The Clayton Brothers from LA area are throwing together some wicked peices, check it out at fecalface.com

New Kindle from Amazon is here, just released today.  Retails for $489.  Bigger, better and more powerful.

“With a screen that measures 9.7 inches diagonally — two-and-a-half times the size of the current-gen Kindle 2 — the DX is aimed squarely at penetrating for the first time the $9.8 billion textbook market, as well offering some life support for the struggling business of subscription-based electronic newspapers.” -from wired.com

My only concern is how do I display all the wonderful books I’ve bought and plan on reading?  Next a  bookshelf computer that displays all those great titles and masterpieces that make you look oh so intelligent…

The kindle looks pretty cool, but a book is a time when I can get my head away from a computer screen and disconnect for a while…

Check it out, amazon.com

California has got more to offer than LA, San Francisco and San Diego.  Cali is one of the most unique places in the US, and I’m not just saying that because I’ve been here for years.  Common conception — there’s nothing pass San Francisco, but good weed and hippies and then Eureka and Oregon — wrong.  Besides some of the most lush areas in all of California and an expansive world of Redwoods and Pacific Northwest terrain, there lies the Lost Coast.  The Lost Coast begins at the southern end of Humbolt County sweeping along the coast for 80 miles.

Yes that’s 80 miles of no paved roads, no houses, just wilderness.  The 101 Hwy cuts inland to accomodate the coastal mountain range that drops straight into the ocean.  There are a few ways to attack the Lost Coast, but we rolled into Garberville and headed West to the coast.  Parked, took a shot of tequilla, threw on the packs and headed straight for the beach.  We stuck on the beach for the entire trip.

We had two nights.  First day we hiked 5 miles along the beach (wear hiking boots, this is not a fucking beach stroll) to a secluded revene, camped up on a hill adjacent to the Pacific Ocean and a stream.  Second night we hiked in further, about 3 more miles, to our next stop,  a fortress of drift wood.  The weather was amazing, we even lit candles at night.

Anyway all along the coast there are driftwood shacks built throughout the years.  There are no designated camping spots.  Bears were not a problem, but be sure to bring bear canisters (you can pick them up at the Bureau of Land Management on your way to the beach).  Bring water and a water purification method, and just enjoy the serenity of the Lost Coast, only 4 1/2 hours from San Francisco.

If you’re headed out or thinking about it, throw me a comment with any questions.  Be prepared for rapidly changing weather.  One of the most amazing places I have set foot upon–and it’s all in California.

MSNBC says he’s God, FOX News can’t stop throwing him under the bus and CNN lies somewhere in between, but really everything they will be reporting on today, Obama’s 100th day is pretty much meaningless and worthless.  Do the first 100 days really matter?  Why not the first 120 days or first 10 days or first year.  I’m sure they’ll (news organizations) will be doing this “100 days” thing every chance they get — it’s all about ratings.  Personally I think he’s doing alright, how could one tell?  It’s been an onslaught of change and there’s no real way to tell if any of it is working.  The right may claim he’s a socialist, but in reality he is more center than the platform he ran on.  On Wired.com today there was great article laying out some other points to focus on in these first 100 days, other than the economy and the middle east and Obama reading the Wild Things book.  Check it out…

There’s all types of conventions to honor some of the greatest films of all time and those who inherited those films as their own.  Most associate such film groupies with series like Star Trek and Star Wars, but for all us other geeks out there, there’s a “fest” that encapsulates a certain bread.  A community who can associate with the Dude, Donny and Walter.  The ultimate cult movie.  A theatrical masterpiece about nothingness.  The Big Lebowski.  Throughout the year, people put aside their alter egos for two days and portray their true identities.  Identities suppressed 363 days a year.  Dudes, Jesuses, Donnys, Walters, Lebowskis, Maudes, and more flock to a common meeting ground for concerts, celebrity sitings, and a full day of bowling and costume contests.  All the while dropping their favorite line and sipping White Russians.  Fuck it Dude, check it out, it’s probably coming to a town near you, and if not, it’s worth the flight.  Go to LebowskiFest.com.

My uncle and I made the trek to Rachel, Nevada in hopes of grabbing a glimpse of unidentified flying objects, getting as close as possible to top secret Area 51 base, exploring the tourism attractions and most of all document the entire journey with two Nikon cameras.  We headed east through Las Vegas a week before Christmas.  Snowfall had just subsided, but all through Las Vegas the ground was pale.  Beyond Las Vegas, well to the north-east of Las Vegas, there really isn’t much to speak of.  Mostly barren land with the random ranch etched between.   The barren and desolate place was beautiful in the same sense.  Not another human for miles.  The thought crossed my head time and time again, if you had to hide something this would be the place.  We drove just outside of Rachel, NV, which is the famous location of the Little Ale Inn and lies just beyond the turn off to Groom Lake, where Area 51 supposedly resides.  We explored the next day, pulling down random dirt roads, stopping photographing, then moving on.  Late morning, we headed down Groom Lake, possibly thinking we might meet our maker… Anyway, it’s a  dirt road, nicely grated, that goes for miles through nothingness.  It’s a apprehensive, excited feeling driving down the road, because really not sure what is going to happen and you’re constantly aware that there is a sign, that if you pass this sign, you will surely be arrested and detained — and I wasn’t ready to be on any terrorist list just yet.  We arrive after about 30 minutes driving time to the famous sign telling us not to cross, private property, restricted, no cameras, ect.  We flip a “u,” and head out as fast as we headed in.  As we head out, looking to the left and right of us is a truck sitting on top of the one of the bluffs and sensors of some sort on other hills–like stalkers just waiting to pounce when we crossed the ominous restricted area sign.  Overall it was uneventful–well at least the drive, but when you’re in a place as desolate as the Nevada desert, you begin to appreciate the place and see it for all the beauty it offers.  Anyway, why do I bring this up, some information was declassified about Area 51 and the LA Times did an article interviewing 5 former government officials associated with Area 51 and it answered a lot of questions, but opened up a few too.  Check it out “The Road to Area 51″ by Anni Jacobsen.

Also check out the photage from the Nevada Trip

The legalization of Marijuana is an on going conversation and for the most part I have gotten quite sick of the debate because, despite your view, things are not going to change.  They may sway to the right some years and to the left others, but it’s like Gay marriage, we are so stuck in our beliefs that we often don’t think rationally about such complex political issues.  But this morning I was listening to a radio program in Southern California regarding the recent raids of Marijuana clubs in San Francisco by the DEA even though California State Law prohibits the sale and distribution of pot for medical uses.  And why has this raid made the headline news, because our self proclaimed in-haler Obama proclaimed that conducting these types of raids was a waste of tax dollars.  I am not here to advocate one way or the other, but to start I will give you some statistics from 2007.  Everyday, well at least in 2007, 36 people were killed in an alcohol related crash, in that same day 700 were injured in an alcohol related crash.  400,000 people die each year from Tobacco related deaths.  And here’s the most shocking of all, 0, yes 0 die from Marijuana.  This all from the Center of Disease Control and Prevention.   Anyway, the author of Freakonomics, Stephen J Dubner, wrote an interesting take on the whole, “why is alcohol and cigarettes legal, but not pot?” debate that consumes so many of us.  Below is an excerpt, but to get the full monty check out the article.  Personally, I see no harm in the legalization of Marijuana except obesity…

“I have a favorite thought exercise: look at an issue that’s important, complex, and interesting — something like healthcare, education, or electoral politics — and pretend that you could rebuild the system from scratch, without the convoluted histories and incentives that currently exist.

What would the new system look like? How differently would you think about key issues if there were no precedent or blueprint?

So here’s an example. Pretend that humankind made it all the way to the 21st century without alcohol or marijuana. (Perhaps this would not have been possible?) Now pretend that alcohol and marijuana are simultaneously discovered, and think about what kind of laws would be put in place, if any, to govern their use.

My guess is that the alcohol laws might be tougher than they are now and that the marijuana laws might be more lenient — but, again, I am only guessing.

The alcohol vs. marijuana question is so speculative as to be nearly useless beyond a thought experiment. So we assembled a group of folks with expertise in this area and asked them a much more targeted pair of questions:

Should marijuana be legalized in the U.S.? Why or why not?

You will find that their replies routinely contradict one another, even on statements of fact. This is a limitation of nearly any debate of this sort, and while these contradictions illustrate what makes the issue a potent one, you may also be frustrated (as I was) by them.

That said, there is a lot of good and thoughtful information and argument in the following answers, and I thank everyone for participating.”

See the full article…

This is the og of afro-beat-funk. Cool rythmic sections, perpetual beats, with jazz interludes and spoken word that hits the soul. Fela Kuti’s dead now, but his music is more prevalent than ever. It’s what music should sound like–no big headed executives, no money, just pure thought and inspiration.

“The man who would become the father of afro-beat was born into the Yoruba tribe in southwest Nigeria, where his father, like his grandfather, was a protestant minister, and his mother was a prominent feminist political activist. Against his father’s wishes, Fela sang in highlife bands at age 16. During the ’60s he studied music in London, where he formed a highlife band called the Koola Lobitos. In 1969 he spent a year in the U.S., where he linked up with the Black Panthers and others, broadening and radicalizing his political sense, which embraced Kwame Nkrumah’s pan-Africanism.” (From Rollingston.com).

It’s a sound all to its own. With 30 minute songs that never grow old. The music flows through your veins, soothing, yet sparking every nerve in your body. Any album is well worth the while, but lately I’ve been dabbing into “Coffin For Head of State and Unknown Soldier.” Check it out at last.fm.

From Yahoo.com

In an event that hits the computer world only once every few years, security experts are racing against time to mitigate the impact of a bit of malware which is set to wreak havoc on a hard-coded date. As is often the case, that date is April 1.

Malware creators love to target April Fool’s Day with their wares, and the latest worm, called Conficker C, could be one of the most damaging attacks we’ve seen in years.

Conficker first bubbled up in late 2008 and began making headlines in January as known infections topped 9 million computers. Now in its third variant, Conficker C, the worm has grown incredibly complicated, powerful, and virulent… though no one is quite sure exactly what it will do when D-Day arrives.

Thanks in part to a quarter-million-dollar bounty on the head of the writer of the worm, offered by Microsoft, security researchers are aggressively digging into the worm’s code as they attempt to engineer a cure or find the writer before the deadline. What’s known so far is that on April 1, all infected computers will come under the control of a master machine located somewhere across the web, at which point anything’s possible. Will the zombie machines become denial of service attack pawns, steal personal information, wipe hard drives, or simply manifest more traditional malware pop-ups and extortion-like come-ons designed to sell you phony security software? No one knows.

Conficker is clever in the way it hides its tracks because it uses an enormous number of URLs to communicate with HQ. The first version of Conficker used just 250 addresses each day — which security researchers and ICANN simply bought and/or disabled — but Conficker C will up the ante to 50,000 addresses a day when it goes active, a number which simply can’t be tracked and disabled by hand.

At this point, you should be extra vigilant about protecting your PC: Patch Windows completely through Windows Update and update your anti-malware software as well. Make sure your antivirus software is actually running too, as Conficker may have disabled it.

Microsoft also offers a free online safety scan here, which should be able to detect all Conficker versions.