breakfast first

A surprisingly difficult question

"Where are the mailboxes near me?"

This seems like it would be a common question, but I couldn't find the answer to it on the USPS website. Nor could I find anything after some searches on google (although I can point you to maildrops on the Appalachian Trial). The USPS website has ways to locate post offices and businesses that sell stamps, so why not mailboxes?

Remote violence

As if guns haven't already separated people enough from their actions, some guy in Texas is setting up a website that will let users fire a rifle at animals on his ranch.

The idea came last year while viewing another Web site on which cameras posted in the wild are used to snap photos of animals.

"We were looking at a beautiful white-tail buck and my friend said 'If you just had a gun for that.' A little light bulb went off in my head," [Underwood] said.

Good God, do you hear yourself?

Bad day for electronics

Within the past 24 hours:

• My wireless keyboard stopped working
• My laptop has started rebooting when I try to use wireless networking
• I can't get my old Tivo to work (looks like a dead modem)
• The key fob that lets me get in and out of my apartment building stopped working

Apparently the merest touch from my hand will destroy consumer electronics.

Closet lighting

From the simple-but-genius files: a closet rod that's also a light.

Does this coffee taste funny to you?

Yesterday, a co-worker who's a big coffee drinker and who just returned from trip to Africa offered me some freshly brewed coffee made from beans he brought back from Uganda. It was pretty tasty, and while we were drinking it, he explained how it came from a small farm on the side of Mt. Elgon.

Hmm. Mt. Elgon, Mt. Elgon. Why did I know that name? The it hit me: that's where scientists believe the Ebola virus may have started. Right. Well. Coffee break over.