HE * HE = SHE
25 * 25 = 625

And that is why I am the coolest kid around town.

Time Travel in San Francisco via Google Earth

Time travel is always fun, and Google Earth now makes it easy to do. The newest version includes a button that allows users to to view historical imagery to see how a place has changed through the decades.

I tried it out with San Francisco, where Google Earth offers views of the city dating back to 1946. Sometimes the changes are subtle, but at other times they are very stark.

The image at top, for example, shows SOMA and the original Bay Bridge approach on Fifth Street. Notice all the ships tied up at San Francisco’s then-active wharves.

Here’s the site of the former Seals Stadium, at 16th Street and Bryant, as it looked in 1946, before the elevated 101 freeway went in, and before it became today’s Potrero Safeway:

Thanks PC! The boy figured out the number of possible permutations, but got stuck on figuring the actual answer. Will see if I have hint him in the right direct now.

Boo, pool closed!

I think that you've gotten enough exercise for a bit.

You can see Google from here: a Zeppelin view of San Francisco

The video is pretty cool.

When we first heard about Airship Ventures, a company that's resurrected the Zeppelin for air tours of San Francisco and other locations, we said: Sign us up! Well, the company took us seriously, giving us a free ride on one of their airships for a quick flight around the Bay Area (such a ride typically costs about $500). The result: some top-notch sightseeing, and the only flight we've ever taken when it was okay to open a window on the aircraft. It's all caught by our trusty camcorder — experience airship travel via the video and continue reading for the full story on the Zeppelin.

Airship Ventures' particular Zeppelin (technically a Zeppelin NT), called the Eureka, is one of only four in the world. The company takes it on tours up and down the California coast. This is no blimp — what makes it an airship is its rigid frame, made of carbon fiber and aluminum. At 246 feet long, it's actually physically bigger than a Boeing 747 (see the size chart below). It has a lot of advantages over other aircraft — it doesn't need a runway and low noise in the passenger cabin being just two — but it does need a guy to stalk it with a big orange remote control for some reason (see video).

Thanks PC! The boy figured out the number of possible permutations, but got stuck on figuring the actual answer. Will see if I have hint him in the right direct now.

Since the last digits were all the same, E had to be 0 or 5 (...or 1...or 6...okay, I think I got lucky). But I knew any 0 numbers squared wouldn't give me the XHE answer, so I cycled through the X5 squares (well, I think I pretty much went straight to 25 since I knew that square). Anyway, that may help you steer him in the right direction. It was easy for me since I memorized the squares up to 25 in high school for Number Sense competitions, but I don't know if he's as familiar with them.

South Carolina now requires "subversives" to register

Planning to overthrow the US government? If yes, and you live in South Carolina, you must pay a five-dollar subversive registration fee.

The form text is pretty surreal....

Co-worker is now meerkatting me on purpose to disturb me. He's going to get light-headed and fall over, I know it.

Combine that with consultant who called in with questions despite being home with the flu and I feel like a den mother to irresponsible boys. Behave!

South Carolina now requires "subversives" to register

If only they had that form in 1860.

What if senators represented people by income or race, not by state?

The Great Compromise was intended to make sure the big states didn't trample the little guys. But today, with 37 more states on the scene, the little ones wield disproportionate power. "Half of the population of the nation lives in 10 states, which have 20 senators. The other half lives in 40 states that have 80 senators," says the official Senate historian, Donald Ritchie. Small states and states whose representatives might tip the balance on a key vote make out like bandits, as their senators demand outsize appropriations in return for their support. The Nelson fracas was nothing other than the Senate working exactly as it was designed to.

An interesting article speculating on if the Senate was modeled after demographics instead of states.