I forgot to mention yesterday why encoding an mp3 at 192kbs is important. At 128kbs, most songs sound ok, but every now and then, especially when they're burned to a CD, you can hear hissing or chirping or other audio artifacts. Only the most anal audiophiles can catch artifacts at 192kbs. The only problem is that the file size is slightly larger, but with the huge hard drives nowadays, that's not much of an issue.

Yay! I hunkered down and finished the next section in my dissertation. Now onto section 1.5 Fischer-Tropsch-type synthesis.

I've been using Ruckus for a while now because it's free to ASU students, but I've got to say that it is an absolutely horrid music download service. The software has almost no options, and it can't even play the music I already have on my laptop from ripped CDs! So of course I use it only for downloading and not for playing, but then it fucks up whenever you rename or move a song or edit the media information. Of course, as soon as Ruckus can't find the file, sooner or later the license will expire, and you have to renew it through Ruckus. Right now I'm redownloading a number of songs that had this happen. I'm also keeping the files where Ruckus puts them, even though the organizational scheme bugs the hell out of me. You see, the Ruckus database is primarily organized by Album Name rather than Artist Name, and I've already downloaded a number of songs that don't have an Artist Name in the database. I know, it's super retarded.

I've been messing around with the Yahoo music service for a little bit, and I like what I see. Like Ruckus, it's has unlimited downloads but no CD burning or mp3 player support. However, it's super cheap ($5/month instead of the standard $10/month) and it doesn't punish subscribers who want to purchase songs outright ($.79 per song for subscribers; $.99 per song normally). I've already noticed that Yahoo has a lot more of the indie songs I like than Ruckus, although I still can't find the new Mogwai album. Another good thing is all the Yahoo songs are encoded at 192kbs rather than the standard 128kbs that the other big subscription service, Napster, uses. Ruckus songs are sometimes at 192kbs, and sometimes not. So I'll continue to use Ruckus because it's free, but once I graduate, I'll probably switch to Yahoo.

Besides, I love their widget software!

I started writing my dissertation again. It's been a few weeks because of going to New York and LPSC. It actually feels good to write again. I'm on section 1.4 - Kerogen.

In case you're interested, I've put a mini-version of my LPSC poster online.

I'm back from LPSC now. It was a good week, but very exhausting. The thing about LPSC is the parties every night of the week, hosted by major universities. So I think I'm going to be dry for a week or two.

Anyway, my poster went well Thursday night. Too well, I might say. There was a constant stream of people who wished to talk to me, which is a good thing when I'm trying to get my name out there fishing for possible postdocs. On the other hand, there were a number of posters that I wanted to see that night, and I didn't really get a chance to see them. But after the poster session, my week was pretty much done. Time to cut loose! That night the big party was at a local bar, hosted by the University of Arizona. I met some very cool people there and had a lot of fun. I hope my horrible dancing didn't scare off too many people, though.

By the way, I think I had one of the best ideas of my life this week. A large portion of the oysters in the US come from the gulf coast of Texas, so I always make it a priority to have oysters at least once a week. And to tell the truth, I do get a craving for them every now and then, but I know they'll never be as good as the one's in Houston. But what if you're vegan? My solution is SOYSTERS! You can start with some silken tofu in a plastic shell on ice. Since the best oysters don't have much of a taste (except that they taste "fresh"), I don't think flavor would be much of a problem. The big obstacles are texture (probably not much of a problem) and appearance. Real oysters are gray and have a black rim, which might be hard to replicate. But I think soysters would be a great appetizer for more hip vegan restaurants like Green (formerly Veggie Fun) and Mandala Tearoom. And you'd never have to worry about having rotten raw shellfish! I'm welcoming comments on this idea, especially if it is actually a horrible idea and I'm just fooling myself!

I finished my LPSC poster today. I've been working on it nonstop since Monday. I think it turned out really well, and the woman in charge of printing out posters thought that it should be on glossy paper instead of matte paper. I'll put it online when I get back from the conference next week.

Sirius headquarters. Howard Stern must be around here somewhere.

Rockefeller Center. It reminds me of the last episode of SNL every year.

You're fired!

Many generation of Apple products at the Museum of Modern Art

Vespa at the Museum of Modern Art

On site a Brookhaven National Labs. One of the dorms is on the right.