Kegbot

I was talking to another geek in the neighborhood last night who was telling me about this interesting idea that appeals to geek beer fans: the Kegbot. He had been at a friend’s party where the Kegbot was used to track who had been drinking what, with charts generated on the web for bragging rights purposes.

According to the project website:

Kegbot is a free, open-source project to turn your beer kegerator into a computerized drink tracker. With Kegbot and our Arduino firmware, you can:

* Monitor exactly how much beer is left in your kegs and track the temperature;
* Record the volume of each and every pour;
* Set up user accounts to track who is drinking, how much, and all sorts of other nutty statistics;
* Use special keys (tokens, RFID tags, barcodes) to authenticate your kegerator users;
* Control access to your taps (with special valve hardware) to prevent unauthorized pours;

Many of my computer-geek friends are also beer geeks, so this scratches two itches for them. I look forward to encountering my first Kegbot and trying this for myself!

Roomba’s “other shoe” drops

I’d been enjoying our Roomba robot vacuum again now that it has a fresh battery and its automatic schedule has been set. That all changed yesterday when the Roomba did it’s “wiggle walk” again, indicating that the only remaining wheel sensor has busted.

It has been over a year since the first wheel sensor failed and was hard-wired into place to extend Roomba’s life. Now it looks like I’ll be doing more soldering to patch Roomba up yet again. At least this time I know what to do, though!

Crackdown reins in Bahrain activists

Nowhere will America’s commitment to democracy be tested more than in Bahrain, home to the U.S. Navy’s Central Command.

The once massive pro-democracy protests in Bahrain have been reduced to small clashes between youth and police in predominantly Shia Muslim areas.

Security forces have launched a crackdown on protesters marked by beatings and sweeping arrests. Nearly 1,000 demonstrators have been imprisoned, among them doctors, artists and lawyers.

via Crackdown reins in Bahrain activists – Middle East – Al Jazeera English.

Stealth helo

I remember being on base in Pensacola during my Navy training in 1988 and being astonished when two helicopters in the distance suddenly went completely silent. Now I wonder if I was watching some of these stealth helicopters.

The May 2 raid on Osama bin Laden’s luxury compound in Abbottabad, Pakistan, had it all: painstaking intelligence-gathering, a heroic Navy SEAL assault team, satellite and drone surveillance, and biometric forensics.

And now this: a possible super-secret, stealthy helicopter, unknown to the wider world before one crashed during the assault.

via Aviation Geeks Scramble to ID bin Laden Raid’s Mystery Copter | Danger Room | Wired.com.

Level that playing field

I read with concern today that the U.S. Post Office is closing a local mail station because of to the shrinking volume of mail being sent. Cited for this decline was the rise of email, online bill payment, and the growing use of commercial shippers like FedEx and UPS.

It’s a shame that private enterprise is allowed to compete with the government. These companies are using their commercial nature to unfairly compete with the public entities. If only there was a law that reigned in the predatory nature of private enterprise … you know, level the playing field, so to speak. Wouldn’t that be great?

The grand conspiracy

I suppose it was inevitable, with as many Parks board meetings we’ve had in the city council chambers, that eventually we’d attract some … ah, “unique” individuals during our public comments phase. That’s what happened during our last meeting.

One gentleman stood up and began to discuss the Walnut Creek greenway in Southeast Raleigh. His concern seemed to be that the water from the nearby wastewater plant would pose a health hazard to walkers on the greenway. Then he seemed to veer off into some crazy talk about the city purposefully pumping reuse water to the homes of Southeast Raleigh residents. Oh, and the “Freemasons” were in on it, too. No kidding, he actually said that. A conspiracy wouldn’t be complete without the Freemasons, you know.
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Quiet neighborhood

Around 9 PM last night, I heard a multitude of sirens all converging somewhere close by in the neighborhood. I was curious to know what was going on, so I hopped in the car and drove around until I located the incident. Coming up on a family sobbing in the yard and a half-dozen police cars, an ambulance, and a fire truck nearby, I wondered it this was a domestic dispute, or some hapless individual had gotten shot while buying drugs, or if it was some other dangerous criminal event.

Instead, a police officer let me know that an elderly resident had passed away peacefully. During our chat he remarked at how quiet the neighborhood is, crime-wise. I had to agree, and thanked him for being on the job. The neighborhood hasn’t always been quiet but it has made amazing strides just in the time we’ve been here.

It’s nice to live in a quiet neighborhood.

Mordecai and CAP

A neighbor on the Historic Oakwood email list said this today about Mordecai Historic Park:

One of the problems attached to matter relating to the Mordecai Plantation House and grounds has been that buildings not associated with the Mordecais are in the Park. And the Park is not under the management of historical preservationists or historians, but of the Parks and Recreation Department. That Department is actually a fine administrator of Parks, but strictly speaking, the Mordecai House should not be part of a Park, but an independent House Museum, managed by historians and preservationists.

Well, let’s take a look at that for a moment. The city of Raleigh bought the Mordecai property in 1969 to preserve it. In 1972, the predecessor of Capital Area Preservation, Moore Square Historical Society, was formed to manage the park, with the city paying them $150,000 yearly to do so. It was in the 1970s (during CAP’s management) that many of these buildings unrelated to the Mordecais were placed on the property. The good news is that the buildings were saved from destruction, but the bad news is … well, they were plopped down next to the Mordecai House. I’m not sure what the city had to say about that decision at the time – I’m still researching it – but I certainly hope the decision wasn’t made simply for the convenience of CAP.
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Fallen wires

The tornado that ripped through Raleigh a few weeks ago left much debris and heartbreak for its citizens. It also left a few downed telephone lines, one of which has been lying in the road near my home since the storm struck. I pondered how anyone could find it acceptable for their phone service to be out for over two weeks.

Then I hit upon the answer: no one has landlines anymore.

That copper lying in the street is likely “dead” copper, having long ago beed disconnected in favor of cellphone service or a VoIP connection. AT&T hasn’t been in a hurry to rehang that line because it’s not making any money from it. I wondered how much copper still hanging on those poles is still being used, and if local telephone companies are on a slow march to irrelevance.

Or maybe it’s a quick march.

The Mordecai Interpretive Center

Mordecai House


Thursday evening, some of the neighborhood email lists lit up with discussion of the planned Interpretive Center at Mordecai Historic Park. The center is going through the planning stages and the proposed location has been selected by staff, with the Mordecai Historic Park (MHP) board and the Raleigh Historic Districts Commission both offering their approvals. Three public meetings have addressed the center and public feedback up until now has been overwhelmingly positive, with the project receiving a standing ovation at its public hearing in the Mordecai neighborhood in November.

When first presented with this plan at the Mordecai board meeting, I was concerned that the board was not given time to properly vet this plan. I needed time to study it and get my questions addressed. I recognize the historical importance of the park and wanted to make sure we did this right. It remains the only time I voted in the minority as a Mordecai boardmember.
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