Lee.org

I just listened to a podcast of Peter Diamandis speaking at Pop!Tech 2005. He’s the founder of the X Prize. He’s got these crazy ideas about how to foster innovation. Instead of throwing money at a problem, offer up a prize for the first one to achieve the goal and let the competitive spirit of people take its course. He says that the 10 million dollar X Prize for a reusable space ship leveraged many times as much capital, getting people to try and win the prize. It’s a crazy idea that’s not so crazy! Charles Lindburg flew the Spirit of St. Louis to win a $25,000 prize offered by Raymond Orteig…

I’m kind of thinking of going to the X Prize cup but it’s a bit of a distance from me… Anyone interested in going with me?

X-Prize Cup Calendar

Wednesday Flaming Lotus Girls meeting and work on Serpent
Thursday Improv Party at Mary’s… waay too much fun
Friday Forbidden Island in Alameda with Michael and Karin from Improv
Saturday woke up late (darned tropical drinks! It’s the umbrellas, I tell you!). worked at Box Shop, Fire Arts Expo at Monster Park
Sunday Improv class, hang with Harmony and Crism
–now– midway between Sunday and Monday
Monday chill I hope!
Tuesday photo shoot for Flaming Lotus Girl Calendar (!!!) What should I wear (or not??)
Wednesday FLG meeting and work on Serpent
Thursday Going out for Shameless Heather’s birthday
Friday Treesa’s Memorial Day party overnight in Boulder Creek
Saturday prep for my folks coming to visit! Chill with Andre from work?
Sunday last improv class :-(

Phew!

I’m going to be doing a bit of stainless steel welding shortly. I know that the fumes can be dangerous, mostly because of hexavalent chromium, but I’m having a hard time getting the following question answered:

Exactly what do I need to do to keep myself safe while welding stainless steel?

Update 4-12-09: Here is the answer.

We’ll be welding a lot in an only moderately well ventilated building. Running 2 MIG welders for maybe 3 hours a night for 90 days.

I’ve found some tremendously detailed documents but nothing that gives a reasonable guide to safety.

For example, this page reads:

OSHA does not believe that a specific requirement mandating use of HEPA filters for air purifying respirators used for protection from Cr(VI) is justified, and has not included such a requirement in the final rule. For air-purifying respirators, in addition to the option of providing a respirator equipped with a filter certified by NIOSH under 30 CFR Part 11 as a HEPA filter, the Respiratory Protection standard allows employers several alternatives. Under 1910.134 the employer may also provide either (1) An air-purifying respirator equipped with a filter certified for particulates by NIOSH under 42 CFR Part 84; or (2) an air-purifying respirator equipped with any filter certified for particulates by NIOSH where dealing with contaminants consisting primarily of particles with mass median aerodynamic diameters (MMAD) of at least 2 micrometers. OSHA believes these requirements are appropriate for protection from exposures to Cr(VI).

That’s well and good but the standard respirator rating systems don’t talk about 2 micrometer particles. An N95 mask filters 95% of 0.3 micron particles. First, is 95% enough? Second, how good is it at 0.2 micron particles? 94% or 20%???

That document mentions things like “The final rule establishes an 8-hour time-weighted average (TWA) exposure limit of 5 micrograms of Cr(VI) per cubic meter of air (5 [mu]g/m\3\)”. That’s fine but I have NO idea what kind of exposure rate I might get with welding stainless steel. Maybe a gentle breeze will completely protect me, or maybe it’ll kill every living thing in in a 2 mile radius.

I’ll continue my research but I’m bothered that my research is going so slowly. Where can I get answers?

Crap you shouldn’t “buy just to find out about it” because that is exactly how they make their money. Train wrecks you might slow down and look at but crap just stinks.

– The Celestine Prophecy
– Medjugorje
– The Da Vinci Code

Please add to the list in comments

I’ve been working with the Flaming Lotus Girls on this very large art project for Burning Man.. The Serpent Mother. It’s shaping up to be pretty amazing.

Though the project is partially paid for with a large grant from Burning Man, it definitely doesn’t cover everything so were putting on a kickass fundraising party. I won’t be able to make it… My folks are in town for the week and I don’t think they’d dig going to the event.

The party is June 2nd… check out the pix below to get the whole scoop. It’ll be something!

Continue reading ‘Flaming Lotus Girls Fundraiser’ »

Here is a Golf GTI ad that I just love.

Here we go… I told you that I’d be posting larger files…

Here’s a commercial for the Golf GTI with Gene Kelly in it. “The new Golf GTI. The original, updated.” Well, he’s not really in it… but he is.

Get the latest Flash Player to see this player.

I am totally mezmerized by the dancing in bit. I’ve watched it many times times and I’ll watch it many more. I find it quite soothing.

Download the full version:  Gene Kelly Singin’ in the Rain with the new Golf (6MB .mov)

So says a guy on GTtv, Lego Star Wars II is going to be available in September on the PlayStation II, XBox, XBox 360, Gamecube, PC, PSP, DS, and GBA. I don’t care much about the game (though it seems cute) but talk about cross-platform design!

I just got off an hour-long video conference with my 5 year old niece. It was great… But I we still miss each other!

We use Yahoo Messenger audio chat and “view webcam” at the same time. It works really well. Now if I can just get her to figure out how to stay in the camera’s frame; she keeps talking to the screen (where my face is) instead of the camera. It’s cutre when she tries to show me the picture from a book… and she’s holding it up to the screen.

Lee.org is now hosted at Dreamhost.com. I was at Spenix for several years. The switch came in part because I couldn’t reach anyone in order to change the billing on my expiring credit card.

I’ve now got 20 gig of space and 1 terabyte of transfers/month instead of 1 gig of space and 20 gig/month (for less than I was paying before… $8/month instead of $10) so I’ll be starting to post a lot of terribly high bandwidth dreck. Goodie for you!

FMI, I’ve been getting 400,000 hits per month on the site recently. Cool.
Continue reading ‘New Internet Provider’ »

A very good friend of mine reminded me of an experience we shared. She rekindled it perfectly in this email to me

lee, i can just imagine this conversation…
coworker: blah blah blah
me: grrr. i want a cookie
coworker: what?
me: oh, nothing, just that i want a cookie.
coworker: huh? what does that have to do with blah, blah, blah?
me: uhm, nothing, it’s just this line from a song by evolution control committee…

coworker: (response one) oh, that’s nice, now on to blah blah blah me – right, bleh, bleh , bleh

coworker: (response two) really – who are they – what’s the song like?

/me: (inside voice)well, you see, an ex of mine and i were way too drunk at a corporate party and were trying to orchestrate a hookup with two very cute party members, and well, it wasn’t going so well, so i looked at him and said, “i want a cookie” which is a line to this song they have about dissatisfaction, wanting, sex, cookies….
/
me: (outside voice) oh, ECC, a very cool music and digital manipulation group – they make their own instruments, and have a remix of dan rather’s voice that got them notoriety in the early 90s as well as a cease and desist for CBS. one of their other songs is called “i want a cookie” and it is about all the things we want that we don’t have, a better job, or sex, or something as mundane as a cookie, it’s all the same – the dissatisfaction with our lives and the desire for better sex and a cookie and a job, all come from the same center. voice trails off…

coworker: perplexed look

me.i should have used my inside voice on that and just told you they were a funky art band that makes their own instruments and resamples voices over music?

coworker : uh, yeah
me: about blah blah blah…
coworker – right, about bleh, bleh, bleh….