TO LA to visit Kate

We'll be driving down to Los Angeles (from our home in San Francisco) to visit our older daughter, Kate, who lives in Culver City, for just a few days. 

Kate's working on her short-film script, Hollywood Bandits, from a notion I suggesed to her, and it's looking very good -- she's really enormously gifted at storytelling and creating interesting characters from a mere notion. I hope she'll be able to shoot this as a short and submit it to the festivals. She's so good -- her USC student films were the best you've ever seen. 

While we're driving down, I'll try to keep the RAV4 at a steady 65 or 68, see how the fuel use reacts -- we got 24 mpg coming in from Death Valley, but we were closer to 70 the whole way, so I want to see if even a few mph lower will help lower fuel use. 

If it matters, that will be an incentive to drive slower when, in a couple of years, we revive our plan to drive all over the country. 

If it has no significant effect, then we know we can do 68 or 72 when permitted without worrying about wasting gas.

Good recent quotes: "You Gotta Give 'Em Hope!"

"You gotta give 'em HOPE!"

-Harvey Milk

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A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.

-Robert A. Heinlein

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"Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate"

The Italian of Dante's inscription over the gates of Hell: 'Abandon hope, all ye who enter here.'

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'Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away.' 

Philip K. Dick (1928 - 1982) "How to Build a Universe That Doesn't Fall Apart Two Days Later" 1978.

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"...On display were new works by KAWS (government name Brian Donnelly)..."

Chris Lee, LA Times article on opening of artist KAWS exhibit in Culver City, Feb 24, 2009. "Government name" -- that's good!

Google Latitude's Real Best Feature: It's a free GPS

Google's new location feature for cell phones, Latitude, has been getting lots of press, good and bad.

Because one of its features--the one they talk about most--is that you can invite friends to know where you (or your cell phone) are at, exactly, I've seen a number of the usual "my privacy is being invaded--arrrgh!" blog postings. Idiots. You can choose who to let know where you are, how accurately they find you, and you can turn it off selectively any time you want. Sheesh.

But the "find a friend" function, for all the publicity, is not the Cool Feature. Latitude is --> a free GPS on your cell phone! Its most widely useful (but non-Social Web2) feature is, no doubt about it, the fact that it will give you turn-by-turn instructions (with map if you like) to any destination on Google Maps. For free.

It works with any smart phone -- mine is a nearly obsolete Palm Centro -- and your phone does NOT have to have GPS features enabled! Google Latitude uses 'cell-tower triangulation,' rather than GPS satellites, to figure out where your phone is. 

It's not the most feature-filled GPS -- no voice speaking turns aloud, and the accuracy of the location feature is less than that of a GPS satellite -- but - did I mention it's free? And you don't have to have carry around a second device.

This is a *great* light-duty GPS-in-your-Cell Phone product. Free. (Except you have to have data services enabled on your cell phone, so you'll pay data charges if you use it heavily.)

I personally like it plenty!

mac