Year: 2017
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The Week that Was
A man wearing a “Trust Me” t-shirt was arrested after stealing a car that was left unlocked on the street idling to warm up. Mary Horomanski in Erie, Pennsylvania received her December electric bill and her, “eyes just about popped out of my head” when she saw that the total due was more than the…
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Jimi Hendrix & BB King in 1968
One of the pleasures of working from home over the holiday week is that I can to listen to music and explore the depths of an inherited music collection passed on from friends (thanks Alex, thanks Charlie) over the years. Today I was dipping into the 330+ song Jimi Hendrix section and stumbled across this…
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The week that was
A man in London spontaneously burst into flames. So much rain fell on Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas and Mississippi during Hurricane Harvey that the earth’s crust flexed. People stealing packages left on front porches is such a big problem that one man has gone into business selling booby trap devices that set off a small explosive…
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Alabama Getaway
With the ground-breaking repudiation of Roy Moore this past week in the Alabama special election a Facebook friend shared a few lines that opened up a journey down a rabbit hole that I had to share. Here’s a breakdown of the lyrics to the Grateful Dead song Alabama Getaway. Thirty two teeth in a jawboneAlabama…
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The week that was
A mummy of a “senior official” from 3,500 years ago was uncovered in Egypt. Wonder if they buried him with his paperwork. Scientists at the Arctic University of Norway found a shark swimming in the North Atlantic estimated to be over 512-years old. What happened in 1505? Martin Luther had yet to present his 95 thesis…
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AlphaZero Masters Chess in Just 24 Hours
DeepMind, the same outfit that built AlphaGo, the AI platform that learned Go through supervised study of the game and went on to famously beat the top ranked player Lee Sedol has built an algorithm that now plays chess. What is even more incredible about this new “AlphaZero” AI is that it learned how to…
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The week that was
A 77-year old man in Japan has taken up a new hobby, painting . . . with Microsoft Excel. A researcher at Yale has figured out the secret to turn conservatives into liberals. A 5-pound avocado grown in Hawaii has broken the world record, “We just cut giant slices out of it like avocado steaks and…
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Encore Gig : Camperforce
Migrant workers in 2017 now work for Amazon and live out of an RV. The Guardian reports that older workers, unable to afford rising rent and medical expenses, hit the road to work at Amazon distribution centers in exchange for a place to park their RV and water, sewage and electrical hookups. They call them…