Tristan Launches a Space Probe

Well it's been an interesting week to say the least. My current obsession is space travel. A word to those who may interact with me, space travel and colonization is always a good conversation piece! It came to my attention, through various Google searches, that I could send a probe into space with relatively few dollars and almost no skill. That sounds fairly far-fetched, and to be honest it kind-of is. It is possible for the average Joe to send a weather balloon up to about 20 miles. This puts the balloon square into the stratosphere... hardly into space. But it does return some fairly awesome footage, and definitely some bragging rights. The following link is to a YouTube video from a family who did this, and has provided information on how to do it. Because of this, I know that I would like to do something of this nature for a summer project. If anyone would like to join me in this endeavor, I welcome the discourse. 

I can definitely see the potential for some awesomeness here... can you imagine if I were to put a little rocket fuel in there and have it ignite as the balloon reaches it's apex? Perhaps this would be illegal, but I have a theory that it would take relatively little thrust to push the payload beyond Earth's gravitational control once at a high altitude (and provided the payload is quite light). Maybe I'm wrong, but that's for the comment section below! Let me know what you think.

MMORPG Review: Star Trek Online

Like I said in my description... I have a lot of interests, from politics to video games. To today I would like to share with you my new pastime. Over the past week I have been playing Star Trek Online. It's a massively multiplayer online RPG... the most addicting kind of RPG.

Firstly, lets start at the beginning (there may be a few light spoilers here). The game begins, you are left in command of a small starship because your captain and bridge crew have died. An unsurprising theme for any Star Trek storyline. As you play, you work your way up the ranks. Get larger starships, more diverse and talented crew, and take on increasingly more difficult adversaries.

What I like about it:

1. IT'S FREE TO PLAY.
2. Secondary to that point, it's possible to continue playing and enjoying the game without paying. Paying for items will allow you to increase rank faster, get cooler looking starships, get awesome gear. But if you play without paying, you're gameplay is not retarded (no level caps and you can still eventually get the highest class starship)
3. Very detailed customizability of ship, character, and crew
4. Graphics, very well done for a free play online game.
5. Mixture of starship fighting, second person (or first person) shooter for ground assaults and missions, and starship management (assigning tasks for officers, who complete the tasks autonomously of you)

What I didn't like about it

1. Learning curve. There is a lot to learn and know about the game. And it takes quite a while to get the hang of using things effectively. The tutorials work pretty well, but I find are lacking slightly.
2. Use interface. It's hard to logically tell where you should click in order to open up a particular window. Buttons are small and hidden away. I'm assuming that this is because they want to encourage you to use keyboard hotkeys, so I guess I can't fault the designers too much. once you learn these key bindings, it's relatively easy to navigate the game.
3. Travelling from area to area can get tiresome. (Especially when a task is halfway across the galaxy) This is rectified in higher levels by the use of ship improvements to speed things up.. but is annoying at lower levels..

All in all, it's a good game and  I recommend it highly. 

Election 2012: Apathy at its Greatest

Being a dual citizen of the United States and Canada, I have had the pleasure of watching the US election from not only an insider's perspective, but also an outsider's perspective. My conclusion: I don't care.  My feelings toward the upcoming US election scare me, and I don't think that I'm alone. We have two main political parties in the US... neither of whom embody an ideal candidate. Obama makes some good points and so does Romney... but do I want to sacrifice some civil liberties and social programs or do I want the US to get out of debt... the list goes on. In the end, my mind is more consumed with my day-to-day life than it is caring about a popularity contest between to men battling for an increasingly king-like position. What ever happened to the "citizen president" ? Maybe I'm just ranting.... but I am feeling more and more defeated and disillusioned by the US government.

If you have read any of my other posts, you'll know that I'm fairly Libertarian when it comes to politics. I would rather be self sufficient on a plot of land by the ocean than dependent on my fellow man for anything. But we always have to find a balance between what is good for the individual and what is good for the betterment of the world. This is one of the main underlying struggles of this election; the pull between isolationism and world communism (I use this in the theoretical sense..). As a people, do we want to care about the rest of the world? or just ourselves? In theory, this is a simple question. Most of us would answer that we want the world to thrive... but most people don't want to give up money, fame, or privilege in order to help the world. It's a nation-wide dissonance in thought.

In November... I will vote. The candidate that I feel best represents the nation will likely not be elected. And I will go on, striving to distance myself from big brother, and making the most of my life on this planet. Keep calm, and carry on.

How to Eat, Lose Weight, and Have Fun Doing it

Most of you remember the old days of the Atkins diet, and the South Beach diet, and all the other magical mysterious diets that claim you can lose 500lbs in just one week!! Well, there is science behind some of these diets, and some actually work to an extent. However, there is one key item that gets left out of these diet plans. It's called sustainability. Can you really give up chocolate cake for the rest of your life? No, you can't, there will definitely be an occasion where you will say "one bite wont hurt" and before you know it, you've devoured the entire cake... not to mention the rest of the buffet table filled with carby goodness. So what is a person to do if they want to lose a little weight and make it stick? It's called making a lifestyle change! It's one of the hardest things a person can accomplish. So in order to increase your chances of success you have to take small steps in the right direction, after a while these changes become habituated, and then you can move on to more good habits. I've put a bit of an outline in the following section that helps people come up with a customized plan of attack.

1. Determine body type to increase the efficiency of your workout:
1. Lots a fat and no muscle = 60% muscle building 40% cardio
2. Lots of muscle and lots of fat = 50/50 strength and cardio
3. Skinny (its hard for you to build muscle or gain fat) = 90% strength and 10% cardio
2. Take a look at what you already eat and look to cut out one or two items:
1. Chips, replace these with carrots or celery, the crunchy sensation helps with the craving
2. Sugary things: A lot of "low fat" items have a LOT of sugar added to make them taste better, so look at the labels. Fat isn't necessarily bad, just make sure you aren't eating tubs of butter. You can replace sugar with various substitutes (Stevia, Xylotol, Splenda.... these are the ones that I use) If you crave sweets for desserts, try making fruit based desserts with the above mentioned substitutes (or no added sweetness at all). 
3. Starchy things. Potatoes (use them in moderation), pasta, white bread. Try to find items that are whole grain. Whole grain rice is a good substitute for pasta; and avoid minute white rice. Starch gets converted to sugar in your body, so eating a bunch of pasta is almost the same as eating a couple spoons of white sugar! <== sadface
3. Places where calories hide:
1. Coffee: If you have a coffee with cream and sugar in the morning.... that can be up to 300 extra calories in your diet. Not to mention the amount of fat in the cream, and the sugar content. Try using milk instead of cream and sweetener instead of sugar. It will take a little while to get used to, but just think about the benefits of cutting out 200 calories from your daily intake!
2. Sauces: they can make or break a meal, and also make or break your diet plan. A lot of sauces have high sugar content and are full of preservatives and chemicals. Look for sauces that are vinegar and olive oil based and that use natural ingredients. 
3. Low calorie snacks: They are small, unsatisfying, and you will gorge on them! Get baby carrots and chew on them throughout the day.
4. Make your plan:
1. Start with moderate exercise (2 days a week for an hour each session)
2. Start with one food item to replace. For example, if you love chips, replace them as described above and don't change anything else for a week or so. Then add more and more items to that list of changes.
3. If you don't feel like exercising, just start and say to yourself "I'll just do 15 minutes" chances are... you'll just keep going once you've started. 

Make sure your family is supportive and on board with you. It is always easier to follow a plan if your whole family wants to get involved and follow the plan as well. If they don't want to give up their chips, you will be faced with a craving and the ability to get the item you crave (it's like a cocaine addict, they can't be around cocaine without craving or going after it) Make sure they know that this is something that is important for you and they must treat this change with respect. Communicate with them if they make your choice of eating habits seem stupid. If you have to.... call a family meeting to discuss the plan.

As with any diet and exercise routine, consult your doctor and get a physical to determine your baseline health.

There are lots of great sites that you can visit to find good workout routines based on your body type. I will post some at a later date as I want to review the sites thoroughly before I pass them on to you.

In the meantime, good luck on your weight management endeavors!

Tetrapharmakos

Do you know where this is? Why don't you discover it!

Way to start a post with an unfamiliar word that's impossible to pronounce. Well, lets break this down a little. I'm not going to regurgitate the definition for you all over my post, you can do that on Wikipedia (they're better at cleaning up that kind of mess anyway).  I'm going to attempt to modernize this old Greek thought and hopefully change around a few minds.

Tetrapharmakos is basically a four-part "cure" to living the best life possible. Traditionally, the four parts can be explained as follows:


1.  Don't fear God
2.  Don't worry about death
3.  What is good is easy to get
4.  What is terrible is easy to endure


I can tell that a lot of you are already having issues with this already. Particularly the God-fearing part.  Most religions say that we must fear God as part of our faith. What we must understand is that the Greeks looked at the gods in their own special way. Basically, they thought that if you didn't appease the gods (with slaughtered goats and virgins) that they would wreak havoc on earth (volcanoes, pestilence, etc..) 

Second issue I fell you may have: hedonism... Tetrapharmakos sounds an awfully lot like hedonism. For those of you who don't know what hedonism is: it's basically that we as humans want to avoid pain and maximize pleasure (in all its naughty forms). But tetrapharmakos is a bit different from hedonism, which I believe you will see later in this post.

Now that I'm done fortifying my position, lets get to the nity gritty.

1.  Don't Fear God: What I tell you, dear reader, is that you shouldn't fear things that are beyond your control. You must accept these things as inevitable and continue living your life. This does not mean that you shouldn't take an active role in your government, or be involved in helping a poorer nation. It means that you shouldn't fear, for example, Wall Street. Why, you ask? because Wall Street does not decide whether you will live or die, it does not decide if you will eat well or eat poorly. Wall Street is an easy way for people to gamble their money. Some make fortunes, others do not. What I want you to take away from this is that, essentially, you shouldn't waste your time and effort on things like stocks; you're better off saving your money and spending it on charity, trips, and food. Then, make sure you put some away for retirement in a retirement fund. I realize that retirement funds are linked with the stock market, but leave that up to the people who guarantee your fund to worry about.

2.  Don't worry about death:  This is a big one. Some philosophers have even suggested that the only motivation we have as human beings is that associated with death. For example, making a lasting impression on society, saving money for your children etc... So why should we not worry?  Because if you don't worry about death, you will have no regrets when it happens. So instead of worrying about what will happen to your children after you die, just live in the moment, enjoy yourself now rather than worry for tomorrow. This might sound a little fishy to some, just remember: everything in moderation. Don't go spending $340,000 on a car when you know that you cannot afford it. Just don't worry when, how, or why you'll die.

3.  What is good is easy to get: This one is really simple. The Beatles really had it when they said "All you need is love". Essentially, all you need in life is food, water, shelter, social relations (romantic and otherwise), and a sense of choice in your decisions. The rest is superfluous, so keep it simple. Have your core needs taken care of (by working..... duh) then take the rest of your time to do things that you enjoy doing. If you don't know what you enjoy doing, then you definitely need to get out there and have a hobby or two. If you are incredibly unhappy in your job, quit and move on. If you want to do something, make a plan so you can attain that goal and work tirelessly towards it. You'll find that motivation to, for example, save for a trip to Cambodia will come naturally. You'll enjoy the trip, and you'll enjoy working toward that goal. Because life is essentially just working toward a goal and enjoying yourself when you get there.

4.  What is terrible is easy to endure. This is probably the hardest one to wrap our heads around. Basically it is not talking about disease, torture, and bad things like that. What it means is that if you have to live through some uncomfortable circumstances in order to attain your goal, then they are easy to get through. Think about it, the last time you were living paycheck to paycheck it may have seemed like the end of the world. But in actual fact, there is a way out, and you made it (or are still on your way out). So take the initiative and make that path. The other thing that makes this last point work, is if you follow the first three, the fourth comes by itself. If you're care-free, happy, and you know what you can and cannot control then there shouldn't be much horror for you to endure.

To sum up, and give you the first push toward your new life, I would like to tell you a little theory of mine. Get your finances in order, work to pay of any debt, and spend your money in two ways: cover your basic needs (few frills) and spend the rest on activities (not items).  Do you really need that new flat screen? or would you rather take a trip somewhere....? your call!

Well hello there...

I didn't see you sitting in the corner. The bar is dark and the haze of cigar smoke is heavy in the air. Yet there, through the din, are my followers! 

It's been a long time since I have posted on here. A great deal has changed in my life. From one end to the other I have many new insights and experiences to share. So take a green tea, a little biscuit, and about 15 minutes of your day to take a break and a read.

Subject of my next post: Tetrapharmakos

Do your homework early and I will give you extra credit :-)

Your (sometimes) faithful blogger,

-Beatnotes

Happiness, and what it really means

Sadness is an unnatural state :-)

You all know what happiness is, right? Give me a definition.... not so easy was it?  Happiness is different for every person on this planet. What makes me happy is profoundly different from what makes you happy. I will admit, however, that there are subjects of overlap (e.g. a fluffy kitty makes me happy and also makes you happy)  But in the grand scheme of things we all want to have our own little brand of happiness and carry on our lives comfortably.

But what happens if your arm gets cut off?!?! Most people say something like this: "I would never be completely happy again". Here's where I'm going to blow your mind away; people who actually have had their arms removed report the SAME level of happiness they experienced before the amputation, roughly six months after the amputation. This is our mind's immune system at work. Once we learn to cope with a loss (whether it be losing an arm, family member, job, etc...) We return to how we were before the loss. There are some confounding factors though; for example, if you were to lose your job, and end up working much more demanding and stressful jobs for the rest of your life it would only stand to reason that you might not be quite as happy as before. However, when you consider this... how likely is that situation? Not very, if you have the experience, you can always find a job that you are at least moderately happy in doing.

At this juncture, you're probably wondering if I have a point to all of this; well, I do. And it comes down to making decisions. There are almost NO decisions that you can make, that you are going to be stuck with for the rest of your life (maybe a tattoo doesn't fall under that category though...). For example, if you decide to move across the world for a job, and that job turns out to be a big mistake... you can always change your mind and move back. It may take a little work to pull yourself you, but you can make the change. So, when it comes to making a decision; don't stress too much over it, science has shown that you will be happy regardless of what you decide (even if you decide to remove your arm [please don't do this though]) There is a difference between knowing your options and making educated decisions and wasting time waiting for the right opportunity, or analyzing an opportunity so much that you convince yourself that it's a bad idea; when in the end, it really isn't.

I'm going to share a video that goes into a little more detail about happiness that I believe you should ALL watch. It's on the TED website (which, by the way, is a fantastic place to get information)  A great deal of the information that I used in my everyday life came from this video and other psychological journals; let me know if you want some further reading and I will e-mail you some great PDFs.

Dan Gilbert on Happiness

Cheers!