One of my wonderful colleagues just forwarded this absolutely dazzling array of fun stuff going on at the harbour and Erie central wharf this week and weekend and early next week. All events are here:

Thinking of hitting the Beethoven's 5th tomorrow evening. Who is coming with me?

This week at Canalside there are 30 events, and they are all free to the public.

Wednesday, July 13
Damn, missed this! I wanted to go on that boat.

• Boat Ride with Buffalo Maritime Center aboard the White Elektra or OK Clark Canalside: Commercial Slip – Central Wharf side 5 p.m. – Weather Permitting - Free (First come–first served with no reservations accepted.)

• Jack Civiletto Sings Sinatra: Concert aboard USS Little Rock Buffalo Naval & Military Park 7 to 9 p.m. – Free

• “Erie Canal Sal” The Story of Sal McMurray An Irish cook aboard a packet boat in 1840 Performed by Gretchen Murray Sepik Canalside: Central Wharf 6 to 7 p.m. – Free

• “From Albany to Buffalo: Erie Canal History, Culture and Music” Performed by Dave Ruch Canalside: Central Wharf 7:30 to 8:30 p.m. – Free

• Sunset Yoga Canalside: Lawn 7:30 to 8:30 p.m. – Free

• Thursday, July 14 Thursday at the Square presented by M&T Bank Featuring: Court Yard Hounds Canalside: Central Wharf & Cobblestone Streets 5 to 9 p.m. – Free

Friday, July 15

• Erie Canal Story by Buffalo Tours: One Hour Guided Walking Tour Canalside: Whipple Truss Bridge – Central Wharf side Noon to 1 p.m. – Free

• Friday Family Fun on the Central Wharf with Explore & More Children’s Museum The Sky’s the Limit Canalside: Lawn Noon to 4 p.m. – Free Groups of more than 10 children must pre register by calling 716/655-5131.

• An Evening with the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Matthew Kraemer Central Wharf: Main Stage 7 to 9:30 p.m. – Free

Saturday, July 16

• Saturday Family Fun on the Central Wharf with Explore & More Children’s Museum “The Sky’s the Limit” Canalside: Lawn Noon to 4 p.m. – Free Groups of more than 10 children must pre-register by calling 716/655-5131.

• Erie Canal Story by Buffalo Tours: One Hour Guided Walking Tour Canalside: Whipple Truss Bridge – Central Wharf side Noon to 1 p.m. – Free

• “A Mule Named Sal – A Children’s Concert at the Erie Canal” Performed by Dave Ruch Canalside: Central Wharf 5 to 6:30 p.m. – Free

• “Mary Jemison” The story of a young girl captured by the Indians – years later when offered her freedom she chose to remain with her Indian family. Performed by Gretchen Murray Sepik Canalside: Central Wharf 6:45 to 7:45 p.m. – Free

• “From Albany to Buffalo: Erie Canal History, Culture and Music” Performed by Dave Ruch Canalside: Central Wharf 8 to 9 p.m. – Free

Sunday, July 17

• Beginner’s Yoga Canalside: Lawn 10 a.m. to 11 a.m. – Free

• Intermediate Yoga Canalside: Lawn 11:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. – Free

• Erie Canal Story by Buffalo Tours: One Hour Guided Walking Tour Canalside: Whipple Truss Bridge – Central Wharf side Noon to 1 p.m. – Free

• Yogalates Canalside: Lawn 1 to 2 p.m. – Free Boat Ride with Buffalo Maritime Center aboard the White Elektra or OK Clark Canalside: Commercial Slip – Central Wharf side 2 p.m. – Weather Permitting - Free (First come–first served with no reservations accepted.)

• “A Mule Named Sal – A Children’s concert at the Erie Canal” Performed by Dave Ruch Canalside: Central Wharf 2 to 3 p.m. – Free

• “Dug’s Dive” Performed by Kevin Cottrell Stop in at the popular waterfront basement saloon for a visit the proprietor William Douglas – operator of one of the most infamous saloons in all of the Canal District - a one-person interpretive performance Canalside: Historic Ruins – Commercial Slip 3:30 to 4:15 p.m. - Free

• “Mary Jemison” The story of a young girl captured by the Indians – years later when offered her freedom she chose to remain with her Indian family. Performed by Gretchen Murray Sepik Canalside: Central Wharf 5 to 6:30 p.m. – Free

• “From Albany to Buffalo Erie Canal History, Culture and Music” Performed by Dave Ruch Central Wharf 6:45 to 7:45 p.m. – Free

• “An American History Songbook: A program of songs of the 19th Century” Performed by the Hutchinson Family Revival Canalside: Central Wharf 8 to 9 p.m. – Free

Monday, July 18

• Science Outdoors with Tifft Nature Preserve Learn more about the rich biodiversity of the plants and animals of WNY and how everything connects. Canalside: Lawn 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. – Free

• Zumba on the Waterfront: exercise and dance to Music Central Wharf 6 to 7 p.m. – Free

Tuesday, July 19

• Yogalates Canalside: Central Wharf 6 to 7 p.m. – Free

Wednesday, July 20

• Boat Ride with Buffalo Maritime Center aboard the White Elektra or OK Clark Canalside: Commercial Slip – Central Wharf side 5 pm – Weather Permitting - Free (First come–first served with no reservations accepted.)

• Friends of Harmony: Concert aboard USS Little Rock Buffalo Naval & Military Park 7:30 to 9:30 p.m. – Free

• Sunset Yoga Canalside: Lawn 7:30 to 8:30 p.m. – Free

I finally did it yesterday. I got to the Upward Bow/Wheel pose without sagging on my yoga mat.


I wasn't expecting to reach the pose at all. But my head was suddenly suspended in mid air and I was looking at (e:Paul) on the nearby mat upside down. It was a very happy moment. Erin's wonderful practice at Hand to Heart yoga has finally started making a positive difference to my upper body strength.

And now for the next yoga frontier...


Check back in a year. ;-)

You are a very inspiring person, in general. I realized that yesterday, watching you work. I don't know if I ever told you.

I went home and worked a couple hours more till it was finally dawn, thanks to you. Hehe :-)

Just when I was getting ready to order the wok, Amazon changed the price on me.

Now this is just annoying! Or maybe it's a signal that I didn't need that wok.

EDIT: And of course, as soon as I deleted every single thing from my cart in protest against Amazon's price-changing shady tactics. the wok silently dropped to it's former price again.


How unbelievably dodgy is this?!

EDIT2: I gave Amazon the royal shove and bought this 12 inch fry-pan from Overstock.com where it has been the same price for more than a month.

I can always use R, but sometimes Gnumeric comes in handy to whittle down lists filled with duplicates in a jiffy.

Simplified steps from

1. Say you have a column A with A1 to A100 rows with duplicate data that you want to eliminate

2. Go to Data > Advanced Filter. Under the input tab, choose list range as A1 to A100.

3. I don't understand why Gnumeric needs a criteria range for everything but it does... Even for duplicate-value-finding that involves no mathematical formulas. So choose a criteria range. Say B1 to B2. Make sure that the first cell of the criteria range has the same column header as the list range. So if, say your cell A1 was named "Numbers" then B1 should also be "Numbers". Leave B2 blank.

4. Check unique records only

5. Go to the Output tab. Choose an output range (longer than the input range, just to prevent any complaints from gnumeric). Click OK.

You should have the original list with no duplicates in the output range.

I found an interesting variation on the Biscoff Speculoos recipe at this

Ingredients:

2 c. all-purpose flour
3 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp baker's ammonia
1 c. unsalted butter, softened
1/2 c. sugar
1/4 c. firmly packed light brown sugar
1 tsp. pure vanilla extract

Directions:

In a small bowl, whisk the flour, cinnamon, nutmeg, baker's ammonia and salt together; set aside. In a large bowl, with an electric mixer on low speed, cream the butter, sugar, and brown sugar together. Add the vanilla extract. Gradually blend the flour mixture into the butter mixture. Press the dough evenly into the bottom of a 9x13 greased pan. Decoratively score the dough with a fork or small knife, if you wish.

Bake in a 350-degree oven for about 20 to 25 minutes, or until golden brown around the edges. Let cool completely before cutting into bars. Store in an airtight container. Well-wrapped shortbread may also be frozen.

Source: The Art Of The Cookie

Baker's Ammonia? What in the world is that? Sounds so fishy... and sea-weedy.

Do I really want this keyboard? I am tempted to get it because it is exactly like a laptop keyboard. I am a very noisy typist and can probably wake the dead with my typing... or at least make them toss around. Maybe this keyboard will stop all that noise and I don't have to drown out the sound of my own typing with music?





BUT I am sure accumulation tax applies to such frivolous things. I can probably buy more heavy metal instead... Besides, I am sure the dead need all the extra exercise they can get. I am resisting this totally unreasonable impulse to buy this absolutely unnecessary keyboard.

I upgraded to the latest VLC on Crunchbang today. It turned out that I had completely forgotten where the audioscrobbler settings for last.fm submission were in VLC after so many years of not changing them.


They are under Tools > Preferences > (Show Settings: All) > Interface > Control Interfaces > Audioscrobbler.

I always notice that the features that are super-important to me are usually buried under countless sub-sub-headings. Maybe that says something about the completely trivial ways I use my music playing software.

I took a quick short stroll to stretch my legs around taste of Buffalo today and got to sample two different kinds of Keurig single-brew coffee. I had the blueberry and nantucket versions. It was pretty decent coffee... much better than the messy excuse I make at home occasionally.

But is the waste worth it? I know people have devised ways to reuse the single-serve coffee brewing Keurig cup more times than one... but still it is definitely way more plastic than I am comfortable just throwing away.

I felt guilty throwing away the small sample plastic cups they gave me. I also felt horrible looking at the trash cans around the event filled to the brim with plastic and more plastic. It was helplessness mixed with guilt because I was part of the problem. What are other ways to make such an event generate biodegradable waste instead? One alternative would be cups made of dried (or even fresh) leaves and bound by twigs (they use these back home).

(e:heidi), so what happened to your single coffee brewer in the end?

...and thus, effectively, stall future innovations in technology by Google, JUST BECAUSE their crappy outdated non-forward thinking technologies face the likelihood of making god forbid, less money than Google. While Google gives away and shares its technological innovations free with the people and helps make the internet a better and sounder place for the future, all Microsoft ever thinks of is making money and all Apple thinks of is how to keep extracting money in spite of their ridiculously high-failure-rate hardware and limited-software from snobby sheep.

And their combined evil solution? Well, just sue Google and its partner companies for every technological process ever patented by

• a) buying the companies that originally created these patents (who needs the brains to develop and innovate and actually apply for patents when you can conveniently buy the company that created and innovated, in the first place..) and
• b) by pouring money into nitpicky and downright grubby-paw litigation and
• c) using cunning backdoor strategies to win these ligitations.

In the end, these strategies make Microsoft's technologically PALEOLITHIC and appallingly poorly made software make money out of what Google slaved over creating.

I read the OS News website after a conversation with (e:Paul) yesterday and was completely blown away by the ever-expanding EVIL Apple and Microsoft are perpetrating against progress in technology, in general and more specifically, how they have both invested substantial amounts of influence and money to keep open source technologies like Linux stunted and shunned by a large proportion of the population. Worse, when one branch of linux, the Android OS, is honed into a commercial success for mobile platforms by the brains at Google, Microsoft and Apple make sure that they STILL fleece the unsuspecting population and make money out of Android by using underhand and totally loathesome unethical legal strategies.

All of this makes me loathe Microsoft and Apple even more. It cements my view that any self-respecting consumer who lives with technology and thus, has even remote interests in innovation in technology, should seriously think about means and ways to move away from the stifling monopoly that microshit and crapple have on the market. More importantly, it is time to take assertive steps to implement this move away from the technological cesspool that microsoft and apple have managed to create.

(e:Matthew) was telling me how he has walked and continues to walk with kids and a pram down Linwood and it remains one of the most positive things one can do for a neighbourhood. I couldn't have agreed more. In a weirdly analogous way, small individual actions to dispel general misconceptions about linux and opensource technologies (that are not bound down by the venal giants, Microsoft and Apple) make a world of difference to the neighbourhood of future technological innovation that are not geared to fleece people but empower them to be more productive and encourage independent thought.

I am glad that I have taken the first daunting step by embracing linux and at the very least, trying to learn to think for myself. If I can do it, anyone can. It's not that hard. It just requires the willingness to fight the cancer that hamper progress and thought.

Do it today, try out a linux OS, try out R for analysis, ditch SAS, move your office applications to a browser-based cloud, weed out microshit and crapple from your lives, try out some Google products. See how they change and rock your world. You would have done that small invisible favour to help take web technology and innovation a little bit further and away from the artificial and downright, atrocious restraints that it doesn't deserve.