It was one year ago, in August 2013 that my journey into podcasting began. Wow, has the time ever flown. Thanks for dropping by this site and listening to many, if not all, 17 podcasts. Our podcasts have been listened to by over 30,000 individuals last year and YOU are one of our favorite listeners. Thanks for your encouragement. Congratulations to all of us! Here's to another great year of eclectic podcasts! Sincerely Virtual Saguaro :) Some Notes: Choose a particular category from choices on the right. Remember, you may leave a comment on any blog entry. And away we go for another year…
0 Comments
In 1988 Apple created a mockup of what they thought the future Man-Machine interface would be. They called it the Knowledge Navigator. Watch the video below to see how accurate they were. Just a little more ways to go and their predictions will be 100% true. The identified Computing Needs at that time (1988) were
Apple's Knowledge Navigator - Enjoy!What a Surprise! He turned the wheel and the inside didn't move!I was a backseat driver yesterday and was just amazed when I saw our friend driving the car. He wasn't shocked, it was ordinary for him, but for me, well, that was another story. All my life of riding and driving in cars told me that when the steering wheel turned, everything in the middle turned as well. NO MORE! The center mounted controls don't move - Great thinking! The buttons that you depend upon are always in the same place. Take a look Citroën C5 Saloon shown below Turning in a residential areaDriving on the Open RoadAre Nothing and Zero the Same Thing?Observation: Do you remember the ubiquitous number line that inhabited the walls of your math class in school? It may have looked something like this: Zero in the middle and 2 series of numbers going left and right from the center. I find it really interesting that as students we simply watched, listened, and learned about numbers from our teacher, parents, culture, and society. We were young, unaware of different ways of thinking that may have come before our generation. The concept of Zero was so simple: it exists between numbers on the left and numbers on the right. That bliss of understanding helped me through the years of math classes, there seemed to be an unwritten agreement that this 'Line' was the ultimate presentation of numbers. We learned that any two numbers could be represented as a fraction, the top number was called the numerator, and the bottom number was the denominator. As shown is the typical fraction. But one day, a student asked a question to our teacher, "Why can't you represent a fraction with a Zero in the denominator (sometimes called 'dividing by zero')?" The teacher's answer was a bit harsh, straight forward, and authoritative: "You can't divide by Zero because it is not defined!" That was it, no explanation, no sympathy for an inquisitive student. Done! Years later, this subject was reapproached from a different perspective and there is a much simpler and intuitive answer that the teacher could have provided: "It's because Zero is NOT A NUMBER" Epilogue: Little did the Math Teacher realize what a great opportunity for 'getting off task' this question provided. The gradual acceptance of Zero and its subsequent use spanned the globe: Ancient Mayan, Eqyptian, China, India, Persia, Greco-Roman, and finally in the 12th century to European mathematics. The mystery of Zero includes religion, history, practicality, positional numbering systems, and disputes and discussions of how to represent NOTHING, which in times past, had a god-like, invisible quality. (And when god was involved you had some very polarized opinions!) So if you are not overloaded on math at this point, I suggest you continue with the audio podcast link below. Enjoy the Podcast! Sincerely Virtual Saguaro An ancient Chinese description of Zero as a blank, an empty or nothing, in their counting rods system. Following are some internet links to articles on this topic of Zero. Keep in mind that these scholars have perhaps not had the opportunity to listen to this podcast. It seems they quickly place Zero into the number system as a number without regard to its 'nothingness'. :) The History of Zero, by the Yale Center The Origin of Zero, by Scientific American “Zero, The Biography of a Dangerous Idea”, by Charles Seife, Book Available at Amazon Representations of Numbers, Encyclopedia of Mathematics 0 (Number), Wikipedia "Numbers Song in French" Written and performed by A.J. Jenkins - Audio Segment used in Podcast
More than 20 years had passed since the time Axel was financially forced to sell his beloved Martin D28s Guitar. But one day...Axel Girnus has been playing the guitar for a very long time. At an early age the guitar fit into his hands and life in a comforting and creative manner. Playing gigs, teaching lessons, working in music shops, and even making some life changing decisions when his country called upon his services. Listen in to his story below, hear him play a few licks, and find out what happened to his wonderful Martin D28s. Entertaining, fascinating, and such a great person. Sincerely Virtual Saguaro :) Martin Guitar History Fact: "With the tremendous interest in acoustic guitars in the early 1970s (which coincided exactly with the new "soft-rock" era of James Taylor, Loggins & Messina, and Seals & Crofts), the Martin company increased production to an unprecedented rate. As a comparison, in 1961 the company made 507 D-28s; in 1971 the total was 5,466. The company offered five different Dreadnoughts (as well as numerous smaller-sized guitars) to a market that seemed to grow every month." You might be saying to yourself, "What is a Dreadnought?" It is both a description of a guitar that has square shoulders and bottom made popular by the Martin Company AND the British Battleship of 1906, the HMS Dreadnought. Martin Dreadnought guitars are also known as "D-size" guitars, or, colloquially among musicians, as "dreads." Martin Dreadnought guitars have model numbers consisting of "D-" followed by a number, such as "D-18" and "D-45". Click here to go to a Wikipedia article for more information on this innovative and widely copied guitar design. Axel and his other 2 colleagues are available to assist with any musical product or information on practically any musical subject. Norfried (owner) and Christian make up the dynamic and talented personnel working at MusikBaum. German (of course), English and who knows how many other languages they know. Drop by and tell them you heard the podcast! Great Video describing MusikBaum's Shop in Bad Godesburg, GermanyJust a few pictures of their shop. Many rooms of equipment and supplies! Click to Listen to the podcast - 'Axel's Guitar Returns to Say Hello'
This cryptic equation rode along with us on many bike rides as we passed through small towns, villages and rural settings in Germany over the last couple years. Sometimes in chalk, on rocks near homes, vertical, horizontal mostly, it provided a curious discussion amongst us. The most likely 3 possibilities we came up with was 1) Fire code to tell emergency staff what was inside 2) Postal code for package delivery 3) Building code compliance update in progress How amazing when we searched the internet for a match on this equation! Now don't laugh, we really had no idea that it was connected to Christmas! Have you had a blessing on your house lately? I think it's a great idea. An excerpt from a website below (click for the entire web page): (The letters have two meanings. They are the initials of the customary names of the Three Magi:Caspar, Melchior and Balthasar. They also abbreviate the Latin words “Christus Mansionem Benedicat”, “May Christ bless the house”. The year is divided before and after the these letters. The crosses (+) represent the protection of the Christ.) Let's do some Math: Prices shown at the left are in Euros per Liter in Dusseldorf, Germany, August 18, 2013 To convert this number to USDollars per gallon we do the following 155.9 Euros/liter X 3.78 Liters/Gallon X 1.32 USDollars/Euro= $7.79 / Gallon The following quote puts PER GALLON costs in another perspective. And although the date of the publication was for 2012, I think you'll get the hint that other things cost way more per gallon than gasoline.
Source of this Article-Click Here "Think a gallon of gas is expensive? But did you know gas compared to other liquids is still cheaper, gallon-to-gallon? This makes one think, and also puts things in perspective. Name Brand Bleach - $2.56 a gallon Soda - $3.84 a gallon Diet Snapple ($1.29 for 16 oz.) - $10.32 per gallon Starbucks Coffee - $7.00 per gallon Lipton Iced Tea ($1.19 for 16 oz.) - $9.52 per gallon Gatorade ($1.59 for 20 oz.) - $10.17 per gallon Ocean Spray ($1.25 for 16 oz.) - $10.00 per gallon Brake Fluid ($3.15 for 12 oz.) - $33.60 per gallon Vick's Nyquil ($8.35 for 6 oz.) - $178.13 per gallon Pepto Bismol ($3.85 for 4 oz.) - $123.20 per gallon Whiteout ($1.39 for 7 oz.) - $25.42 per gallon Scope ($0.99 for 1.5 oz.) - $84.48 per gallon Name Brand Cough Syrup - $128 per gallon Champagne - $755 dollars a gallon Nail Polish - $1,024 dollars a gallon. And this is the REAL KICKER... Evian water ($1.49 for 9 oz.) - $21.19 per gallon for WATER So, the next time you're at the pump, be glad your car doesn't run on water, Scope, or Whiteout, or Pepto Bismol or Nyquil. One could argue that gasoline isn't used in the same way that other liquid products are. For example we don't use 15 gallons of honey in one week. Where as gasoline is a sort of a requirement, you have to have it, if you're going to get from point A to point B, but we do have other choices when some of our favorite products go up. The average American worker spends $1,100 annually on coffee. In 2011, the average household spent $4,155 on gasoline. That's an all-time high, as was the year's average price for a gallon of regular continues to climb."
|
Archives
February 2020
AuthorSubscribe to Podcasts Only using iTunes or other RSS Feed program: Categories
All
|