HoodedHawk

The US Postal Service will be releasing a set of “The Simpsons” postage stamps on May 7, 2009. Many years ago (as a kid) I used to collect stamps. None were as cool as these! The Simpsons has been on TVfor 20 years now; longest running comedy ever…

The USPS is even hosting a survey where you can vote on your favorite character -guess which one I voted for? Duh!

Oh, if I lived in the city I would *so* get one of these (experimental now) Seqway P.U.M.A. (Personal Urban Mobility & Accessibility) vehicles! Although I’d try to figure out a way to enclose it more for rainy days…

See the Segway PUMA website for more info/pix. Fun!

Oh, they just don’t make science kits like they did 50 years ago. This one came with radioactive sources. It was $50.00 at the time (and can fetch more than $7000.00 if you can find one now):

The set came with four types of uranium ore, a beta-alpha source (Pb-210), a pure beta source (Ru-106), a gamma source (Zn-65?), a spinthariscope, a cloud chamber with its own short-lived alpha source (Po-210), an electroscope, a geiger counter, a manual, a comic book (Dagwood Splits the Atom) and a government manual “Prospecting for Uranium.”

Gilbert U-238 Atomic Energy Lab (1950-1951)

My wife’s family was in town for her grandmother’s and uncle’s birthdays (happy 92nd birthday, Margaret!; happy birthday, Paul!) so we all went to the Freer Gallery of Art in DC. Preston fell asleep in his stroller (but not before some very loud “OUTTA HERE!”s echoed off the gallery walls). The rest of us enjoyed it. :)

I spent most of the time in the galleries of ancient Asian ceramics, and bronze. I’ll definitely be going back for a more leisurely visit, but not around Preston’s naptime.

Some highlights below (click any image for a slideshow), but a lot more via the photography page.

Freer Gallery of Art, Washington, DC

Freer Gallery of Art, Washington, DC

Preston at Freer Gallery of Art

Freer Gallery of Art, Washington, DC

Freer Gallery of Art, Washington, DC

 

Tim Berners-Lee in 2001

It was twenty years ago today (March 13, 1989) that Tim Berners-Lee wrote up his proposal for management at CERN, titled “Information Management: A Proposal“.

This document was an attempt to persuade CERN management that a global hypertext system was in CERN’s interests. Note that the only name I had for it at this time was “Mesh” — I decided on “World Wide Web” when writing the code in 1990.

Berners-Lee’s boss thought his proposal was “vague but exciting”. :)

A client/server model for a distributed hypertext system.