If you don't have 2 1/2 minutes to watch the video you can read a little more at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beer_Launching_Fridge.

Conwell's home page, http://www.duke.edu/~jwc13/beerlauncher.html, was last updated just before he went on the show. I guess he either graduated or no longer has time for a website because he's so busy making Beer Launchers.

I was expecting the first day of Spring to be today, March 21, but it turns out it was yesterday. That got me wondering, what is the definition of the first day of Spring. This year, according to National Geographic, in the Northern Hemisphere spring officially begins at 7:44 a.m. ET on Friday, March 20, 2009—the vernal equinox, or spring equinox.

So many interesting tidbits!

The word equinox derives from the Latin words aequus (equal) and nox (night); in reality, the day is longer than the night at an equinox. Commonly, the day is defined as the period when sunlight reaches the ground in the absence of local obstacles. From the Earth, the Sun appears as a disc rather than a single point of light, so when the centre of the Sun is below the horizon, its upper edge is visible. ... The date at which the time between sunset and sunrise crosses 12 hours, is known as the equilux. Because sunset and sunrise times vary with an observer's geographic location (longitude and latitude), the equilux likewise depends on location and does not exist for locations sufficiently close to the equator.

But when is it?

Currently, the most common equinox and solstice dates are March 20, June 21, September 22 and December 21; the four-year average will slowly shift to earlier times in coming years. This shift is a full day in about 70 years (compensated mainly by the century "leap year" rules of the Gregorian calendar). This also means that in many years of the twentieth century, the dates of March 21, June 22, September 23 and December 22 were much more common, so older books teach (and older people may still remember) these dates.

And finally:

It is perhaps valuable for people in the Americas and Asia to know that the equinoxes listed as occurring on March 21, which occurred frequently in the 20th century and which will occur occasionally in the 21st century, are presented as such using UTC, which is at least four hours in advance of any clock in the Americas and as much as twelve hours behind Asian clocks. Thus, there will be no spring equinox later than March 20 in the Americas in the coming century.

Read lots more, complete with illustrations, at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vernal_Equinox

There are a lot of PDF converters out there, but most have nag screens, add information to the conversation, of just plain don't do a good job. I finally settled on doPDF because it fixes all of that stuff. It just works as expected. The description from their website:

doPDF is a free PDF converter for both personal and commercial use. Using doPDF you can create PDF files by selecting the "Print" command from virtually any application.

	Price	Package Size	Cooked yield	Price per cooked oz.	Price per slice
Bacon Bits	$1.89	3 oz.	3 oz.	$0.63	31?
Raw Bacon	$5.99	16 oz.	4.75 oz	$1.30	63?

As you can see from this chart, the Oscar Mayer package of bacon bits are a good price for their weight. Bacon is priced like diamonds: The smaller the pieces, the cheaper they are per ounce.

It's good to finally know the conversion factor of 16 oz. of raw bacon cooks down to 4.75 oz. My pricing is very different because I tend to buy in bulk and when things are on sale, but the bit price per ounce still wins, just not by as much: $0.39 vs. $0.53.

"Mixing the classic VIC-20 text-adventure games' style with the enthralling plot of Pac-Man for the ultimate in retro gaming action, we present Pac-txt."

Play Pac-Txt. You'll be bored in about 1 minute.

No wonder it's so hard to make paintings. The brown tile in the center of the top face and the yellow tile in the center of the side facing left are the same color.

This is one of many illusions from Beau Lotto's LottoLab Illusion pages. They say that their "AIM is to explain and explore HOW and WHY we see what we do."

The music was a nice blend of a bunch of styles, with no one of them overpowering the others. The sound was great (and even mixed well) and they're playing was excellent. Give them a try if you get the chance. I'll be picking up a CD soon.

For more, check out Incendio's website and MySpace page. Both have music streams.

Published: Aug. 3, 2007 at 7:26 PM

BEIJING, Aug. 3 (UPI) -- China's communist leaders have forbidden reincarnation without government permission in largely Buddhist Tibet.

The reincarnation ban is part of a 14-part regulation issued by the Chinese government in an attempt to limit the influence of the Dalai Lama, the exiled Tibetan religious leader, the Times of London reported Friday.

The People's Republic of China invaded Tibet in 1950 and has attempted to consolidate its control of it since, designating it an autonomous region.

Since the 12th century, Tibetan Buddhists have believed that reincarnated important religious leaders, known as tulkus, can be identified in young boys.

Because tulkus have a large influence in the Himalayan region, the Chinese government has frequently sought to control the process of identifying the boys.

The new regulations, which go into effect September 1, 2007, will make it illegal to identify the child reincarnation of the Dalai Lama without the approval of Chinese authorities.