Year: 2007

Salt Water As Burning Fuel Using Radio Frequencies

A really interesting and promising bit of news…

An Erie cancer researcher has found a way to burn salt water, a novel invention that is being touted by one chemist as the “most remarkable” water science discovery in a century.

John Kanzius happened upon the discovery accidentally when he tried to desalinate seawater with a radio-frequency generator he developed to treat cancer. He discovered that as long as the salt water was exposed to the radio frequencies, it would burn.

The discovery has scientists excited by the prospect of using salt water, the most abundant resource on earth, as a fuel.

[Source: Yahoo News]

Now that would be a great source of energy: sea water.
We have more of it than we need, it’s clean, cheap, and all we’d possibly get as emissions from burning it is more water, now who wouldn’t want that?
Hmmm… well, actually a lot of people, starting with the oil companies and the people backing/profiting/being backed by them; but that’s their problem.

[Thanks for link: Janissary]

The Teleportation Device

Transport is so unpractical in our world nowadays.
It just takes too long to get from a certain point A to another point B.
I can’t believe that over the years, mankind haven’t been able to invent a faster method of transportation than the airplane.

A dream method of transportation for me would be a teleportation device.

There would be public ones, phone booth like structures that you find on every street corner, or private ones that you could buy and use from the luxury of your home.

You’d walk into one of these booths, to find a little ATM like device/interface waiting for you. You slide in your magnetic card, which acts as a passport, a credit card and contact/destination storage device.

You don’t enter your pin number, those are so out-dated, you rather get an Iris check or maybe even a quick DNA check, then you’re given access to the main interface, and your personal homepage is shown.

You have the possibility to choose one of your saved favourite destinations, the top 5 of which appear on your homepage, or you can search for the nearest booth to the place you want to go to; ads for places like restaurants, hotels and whatnot will be shown on the side, tempting you to drop by when you’re in the area, maybe even offering you a free or discount round-teleportation-trip.

You choose where you want to go, and then the system checks your card to see whether you have the necessary visa/authorization to go to that place, and if you have the required funds to cover the price of the trip. The price is determined by a set of different factors, among them the person’s mass, the distance to be travelled, …etc.

When your destination is chosen, you’re found to have the authorization to travel there, and your trip is paid, and well you’ve also re-confirmed your wish to travel there: the teleportation begins.

In a matter of seconds, if not less, you’re in the teleportation booth that you chose to travel to; your card pops out from the system in that booth for you to collect, and you walk out right where you want to be.

All this in less than a minute all in all. Perfect, simple and ever so practical.

Oh, how I wish, something like that were possible right now.
Travel would be an even greater joy than it already is.

The Shadow of the Wind (Carlos Ruiz Zafón)

Last night, I finished reading “The Shadow of the Wind” by Spanish novelist Carlos Ruiz Zafon.

I first came across this book in a Waterstone’s in London, and it seemed very interesting, still I didn’t buy it because I had already bought a bunch of books and couldn’t keep going forever putting things in the already heavy shopping basket. A year and a bit more later, early this year, I encountered the book again at another Waterstone’s, only this time in Manchester, and it that’s when I bought it.

The events of the story take place in Barcelona in the year 1945; The city lies shrouded in secrets after the war, and a boy mourning the loss of his mother finds solace in his love for an extraordinary book called The Shadow of the Wind, by an author named Julian Carax, that he got from the Cemetary of Forgotten Books where his father took him.
When the boy searches for Carax’s other books, it begins to dawn on him, to his horror, that someone has been systematically destroying every copy of every book the man has ever written. Soon the boy realizes that The Shadow of the Wind is as dangerous to own as it is impossible to forget, for the mystery of its author’s identity holds the key to an epic story of murder, madness, and doomed love that someone will go to any lengths to keep secret.

I personally really enjoyed reading this book, it takes you on this beautiful ride, solving this mystery with the main character and diving into its smallest details.
I did guess a number of things earlier on in the story than the main character did, but still the book kept me engaged, wanting to know more and go deeper.

I really recommend this book, it’s a really good and enjoyable read.

[Amazon: The Shadow of the Wind (Carlos Ruiz Zafón)]

10 Ways To Lose A Job

For the fun of it, I thought I’d compile a list of 10 things that a person could do to lose their job.
At some point or another in my career I’ve met people who have done one or more of these things; some of them eventually lost their jobs, others didn’t. Anyway, personally, I think these ten reasons should be a sure way out for anyone.

1. Go to work late; put your stuff on your desk and directly go out for a long coffee break; daily. Bonus points if you go out for long lunches too, have another afternoon coffee break, then leave early.

2. Don’t go to work for a few days and then go back with no convincing or provable reason; bonus points if you can manage to get the HR manager run into you while you’re out having fun with your friends.

3. Download a bunch of porn onto your work computer; bonus points for sending it around to your colleagues.

4. Spend a lot of your time working on your CV and surfing job sites; for a bonus: ask one of the managers to help you translate your CV into another language or for some tips.

5. Have a shitty attitude towards everyone, act bitchy, shout and make a big fuss out of everything no matter how small it is; bonus: especially if it’s a manager.

Continue reading 10 Ways To Lose A Job

The Person In The Mirror

Mirrors are all around us, and there isn’t a day that goes by without us taking a look at ourselves in at least one of them.

Some people spend more time in front of the mirror than others, while some just take a quick glimpse while walking by.

Most times, when you look at the mirror, you see a dumb reflection of yourself, you straighten your hair, check out your smile, sweep your tongue over your teeth in an attempt to make them even whiter or shinier, maybe wink at yourself if you’re the kind that does that, and then go.

But sometimes if you look a bit closer, the reflection will disappear and in its place you’ll find a person staring back…

This person is one of two: A happy you, who feels good about where he is in life, and recognizes himself directly, and is comfortable with what he is and where he’s going.

Or the person looking back at you could be someone you don’t recognize, someone who looks just like you but who is not really happy, who isn’t really where he wants to be in life, somebody you just don’t see your true self in. And that’s a signal that you have to do something to get your life back on a track that will make you a happier person.

Mirrors are everywhere, and they hold this great power to tell us where we stand in life, and how happy we are about it; so maybe we should try to use them towards this effect more often.

To end this post, I thought I’d share this great quote I found, by an unknown source, that goes:

Jimmy Carter Calls For Balanced Middle East Debate In US

“We must always make clear our commitment to the security of Israel, but we cannot be peacemakers if American government leaders are seen as knee-jerk supporters of every action or policy of whatever Israeli government happens to be in power at the moment

[…]

Under AIPAC pressure, there are few significant countervailing voices in the public arena, and any balanced debate is still practically nonexistent in the U.S. Congress or among presidential hopefuls

[…]

The American friends of Israel who demand such subservience are in many cases sincere and well-intentioned people, but on this crucial issue, they are tragically mistaken. Their demands subvert America’s ability to bring the Israelis what they most desperately need and want