Posted March 7th, 2011 @ 02:13pm by Erik J. Barzeski
So, the elliptical we just got broke already. When we turned it on, the user selection screen would scroll rapidly between "USER 1" "USER 2" and "GUEST". Pushing virtually any button would stop the switching as long as it occurred, but when you let up they'd cycle through again.
Every button except one - pushing the "+" button for resistance on the right handlebar would have no effect. Disconnecting the wire to the right arm would allow the machine to function normally.
We called LiveStrong and four days later, an entirely new right arm showed up. I installed it in about two minutes and it works fine. They included no instructions to send the old, broken arm back, so we're keeping it.
Bummer that such a new machine broke already… and awesome that the company was so quick to fix the problem.
Posted March 5th, 2011 @ 12:36pm by Erik J. Barzeski
As we obtain knowledge as a culture ((I don't know that we're getting "more intelligent" but we're certainly getting more knowledgeable.)), are we seeing a decrease or an increase in the number of people who are "religious"?
Are the two related? Or is a change in the "religiousness" of the world unrelated to an increase in knowledge?
Posted March 4th, 2011 @ 11:13am by Erik J. Barzeski
"Truth is a defense for libel, not for graciousness." - Unattributed
I'm admittedly blunt and direct when it comes to things, but I'm softening - learning to be more gracious (("More gracious" is simply moving towards graciousness. Quite honestly I'm not sure I'll ever get there.)) with each passing year. It's tough, and I still fail a hundred times for each success, but if that number can be lowered to 98, and 94, and eventually if the second number can be larger, then that's good. Progress, that is.
Posted March 2nd, 2011 @ 11:06am by Erik J. Barzeski
I like this quote and think it applies to people in other areas as well, including athletes.
There are two kinds of geniuses: the 'ordinary' and the 'magicians'. An ordinary genius is a fellow whom you and I would be just as good as, if we were only many times better. There is no mystery as to how his mind works. Once we understand what they've done, we feel certain that we, too, could have done it. It is different with the magicians. Even after we understand what they have done it is completely dark. Richard Feynman is a magician of the highest calibre.
Posted March 1st, 2011 @ 10:17am by Erik J. Barzeski
If you could have one meal, regardless of cost (both financial and health), what would it be? Describe it in as much detail as you please.
My answer is probably lame: some whole milk, corn, mashed potatoes, and a big ol' juicy slab of steak, perfectly seasoned, with some chocolate cherry ice cream for dessert.
Well, a few people using Analyzr have asked about "live capture" of swings. This has historically been done on a machine hooked up to two Firewire- or, occasionally, USB-driven cameras to capture swings immediately into the software. Some software will note impact, record the two seconds prior and the one second after, and import that as a swing.
The downsides are that this is only really feasible indoors, with cameras recording 30 to (at most) 60 frames per second, and every swing will be recorded while in live recording mode. Cameras simply aren't being made these days to support this, so the feature is slowly dying in cameras as well.
With the Eye-Fi, I think instructors can get you the best of both worlds. They can record the swings they want, in high-speed (120, 240, 300 FPS), and they can sync the video to their computer for easy importing.
When I'd 
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