More specifically, it's a Sikorsky Skycrane: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sikorsky_S-64_Skycrane

It is a very odd-looking chopper even when it doesn't appear to have stationary rotors.

What you are talking about, I believe, is referred to as contact DNA. This is becoming more feasible, with the tests becoming more sensitive and smaller samples being required. Of course, there would have to be skin cells or some nuclear material left behind. Also if the object was handled by other people you would have contamination from other DNA being present. Objects like cigarettes and soda cans that are touched by the mouth are more likely to have the DNA of only one person. Plus we shed whole cells more often and reliably by our lips and the soft mucousal tissues of the mouth.

If you do it yourself, be very careful with the cassettes, first off. Make sure they have proper tension before jamming them into a tape deck. Just use your fingers to hold the supply reel and gently wind the take-up reel until you feel tension. Then exercise the tape since they haven't been played in a long time. Give them a full fast-forward and then a rewind once you're certain the tension is good. Then you can press play. Make sure they are fully wound one way or the other once you are finished with them. Store them in a case that has some sprockets to keep the reels from unspooling.

As far as gear, a TASCAM or Marantz deck should be suitable. I would avoid those all-in-one USB devices if you care about sound quality. You should, however, check out M-Audio, Apogee, MOTU, etc for a USB or Firewire audio interface. You only need two channels, but there are lots of options. Each of these should be $300-500. You will also need editing software. Audacity is crap because it is free, so look for software you can afford. Use the highest resolution your USB/firewire interface provides (prob 24bit, 96kHz wav). You will need some extra hard drive space, but down the line you will be happy you did it. Especially if you plan on releasing any of it.

This is absolutely a project you can do yourself over a period of time. It's always best to monitor the complete transfer, but once you master the software you can set the recording time to a minute or two past the cassette side length and let it run. If something goes wrong you'll find it later. Just always spot check your recordings once you are finished.

My experience has been that the window screen trapped fly constantly crawling about looking for an exit will meet a natural end within a day or so, basically succumbing to starvation, and stress from being subjected to less than ideal temperatures. An active fly will seek out the temperatures it needs to survive for resting at nightfall or other times.

Here is a more detailed answer that considers all of the aspects of where it is in its life cycle, etc. and hard to beat for completeness.

One method to use after you get that pesky fly trapped in the window is to suck him into your vacuum cleaner using the bare wand on the hose. With the vacuum cleaner turned on you can sneak open the window and grab him when he is close. This vacuuming can work when they are crawling on a window pane searching for a way out also. It will save you having to see the insect active, hear him buzzing and having your open window out of service for a day or so. The forces involved in being sucked up by the vacuum is pretty violent and will likely end its life plus the dry dusty environ of the collection bin or bag is not conducive to survival.

That's not quite how it works. There is no easy way for people to directly access the video file on your desktop over the internet.

QR codes are essentially bar codes. They only contain text. So a QR code that "embeds a youtube video" is actually just a QR code that points to a youtube.com URL like http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dQw4w9WgXcQ

QR codes are easy to make. Here is a seemingly decent website where you can make them:

http://qrcode.kaywa.com/

And here is one I made:

http://qrcode.kaywa.com/img.php?s=8&d=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DdQw4w9WgXcQ

So, for you, the first thing you need to do is get your video hosted somewhere you can easily share it with others. Youtube is obviously an option -- maybe as a private video? There are other Youtube-like sites as well like Vimeo.

Or, if you don't care about your video playing in a web browser, and simply want to share the file, Dropbox would be a good option. They have a "Public folder" where you can upload files and then link them via http://something.dropbox.com/something -- but this will not put the video in a nice player with play/pause/seek and such. It will just provide the file itself.

I hope that is helpful! Feel free to use comments if something doesn't make sense.

First I would get a google voice number in the area code you would be using the most when you do use a phone - that way you have a permanent number to accept voice mails and/or text messages when you're not in call range, and you can access your messages from the web.

Then I would get a prepaid phone with a per-minute plan - you don't need a monthly package. Just put enough money on your prepaid account so you can make calls when you're in cell range, then reactivate next time. I'm pretty sure most prepaid carriers let you do this and keep the same number - you will lose any unused minutes, but it's still way cheaper than any monthly plan. You should ask just to make sure. Also a lot of drug and grocery stores cell prepaid phones & cards, so you don't need to give the cell company your credit card and worry about them charging you. Bartell's usually has good basic prepaid phones on sale.

The best per minute plan I've seen is T-mobile's - if you put $100 on your account you get 1000 minutes and 1 year to use them. But I don't know what's going to happen when the AT&T buyout goes through, or when that will happen.

Almost all the film developing places will scan a CD of images for you, as well. As with anything, the cheaper options tend to be less high quality (Walgreen's photo CD is $5, and is fine for posting pics online, but the images aren't super sharp or very easily printed in larger sizes). Whether it's Kit's at the malls, Bartell's drugstore, or an independent shop, they can take of your needs. "60 Minute Photo Express" suggested by Fnarf sounds like a great option, too.

I manage fine, and I pay for the second-to-slowest CenturyLink option.

Hulu used to play pretty choppy on my DVD player, but I recently switched to a Roku, and it streams like a dream.

Meteor showers are best viewed between midnight solar time (which is approximately 1:00am when daylight savings is in effect) and twilight. This is because the earth has turned toward the space through which its passing during these hours, so the meteors are, in a sense, hitting the atmosphere the way bugs hit the windshield on the highway.

This year, you'll have to contend with the full moon, which will wash out a lot of meteors. If you don't get far out from the city, the light pollution coupled with the moon will probably make for poor viewing.

Tweet-deck is the answer, I think. It's been ages since I've used it (I abandoned my Twitter account a few years ago), but it will allow you to group various feeds together. So, you could have a "work" group, and it would appear as a separate column in the TweetDeck dashboard. (You could do the same thing with your 90 bajillion news feeds.)

Hardwick's on Roosevelt in the U district has just about everything in the world. I've bought exactly these tools there.

Depending on how it's embedded or how you're hovering over it, it might trap the keyboard keypresses.

The Tardis would sound a warning, of course! LOL!

I'm a little disappointed nobody else thinks the changes to Spaces has completely changed how they use a one-monitor OSX computer.

http://www.apple.com/macosx/whats-new/

The gesture for Mission Control is amazing. Here is how my desktop works now:

#1: Dashboard -- sort of useless at the moment, I hope some decent apps get made for it

#2: Chrome (full screen)

#3/#4: Empty "workspace" desktops

#5: Mail (full screen)

#6: iTunes (full screen)

Being able to swipe back and forth between the desktops is much better than the old system of using the cntrl key and numbers or arrows (or 4 finger swipe for running application list).

Full screening programs went from mostly annoying to great now that you can devote an entire "space" to a specific, often-used program (this is all really an improvement on Spaces, which doesn't really exist anymore).

I think if you change how you use OSX a little bit you will be impressed, but not everything is perfect. The nice gesture to go back and forth between desktops broke the ability to go back and forth on webpages in Chrome -- not ideal (and fixable with some addons but I'll wait for something more official). The new mouse scrolling was, in my opinion, a mistake and I quickly reverted it back. And I'm not sure of the usefulness of the Launchpad and its accompanying gestures when Spotlight + the dock seems to be fine.

Mission Control isn't perfect either. Sometimes you want to rearrange the desktops but it doesn't seem to be able to. Opening full screen programs doesn't always work as expected and your screens get out of order. It does need some polish but Lion is a much bigger leap forward than Snow Leopard was.

Anyway, just wanted to give some positive opinions in light of all the downer posts. I like it! The new "Spaces" system kicks ass for any single-screen computer like a Macbook.

None of my programs stopped working.

It's an arctic drilling rig:
http://www.myballard.com/2011/07/19/arctic-drilling-rig-kulluk-making-its-way-into-puget-sound/

Why? Basically, it comes down to convention -- mathematicians set up rules a long time ago to make sure that everyone will get the same answer if they have the same problem, and also to avoid contradictory answers appearing from the same problem.

Along the same lines, why do we use PEMDAS? Because there needs to be an order of operations, or else we will get different answers for the expression 2 + 3 x 4. If you add first you get 6 x 4 which then equals 24. If you multiply first (following PEMDAS) then you get the correct answer of 2 + 12 which equals 14.

So back to the negative sign with exponents: you just have to memorize the rule that was established. If there is a negative sign in front of a number with an exponent, you have to apply the exponent first.

One way that is helpful to people is to think of the parentheses as "glasses" and the exponents as having bad vision. With the parentheses there, the exponent can "see" the negative sign and it will be included in the exponent operation.

Planet X was a name for what became identified as "Pluto" ...but it also has been used at various times to identify any unknown, or suspected planet...

In the awful 1960s sci-fi flick "Journey to the Far Side of the Sun", an astronaut who is lost in space, returns to the earth and discovers that he's on a duplicate of Earth that orbits exactly opposite the sun from us, in a place we can never see...and gets confirmation when the polarity of the electricity in the capsule is reversed...unfortunately, dooming him to crash land and never getting the story out.

There's also been a theory that a rouge planet will sweep in and either: 1) Collide with Earth, 2)Collide with the Moon 3) Near miss, causing tidal forces and disaster, 4) take up orbit with us, etc. 5) rip us away from the sun,etc.

Take your pick of which theory you want. Why? What did you hear?

In any Windows 7 application like Explorer, if the top menu (File, Edit, etc..) isn't visible, you can hit Alt and it'll show it. So just press Alt and look under the Edit menu, and you'll find "Move to folder" and "Copy to folder".

I will suggest the cheap, multi-platform, open-source GIMP:

http://www.gimp.org/

The online manual is pretty comprehensive, but here is a quick Google-derived primer to get you going after installation:

1) Open your image file in GIMP, go to the top bar, and select Image > Mode > RGB

2)Select Layers > Duplicate Layer

3)Select Filters > Blur > Pixelize - for starters, set the height and width to 20 px and adjust to taste

4)If you want to emphasize the borders between pixels, select Filters > Enhance > Sharpen and set the sharpness to your liking (e.g. 88)

Good luck!

There will definitely be images there and I think you will be genuinely pleased with the overall results. Be sure to inform the lab that handles this film that it is old and may need some color correction as there may be a color shift with the long delay in processing it. If the operator of the equipment is aware of it they can sample some of the negative images and make some color corrections to give you the best printed result.

Lastly, get ready for a step back in time, when you flip through the prints and remember the occasions depicted in your photos.

Batteries are rated in amp-hours (Ah). Your cpap draws 5 amps, so 8 hours of sleeping is 5x8=40 amp-hours. Four nights camping is 160 amp-hours.

160 amp-hours is too high for a standard automotive battery, but you can certainly find a deep cycle lead-acid battery with at least that capacity. However, it will weigh a ton and won't be cheap. A quick Google search for a 150Ah battery revealed one that was $200 and 84 lbs, and more research might reveal a better one. But that will be in the ballpark for cost and weight.

$200 might be worth it, and it may be something you'll use again. But 84 lbs ... are you getting dropped off, or do you have to lug this thing 1/2 mile to begin with?

You could save a lot of weight by going with a Lithium battery, but it would cost you a fortune ... probably $1500 or more, and still 25-30 lbs worth of batteries.

Perhaps you could consider using it just a couple of hours per night? An 80Ah lead-acid battery weighs probably 40% less. That's 16 hours of good sleep.

Seriously, if it's that complicated, get a friend who is stereo savy or familiar and confident to help you set it up. Don't experiment... the wrong crossed cords could blow up the amp and cause costly repairs. (Plus, if the system is already blown...[do you trust your seller?] you want to know about it BEFORE you do any damage. A tech savy friend would recognise this before you might.)

This website is headed for a disaster of biblical proportions. Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together, mass hysteria!

We had a glitch yesterday with the RSS feeds, should be better now (but please let us know if you're still seeing problems). You're always welcome to write us at webmaster@thestranger.com if you see anything amiss. Thanks!

Why wouldn't you use Audacity? It'll include a link to where you can download the proper codecs (probably LAME.)

Really, the quality of your mic (especially since it's USB and not going through your sound card) matters much more than anything you'll do post-recording. If you're looking for a USB upgrade, http://www.bluemic.com/snowball/ is pretty stellar.

I think it should be the same: whatever your night-to-day ratio is when you're on one side of the sun, six months later, you're at the opposite side of the sun, the angle of earth's inclination is now the opposite with regard to the sun, so you get the opposite ratio. So all points on the globe end up getting an overall annual ratio of 50:50.

However: the closer to the poles you are, the more gradual the transition between night and day; depending on your purpose, these twilight hours may or may not count as real daylight. So you could claim that there's more proper daylight closer to the equator.

There's been some controversy with publishers trying to screw authors out of their proper royalties on E-books. From what I understand, they've been trying to give authors the same percentage of the price of the E-book as the price of a real book, meaning that the author gets 40-60 percent of their normal royalties. I'm pretty sure authors have revolted and are refusing to put up with it.

In the end, selling books for a lower price in a more-convenient-to-purchase format will hopefully increase overall sales, benefiting publishers and authors alike. So I would buy Kindle books without guilt (if I weren't too poor to buy books rather than borrow them).

Maybe I'm misunderstanding, but I'm pretty sure that is already built into Google Maps. You do have to have a Google account, and once you're logged in, on the left-hand side, under Google Maps, you should see "Get Directions" and "My Maps." Click on "My Maps" and then "create new map".

You can title the map and give a description of the entire thing on the left, and then on the map itself, at the top left, you'll see a hand icon, a place-marker icon, and a line icon. Use the line icon to draw the trail and add markers to show trail features.

If this isn't what you're talking about, let me know!

Becoming infected by a website is possible, but most web-based malware involves third-party code, not a passive exploit. Unless you're running an ancient browser, you're going to be prompted before it runs anything like that. First of all, you won't need to run third-party code to download a torrent. So don't do it. You can minimize the chances of web-based malware by downloading the torrent directly from a reputable torrent indexing site, like Pirate Bay. Make sure you don't click on the plethora of fake "download" links and ads. Finally, if you're running a modern OS like Vista or Windows 7, don't run your browser as administrator or under an administrator account.

My money would be on executable files in the torrent. You shouldn't have to run an EXE to watch a movie. A legit release will just be the media file, like AVI, and a readme. If you're pirating software, watch out for any other executables like keygens or installers, but in that case you're going to have to at least trust the cracked software. Look for releases from a "reputable" group at the original source, like a torrent or newsgroup posting.

Academic point: media files *can* cause viruses or other malware if they exploit the software that is reading them.

Yes, the vast majority of infections come from directly running an exe file or a tainted installer. But everyone knows not to run weird exe files. That's where exploits like buffer overflows come in. They can use malformed data to trick the program into running arbitrary code.

That said, that type of thing is extremely rare and usually patched quickly. Keep your media player up to date and you should be fine.

From what I can tell it's an issue with the feed reader. If you look at the RSS feed, you'll notice the deleted posts aren't actually there anymore. It seems that once Google Reader gets a hold of an item, it leaves in in the list forever, regardless of whether it's been removed from the source feed.

If it was me, I'd try the following:
1. REMOVE THE BATTERY (very important)
2. Scrub the phone inside and out with soapy water
3. Rinse thoroughly (deionized water is better than distilled water which is better than tap water)
4. Dunk everything in isopropyl alcohol
5. Let dry completely (be conservative)
6. Reinstall the battery ... if it works, great, if it doesn't, get a new phone.