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Agriculture, skepticism, politics

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-09-26

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Wedding is nigh

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The wedding is upon us. View all the wedding information at dianetraffas.com. For those of you looking for the quick details, here they are.

The wedding ceremony will be at 4 p.m. on Saturday, 25 September, at St. Boniface in Sharon, Kansas. Sharon is small, the church is in the northeast part of town and is quite unmissable.

The reception will be held just east of Medicine Lodge, Kansas, at the Barber County Heritage Center, at the intersection of US-160 and Isabel Rd. We’ll start serving cocktails at 5:30 p.m. and dinner at 7 p.m., followed by a dance. View directions as well as accomodations.

Those of you joining us for the rehearsal are invited to meet us at the church no later than 6:15 p.m. on Friday. We’ll eat following the rehearsal at the Knight’s of Columbus hall in Sharon.

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-09-19

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DTV Shredder

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One of the suckiest parts of fence-fixing is getting on and off the ATV. I saw this new…thing on GeekBeat.tv and think it would be the awesomest thing to use fixing fence. It’s not likely the most comfortable riding experience over long distances, but pulling a trailer alongside you would be a pretty slick use. Just try to get it stuck.

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-09-12

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  • Finally found the perfect Google Reader app for iPad. Goodbye, Reeder. Hello, River of News! #
  • Mashable Readers Say Craigslist Should Not Be Censored http://bit.ly/a1p8JE #
  • Duke Nukem Forever is back: coming to both consoles and PC http://bit.ly/bgr71z #
  • Social Media Grammar: The “Checkin” Conundrum http://bit.ly/c7XraQ #
  • @dN0t: The GameCenter home page itself looks like the background for a card game for an NES, though with slightly higher resolution graphics in reply to dN0t #
  • The Nexus One Was Google’s Dream. The Carriers Were Freddy Krueger. http://bit.ly/d7wpQI #
  • @midmoia: Canola oil is made from canola, which is a type of rapeseed. I think we may plant some canola next year. in reply to midmoia #
  • @mint It's been over a week now since any of my accounts have updated. When can we expect things to work again? #
  • @sprint's new website is a big bucket of fail. #
  • Fresh on AuctioneerTech: Dropbox now in beta for BlackBerry http://traff.as/KQ #
  • Am I the only one who finds Google Instant utterly annoying? #
  • @ginatrapani Love the new look of ThinkUp – any plans to be able to import archived tweets from Twitalytic? in reply to ginatrapani #
  • @thinkupapp Awesome! I had to mod the first file, but the following 8 ran flawlessly to upgrade from an early Twitalytic to current ThinkUp! in reply to thinkupapp #
  • Unas in Stargate SG-1 "Thor's Hammer" totally looks like a Jem'Hadar from Star Trek: Deep Space 9. #iamnotageek #
  • The best sandwich in Manhattan is the oyster poor boy from the Hibachi Hut…and that's after the discount for the awful bun it's served on. #
  • @bobbyts We're coming to see you. Tell @djpizzle to put on a good show…never seen it before. #
  • I just ousted Adam M. as the mayor of Bobbby T's Bar and Grill on @foursquare! http://4sq.com/aGaWcI #
  • @djpizzle 18 Days, Sk8tr Boi, Your Love is My Drug, and Poker Face, please. #
  • @djpizzle Spinnin', grinnin', and winnin'. http://flic.kr/p/8zX9yf #
  • Kansas might just screw around and pull off this upset. #kufootball #
  • It's disappointing to see Kansas self-destruct after looking so good. #kufootball #
  • Settling in to watch Notre Dame in HD. Love that Cox doesn't encrypt the NBC high definition feed. #
  • Way to go #Irish #
  • @timseley "Crush" by Cory Branan in reply to timseley #
  • @timseley Maybe "Question" by Rhett Miller/Old 97's, but that's kind of niche. in reply to timseley #
  • @timseley Check out "Miss Ferguson" by Cory Branan while you're at it – it's upbeat and very clever…not sure what you're after. in reply to timseley #
  • After spending the day wrestling with a development web server, I'm finally digging into the project at hand. #
  • Boom! Headshot. It's time for Counter Strike: Source. #
  • Whoah. Major upgrades to Counter Strike since last I played. #

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Kansas skeptical community finds a home at skeptikan.com

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Mason Powell’s been spearheading the creation of a skeptical movement in Lawrence. Late last week, we launched a new website at skeptikan.com. Here’s my introductory post.

I read Carl Sagan’s “The Demon-Haunted World” when I was in high school. At the time, I wasn’t aware of any formalized skeptical movement, but the concept of using science and reason to sort out the woo from the reality resonated with me and excited me. The book’s subtitle, “Science as a Candle in the Dark,” summarizes for me what skepticism is about – a reliance on the scientific method to tell us fact from fiction.

I was first introduced to the skeptical movement several years ago when I was searching for new podcasts. I came across the Skeptics’ Guide to the Universe, and was immediately hooked. Here was a podcast that was somehow packed full of educational content and yet also entertaining. Through the SGU, I learned that there is a movement of like-minded people who are organizing and advancing the cause of science beyond simply the science itself.

There are many other science- and skeptic-based podcasts, but the only other podcast I’ll mention at the moment is Skeptoid. A weekly series, Skeptoid’s host Brian Dunning spends about 10 or 15 minutes on a specific topic. They’re pithy, short discussions, perfectly suited to learn about any given subject, or perhaps forward to a friend or loved one who may have fallen to believe in a particular pseudoscience or purchased a scam product. Dunning also created “Here Be Dragons: An Introduction to Critical Thinking.” It’s a free, 40 minute video that’s perfect to introduce classes to the concept and importance of critical thinking.

Woo has a very large surface area, and there are many different subjects that deserve a skeptical look. There topics such as some religions and conspiracies that result mostly in a walletectomy – removal of money – from the believer. The topics that concern me the most, however, are those that can actually cause physical harm. Complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) such as acupuncture, chiropractic, homeopathy, reflexology – the list goes on – can cause both a walletectomy and real damage to people who need medical treatments or cures and are instead led to believe that these woo-jobs can help. The anti-vaccination movement is also particularly troublesome to me since it directly results in an increase in mortality from vaccine-preventable diseases.

That’s all for now. On a personal note, I can’t express how excited I am to be a part of SkeptiKan. I’ve always been jealous of skeptics living in other parts of the country who have meetups and organizations to which they can belong, and now it seems that Kansas is forming its own skeptical community. I look forward to contributing both by making this website attractive, usable and accessible and by participating in the discussion. We have exciting plans for the site and the project, and I thank Mason for inviting me to be a part of it.

Twitter Weekly Updates for 2010-08-15

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