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Crazy night
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Miscellany
- Hits: 1913
A crazy night at the restaurant. 2 waiters, full dining rooms, at lunch we looked busy but as the day passed the book filled up, parties increased their size, and by 6:30 we're crazy.
There's an Oil and Gas conference in town.
Crazy busy. Always running, 2, 3 steps behind, people at the door, the owner howling in the kitchen, people waiting to be cleared, for food, for drinks, to see a waiter (any waiter), it's a gong show.
At the end of it we've rung out what we'd do on a night with 6 people - a busy night with 6 people.
But we're alive, and that's all that counts.
It's the stuff waiter's nightmares are made of.
Atlas Obscura | Curious and Wondrous Travel Destinations
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Link of the day
- Hits: 1660
For most of you this is old news, for those that haven't discovered it, a guide to all the worlds more eccentric and curious travel destinations and roadside attractions.
Link: Atlas Obscura
Package #3
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Miscellany
- Hits: 2295
I'm careful to catch the mailman as she drops off the post today.
I don't want to have to make any more trips to get my parcels.
And it's here, the final parcel from Belgium, again much smaller than I would have imagined, but no smaller than advertised. Thin, finely detailed, a moments pleasure in the cup of one's palm. I place it in the Shrine to the Beloved Virgin, who's Juju is daily growing...
That's the last of the parcels in the mail - for the moment, I've scanned and discovered other treasures but have to search a few of the New Age shops in Kensington to ensure the price is right and that they are (for the moment at least) unique.
The "Wow!" Signal
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- Written by: Rod Boyle
- Category: Ideas & Questions
- Hits: 1781
Like anyone with an ounce of intelligence, I'm intrigued by the possibility of life - intelligent life - beyond our solar system.
There's something in human nature that cries out for companionship, curiosity, the hope (and fear) that other alien beings are out there and may be somewhat like us.
The SETI institute (Acronym for the SEARCH for EXTRA-TERRESTRIAL INTELLIGENCE) has been watching the skies for decades and not detected anything that would definitively indicate we share the universe with other sentient beings. Well, not detected anything EXCEPT for the "Wow!" signal. Which, exciting as it was, in the end conclusively proved nothing. It was non-replicable, despite repeated listening attempts it did not recur and the source of it remains an enigma.
At the time of the listening it was imagined that any sufficiently advanced interstellar civilization would use radio waves to communicate - hence the listening with radio telescopes. However times change, and in a scant few decades we've seen our own radio signature drop so much that we've become ourselves almost invisible, and we may need to consider that other intelligences may have followed the same trajectory and found other, more efficient means to communicate. We may be looking for intelligence in a very narrow window defined by our own limited technology. Other possibilities for interstellar communication might include an interstellar beacon which would, via quantum entanglement, deliver information instantaneously between stars or remote points. And as our technology we'll doubtless evolve we'll discover other possibilities.
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