I just completed a 9 day trek deep into the Sierra Nevada wilderness, where many interesting things may be seen. I'll spare you the usual tedious mountain peak shots and proceed directly to an amazing phenomenon rarely caught as an image.

Below is a photograph of the elusive mountain ape in its natural surroundings (Evolution Lake in this case), where you can clearly see three prime specimens "displaying" for the females. What superb luck to witness it!

The females appear to be using body pigments of some kind (perhaps colored mud), revealing a hitherto unsuspected sophistication. Do the males wash off this pigment as part of the display? Alas, I arrived too late to view the early part of the ritual, and was soon compelled to retreat due to the risk of being discovered myself.

Exhausted by the exertions of the trail and the giddy excitement of my discovery, I had to rest upon a high slab near Muir Pass.

Next year I hope to return and learn more about these magnificent but endangered beasts. Until then...

A web buddy has just hipped me to This.

See that item down in the left corner? Safari now has a shiny new version number, and it works on the PC too. So old Stevie has entered the PC Browser Wars, eh? That should stir the pot a bit.

Today our article Newly Supported CSS Selectors in IE7 appeared, and by pure serendipity we got a note all the way from Brazil on this very subject.

Mauricio Samy Silva has created a PHP page that allows you to type advanced compound CSS selectors into a field and see the results live on the same page. Cool! Just what we need to cram those new combinator combinations into our craniums.

Sorry. :-D

Burnout is a very ugly thing. That's why I have taken the decision this summer to accompany my brother and his friends on their annual excursion into the high Sierra Nevada wilderness.

It's really neat. 75 miles in 11 days, over hill and dale, flirting with hypoxia at 10000ft and above. Not to mention a planned 20 mile detour cross-country, if you can call a solid rock landscape above 11 grand a "country." At least there are glaciers and former glaciers (called "lakes") scattered about, to break up the rather intimidating mineral scenery.

Of course, death marching isn't our only goal, there's eating too. A whopping 1500 calories a day! Yum. Also there's sleeping, one of my favorite things after a rousing day of death-marching in the statosphere. Technically it's called "comatosing," but that's a quibble.

I suspect that after a day or so I will welcome the attentions of any bears that happen along, altho they may be put off by all that moaning and groaning. Still, the camera will be happy, and that what really matters, right?

Heck, after a few days of far too few calories, those bears may have to look pretty sharp themselves. Even the marmots could be at risk.

Mmmmm, marmots...

It's the little things that get you.

The day started normally, as I arose to go fetch a load of horse dung (from a friend who owns several of the big guys), for use in this spring's garden. The air was crisp, the sun was shining low, and all was right with the world.

I arrived on time, and Les was inside his house practicing on his saxaphone. We both play in the same band. Les is so experienced that he sometimes serves as director, and a hard taskmaster he is. Knock knock, and he comes out, insisting on helping me bag. What a guy.

We got straight to work, and commenced to engage in deep intellectual discussions, whilst scraping up the stuff not mentioned in those exciting western epics. The time flew by. Soon there was a big pile of bags.

When we had a full load, I threw the bags in the van. The physical work done, we got down to serious dicussifyin', and then it happened. There was something tiny in my throat, and coughing was not helping. After a while the tickle eased up, but a new problem appeared. I realized I was rubbing my left eye far more than usual. It got worse. And worse. Soon the right eye was involved too.

Not being the panicky kind, I broke in, to "mention" that there was something amiss with my eyes. Mere moments later, you would have seen me, arms akimbo, stumbling into the house to irrigate my protesting pupils in the first wet concavity I could find.

Mind you, this western boy does NOT get allergies! And yet, here was proof positive that invisible airborne "pollutants" could easily lay me low without warning. Oh no! Somehow I pulled it together, and hied on back to town with the goods. There, my wise old landlady applied aloe vera to the affected orbs, and it got a little better. But even now, many hours later, the painful puffyness persists.

Was this a Judgement? Have I become complacent, thus inviting a stern universe to apply some "real world schooling?" Don't know, don't care. All I know is, I'm really, REALLY, tired of this crap.

The news has been so bad, and only seems to get worse. But even amidst the carnage of Man and Nature, life finds a way to keep going, somehow.

This little guy got tired of waiting for help and took things into its own paws.

The escape of one tiny kitty from the flood won't change the problems facing others, but it does show that nothing is ever a "total" disaster. As the old saying goes, "This too shall pass."

What amazes me is how such a small cat made such big waves! New life wants to live, and won't be denied. Like that cat, the ravaged land and its survivors will endure, and somehow pull thru. That's just how life is.

As a confirmed Spacebug, I'm always aware of the gadgets we humans send careening or crawling around the neighborhood. Cassini is performing its massively pre-choreographed 4 year loop-dance around Saturn with dizzying precision, playing tag with the various moons and rings. Other probes are snapping the Sun, capturing the Cosmos, and roughing up innocent comets. This is the real Golden Age of space exploration, folks.

But one achievement surpasses all others of recent memory. At this very moment down on the dusty surface of the Red Planet, two ridiculous six-wheeled contraptions are driving around, imaging, sampling, and spectrumizing for us, and they have been doing this in a cold harsh alien enviroment for almost a full martian year. That's about two Earth years, kids.

"So what?" I hear you say? Well, prior to this mission, Mars was known as the "mission graveyard," swallowing up two thirds of the machines we sent its way. But we got both rovers down on the surface in perfect condition, despite scary last minute changes to adjust for dust storm activity. Then once down, a software glitch nearly killed off Spirit in the first month of service. Only an emergency "backdoor" recovery command secretly installed by a paranoid JPL geek saved the day.

Our high tech dune buggies were only meant to last 90 days with any confidence, altho it was hoped that they would stand up longer. Also remember they have had NO maintainance in all this time, unless helpful Martians are sneaking around at night with socket sets and lube guns. Besides that, these are solar powered toys, and dust buildup was supposed to eventually smother their power flows forever. Amazingly that hasn't happened, thanks to playful and very handy dust devils that apparently come along and perform "cleaning events," thank you very much!

Each rover is sporting a bum wheel now, but they persevere, dragging, pushing, and damn well FORCING progress to happen. Opportunity plowed into a big soft dune and got stuck for weeks, but dang if it didn't bust loose once more. Spirit had nothing but boring basalt to look at, so it "headed for the hills" almost two bloody miles distant across a rubble strewn plain, climbed them hills (with 5 working wheels and an anchor-wheel, in winter yet), and is now poised only 70 meters from the highest summit! Veni vidi vici.

These go-carts were never meant to be billygoats. They aren't really dune buggies. Their "brains" are available only thru a very slow and intermittent dialup from Earth. And yet they soldier on. They have survived crisis after crisis, many not well known to the public. Spirit has lasted so long that its rock abrasion tool is wearing out! Nobody ever suspected that would become a problem, and now they have to do wheel scuffs as a substitute. Hey, whatever it takes, man.

Finally, they have totally nailed their primary mission, to see if Mars really was once a wet world. It was, and we now know this thanks to those two beautiful expressions of the Geek Spirit. Millions of Geek-hours and about a billion bucks went into the mission, and it has paid off big, BIG TIME.

When I was young I dreamed of such things, but it seemed absurd to suppose it could ever actually happen, especially after we found out how expensive and difficult space travel really is. Many other geeks dreamed the same dreams, and somehow made it a reality. Now only one big question remains to be settled there.

Was Mars once a living world, and if so, does it still live?

This geek expects to learn the answer one day.

As I write, Nasa is moments away from giving Temple 1 a really good poke in the eye. It is being delivered in the form of 2/5ths of a ton of copper arriving at 10 kilometers per second.

Normally Astronomy is a staid, sopoforic endeavour, but this one time they will get a chance to actually make something happen "out there". Tonite every amateur and professional Astronomer will be united in the primal desire to WHACK THAT PUPPY! Yeah.

Talk about a defining moment. Only problem is, once these geeks get a taste of direct action there will be no holding them back! Before we know it, there will be pockmarks on every solid object within reach. We have to head this off while our beautiful solar system remains intact!

I urge all to join with me in the "Hands Off Our Celestial Bodies!" campaign. We must bring home to those soon-to-be-wild-eyed telescope jockeys the understanding that the cosmos is NOT their personal shooting gallery! Geeze, why don't they just go play paintball or something?

You've all seen them, the "puzzle" games. Myst was the trailbreaker, leading to a mess of other titles. Some of them are very good and some stink on ice. They all shared one factor tho, namely that they were applications, and therefore a bit complex to create.

This had the effect of restricting the pool of talent that could be applied to the art. Well, those days are over. Thanks to the spread of Flash, huge numbers of folks may now turn their hand to the interactive puzzle format. Things are starting to happen in a big way.

Maybe you have seen "The Crimson Room" and other similar escape room puzzles. Those are great, but some truly insane artist/fiends have recently begun to produce exceptional work that goes way beyond mere "rooms".

Take for instance Hapland and Hapland 2, created by a nameless Brit maniac. This twisted individual seems to understand what puzzle people really like, and has created two games with only that stuff. These are really hard! Oy.

In a more artistic vein (but not an easier one) is The Archipelago, an amazing example of how rich Flash can get. Jonathan May is the author, and he's also got "The Dark Room" in there, but it's nothing like the other room puzzles. There's a "Return to the Archipelago" too, which has unique and superb visuals along with infuriating puzzles to solve. Very nice sound effects and music too!

I am definitely looking forward to an explosion in this genre, or should I say "dreading?" Hrmmmmmm...

Steve Fossett is now passing to the north of Hawaii, and is only a few hours away from landfall on the continental US. Then it's just an "easy" 1000 miles or so to where he took off, over 50 hours ago.

Okay, so this attempt ultimately means nothing, and yes it may be a "guy thing." I just admire any human being who prefers spending three days without much sleep (if any) in a tiny, lonely cabin, for the purpose of doing what has never been done, rather than enjoying that chateau in the south of France. Steve knows that creature comforts are for creatures, and a thinking human wants a little more.

Sure, Steve is a bit mad, but it's a divine madness, one that no single "record" can ever satisfy. He is doomed to press against barriers, one after another, until circumstance or old age finally defeat him. He will never surrender though.

Our dreams always exceed our reach; That is what makes us human. When one of us cheats the odds even a little, many feel that tingle of hope we need to keep going. Thanks Steve.

As these words are being written, Steve Fossett, the man who would break all avation records, is crossing India, and is approaching Calcutta at 300 knots. Altitude is 46,801 feet, and just now the crawl announced that Steve has reached the halfway point in his quest to fly 'round the world in 80 hours, alone.

I'm following along, courtesy of the world wide web:

http://www.virginatlanticglobalflyer.com/MissionControl/Tracking/

I grew up on science fiction many many moons ago, but I never dreamed the future would be this cool! The same people who made Steve's airplane are currently taking reservations for the first sub-orbital tourist trips. They have over 100 customers already lined up. Good luck getting insurance, guys!

By the time you read this, Steve may be far out over the Pacific Ocean, feeling pretty groggy no doubt. Still, it's a heck of a lot faster than his balloon circumnavigation, even if that ended up only 19,000 miles long. Hard to steer those balloons, y'know.

It's noon in India right now, so at his altitude the Himalayan wall, 300 miles to the north, must be clearly visible above the horizon as a pure white jagged line. The intense flat green of the lower Ganges is spread before him, and soon he will cross southeast Asia, heading for Japan. Ah, I see he has now reached Calcutta. (slow typist)

I live in Arizona, which could easily fall under Steve's flight path. Perhaps sometime Thursday afternoon, I will spot a tiny contrail high up in a clear blue Arizona sky. Sure hope so.

Here in the heart of the Great American Southwest, our usual and highly prized aridity has been rinsed away this winter, by an unseemly and continuous train of supercharged subtropical rainstorms. Everything is turning green, and squishy sounds are heard across the land.

Yes, the soon-to-arrive desert flower display will be awesome, but those flowers are there for a reason. Bugs! Sure as God made little green chiggers, those hard-shelled interlopers will see the high humidity as a mandate to go utterly hog wild. Oh lordy!

And then.. and then, will come the Locusts. Oh yes, unstoppable hordes, munching across the emerald desert floor. Their legions shall darken the sun, and the people will tremble at the sight!

But then, at long last, Old Sol will complete his journey to the north. This rocky land will dry and bleach once more, and the wild frenzy of Spring will be but a memory, as the Creatures of the Night reclaim their domain.

I have been into Opera for some time now, and it's an excellent browser, particularly the "zoom" feature. Unfortunately I am sometimes prevented from operating certain sites, and I have found that Firefox reliably handles them, so I know it's not just IE-specific code at fault.

So, I have been toying around with FF1.0 a little, and I didn't care for a few of the ways it behaves, so I was reluctant to switch over. Well no more.

Today I went for it, and started gleaning thru the hundreds of new FF extensions to be had, and suffice to say, my mind HAS BEEN BLOWN. Right now an explosion is happening in the FF extension field, and the sky is the limit.

I'm literally chortling with glee (and I don't do that too often) over all the cool functionality now at my beck and call. Irritating Flash ads? Zap 'em. Don't like a particular image or text block? Kaboom. Ads in general giving you hives? Blacklist them, complete with wildcards. Woohoo! Blog tools galore, RSS stuff, developer tools, you name it.

And that's not all. There's a popup counter, showing just how many popups FF blocked for you on a page, along with the "all time high" # of popups ever blocked at one time. "Madge, I THINK I'm going to be sick!" You can select a plain unlinked url on a page, right click and off you go. Does it irritate you to have to register at every Podunk paper just to see some linked story, only to never visit again? Arrrr, ye be covered, Matey. >;-D One extension employs algorythms to make the mouse wheel scrolling butter smooth. Ahhhh.

This only scratches the surface of what's available, and the fun is just getting started. Consider "Fangs", which gives a text representation of what a screen reader would speak. Awesome. One extension even replicates my beloved "restore closed tab" feature from Opera. Happy happy happy! Joy Joy Joy!

Yes, I now feel a true master of my domain (no pun intended). It's good to be King.

Well It's official, Winter has arrived in the Arizona Desert.

Amazing! Solid H₂O! Does this mean the Day After Tomorrow is almost here?

Pay no attention to that turbine, that's just ventilation for the "bunker" (don't ask). A little more and I will start thinking about snowball fights...

I happen to be an economy sized galoot, so when I read the title above on an email, my normally vigilant internal spam filter was bemusedly overridden. I'm glad it was, because here is the text my occulars perceived within:

My tablets is an innovative fat-holding fast appurtenance that removes grease from a board we gorge! Explicated with the vigorous grease-banding fibre, the blend of all-natural multipliers...

Since I have indeed been "gorging boards" rather heavily recently, I had a powerful urge to get my hands on this "appurtenance", post haste!

Alas, my 'grease' is made of sterner stuff, and won't be so easily banded by a mere fiber. It's a pity, because my all-natural multipliers sure could use some blending, yeah boy!

Well, I'm beginning to "settle in" to my new unicycle at last. The swelling is going down, and genuine injury has been avoided.

I went out today to supposedly "work off" some of the gigantic calorie influx that just passed down my gullet. Ha! Might as well go hunting T Rex with a BB gun! Anyway, I discovered that tryptophan does more than just make one sleepy, it also makes you dizzy. Who knew?

The older I get, the more impact the turkey seems to have on me. it's been hours, and I still have that "bowling ball" feeling sloshing around at my center of gravity. Speaking of gravity, I seem to have captured several satellites and a stray space probe since last time I looked...

As a youngster, I happened to aquire a unicycle and taught myself to ride it. I got pretty good over the years, but more recently I allowed my riding to lapse, after wearing out the last one.

The other day I was in the local bike shop, and there was a very nice black unicycle on display. Unlike those from my youth, this one was designed like professional models and was reasonably priced as well, so the temptation was too great to resist.

Alas, it seems that certain parts of my anatomy have forgotten the lessons they learned earlier, and the complaints have been deafening, IYKWIM. So when you see some middle aged guy balancing on one wheel, know that while it may look cool, that smile is really a grimace.

It is not better to look good than to feel good! Trust me, or better yet, truss me!

Hi, I'm Big John, and I'm a webcomic addict.

I never thought this would happen to me personally. Oh, I have seen the host of webcomics available, and even read Sinfest pretty often, but all the others I ran across tended to make me recoil in horror. I thought, "Hey, newspapers ARE useful for something! They filter out all this dreck!"

Unfortunately for me, Sturgeon's Law says that "90% of everything is crud", and since there are literally thousands of webcomics, there must therefore be very many good webcomics. In other words, only the law of averages was saving me.

I have a geek's brain, and like a squirrel, that brain eventually gets into everything. I had accidentally come across one more good comic, Freefall, and I noticed that the author had a page recommending other webcomics. Piqued, I visited one. Amazing! It was actually a GOOD one! I hadn't had to search or anything!

At that point it was far, far too late for me. It seemed that every comic on that list was better than the last, and soon I discovered that some of them had their own recommends, and so I was led on and on, down that old slippery slope...

Well, you get the picture. Suddenly the real world of webcomics was revealed to me. "So what?" you say? Yeah, I said that too, but try saying that to a finger with an insane compulsion to repeatedly click the "Next" button. Fingers don't have ears.

See my problem? "Webwork time" - "Webcomic time" = "Broke loser". So what I'm asking is, where is the support group for (supposedly) recovering webcomic-aholics? Is this a need too new to have engendered a societal response? Is there any hope, or should I just stop fighting it and submit to assimilation?

Oh my aching eyeballs...

Four months ago a purple sauropod suddenly appeared on the bleak, volcanically active White Island, off New Zealand. Holly did some web research and discovered the identity of the dino to be, well, Dino!

There happens to be an hourly webcam on the island, so we can keep tabs on everybody's favorite cartoon dinosaur

After Dino became world-famous, the geo-survey head honcho stated that the caustic vapors of the island would make short work of our plastic buddy, but it looks like he's made of sterner stuff. Go Dino, go!

My boss's wife from my very-part-time job has a problem with her XP 'puter. First it wouldn't print, so I cleared all the "phantom" printers out of the way, and it then worked fine. I wonder who told it there were six printers installed?

Then I was informed that it was acting funny. Found that it hung shortly after IE started up and even prevented cntrl+alt+del from working. Used Adaware on it, and the problem went away. Decided to go the extra mile and upgrade the sucker. Bad mistake. After "upgrade", the thing can't complete the dialup process, getting cutoff during the final moments of connection.

The ISP (after a looooong hold) said it was the SP2 from you-know-who that was at fault. I tried to remove the security upgrades, but XP insists on rebooting after nearly every removal, and there were about 30. It was excruciating. So, I went ahead and reloaded the OS itself.

The dialup problem persists.

The harpy commenced to become unpleasant, suggesting that I "claimed to be a computer expert", and that she "didn't ask for this".

Meanwhile I'm losing money on the deal, letting my high-paying clients languish while I clench my teeth and bite back well deserved character critiques. Have I mentioned that IHMSWAP?