In July 1969 I was 8 years old and I remember it was very hot. My family had rented a cottage for a couple of weeks of vacation in the Muskoka area north of Toronto.
I remember on some very hot days we drove into the nearest town to go to the Dairy Queen and have Mister Misty's - they were the coldest and most thirst quenching thing on the menu.
There was a small black and white television and roof antenna in the cottage. On July 20th I stayed up with my parents to watch the moon landing including the live footage of the first steps on the moon. I don't think my younger brother and sister were able to stay awake for it. At the time I understood the importance and was very excited about it. I remember looking up at the moon and thinking about the astronauts who were up there. I'm sure it was a factor in my becoming a life-long fan of science, science fiction, and astronomy.
I still have some 8mm home movies (now transferred to video) of the summer vacation at that cottage.
Monday, July 20, 2009
Saturday, July 11, 2009
SolderSmoke - A Global Adventure in Radio Electronics
I just finished reading the above book and really enjoyed it. Bill Meara tells of his experiences with amateur radio and electronics starting in his teens and later as he lived in various parts of the world as a diplomat. It alternates between narrative stories and discussions on electronics theory.
As someone who also played with ham radio and electronics from his teens and continuing in adulthood, I felt a lot in common with the author.
You can find all the details here.
As someone who also played with ham radio and electronics from his teens and continuing in adulthood, I felt a lot in common with the author.
You can find all the details here.
Monday, December 8, 2008
In the Steps of John Lennon
John Lennon died on this day in 1980. I realized this weekend that last month I stayed at the Montreal Hilton, the same hotel where John Lennon had his famous "Bed-in" in 1969 and recorded Give Peace a Chance.
I've also been to the University of Ottawa building where John Lennon spoke during a visit in 1969 and was given a tour of the city by a 21 year-old student named Alan Rock (a former politician and UN ambassador, he is now the University's president!).
This past February when I was in New York City I walked past the Dakota apartment building where John Lennon lived for several years until he was shot just outside. I also visited the nearby Strawberry Fields memorial in Central Park.
I remember seeing John Lennon's psychedelic painted Rolls-Royce car when it was on display at the Museum of Science and Technology in Ottawa .
So without leaving North America, I've made a little John Lennon pilgrimage.
I've also been to the University of Ottawa building where John Lennon spoke during a visit in 1969 and was given a tour of the city by a 21 year-old student named Alan Rock (a former politician and UN ambassador, he is now the University's president!).
This past February when I was in New York City I walked past the Dakota apartment building where John Lennon lived for several years until he was shot just outside. I also visited the nearby Strawberry Fields memorial in Central Park.
I remember seeing John Lennon's psychedelic painted Rolls-Royce car when it was on display at the Museum of Science and Technology in Ottawa .
So without leaving North America, I've made a little John Lennon pilgrimage.
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
The Last Theorem by Arthur C. Clarke and Frederik Pohl
This past weekend I finished reading this long awaited (by me) novel. Clarke had been working on it for a few years but was unable to complete it before his death due to ill health. He passed it on to another one of my favourite authors, Frederik Pohl, to complete.
I won't go into a full review because doing so would spoil the novel. I'll just say it was a very good read and has all the usual Clarkian elements. Much of it is set in Clarke's adopted home country of Sri Lanka.
My impression was that it was an Arthur C. Clarke story but was written in the style of Frederik Pohl's novels. The characters were perhaps more developed than in most of Clarke's books; that may have also been Pohl's doing.
Happily, Clarke was at least able to see the final manuscript before he passed away earlier this year.
All in all, highly recommended.
It is currently selling for about $20 on amazon.ca so order it now before the Canadian price goes up, or better yet borrow it from you local library like I did.
I won't go into a full review because doing so would spoil the novel. I'll just say it was a very good read and has all the usual Clarkian elements. Much of it is set in Clarke's adopted home country of Sri Lanka.
My impression was that it was an Arthur C. Clarke story but was written in the style of Frederik Pohl's novels. The characters were perhaps more developed than in most of Clarke's books; that may have also been Pohl's doing.
Happily, Clarke was at least able to see the final manuscript before he passed away earlier this year.
All in all, highly recommended.
It is currently selling for about $20 on amazon.ca so order it now before the Canadian price goes up, or better yet borrow it from you local library like I did.
CD Review: Roy Orbison - The Soul of Rock and Roll
I'm a big fan of Roy Orbison. He had an amazing singing voice, was a talented song writer, and was a pretty good guitar player. And with his jet black hair and trademark sunglasses, he was cool. If you took the best of Elvis Buddy Holly and combined them, you'd have something close to Roy Orbison.
So when a new Roy Orbison CD compilation came out, I had to get it. The Soul of Rock and Roll is a set of four CDs containing 108 tracks. It covers his entire career, from his first hit Ooby Dooby recorded by his band The Teen Kings (when he was still in his teens) to a recording made two days before his death.
The CDs are roughly in chronological order. You can follow his career from the early rockabilly tunes to Rock and Roll songs to the ballads he became most famous for, and rebirth with the Traveling Wilbury's in the eighties.
The compilation includes most of his major hits spanning from the 1950s to 1980s. It also includes some demo recording and other rarities, some of which were not previously unreleased.
I particularly hearing some of the demos that feature just Roy and his guitar.
On the pros side, the compilation includes almost everything Roy Orbison recorded in one set. There is a generous number of tracks per disc. The tracks are of good quality. It includes a book of almost 100 pages about his life, pictures, and info about each of the tracks.
My only complaint is with the packaging. While it looks nice, it is too big to conveniently carry with you, so you will need some jewel cases or other holder (assuming you don't just rip the tracks to you MP3 player).
It is available from Amazon.
So when a new Roy Orbison CD compilation came out, I had to get it. The Soul of Rock and Roll is a set of four CDs containing 108 tracks. It covers his entire career, from his first hit Ooby Dooby recorded by his band The Teen Kings (when he was still in his teens) to a recording made two days before his death.
The CDs are roughly in chronological order. You can follow his career from the early rockabilly tunes to Rock and Roll songs to the ballads he became most famous for, and rebirth with the Traveling Wilbury's in the eighties.
The compilation includes most of his major hits spanning from the 1950s to 1980s. It also includes some demo recording and other rarities, some of which were not previously unreleased.
I particularly hearing some of the demos that feature just Roy and his guitar.
On the pros side, the compilation includes almost everything Roy Orbison recorded in one set. There is a generous number of tracks per disc. The tracks are of good quality. It includes a book of almost 100 pages about his life, pictures, and info about each of the tracks.
My only complaint is with the packaging. While it looks nice, it is too big to conveniently carry with you, so you will need some jewel cases or other holder (assuming you don't just rip the tracks to you MP3 player).
It is available from Amazon.
Monday, September 1, 2008
Humans, by Robert J. Sawyer
I just read Humans, the second novel in The Neanderthal Parallax trilogy by Robert J. Sawyer. It was just the thing to pass the time flying back from Houston, Texas with a few hours to kill in airports and on airplanes. A few months ago I read Hominids, the first novel in the trilogy.
I won't spoil it for you by revealing any details, but the trilogy is about making contact with a version of Earth in an alternate universe in which Neanderthals, rather than humans, became the dominant species.
Sawyer did his homework when it came to Neanderthals. There is increasing evidence, some of it published since his novel was published, that Neanderthals may have been as intelligent as humans. Sawyer's insight into their possible religious beliefs is an extrapolation based on real evidence from fossils and artifacts. Their possible speech patterns is also backed up by recent computer models based on Neanderthal skulls.
As usual, Sawyer gets in his Canadian content, with some of the action taking place in Canada and several important characters who are Canadian. It also has events taking place in the United States, including New York City and Washington, DC. There is a particularly moving scene at the Vietnam War memorial that Sawyer thinks was one of the best things he's ever written.
I found it a great read. If you are not an SF fan you will likely still enjoy this novel -- like all his books it's not so much about technology or aliens, but about believable characters, interesting situations, and thought-provoking questions. It also has an element of crime mystery too.
The ending was particularly exciting and had a interesting plot twist that caught me off guard.
I'm looking forward to shortly reading the final book in the trilogy, Hybrids.
See also:
I won't spoil it for you by revealing any details, but the trilogy is about making contact with a version of Earth in an alternate universe in which Neanderthals, rather than humans, became the dominant species.
Sawyer did his homework when it came to Neanderthals. There is increasing evidence, some of it published since his novel was published, that Neanderthals may have been as intelligent as humans. Sawyer's insight into their possible religious beliefs is an extrapolation based on real evidence from fossils and artifacts. Their possible speech patterns is also backed up by recent computer models based on Neanderthal skulls.
As usual, Sawyer gets in his Canadian content, with some of the action taking place in Canada and several important characters who are Canadian. It also has events taking place in the United States, including New York City and Washington, DC. There is a particularly moving scene at the Vietnam War memorial that Sawyer thinks was one of the best things he's ever written.
I found it a great read. If you are not an SF fan you will likely still enjoy this novel -- like all his books it's not so much about technology or aliens, but about believable characters, interesting situations, and thought-provoking questions. It also has an element of crime mystery too.
The ending was particularly exciting and had a interesting plot twist that caught me off guard.
I'm looking forward to shortly reading the final book in the trilogy, Hybrids.
See also:
Sunday, August 24, 2008
2008 Olympic Results - Another Way of Looking at the Numbers
The 2008 Summer Olympics are over, and the results are in. The official rankings are weighted by the type and number of medals won, and with that system, the top ten countries were: China, United States, Russia, Britain, Germany, Australia, South Korea, Japan, Italy, France, Ukraine, and Netherlands (the last three were tied).
Canada came in 19th with 18 medals: 3 gold, 9 silver, and 7 bronze.
If you rank countries by the total number of medals won, the results are similar but the United States overtakes China for the number one spot. The rankings are United States, China, Russia, Britain, Australia, Germany, France, South Korea, Ukraine, Italy.
Canada comes in 15th when ranked by number of medals.
But we're a small country. Clearly a large country like China over a billion people has a larger pool of potential athletes to choose from. So how about looking at the medals won per capita? I reworked the rankings by sorting them by number of medals won per millions of population (the full table is at the end of this blog entry).
With this ranking, Bahamas comes in at number one. They won only two medals, but with a tiny population of 331,000 that puts them in first place. Second, not surprisingly, is Jamaica, which won 11 medals with a population of only 2.7 million.
Iceland, with a population of just over three hundred thousand, won a single medal, putting them in third place.
The only larger countries (more than 10 million population) making the top ten list were Australia and Cuba.
How did the big boys, the officially ranked top 10 countries, do?
None of them made the top 10 except Australia which was 6th, coincidentally the same as the official ranking. China is a big loser at 69th place as is the United States at 45th.
Dead last when ranking by population is India, which won only three medals with it's over 1 billion population.
When I started this exercise I had hoped that Canada would come up higher in the rankings. When ranked by population, Canada is 37th, so we don't come up higher in the rankings by population than by medals, although we come out ahead of the big players. At 0.54 medals per million people we're in the same range as many other similarly developed countries.
Canada came in 19th with 18 medals: 3 gold, 9 silver, and 7 bronze.
If you rank countries by the total number of medals won, the results are similar but the United States overtakes China for the number one spot. The rankings are United States, China, Russia, Britain, Australia, Germany, France, South Korea, Ukraine, Italy.
Canada comes in 15th when ranked by number of medals.
But we're a small country. Clearly a large country like China over a billion people has a larger pool of potential athletes to choose from. So how about looking at the medals won per capita? I reworked the rankings by sorting them by number of medals won per millions of population (the full table is at the end of this blog entry).
With this ranking, Bahamas comes in at number one. They won only two medals, but with a tiny population of 331,000 that puts them in first place. Second, not surprisingly, is Jamaica, which won 11 medals with a population of only 2.7 million.
Iceland, with a population of just over three hundred thousand, won a single medal, putting them in third place.
The only larger countries (more than 10 million population) making the top ten list were Australia and Cuba.
How did the big boys, the officially ranked top 10 countries, do?
China 69
United States 45
Russia 38
Britain 27
Germany 39
Australia 6
South Korea 32
Japan 58
Italy 40
France 33
Ukraine 34
Netherlands 23
None of them made the top 10 except Australia which was 6th, coincidentally the same as the official ranking. China is a big loser at 69th place as is the United States at 45th.
Dead last when ranking by population is India, which won only three medals with it's over 1 billion population.
When I started this exercise I had hoped that Canada would come up higher in the rankings. When ranked by population, Canada is 37th, so we don't come up higher in the rankings by population than by medals, although we come out ahead of the big players. At 0.54 medals per million people we're in the same range as many other similarly developed countries.
| Medal Ranking | Country | Gold | Silver | Bronze | Total | Population | Medals per Million Capita |
| 56t | Bahamas | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 331000 | 6.04 |
| 13 | Jamaica | 6 | 3 | 2 | 11 | 2714000 | 4.05 |
| 56t | Iceland | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 316252 | 3.16 |
| 37t | Slovenia | 1 | 2 | 2 | 5 | 2029000 | 2.46 |
| 6 | Australia | 14 | 15 | 17 | 46 | 21394309 | 2.15 |
| 28t | Cuba | 2 | 11 | 11 | 24 | 11268000 | 2.13 |
| 19t | New Zealand | 3 | 1 | 5 | 9 | 4275100 | 2.11 |
| 19t | Norway | 3 | 5 | 2 | 10 | 4778500 | 2.09 |
| 56t | Lithuania | 0 | 3 | 4 | 7 | 3361100 | 2.08 |
| 56t | Armenia | 0 | 0 | 6 | 6 | 3002000 | 2 |
| 16t | Belarus | 4 | 5 | 10 | 19 | 9690000 | 1.96 |
| 28t | Mongolia | 2 | 2 | 0 | 4 | 2629000 | 1.52 |
| 56t | Trinidad and Tobago | 0 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 1333000 | 1.5 |
| 37t | Estonia | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 1340600 | 1.49 |
| 19t | Georgia | 3 | 0 | 3 | 6 | 4395000 | 1.37 |
| 37t | Latvia | 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 2268000 | 1.32 |
| 37t | Bahrain | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 760168 | 1.32 |
| 28t | Denmark | 2 | 2 | 3 | 7 | 5489022 | 1.28 |
| 19t | Slovakia | 3 | 2 | 1 | 6 | 5402273 | 1.11 |
| 56t | Croatia | 0 | 2 | 3 | 5 | 4555000 | 1.1 |
| 19t | Hungary | 3 | 5 | 2 | 10 | 10043000 | 1 |
| 10t | Netherlands | 7 | 5 | 4 | 16 | 16445000 | 0.97 |
| 28t | Kazakhstan | 2 | 4 | 7 | 13 | 15422000 | 0.84 |
| 37t | Azerbaijan | 1 | 2 | 4 | 7 | 8467000 | 0.83 |
| 56t | Mauritius | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 1262000 | 0.79 |
| 4 | Britain | 19 | 14 | 15 | 48 | 60975000 | 0.79 |
| 28t | Switzerland | 2 | 0 | 4 | 6 | 7637300 | 0.79 |
| 37t | Finland | 1 | 1 | 2 | 4 | 5318105 | 0.75 |
| 56t | Ireland | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4422100 | 0.68 |
| 37t | Bulgaria | 1 | 1 | 3 | 5 | 7640238 | 0.65 |
| 7 | South Korea | 13 | 10 | 8 | 31 | 48224000 | 0.64 |
| 10t | France | 7 | 16 | 17 | 40 | 64473140 | 0.62 |
| 10t | Ukraine | 7 | 5 | 16 | 28 | 46059306 | 0.61 |
| 19t | Czech Republic | 3 | 3 | 0 | 6 | 10403136 | 0.58 |
| 56t | Sweden | 0 | 4 | 1 | 5 | 9215021 | 0.54 |
| 19t | Canada | 3 | 9 | 6 | 18 | 33354500 | 0.54 |
| 3 | Russia | 24 | 21 | 28 | 73 | 141888900 | 0.51 |
| 5 | Germany | 17 | 10 | 15 | 42 | 82191000 | 0.51 |
| 9 | Italy | 8 | 10 | 10 | 28 | 59619290 | 0.47 |
| 14t | Spain | 5 | 10 | 3 | 18 | 46063000 | 0.39 |
| 56t | Kyrgyzstan | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 5317000 | 0.38 |
| 16t | Romania | 4 | 1 | 3 | 8 | 21438000 | 0.37 |
| 14t | Kenya | 5 | 5 | 4 | 14 | 37538000 | 0.37 |
| 2 | United States | 36 | 38 | 36 | 110 | 304943000 | 0.36 |
| 56t | Austria | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 8340924 | 0.36 |
| 56t | Greece | 0 | 2 | 2 | 4 | 11147000 | 0.36 |
| 56t | Serbia | 0 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 9858000 | 0.3 |
| 37t | Zimbabwe | 1 | 3 | 0 | 4 | 13349000 | 0.3 |
| 37t | Panama | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 3343000 | 0.3 |
| 56t | Tajikistan | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 6736000 | 0.3 |
| 56t | Moldova | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 3794000 | 0.26 |
| 19t | Poland | 3 | 6 | 1 | 10 | 38115967 | 0.26 |
| 28t | North Korea | 2 | 1 | 3 | 6 | 23790000 | 0.25 |
| 37t | Uzbekistan | 1 | 2 | 3 | 6 | 27372000 | 0.22 |
| 56t | Singapore | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 4588600 | 0.22 |
| 37t | Dominican Republic | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 9760000 | 0.2 |
| 8 | Japan | 9 | 6 | 10 | 25 | 127690000 | 0.2 |
| 37t | Belgium | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 10584534 | 0.19 |
| 37t | Portugal | 1 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 10623000 | 0.19 |
| 56t | Chinese Taipei | 0 | 0 | 4 | 4 | 23000000 | 0.17 |
| 56t | Togo | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 6585000 | 0.15 |
| 28t | Argentina | 2 | 0 | 4 | 6 | 40301927 | 0.15 |
| 56t | Israel | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 7303000 | 0.14 |
| 37t | Turkey | 1 | 4 | 3 | 8 | 70586256 | 0.11 |
| 37t | Tunisia | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 10327000 | 0.1 |
| 16t | Ethiopia | 4 | 1 | 2 | 7 | 79221000 | 0.09 |
| 19t | Brazil | 3 | 4 | 8 | 15 | 187529000 | 0.08 |
| 1 | China | 51 | 21 | 28 | 100 | 1325693000 | 0.08 |
| 56t | Ecuador | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 13341000 | 0.07 |
| 56t | Morocco | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 31224000 | 0.06 |
| 28t | Thailand | 2 | 2 | 0 | 4 | 63038247 | 0.06 |
| 56t | Chile | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 16763470 | 0.06 |
| 56t | Algeria | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 33858000 | 0.06 |
| 37t | Cameroon | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 18549000 | 0.05 |
| 56t | Colombia | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 44513090 | 0.04 |
| 56t | Afghanistan | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 27145000 | 0.04 |
| 56t | Malaysia | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 27170000 | 0.04 |
| 56t | Venezuela | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 27953701 | 0.04 |
| 37t | Iran | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 70495782 | 0.03 |
| 28t | Mexico | 2 | 0 | 1 | 3 | 106682500 | 0.03 |
| 56t | Nigeria | 0 | 1 | 3 | 4 | 148093000 | 0.03 |
| 56t | Sudan | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 38560000 | 0.03 |
| 37t | Indonesia | 1 | 1 | 3 | 5 | 231627000 | 0.02 |
| 56t | South Africa | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 47850700 | 0.02 |
| 56t | Egypt | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 75231000 | 0.01 |
| 56t | Vietnam | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 87375000 | 0.01 |
| 37t | India | 1 | 0 | 2 | 3 | 1137087600 | 0 |
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