Even though I'm loyal to Second Cup

I'm a sucker for scones. In fact, I will at times walk past the local cafeteria where I work, past the Tim Horton's, through rain, and around construction sites, to get a good scone to go with my coffee. The problem with scones is that, like any pastry in a coffee shop, they are just too pricey to justify buying. Oh, and they're usually chalked full of sugar, but I digress.

A few years ago when my sister was visiting out east, she made these fantabulous scones for breakfast one morning. They were such a hit that, at her wedding last fall, somebody wrote "Make More Scones!" and submitted it as her advice to the newlyweds on how to nurture a long and happy marriage. I made the recipe once. They were delicious. But the ordeal broke the student-quality food processor I had at the time. I haven't ventured to make them since. But I will.

Anyway, I'm getting distracted from the whole point of this post. (No, it's not about scones. Or at least it wasn't when I first thought of writing it.) This morning, Lifehacker pointed me towards a cool little recipe book.
I thought that it might interest a few out people out there, even if the recipes aren't from Second Cup.

peanut butter running time

I like running. I like going for long runs. A lot of people go on runs to think. I go to clear my head.

My meditative method for clearing my head dates back to when I started running as a teenager. I pull some rhythmic section out of a song -- usually a couple of bars -- loop it over and over in my head while running. This repetition creates a trance-like state where I zone in only on running: my breathing, where my feet hit the ground, when my feet hit the ground. It also stops other thoughts from entering my head, because those would mess up my cadence and probably cause me to get a stitch or something.

Often I seem to get "Big Calm" by Morcheeba stuck in there, but other tunes will kick in from time to time. One of my least favorites is Hammer Time, which dates back to my high school days when an aerobics class in the centre of the track would blast MC Hammer while I did my track workouts.

On occasion, this "rhythmic meditation" can backfire because I don't have the best ability to control what the tune will be and once I get this song in my head, it doesn't leave until I'm done. This weekend, I ran to what was probably the worst song (if you can call it that) I've ever had stuck in my head. It was in there for every step of my hour-long run. And I hope it never finds its way back in there.

... so ...

Hi.

I've been kind of busy.

And, well, I sort of forgot about this blog. And for that I apologize.

In all likelihood, this blog would have remained forgotten and fallen into the abyss of unused and unmaintained websites. But then, in the week that I declared myself to be less busy than I'd been in over a year, I got three separate hints that I should start blogging. (And I didn't even know that three people read this site.) So before the guilt from those hints wears off, I thought I should at least post something to get the ball rolling again.

So, to begin, what have I been doing? Well I'll give the mega-short version. There are three major things that I would have been reporting if I'd remained an active blogger (which, based on my archives, halted some time in May 2007):

1) I got married.
2) My wife and I bought a house.
3) I wrote and defended my thesis.

It's kind of funny to think that of those three, the largest time investment (so far) has been number 3, my thesis. Perhaps not surprisingly, it also feels the most anti-climactic now that it's been achieved.

So anyway, I'm going to try to make another run at this whole blogging thing. Hopefully I'll have time to post more often about more interesting things. If only I'd kept a that-would-make-a-good-blog-post notebook in my pocket during the last year, then I'd be off to the races.

Had to share this, although admittedly it will appeal to a very small audience.

in case you were wondering

In case you're wondering why things have been so quiet on this site in the last few months, this figure shows the mood of your average PhD student as a function of time. It was generated by a friend of mine who just completed his degree in December after a long and courageous battle. The gray dot indicates my present location -- at least on the time axis.



But dammit it will all be over soon. And I hope that it will end on the "Woo!" side...

10 bucks is 10 bucks

This is a real ad:

SURVIVAL SYSTEMS LTD.
Research Subjects Wanted!!! EC

Dartmouth, NS, CA

1/19/2008 12:00:00 AM

Research Subjects Wanted!!! "ECG responses to Helicopter Underwater Escape Training"

We are looking for 30 healthy men to participate in an experiment in our helicopter underwater escape trainer at Survival Systems Ltd in Dartmouth to be arranged between March 25th and April 6th, 2008.

If you are in a helicopter accident over water you will be flipped upside down and submerged. Therefore, we want to see what your heart rate and response is when you are inverted in our helicopter underwater escape trainer. You will be compensated for your time with $100 cash! For more details about the study please e-mail us at some@email.address

Originally published in The Daily News, Halifax, Nova Scotia

I can't help but think that there are very few people who would do this for $100 but wouldn't do it for free. For some reason, I immediately thought of this.

moving now safer than knitting

Depending on how you interpret this, one might suggest that gardening is only 10 times safer than sky diving... interesting.



Luckily, when I tried "died in a moving accident", there were only 4 hits, and they pertained to turtles, fish, and computers. So the coast is clear for this weekend...