A Gummy Bear Death

Things like this make me realize how *very* little I know about the world around me.

Modern Japanese Technology: Bullet Trains

A Tokaido Shinkansen pulls into Jr Utsunomiya Station on the southbound tracks (Track 4). This fellow got me to Tokyo (100km) in about 55 minutes. Not suuuuuper fast (Tokyo-Osaka Hikari goes much faster), but much faster than the local JR line that runs down below. These trains are probably one of my most favorite things about Japan.

To Watch Where No Man Has Watched Before

Thanks to the NYT for this one.

Three astronauts (an American, a Russian & a Japanese) are all up in the Unity portion of the I.S.S. right now watching Star Trek: The Future Begins on a laptop. How cool is that?

Just great that 3 guys from 3 different countries, 3 different cultures can hang out and enjoy a good ol' space/action flick. Period. Maybe I'm simplistic, but that just seems cool to me.

Or maybe I just think it's cool because I'd like to be up there watching ST from the I.S.S.

Just maybe...

SPAM Cancer

Sounds like Yahoo and Northwestern University are on to something: checking a user's mail's timestamps in order to differentiate said user from a SPAMbot. Good news. Just makes me wonder when someone'll turn this around and use it for nefarious purposes.

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