Ken Nelson

Me, outside my hotel. Not!  Actually it is Bikram Choudhury

Yoga is REALLY good for you. I can testify to that. Hot Yoga has helped me avoid chronic hip pain, sleep better, lose weight, and surprisingly, improve my complexion.

Lacking a Hot Yoga studio in St. George (which I may just remedy!), I’m taking advantage of our 107 degree summer, and I just practice outside in the shade of the hotel.  I don’t sweat nearly as much due to our 20% humidity ( a normal Hot Yoga studio is at 60% humidity).  But it still helps.

So what does science say?

Practicing yoga may do more than calm the mind — it may help protect against certain diseases, a new study suggests.

In the study, women who had practiced yoga regularly for at least two years were found to have lower levels of inflammation in their bodies than did women who only recently took up the activity.

I recommend it, although like many physical activities the first few times may be shockingly difficult (especially Hot Yoga). Keep on trying and you soon wonder how you could ever miss a session.

Another good thing… unlike other exercises, I’ve never been sore after a Yoga Practice.

Give it a go!

about traffic is wrong:

This idea, that making roads less safe leads to less accidents appeals to me. I can’t help but wonder if a lot of the problems people, states and the country face can be best addressed by ignoring what “experts” tell us we need (higher taxes, more regulation, more central control, more of others deciding for us) and that we should instead just let individuals get on with their lives in their naturally cooperative fashion.

I would welcome Mr. Monderman’s traffic ideas in St. George. We already have a fair number of traffic circles, but no traffic “squares” that I’m aware of.  Watch the video above, it is eerily cool how cars just approach 4 way intersections with no controls on them and do the right thing.

Down with traffic lights!

I’m going to miss hot yoga when I return to St. George.  There is supposed to be a hot studio opening, but they haven’t responded to my queries.

The folks at CorePower Yoga, a chain in California, Colorado and other states, should open a branch in St. George!  I’d certainly sign up.  Here is a video showing highlights of their Hot Power Fusion class. This class, which is the one I’m attending here in San Diego,  mixes the 26 asanas of traditional hot yoga with vinyasa flow movements and breath.

I doubt the room was that hot in this video, they are wearing way to much clothes. At the end of my practices here in San Diego, my yoga shorts are as wet as at the beach, my yoga slip pad is as soaked as if it were in a pool, and there is a puddle of sweat surrounding my Yoga mat.

Here is a video showing more of the hot Yoga poses:

They look hard, and the maximum postures are close to impossible, but each posture has “outs” or “alternatives” that you can do.

If a hot studio isn’t open in St. George, I’ll convert a space in my house to do it.  I’m eager to keep this going, and to keep the back, hip and other body pains away as they are now.

 
Approximate sweat flow

I just did my first “hot” yoga class this morning. I quite enjoyed it.

I did it at CorePower Yoga on Rosecrans in San Diego. Melissa, the instructor, was very patient and helpful with those of us not that familiar with yoga.

The session lasted an hour. I lasted about 50 minutes. I stayed in the room the last 10, but pretty much just did rest poses. I’d made the mistake of doing a full work out at 6AM this morning – I had nothing left.

I can’t remember ever sweating that much. Basically a shower was coming off me.

But I feel great after and I’ll definitely be back on Sunday morning at 0800.

My entire month on sabbatical in San Diego starts tomorrow.  The pictures above represent my tentative plans… sitting at beach, kayaking, reading my iPad at cafes (minus the expresso), biking everywhere, and 90 minutes of Bikram yoga every morning.

It should be refreshing. During this time this blog will become less active and probably just have photos and reports about stuff I’m doing or seeing around San Diego.

This should be on your reading list.

One of the things I’ve seen over the years is that work experience does not correlate to high quality and efficient software engineering.

So how can programmers get better?  Todd Hoff, a programmer known for his C++ coding standard (among other things), says they can get better like pretty much anybody else – with practice.

Deliberate Practice, or Experience, to be precise:

Rather than mere experience or even raw talent, it is dedicated, slogging, generally solitary exertion, repeatedly practicing the most difficult physical tasks for an athlete, repeatedly performing new and highly intricate computations for a mathematician, that leads to first-rate performance. And it should never get easier; if it does, you are coasting, not improving.

This is true, whether in programming, or in skating or shooting. Deliberate practice to build unconscious skills (aim/shoot, make ever more difficult figure skating jumps) leads to excellent performance.  Repeat at higher and higher levels to raise the performance bar.

Yet most programmers go home and forget about work. They don’t read about software engineering. They don’t expand or hone their skills.  They really aren’t interested in software engineering beyond paying the bills. And while most managers would like software people to get better, sending them to training and giving them time to practice and expand their skills can be really hard to fund.

Some say we need to require certification and continuing education, like doctors or lawyers, but I don’t think that really necessary or helpful. It would just drive up costs of an already very costly and inefficient occupation.

Frankly, I don’t think there is an answer that is satisfying. Other than for software engineers to step up and take an interest and pride in their profession and want and try to get better at it.

For now, as I hire, I try to bring in those that are interested in computer science and software engineering. They read about it, and have memberships in professional organizations, and at a basic level have a self-motivated desire to improve.

I think I’ve just discovered my next topic for the software engineering class I present to each year.

The inventor of T9 texting has come up with “Swype”; a faster way to type on a virtual keyboard.

Cool. I’m going to try this, in some form, in July. No promises for August. And digital.

http://photooftheday.hughcrawford.com/

I encountered two gals doing a 365 pictures of themselves project recently. They were quite creative and used radio remotes.  We met them at the Utah State Capitol building, where they were using the architecture to good effect.

My project for July will record a sabbatical I’m taking there for all of July. I’m toying with photos documenting each SD Trolley stop as one “concept”.  Alternately, I may strap a GPS watch on and sync my photos to my location and map them on a map of SD.

Something to do anyway (-:

We buried my Uncle Ray yesterday in a short, but moving, ceremony at the Riverside National Cemetery.

Given that not many people play the bugle any more, and also given that the cemetery does 40 to 50 burials a day, normally Taps is played by recording.

Our excellent funeral director, Bob Hansen of Crippen Mortuary, arranged to have a live bugler be part of the honor guard with an organization called “Bugles Across America”.

Craig Bryant, of Bugles Across America, drove from Anaheim to Riverside to play Ray’s funeral.  He did a lovely job and we thank him.

You can donate to and learn more about Bugles Across America here.

Heading elsewhere

Apparently, illegal aliens are fleeing Arizona. This is what happens when immigration laws look like they will be enforced. If only our Federal government would show similar resolve.

But alas, it doesn’t look like their homeland is where they are heading:

Juan Carlos Cruz, an illegal immigrant who has worked in plant nurseries for 20 years, huddled with dozens of relatives over the Memorial Day Weekend in the backyard of his brother’s Phoenix-area home to plot out the family’s next move to avoid what they say will be harassment by police. Virginia and California are the front-runners.

20 years hear illegally… that says a lot about our government doesn’t it?

The next step, naturally, is for more states to do as Arizona did.

Hayek’s classic is the #1 book on Amazon (thanks to Glenn Beck).

But, lets say you have a liberal neighbors, you know.. agreeable, he has a goatee, she separates their trash, but…. the Obama sticker on their Prius shouts to the world “we don’t get it!”.   And while they have signed copies of Saul Alinksy’s work, their heads would explode if they dug into Hayek.  Take heart… a comic book version is available online:

H/T: Instapundit

Salman Khan may be the future of education. He has developed over 800 videos explaining everything from the banking crisis to calculus.

Here he explains an alternate approach to the banking bailout (one I like quite a bit):

He covers lots of stuff… here he explains “Standard Deviation” in statistics…

Is this the “future” of education?  Yes – this or something like it.

All his videos can be seen at http://www.youtube.com/user/khanacademy#p

In SciFi books characters usually “beam” credits to their transport, lodging clerk, or anything else they need to buy.  Alas, here on earth we have to tote around cash.

Square looks to change that – by letting anybody with a mobile device accept credit cards.  Right now they are testing it on the iPhone and iPad. It looks slick.

The merchant fee is 2.75% + 15 cents. Which is mid-range of the rates usually charged.  If you were in a serious business taking millions in sales, you already accept credit cards. This is for you personally, or a smaller business.

Sounds good. I’d prefer to lose the cards, in the end, but this is a start.

While in Arizona this weekend, I passed numerous “photo enforcement” zones.  Towing an ATV trailer in high winds, I was nowhere near breaking the speed limit but I despised them anyway.

Thank goodness they weren’t making Arizona money, and they are now being canceled.  Don’t fool yourself that this was about safety – it wasn’t then, and cancellation isn’t now, ever about safety.

Janet Napolitano, currently failing head of Homeland Security, and then failed governor of Arizona, instituted the program.  Mistreating citizens while pampering illegals and terrorists seems her modus operandi.

Driving by these things irritated me. Government taking pictures of me as I drive. Sending tickets to the owner, but not driver of the vehicle. Big brother stuff. Good riddance.

Arnold Kling proposes realistic, workable, solutions to our nations over extended promises. Summed up… cut back, intelligently, on the promises.  Read the whole thing.

Professor Kling served time in the belly of he beast – at Freddie Mac and the Federal Reserve, but seems relatively untainted by the experience.

Alas, his simple, workable, correct ideas will go nowhere because they don’t fit our political classes goals of more power, life time employment and corruption.

Their intransigence will force violence, eventually. Their narcissistic goals will ensure we persevere with this doomed system that will collapse and cause upheaval that kills millions.

Put another way, they aren’t interested Professor Kling.