This is very sad. The fact that people can regard themselves as Christians and believe that their prayers could have such a diabolical effect... and worse that they can imagine that they worship such a fallible God that he could somehow get the wrong Senator. James Inhofe, the victim of God's bad aim?

Here is the article that pointed me to this.

Aside from a slightly delayed start, the flight was uneventful. We were on a 767-300 which had been swapped in for a smaller plane to accommodate people who'd been stranded by the snow. The plane had come from an international destination and needed a longer screening process than usual.

• Here are a few pictures.
• On the flight, I was seated behind a young woman who HAD to be the person the comic-strip character Alex Doonesbury is based on. I didn't speak to her, so I don't know for sure. She had the clothing-style, body-type, hair-style ear dangle, and attitude, and a face that would be easily doonesbury-ized into Alex. I have no idea what level of being a celebrity such a person has to deal with, so I left her alone.
• I got home kind of late. We watched some Rachel Maddow, with some video of John McCain showing he's either forgetful or a liar and hypocrite. I tried watching Outer Space Astronauts but Denise tolerated it for about 60 seconds.
• Happy Birthday jsslate  and patsmor and Red Sox catcher Victor Martinez.

My younger brother Pete is four years younger than I am. He and his wife Charmaigne, and son Daniel (and two dogs) live about 35 miles South of Atlanta in a little town South of Peachtree City. They have a nice place. I don't see them often enough. Among the things we discussed is what we need to do with our Mom, who is getting increasingly elderly. No conclusion reached.

• Here are a few pictures.
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• Tonight I will fly home. I'm returning to greater Atlanta next Sunday evening, and will hopefully get together with some folks from South Downs.
• Traffic in Atlanta is as bad as they say.
• Hertz doesn't put scrapers in the cars down here... I used a credit card.
• I saw pictures of me from just before Katrina with Texas relatives (Pete took them). I looked much more slender back then.
• I'll be interested in hearing how Daniel like the geeky Christmas present I got him.
• I'm transporting gifts back for Piper and Josiah.
• I'm starting to see blog-posts from right-wingers complaining that Avatar was too tree-huggy.

I made it to Atlanta without much difficulty.
The plane was full... loaded with people from earlier canceled flights.
I was sitting next to a guy who was writing his thesis for a PhD in Theology. The thesis had a lot to do with ontology, and the degree to which Christian and Jewish ethics have changed since the holocaust. We talked about ethics, nominalism, Ockham, Commedia, and Camelot.

Here are a few more pictures from during the snowfall, including this joyful shot of JoAnn and Maggie Adams yelling "Snow!" Most of the other shots are scenery. Lots of leafless trees behind a curtain of white flakes. In other News:

• I am planning to get to Atlanta tonight. As of a few moments ago, my flight is still listed as on-time.
• The snowfall here has just come to an almost complete stop. I think we got about eight inches (TWSS). The snow was fluffy and easy to remove.
• The car was plowed out in such a way as to not leave a pile in front of it (this was great luck!)
• While in Atlanta, I will be visiting my brother Pete, SIL Charmaigne, and their son Daniel.
• Something odd has happened to LJ, and it is removing my paragraph tags, when I submit, making everything appear in a block - hence the bullet point formatting.

One of the things that of pretty cool about this video is that it shows how close to the edge of the visible universe we've mapped. It also shows how large an area of the universe has had any chance of detecting our radio signals. definitely fun.

We had a great party last night to celebrate our annual cookie competition. The best over-all cookie was Dee Slate's subtly delicious "Ultimate Maple Snickerdoodles". Yum!

• During the party, some of the ladies attending had pictures taken of them in their medieval underwear for a fund-raising calendar to support some extra travel by the current Oriental Prince and Princess. These pictures were taken by Ethan, who photography-wise is not a hack. Too late, it occurred to me that the pictures should have shown the women WITH medieval power tools... Maybe next year.
• Nobody seemed to be talking about cosmology or the recent possible observation of Dark Matter in Minnesota, so I decided to take pictures and make small talk. To the right is a fun shot of Skoog.
• Later in the evening Christian, Abigail, Anne of F, and I had some discussion of flirting theory. It was fun.

Here are a few pictures from before the snow that is supposed to come later today. The first one is from waiting in line to get in to Avatar. The rest are from around Camelot.

I took the kids to see the 9:15AM completely sold-out show of Avatar at Jordan's Furniture in Framingham (Natick?)

• The kids and all liked the movie
• Before the movie the theater was doing some kind of light-show to new big-band sound, such as Squirrel Nut Zippers, and the Brian Setzer Orchestra.
• There were no Previews of Coming Attractions or short features
• The seats were very comfortable, and made of memory foam
• Each seat is equipped with some kind of vibration thing to add to the picture
• The film uses alternating polarization to give the 3D effect, but with a very good frames-per-second rate, so it seems smooth
• I stayed till the end of the credits to see if there was a cookie at the end. There're a lot of credits, and no cookie

( mild and meta-spoilers )
All in all I recommend this film for the visual spectacle. The story can also be engaging.

It's been cold out lately... so cold I forget that it is still Autumn. Here are a few pictures from recent days.

In other news:

• Denise has left for the day to do some scrapbooking thing
• I bought tickets for Piper, Josiah and I to see Avatar-3D in Natick tomorrow at 9:15AM (lots of sold out shows)
• I finally broke down and bought an ice-scraper for my new(ish) car.

Ever see the Sun reflecting off the surface of a lake? The picture to the right is a giant lake full of liquid Methane (or something that is liquid at very cold temperatures) on surface of Saturn's moon Titan.

A paper was released which does state that two events were observed in the mine in Minnesota that are consistent with the Dark Matter collisions that the experiment was designed to detect. This is not enough to call proof, but it is enough to justify expanding the experiment with three times as many detectors to speed the search. This is an exciting time for both cosmologists and particle physicists.

A couple weeks ago I reported on a rumor related to the possible observation of a Dark Matter particle. The rumor was that it was going to be reported in today's issue of Nature. No such report appeared. The rumor is apparently not true.

I've been letting some ideas develop (fester?) without actually letting them cross my conscious thought on a continuous basis, but this conscious side (Frontend Service) has started handling the requests a little more frequently in the last day or so. It escalated somewhat as I was thinking through where I wanted to go with my NaNoWriMo project back in October. The idea that had come to mind involved the idea that one of the many things that may be different between now and a century from now (or less) is that in the future, it may be impossible to tell fake artifacts from real ones, and that no record, or possibly even old memory, will be something that can be trusted. There are a lot of dystopian ideas that fall out of this, but what I've been thinking about has more to do with finding meaning and happiness in life in an age when every bit of physical evidence can be hidden, altered, or manufactured... and when (we presume) the cosmos and quantum worlds are nearly understood. Of course finding meaning and happiness in life has always been a challenge. I think that the general drift of my conclusions has been away from certain kinds of material satisfaction, and hope for making a lasting impact, and toward the immediate social and personal successes.

BTW, happy birthday snarkyman  and peregrinning .

I'm in Camelot for a week. So far it's been good. I feel like I'm finally starting to acclimate to the community.

Here are some recent pictures, including this one to the right where two happy girls are dancing and celebrating the fact that one of them has just moved in. Yay!

- Happy Birthday ladysprite .
- A local SCAdian died of H1N1. I suspect I probably have spoken with him, but I never really knew him.
- I got my expense report done. They aren't hard to do. It's just hard for me to start doing them from some kind of habit that adds stress to the process.
- I got some videos from Open-Mike night at the Cocoa-House. I'll probably edit them into an MP4 today or tomorrow.
- I plan to glue sound absorbing foam today because the glue has to be used in a well-ventilated environment, and this may be the last day for a long time that I can do it outdoors.
- Josiah was watching Bones last night. He was fascinated by the grizzly pictures of decomposed bodies.
- We're currently discussing where the board-games should go. I suggested building some new shelves.
- This morning feels like a finding-my-way day. I'm not sure what I'll get done.

( Dreamy blitherings behind cut )

It is a little strange for me to remember even one snapshot from my dreams. VERY odd to remember this much.

My trip home yesterday went quickly. At 33,000 feet there was a 150 MPH tailwind. The main part of the flight was so fast we had to circle around Boston Harbor a few times to wait until our gate was clear, and even then we landed 30 minutes early.

I went to sleep early, and then woke up not early, and took a late morning nap just to be sure. Eventually I bundled up and went into the conservation land (crunch crunch crunch). Walking in crunchy snow uses more energy than I think it should. Gravity breaks the snow for me, not my muscles.

Here are a few pictures from today. More to come tonight with the Cocoa-House fund-raiser.

I think I'm going to try gluing some foam to Masonite this afternoon.

An electric outlet that shares a circuit with our smoke detectors stopped working last night. It's the one my laptop is on normally. I have some unexpected work to do.

Aside from that, I managed to watch the Daily Show and Colbert Report this week on Hulu. That was great, I didn't get behind on it, though I see now that one of the rituals of my returning from travel was Denise and I catching up on the Daily Show & Colbert. Mildly awkward. I need a plan to handle this in the future.

My plans for today are not very concrete yet, but I bet they mostly center around doing things in the house, including more work on the green-screen area. I'll probably brave the elements and go for a longish walk too.