A few days before James Doohan’s remains were rocketed into space, Stephen Hawking experienced weightlessness … eight times.

Hawking is a celebrated British astrophysicist, black-hole theorist and author of A Brief History of Time. Now 65 years old, he is paralyzed by Lou Gehrig’s disease.

In side of a Boeing 727, Hawking and his caretakers rode the plane as it made 8 arcs in the sky, each arc offering 25 seconds of weightlessness.

Like Doohan, Hawking also has a Star Trek connection. He played a hologram of himself on an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Article: Famed physicist Hawking takes first step toward space

The phrase “Beam me up, Scotty“, is a part of the American venacular.

Oddly enough, like many such phrases (e.g., “Play it again, Sam“), it was never actually spoken in the show.

But it doesn’t matter. It is the phrase many of us remember whenever we see a photo of the actor, James Doohan, who played the starship Enterprise’s chief engineer Scotty.

James Doohan died two years ago. Yesterday, Doohan finally made a brief sojourn into space. A spacecraft, containing a capsule of his remains, remains of Gordon Cooper, who first went into space in 1963 and died in 2004, and capsules of about 200 other people road a rocket to an altitude of 72 miles, the edge of space.

After the trip, the rocket returns to earth via parachute, the capsules are retrieved, mounted on plaques and given back to relatives.

The flight was arranged by Houston-based company Space Services Inc. The company charges $495 to send a portion of a person’s ashes into suborbital space and return it.

Wikipedia reports this story about Doohan:

In the 1997 documentary Trekkies, Doohan related a very somber story: a female fan sent him a suicide note. Doohan immediately contacted the fan and arranged to speak with her at his next convention appearance. Doohan continued to see her at several other conventions, but ultimately didn’t hear from her for several months, which quickly became years.

Doohan, visibly moved by relating this tale, then revealed the reason for the eight-year-long silence: one final letter arrived, thanking Doohan for his kindness and comforting words, and informing him that because of his encouragement, she had gone back to school and earned a degree in Electronic Engineering.

As Scotty once said in Star Trek: “I’ve giv’n her all she’s got, Captain, an’ I canna give her no more.”

Bye (again), Scotty. We miss you.

If you have begun using IE7, you have almost certainly noted that the classic menu, the File-Edit-View Toolbar is not on the top, immediately under the window title, where it ought to be.

We have spent years creating a standard layout for the graphical user interface (gui). And for some unknown reason Microsoft decided to not abide by their own standards.

Fortunately, you can fix it. This page explains how.

Put the info below in notepad and save as toolbar.reg

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Internet Explorer\Toolbar\WebBrowser]

“ITBar7Position”=dword:00000001

Here are my my attempts at clarification:

1. There are three lines of text. They begin with “Windows”, “[HKEY_CURRENT_USER” and “ITBar7Position”.
    
2. If you copy paste into notepad, change the “curly” quotation marks to plain straight quotation marks. 
    
3. You may save the file on your desktop.
    
4. After saving the file on your desktop, double click it and allow it to update the registry.
    
5. If that doesn’t do the job, reboot.

If you try this and have any problems, let me know. I’ll keep tweaking this post.

Today, as I sat in the queue at a red light, I observed a behavior I have observed so many times before … ooching.

Cars pull up into the queue and stop behind the car in front. Then, after a while, a driver will decide that maybe he stopped too far back. He ooches forward.

This ooching does two things. First, it creates a bigger gap behind that car. And second, by its motion, it calls attention to that gap.

The car behind them then ooches forward to make up the increased gap and perhaps a bit more.

This ripple continues down the queue.

In the meantime, a car in front of the original oocher has also ooched, creating a second ooch ripple which moves down the queue.

Also, drivers who ooched will decide they didn’t ooch enough. This will create a second ooch and another ooch ripple.

Yet none of this ooching has any impact on the light changing, nor any measurable impact on actually getting through the light or to the destination. As the light turns green and the queue begins to move, all of the ooched-up space must be slowly expanded back to driving distance.

Me? I don’t ooch. Don’t get me wrong, if someone makes a right turn and opens up a whole car length I’ll move forward. But ooching out of impatience or to close an ooch-gap seems like a waste of effort and meaningless wear and tear on my brakes.

But don’t try to convince the guy behind me who now perceives an oochable gap in front of me and is just about to wet his pants because I won’t ooch so he can ooch.

My brother, Major Jon L. Huggins, is a U-2 pilot. I just received this notice from him. It seems appropriate to note it here:

The Society is sad to announce that Lt. Col. Robert Riedenauer, USAF (Ret), (F), passed away Monday, 23 April 2007 at his home following a long battle with cancer. He was 70.

He is survived by his wife, Sharon; two sons, Jeff Koontz of Palmdale and Scott Riedenauer of Bellflower; and two daughters, Cheryl Clayton of Palmdale and Kimberly Sweazy of Florida; seven grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren.

A celebration of Riedenauer’s life will begin at 4 p.m. Saturday at the Antelope Valley Country Club, with military honors and a fly-over.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests donations may be made to the Antelope Valley Country Club Scholarship Fund, 39800 Country Club Drive, Palmdale, CA 93551.

Riedenauer is the only test pilot to have flown the U-2, SR-71 and F-117 during a lengthy military and civilian career.

A 1969 graduate of the U.S. Air Force Test Pilot School at Edwards Air Force Base, Riedenauer began his test career on F-111 programs and the U-2.

He flew more than 120 hours in the U-2 in aiding the development of advanced sensor systems.

Riedenauer then flew developmental flight tests of the SR-71, retiring from the Air Force as chief test pilot for that program.

As a test pilot and director of operations for Lockheed’s Skunk Works, he helped design, develop and test classified programs such as the F-117 stealth fighter.

In 1982, Riedenauer crashed on the first flight of the first production stealth fighter, when the program was still highly secret. Although he was unable to eject, he survived the crash. However, the injuries he sustained ended his flying career.

The aircraft was damaged beyond repair, but its remnants were used in the stealth fighter which stands on display in front of Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Co. facility in Palmdale.

Among his many accolades, Riedenauer joined Lancaster’s Aerospace Walk of Honor in 2002 and was named an “Eagle” by the Flight Test Historical Foundation in 2005 for his work with the development of the U-2.

Riedenauer served as executive director of the Flight Test Historical foundation in its early years and was heavily involved in the initial fund-raising efforts that resulted in the foundation’s ability to build the museum facility at Edwards AFB, Air Force Flight Test Center Museum Director Doug Nelson said.

In recent years, he was active as the chairman of Palmdale’s Aviation and Aerospace Commission, tasked with advising the city on matters relating to Air Force Plant 42 and the L.A./Palmdale Regional Airport.

Riedenauer logged over 6,500 hours in more than 50 different aircraft.

He flew 120 combat missions in an F-105 over Southeast Asia in 1968, and was honored with the Air Force Distinguished Flying Cross with two oak leaf clusters, the Air Medal with 11 oak leaf clusters and the Meritorious Service Medal.

Born in Fresno on Aug. 2, 1936, Riedenauer earned a bachelor of science degree in mechanical engineering from Arizona State University in 1967.

One of the Marketing Gurus I “know” is Sean D’Souza.

He operates PsychoTactics, 5000BC, and SpiderSecret.com (also called Attversumption). If you “do” marketing, particularly website marketing, I’d encourage you to drop by those for a visit and a sampling of his freebies.

In addition, Sean teaches a Website MasterClass. I particularly want to encourage those of you who are website “doers”, to drop by his marketing page for that class … even if you can’t attend his course.

If you will trade Sean some of your personal information (like your name and email address) on his information sign up form, he’ll send you some great information in the form of PDFs and MP3 downloads. Even without the masterclass, I believe they are worth the effort.

There is a story in the news today that will be completely new for most people. It is not totally new to me … I have tracked it for about two years.

If you go to http://www.cem.va.gov/cem/hm/hmemb.asp you will see a list of the religious emblems that the Department of Veterans Affairs has approved for headstones.

Many different emblems are permitted. These include a generic Christian cross, most of the individual Christian denominations, Hebrew, Buddhist, Native American, Bahai, Muslim, Hindu, Konko-Kyo Faith, Sufism, Tenrikyo, Seicho-No-Ie, Eckankar, and even Humanism and Athiesm.

Today, at number 37, after a request that was made about 10 years ago, and a lawsuit that has dragged on for almost 2 years, the symbol of the Wicca religion was finally added.

In the meantime, adding 6 other symbols took a few weeks each.

The New York Times reports

There are 1,800 Wiccans in the armed forces, according to a Pentagon survey cited in the suit, and Wiccans have their faith mentioned in official handbooks for military chaplains and noted on their dog tags.

So, why did it take so long?

I’m not sure. But the appearance is that someone who had strong influence over the VA worked to prevent it.

I’m not sure who that was, but the New York Times also reports

In reviewing 30,000 pages of documents from Veterans Affairs, Americans United said, it found e-mail and memorandums referring to negative comments President Bush made about Wicca in an interview with “Good Morning America” in 1999, when he was governor of Texas. The interview had to do with a controversy at the time about Wiccan soldiers’ being allowed to worship at Fort Hood, Tex.

“I don’t think witchcraft is a religion,” Mr. Bush said at the time, according to a transcript.

Humanists? Yes. Athiests? Yes. Wiccans? No.

That “no” is finally a “yes”.

My first encounter with environmental study was in 1971. In that summer, and again in the summer of 1972, I was privileged to participate in the Clear Creek Basin Water Quality Study. I had just graduated from Clear Creek High School. That summer, for 8 weeks, we collected water samples in Clear Lake and Clear Creek, the mixed water estuary across from the Johnson Space Center (then the Manned Spacecraft Center) south of Houston.

We showed the impact of the tides on the salinity of the lake and creek. And our temperature measurements showed the impact of the cooling water discharge of the Houston Lighting and Power (HL&P) Webster power plant on the lake, elevating the temperature and, for example, potentially encouraging elevated levels of algae growth, sediment and water pollution.

Our groups received Presidential citations both years for this work. And I felt proud about it then, and, looking back, still do.

That said, I’m not sure it made much difference. I learned a lot about pollution, and Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD) and laboratory techniques for measuring pollution.

But in real terms, I don’t think our studies had any impact.

The power plant is gone now. It became part of Texas Genco, a subsidiary of Centerpoint Energy, and was recently demolished to make way for a 330 acre subdivision.

Clear Lake is still not even close to clear.

And some thirty-six (36) years later, we continue to pollute the soil, water and air, destroy the rain forest, threaten entire species and heat the planet.

Yesterday I wrote about TED.

Today I want to comment on the particular video that took me to TED. It is a video about choices and the problems of “too many choices”.

Psychologist Barry Schwartz takes aim at a central belief of western societies: that freedom of choice leads to personal happiness. In Schwartz’s estimation, all that choice is making us miserable. We set unreasonably high expectations, question our choices before we even make them, and blame our failures entirely on ourselves. His relatable examples, from consumer products (jeans, TVs, salad dressings) to lifestyle choices (where to live, what job to take, whom and when to marry), underscore this central point: Too many choices undermine happiness.

In his 2004 book The Paradox of Choice, Barry Schwartz tackles one of the great mysteries of modern life: Why is it that societies of great abundance — where individuals are offered more freedom and choice (personal, professional, material) than ever before — are now witnessing a near-epidemic of depression? Conventional wisdom tells us that greater choice is for the greater good, but Schwartz argues the opposite: He makes a compelling case that the abundance of choice in today’s western world is actually making us miserable.

Infinite choice is paralyzing, Schwartz argues, and exhausting to the human psyche. It leads us to set unreasonably high expectations, question our choices before we even make them and blame our failures entirely on ourselves. His relatable examples, from consumer products (jeans, TVs, salad dressings) to lifestyle choices (where to live, what job to take, who and when to marry), underscore this central point: Too much choice undermines happiness.

How about you? Have you ever struggled with too many choices?

Too many different brands of chips?

Too many different investment choices?

Too many possibilities for soul mates?

Well, I’m not sure about the soul mate question. I know a few women who want to know where all the good men have gone. But maybe in other parts of our lives. 

TED: The Barry Schwartz Video
http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/93  

TED: About Barry Schwartz
http://www.ted.com/index.php/speakers/view/id/91 

Recently, I stumbled upon TED. TED stands for “Technology, Entertainment, Design”. It started out in 1984 as a conference bringing together people from those three worlds. Since then its scope has become ever broader.

The TED Conference, held annually in Monterey, is the heart of TED. More than a thousand people attend. The event sells out a year in advance. And the content has expanded beyond Technology, Entertainment and Design to include Science, Business, the Arts and all the Big Global Issues facing our world. Over four days, 50 speakers each take an 18-minute slot - only 18 minutes! - to give their presentation.

There are no breakout groups. Everyone shares the same experience.

The TED site makes the best talks and performances from TED available to the public, for free. More than 100 talks with more added each week.

Not only that, these videos are released under a Creative Commons license, so they can be freely shared and reposted.

TED is owned by The Sapling Foundation, a private nonprofit foundation, a 501(c)3 organization (USofA). It was created in 1996 by Chris Anderson, at that time a magazine publishing entrepreneur.

“The goal of the foundation is to foster the spread of great ideas. It aims to provide a platform for the world’s smartest thinkers, greatest visionaries and most-inspiring teachers, so that millions of people can gain a better understanding of the biggest issues faced by the world, and a desire to help create a better future. Core to this goal is a belief that there is no greater force for changing the world than a powerful idea. Consider:

• An idea can be created out of nothing except an inspired imagination.
   
• An idea weighs nothing.
   
• It can be transferred across the world at the speed of light for virtually zero cost.
   
• And yet an idea, when received by a prepared mind, can have extraordinary impact.
   
• It can reshape that mind’s view of the world.
   
• It can dramatically alter the behavior of the mind’s owner.
   
• It can cause the mind to pass on the idea to others.”

Tomorrow, I’ll talk about the video that first brought me into TED.

TED:
http://www.ted.com

About TED:
http://www.ted.com/index.php/pages/view/id/5

Who Owns TED:
http://www.ted.com/index.php/pages/view/id/42