Here's Looking Like You, Kid

Today on the way to work I caught part of a radio bit while changing CDs. That is interesting since I almost NEVER listen to the radio and when I do, I am one of those who just bounces around for music, any music, rather than listening to the DJs talk. Well like I said, I heard part of a piece today about a webpage and I decided to check it out since it sounded mildly amusing. It is basically a site where you upload a photo and it uses facial recognition software to see what celebrities you most look like. I have been told a number of times over the years that I look like Steve Martin. So, maybe it is time to put that to the test. Of course, that would imply I had a picture of myself to use so instead I decided to use the one I have on my Facebook and MySpace profiles as a test.

Here are the results:



I am not sure what this says about Jodie Foster and (the lovely) Keira Knightley...

OK, FINE!!! I will do one. Stop hassling me!!!

I used an eight or nine year old picture (it was all I could find quickly) but no Steve Martin:



Of course, as a final test, I actually used a picture of Steve Martin, just to see what would happen:



Well, at least he 76% resembles himself, so that is probably a good thing. Maybe I will retry myself with a more recent photo in a future post, and one without a phone as I have a feeling that does NOT help the facial recognition to have a weird growth on the side of my cheek...

Asclepieion

While talking with Loretta recently, the topic of dreams came up. Some of the conversation led to what do you dream about? Does it make sense? How often do you dream? Do you remember them? What do they mean? Do you dream in first or third person? Well, all that is far outside the scope of anything I care to write about or more importantly, more than I can be bothered to research since it is pseudo-science anyway (though any readers who have some knowledge in this area, feel free to fill us all in). The summary that came out of the conversation is that I almost never dream and when I do I apparently don't remember them. However, I did learn/realize/recall/whatever by talking about them that I seem to have a few recurring themes that have popped up in quite a few over the years, though most did not occur to me until I was consciously trying to remember what I had dreamt:

I almost always dream in third person, meaning I am an observer even when it is "me" so I watch the action sort of like a tv show where I am a character. However, as I have gotten older I do recall a few instances where I was experiencing the situations by dreaming in first person.

I quite often dream parts of conversations that later happen. I don't usually realize it while it is happening but then I hear "the phrase" or whatever and it all comes rushing back to my mind. It is usually something overheard between two other people, not something involving me. Sometimes the gap between dreaming and experiencing is years.

There is a certain white house on a small hill at an intersection that I am often near or outside but don't ever recall having been inside. There is nothing particularly special or interesting about the house, just something I have dreamt about a number of times. To my knowledge, I have never seen this "real" house.

I run very slowly, to the point of running a race and always being passed by a senior citizen or some other non-runner and simply being unable to keep up with them.

I can levitate. ie, not fly, just float a foot or so off the surface.

However, I do have rather vivid flashes of memory from two dreams I had a very long time ago. My best guess is age 4 and age 6. What I mean is that I may not have tons of detail or remember a lot of specifics but there are some very prominent things I remember even to this day. They were not nightmare causing or life changing or anything, they just stuck in my head very well. After reading them, you may think I am more bizarre than you originally thought.

=====The Cow=====

The first dream I ever remember having was actually a very short dream from what I can recall; it only seems a minute or two in length even now. Initially, my perspective was from approximately south-southwest and elevated. I was looking down into a barnyard with dairy cows eating hay. There were a few normal looking cows except one of them happened to be a giant Holstein. When I say giant I don't mean big, I mean GIANT, like 3 stories tall. Here are a couple of pictures I found that might portray what I mean for size and relationship to humans:



The giant cow was aligned so it pointed west and was actually surrounded by barns on all four sides so could not ever go anywhere else. I guess you can blame the poor imagination of a kid but the giant cow was actually stuck in this barnyard where it would barely have room to lay down... Anyway, sitting at the west end of the barnyard and watching the cows were a few farmers. They were your stereotypical old men with coveralls chewing on pieces of straw. Now enter the kid, that would be me (well, I have to assume it was me at least). I wanted to cross the barnyard from north to south. The old men told me to be careful and to go around but I thought that would take too long so instead crossed the middle of the yard. With such a large cow there was a lot of very thick hay and I was having trouble plodding through it. The next thing I know, I was taken up along with a mouthful of hay by the giant cow.

Now my perspective is inside the cow's stomach (nevermind the fact they have four, I did not know that at the time obviously) again from the south-southwest. Inside the stomach were a few "baby" (ie, regular sized) Holsteins eating hay, one of which was me. I guess as part of being eaten, I also changed species?!? Sitting watch on a wooden bench at the north side of the chamber were a black pig, and sheep and a chicken.

That is all I remember...

=====Statler & Waldorf=====

The second dream I can remember seems longer and more involved but again not really anything complicated. I had more freedom in this one in that my perspective would change and I would zoom in/out. Essentially, it was like I was flying overhead watching myself and would move around from time to time.

Imagine a jungle setting with what would be best described as a neverending slow train ride at an amusement park where the cars have the design of two person roller coaster cars. By neverending I mean it had no beginning and end, it was just a big long train of cars running in a continual loop with no gaps of any sort. Each of the cars had two seats side by side and in every car were two people wearing all white, almost like labcoats. As the train wound through the jungle it eventually passed two giant, living heads shaped like Statler and Waldorf, those two old guys from the balcony on the Muppets (whose names I did not know until recently).

As with the cow dream, these were giant heads as in something tall like this:



















But more on the scale of this to get the proper proportions for the facial features :















Well, as the cars would pass, some sort of automatic arm/hand would pluck someone out of one of the cars and toss them into one of the two giant mouths. The Muppets had blood dripping from their mouths and those pretty white outfits the people were wearing kept getting stained as the cars went under the faces. But in spite of watching the person next to them being taken up and eaten, everyone seemed oblivious. After someone was removed from the train, it continued on (it never stopped for the plucking) and a new person was dropped into the empty seat, almost like an assembly line.

Apparently, I was the only person who realized what was going on so after my first trip by the "feeding contraption", I got up and started climbing backwards over cars and people to try and avoid going by the Muppets again. Once the heads realized I was "aware", they were trying to catch me, though since they could not move all they could do was watch me and wait until I came by them again. The problem was that the train, while slow, still moved faster than I could so I kept losing ground to the point where I would eventually turn and scramble forward to pass them as quickly as possible while dodging the arm thing. I remember making this circuit with the "scary crossing" a couple of times though never quite being captured. The entire time I was trying to convince others to wake up from their zombie-like state and flee. Alas, no one ever did. And no, I can't explain why I simply did not get off the train...



You will never look at them the same now, will you?

So what have we learned from these? Well, I guess simply that giant things like to try and eat me. Hmm... maybe these two memories explain why I don't remember dreams now?...

For more on the title, go here.

Here Fishie Fishie Fishie

Over the years I have set up and torn down numerous aquariums by scavenging stuff my dad's old 10 gallon one and buying whatever else I wanted to add. I don't claim to be good at it but I do find the fish relaxing and pretty to look at. I have a (not well used) season pass to the Georgia Aquarium and a (not used in a long time) PADI dive certification which I also like to use to look at fish. When in my preteen/teen years is when the aquarium fascination started and I still remember the morning ritual of racing the cat. At the time my tanks tended to consist of a couple plastic plants, fake wood and swordtails, black mollies, guppies and neon tetras. Well for whatever reason, swordtails seem to like to jump out. Many mornings I would hear the plastic "thump" where the fish had literally jumped up, lifted the lid on the way out and fell to the floor. That sound would cause both myself and the cat to make a beeline for the end of the hallway where the tank was located. Amazingly, I would usually win that race, scoop him up and drop him back into the tank. After so many years my memory is spotty on this but I think this was fairly common. I still have no idea WHY the stupid fish kept jumping out but it did. When in college I had a tank that I would drain almost dry and carry back and forth in the car at the end of the year. I am sure fish like roadtrips... Once I moved to Georgia, it was a number of years before I decided to set one up again but I decided to branch out. I decided I wanted to use live plants, which was a first, and go for a more natural setup with more background and fewer fish. That happened in fits and spurts since the plants simply did not survive in my tank due to my lack of maintenance and/or the poor quality of the light. I tried adding plant food and a "plant light" but never had a lot of luck and would end up pulling all the plants out every few months and replacing them. After growing tired of this routine, last fall I decided to upgrade my aquarium.

OK, to be honest, what I REALLY decided was that I wanted to install a reef tank, but after researching costs I decided to upgrade the planted aquarium instead while still buying things I could use later if I changed it over, such as high quality lighting and powerheads.

So last fall, I started working on it. I roughly followed a general guide I found online after getting a new bigger tank, light and filter as well as substrate, driftwood and plants. I think things turned out pretty good and here is the finished product.





Well, fast forward about 7-8 months. The freaking tank is a disaster. The algae is winning (sorry, no pictures before I actually started trying to clean it up). It is coating everything. It looks kinda cool actually with the plush green carpet but it is really a nasty film that I simply cannot stop. I cleaned it out and it grew back. I changed the light timers to give less light and it grew back. I changed the light timers to give more light and it grew back. I dramatically cut off all parts of the plants that had algae and it grew back. I removed all the plants and it grew back. I removed EVERYTHING but the fish and it grew back. I added algae killing chemicals and it grew back. I purchased a UV Sterilizer and it grew back. I removed the fish (don't worry, they are still living in a crappy temporary tank next to the tv) emptied the tank entirely scrubbed the driftwood and rebuilt it from scratch and it grew back. Essentially, no matter what I do it will slowly grow back over a couple weeks or less.

::sigh:: Well I have to assume that the only thing left to "eliminate" is sunlight. That confuses me since the old tank was in the same place for close to two years and never had this problem. Plus the new one made it a while (though it was fall/winter/spring) before this started happening in it. The problem I have is complicated.

The aquarium is in the basement so it gets limited light anyway however...

1. ...there are a lot of windows so it really COULD be getting too much light, especially in the morning hours when the sun is at the best angle to cause problems...
   
2. ...so I need to find someplace out of the light to put it that is...
   
3. ...out of reach of the cats and...
   
4. ...not able to be knocked over by the dogs on those rare occasions when they sneak down the stairs...
   
5. ...plus is not in my way and...
   
6. ...is near some power outlets.
   

Wish me luck. Step one is find a location and come up with a table/stand/etc to put it on. Maybe I should throw the old fake plants into the temporary tank since the fish may still be there for a while longer...