File under "Fun with Microwaves." Detailed directions can be found at http://www.pmichaud.com/grape/, but simply cut a grape almost in half, leaving about 1.5cm of skin joining the two halves. Put it on a plate and nuke it. After only about 5 seconds it will shoot up a flame, as much as 3 inches tall. Our [...]
Yep, I started another company. Couldn't help it. I have a passion for media, and I was getting way too anxious watching the TV/broadband world change without being a part of it. Coincident with that, the commoditization of media creation tools is incredibly exciting, and of particular interest to me is the impact that is [...]
Part Car Show, part Air Show, part Tractor Pull, the Half Moon Bay Dream Machines festival at the airport is a unique way to spend an afternoon. I was particularly amused by the Hell's Angels booth, where one could buy tee shirts with clever slogans like "Known Associate." The first video I'm posting here is [...]
I googled my birthday - not just the day, but the year. Ignoring who was born or died on my birthday, here's some of the highlights for June 28, 1957: Elvis was hanging out with Lou Costello and Jane Russell. It was Harry and Bess Truman's 38th anniversary, and he wrote her a note with [...]
There is a very fine line between the current cover of Newsweek and the covers of The Weekly World News. This week's edition of the former is a composite image of Martha Stewart's head on a model's body. Newsweek blames any confusion between this image and reality on us, the readers: "Anybody who knows the [...]
Rendering complex computer animation can easily demand thousands of hours of compute time, a task generally relegated to racks and racks of submissive CPUs fondly referred to as Render Farms. In days of yore, the cost conscious production company would triple shift every computer in the facility, creating an overnight render farm out of people's [...]
There was a great article in the San Jose Mercury News yesterday about blogging addiction. I'm happy to say that I am not a member of that set. No, I have found that blogging is primarily a form of procrastination. For example, I really need to be writing a 300 word bio for a book [...]
With the exception of KFOG and KUFX, 100% of my audio and visual media is now digital. The promise of the digital age has been delivered in my house and my car. And it sucks. Given the choice, I would not trade off the analog artifacts for the digital artifacts, but alas I would have [...]
Get off your butt and get to New York. The Cristo and Jeanne-Claude installation 'The Gates' is only there from February 12th to the 27th. Sarah and I had the pleasure of joining the Montalvo Arts Center tour this weekend. I took 180 photographs, but I'm only going to share a few of my favorites [...]
I've had knee surgery twice now, once in 2003 to replace my ACL, and then in 2004 because I tore the meniscus again. Rather than a toothbrush and floss like my dentist gives me, my doctor handed me a CD with stills and video from the procedure. If you have a strong stomach and strong [...]