Housekeeping

Well, the last post was my 100th on this blog. That's an arbitrary milestone, here's hoping it will take me less than two years to get my next hundred.

I've added a couple of blogs to the list on the right. Watts Up With That? is a great blog if you're an Anthropogenic Global Warming skeptic, i.e., you think Al Gore is full of beans. There is a lot of good data there, and a number of good discussions. Anthony Watts has another site, SurfaceStations.org, dedicated to going around the country and documenting the local environment of all surface temperature monitoring stations. So far they have checked almost 50%, and of those, two-thirds have adjacent buildings or asphalt that skew the temperature reading between 2 and 5 degrees C. Considering that the increase in temperature is about half of that, it does make you wonder how much "Urban Heat Island" plays into warming weather.

William Briggs is a statistician that I don't know personally, but I really like his down-to-earth discussions of how statistics are used and misused. We're in an age where statistics are used to promulgate all kinds of things, and knowing how things are skewed to prove points (like AGW, above, which is probably why Dr. Briggs is on Anthony Watts' bloglist) is an important thing. I comment there from time to time.

The political season is heating up, and likely so is my keyboard. I have a bunch of kit reviews I'd like to get to, and will as time permits. Having a hurricane is great for scaring away patients, business has been slow these last couple of days. The RNC last night went pretty well, though it does seem a little subdued compared to the DNC. It will be interesting to see how Sarah Palin does tonight, and whether or not if she gives a great speech it will be seen as such by the media. They seem to be desperately trying to write her off, she could give a speech like Henry the Fifth's at Aigncourt and it probably wouldn't be well-received. We shall see.