Russ Nelson

:) I have a theory about gastric upset: what you can successfully eat *and gain nutrition from* depends on your gastric bacteria load. If you change what you eat, you need different bacteria. Swapping out the bacteria is not a pleasant experience.

So it's not about food poisoning, but instead about food *type* poisoning.

I have ascertained the secret of Tai Chi Push Hands. This is a system of study to the end of being able to push an opponent so hard that they go flying across the room. It's not fake. It's real. I've had it done to me, and I've seen it done to others.

The way it works is simple but subtle. The master of the art knows how to get you off balance so quickly that your body jumps in order to stay in balance. You can see this for yourself when you walk on ice, and the supporting foot slips out from underneath you. You don't fall; instead you jump up and use your unweighted leg to get your weighted leg back underneath you.

The master simulates this by determining (through years of practice) where your balance is weakest. He then pushes you in that direction, very gently, but quickly. If this is done correctly, you jump backwards to keep your balance. The master exerts very little force, but induces you to do all the movement.

This is a very effective fighting art, because in a fight between peers, the fight is won by the person with the greater stamina. If the master is constantly forcing you to exert great effort, with very little effort on his part, you will be exhausted before he is even winded.

The Rival Student goes to the Master and says "Master, demonstrate your system on me so that I may decide if I want to be your student." The Master soundly defeats the Rival Student's every attack.

The Rival Student goes away thinking "He is a fraud. He only used his physical strength, no qigong at all."

The Master thinks "... and he couldn't even stop my physical strength. Not much of a student."

I've been looking for unfinished railroads via map services again. I think I've found the tunnel that the Ogdensburg, Clayton & Rome built near Pixley Falls in the Boonville Gorge. I also have a candidate road for this "cut and abutment". Look on the Historic USGS maps. Look at the red circle, and the road just to the south of it. That road heads down the hill. Where it crosses the driver is approximately one and a half miles below upper Lansing Kill Falls, just as described. I'll have to look in person, but I'm reasonably confident that it's not the railroad.

Just to the left of the red circle is a large flat spot on the side of the hill. On the south end of the flat spot, next to the aforementioned road, is a house. I'd guess that somebody wanted a farm with a view. I can't see any ruins of a farm there, but you can look at the farm site for yourself and see if you can see it. Switch to Satellite for high-resolution photos.

Do I have too many GPS receivers? A Delorme Earthmate (RS-232), a Navman 3000 sleeve for an iPAQ, a Delorme USB receiver, a bluetooth combination compass and receiver, a Nokie n810, a Garmin foretrex 201, an el-cheapo USB GPS receiver for my OLPC XO.

And if you want to count cellphones, my OpenMoko will spit out NMEA.

All points in Hemn space are possible, including the ice block inside the star. Stephenson wastes some time (as no doubt have metaphilosophers) considering how the ice block could have gotten there. It is of no importance to the idea, because "gotten there" introduces the idea of time. Hemn space is merely an enumeration of all possible states of all possible worlds.

More mention is made of "the laws of nature", but again, the laws of nature are at least in part a consideration of time. We live in time, and like fishes cannot conceive of water, have a hard time (hehe) thinking of a world without time. So, introduce time.

How does the ice block get into the star? We can ignore that, but consider that time is a path through Hemn space. Time is a connection between points. A Narrative is but one possible path of time through those points. So what, then, of the laws of nature? Simply, they dictate that some paths are not possible. For example, the 2nd law of thermodynamics disallows any path which results in a decrease in entropy.

So the path which skips you from point to point to point where the ice cube never melts, is not possible with a world with a 2nd law of thermodynamics.

Interesting stuff.

I really like retrophotos. That's where somebody goes to a location with an old photo, and takes a modern version of the same photo. Here's my contribution to the genre. This is Potsdam, NY's old water plant, built in the 1800's. The 2008 photo has the modern water plant in the foreground.

Old photos courtesy of the Potsdam Public Museum, 2008.

It has come to my attention that there are some people running around, falsely calling themselves Russ or Russell Nelson. Do not be fooled! Accept only the genuine article! I am the One True Russ Nelson, forever and always the first and the best.

While I was on a bike ride along the Black River Trail, I heard various loud noises coming from the direction of Fort Drum, just across the river from the old railbed, now a paved trail. Well, it's a paved trail part-way. The pavement and indeed, the trail itself, just stops in the middle of nowhere. The reason for that is that a state employee was killed operating a front-end loader while constructing the trail. They basically walked away from the trail at that point. UPDATE 8/08: The trail will be paved soon

I got to thinking about the contrast. On the one side of the river, we have people training to fight a war. Of course they don't mean to give up their life for their country, but that's a risk. On the other side of the river, you have (in essence) a memorial to a person who did give up his life for his county, building a trail for people's pleasure.

Is the one sacrifice to be compared to the other? We all respect the soldier's sacrifice as "the cost of freedom, buried in the ground." And yet should we respect the worker's sacrifice any less? The concept is less grandiose, dying to build a trail. And yet the trail is used for good benefit on a daily basis by the people of the worker's community.

I'm thinking that taking a risk so that you may please the people around you is a risk worth taking. So it just annoys me when I don't get to see the pictures of Chicago that Doc Searls was going to take. In return for what? An immeasureably lowered risk of dying that morning? Fortunately for you, now, nobody tried to stop me when I took this photo of Central Park.

We should take our pleasure when and where we get it and not worry that life is short and people are fragile.

My contribution to the Chuck Norris never/always meme:

Chuck Norris is never wrong, even when he changes his mind.