Congratulations, you've made it through the week!

  Have a Happy Thought:  We use a lot of data in today’s world. IN fact, the total amount of data created and stored digitally is expected to reach 181 zettabytes this year . (A zettabyte is 2 to the 70 th power, or 1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 bytes). Moving all of this data around accounts for a lot of power usage today – every email (yes, including this one), shared document, or any other file digitally transferred takes energy to send, share, and store online . Now, we’ve all at some point struggled to figure out the best way to transfer a file – maybe it’s something too large to send over email, or an odd file type that wouldn’t attach. So, here are some alternatives that might a)take less energy; and b) actually be more efficient?? Option 1: Use a snowmobile. Yep, Amazon Web Services actually offers this as a way to transfer very large ( 100 petabytes = 10 to the 15 th power, or 1,000,000,000,000,000 bytes, still much smaller than a zettabyte) amo...

Have a Happy Thought:  Two of the most important fun voting opportunities are taking place, at the same time this year! No, I don’t mean local elections in New Zealand – while very important, they are less fun. (despite some of the ads being very funny). I do mean: 1. Fat Bear Week ! Yes, it’s that time to look at pictures of adorably pudgy bears living in Katmai National Park in Alaska, and decide which one gets your vote. You can choose the reason for yourself. Are you more interested in who has put on the most weight this summer? Or maybe it’s a good coat colour change you’re after. Or maybe its a bear you’ve voted for in previous years. In any case, the bears will be announced this coming Monday (Alaska time). In the meantime, you can check out – and vote for – fat bear junior, a compendium of adorable bear cubs, making their way through their first year of life. Here’s a couple of examples:​ ​ ​​ 2. Bird of the Year . Voting closes next weekend, so you ...

Have a Happy Thought:  A wonderful thing about being part of diverse humanity is being able to experience the work of people who think very differently than you do. Me? I’m pretty literal, I like numbers and words. I don’t “think” much in imagery ( you may already know why ). That’s possibly why so many of these Friday posts focus on visual artistry – it is a communication that I can appreciate, but can’t even imagine doing. That goes doubly for the artist this week – the medium she uses – metal – feels so solid to me that I am blown away by these designs: Some of these works exude the strength of the metal: While others almost appear delicate: And still others capture the delicate-yet-strong-at-the-same-time vibe: Anyway, go check out more of her art here: https://www.raeripple.com/gallery And I hope you find something “different” to appreciate, this weekend :)

Have a Happy Thought:  At some point in your life, you probably made up a code with some friends. Maybe it was just a few words that you attached a special meaning to, or maybe it was an entire language (and no, pig-Latin doesn’t count, because all the adults already knew it). Sometimes, though, people come up with codes to communicate more clearly (think the NATO phonetic alphabet to help make sure words are spelled correctly)… but end up just making everything more difficult. This is a case in point: a cypher code created in the late 19 th century to – apparently – make it easier to send telegrams about new discoveries in Astronomy. My guess is that either very few people used this… or the people that did use this spent as much of their time decoding messages from colleagues as actually doing astronomy. Here's the first couple of sentences in this explainer about this “cipher-code”… This concept was pretty complex, but I’m guessing if you really took the time, it wou...