Wow, they move faster than sound in space. Wonder what speed that is? Are orbiting space loudspeakers blasting rock-n-roll to unfortunate planets next? (Apologies to Douglas Adams)

Cool videos, though.

Yes, and the people who were near the where the lasers impacted the earth at the end of their ballistic trajectory were not amused.

"Theoretical Shoe Inserts Could Power Your Gadgets"

I suspect that a theoretical doughnut could only satisfy theoretical hunger.

Wonder what wonders are available if they were Hypothetical rather than Theoretical?

Arrive at work and turn on corporate laptop (2 MHz Dual Core XP with whole disk encryption and gigabit LAN) if I had turned it off when I left. Scoot chair to LINUX machine in corner (same specs but not connected to corporate LAN) turn it on. Move to XP machine, ah, there is the first logon, enter username and password. Scoot over to LINUX machine which has desktop up and is waiting for my keychain password and enter it. Launch Eclipse or Chrome and glance at XP. Is the second logon there? No, wait, there it is, enter same user name and password and go back to LINUX machine to do some real work for the next 12 minutes or so while the disk on the XP thrashes. If I think of it look at the screen for the XP machine and close error message boxes and either enter passwords or close a couple more dialogs while this is going on.

Total time to be able to use the XP without delays, the cursor not where I think it is or moves in jerks and windows take many seconds to display, is about 15 minutes. If it's the day for the anti virus software to run then this takes longer and the XP machine will be really slow with lots of waiting for windows for about an hour and at the end of the scan ignore and close the window that says a virus has been detected in an Excel file in the cache and I need to call for help. (The original file, last edited in 1996, is apparently OK, though.)

IT is really earning their pay.

Programming is not the major item on my position description but I do a lot of it, usually in spurts separated by programming inactivity. Last year my boss wanted me to learn Java since our contract engineer knew Java but not C/C++ so I've been sporadically attempting to learn it, and Eclipse, and ...

I've done pretty well at teaching it to my self using a couple of books, Google searches, and attempting small programs related to what I'm going to need to do when I get more proficient. It's harder than it was 20 years ago when I was 50.

I can't advise you that you should attempt the learning for your work, though, that's beyond me, but continual learning appears to keep the mind active longer. I can't remember where I read that.

What's the difference between making a person give up fingerprints and giving up DNA without a warrant? Either may be used to search databases, that is, for fishing for possible links to crimes. I think that the two are very much analogous.

Goodbye Viagra!

The tag on the backs of the servers have their name stamped on it, such as 768909879, which appears just after SN (Server Name) . Yes, I know that the names are hard to remember and they could be taught new names but frankly, life's too short.

and I think they won't do so well on my carpets. But how about swarm wars? THAT'S cool!

Wow, I had no idea that the Marines even had biologists. Whatever for?

At least senior engineers? And they have less education and get free lunches, drinks, and travel, too? I'm aghast! The world turned upside down!

What about the radiation from the bluetooth headset? It will be next to your skull far longer than a cell phone?

I don't eat the rind anyway, so why should I care that the skins of oranges may be dyed? Should I worry about the microorganisms in my compost pile?