The Great Geek Manual

1787
Clause 8 of Article I, Section 8 of the United States Constitution governing copyrights and patents is adopted by the constitutional convention.

1831
Charles Darwin first meets Captain Robert Fitzroy, commander of HMS Beagle, who will be his cabinmate on the historic five-year expedition during which Darwin will visit the Galapogos Islands.

1857
Charles Darwin sends a letter to Harvard botanist Asa Gray, discussing his theory of evolution. The encouragement that Darwin will receive from Gray and other colleges will prompt him to finally publish his theory after twenty years of indecision.
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The purpose of a storyteller is not to tell you how to think, but to give you questions to think upon. Too often, we forget that.

- The Way of Kings by Brandon Sanderson, 2010.

So, a few weeks back, I received an advance review copy of The Calculus Diaries by Jennifer Ouellette on my doorstep out of the blue.

My first though was “Who is this woman was, and why is she sending calculus texts to my door?” Followed closely by “What did I ever do to her?” I mean, I’m pretty sure that if Jennifer Ouellette received a box full of something frightening like, say snakes, out of the blue from me, there would probably be handcuffs involved at some point down the line. Mind you, these would have to be very dull snakes for the calculus metaphor to work – maybe just some very menacing worms, but there’s a principal involved here. Civilized people just do not menace other civilized people with calculus. We save that for savages and school children. It’s in the Geneva convention.

As it turns out, the book was pretty good, once I got past the “calculus” in the title. As to who this Jennifer Ouellette is and why she sends math homework to innocent bloggers, it turns out that Penguin included an interview for reviewers to excerpt. After browsing through it, I thought I’d share a bit here.
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1882
Thomas Edison supplies electricity to the first customers of the Edison Illuminating Company at 257 Pearl Street in New York City. Edison inaugurates its operation by pulling a switch on the Wall Street office of his primary financial backer. The station’s “Jumbo No. 1″ generator is a direct-current steam-powered dynamo. It can power about seven hundred sixteen candlepower lamps. Within fourteen months, this first power station serves 508 subscribers and powers 12,732 bulbs.

The New York Times becomes the first newspaper to use the electricity generated by the Edison Illuminating Company. The paper uses the electricity to power twenty-seven lamps in the editorial room and twenty-five lamps in the counting room. The following day, the paper will run an article reporting that its employees unanimously prefer the light provided by the carbon-filament lamp over the building’s former gas lighting.
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Both the revolutionary and the creative individual are perpetual juveniles. The revolutionary does not grow up because he cannot grow, while the creative individual cannot grow up because he keeps growing.

- Reflections on the Human Condition by Eric Hoffer, 1973.

Art

• The Geek Art Gallery offers a picture of a Serenity Only Parking Sign.
• Steampunk Mr. Potato Head
• Steve Thomas is selling these Lord of the Rings-inspired sports logos on Zazzle.
• Wired profiles the stunning Vintage Circuit Board Furniture of Theo Kameck.

Comics

• 20 Facts about Marvel Comics Facts, an Infographic.

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Utilities

• Clavier+ – this handy utility allows users to create keyboard shortcuts using any key combination, including the Windows key. The shortcuts can be used to launch programs or paste in frequently used text.
• Google Code University – a collection of tutorials on languages like Python, Java and Go for relative beginners.
• Mappiness – a free iPhone app that allows you to keep track of your happiness. It’s also a research tool for London School of Economics scholars Susana Mourato and George MacKerron, who are using it to learn “how people’s feelings are affected by features of their current environment—things like air pollution, noise, and green spaces.”
• Photovisi – a free and easy to use online tool to create photo collages. Select one of the many collage templates, add your photos and then customize by dragging items around.

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I’ve never owned a thousand dollar book and I seriously doubt that I ever will, but this is what one looks like. This is Knowing Darkness: Artists Inspired by Stephen King. The deluxe edition measures 11 x 15 inches, has 448 pages and over 500 illustrations, including 30 double-page foldouts. It’s listed for just under $1,000 on Amazon.
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