[Not] on the road...again.

I'm home, after a long drive back from Florida to return Emily and Joe. I took a slightly different route back, traveling through Dothan, Alabama and Columbus, Georgia. I took I-77 from I-85 to I-81, and stopped in Christiansburg, Virginia for a little auto repair work before returning home very early this morning.

There's nothing like a long road trip to provide plenty of thoughts for short essays. Driving the old U.S. routes and stops in many small towns provide lots of fodder. I plan to get around to writing these essays, but need to interleave that work with more important things (like dissertation writing!). Here's a partial list of topics:

Bandannas as fashion statements?

Regional influences of headwear in eating establishments (closely related to the bandanna topic, above)

On variations in road debris density (inspired by a AAA study report)

Freeway and highway signage density, quality, accuracy, and topics (inspired, in part, by Missouri's HS HCS SB 870, "Prohibits locating sexually-oriented billboards within one mile of a state highway", signed into law on 17 June 2004).

In-room phones, free cable television, and now "Free High Speed Internet" coming soon to a motel or hotel near you

Money management (inspired by the number of "title loan", "check to cash", and related businesses that dot the landscape)

Anyway, more to follow....

Druyun cooperating with government after guilty plea - 2004-04-20 - Puget Sound Business Journal (Seattle)

I was wondering why this blog was getting so many Google(tm) and Yahoo(tm) search hits on the phrase "Darleen Druyan". Seems that I was one of the only people who (mis)spelled her last name that way. Here's a recent piece that gets the spelling right: Druyun cooperating with government after guilty plea - 2004-04-20 - Puget Sound Business Journal (Seattle)

Claudio Basile's publication page

With Citeseer undergoing a transformation, it's become much harder to find resources on the WWW. . After some searching, I found a copy of "A Survey of Dependability Issues in Mobile Wireless Networks", a nice paper by Claudio Basile, Marc-Olivier Killijian, and David Powell.

Toohey's Extra Dry Beer viral ad

From the good folks at Kontraband.com comes this little viral ad...very nice job.... Toohey's Extra Dry Beer

Better living through physics.

Oh, brother. A "physician-reviewed" "formula" for computing the height of high-heels. I admit to being somewhat of a reductionist, so perhaps I should rejoice that the height of high heels can now be reduced to a single equation. And brought to me by physicists at the Institute of Physics in London, no less: How High Can High Heels Go? - Trustworthy, Physician-Reviewed Information from WebMD

Vernal Equinox -- courtesy of the U.S. Naval Observatory

The Sky This Week: "The Sun appears to arrive at the Vernal Equinox at 1:49 am EST on the morning of the 20th. This is the earliest time that this event has occurred since the year 1896. It will continue to occur a little earlier every four years until the year 2100, which will skip the leap year cycle in the Gregorian Calendar. The Equinox is defined as the moment when the apparent center of the Sun's disc crosses the Celestial Equator into the northern hemisphere of the sky, and astronomically it marks the beginning of spring. This date is a key date in many religions and cultures, as it fixes a number of important dates in various ceremonial calendars. For most of us, it's the time when the days seem to get longer at their fastest rate, and we finally shake the chill of winter. "

Citeseer

Citeseer is, hands-down, one of the best services on the World Wide Web. I've noticed that the shift from citeseer.nj.nec.com to citeseer.ist.psu.edu hasn't been going well. The server is down today, and from other traffic on the Web, it's been down in the recent past. I'm sure the servers are kept busy from all the hits from researchers. I sure hope Penn State restores a service that many of us in the research community find invaluable....

Finished another paper this evening, and got it submitted. This was the 2004 Spring SISO paper, which I'll deliver in April. Another step closer I hope, to finishing....

I ran across this site today; the humor isn't for everyone.

VH1's Best Week Ever has a blog.

Dictator or TV sitcom character?

GForge CDE : Collaborative Development Environment

Another reference to tools.... GForge CDE : Collaborative Development Environment

RT: Request Tracker

This is a work-related link. I'm interested in open source bug tracking tools.... Best Practical Solutions, LLC:

Another weekend at last. One paper (the one for SISO) is due in about two weeks. There are another two papers due right after that.

Made good progress on the application layer protocol portion of the dissertation this week. All of that material is also useful for the dissertation.

Progress, progress, progress.

Save the pinata

Gotta love the folks at Turnpike Films: Save the pinata

DELAY TOLERANT NETWORKING RESEARCH GROUP

Very interesting...closely related to the work I'm doing in MANET research: DELAY TOLERANT NETWORKING RESEARCH GROUP

Robert Bruen's review of "Exploiting Software. How to Break Code" by Greg Hoglund and Gary McGraw, Addison-Wesley 2004, IEEE Cipher, E58 Jan 15, 2004"

On the "to read" list: Robert Bruen's review of "Exploiting Software. How to Break Code" by Greg Hoglund and Gary McGraw, Addison-Wesley 2004, IEEE Cipher, E58 Jan 15, 2004"

ACM Queue - Game Development: Harder Than You Think - What makes you think that creating alternative worlds is all fun and games?

Interesting article on game development by Jonathan Blow: ACM Queue - Game Development: Harder Than You Think - What makes you think that creating alternative worlds is all fun and games?

Who Invented Monopoly?

I ran across this compilation of the history of the popular board game Monopoly(r). I played this game as a child, and always found it to be fun: Who Invented Monopoly?

This just in from the Navy League

The Navy League's March 2004 Sea-Power Magazine contains the headline, "Single Integrated Air Picture Holds The Key to Navy's Net Centric Plans". Nice article -- a good summary of a complex subject with a lot of moving parts. "A little-known engineering office", though? Perhaps it's better to be little-known sometimes....