Derby Doughnuts

My kids were playing with their toy cars this morning, so I got mine out too. My derby car has always been good at left turns but when one of the propellers flew off, it became downright gifted at them.

Get Yer Derby On!

My Elders Quorum had a pinewood derby race Friday night - modified class only. About half of the men are engineers, so there was a little excitement about what might be produced - sadly, no rail-guns. The "no fire" rule kind-of killed the rocket motor crowd, but there were still plenty of clever designs. I went with a propeller (two other guys did too). There were a couple CO2 cars, but they kept having problems setting off the cartridges - one wasn't centered and went spinning off the track the amusement of all. There was a rubber band propelled car, a few that were just much heavier than standard rules allow (one was cast out of metal), and one that had the works of a pull-back car attached to the back wheel.

I was a little proud of my car, 'Driving Miss Daisy,' mainly because I made my own propeller out of a plastic water bottle and a paper clip.

Here is my first test vehicle once I got the propeller mounted.

The three propeller cars made it to the top of the standings. My semi-final race was against a car called "Vote 'Yes' for Proposition 102," (pictured below) named for the Arizona 'One Man, One Woman' marriage ammendment on the November ballot. I felt a little bad when I beat it.

The championship race pitted me against a car made using an RC airplane motor and propeller. When the gate came down, my opponent hit the throttle on his remote control and smoked me. Ah well. It was a good run. My only regret is that I forgot to try to race somebody back up the track.

You got extra points if your car was really good at making left turns - mine was.

Hmm, what else you got under the dirt?

Yesterday, we went to the Titan Missle Museum. There used to be 54 Titan II missile installations clustered in 3 locations in the South of the US. 18 of them were centered around Tucson, AZ. At the end of their operational life, 53 of the silos had their blast doors blown open, their missiles removed and de-activated, and were backfilled with tons and tons of dirt to make them completely un-usable. One was converted into a museum. Its top blast door was locked in the half open position (the missile can only fire if the door is completely open) the nuclear tipped Titan II missile was removed and a disabled training missile was laid on its side next to the silo. This was to give the Soviet satellites clear evidence that the installation was inoperable. Then the missile was placed in the seven story launch tube and tours began.

It's hard to get a good picture to demonstrate the size of these beasts (they are in an underground silo, by the way) so we'll let this amazed face convey the awe you should be feeling. In case you were wondering, the missile is 102 ft tall and 10 ft in diameter. That warhead on the top (not a real one, of course)? 9 megatons. Yup, that's the equivalent of 9 million tons of TNT. Thats almost 500 times more powerful than the bombs used to end WWII.

This face is a bit more of what I was feeling looking around this place. Awesome!

By the way. If you wanted to buy your own Titan I missile complex (much larger than the Titan II) there is one available.

Lightning is AWESOME!

This is the coolest lightning video I've ever seen. I could watch the first 5 seconds over and over and over and over and over... and over again.



You get extra points if you know why the main bolt strikes from the ground up.

Revenge of the Car!

I'm sure Ryan was biting his nails for our entire trip to Indiana with the check engine light on (see previous post and comment). Not to worry, we made it just fine. I even forgot to bring our spare jug of oil, so the engine was making some great rattling noises for the last state or two. But, because my car loves me (I get along great with inanimate objects - like cars, calculators, and Rubik's cubes) it toughed it out and took us to my in-laws.

Once there, it finally got some tender loving care. My brother in law popped the hood and showed me some things - like what a valve cover is and where my fuses are. We decided to change the valve cover gasket in case that's where the oil leak was coming from. We looked at the muffler bracket and sure enough, it was broken off with no good way of fixing it without a welder. We also checked my brakes - which some guy told me a year ago had only a month left in them - and decided that we might as well replace those too. A trip to Autozone got my check engine light read. Apparently, my engine was occasionally misfiring, so we decided to change the spark plugs too.

We headed on down to NAPA and used my father-in-law's fireman discount to get crazy discounts on all my stuff. Then we put the car back together. The new muffler bracket didn't fit, so we jimmy-rigged a wire sling to hold it up, but all the rest went together like a champ. Tada! my car's all fixed! The gas mileage is slightly improved, probably because the engine is no longer misfiring, and I don't have that annoying check engine light on any more.

So why did I name this post "Revenge of the Car?" Because I wanted to give Ryan some sense of satisfaction that my inattention to my car's needs led my downfall - before I dash all his hopes in the justice of the world and tell him that everything turned out alright due to sheer luck. OK, I guess the car still leaks oil - happy, Ryan?

It is a bit embarrassing for an electrical engineer to admit, but until recently, I didn't know how to jump start a car. Maybe I should correct that, I wasn't entirely sure how to jump start a car. I understand the basic theory, of course, but I didn't have nearly enough practice to make me comfortable, and this commercial scared me:



Anyway, a friend asked me to give him a jump a month or so ago, and I realized that the way I would have done it was completely right. Furthermore, my little Saturn didn't have enough power to blow up his minivan, so I felt much better about the whole thing.

On my way home from that same trip, I noticed that something about my exhaust system didn't sound quite right. Driving over 20 miles of dirt roads had apparently broken the hanger on my muffler, so it makes a throatier growl than previously.

My car has long had a slow oil leak. I'd noticed for a while that my car made a rattling sound to let me know when the oil needed to be changed. I'd never thought too much about why that was until I went to a new garage to have my oil changed. The mechanic told me that I should have my gaskets and seals replaced because he'd only drained half a quart of oil from my car. Half a quart!? Isn't that kind of a big deal? Doesn't my car need 5 quarts? Of course, being a cheapskate, instead of getting my gaskets and seals replaced I just add oil to my engine occasionally. This has the added benefit of keeping my oil fairly clean and increasing the time between oil changes - or so I tell myself.

We recently drove to St. Louis and back for my sister's wedding. About an hour from home on our way back, the check engine light came on. A few miles after that, the check oil light came on. Since the car was rattling, the second occurrence didn't surprise me, but I was still happy when we got all the way home without smoke pouring out of the engine.

I'm afraid I just don't understand cars very much, so I don't know what they need apart from gas and oil. I'm sure I'm not alone in this, which is why car mechanics feel so comfortable recommending everything under the sun to fix my car. (In four successive oil change visits I have had four different critical services recommended to me - I declined them all) I don't doubt that my car does have needs, but since I don't trust the guy who's trying to drum up more business than the oil change, I just wait for my car to tell me. So far it's been pretty uncommunicative aside for the cryptic "check engine" light. (I've checked the engine; it's still there. What's the problem?)

We are driving to Indiana next week and my brother in law, who is a self proclaimed genius when it comes to cars, is going to go over it with me and hopefully teach me a thing or two because I refuse to be afraid of my car anymore. Cars are mostly electronic these days anyway, right? That should be right up my alley. As long as my car doesn't die along the way, we should be in good shape...

Bling Out the Play Set

What does a nerd do when he's not writing a blog? I'll tell you what. Drumroll please...


Tada! I made it! All by myself!

Ok, my friend Phil helped too, and my daughter lent a hand every now and again (though, I don't know if I'd call that helping). And, if you want to get technical, all the wood was pre-cut and drilled and delivered to my house... but it was still a LOT of work. In total it took 3 Saturdays, 3 weeknights, and I got 3 sunburns - you'd think I would have learned after the first one - but now I have a fabulous play set, cheap babysitting, and a super sexy farmer tan, yeehaw!

I was talking on the phone to my mom last week and I told her that I was going to put string and cans up between the play set and the house so that we could tell the kids to come in for dinner and things (because yelling out the back door is way too hard). She told me that string phones don't actually work. For her and all the other doubters out there, check this out. HowStuffWorks.com never lies!

This did get me thinking, though. Maybe I do need to be a little more high tech - this is the 21st century after all. I could easily put a microphone and speaker out in the tower and run wires back to the house. Even cooler, I could do it wirelessly. While I'm at it, why don't I set up the play set as a node in my home wireless network. Along with the IP intercom, I could put a temperature monitor on the slide (yes, it does get hot enough to burn little bums), strain guages on the support beams, and a swing speed monitor to slow down enthusiastic swingers.

Hmm, maybe that's too high tech. Perhaps I should just start with a flagpole and a jolly roger and work from there. After all, my kids can't seem to figure out how to work the accesories they already have.

PS

Check out these other super cool play sets and tell me what you think I should do to bling out mine - yes, I have considered a paintball turret.

http://www.cedarworks.com/refer.php?src=GL&qw=playsets&gclid=CK7W28-WmpICFRTNiQodIDKppQ

http://www.danielswoodland.com/

http://www.rainbowplay.com/index.php/swing-sets/package/metropolis/

Hey! No Hoggin' the Hero!

I was at Toys R Us yesterday. Um..., I was... shopping for my kids... yeah, shopping for my kids.

After a perusal of the newest lego sets and Star Wars toys (PS: Star Wars + Legos = the coolest toys ever!) I meandered over to the electronics section to see the latest in tot entertainment. Passing the iPod covers my ears were greeted by the unmistakable strains of "Hit me with your best shot" being butchered by somebody with no Guitar Hero skills. I hurried over to see that there was a whole setup for the game being played by a woman with 4 kids climbing in and out of the cart.

I ambled over, trying not to be too obvious that I wanted a turn, because anybody that bad doesn't need any extra pressure. She was booed off the stage and I figured that the embarrassment of that, coupled with me standing behind her would induce a quick retreat. I was wrong. She proceded to play another song, "Even Flow," which has got to be the longest song in the entire game - made longer by the fact that, even on easy she was missing half the notes! As this song was nearing the end, my wife finally found me and was suggesting that it was time to go. I was determined to get my turn as a reward for suffering through the interminable agony of watching this woman suck it up on stage, so I turned around to find this woman lining up yet another song. I couldn't believe the gall. I wanted to say something truly rude, but figured discretion was the better part of not getting thrown out of Toys R Us (though, just between you and me, that would have made a better blog post - to my wife's eternal shame).

So the lesson for the day is, No hoggin' the Hero! If nobody else is waiting, sure go right ahead and take another turn, but if there's a line, you get one turn. If it's that important to you, get to the back of the line and wait for another turn. If it's really that important to you, buy the blasted game and play it at home! But for heaven's sake, get out of my way so I can jam!

April Fool's Day

Who on earth ever thought up April Fool's Day? What genius came up with the idea of making a holiday out of practical jokes. Today we pay homage to some truly nerdy April Fool's Pranks.

Google actually has a proud history of April Fool's pranks. You may have noticed one if you did a Google search today. Visitors to the Google.com were greeted with the adventure of many lifetimes, an opportunity to apply for citizenship in the Virgle community, the first permanent human colony on mars. Not to be limited to a single gag, Google also introduced Gmail Custom Time to users of Gmail. This claimed to allow users to assign any time stamp they wanted to emails. In previous years, Google has featured MentalPlex, the Google Copernicus Center, and more. In fact, Google has chosen April Fool's Day for some of its real launches, such as Gmail and a Gmail storage increase.

In 1989, a glowing flying saucer floated landed in a field in Surrey, England, prompting terrified calls by motorists to the police. When the police came to investigate with their billy clubs at the ready, a door opened at the bottom and a small silver figure came out. The police ran in the other direction. The alien was actually a midget, and the UFO was a hot air balloon specially built by Richard Branson (a collaborator in today's Virgle gag) who was dressed as ET for the occasion.

In 1998, MIT students hacked the school's web page and replaced it with one announcing the sale of MIT to Disney. The page was adorned with a picture of the great dome at MIT with Mickey ears.

On April Fool's Day in 1962, the "technical expert" at Sweeden's Sveriges Television showed viewers, after a lengthy instruction on the prismatic nature of light, how to instantly turn their black and white televisions into color sets by covering the screen with nylon stockings.

Hopefully you had fun with April Fool's Day too. Please, share.

Fog Machines Promote Health

My kids were sick this week. Yes, it was terrible. Yes, they were miserable. Yes, it was pathetic. No, I didn't sleep. But guess what I did get to do?

I bought a new humidifier!

Now wipe that "that the lamest thing I've ever heard" look off your face and let me tell you about my new ultrasonic humidifier.

First of all, it doesn't release steam, the way many other humidifiers do, because it doesn't heat the water to the boiling point.

An ultrasonic humidifer uses a piezo-electric transducer (for the nerd-jargonly-challenged, thats a speaker) to create high frequency mechanical oscillations in the water. When the transducer moves away from the water, the water tries to follow but can't move fast enough. This creates a momentary vacuum creating vapor. When the transducer moves forward into the water, it creates high pressure compression waves on the surface, realesing water vapor. The result is a fine cool mist that quickly evaporates, raising the humidity of a room.

As if the mechanics of the thing weren't cool enough, it's a fog machine! I once saw somebody use the fog from one of these to make a tornado generator (think fans positioned to swirl the mist - yeah, pretty awesome).

So there you go. Even when your kids are laying around as if the black plague has returned, you can still amuse yourself with a new humidifier.

Pi Day

Oh Pi Day. That wonderful day of the year that feels like an inside joke of the nerd population. I think it's hilarious to wish people a happy Pi Day and have them reply,

"Happy what!?"

I told my wife it was Pi Day and she asked if it was a day we were all supposed to eat pie. I gave her my best "I can't believe you don't know what I'm talking about" face and said,

"No, Pi Day. March 14th, Pi Day"

"Oh," she said, "3, 1, 4"

I can't believe that my nerdiness has failed to rub off.

For those who have any doubt about nerdliness being genetic, let me tell you about what my family did on Pi Day. My father texted "Happy Pi Day" to his children. My brother texted back to tell my father how he was celebrating the occasion. My sister sent a picture of the pie she had made. Another sister also replied, telling about her own pie. We're nerds, it's in our blood (and the left hemisphere of our brains)

How did you celebrate Pi Day?

Nerd for President

The media hype surrounding this presidential election is incredible. It has spawned all kinds of hillarity such as Stephen Colbert jumping on the ballot in South Carolina, political games, and private citizens stating their own platforms. I won't go so far as to say that pantsuits have become a fashion statement, but the election is the main source of news in this country.

It occured to me that what this country really needs is a nerd as president. I don't feel like nerdy needs are properly being addressed by the establishment. Ronald Reagan, with his "Star Wars" program was the last president/candidate to appeal to nerds (unless you count Al Gore inventing the internet, which we don't). What we need is a president who will take us to the future. You may wonder why we don't have flying cars, public space travel, or a bid to enter the united federation of planets. We would if a nerd had been running things. So what else would change with a nerd for president?

• The Secret Service would carry lightsabers.
• Why is the alternative fuel program mucking around with ethanol? We should be looking for dilithium crystals!
• In the interests of saving tax dollars, Congress would be outsourced to India and China.
• Tax credits would be available for anyone able to solve differential equations on their form 1040.
• Klingons would finally be allowed to join the UN.
• All defense programs with the word "LASER" in the title would be automatically funded.
• Amnesty would be given to all illegal aliens who can prove they came from a different planet.
• Our new helicopters really would transform into killer robots.

I suppose the real qestion is, who do we get to run? Steve Jobs could do it, especially if we started a rumor that everyone who voted for him would get an iPod. Bill Gates wouldn't even need to raise money. I bet we could even get Al Gore to take up our cause if we could convince him that it would make a cooler movie. What do you think?

Nerd: A Definition and a Tribute

I think 'nerd' needs a revised definition. It has too many negative connotations, though I can't understand why. Those epitomes of nerdiness, Bill Gates and Steve Jobs are ridiculously rich and successful. So are the Google boys and countless other textbook nerds. So why do we still think of 'nerd' as an insult? Maybe it's because at the heart of it, a nerd is someone who doesn't fit in.

Fit in to what, though?

Are we still comparing ourselves to those jocks and cheerleaders in high school? Are we still afraid that after all these years Biff is going to give us wedgies and lock us in our lockers? A lot has happened since high school. Hopefully you've noticed that the ability to apply abstract thought and hold a meaningful conversation has gotten you more out of life than the ability to burp the ABC's in front of a packed cafeteria. Perhaps you've discovered that "your mom" jokes aren't nearly as helpful in a job interview as a good GPA and teacher recommendations.

If nerds can be so succesful, why do most definitions focus on their social ineptitude and irritating personalities? Surely there is more to a nerd than a pocket protector and glasses. I vote (and since it is my blog, mine is the only vote that counts) that we revise the definition of a nerd to eliminate the insult and pay homage to some nerds that you may not have thought of before.

Nerd (nûrd)
-noun slang

1. One who enjoys doing mental math while driving (or any other activity)
2. One who questions public wisdom and finds humor in everyday activities
3. One who enjoys playing with toys well into adulthood
4. Extreme intelligence in some areas offset by occasional lapses in judgement and inattention to detail

Perhaps my favorite nerd is Jane Austen. I realize that the worldwide testosterone council may consider revoking my membership for making such a statement, but hear me out. Anyone who equates Jane Austen with sappy love stories has either never read Jane Austen or wasn't nerdly enough to understand the books. Jane Austen was an expert in poking fun at the social customs of the day and her books are chock full of nerdy characters spinning circles of witty dialogue around their less intelligent neighbors. Pride and Prejudice has some absolute gems in the repartee between Mr. Bennet and his wife.

Matt Groening, creator of "The Simpsons" (do you need any more evidence?) has a degree in Philosophy. No wonder Bart is so smart. PS - I think Bart's a nerd too.

Al Gore invented the internet and took global warming terror to a whole new level. Hmm, I don't know if nerd is quite the right word...

Any parent is worthy of taking on the nerd title. The mere fact that you thought it would be a good idea to give life to and take care of a child is a demonstration of an extreme lapse in judgement. That fact that you didn't kill that child the first time it woke you up in the middle of the night is further evidence of your nerdy intelligence that one day that child will pay for your retirement. Hats off to all parents. Wear your nerd badge with pride.

Jodie Foster has a Literature degree from Yale. If that isn't enough, she starred in "Contact." Yeah, she's a nerd.

So come out of the shadows, nerdlings. You have great company. The only rquirement to be a nerd is to elevate yourself above the common rabble and act like one.

Man's Search for iPod

I decided that I wanted to get my wife an iPod for Valentine's Day. I found out just before last Christmas that she'd like to have one, but I had already exceeded the strict limit that she places on my Christmas spending so that I won't do something ridiculous like buy her an iPod. Lucky for me, (and her) she forgot to put a limit on Valentine's Day. Knowing, as any nerd worth his salt does, that you can always find something online for less than retail, I began mid-January to search for an iPod. I quickly found that the cheapest place to get an iPod is eBay. The difficulty with eBay is that you have to read product descriptions very clearly to make sure that you are buying what you want to. On eBay, the title may say "Brand New!!! Apple iPod!!! Blue!!! Gen 3!!! 8MB!!!" What you are really buying is:

• An iPod knockoff
• Nothing, the seller is going to take your money and send you nothing
• A real iPod, but in a cheap plastic box with knockoff accessories and without those stylish yet oh so hard to keep in your ear white earbuds.
• What do you know! An actual new in the sealed box iPod

So I read the item descriptions carefully, selected my iPod with care, and... curse you eBay sniper! Repeat the process until you actually win an iPod. (This is where starting a month in advance seemed like a good idea)

The seller was listed with a Seattle zip code so I figured a week tops for shipping. After a week and a half and no iPod, I emailed the seller and asked where my iPod was. Some arm pulling ensued and he finally coughed up a tracking number. I was a little hesitant when I saw that my iPod had just cleared customs coming from China, but I reasoned, "iPods are made in China, right? Maybe he gets them for cheaper over there." When my package showed up three days later, I opened it to discover a chiPod (looks kinda like an iPod, smells vaguely like an iPod, but it isn't an iPod). There was no way I was falling for that. I emailed the seller who assured me that his supplier was to blame and that he would be more than happy to send me a real iPod. I sent his sorry excuse for Apple's finest back and again waited for my iPod. This was the week before Valentine's Day, and I started to get nervous. On February 12th, he sent me a refund and an apology - apparently, someone took offense to being sent a fake iPod (go figure) and complained via a Paypal dispute. His funds were frozen and this was all he could do.

I hopped on eBay again, because I needed an iPod fast. Putting all your Valentine's hearts in one basket is trouble if it gets replaced with a Chinese knockoff. I upped my bid to make sure I could get an iPod fast, thinking I could get it by Valentine's Day if I offered to sweeten the shipping. Valentine's Day came and went with no iPod. I thought for sure it would come soon and I could present it on Saturday, kind of a whole weekend celebration of Valentine's. On Saturday morning I got an email from eBay's loss prevention department. By Saturday night, I'd gotten another refund.

What choice was there now? Swearing off eBay for the fourth time didn't fix anything. I planned a month in advance and still came up empty handed on Valentine's Day. So I went to the apple store and paid full price. What did I get for that extra money? Well, for one thing, I actually got an iPod. I also got free shipping and engraving, real iPod accessories, and most of all, I got to celebrate Valentine's Day on February 28th and make up for missing it the first time around. Think she'll like it?

I think so too.

Of Kilometers and Light-Seconds

I happen to live in a place where the mile markers and freeway signs are in kilometers. No, it's not Britain, or even Canada. I think we were the victims of a plot by the US government to further the metric extremist agenda. (See sidebar -->) I think the signs are kind of fun. I'm so used to miles and MPH that measuring things in kilometers makes me feel like I'm going faster. Did you know that 75 MPH is 120KPH!? I only wish they had converted the speed limit signs too.

"Honestly officer, I thought it said 100 miles per hour."

While I was rocketing down the freeway today at the blazing speed of 130 KPH, I got to thinking about other measurement systems that we could impose upon the unknowing masses to cause mass-hysteria. Being of a nerdly sort, I thought about light speed and parsecs.

"But," I reasoned, "parsecs are much too large to be practical in everyday applications." Do you know how big one of those bad boys is? Google it, you'll be impressed at Han Solo's Kessel Run skills. Light-years are a bit unwieldy too, but light-seconds? Perfect!

It probably isn't safe to all of the other drivers for me to divert my concentration from such a mundane thing like staying within the lines to the higher order conversion of light seconds into real money, but I quickly emerged from my intellectual coma to exclaim,

"3.3 micro light seconds!"

My startled wife asked me what the heck I was talking about, while I marveled that she could be oblivious to the obvious train of my thoughts. I explained my previous musings to her and informed her that 1 kilometer was equal to 3.3 micro light seconds. She didn't look sufficiently impressed, so I started converting other distances to light seconds for her.

• I drive 215 micro light-seconds to work and back every day.
• It is 8 milli light-seconds from our house to my parents. (doesn't seem far enough, does it)
• It is 61 nano light-seconds from the computer to the fridge. (that's what I'm talking about!)

With this new system, nerds could brag about their cars in new and exciting ways:

"She'll do an 8 second micro light-second!"

"That's nothing. I got a new electric that'll do 0 to ten millionth of c in 4 seconds!"

The possibilities are endless! But how can we bring about this new world order? How can we force everyone to adapt to a new system? We'll need some measurement terrorists of our own. I know a guy in a Wookie costume who might help...

Ode to Starcraft

I love Starcraft. You might note and question the present tense. It isn't a mistake. I look forward to my wife having places to go when I'm home, as it gives me a chance to run to the computer and get my Starcraft fix. I haven't always had Starcraft in my life - ours has been a dysfunctional relationship.

I was first introduced to Blizzard's strategy franchise by way of Warcraft 2. Many a night was spent arguing with my brother over whose turn it was to play. I would even wake up at ungodly hours (the only time my parents would allow me to use the phone line) to play over direct dial up with a friend. When Starcraft came out, we begged and pleaded, and our parents got us a whole new addiction for Christmas.

Going away to college meant leaving Starcraft behind, but it also introduced me to another drug - high speed internet. When I found out that some friends of mine had copies of Starcraft, I participated in the age-old college tradition of mooching and used my new college smarts to navigate to battle.net. My friends and I didn't party in college, we played Starcraft, to the same effect.

Years went by. I got married. I graduated. I got a job. I remembered Starcraft. My youngest brother is more an Age of Empires player and when I asked about Starcraft he said, "That game? You can have it." I nearly cried.

I am a grown man, with a wife, children, a job, and a mortgage; and I still sneak off occasionally to play Starcraft. What has it brought me, you may ask? I owe many of my life's lessons to Starcraft. Let me name a few.

• It's never a good idea to talk smack in the game lobby before a match. That twelve year old kid is just going to embarrass you, and probably with just a few dragoons.
• Education is worth more to you when you pay for it yourself. (I attribute the loss of my full ride scholarship to the fact that I stopped studying and doing my homework during the second semester. The reason? You guessed it.)
• No matter how sophisticated and ordered your defenses, enough zerglings will bust right through them.

I thought for a while that I was surely the only person who still played the original Starcraft, but I have been gratified to find that not only are there still active Starcraft communities, but you can even still buy the game. C'mon, it's only ten bucks. You know you miss it too.

So what classics do you love? What throwbacks from the teenage years do you still indulge in? Hold your heads up high, because as pathetic as it might seem, you aren't the only nerd out there.