Why Is There Confetti In So Many Taser Guns?

one of the advantages of walking daily (besides the whole getting healthier, losing weight, blah, blah blah is having the  to listen to more podcasts—something i lost when i stopped longer commutes (which i don't miss, by the by)

anyway, today learned that many tasers have confetti which contain trackers in it

from Mental Floss UK:

When a Taser gun is deployed, two probes are fired up to 10.6 metres, attaching to the body through up to 5cm of clothing and creating an electrical circuit between the gun and the victim’s muscles and nerves.
Normal gun manufacturers use various techniques to make every barrel unique. When a bullet passes through the barrel, it produces individual markings and these can be used to analyse whether the bullet was fired from a particular gun.
But, unlike regular gun bullets, the Taser probes are not able to leave an identifying mark that would lead investigators back to the person that fired them.
So in 1993 the AFID system was created. Now, when many Taser guns are fired, they disperse dozens of colourful anti-felon identification (AFID) tags, which resemble confetti and are printed with tiny serial numbers. It would be very time-consuming to pick all the tags up and so inevitably the police are able to find some and trace the gun that was used.
Huge swathes of law enforcement officers also carry this variety of Taser, which helps in determining overall accountability when the gun is used in the line of duty, although it’s mainly used to trace personal Taser use.
"What it is doing is preventing people from doing crimes," says Taser Vice President Steve Tuttle. "It tells the owner, if you do, you're putting twenty to thirty [business cards] out there."
"There's a ninety-eight per cent chance that when you deploy this, good luck, because we're going to catch you."

I also highly recommend listening A Violin’s Life by Frank Almond at the moth

canines for a feline free tomorrow

first there was this:


then this:


predicted by Violent Femmes?

not only does this kitten act like a baby Katushka

she looks like one too:

Erin McKean redefines the dictionary | Video on TED.com

E-books drive older women to digital piracy

The Telegraph

by Christopher Williams, Technolgy Correspondent 1:44PM BST 17 May 2011

One in eight women over 35 who own such devices admit to having downloaded an unlicensed e-book.

That compares to just one in 20 women over 35 who admit to having engaged in digital music piracy.

News that a group formerly unwilling to infringe copyright are changing their behaviour as e-books take off will worry publishing executives, who fear they could suffer similar a similar fate to the record labels that have struggled to replace lost physical sales.

The picture across the entire e-reader and tablet markets is even more troubling for the publishing industry. Some 29 per cent of e-reader owners of both genders and all ages admit piracy. For tablets the figure rises to 36 per cent.

The findings are part of the Digital Entertainment Survey, an annual assessment of consumer behaviour online by the law firm Wiggin.

The online poll of 1,959 consumers also found that the potential damage to publishing is likely to increase, as a quarter of those who admitted to e-book piracy said they would continue.

And the iPad and Kindle were both in the top three most wanted devices across all consumer groups.

The Publishers Association recently revealed the number of physical books sold fell by 3 per cent last year, and although consumer e-book sales grew strongly revenues were just £16m, compared to £3.1bn in physical sales.

Announcing the figures, the group’s chief executive, Richard Mollet, placed emphasis on preserving copyright protections.

"The innovation in the digital marketplace and the strength of British publishers’ export performance is only possible because of the robust and flexible copyright framework which underpins the UK creative industries," he said.

"Copyright ensures that authors, writers and researchers get rewarded for their talent and expertise, and that the publishers who support them see a return on their investment – particularly in their digital infrastructure."

Maybe the people over 35 are just more honest than those under 35 (although i have found that "kids today" don't even seem to realize that copying cds you don't own as wrong/illegal {at least when i do it, i know it's wrong} And that downloading book texts from sites like scribd is violating copyright (somehow, i am less likely to do that~although i do seem to reprint entire articles on my blog~is attribution enough?)

now the year needs to expand

or just make a new calendar (after all if we are moving into a Post-Modern version of our language, why not a PoMo calendar...)

Past, Present, and the Quantity of the Year

New York TimesPublished: May 3, 2011

How long is a year? Ask most people, and they’d say 365 days and not nearly long enough. The year, of course, is the time it takes the Earth to orbit around the Sun, a rate that is slowing fractionally each century. For many reasons, scientists need a more precise definition of the year than its length in days, yet the only unit of time defined in the International System of Units is the second, which is measured in oscillations of cesium atoms.

(i'm not sure i love this word, though

Recently, a task force of geologists and chemists proposed a new unit of measure called the annus — the Latin word for year — which would use the length of time between one equinox or solstice and the same equinox or solstice a year later. Because the Earth’s orbit varies in temporal length, the annus is keyed to the year 2000, which was 31,556,925.445 seconds long.Astronomers prefer to use the Julian year — which is 31,557,600 seconds long — and they, like some scientific journals, are not likely to adopt the annus. Many working geologists are objecting to the proposed abbreviation for annus, which is “a.” To the task force, the symbol Ma means mega-annus, or million years. But to geologists, Ma means “million years ago,” and 90 Ma, for instance, means a specific point in the Cretaceous period.
However this is resolved, we are left meditating on a remark made by a pair of geologists who note that a geological date like 90 Ma, or 90 million years ago, implies “before present.” Unfortunately, these geologists write, the present “is not well defined.” We know the feeling. We also know that whatever you call it, the year gets shorter and shorter the older you get.

(do you remember when the days, and weeks, and months, and years went by so slow you couldn't stand the wait?)but then, of course, all of our years will run out. . .

Someday the Sun Will Burn Out and the World Will End (but don't tell anyone)

The New York Times By DENNIS OVERBYE
Published: February 14, 2006

I've always been proud of my irrelevance.

When I raised my hand to speak at our weekly meetings here in the science department, my colleagues could be sure they would hear something weird about time travel or adventures in the fifth dimension. Something to take them far from the daily grind. Enough to taunt the mind, but not enough to attract the attention of bloggers, editors, politicians and others who keep track of important world affairs.

(is this anything like my raising my hand to argue with my high school teachers?)

So imagine my surprise to find the origin of the universe suddenly at the white hot center of national politics. Last week my colleague Andrew Revkin reported that a 24-year-old NASA political appointee with no scientific background, George C. Deutsch, had told a designer working on a NASA Web project that the Big Bang was "not proven fact; it is opinion," and thus the word "theory" should be used with every mention of Big Bang.
It was not NASA's place, he said in an e-mail message, to make a declaration about the origin of the universe "that discounts intelligent design by a creator."
In a different example of spinning science news last month, NASA headquarters removed a reference to the future death of the sun from a press release about the discovery of comet dust around a distant star known as a white dwarf. A white dwarf, a shrunken dense cinder about the size of earth, is how our own sun is fated to spend eternity, astronomers say, about five billion
years from now, once it has burned its fuel.
"We are seeing the ghost of a star that was once a lot like our sun," said Marc Kuchner of the Goddard Space Flight Center. In a statement that was edited out of the final news release he went on to say, "I cringed when I saw the data because it probably reflects the grim but very distant future of our own planets and solar system."
An e-mail message from Erica Hupp at NASA headquarters to the authors of the original release at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., said, "NASA is not in the habit of frightening the public with doom and gloom scenarios."
Never mind that the death of the sun has been a staple of astronomy textbooks for 50 years.
Personally, I can't get enough of gloom- and-doom scenarios. I'm enchanted by the recent discovery, buttressed by observations from NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, that an antigravitational force known as dark energy might suck all galaxies out of the observable universe in a few hundred billion years and even rip apart atoms and space. But I never dreamed that I might be frightening the adults.
What's next? Will future presidential candidates debate the ontological status of Schrödinger's cat? That's the cat that, according to the uncertainty principle of quantum physics, is both alive and dead until we observe it.
Apparently science does matter.
Dreading the prospect that they too may be dragged into the culture wars, astronomers have watched from the sidelines in recent years as creationists in Kansas and Pennsylvania challenged the teaching of evolution in classrooms. Never mind that the Big Bang has been officially accepted by the Roman Catholic Church for half a century. The notion of a 14-billion-year-old cosmos doesn't fit if you believe the Bible says the world is 6,000 years old.
And indeed there have been sporadic outbreaks, as evidenced by the bumper stickers and signs you see in some parts of the country: "Big Bang? You've got to be kidding — God."
When the Kansas school board removed evolution from the science curriculum back in 1999, they also removed the Big Bang.
In a way, the critics have a point. The Big Bang is indeed only a theory, albeit a theory that covers the history of creation as seamlessly as could be expected from the first fraction of a second of time until today. To call an idea "a theory" is to accord it high status in the world of science. To pass the bar, a theory must make testable predictions — that stars eventually blow out or that your computer will boot up.
Sometimes those predictions can be, well, a little disconcerting. When you're talking about the birth or death of the universe, a little denial goes a long way.
That science news is sometimes managed as carefully as political news may not come as a
surprise to most adults. After all, the agencies that pay for most scientific research in this country have billion-dollar budgets that they have to justify to the White House and the Congress. It helps to have newspaper clippings attesting to your advancement of the president's vision.
It's enough to make you feel sorry for NASA, whose very charter mandates high visibility for both its triumphs and its flops, but which has officers recently requiring headquarters approval before consenting to interviews with the likes of me.
The recent peek behind the curtains of this bureaucracy has been both depressing and exciting. So they are paying attention after all.
They should be paying attention, but I'm not looking forward to having to include more politicians and bureaucrats in my rounds of the ever-expanding, multi-dimensional universe (or universes).
I'll do it, but, lacking the gene for street smarts, I fear being played like a two-bit banjo. I'm even happy to go star-gazing with Dick Cheney, if duty so calls, but only if he agrees to disarm
and I can wear a helmet.

I loved going to the planeterium as a child, one of the programs showed (what they imagined to be) the solor system's birth to death. The idea that it would all die out wasn't so much frightening as incomprehensible to me.I also remember being in church and finding it so hard to contemplate a never-ending eternity (like a ring that has no beginning and no end.) It hurt my brain and i was left in the void not being able to contemplate either ending or not-ending.Luckily it looks like i'll have 7.59 years to work it out...

In the end, there won’t even be fragments.

Best day ever!

1. Demetra somehow managed to open a closed box, open the cellophane packages inside, and rip apart the new toys i had ordered for her.


2. I pinched a very sensitive part of my body when i tried to close the recycling bin.


3. The ATM ate my debit card.


4. I lost my license.


5. I almost T-boned another car because i could not stop my car from sliding into it.


6. I locked both my keys and my phone in the car and had to call a locksmith who demanded $65 from me (i was praying to someone's god that the charge would actually go through..)


7. Finally got home and spilled coffee all over my brand new carpet.


8. About 11:00 pm the power went out to my entire house (and ONLY MY house,) had to call the power company who sent someone out only for him to be completely baffled by the situation.

I'm just hoping that the universe is just letting my bad luck run out before the new year starts.

or maybe not--now 12:17 am, January 1, 2011 and i just dumped red wine all over myself and my new couch...)

(1:17: now my computer has completely ceased to work...)

kitty say what

some days

are just like that

(and this is so apropos to my life as i have not been able to print anything on my printer for centuries because of some non-existant paperjam!*#%&*! ~ no matter how many times Demetra has tried to remedy the problem!)

damn, missed yet another Pagan holiday

Now however will i predict my future?

"This is an excellent time for rites of divination."

Humanity has been celebrating Litha and the triumph of light since ancient times. On the Wheel of the Year Litha lies directly across from Yule, the shortest day of the calendar year, that cold and dark winter turning when days begin to lengthen and humanity looks wistfully toward warmth, sunlight and growing things. Although Litha and Yule are low holidays or lesser sabats in the ancient parlance, they are celebrated with more revel and merriment than any other day on the wheel except perhaps Samhain (my own favourite). The joyous rituals of Litha celebrate the verdant Earth in high summer, abundance, fertility, and all the riches of Nature in full bloom. This is a madcap time of strong magic and empowerment, traditionally the time for handfasting or weddings and for communication with the spirits of Nature. At Litha, the veils between the worlds are thin; the portals between "the fields we know" and the worlds beyond stand open.

if only...

and for the friend who commented:

"Sassy gay friend" isn't exactly an archetype you'd stick in a tragedy. That's probably why he's missing from Hamlet. He does show up in Romeo and Juliet, but luckily he gets stabbed to death in the second act, otherwise he might have interfered with the suicide scene in act 5.

here ya go:

to which said friend adds "That's why Mercutio had to die."

i wouldn't recommend this experience

There i am, on my way to work, after lunch break, i am pulled over by a detective (and i have no idea why.) She comes to the window and asks if there is any reason why i'm driving a car whose registration expired in December (because i had thrown my current registration in the glove box and completely forgot about it~and apparently couldn't be bothered to put the sticker on it.) I hand her the registration. Then she asks if there's any reason why i'm not wearing my seat belt (i really don't know, as i always wear my seat belt.) Stammer a little. She asks me for proof of insurance, license, all that jazz. Then she says something about me going to work and her putting the sticker on my car (or so i thought~it sounded a little strange but whatever.) She goes to her car, i wait for her to come back (while giving questioning gestures to her about what i'm supposed to do), then finally start my car.

The next thing i know two more police cars pull up, sirens blaring, and surround me (and i'm thinking "My coworker, who had her car impounded this morning, was right about the police being crazy.) One officer walks around my car then approaches me.

"Why did you do that, why were you fleeing."

"I'm sorry, i was confused, i misunderstood what she said."

He continues to question my actions, i continue to apologize.

"What is your criminal record?"

"I don't have one."

"You've never been to County Lock-Up?"

"No."

"You don't have any warrants out for your arrest?"

"No."

"Are you sure?"

"I'm sure."

"Okay, we're going to check your record."

"Alright."

Then he points to the passenger side of my car, "Have you been drinking any of that hard liquor today?"

I'm thinking "What hard liquor?" I glance to where he is pointing to (barely) see a liquor store bag hiding underneath a BUNCH of books (from my vet visit i'm sure~but i don't even know why it's there because i always put my liquor (as i do all groceries) in the trunk. "No."

"Are you sure?"

"Yes, i'm on my way back to work." (and wouldn't you be able to smell it or something?) "Is it supposed to be in the trunk?"

"No it's fine." He grills me a little more then finally is on his way.

The detective comes back and again quizzes me about why i tried to flee the scene.

"I'm so sorry, i misunderstood what you said."

"We don't know if you're fleeing the scene of a murder or something." (then why would i pull over in the first place?) "I'm ticketing you for a seat belt violation." (again, i couldn't tell you or her why i wasn't wearing a seat belt either because i ALWAYS~or apparently not always~wear a seat belt.)

Then she asks me if i'm alright.

"I am a little shaken."

"Haven't you even been pulled over before?"

"I have been pulled over, it's just a little different than being surrounded."

After a few more warnings, i am on my way back to work.

Moral of the story?

Never forget ANYTHING; not your registration sticker, not to not start your car, not that you have liquor on your floor, and especially not your seat belt!

(and when i told my mom she first asked if any of the officers were cute (i didn't even notice) and then asked if they checked to see if i was a citizen (i don't know what the detective looked up in her car, but they didn't ask me.)

a trip to the vet...

We were off to our vet appointment today (well three of us were off, since Dixie seems to have learned that precognitive skill of sensing beforehand that the vet trip is eminent.) Even though i was able to lure Demetra and Katushka into the bathroom with cat treats and then close the door only to insert them into cat carriers, Dixie was having none of it (nor the promise of food) and hid in the basement. The search for her was futile. So i trundled off the two others to the appointment meant for three. The beasties needed their annual exams and to have their talon-like claws clipped (they will not let me near their paws--amazing how an animal 5%-10% of your body weight can really hold their own against you.) I threaten them with declawing every now and then but i never would as i am morally opposed to it (besides the fact that i refuse to put the 16 year old Dixie under anaesthesia unless absolutely necessary.) I have bought those soft paws things (rubber caps that slip over the claw itself and fall off after six to eight weeks) but not only do you have to trim their claws before you can apply them but you also need them to hold still while you glue them on (what's the point?) I've had groomers tell me that vets can do it for you, and of course the vets tell me that groomers do. Does anyone know anything about the effectiveness of EmeryCat? I'm actually more concerned about my own safety rather than my furniture (although Katushka claws at my kitchen bench incessantly). Dixie claws at the carpet and runs over me with her claws, Katushka also runs over me, and she has a bit of a kneading problem. Demetra has a major kneading problem because she was weaned too early (but she always using her scratching post.)

As if you cared for any of the above detour, back to my story: I asked Herr Doctor if Demetra has gained weight just because her sides seem to be buldging a teensy bit (can i stress teensy?) I probably wouldn't have even noticed if Demetra had not been a short-haired cat, unlike her sisters (Katushka once lost 25% of her weight without my note until the vet weighed her.) So Herr Doctor tells me that she has gained a little and then proceeds to tell me that she needs to go on a diet (a little difficult with three cats who don't care whose food they eat), that i need to brush her back better because she probably can't reach around to groom herself (little does he know i rarely brush any of them), and that she has possibly lost the fur underneath her chin due to her neck size increasing rather than some kind of reaction to her collar. I wonder if he would have even come up with this theory if i hadn't brought it up (she had hissed at the vet tech, something she never does~maybe she was unhappy with being called fat) it's not like the animal is obese, just a little pudgy.

Cats all bundled up and in the car i make a quick visit to the liquor store next to the vet (it was a five minute trip and cool and cloudy outside.) Had a major attack of vertigo while in the liquor store, shaking, swaying, waving vision (and i'm sure as i stumbled out of the liquor store a few assumptions were made.) My mother claims it was the act of being in the liquor store~maybe it was bad Karma for leaving the kids in the car~in actuality i believe it was just a relapse.)
Got into the car and had a lens fall out of my glasses (which rendered me completely unable to see.) Called mom to let her know she might need to come pick us up. So, with shaking hands, after about ten minutes got the lens back in. Drove like a little old lady until i got about a block away from my house where i ran out of gas. Had to call mom to rescue us, and then carry the animals in once i got home I'm sure they were wondering what the hell was going on when their trip home was much longer and confusing than it usually is. Needless to say the trip home from the vet was not the most enjoyable adventure...

it's twenty-ten let's do the timewarp again!

and isn't that a brilliant almost-rhyme?

It's just a jump to the left

And then a step to the right

With your hands on your hips

You bring your knees in tight

But it's the pelvic thrust that really drives you insane,

(insay-ay-ay-ay-ane)

and bid adieu to the 'aughts (tried and tried to get that one to catch on--maybe in retrospect...)

hundreds gather for global warming protest

deep in the heart of the Buffyverse…

as you know, i'm sure, by now, i'm a big buffy fan. Edward, Bella, Twilight, not so much:



BUFFY KICKS ASS (does she not?)

paranormal activities in the night...

or, close encounters of the What kind?

vernal equinox

Happy Ostara

or maybe...

the Vernal Equinox

or even Easter as most of you may celebrate...

Today is the Vernal Equinox, the first day of spring in the Northern Hemisphere and the New Year in many ancient traditions. It is the time of new growth and new beginnings. Eggs are one symbol of this festival since they represent new life. To celebrate, decorate an altar or small table with a green cloth and place on it spring flowers, Pussy Willows in vases, or sprouting bulbs in pots. Place a bowl of hard-boiled eggs in the center. Cast a circle and call the quarters: east for the spring, now with us; south, for the summer that is to come; west, for the autumn far away; and north for the winter that is ending. Hold up an egg and say, “I dedicate this egg to new beginnings in the coming season.” Meditate for a little while on your hopes for spring, then take that energy into you by cracking and eating the egg. by.....

~Magenta Griffith

blessed be...

little ways to annoy me

1. snowing on my car (which is in my carport, after all)
2. refusing to let me into your lane even though there is room for you to either speed up OR slow down (i mean how much harm does it really cause you?)
3. make a right turn from the left lane or a right turn from the left lane (when both are clearly marked.)
4. riding my bumper and when i move forward to allow you space getting back on it (if you're going to ride my ass, at least pull my hair...) Were you not in Driver's Ed the day they discussed the amount of car lengths you were to allow between you and the car in front of you? I might just allow my car to roll backwards...
5. running your red light causing me to slam on my brakes in my green light
6. honking at me once you've decided i need to turn into traffic (i know how fast my car moves as well as its capabilities, and it is my decision to make how reckless i want to be at any given moment...) or if i don't advance on the green light the millisecond it changes (i once had a friend pulled over and ticketed for just such an action~the officer told him the horn was only to be used for emergencies and that didn't quite qualify.) In fact honking at me at all (except in an afore mentioned emergency when my course of action might kill me or you (or our respective cars) might just annoy me to the point where keeping you from your destination becomes my greatest mission in life (can we say road rage?)
7. honking (those quick little beeps to let someone know you're just driving by their house or those long annoying ones to let your roommates know you've just arrived home, or those long annoying ones to tell someone to come out to the car, perhaps after ten minutes or so of repeated honking you might want to go inside to see what's keeping them) next door to my own house especially when i am critically migraining in my living room. And honking your horn repeatedly outside a public library to tell someone inside the library to come out is completely unacceptable (do you get the idea i am not overly fond of horns? I am also no hypocrite, i never use mine {except in emergency situations of course...})
8. asking me what i did to my (slinged) arm. I have no idea (my collar became mysteriously fractured {though the doc did suggest it was my multiple personality acting up}), i have a nerve infection, and possibly something else which requires a very expensive MRI.) Not that you would know that but i am wearying of the entire fiasco...)
9. and yes it hurts
10. telling me to smile, i will smile when i damn feel like it, don't tell me what to do (this is especially annoying when you add "life's not that bad," you have no idea what is going on in my life; maybe it IS that bad.)
11. trying to provoke a smile (you also have no idea how stubborn and oppositional i really am, the more you push the less i give.)
12. friends asking me how i am (not so much because i am so often terrible but because i feel almost guilty telling you that, yet again, and like i'm trying to elicit sympathy~i really don't love to complain even though i am so very good at it...)
13. not looking at me when i am using my finger to point you in the direction of the location you asked me for and heading off in the complete opposite direction when you do look (i once had to tell a woman quite slowly and explicitly to "look in the direction i'm pointing"the fifth time she asked me and then walk over there as she wondered past it.)
14. in general, not listening to the answer to your question as i give it to you either by asking the question and then wandering away from the desk (or answering your cell phone before you give me the chance to answer), or interrupting me to ask the question i am in the process of answering, or letting your mind obviously wander even if the answer is very short, or just not listening to me at all, did you really need to know the answer? By about the third repetition becomes incredibly difficult to control my words, voice, and tone.)
15. not even asking a question but rather standing in front of the desk smiling at me when i ask you if i can help you (and yes isn't a question in and of itself, i need more information if i am to actually help you~i am not a mind reader.)
16. asking another staff member the same question you just asked me simply because you didn't like me (often times you ask a third or fourth staff member because you keep getting the same answer from each one.) And i have to suppress a smile when the second staff member sends you back to me because they don't know the answer or because i am the one in charge.)
17. Teens telling me to "just relax" because they are doing what i just asked/told them to do and they are showing no evidence of doing so.
18. i can't relax because they are not relaxing me
19. and when you ask me why i am so annoyed it is because you are so annoying (but i do love it when you are so totally misbehaving, disruptive and disturbing to other patrons that i finally get to ban you from the library and have the police come ticket you for trespassing during the proscribed period of time.)
20. using the phrase "excuse me" just BEFORE you do something extremely rude (as if it really does excuse you.) This former form of manners has just become another irritation.
21. stupidity/ignorance, in general is not that annoying (most of the time...) but complete unwillingness to learn is (especially if you are just using it as a reason to get me to do everything for you.)
22. constantly disconnect me from the internet, causing me to buy a new router which might not even solve the problem.
23. my mom asking me if i am speaking clearly into the telephone as if i were some kind of idiot who doesn't know how to use a telephone (and if i didn't wouldn't it have been my mother's responsibility to teach me long, long ago?) Please, just tell me that you can't hear me or that i am breaking up and i will take the appropriate action. (and while we're on the subject while it doesn't annoy me but quite amuses me when my one and only sister leaves me a message and feels the need to add "your sister" to her greeting of it's me, as if i wouldn't recognize her voice.)

yule

This “low holiday” or “lesser sabbat” falls on the Winter Solstice, the longest night and shortest day, when the decreasing days give way to increasing light and life. The Goddess becomes the Great Mother and once again gives birth to the new Sun King. This sabbat is also known as Midwinter’s Eve. This date varies each year.

This is the holiday that i celebrate with "Seasons Greetings" (and i always send out cards with out the mention of Christ even though most of my friends are Christians.) I also love winter!

and i don't consider it at all low!