are wrong.  And if you were to graph all these beliefs, for all Christians, the centroid of those beliefs may not represent any group.

The same is true of the Jews.  There is no simple description of what Jews believe because the individual beliefs vary widely.  Also, the traditions of the Jews have changed over time, perhaps as a result of wars, raids, etc.  There is a tribe of Jews recently discovered in Africa that did not experience persecution by Christians and Muslims and their traditions may hint at what the old traditions were.  In particular, they open their doors at the beginning of some particular ceremony instead of the end; Jews in the rest of the world open their doors at the end, after the meal has been consumed, because during Islamic occupation any house visibly having a feast would be raided.

From a much earlier conversation, I was taught about the current establishment of Jewish matrilineal descent (children of Jewish mothers are born Jewish) was a change from the traditional patrilineal descent (children of Jewish fathers are born Jewish), based on war casualties.  So many men were dying in wars that the culture would die if women could not pass on the culture.

Question 1

"I haven't seen much mention of Heaven and Hell in the Old Testament.  Do Jews believe in Heaven and Hell?" 

In many Christians' belief systems, the concept of Heaven and Hell is vitally important, perhaps of paramount importance.  If it is of such great importance, why did God not tell his chosen people about it?

Again, Aaron wasn't going to tell me what all Jews believe, or even what most Jews believe, and he wouldn't guess at what percentages believed what.  However, he would answer what, from his necessarily limited perspective, the Jews that he knows or heard about believe.

You can map the spread of Judaism with a tree, the root planted somewhere around Israel and reaching out to all the continents.  Every Jew is somewhere on the tree, and groups of Jews who live closer to each other are closer on the tree and more likely to believe similar things and have similar cultures.  On top of this, there are major cultural forces, like the various movements such as Orthodox Judaism, which catch on and homogenize the Jewish beliefs across cultures.

What we see is that many Jews are influenced by the major movements and also by their local environments.  Jews in North America are more likely to believe in Heaven and Hell than those in Israel because of the pervasive Christian culture in North America.

As for the Old Testament, there is no concept of Hell.  The word Sheol which is translated to Hell means either grave, or "that stinking pit outside the city," signifying an unpleasant place, but not one of eternal torment.

Incidentally, The New Testament does not support the current Christian idea of Hell as a place of eternal damnation either.

Heaven is slightly different.  There is no concept of the Christian Heaven in the Old Testament, but there are hints that something exists.  In particular, the thummim and seraphim are non-worldly artifacts, and if they are not of this world, and they are from somewhere, then there must be another place not in this world.  This is a far cry from a place of eternal bliss.

Aaron also had a comment concerning the carrot and stick approach to Heaven and Hell often used today to entice people to follow church teachings.  In Judaism there is not a concept of "if you don't follow these rules, bad things will happen to you."  Instead, they have "you will follow these rules."  There is no option if you want to live God's way.

Question 2

"Do Jews believe that all the books of the Old Testament are true?

It is taught in my church that Christians are expected to believe that all the books of the bible at true.  However, there seems to be a hierarchy in the Old Testament, with the Torah being more important than the rest.  What's up with that?

Aaron said that some Jews believe that all books in the Old Testament are true, just as some Christians believe that all books in the Bible are true.  However, most believe that some are stories.

In particular, the Old Testament, known as the Tanakh, is broken into three sections, the Torah (the first five books of Moses), the Nevi'im (the works of the Prophets), and the Ketuvim (the Writings).  The word TaNaKh, is formed of the first three consonants of Torah, Nevi'im, and Writings.  Here is a talk about the Dead Sea Scrolls, given by a Jewish scholar to Jews, where he describes "the Torah being big divine inspiration, the Prophets being a little less, and the Writings being, again, even less - a descending order of inspiration."  This description states that the books of the Ketuvim "do not present themselves as the fruits of direct divine inspiration."

In particular, Chronicles is currently part of the Bible, but the author is interpreting other books and we don't know if he thought he was writing a book or the Bible or we took his interpretive book and added it to the Bible.

My thought goes something like this.  The Jews have a very powerful pattern of passing information from one generation to the next, an extremely solid oral and written tradition and a history of unbroken ceremonies and lessons.  They are much, much better than Christians at preserving knowledge through the centuries.  So why is it that Christians do not use this amazing resource to help understand the Jewish Bible?  If Christians generally believe that the books of the Old Testament are true and Jews generally believe some are not-so-much, then it is highly likely that this particular Christian belief is a result of recent changes in mindset and thinking.

Missing Question 3

It was also my intent to ask him about the many laws the Jews are purported to follow, with The Old Testament often being referred to as "The Law."  This guy, describes the Torah as instruction and calling it Law is unfounded in scripture and against the general intention of forming a relationship with God.

In another conversation, it was explained to me that some of the Jewish laws are meant to protect the people from breaking the commandments.  For example, from Deuteronomy 14:21, "You shall not boil a young goat in its mother's milk," becomes "do not eat milk and meat together."  In order to guarantee that you never boil a young goat in its mother's milk, keep the two foods separate.  What if you have cows milk and lamb meat?  It should be okay, but how sure are you that your cow's milk is really cow's milk?  How sure are you that what you think of as lamb's meat is really lamb's meat?  The truth is that you cannot be sure, so better be safe than break a commandment.

Commentary

I have often been in situations where someone makes a claim about another group of people, not necessarily in a religions context.  In church, it is often a sweeping generalization of another religion and what people in those religions believe, be it Judaism, Buddhism, or any other.  I often wonder, why don't we just ask an intelligent Jew, Buddhist, or other?  I think we will often find that our simplistic notions are flawed.

A new barbell

It's been exactly one year since my last weight training update.  I was stuck at a 212 lbs until a few months ago when I finally bought a new Olympic barbell.  It's black metal oxide and pretty sexy.  I also picked up some great steal Troy and IGX weights from Craigslist.  I've got about 600 lbs, which should last me a while.

You'll notice in my picture above that I covered the grips in electrical tape and scotch tape.  I added the electrical tape because the grip was far too aggressive, and even at 100 lbs it ripped into the fleshy bits of my hand; it was unusable.  Here's what it looked like up close:

The electrical tape is a bit too smooth so my grip doesn't feel very secure, but I haven't had the time to try anything else yet.  I might fill the grooves with something later.

The scotch tape is my fault.  I bought a power lifting bar instead of an Olympic bar, not knowing there was a difference, and the longer knurling cuts into my knees on the squat.  I use the tape to make it smoother.  However, I think this was the only 5 foot long Olympic-weight bar I could find, so I didn't really have a choice.

Before finding the nice weights on Craigstlist (which took a few months), I purchased some cast iron Weider weights from Big 5 Sports.  The first one I put on my bar immediately scratched it.  Always up for some experimentation, I decided to try and fix it, by:

1. Removing the [excessively thick] paint using a chemical peal and a wire brush attached to my hand drill.
2. Smoothing the inner circle using a grinding stone attached to my hand drill.
3. Painting it black with canned spray paint.

Here is the result after the peal and grinding, beside the original.


In the end, it worked okay.  I didn't scratch my bar immediately, but wasn't even close to the smoothness of steal.  And the diameter of the inner holes were still about 2mm too large so the weights rattled.  I only used them once and it was not at all worth the effort.

And here's where I'm at in all my barbell exercises.
Deadlift: 239 lbs
Squat: 199 lbs
Standing Press: 99 lbs

A heavier barbell

I have run out of weight plates and reached the limit of my barbell in the deadlift.

My deadlift is now at 212 lbs and I'll need new equipment to increase it!  While not super impressive, it's 50 lbs heavier than when I started.

And here's where I'm at in all my barbell exercises.
Deadlift: 212 lbs
Squat: 145 lbs
Standing Press: 82 lbs

A better barbell

Let's start with the obvious: I'm cheap.  Or perhaps frugal.  And lazy; we shouldn't forget that.  I want to build some strength and don't want to bother driving to or paying for a gym, let alone waiting for equipment or listening to the awful music.  However, my standard weights and barbell pose a few problems:

1. The weight plates are too small to do deadlifts, about 8 inches in diameter less than Olympic weights, so the bar lays too close to the floor. 
2. It takes forever to change weight plates with the screw locking mechanism.

I have a history of hurting my back with squats and deadlifts at the gym.  The last time I tried them I was out of the gym for 3 months.  This time I'm following Starting Strength by Mark Rippetoe and, surprisingly, his advice and instructions are more cohesive and useful than the "training" I got at my last gym.  I highly recommend this if you plan to gain strength with free weights.

But my weights aren't the greatest.

To fix the height-off-the-ground problem, I built a simple platform using a single 4x4 (cut to 1 foot sections at Home Depot), a cheap rubber mat, a 3/4" x 1.5" piece of wood, and some scrap MDF:

 

This was a pretty simple project.  My only mistake was gluing the 4x4's together before screwing them to the MDF.  The glue seeped out and pooled on my workbench.  I made two of these:



These platforms work great and also help keep my deadlifts honest.  I can see if the bar inches forward during my lifts by their placement on the blocks.  If you read Starting Strength, Mark will tell you many times that there is a tendency to move the bar forward before, during, and after your lift, and I can see easily when this happens, prevent it, and learn to lift correctly.

In the picture above you'll also notice how I modified my bar.  First, I got Lock Jaw collars to replace the barbell screw locks.  These save me many valuable seconds in a workout set since I can take the lock off in about 1 second instead of 10.  While this is good, when changing weights they kept getting caught on the spiraling screw mechanism.  My solution, again too cheap to buy a better bar, was to cover it up with duct tape.  Now my weights move fairly smoothly and the bar looks bad ass.  As a bonus, there is less space between the bar and weights so there's less slop in their connection.  I'll soon be adding one or two more layers of duct tape to make this even smoother and create a better fit between the bars and the weights.

That's it.  A simple project, but it made a huge difference in my happiness working out with these weights.

What babies know

I've been postponing this post for a long time since I was expecting the list to grow.

There are many things a baby doesn't know, like how to walk, sing, and do long division.  Here is the list of things that my baby didn't know how to do which I wasn't expecting:

1. Sleep.  I kinda knew this one.  But my kid had to be taught how to sleep.  I suspect he would of learned on his own given more time, however.

2. See moving object.  When my son started to be able to see me, he could recognize faces.  If I was in front of him, he'd pay attention.  However, if I moved my head by a few inches, his eyes stayed affixed to my previous location for at least a second.  Once I stopped moving, he would notice out of the corner of his eye a face and then turn to my direction and look again.  It's like I didn't exist when moving, but once stopped a new me materialized.

3. Binocular vision.  This one was cool and it was exciting to see him change.  Even when my son could see me, he often only looked with one eye, or perhaps one eye first and then the other.  While one eye looked at me, the other was free to wander and see other things.  Over time, he learned to move both at the same time and converge on the me he wanted to see.  I don't know if he can see in stereo yet, but he can certainly judge distance.  And I suspect that he could have learned to use both eyes independently like a chameleon, but the advantages of stereopsis and binocular summation are too enticing.

4. Left/right independence.  When my son could first grab things, he used his right arm.  Then he tried his left.  I could see him intently trying to acquire the toy but every time he tried to move his left arm, the right one would go instead.  If his left hand was in the right position, his right hand would make a grasping motion.  It's like his brain had learned how to do a "grasp" but didn't know there was a "left grasp" vs. "right grasp" yet.  The little guy got it eventually; he did try really hard.

And that's it.  Everything else you'd expect.

My son never really cried until last week when he saw a baby cry and get lots of attention; now he does it frequently.  So I guess learning to cry is another one.

C# Resize Image / Fit Image

After spending a good 10 minutes trying to find a program that can batch resize images from the command line by someone that looks trustworthy (enough to install on a shared server), I gave up and decided to write my own.

Here is the code in case it helps anyone.  This is C# and it compiles for .NET 2.0.  You'll need to add The assembly reference System.Drawing to your project.

ResizeImage.exe <filename> <maxWidth> <maxHeight> 

For example, calling "ResizeImage.exe hello.jpg 100 100" will decrease the width of hello.jpg to be 100 pixel or less and the height to be 100 pixels or less, maintaining its aspect ratio.  If hello.jpg is already smaller than 100x100, there will be no change.

You can batch resize many images by using a batch file.  For example, this will resize all images in a specified directory, including all subdirectories:

@FOR /F "delims=" %%A IN ('dir %1 /s /b') DO @"ResizeImage.exe" "%%A" %2 %3

For example, "BatchResize.bat c:\images 100 100" will resize all images in c:\images\...

using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Text;
using System.Drawing;
using System.IO;


namespace ResizeImage
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            if (args.Length != 3)
            {
                Console.WriteLine("Please use arguments: ResizeImage myfile.jpg 640 480");
                return;
            }
            string fileName = args[0];
            int width = int.Parse(args[1]);
            int height = int.Parse(args[2]);
            if( width <= 0 || height <= 0 )
            {
                Console.WriteLine("Invalid width ("+width+") or height ("+height+")");
                return;
            }
            try
            {
                System.IO.FileStream fs = new FileStream(fileName, FileMode.Open);
                Image originalImage = Image.FromStream(fs);
                fs.Close();
                Image resizedImage = ResizeImage(originalImage, width, height);
                if (resizedImage != null)
                {
                    originalImage = null;
                    resizedImage.Save(fileName);
                    Console.WriteLine("Converted: " + fileName);
                }
            }
            catch( System.IO.FileNotFoundException )
            {
                Console.WriteLine("File not found: " + fileName);
            }
            catch (System.Exception e)
            {
                Console.WriteLine("Exception: " + e.ToString());
            }
        }

        static Image ResizeImage(Image image, int maxWidth, int maxHeight)
        {
            // Get the image's original width and height
            int originalWidth = image.Width;
            int originalHeight = image.Height;

            // To preserve the aspect ratio
            float ratioX = (float)maxWidth / (float)originalWidth;
            float ratioY = (float)maxHeight / (float)originalHeight;
            float ratio = Math.Min(ratioX, ratioY);

            // New width and height based on aspect ratio
            int newWidth = (int)(originalWidth * ratio);
            int newHeight = (int)(originalHeight * ratio);
            if (newWidth >= originalWidth || newHeight >= originalHeight)
                return null;

            return (Image)(new Bitmap(image, new Size(newWidth, newHeight)));
        }
    }
}

Schrödinger's Poo

Definition: the state of the interior of a child's diaper immediately before being changed, where it is in the quantum superposition of being both clean and poo-filled.

This deviation from my regular highbrow material should make it obvious that I recently had a child.

Phones are dangerous

Many people believe the ban of phones and other electronic devices on planes is a bit ridiculous.  I'm one of those people.  Apparently the flight attendant on American Airlines are as well.  On a domestic flight last night, as the airliner was landing and we were all in our seats with our electronic devices turned off, the flight attendant was using an AT&T branded American Airlines cell phone, possibly a Galaxy S3.  She was using an seat assignment app but also launching other apps until she heard me comment on her blatant disregard of her own instructions.

Airplanes fly through thunderstorms, radio waves, satellite communications, and all other sorts of radiation throughout each flight.  Cell phones work on planes, which means the radiation from cell phone towers can get through the hull regardless of whether or not cell phones are used.  The thought of an iPod messing with the sensitive equipment is a bit hard to believe.  Requesting that Kindles be turned off is just ridiculous, as its on state is no different than its off state when its wireless features are turned off.

The situation becomes more suspicious when you consider the different approaches by different airlines.  Some planes have WiFi onboard.  Some have a mini cell tower.  Over-the-ear headphones are banned on some airlines while ear buds are allowed.  iPod's cannot be used but the in-flight entertainment is fine.

I suspect there are three reasons for turning off cell phones:
1.  The cell phone network was not designed for phones to see more than a few cell phone towers and the communication protocol was not designed for rapid cell switching.
2.  Each cell in the cell phone network has limited capacity and allowing people to call/text when they land or at the airport could conceivably prevent the pilot from using the network if their radio dies.
3.  It's safer for the airline to tell people to turn off electronics if their could be a problem, then to crash and be the first to determine there is actually a problem.

I also suspect there are reasons for restricting music:  It limits the ability to hear important instructions.

I could even make a stretch and say hard objects like laptops/tablets would be physically dangerous in a crash and should be stowed when crashes are most likely.

Maybe it's just easier to create a strict ban of all electronics.  But creating a false reason just engenders disbelief and resentment.

Science: the new religion

Why are drugs sold by actors in lab coats?  What makes a fruit super?

I live in a country where science is paraded, used as tool to spread personal or corporate beliefs, and generally assumed to be correct.  I live in a country where people pit science against religions.  And I wonder, do I live in a country where science has become a religion?

Picture this.  If you take a man, give him 4 years of seminary school and an apprenticeship, put a robe on him, stick him behind a pulpit and let him talk, the people of his congregation will often accept what he says as Gospel.  He can control the crowd and influence their decisions.  If he says that science or a different religion is wrong, he is believed.

If you take a man, give him 4 years of college and some research study, put a lab coat on him, stick him behind a camera and let him talk, the people watching their televisions will often accept what he says as law.  He can control a viewership and influence their actions.  If he says that religion is wrong, he is believed.

It is not infrequent to have a conversation with someone who believes something because a scientist said so on TV or in a magazine, was picked up in a newspaper article, or because a semi-related study drew some conclusion.  Do humans share a common ancestor with gorillas?  Does fish oil give you healthy fatty acids?  Does stretching before exercise increase injury?  Does a belly jiggling machine help you lose weight and build muscle?  The answer to these questions may all be yes, or no, but defending them because a scientist says so is not a good reason.  You can find a scientist that is biased towards either.  It is the same as believing a priest because of his position.  The fallacy is the same.  And I wonder if the people in the crowds are the same - would the person who blindly worships science today have blindly followed a religion if born to different circumstances?

I see this a lot in new age religious text.  How quantum mechanics or some strange property of light is used to justify their beliefs.  The same holds true for health magazines.  The mere fact that they are inspired to use science as a way to validate their claims (when the science rarely applies) implies that people are more likely to believe it - if you invoke the word of science, your argument has weight.  However, reality is more like this: http://xkcd.com/1240/.

I believe that messages should be considered - thought upon, weighed, compared with personal experience of reality, and then dismissed, accepted, or challenged - regardless of who they come from.  For ideas that are not worth the effort, or you don't have the information to judge, then keep them separate from yourself, keep them as other peoples' ideas.

Science is great, and the scientific method is both obvious (now) and incredibly useful.  But there is a difference between believing particular statements of science and believing that the scientific method helps us understand our natural world.  The first is either faith or conclusions based on judgment of prior experience and the second is a judgment of principles.

Religion can be great and incredibly useful.  But there is a difference between believing the teachings of a religion and believing that a religion helps us know truth.  Again, the first requires faith or judgments based on experience.

Perhaps because of my background in science, I prefer judgment based on personal experience to faith - a belief based on faith should only be as strong as your trust in the guarantor of the idea, based on your own past experience.  This can be applied equally to science and religion.

Believing what we experience is infinitely more important than believing what we've been taught.  Prejudices, hatred, and cultural wars are borne of teachings and thoughts.  But experience is borne of truth.


ADDENDUM:
After writing this entry and letting it ruminate in my mind, I read the chapter entitled "We've got it all backward" from Steve Hagen's Buddhism is not what you think.  In the chapter, Hagen states that people have it backwards: we think that religion is about believing in a set of beliefs and that science is about knowing reality; In truth, religion is about helping people experience reality and science is about cultivating a set of beliefs.

Beliefs are the fuel and output of science.  Scientists create beliefs (theorems), develop experiments to test the beliefs, and reject beliefs that do not hold up to testing.  Science does not create reality, but creates models of reality that are believed for a while and then replaced.

Religion is about reality.  About knowing the truth.  The problem with religion today is that it is often distilled into a set of beliefs, and these beliefs are then taught and believed.

Using this idea, which matches a theory I've been working on for a some time, I would say that the problem with science (or, more accurately, the problem with people) is that the public seems to believe the beliefs of science, much as today's religious believe in the beliefs of the religion.

The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carrol

For her birthday and our anniversary, and since we have never been to a really fancy restaurant, I took my wife to Canlis in Seattle.

The night started off well.  I was warned beforehand that the restaurant only had valet parking but there was no one standing outside when we arrived (or more accurately, there was already a car in front of the restaurant occupying people) so I decided to try my luck.  I drove right through the valet stand and into the parking lot, chased after by a surprised attendant.

The food was good, the drink surprising, but more interesting was the service.  It was good.  Really good.  Annoyingly good.  Over the course of our meal, there must have been at 30 to 40 waitress-client interactions.  Clearing our plates, straitening our forks, poring water, asking how the food tastes.  With each course, there were two waitresses bringing our food and one waiter giving us the rundown.  At first, I made eye contact and said thank you to the waitresses as they finished their pampering.  After 20 interactions, I switched to eye contact, smiling, and nodding.  Near the end, it was just a slight smile and nod.

This got me thinking about the rich and how they treat servants.  Living in these conditions for two hours created a disconnect between the waitresses and I.  They no longer received the standard pleasantries from me because the pleasantries created a kind of social friction, degrading the meal experience and tiring me.  If one were in this situation for any length of time, I would expect that the servants would become, if not invisible, simply not nodded to on account of their omnipresence.

I did not particularly enjoy this part of the experience, and prefer people to remain thankingworthy.

Before this experience, it was easy to believe that some rich people simply don't care enough to treat their staff with simple dignities.  After this experience, however, I think it is not necessarily that the privileged lack a caring personality, but in their situation interactions would be greatly hampered by niceties.  The choice then becomes deciding if you want to be in that situation or not.  It may be better to not surround yourself with servants.

Aikido Techniques

In a flash of brilliance, a friend of mine decided to put together a set of Aikido training videos.  Here are some samples from the initial trial.

In the first, you'll notice her chin tucks down to avoid a possible strangling while easily twisting the attacker's hand to loosen his grip.  The twisted arm tenses and the small force transfers up the arm through the shoulder and drives the attacker off balance.  When the attacker is off balance, a quick cut of the hand would drop him to the ground quite painfully, but the sensei, instead, gently lowers her hand to avoid causing pain while remaining in control.

I was asked if this was real.  The attacker was not intentionally trying to stab the victim (for his own safety, since slower defenses are much less painful), but the rest is real.  From the moment the attacker's hand is grabbed, he has no control.  Since this was a casual and friendly environment, the sensei did not pay much attention to control once on the ground so you'll see the attacker try to take advantage and attack with his left hand.  Any hope was short lived as the sensei simply used his right arm to block his left, then pushed the sai towards his neck.

This was clearly my best idea of the night.

These three videos may not make the final cut.

Project: Workbench

A real man needs a real work bench.  So I built one.

I was getting pretty tired of (and sore from) doing all my shop work on the floor of my garage.  At least, that's my official excuse.  In reality, I want to build a tool shed to store all the tools I need to make a tool shed.  And to build the shed, I need a proper table.  And to build a proper table, I need some tools, but more on that later.

Since my wife refuses to park on the driveway, I don't have enough room for a traditional work bench so I designed one that folds up nicely beside my car.

The structure is made of 2x4s and has a pine top.  Pine is a soft wood, but the frame was already pretty heavy so I opted for something lighter that is both easier to lift and puts less stress on the hinges.  If it becomes a problem, I may replace the top later.  I was just barely strong enough to install it alone, but once hung it's not heavy at all - the wall bares most of the weight.

The legs swing down from beneath the table.  To prevent the legs from collapsing accidentally, I use a 6' piece of dowel that sits on a couple screws.  I'm considering adding a second 2x4 to each leg to make it more stable, look a little better, and give a little bit of room between the table and the wall when it's closed.  With this extra room, I can install plywood or pegboard beneath the table for extra tool storage. This would help as my tool chest is full, possibly because of all my screwdrivers!!

I did make a few mistakes when building the table.  It's designed to sit 36" above the floor and I measured it where the floor meets the wall.  My garage floor is slanted though, presumably to help water escape and flow away from the walls.  So the back of the table was 36" off the floor, the front-right was 36.75" and the front-left was 37.75" (that's a full inch drop from right to left!).  Since the legs weren't quite long enough, I had to remove the 2x4 support on the wall and screw it in 3/4" lower to accommodate.  Just when I thought I was done!

Next, the door hinges I bought caught on the wood and prevented it from moving.  If you look at any door in your house, you'll notice that the axels of the hinges hang off the door, in the air.  In my design, there is no gap between the axel and the wood so there was a lot of friction when I screwed in the hinges.  I fixed it by installing washers between the hinge and the wood.  In the picture below, you can see the washers and a set of four holes (two of which are unused after moving the 2x4).  You can also see that the hinges don't support any weight when the table is open - it's all on the feet and the wall mount.

To smooth the table, I bought a hand-held band saw.  This turned out to be useless - it made the surface more rough than when I started - so I had to fix the sand job by hand.  Next time I'll know to ignore the advice of the Home Depot employee and use a random orbital sander.  But now I have a belt saw.

And now I can build things for real!

The sound of OOF

Staying home from work today, I sent this email to my team:

The bad news is that I’m not feeling a whole lot better than yesterday.

The good news is that to get you through this troubling time without my presence, I provide you with rap.

Please read this in the voice of a thug, as who has street cred.
…and rather poor rapping skills.


Diagnosed with streptococcus.
It’s got me down; I cannot knock this.
Stay at home to rest and cough. It’s
Hard to be away from the office.
Try to remote in but they’ve blocked it!
Password’s expired and can’t unlock it!
All I want to do is log in!

Now my rage is engaged.
Feels like I’m encaged.
There's a war being waged.
How can it be in this day and age
That my body’s upstaged by a bacteriophage?

Word.

[sound of microphone hitting the floor as I walk away]

Project: Soft Box Mount

Helping to build my home studio, my mom gave me a Neewer 250 Watt strobe for my birthday and I want to attach a Loadstone Studio Ultimate Soften Light Soft Box to it.

The only problem is that the strobe has a non-standard mount...or maybe I just don't know the standard.  I guess that's what happens when you buy online without real knowledge.  Also, my soft boxes are designed to fit around a custom quad light socket mount.  The strobe has an outer diameter of 3 3/4" and the soft box base has a diameter of 6 1/4" with four post holes.

The Novatron N7301 Universal Speedring would be perfect for the job, so I bought it.  Unfortunately, The ePhoto Universal Speed Ring arrived instead, labelled as the N7301.  Amazon's customer service is pretty amazing though (again ranked #1) so I'll return it.

This leaves a whole in my studio.  I wasn't able to find another brand and I can't trust that I'll receive what I order next time, so to Home Depot I go!

They carry a 2"-4" bushing for PVC pipe:

A 4"-6" bushing would be perfect, I could just screw holes for the soft box rods and add some tensioning screws, but Home Depot doesn't carry that size.  Amazon does, but it costs $22 plus shipping, which is more than the N7301.

So back to Home Depot!

Here's what I bought for just under $20:

• A 7" light reflector (which fits on the back of some random light)
• Four 3/8" coupler nuts
• Some copper attachments used to secure piping
• Weather stripping

Here is it partially assembled.  I lined the interior with weather stripping and drilled eight holes using a hand drill.  You can see a tiny piece of weather shipping sitting on the right side of the ring where the next coupling nut will go.  I use this to keep the nut from slipping and to provide a little lift since the metal ring is slightly curved and I want the nuts to be square.  Plus, I had a lot of extra stripping left over.

Beware!  Drilling metal is not like drilling wood.  It's not sufficient to hold onto the part with your bare hand (and it's dangerous to use gloves with a drill, since catching a glove will cost you more than a little bit of skin).  If the drill bit catches the metal ring at 2000RPM, in a battle between your hand and the metal disk, it's not hard to guess who would win.  I'm glad I used my foot and proper shoes to hold down the piece as the metal did catch once after drilling my first hole - I lifted my foot before the drill bit stopped completely.  Bad move.

Also, use protective eye ware.  Metal chips are not your friend.

Here is the unit fully assembled and sitting atop one of my strobes.  It's not as pretty as it could be since I ran out of small screws.  To a keen reader, you'll notice that I'm also using my tripod-to-light stand tip adapter.

And finally, here is the unit assembled on my birthday light with the soft box inserted.

And for a little fun, here is the soft box I built quickly for my first test shoot that the new unit is replacing.  It worked okay, but kept falling down under its own weight.  I expect this new one to work much better.

Project: Light Stand Tip

I've been working on setting up a home studio, mostly to see what I come up with.  However, it's quite expensive so I've been doing on the cheap.  Also, I enjoy building things.  So when I needed to mount a background light, the obvious choice was to use an old tripod that's too weak for my camera.

See mom, it's good I don't throw anything away!

In order to do this, I needed an adapter form the tripod mount to the light stand mount.  I could buy one from Amazon for $12 including shipping, or I can spend half an hour at home depot wandering the halls.

The end result should look like this:

Obviously, it would be best to use a lathe, but getting one of those would push the price a little bit past $12.

Here's what I did:

Using a large washer, small washer, 1/4" coupler nut, and small 1/4" bolt, I screwed the nut onto the tripod and the screw onto the nut.  That's all!

And all for less than $2, given that I only needed to buy the coupler nut.  And here it is doing it's job:

Your mother's kitchen

Growing up in the 20th and 21st centeries, I've become accustomed to the race of technology.  When I was young, our TV was black and white and our remote control (which was awesome) was wired.  Now I can hook up my phone to a projector, both of which fit in my pocket, and watch movies anywhere.  Then there are computers, wireless HDMI, self-driving cars, and 3D printers. The world today is unrecognizable from the world my parents grew up in.

Which is why is surprises me that my kitchen hasn't changed.  The same appliances that exist today existed when my mom was my age.  There were microwaves, stand mixers, blenders, fridge-freezer combos, garbage disposals, ovens, stoves, and can openers.  With all the technology in the kitchen I would expect things to progress faster.  Even knives are the same.

More people now have espresso machines, and I'm sure the Slap Chop hasn't been around for long, but tell me it isn't odd that your grandmother would be immediately at home in your kitchen but likely be stimied by the operation of your TV or telephone.

And why is this?  Is food inherantly simple?  Have we been playing with food for so long that we've done everything possible to it?  Or is innovation slowed by either the multitude of useless single-function vapourware they sell on late-night TV that all appear to be variations on the blender or, at least, the belief that these are all useless?

I don't know, but it surprices me.

Crown Royal Maple Review

I like Crown Royal.  It's my favourite whiskey.  When I was younger I drank Crown and coke, which is still my staple at the bar.  As I've matured and become able to afford better alcohol, I've switched to either Crown Royal Limited Edition and coke or occasionally Crown Royal Special Reserve on the rocks, as it's painful to mix that.

Crown Royal recently came out with a new flavour - their first flavoured whiskey - Crown Royal Maple Finish.  As soon as you crack the bottle you'll notice the difference.  This isn't a subtle hint of maple.  The smell is potent.  The moment you twist the lid your friends will perk up, step out of their rooms, and come to the kitchen expecting pancakes.  It's like smelling the deep heart of maple syrup kingdom, which I assume lies somewhere in central Quebec.

After opening the bottle, Tom and I poured ourselves a drink, mixed with coke.

And it was horrible.  It's hard to describe how bad this was, but those two liquids shall hence forth never again be mixed.  We resolved to finish our drinks and I even poured a second, vowing to drink what I bought, and immediately regretted that decision.  While I did finish both drinks, it was through sheer pride and I would refuse another if one were to offer.  Ian's rating: undrinkable.

So time passed and the shock dissolved.  I brought the bottle to Aaron's place as a prank.  We each had a small cup neat.  It was much better on it's own, but still not great, and Aaron labelled it the pedophile's whiskey on account of the sweetness.  It is as good as drinking Crown Royal original unmixed, which is doable but not pleasant.  Ian's rating: passable.

Then Aaron tried it with coke and was immediately horrified.  I was pleased.

Next, I tried mixing it with lemon juice.  Ian's rating: also undrinkable.
Then, I tried it with limeade.  Ian's rating: drinkable but not entirely pleasant.

I was nearing my limit.  If it's maple then I will allow it to do what maple does.  I will fulfill it's destiny.  I will make pancakes.  And that's what I did.  I replaced the milk with whiskey and milk powder and the results looked great:

And with my first bite I was much more than surprised.  Shocked might be a better word.  That is a lot of alcohol for one pancake.  But the pancake was okay.  And then the burning sensation set it.  I don't know if the whiskey became more concentrated in the process, the alcohol boiled off and just left contaminants, if whiskey and flour should never be mixed, or water is necessary for flour to become edible, but whatever it was, it burned.  Except for that, and the overwhelming alcohol taste, the pancakes weren't bad.  Ian's rating: regretfully inedible.

And finally I tried Crown Royal Maple Finish with lemonade.  Surprisingly after the previous episodes, it was not bad.  One might even make the claim that it's good.  Ian's rating: well worth a second cup.

In the end I made it work, but seriously, don't waste your money.

We're smarter now

Within thirty minutes of returning home with four jars of my mom's jam, my wife and I had a serious conversation on how to handle the situation.

The decision was unanimous and we labelled the jars.

Crisis averted.