I don’t know if I’d want to go under the knife for something like this if it ever truly existed someday (it doesn’t yet). Once the blades come out, my geekiness just sort of goes away, but check out this programmable dermal display via Nanogirl:

Photons emitted by these pixel bots would produce an image on the surface of the skin. This pixelbot array could be programmed to form any of many thousands of displays. Each display would be capable of two functions: (1) presenting to the user data received from the large population of medical bots that roam the user’s body; (2) conveying instructions from the user to that same large population of bots. The display could be activated or deactivated by finger tapping on the skin.

There are also a couple short movies to watch. Imagine playing Pac-Man in the palm of your hand someday. Literally.

Last night before watching Flightplan [review] we had 30 minutes or so to kill, so my wife and I visited a new store nearby called the Cold Stone Creamery. At first I thought it was some sort of upscale yogurt store and begrudgingly followed my better half into the store.

Inside the store was very clean with a wooden floor and furniture and had an almost Starbucks-like motiff to it. Definitely not like Baskin Robbins or Dairy Queen. Inside the long row of refrigerated displays were metal sheet pans with various ice cream flavors. Patrons waited in a snaking line with airport like dividers.

Behind the counter a smiling employee greets “the next group” and offers samples for the various Cold Stone Creamery ice cream flavors. I was impressed by the friendliness and thoroughness the employees showed the new customers, willing to explain and almost counsel as to the best ice cream to buy. Along the inside of the window were waffle cups with the ends dipped in chocolate.

Even cooler, no pun intended, was what happened after we ordered. Turns out that my wife let me do the ordering for both of us. I chose the sweet cream flavor along with Kit Kats. The young lady scooped out the ice cream with two metal spatulas and started kneeding it like bread on this counter, working the chunks of Kit Kat into the ice cream. While she did this she kept some idle chatter going with us and then placed it in the chocolate tipped waffle bowl. The price: $5.41 USD.

Alongside the cash register was a rack of brochures, one showing franchise information. I asked my wife to put that in her purse so I could check out the Cold Stone Creamery website later.

Now back to eating the ice cream. It wasn’t all melted like the last time we hit Dairy Queen or having a non-fresh, kind of frostbitten taste like Baskin Robbins sometimes does, it was thick, dense and you couldn’t really take more than a small spoonful. Absolutely, positively delicious. Hands down among the best — maybe the best ever — ice cream I’ve ever tasted. It was so filling, so good, that both my wife and I couldn’t finish the bowl we were sharing. Wow.

The experience reminded me of the first time I had a Krispy Kreme donut, which was in a shop in Las Vegas. I’d never heard or seen Krispy Kreme before, but I figured if they kept their quality and the word got out, I would be seeing them someday closer. Sure enough they built a brand new Krispy Kreme not far away from this new Cold Stone Creamery store.

Ok, so maybe Cold Stone Creamery is not “new”, being that the first store opened in 1988 in Tempe, Arizona, but it was new to us.

Their brochure said new franchises can be started with an initial $42,000 and a total investment of between $264,800 and $399,600 as of February 2005. If you know anybody thinking of starting a promising ice cream shop, I’d point them to Cold Stone Creamery. If you love to eat good ice cream and are anywhere near one of these shops, stop on by.

We definitely will be patronizing them again. I’m getting a craving for their ice cream just writing about them!

If you are coming out to the Seattle/Tacoma/Olympia area, Cold Stone Creamery has you covered. You can find the nearest Cold Stone Creamery here in your area. There are 10 stores near our office including locations in Bonney Lake, Lakewood, Auburn, Federal Way, Tacoma, Covington, Tukwila and Olympia. Kent is coming soon.

This is not hmm, this is mmmm.

A study by University of Chicago geneticists has found that the human brain is still evolving and growing larger via Bloomberg:

“Our studies indicate that the trend that is the defining characteristic of human evolution — the growth of brain size and complexity — is likely still going on,” Bruce Lahn, lead researcher for both papers, said in an accompanying statement. “If our species survives for another million years or so, I would imagine that the brain by then would show significant structural differences from the human brain of today.”

Makes sense that we are still evolving and I wonder if this means a larger brain means more brainpower? Will people in the future be able to solve some of the computing problems today like more realistic artificial intelligence?

The ultimate smart car could be one that drives for humans detecting the road and becoming an electronic chaffeur. Wouldn’t bother me having a smart car like that tomorrow, forget 25-50 years from now. Or at least something that will better prevent some drunk from getting behind the wheel and putting others in harm’s way. Those steering wheel column blow to start mechanisms start the process but unfortunately only are put in place for people who have already driven drunk.

Along the way of getting to that future would be other mechanical signals by machines to notify drivers when risks are higher.

Drowsiness and distraction are leading causes of road traffic accidents and deaths, but Spence said vibrating seats, belts or foot pedals could alert drivers in a subtle way to a dangerous situation.

The real question I have is why is this going to take until 2020 to do? That’s 15 years from now! These type safety features should be in all new models by 2010. How expensive can this stuff be?

I scored a 37 in the Internet Addiction test which means: “You are an average on-line user. You may surf the Web a bit too long at times, but you have control over your usage.”

Only takes a minute to take the test. How did you do?

As I’m sure many others locals did who are on the outside and will also be impacted in various ways, I went to bed last night hoping that the impending Boeing (symbol: BA) strike would work itself out between the two sides.

Boeing Co. was bracing for a possible strike at its commercial airplane operations after Machinists union leaders representing more than 18,000 workers called for rejection of a final contract offer as “insulting.”

This morning I woke up and see that 86% of Boeing workers voted to strike for the first time since 1995 when they walked off the job for some 69 days. In 2000 engineers went on a 40-day strike which cost the company about $2.6 billion and their stock dropped 32 percent.

Living in this area for some 15 years now, I’m not shocked or hugely surprised, but am still saddened by this news. We have clients and friends who are Boeing employees and a strike isn’t good for them or their families. It seems like the dream company to work for when times are right, the pay is good, the conditions right, but when this strike stuff comes up it’s the worst place in the area to work.

Although it isn’t scheduled to start until 12:00pm PDT (about 4 hours from the time I write this) it now appears certain that the strike is on. If some good news doesn’t come changing this in the next few hours, I sure hope this strike is over quickly and both sides find a way to make a long term agreement. Something that goes longer than 5-10 years, hopefully, before coming to a strike that will cost an estimated $60-70 million per day. If the company loses the employees will lose too; this stuff flows downhill. As I post this, the stock is already down 2.24%.

I don’t think these researchers really know whether coffee is truly good or bad. Most of the studies and “expert” opinion I’ve ever read says to give up the java and my last post on this subject a couple months ago was how to quit drinking coffee. At least with water you won’t get a complex as all researchers agree that plain old-fashioned water intake is essential for hydration.

Coffee not only helps clear the mind and perk up the energy, it also provides more healthful antioxidants than any other food or beverage in the American diet, according to a study released Sunday. Of course, too much coffee can make people jittery and even raise cholesterol levels, so food experts stress moderation.

So recent studird say that 14-28 alcholic drinks a week help improve brainpower and coffee helps clear the mind? Nah, don’t think I’m going back to coffee. Wasn’t a pretty sight all java-fueled.

A long time ago my wife gave me a subscription to Playboy. Lasted for like a year or two and then she stopped renewing it. I dug it, what can I say? You know, for the articles and stories, that’s why. That’s why all men read Playboy, right?

Today I learned that the October Playboy magazine will be available September 13 via Zinio:

The digital Playboy, produced in association with digital-publishing services provider Zinio Systems, will be identical to the print edition, the company said. “We see this is a natural extension of the Playboy brand,” said Christie Hefner, chief executive of Playboy (PLA), in a statement.

Actually the digital version will have some Zinio-enhanced differences like no inserts falling out everywhere and it will be searchable! There has already been an adult webmaster magazine (Klixxx) via Zinio available and from the search I ran (see above) looks like there are some other softcore Playboy titles available via Zinio. Wonder how long before Zinio is running out Hustler or High Society?

Today at noon is the fall signups for the Y. They have lots of different programs that we can sign up for and commit to for the next couple months. Jowl and I still haven’t made a habit out of our workout schedule yet.

Week #1 we worked five days with a couple of the days two workouts, week #2 we were down to five days with no extra workouts and week three we have worked three of the five days this week — yes, we worked out this morning. A couple days Jowl hasn’t woken up and a couple days I haven’t woken up. We started doing resistance training this week with weights and cardio.

Jowl had lost 11 pounds after week 2 and I had lost eight pounds. He put back on seven pounds and I put back on five pounds according to the scales today.

It looks like we’re going to settle into a routine (hopefully) of 3-5 days per week with both cardio and resistance training. As far as how we feel, I know I sure feel a lot better than I did three weeks ago. I asked Jowl how he felt and he said he feels good and “more awake.”

The first two weeks we were strictly in cardio mode and working 5-15 minutes on the bike, then 20-30 minutes on the treamill, then 1/2 mile to mile around the track and then riding the bike for another 5-20 minutes. We used various resistance levels on the machines.

This week we started doing upper body and arm strengthening for 15-30 minutes to go along with 15 minutes on the bike and 20 minutes on the treadmill. On the treadmill we are walking briskly for 4 minutes (at an increasing incline) and then running for a minute, then walk for 4 minutes and run for 1 minute, repeat until 20 minutes. That gives a good cardio workout — or so I’ve read anyway — in a shorter amount of time. Our goal is get the total workout down to an hour, as we both need to do this before going to school.

We haven’t consulted with professional fitness trainers or anything yet. Our workout so far seems to have done very little in the weight loss department, although we both have lost a little weight. Our nutrition and dietary habits are a big part of this, I’m sure, because we have only mildly changed what we’re eating, when and how much, so that will become something for us to focus on more in the coming weeks.

There are programs that can help us track and improve this.

When I asked about fitness programs that were Tablet PC friendly fyiguy (thank you!) pointed me to Bodytrans (14 day free trial, $24.99 USD). This program is very detailed and covers Training, Nutrition, and Mindset allowing users to setup multiple user accounts (so Jowl and I can both track our progress separately) and make notes or enter data using ink. We started entering in data on Friday August 19, 2005.

The BodyTrans home menu is pictured at the top of this thread. You can make diary notes in ink and text (shown below):

Too bad you can’t optionally upload them to your (private or public) blog! (hint, hint for future version). You can also make notes in a daily sleep log so you can make sure you’re getting enough rest. The “pictures” section allows for before and after photos to visually review what improvements have been made in your body.

I really like the detail and effort put into this program. It’s a good companion for taking to the gym on the Tablet PC and keeping track of what’s going on. I was lamenting the other day how the gyms aren’t really caught up with technology. For the $100/month they are charging they should be providing members with tracking software like this but they are still in the dark ages of paper and pencil. Maybe the author should contact the Y, Ballys, etc as this could be a good avenue for distribution … ?

For webmasters: BodyTrans has an affiliate program (via RegNow). You could get yourself in shape (most of us webmasters are out of shape) and maybe make a few bones promoting a good program! We signed up and are awaiting approval approved! I’ll be writing more about BodyTrans as we continue through our usage of the software.

Is it cooler outside your home than inside? Those without air conditioning are probably nodding. Don’t have the cash to put in an air conditioning system? Don’t want to beat up the ozone layer? doityourself.com has a good article that explains how to cool your home naturally, without using an air conditioner:

The primary source of heat buildup (i.e., gain) is sunlight absorbed by your house through the roof, walls, and windows. Secondary sources are heat-generating appliances in the home and air leakage. Specific methods to prevent heat gain include reflecting heat (i.e., sunlight) away from your house, blocking the heat, removing built-up heat, and reducing or eliminating heat generating sources in your home.

We bought one of those folding sun reflectors for the car. I wonder if using those in the windows in the house would help? Seems by what I read here, that this would reflect the sun and help somewhat with the major issue which is keeping the heat from getting inside in the first place.

The article says that shutters help by blocking the sun from getting in, also shading the house using cleverly placed shrubbery and trees. Letting in the cool night air also helps.

Any other sage tips for cooling a house naturally?