Nerd music

Nerds can actually also make music:) The new scene is called nerdcore or geeksta rap, which is a fusion of nerd culture and hip hop - an inconceivable cocktail at first, but never the less very successful and entertaining.

There are many nerdcore songs available for free on the net. One good place to start is Rhyme Torrents where you can find five (soon six) free albums. Afterwards you could look at nerdcore hiphop.

Douglas Adams audio II

Here is a new link containing some audio files about Douglas Adams:

http://www.zootle.net/afda/av/25th/

Personalized radio streams

Personalized radio streams are tailored for each user taste, otherwise they function just like the traditional streaming audio. I have tried two such services: www.pandora.com and www.last.fm. Before you can use the service you need to register, and then provide some information about the style of music you like, for example the name of an artist. In case of using last.fm you also need to download some software. Personally I think that Pandora is able to generate better play lists, but then again I have used Pandora much longer. But last.fm has some additional services, such as information about the artists and lists people with similar music taste. But there isn’t really a need to select one of them - you can just use both:)

Roasted Trout with Thyme

A couple of days ago I went fishing and caught a sea trout. So I tried this receipe found on the net: http://www.jfolse.com/recipes/seafood/fish09.htm. It was quite good.

Here is the fresh trout:


And here is a finished dish:

Douglas Adams audio and video

I'm a really big fan of Douglas Adams who sadly died much too young. I have collected some audio and video links here:

Video of Douglas Adams' Memorial Service

Voices with Douglas Adams

Douglas Adams Interview (October 17, 1983)

Douglas Adams Interview (March 20, 1989)

BBC Program by Douglas Adams about computers and music

BBC Program by Douglas Adams about publishing and the Internet

BBC Program by Douglas Adams about broadcasting

BBC Program by Douglas Adams about convergence

Killer slugs

Some days ago I discovered some killer slugs (Spanish slugs) in my garden. So yesterday I tried to make two traps. One was an electric fence powered with 9 volt, the other trap was three small buckets containing beer.

I experimented with a slug to see if it would move over two wires with 9V across them; when the slug first made contact with the two wires a reaction could clearly be seen, but after a while it managed to get cross the wires. The voltage has to be higher to stop them. Another problem with the electric fence is that the slugs will have an easy time moving under it, since they are quite good at digging into the ground.

So there was only the beer trap left to try. The small buckets where dug into the ground, and some Heineken thinned with water was poured into the buckets. The next day they where full of killer slugs, see photo. I have read somewhere on the Internet that the beer traps attract killer slugs over a large distance, so you might just end up getting all the slugs in the neighbourhood into your garden. So it is probably a good idea not leave the beer traps out to long.

There are more videos on video.google.com

video.google.com has really improved lately. The collection has grown considerably. People interested in guitar music could for example search for Steve Vai, Zakk Wylde or "Crazy Guitar Tapping". There's a Zakk Wylde video that is around 56 min long called Zakk Wylde's instructional video (Pentatonic Hardcore). There is also a guy that plays a Mario tune on a guitar, search for "mario guitar".