Status-Q

…put a dollar down and buy a car

Well, yesterday I put a few more down and rented one. I was driving from LAX to Orange county, about 40 miles, and the nice man at Alamo offered me a very cheap upgrade to a convertible, which I couldn’t resist.

So I was cruising down the highway, feeling truly Californian, gazing at the HOLLYWOOD sign on the hills through the fronds of the palm trees lining the road, and wondering if I would actually get sunburn in January. And I had some sense of why so many million people want to live here.

Unfortunately, I met most of those millions as I tried to make my way back to the airport in the evening. Those 40 miles took three hours. This has happened to me here before. And I decided I probably wouldn’t be one of the millions, not, at least, until I can afford a helicopter.

Rose and I have always been amused that cars in movies always explode if they fall off a precipice, or even roll down a somewhat small hill.

On the Insultingly Stupid Movie Physics page, there are a few more examples. Have you noticed that flashes and bangs from distant explosions tend to arrive at the same time? That bullets generate pleasing sparks when hitting things? These and other topics are discussed here. The site points out, for example, that if people hit by shotgun blasts were really blown off their feet and through the nearest window, the same thing would happen to the person holding the gun…

Quoted on Paul Bissex’s blog:

Last month, USPTO representatives met with members of the open source software community…The meeting focused on getting the best prior art references to the examiner during the initial examination process.

I’ve always felt that published applications on the patent offices’ websites needed a button labelled ‘Click here to report possibly relevant prior art’. Maybe this is a step closer to that goal.