Wednesday 17 September 2008

Was called "a parrot on the keyboard". Don't know to take it as a compliment or no. Come to think of it, parrots and pirates are very alike. Parrots copy others. Modern pirates copy other people's work. Pirate, parrot, parrot, pirate. I wonder if they have the same etymology...

"Being in a relationship is not about finding a match but working through the differences." That came from the least likely of people. It made me wonder why I didn't think of that before.

Wednesday 10 September 2008

Human electricity

I've been thinking seriously about generating electricity using student
(and faculty) muscle power. Our kids spend hours in the exercise rooms pushing,
pulling, pedaling, lifting, running on a belt, etc. Why shouldn't all of these
machines generate electricity for the University? I bet it would be substantial.
They could start by powering the gym, and then see what's left over for other
purposes. It might also be useful to teach them the value of the electricity we
waste!

Along these lines, I've hired two UG students to make stationary bike
electric generators from old used broken bikes. They will be starting soon. It
can be done with a battery, or better still, without one, so people at home can
just connect their generator-bike to an appliance they want to use. Then there's
no pollution from batteries!

I think there's great promise: everyone will want to BENEFIT (besides making muscle) from all the exercise they do! And no one will mind being used to generate energy if they are building their muscle AND helping the world solve its second most important problem!!!
What do you think?

~ From a certain professor of mine