I love learning. I also like talking (sharing) about things that (I hope) other people are interested in. Today xkcd talks about how many people each day learn something that everybody knows.

At their site, if you hover your mouse over the comic you always get an extra thought/punchline/jab. Today’s extra was “Saying 'what kind of an idiot doesn't know about the Yellowstone supervolcano' is so much more boring than telling someone about the Yellowstone supervolcano for the first time.”

xkcd is an excellent comic that talks about life, love, tech, math, science and more. Sometimes it’s just a few frames, sometimes it’s dozens. Sometimes it’s really tall and you have to scroll and once in a while it’s got a little bit of color in it. Sometimes it’s funny and sometimes it’s serious.

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On Saturdays from May until September, Hines Park closes Hines Drive from 8 AM to 3:30 PM so that people can ride bicycles, walk and rollerblade in the road and not have to fear traffic.

They close the road from Outer Drive and Hines Drive (near Ann Arbor Trail in Dearborn) all the way to Hines Drive and Ann Arbor Trail (where they cross is about 12+ miles away? 7 miles?). Many of the parks along that route are open, you just need to access them from a road other than Hines Drive. The parks are the two ends are semi-barricaded off, but it does say you are allowed to drive around them at Outer Drive to get to Helms Haven Park and at Ann Arbor Trail to get to Nankin Mills Park.

The video has a bit of the Rouge River and some geese and baby geese (goslings?). At the end it was later and the road was open, but all the times I shot video, I think I’m on the sidewalk.

Video and photosynth both shot, edited and uploaded from my iPhone 4s. It’s not very fancy edited, just put a few clips together (trimmed a few) and added a (tiny) bit of text.

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This stellar planetarium in your pocket is an application called Star Walk, and it’s only 99 cents on the iPhone, this is normally $2.99 and worth it for the price (the cheapest I’ve ever seen). It’s also available for the iPad for $1.99 (which is much cheaper than the usual $4.99).

This is listed as a Mother’s day sale so I’m not sure when it’s ending, that’s not for a week (right?!?) and that would be a long sale (unless they got their weeks mixed up!).

I did a much longer Star Walk review a year ago with many screen captures and a lot more information that you’ll have to read for all the details.

This is a planetarium in your pocket. If you device has a the GPS and gyroscope, you just tilt it up at the sky and it will identify what you’re point it. It’s awesome! There are some similar products, but I think this might be the most polished.

Other than some small bits of information (and the space image of the day) you DO not need to be connected to the internet to use this information. So this is useful anywhere you can see the stars!!!

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The penny costs to much to make and it uses too much time to spend them. Plus, what can you buy with a penny? I’m not even sure what you can buy for five pennies theses days, so occasionally I’ll take a jab at the nickel too (maybe).

I’m going to mention this every so often, why? Because it’s interesting to me and hopefully you’ll think so too. According to this video, it’s 1.8 cents to make a penny (how counter-productive is that?) and I’ve heard numbers higher that that. I don’t think any machines even take pennies. Although, I did hear in a West Wing episode that toll booths in Illinois will take them.

FYI, individual items wouldn’t be rounded to the nearest nickel, just your final total.

Watch the video, the theme is “Why Pennies are economically inefficient and should be abolished”, the guy who made it makes fun ones and he’s got some surprising points later on towards the end.

He makes some interesting points. Personally, I don’t carry change on me. I keep it in the car and generally use it for parking meters and if I’m getting a 99 cent or $1 item at the drive through. They’ll get mostly dimes and nickels and 9 or 10 pennies to help me get rid of them.

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It’s World Backup Day! It’s not that you should only backup once a year, it’s an awareness day. So I guess it should be called “Backup Awareness Day”. But seriously, you should backup your important documents and photos all the time. Why? Because you’ll be very sad / upset / angry when you lose those files. Please notice, I said “when”, not “if”. Moving your photos to a different device (and deleting off the computer) is not a backup, it’s the only copy. Multiple copies is alwaysrecommended!!!

If it’s an important document, save multiple copies. If it’s your resume (CV), save it as “Resume March 2012″ so that you’ve got previous versions of the file if something happens. If you’ve made massive changes to that document, just e-mail a copy to yourself; the copy in your mail account is an off site backup. When I do new technology plans (100 page documents) I save new versions every few hours, I don’t want to think I moved those 10 pages from section 7 to section 5 and realize later I never pasted them, I can go back and get an earlier version of those pages later.

If it’s photos, don’t wait until your camera is full, that’s the only copy of those photos, if you lose the camera, it gets stolen, or something else weird happens, you lose all those photos!!! Even uploading them to a site like Walgreens, Costco, Kodak or wherever you might send your photos is a backup (it’ll cost to get your photos out, but at least they aren’t lost); these places don’t guarantee that they’ll keep your photos but they do want you to share them and print more copie$ of them, just be sure you’re uploading the largest possible size photos. Facebook is not good for this, they do not keep high quality versions of the photos, they will not be good for printing later.

Every so often back your documents and photos up to multiple DVD (standard DVD’s hold more than 4 GB) and make multiple copies; once you’ve got them sorted making five copies isn’t much harder than making one copy. Keep a copy at your Mom’s house or at your kids house or in your safe deposit box. You don’t want all the copies at the same place in case there is a fire and they all burn down. Then you can delete these photos from the cloud and you’ve got more space for more photos.

The last few versions of the Macintosh OS will back up to an external drive via Time Capsule and you can go back in time and look at what version was on the computer at a particular time (it’s very cool and easy).

There are off site services you can use (I use Dropbox).

Syncing your photo to your computer generally backs up the phone numbers, calendar, photos and more. The latest version of the iOS devices (iPhone, iPad and iPod touch) will back up automatically daily to the iCloud if you wish; the problem with this is it’s an all or nothing option when you want to restore.

All photos that you take with your iPhone or iPad get automatically backed up to the iCloud. These then show up on your computer in the iPhoto Photo Stream. If you import from a camera to iPhoto, it automatically puts those photos in the Photo Stream and you can see them on all the devices you’ve synced with the iCloud (including your AppleTV). It only keeps the last 1,000 photos and doesn’t keep any videos, but it’s a partial backup. So this is an automatic download that I get have in the cloud too.

Backing up is especially important if your main computer is a portable device. You can earlier drop or have stolen your laptop or tablet, you need those files backed up!

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I don’t like sitting at the computer all the time, so why do I do it? Because that’s where all the information is at! With KindleFeeder.com I get my information sent wirelessly to my Kindle (I have the Kindle Keyboard 3G) automatically twice a day and I can read it anywhere! It’s in a magazine format that makes it really easy to navigate around. It looks pretty good on the iPhone and iPad Kindle readers too, not exactly the same format but still very easy to navigate.

So I’ve got 38 FULL feeds that I removed from my Google Reader: NYT, BBC, Economist categories I like (science, tech, most e-mailed), a few other (long post) blogs, some finance (Get Rich Slowly and The Simple Dollar), and a few learning Spanish sites (that I’ve never read before). Then I added a dozen feeds that were popular at KindleFeeder. I took those feeds were on my Google Reader and I put them in a KindleFeeder category, so I’ll know that I don’t really need to look in there for those articles (unless looking for something particular) and eventually I deleted them. These are my longest, most interesting blog sites (that aren’t very colorful) that I can read on the go, very comfortably, even in the sun.

Bottom line: I think KindleFeeder.com is well worth the $20 a year! Convenience and time is everything. So try it out!

You can generate some sample issues (10 feeds with up to 512 MB of images) without paying anything to try it out (but you need to try it for a few days in a row, it’s a little overwhelming the first time you run it on a few sites since you get everything).

Warning! The downside is that it doesn’t work easily on the newer (late 2011) B&W Kindles unless you transfer the files via USB (super inconvenient, IMHO). You can read the articles fine, but it’s not in the easy to use navigation.

Geeky stuff you really don’t need to know: I was worried about the number of images (4 MB max per delivery), but the first time you add a feed it adds all the past articles, once you’re past that (issue) I think it’ll be okay; some feeds only update a few times a week, but they’ve still got a history. Two feeds each had a history of 20 items were both each over 3.5 megabytes, so they looked bad the first time, with twice daily deliveries it’s rare I miss an image; I put the few sites that I don’t care about images last, so if any turn up missing, it’s those.

It has a clips feature that will let me easily mark something on the web (via the Kindle) to save it and thenI can delete that “issue” from my Kindle, so that’s good (but I don’t know if I can “un-clip” them later). From the Kindle (if you’re a paying subscriber) you can even request the delivery of another issue at any time (and if you have a 3G model, you can pull it down free over the 3G network).

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I’ve got this huge painting of the Fisher Building. It’s got to be six feet high and it fits perfect in my condo. I get lots of compliments all the time on it. The first few years I had it, I hadn’t even realized it was the Fisher building.

I’m mentioning this today, because I made a panorama of the Fisher building while downtown.

Does anyone know if there is a restaurant or viewing platform up top?!?

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I’ve got too much stuff. So I’m cleaning, trashing and selling 500 pounds of “stuff”. I hope to do this in a month, but we’ll see how that goes.

I’m also reading (as one of many changes) in an attempt to keep my place cleaner neater.

I’m starting with books. I’ve got a lot of them, I’m listing a few on half.com (eBay’s sister site) and I’ll see what I can get for some old ones and some newer ones. For the old ones, I’ll have to see if it’s worth the effort to actually sell something for a dollar or two (plus shipping). I think if I can do a dozen books, CDs or DVDs, I’ll be able to get a better feel on selling these smaller things. I might just be better off donating them to Goodwill or the Salvation Army (but I’ve got no clue what to estimate the value at) which would be minimal effort to do compared to labeling and shipping items out.

Also, Amazon has a buyback program which gives you gift card credit (click the book above and you’ll see an image similar to the left). That might be significantly easier for newer items (but I have less of those to get rid of), but I’ll try that too (maybe).

I guess I should actually put some in the Amazon used section too…

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Two things for today: a photo thing and a numbers thing.

Today is 11/1/11 or if you live over seas it’s 1/11/11. I like fun number things, in 10 days we’ll have another date number thing.

And in a few days my car milage will be 123456! So hopefully I don’t miss it. (I should verify that)

Yes, it is the little things that I enjoy in life!

The photo thing is a 26 Things project / collection. Slightly different than usual, it’s really 13 things but two photographs of the same topic. For example, one of the topics is “patters” so you could do two different patterns, you could do two opposite patterns, you could do two different perspectives of the same pattern (or just take a dozen different pattern pictures and post your two favorite ones). I like this twist, I’ve started a few times and never finished, but I think I will with this one. And I’ll probably post throughout the month as I get each pair completed (I think?). Plus, it’s less items to remember! Then you post your completed set on-line somewhere (flickr, blog, etc) and link to it from the project site.

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I was out biking this weekend (again) and was playing with a new camera (not mine) and as I was biking along I saw a dear up ahead.

I got some stills and some video. But I was still standing there on the bike so I’m not the steadiest I could be. At the end I was at 14x which also contributes to the extra shakiness and I didn’t have glasses on so I couldn’t really see how focused it was.

This is not a soundtrack I added later, it just happened to be what was playing on my bike stereo when I saw the deer, I thought it worked out well…

The last one turned around and went back (after already crossing the road), I’m not sure why he got spooked when the others didn’t. I went over to the side of the road and sat down for a bit, but never saw any appear on either side of the road again.

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So if it’s nice outside, this is where I’ll go to eat lunch. It’s this tiny little park with four benches that (as you can see) needs a little trimming and some cement work. It’s the next block over from where I work, so it’s a nice short walk to get there. But there’s always a bench available and it’s usually pretty quiet.

The flag isn’t easy to catch, I’ve got a little too much sky in this image but the flag came out the best, so it’s the one I chose to use. This is for my 31 photos in 31 days project for yesterday.

It’s a small park, I’d say one-fourth of a “standard” city block. How big is that? It depends on the neighborhood, where I grew up blocks were about one-sixth of a mile long, in other places in the Detroit area, I’d say big blocks are about one-fourth of a mile long.

And yes that’s got to be the one of the most boring blog post titles I’ve ever done…

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So I have a confession: I LOVE The Big Blue Bridge! It’s the bridge that crosses Telegraph and I-94, I’m not sure why I like it, it’s kind of a bright blue and other than that, I just like it. If you’re in the car with me when I’m crossing it, if I didn’t say anything I think you’d notice something was up.

This is the side view (and it’s not perfect), I don’t think I’ve ever been thrilled with any of my crossing the bridge photos, it’s hard to see the depth (there’s no where to stand, so focus and such isn’t really an option). This is for my 31 photos in 31 days project today.

Speaking of things on the road, this guy is driving down the street with writing on the back of his truck and it took me a few minutes to get a view (and then a few more to get a photo).

This guy has some anger issues, I’m not really sure who he’s yelling at? The government? The Governor? The public? Of course, I had to go look up the definition because I’ve never heard the phrase before. Notice the parts written on both sides of the license plates too. And then the profanity, I can’t believe he hasn’t got a ticket for that yet.

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I like these “glass totems” but whoever put them here did not position them for optimum sunlight and there isn’t any lighting for at night. They’re part of a Dearborn Outdoor Sculpture Exhibition enrichment that they’ve done for a few years with the Midwest Sculpture Initiative.

While I wouldn’t pay $8,000 for these, I get to see them for free and when I’m bored of it in a year, it’ll be gone, possibly replaced with something else.

This is for my 31 photos in 31 days project today.

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I was out roller blading again down by the Detroit River and I got this shot totally by accident at least the reflection part was by accident, I was aiming at the rest. Next time I’ll do some more like it on purpose, but this one was a happy accident.

I was standing on my tippy-toes to get this photo of the fountain over the stairs (by the Underground Railroad memorial) and I got the reflection off of the marble and I really like the way it came out. This is for my 31 photos in 31 days project today.

This is the Detroit Princess Riverboat they run all sorts of trips on the river (starting at $20) and private party rentals. This was taken outside Cobo Hall.

THe is the old Parke Davis & Co. building. It’s now a hotel and this is an area they have with benches outside. It’s about to start raining (yes, I got a little wet) so no one is out there right now…

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I like this open or closed sign they have at the library. It’s lit like it is now (like on open book!) if it’s open. When it’s closed it (kinda) looks like a closed book. But you can see it way out in the parking lot before you walk all the way up to the door.

Sorry about the care and reflection, but it’s a window! If you click the photo for the larger version it’s easier to see the unused bits of neon (or neon-like lights), I wish I had a photo of it “closed” to show. Maybe I’ll get one and use it for a different day since this is for my 31 photos in 31 days project.

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I always love Chicago, I’ve had incredible luck with the weather when you consider the number of times I’ve been there and it’s almost always a different experience than the last time I was there. That’s not to say I don’t do some of the same things: I bike or rollerblade, I get ribs at SRO and I hit the Apple Store; after all, I am a creature of habit (habits?). And with all the people there, you can’t help but spend some time people watching…

This little girl was sitting right on the edge of the pier(?) looking into Lake Michigan. There were a few other kids with her and they were all pretty peaceful down there by the water, there is a beach not far away and I think they’d been there for a while (some were wet and I’m pretty sure they hadn’t jumped off the edge there). This photo was taken almost right behind the Adler Planetarium.

It was a nice day but it was hot out, these people were out relaxing during their lunch. This is downtown Chicago at State Street and Wacker Drive and the river is just out of sight to the left. I’d been relaxing in the shade by the water and didn’t even realize how the big steps were benches and grass until I’d gone up those stairs.

There were people running, walking, biking and blading everywhere (mostly along Lake Michigan). It was really hot when this runner was out and it was still early in the day but there were still lots of people out. You can see the Ferris Wheel at Navy Pier in the background.

Yeah, I know I title this “People in Chicago” but there are some tiny people in the distance in it. In the distance you can see Chicago in the distance. From the left we’ve got Navy Pier, the Hancock Building, Sears Tower (now Willis Tower) and to my right (not in the photo) across the road is the LIncoln Park Zoo (to give you a frame of reference as I try to do with my photos).

This is my 31 photos in 31 days photo for today.

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This is a building downtown on East Grand Blvd. and Beaubien St. I see it occasionally when I’m dodging I-94 traffic and take the sidestreets. We were on a bicycle pub crawl the other day and Jennifer was eyeing the colorful building from a distance so we pedaled over there to get a few pictures (and yes, I said “bicycle pub crawl”).

We’re standing on the corner of East Grand Blvd. and Brush St. looking East for this photo. The Fisher Building is a few blocks behind me and on the left.

It kinda looks like they just poured paint over the side of the building but it doesn’t really look caked on so I think it was more than that.

I tried playing with the focus for some interesting shots and while this one came out okay, I was really hoping for a sequence but didn’t get it.

The topic for this week’s PhotoHunt is “Painted” so it seemed like a good time to post these…

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I went down to Rivard Plaza after work and went rollerblading. Actually, first I sat down and changed my wheels, they were really worn down, it felt like new blades afterwards. It was a little quiet down there, there were people but not too busy. They were setting up for a festival but I don’t know which one.

The Detroit Riverwalk is a nicely developed area from Belle Isle to Cobo Hall; north of Milken State Park (free admission) which is right next to Rivard Plaza it’s not all along the water, it gets a little jaggy where there are some marinas and the coast guard and things, but from the state park to Cobo it’s a straight line along the water. If you’re semi-familar with the area Rivard Plaza is where the Diamond Jack boat docks, the carousel and the bike rental is all right there a few blocks north of the Renaissance Center.

Click the panorama, it gets pretty big (1200×250 pixels); I took this down by Cobo Hall (I think?). This is my 31 photos in 31 days photo for today. It’s a little bit of a cheat since it’s a stitched together panorama so it’s really more than one photo (but it’s at least one!). It’s from my iPhone but it’s made by Microsoft. Yes, I said Microsoft! It’s called PhotoSynth and it’s very cool, it works with some kind of plug-in so you can navigate around but I haven’t played with that yet.

Just goofing around with my iPhone and the video editing. I shot all these clips on the iPhone and edited them with iMovie on the iPhone (clips, Ken Burns effect, titles and credits) and it’s pretty easy to do.

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I love the camera on the iPhone, while it’s not the best digital camera I’ve owned, it’s always with me and it’s lots better than others that I’ve owned*. I’ve taken well over 400 photos in the last two months (actually it’s got an okay flash, a digital zoom, tap to focus, HDR (High Dynamic Range) and a huge screen. And don’t forget that it’s also a HD 720p video camera, for a while it was the best video camera I ever owned (and the only one with a light). Factor in that you can upload (Flickr, YouTube, FaceBook) and e-mail photos / videos instantly, it’s pretty amazing. That’s not even factoring in optional photo and video editing apps.

I actually chose the HDR photo because of the additional detail from the water droplets. While I like the color of the flowers I actually like the color a tiny bit more in the non-HDR version. HDR on the iPhone (almost) instantly takes several photos at different settings to brighten the dark spots and darken the bright spots, giving you a wider range (they do take longer to save).

So these are some flowers out in front of the school where I work. I thought they were looking pretty good for no one really maintaing them in the summer (it’s a student project) with the whacky weather we’ve been having (melting or flooding) so they became the focus of today’s 31 photos in 31 days photo.

So it’s a great camera and I’m always taking pictures with it, even when I have other cameras with me.

* My iPhone is a hundred times better than the first digital camera that I owned, a $600 Casio QV-10 in 1996 (world’s first digital camera that includes a TFT display), which was 640×480 (iPhone 4 has 2592×1936 pixels) and had a proprietary graphics format that you had to convert to JPEG. This camera had no flash, no real zoom and ate AA batteries like they were candy. A feature it did have was that it had a video out; I remember taking pictures at a wedding and hooking it up to a huge projector that happened to be at the reception for some other kind of slideshow, I was the hit of the party (and the photographer said he was going to go get one for his next wedding).

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