Bonehead Move!

Click me for the full view.

Darkside of the Rainbow

You may have heard about the synchronicity of The Wizard of Oz and Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon. You know, start the CD on the third roar of the MGM lion kind of stuff, but have you ever tried it? You should, because there are some amazing coincidences here. PF has always denied any connection but there is something fishy going on in OZ! Check out this cool site that brings all the facts to light. Then roll a fattie and go enjoy the show.

Trouble at Black Rock

It seems we have a problem at Burning Man. The annual counter culture get together has turned sour. On early Tuesday morning as many of the burners were admiring the full eclipse of the moon, someone purposely tourched the Man 4 days early. The climax of the week is usually on Saturday, but this year an arsonist has struck. Sprits are still high and the perp has been hauled away. Burn on!

Doin' The Delta

We are off for a five day sailing trip to the delta! This will be my 4th trip to the San Joaquin River. It is about 45 miles away and takes a good chunk of the day to get there. Once there, its fresh, warm water, hot days, very comfortable nights and the livin' is easy. I'll have a full report upon my return on Monday. Have a great holiday weekend and get out there and do some sailing!!

Sailing Movie - Deep Water

Deep Water is the stunning true story of an amateur yachtsman, Donald Crowhurst, who enters the very first solo, nonstop round the world boat race. He put everything on the line to enter the race. And ended up going mad! For a look at the trailer, click here.

New Update for Google Earth

Google has just released a new version of Earth and it has a great new feature. Now you can cruise amongst the galaxies with the flick of your mouse. Want to see which stars will be in your backyard tonight? No problem. Download the latest version here.

Top Ten Pics Taken By Hubble

clipped from treebeard31.wordpress.com

Hubble telescope’s top ten greatest space photographs 

The Sombrero Galaxy - 28 million light years from Earth

The Ant Nebula, a cloud of dust and gas whose technical name is Mz3, resembles

In third place is Nebula NGC 2392, called Eskimo because it looks like a face

face surrounded by a furry hood.

At four is the Cat’s Eye Nebula

The Hourglass Nebula, 8,000 light years away

In sixth place is the Cone Nebula. The part pictured here is 2.5 light years in

years in length (the equivalent of 23 million return trips to the Moon)

The Perfect Storm, a small region in the Swan Nebula, 5,500 light years away

Starry Night, so named because it reminded astronomers of the Van Gogh painting.

The glowering eyes from 114 million light years away are the swirling cores of two merging galaxies called NGC 2207

The Trifid Nebula. A ’stellar nursery’, 9,000 light years from here, it is where new stars are being born.

Roz Abandons Her Ship

After her row boat capsized twice and she lost her sea anchor, Roz was airlifted off of her boat and is back on terra firma. Another wave caused her to hit her head on the cabin. Now her boat is adrift and waiting for her to return. Below is a video of her rescue. For the full story,
click here.

Roz Fighting Her Way Across the Pacific

Roz has hit some big winds as she rows her way across the worlds biggest ocean. During the night her craft was capsized twice. With it's ability to self right, she is fine. Because it is so bumpy out there she is having a hard time sending her usual updates. Check out her blog here.

Mark Foo's Last Ride

Twenty-two miles down Highway 1 from San Francisco, a craggy fist of land called Pillar Point thrusts emphatically into the cold Pacific. Friday, December 23, 1994, dawned fair over this stretch of coast. Mountainous waves crashed against the headlands, spraying up billows of mist that unfurled languidly across the beaches. Beyond the end of the point, some 15 surfers bobbed in the muted winter sunlight, scanning the horizon for approaching swells. It was not uncommon to see surfers off the point--a spot they called Maverick's--dressed in heavy, hooded wetsuits and sitting astride oversize boards. But the hovering helicopter, the three boats of photographers just outside the surf line, and the throng of spectators lining the cliffs suggested that this was no ordinary surf session.

For more than a week, the largest, most perfectly shaped waves in a decade had been thundering over the reef at the end of Pillar Point. Word traveled quickly over the international surfers' grapevine: Maverick's, one of the world's heaviest waves, was going off. Upon hearing the news, a trio of renowned big-wave surfers from Hawaii--Brock Little, Ken Bradshaw, and Mark Foo--hurried to California to join the local crew in the surf. Read on.

Top 100 Music Sites

There is an amazing array of music available on the web. Here is a list of the top sites for music in many different formats. Checkout finetune.com where you can make a playlist and embed it on your blog or send it to friend. I have put together a playlist of some of my favorite tunes below on the right. Please take a listen.
Have Fun!

Tube of the Year - Pipeline

Insane Windsurf Clip

Quote of the Day

A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects. -Robert A. Heinlein

Jumping Ship!

Ran across an unbielivable story of a couple that survived almost 20 hours in the ocean after their boat sank. Read the account of the adventure here.

Pic of the Day

Click the pic for a full size view.

Tokyo Wave Pool - No Thanks.

31 Wheel Roller Suit

31 Wheel Roller Suit - video powered by Metacafe

Google Takes Over the World

Here is a very clever presentation on where our information will come from in the very near future. You and I maybe the sources by which the news is created in just a few short years. To see the clip, click here.

The Perfect H2uh0 Sport - Surf Boat Down Under

Th Best of the Wedge!

This is one of the sickest waves on the planet. Gnarly, dangerous and sometimes unridable. Editor's note: Ride at your own risk!

Classic Movie Clip

Everything You Wanted to Know About Sex But Were Afraid to Ask

Perseides Meteor Show This Weekend

I am a huge fan of meteor showers. I was once on top of a volcano in Maui during the annual Leonid shower and it was spectacular. If you venture out late Saturday night into a dark area, you may see as many as two meteors a minute. They will eminate from Cassiopeia (the big W in the sky). What you are seeing is tiny dust particals from the Swift-Tuttle comet brushing against our atmosphere and burning up. These particles are smaller than sand yet appear to be huge when they light up and race across the sky. So get your honey, spread out a big blanket under the moonless sky and enjoy the show!

Endless Summer Clip

Steve Fossett - Managing Risk

Here's a great article by Tim Zimmerman about a man who has broken more world records than anyone else. If there as a record for breaking records, Steve would win it. He balloons, flys and sails the world on some of the most ammazing machines ever built. Read the article here.

Top 25 Moments on Seinfeld

One of the greatest shows on TV, here are the top 25 moments "about nothing".

Helix Nebula

A mere seven hundred light years from Earth, in the constellation Aquarius, a sun-like star is dying. Its last few thousand years have produced the Helix Nebula (NGC 7293), a well studied and nearby example of a Planetary Nebula, typical of this final phase of stellar evolution. Nearly 11 hours of exposure time have gone in to creating this remarkably deep view of the nebula. It shows details of the Helix's brighter inner region, about 3 light-years across, but also follows fainter outer halo features that give the nebula a span of well over six light-years. The white dot at the Helix's center is this Planetary Nebula's hot, central star. A simple looking nebula at first glance, the Helix is now understood to have a surprisingly complex geometry.

On a More Serious Note...

Sail boat cruising is a wonderful way to travel the world. It can also be a very dangerous way to travel. You can have a well built boat, all the safety gear you can imagine, a competent crew, and still get into a whole lot of trouble out there. Even if you have all the technology working for you with weather charts and maybe an onshore router, you can still get onto a mess out there. Here is one man's story of doing all the right things, but running into a storm that is so ferocious, there is nothing he can do to save the boat. Read his story here.

Cat in a Bag

Part of sailing's exclusive reputation is due to the considerable cost and inconvenience of owning, transporting and storing watercraft. A UK company has just made the sport far more accessible, with a range of small, sporty 2-person catamarans that fold up and fit into a convenient carry bag - so it's now possible to take your own boat on holiday with you, or become a weekend racer with your boat stored in a cupboard through the week.
You've got to applaud the sheer practicality of the MiniCat. It takes the sport of sailing into a new realm of accessibility. You don't need to worry about mooring or slippage fees, boat trailers, garages or even a roof rack. You can keep a sailing boat at your holiday home, or take it anywhere in a car.
The MiniCat weighs less than 40kg, and folds up into a 1380 x 280 x 280mm sports bag. It takes around 30 minutes to assemble, once you've got your head around it, and less than 20 to pack up again at the end of the day. Assembly and tear-down can be done completely by hand.
Three models are available, all sporting a 3.75 square metre mainsail. The Super model adds a 1.75 square metre jib, and the Sport a 1.4 square metre jib, a sandwich-design high-rigidity mast, and a rollfork. The 3.1 metre twin inflatable floats are made of abrasion resistant Valmex, which is used in the construction of white-water rafts and should hld up to plenty of abuse. Float-mounted keel fins should allow the MiniCat to be sailed in shallow water without too much risk of damage.

Rings