I’m editing the book I wrote last year

   I have decided to do something with it finally. I must say that it’s harder than I thought. Coming up with the story ideas are easy, compared to fine tuning what I already have down on paper.

   I have rewritten the first paragraph several times, but think I have it much stronger now. I have also worked the storyline so it is much smoother, removing one part because it’s not needed anymore and have better coordinated character entrances and exits. Overall, I’d say I should have the final draft by the end of the fall.

   For those of you who haven’t heard, the story is about a widow with three high school aged children who go on a special vacation. A privately funded research facility gives this family a chance to spend time with their father who passed away 5 years earlier.  Special crystals in the story have the ability to channel memories into an interactive hologram of sorts.  However, during the visit with the “mirror” (as the image is called); instead of the automaton they expect - the husband/father actually comes back to visit with his family briefly.  It’s a glimpse of the other side. It blends technology and science with the supernatural. I have really tried to make it as real as possible.  Although science-fiction/fantasy, I think many people might be able to identify with the characters in the story because I believe it taps into some universal emotion. I just hope I do the story enough justice.

It rocks!

Great News! GetDataBack for NTFS worked!

    The scan took about 36 hours to complete. Once the image was created, I was able to view (but not save the data until I purchased a license key) nearly all of my files.

     I bought the key and am now putting the data on my new hard drive. Time consuming, but many lessons learned.

     This software rocks!

The scary world of data recovery

     Well, fellow Blatherians, it seems that the research of that error messages has lead me down a dark & mysterious data recovery path. It looked like it could have been a damage or corrupted Master Boot Record. Then, references were made to make it sound like the partition had been damage. Also, there were references that the registry was damage.

     The reason I am dealing with this is because I didn’t have any recent back-ups of my data. Normally, losing data can sting but it is troublesome even more because I know better PLUS it is my first piece of advice to other computer users. Redundancy. It can make life much easier. I am not at the end of the data recovery tunnel just yet, but hope to have answers in the morning. I have found out that creating an image of your hard drive, sector by sector, on an 80 GB drive can take quite some time.

       Hopefully, I will have good news shortly.

They’re creepy & they’re kooky. Mysterious & spooky

They’re all together ooky. The AGENDA family. (snap snap) 

******the original article 

Ky. Creation Museum opens to thousands

Tue May 29, 5:06 PM ET

PETERSBURG, Ky. - A museum that tells the Bible’s version of Earth’s history — that the planet was created in a single week just a few thousand years ago — attracted thousands to its opening as protesters rallied outside.

The dozens of demonstrators argued Monday that the Creation Museum’s central tenets conflict with scientific evidence that the Earth is several billion years old. Overhead, an airplane pulled a banner with the message: “Thou Shalt Not Lie.”

The privately funded museum had more than 4,000 guests on opening day, said Mark Looy, a co-founder of the $27 million facility 20 miles southwest of Cincinnati. The parking lot was filled with license plates from dozens of states.

“The guests were very happy with the museum experience,” Looy said. “Of course, we had some naysayers come through and engage us in conversation, and that’s fine — we want them.”

Lawrence Krauss, an author and physicist at Cleveland’s Case Western Reserve University, decided to view the museum firsthand.

“It’s really impressive — and it really gives the impression that they’re talking about science at some point,” Krauss said. On a scale of 1 to 5, with 5 being best, “I’d give it a 4 for technology, 5 for propaganda. As for content, I’d give it a negative 5.”

The museum features high-tech exhibits designed by a theme-park artist, including animatronic dinosaurs and a wooden ark at least two stories tall, plus a special effects theater and planetarium.

Some exhibits show dinosaurs aboard Noah’s Ark and assert that all animals were vegetarians until Adam committed the first sin in the Garden of Eden.

*********

Several things stand out in this article:

1) “Thou Shalt Not Lie” appears to be featured in the presentation of this Creationist museum. Since neither Darwinism nor Creationism has been definitively proven, I find it not only pointless to use here and also rather antagonistic. Seeing as Christianity is taken on faith (proof wouldn’t make it a religion then now would it?) and has that “love thy neighbor” thing, I see that as two potential strikes against this place before even setting foot in it. Scientists without proof, on the other hand, is what we call job security. The tone of this exchange is obvious, which makes the later offer to “engage us in conversation” rather pointless.

2) $27 million was collected, set aside and used to build this shrine of nervous antagonism. I wonder how many homeless people this money would have sheltered, clothed, fed, treated and educated had it been spent for more altruistic things.  Normally to see such wasteful spending, you have to go to Washington.

The reality is that science and religion aren’t in conflict. They never were. It’s all a matter of perception. Science isn’t always that exact and that you sometimes have to start with theories. Theories that prove to be not accurate are not clung to, but still documented and taught so we can appreciate how far we have come. It’s not trying to strong-arm its way into anything. It’s on the discussion table as a starting point.

Science also has the concept of unknowns, but seem to be more comfortable with their presense. Both can be taken at face value or literally interpreted, as well as be subject to personal agenda.

Scientists who can’t appreciate the possibility of a divine hand in the creation of the universe are myopic. Believers who think science could possibly unravel the concept of religion reveal their own weak faith. 

just my opinion, of course……

p.s. This reminds me of the spiritual version of that old Reese’s peanut butter cup commercial. One person holding a jar of peanut butter collides in a hallway with someone holding a chocolate bar. They first curse each other. You got your chocolate in my peanut butter. You got your peanut butter in my chocolate. Then, upon tasting the new combination are both pleasantly surprised how well they go together. Only in this case, it was “you got your religion in my science.” Isn’t rather prophetic about how that old commercial was?

My 3 year old daughter explains sunsets

“The sun is up in the sky. (holding her left hand above her head). Like this. Then the moon comes over and bumps it out of the sky. (hitting her right hand into her left hand) That’s what makes the sun go away.”

 I have had 6 semester hours of college-level Astronomy, yet I don’t remember the explanation being so cute.

I passed 8th grade…..again

You Passed 8th Grade Science

Congratulations, you got 8/8 correct!

Could You Pass 8th Grade Science?

Scientists still wrestle with this age-old question

17 year old high school student shows that clothes iron can kill Anthrax spores

In the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, subsequent anthrax attacks in the mail killed five and injured 17 later that fall. A germ warfare specialist from the former Soviet Union told a Congressional committee in October 2001 that a hot steam iron could be used to kill anthrax spores.

During a CNN interview several months later, Raymond Roberge said high heat could kill anthrax, but he didn’t know if an iron would work.

Marc Roberge didn’t use anthrax in his experiments, which he performed at home and at school. “The government might have had a problem with that,” Marc told the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, referring to the toxic and highly regulated substance.

Instead, he used another kind of bacterial spore from the anthrax family that is more heat-resistant than anthrax, and which scientists use as a surrogate for anthrax in their experiments.

Marc put paper strips with millions of spores inside envelopes, then ironed them at various settings for up to 15 minutes.

His findings: an iron adjusted to the highest setting, about 400 degrees Fahrenheit, killed all the spores if they were ironed for at least five minutes.

*****Partial article taken from Yahoo! Feb/21/2006

My comments:

All of the Federal Agencies, plus the CDC were unable to come up with this defense against Anthrax; but a germ warfare specialist in the Former Soviet Union and a high school student were able to get some valuable, and possibly useful information to the public.

The Bush Administration said that they didn’t recognize this because was a publically available clue. The kind that they look for are the imaginary clues that they think they will collect by wire-tapping each and every phone call. I am sure they will call for an investigation, pouring billions of dollars into it, having the results presented after 2 years but then delayed, and will not find anyone guilty of anything. However, they will promise it will never happen again.

Records will be destroyed, people will be paid off, and the media will stop covering it. Then everyone can go back to their television dinners and their Walton’s reruns. The world will, once again, be peachy keen.

Bush’s suggestions to reduce our dependence on oil sounds like a 6th grade science report…..25 years ago.

The use of alternate fuels and exploring other sources of renewable energy is almost as old as Aerosmith. While most people were crankin’ DREAM ON through their car’s KRACO AM/FM Cassette player stereo; junior high students were furiously writing out science reports about “cutting edge” technology such as wind turbines and solar power. Bush is presenting this like he just came down Mount Sinai with 2 stone tablets, but in this case; a bunch of papers and a teleprompter.

However, Bush is also adding to the mix. He has also brought bad science to the table with the “Hey, let’s tap the Alaskan Oil Reserves!” theme. This, of course, does nothing to decrease our dependence on oil (which is a complete shocker since Bush and his family have made a name for themselves by being in the OIL business.) Geologists, according to the Allentown paper ‘The Morning Call’, say that only about 3% of all the world’s oil is in the Alaskan reserve. The bulk of that, say about 60%, lies under those countries in the Middle East that we are either fighting in a war or just those who burn flags and political effigies in the streets everyday. Although he does say this will take years to develop (once again, a bunch of 6th graders 25 years ago knew that already), Bush says we can break away from the stranglehold foreign oil has on us. Once again, we will be again free to squander petroleum products at will. Congress, of course, has done their share. The giant tax loophole that allows 3-ton super-sized sports utility vehicles to get $25,000 tax breaks when used exclusively for business use, while gas hybrids get a skimpy tax break. The real capper is that the use of ethanol-blends in gasoline won’t really decrease the cost of the fuel, because there will be so much expense to convince companies to create the supply…for a demand that may not be there because of how few incentives there will be. It’s not like hybrids will start cheap, be as easy or convenient to use, or include enough power to do the job they are needed to. For example, the hybrid cars I have seen are little more than small two-seaters. What about those of us who haul a family around? Can’t we be environmentally aware and concerned too? Can anyone make a hybrid that can hold a car seat, diaper bag, stroller, and have enough power to work?

Energy conservation and better, more efficient vehicles are something we should have taken seriously long ago.

Nice try, George. This time we ARE going to pay attention to the man behind the curtain, but we doubt he will be able to take us anywhere outside Oz.

Q & A with stjarna #34

Q) Should they be teaching Intelligent Design in science classrooms?

A) Should they be teaching Evolution in Sunday School? No, on both counts.

Because our world seems to be falling apart, there seems to be a big push for religion to take over. Those with fundamental beliefs are not only worrying about themselves, they are also trying to worry for everyone else. In their nervous push for faith for everyone, they forget that science and religion aren’t competators.They are just two different levels to describe the world and our relationship with it. Maybe it thinks it has to be validated by BEATING science,when it may be better suited for a History or World Religion Class…maybe even a Philosophy class. I think it may balk at the idea of being relegated to second-class status. This is rather funny because for those of us who already practice non-mainstream religions CURRENTLY, we have to walk PAST the RELIGION section at any bookstore…and get our text from the NEW AGE/OCCULT section.

How serious do you think society is going to take any religious text when it is packed among books on Elvis sightings and alien abductions?!?!?