cool trees

http://www.neatorama.com/2007/03/21/10-most-magnificent-trees-in-the-world/

and a geeky addition courtesy of yours truly:

http://www.link.cs.cmu.edu/splay/

;)

intentional synaesthesia

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/15.04/esp.html?pg=1&topic=esp&topic_set= (title: "Mixed Feelings")

A fascinating exploration of various technologies for helping us to perceive things that we're not equipped to directly perceive.

I really want a good excuse to go to ETech.

http://conferences.oreillynet.com/etech/

I mean, the technology itself is often pretty cool, but the _people_ there...man, I just want to go hang out and pick people's brains.

*wistful sigh*

about freakin' time.

http://www.contracostatimes.com/mld/cctimes/community/16986435.htm
("E-voting demise could be near")

I'm a big fan of technology. And while I think that it's _possible_ to have a robust, secure, accurate voting system that uses computers, the ballots themselves need to be recorded on actual physical human-readable artifacts.