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According to Forbes Magazine my hometown, Framingham, is the 3rd “geekiest” city in the States, as measured by the percentage of the population working in science, engineering, technology, and mathematics. We’re right behind Silicon Valley (San Jose, CA) and Boulder, CO. Too bad Forbes didn’t realize that we aren’t a city at all. We’re just the BIGGEST TOWN IN THE COUNTRY. No big deal. Thanks to SH for pointing me to the article.
I went to Outside Lands this past weekend, and was lucky to catch a very impressive lineup: Ok Go, The Black Keys, Sia, The Roots, Vetiver, the Old 97’s, and Muse. The whole festival was run surprisingly well – there were next to no lines for anything (beer, food, bathrooms), it was crowded but didn’t feel claustrophobic, the food was great, parking was easy, and it took no time to get between the four stages. The highlight was definitely Muse. They didn’t have a light show. They had a laser show. This is 2011. Here’s a short clip from the iPhone:
Here’s the current plan. Thoughts, ideas, and suggestions would be much appreciated. View Larger Map
Here are a few shots from the dish at Stanford: And here are a couple from my backyard taken this evening:
I’m not sure how I feel about this contraption: It’s a home brewing machine that produces a batch of beer in seven days. Here’s a description of how it works: The machine saves time by combining home brewing’s longest steps—fermentation, which usually takes a week, and carbonation, which can take at least two. The fermentation tank is also a pressure vessel, which traps carbon dioxide released by yeast, force-carbonating the beer. The system also does away with two common foes of freshness: the sealed vessel keeps out oxygen, a culprit behind flat-tasting pints; and a valve at the bottom of the tank isolates the yeast from the beer as soon as fermenting is done, which prevents meaty, off flavors. It’s certainly
The Brewer’s Association, one of the best sources for news and statistics on the craft brewing industry and related trends, just released the 2011 mid-year report on the state of U.S. Craft Brewers. To briefly summarize the report: Things are good, very good. Here are some of the key stats for the first six months of the year: Dollar growth up 15% Volume up 14%, a 50% increase over the same period last year 5.1 million barrels of beer were sold (that’s about 1.6 billion 12oz beers) The industry employs about 100,000 people The US now has 1,790 breweries — a 10% increase since June of 2010. 1,740 of them are craft breweries. And judging by this “chart”, this trend should
Jeff Tweedy of Wilco and his two sons, Spencer and Sam, have a new band, the Racoonists. Spencer, who is 15 years old, is on drums. Sam is younger. I’m not sure what he plays. Probably bass. This song was recorded in their bedroom. Own it:
Kid Dynamite: “In case you’ve been living under a rock: Standard and Poors downgraded the credit rating for the United States of America last night, from AAA to AA+.” It seems that at this point S&P is generally viewed as incompetent, and the decision to downgrade the US may not be as consequential as many initially predicted. But who really knows? We’ll get a hint tomorrow morning. In the meantime, I found the following posts and articles to be thoughtful and/or interesting: James Kwak: Still, I think the whole thing is preposterous. S&P downgrading the United States is like Consumer Reports downgrading Coca-Cola. Consumer Reports is a great institution. For example, if you want to know how reliable a 2007
Hysterical. Click the map to see it blown up: Look at the mouse-over.