thislooksfamiliar

from this article by wired.com’s danger room:

After just a few hours a Pyrament runway is ready for the heaviest aircraft, reaching a strength that conventional concrete can only match after several days.

Pyrament is one type of a new technology called geopolymers. they harden faster than traditional concretes and to higher strengths. very cool technology.

as an interesting aside, it’s been suggested by one of the main creators of geopolymers that they were used to build the pyramids. even more interesting is that, according to the article:

recent X-ray and microscopic study of samples has supported the theory that the pyramids are made of artificial stone.

i don’t understand why the government shouldn’t own the banks, at least temporarily.  it seems like the way they are being run now, the government (and my money) take the risk when things are bad, but the banks take the profits when things are good.  that doesn’t make any sense.  shouldn’t the government (and my money) get some of the profit when things are good?  shouldn’t the banks be forced to close up shop and sell themselves to the government when they make bad decisions?

…which would be great excep i’m already on spring break.  it figures that the only snow day of the year comes when we’re all ready on spring break.

after each semester, my university asks students to participate in an anonymous review of the teacher and the course.  i had particular difficulty with a certain teacher last semster.  the following is my review:

The strongest features of this course were:
the strongest feature of this course was the inexcusably terrible and incomplete teaching of the instructor.  [teacher] clearly did not understand the material comprehensively enough to help us understand it.  it is a wonder that he was considered competent to teach this course.

The best way to increase learning in this course would be to:
the best way to increase learning in this course would be to replace [teacher] with a youtube video tutorial.  this is how i learned everything i did in this class.  the only thing i learned from [teacher] is that sometimes life gives you shitty teachers and you need to make the best of it because no one is going to fix it for you.

Please describe the strengths of the instructor:
capable of tying his own shoes.

Please describe areas in which this instructor could improve as a teacher:
the area in which this instructor could improve as a teacher is the writing of his letter of resignation.

Please offer additional comments on the relationship of the instructor and the student.:
[teacher] did a poor job of explaining basic concepts and ideas.  students had questions.  [teacher] usually became irritated that students were not understanding the material and continued to repeat his previous, incomplete, explanation ad nauseum until students became aware that he had only a limited understanding of the concepts himself, and thus could not explain it to us.  eventually students stopped asking questions.

last friday, january 9th, a fire truck drove into a building in boston.  this happened about two streets over from where i live.  this was all over the local and national news.  i went over with my roommate, matt, as soon as we heard about it, which was about 20 minutes after it happened.  the whole area was surrounded by emergency personnel, as can be imagined.  matt and i walked down the hill that the truck went down and had a fantastic view of the scene as we did.

once we got closer, about 50 feet from the intersection it went through, the police had the area taped off.  we stayed down there for only a few minutes before they started to clear that area, too, telling us that they were roping off the whole street.  this was understandable because there were fresh skid marks from the truck near the top of the hill, apparently the last place the truck had brakes.

i was able to take numerous pictures while we were down at the intersection, and the Huntington News, our school newspaper, actually used one of the pictures on its front page this morning.  i also posted the photos on flickr.  on friday there were 400 views and on saturday, another 950.