Prohibited and allowed items for flying

(via LifeHacker)

If you will be flying in the near future, you should probably check the TSA guidelines for permitted and prohibitted items on flights.

Due to enhanced security measures liquids, gels, lotions and other items of similar consistency will not be permitted in carry-on baggage. These types of items must be packed in your checked baggage.

Additionally, liquids, gels and lotions purchased beyond the checkpoint but must be disposed of before boarding the aircraft.

To ensure the health and welfare of certain air travelers the following items are permitted.

  • Small amounts of Baby formula and breast milk if a baby or small child is traveling
  • Liquid prescription medicine with a name that matches the passenger’s ticket
  • Up to 5 oz. (148ml) of liquid or gel low blood sugar treatment
  • Up to 4 oz. of essential non-prescription liquid medications including saline solution, eye care products and KY jelly
  • Gel-filled bras and similar prostethics
  • Gel-filled wheelchair cushions
  • Life support and life sustaining liquids such as bone marrow, blood products, and transplant organs carried for medical reasons

You are permitted to bring solid cosmetics and personal hygiene items as such lipstick, lip balm and similar solids. Please remember these items must be solid and not liquid, gel or aerosol.

Please keep in mind, that while we can not provide an exhaustive list of items covering all eventualities, all liquids, gels, or aerosols of any kind are prohibited at security checkpoints, in airport sterile areas, and aboard aircraft. You can pack these items in your checked baggage.

I think my stance on this is well known.  I will leave it at my request for balance in spending and restrictions.  You can read my other posts for more details.  This is just something of a public service message, providing you information on how to find out more.
Note that the TSA page does not directly address the question of snakes on this page.  So if you have some snakes you want to have travel with you, it might be wise to call ahead and see if you are allowed to have them on the plane.

[tags]TSA permitted and prohibited liquids guide, Snakes on a plane[/tags]

IBM to buy ISS – $1.3 billion in cash

Having worked in computer security in the past, I like to know what’s going on in the security community in case I manage to get a job back in that industry.  So when I read that IBM is buying Internet Security Systems, Inc. for $1.3 billion in cash, I figured I should post about it, in case either of my readers like to keep up with these things and haven’t heard yet.  The article comes from an Australian paper, so I don’t know if that cost is in Australian or US dollars, but I’m guessing it’s US dollars.

With revenue growth sluggish at IBM Corp., Big Blue is buying its way to getting bigger.

The company’s recent acquisition roll continued Wednesday with a deal to spend $1.3 billion in cash for Internet Security Systems Inc., which performs network monitoring and analysis services for companies.

The deal values ISS at $28 a share, almost an 8 percent premium over its $26 closing price Tuesday on the Nasdaq Stock Market. If the acquisition is approved by shareholders, the companies expect it to close in the fourth quarter.

[tags]IBM, ISS, Internet Security Systems Inc., IBM buys ISS, Security news[/tags]

Dan Gilmor’s comment on the Floyd Landis Tour de France drug uproar

I agree with Dan here – I don’t care if athletes are using drugs.

But for the cycling world, Thursday’s announcement was a measure of achievement. Cycling is doing more to test its biggest stars at its biggest event than most other professional sports. The depressing news of Landis’ drug test is a reminder that the entire professional sports world should be doing more to catch cheaters.

The real story here is not what our media watchdogs and sports authorities say. It’s blatant, gross hypocrisy.

Right now I’m using a performance-enhancing drug, which I need to function well. It’s called caffeine, and is part of the coffee I drink each morning.

Later I’ll use a drug that helps me relax. It’s called alcohol, and it comes in the wine I’ll drink with dinner.

Drug laws are insane enough. Sports drug bans are beyond hypocritical, because they punish one kind of enhancement while pretending that all others are okay.

I don’t care at all if professional athletes use drugs. They have already been modified in all kinds of other ways — such as diets, blatantly unhealthy, that turn pro football linemen into people the size of large refrigerators.

As I said, I agree with him. I’m not bothered by professional athletes taking drugs and I’m not been bothered by college athletes getting paid. People complain that this will result in the biggest colleges always having the best athletic programs, but why is it so wrong for colleges when pro sports have it (NY Yankees, anyone)?

[tags]Dan Gillmor on Tour de France drug ruckus, Athletes and drugs – so what?[/tags]

Teach yourself hypnosis

More from the wonderful world of the scientific past that is the Modern Mechanix blog. With this, we can learn how to hypnotize without detection.

STARTLING SECRETS TEACH YOU DISGUISED HYPNOSIS

CAUSE TRANCE WITHOUT SUBJECTS KNOWING!

Revealing manuscript tells jealously guarded secret techniques used to cause the “Indirect Trance”. Read how sub jects are hypnotized without their knowledge. Learn amazing shortcuts that make hypnosis fast and easy. Discover the safe *”fake nerve pressure” technique… the “falling back” test and many others. Read how the author hypnotizes a roomful of people without their knowledge — using a common household cooking ingredient. This is so dramatic and effective it is worth the low price of the book alone. But that’s not all. order now and get these FREE EXTRAS The fun packed book “Entertaining with Hypnosis” and a clever Hypnotic “Trance-Fer” chart. This exclusive aid helps you cause the “Indirect Trance”. All come to you in a plain wrapper $1.98

10 DAY MONEY BACK GUARANTEE
ALLIED-AIDS, Dept. D-136, 95 Madison Awe., N.Y.C. 16

If I’m not mistaken, this book is available used at Amazon.  That information just in case the company doesn’t respond to you when you send in the ad and your money.
[tags]Learn hypnosis, Disguised hypnosis[/tags]

The latest laser news

(via Engadget)
A co-worker pointed this out to me, as I missed it when perusing my Engadget news for the day – UC, San Diego researchers have come up with an improved method for finding flaws in tracks using lasers.

A team led by UCSD structural engineering professor Francesco Lanza di Scalea describes in the Aug. 22 issue of the Journal of Sound and Vibration a defect-detection technique that uses laser beam pulses to gently “tap” on steel rails. Each laser tap sends ultrasonic waves traveling 1,800 miles per second along the steel rails. Downward facing microphones are positioned a few inches above the rail and 12 inches from the downward pointed laser beam. As the prototype vehicle rolls down the test track delivering laser beams taps at one-foot intervals, the microphones detect any telltale reductions in the strength of the ultrasonic signals, pinpointing surface cuts, internal cracks, and other defects.

And let me just say, I find it freaky cool that there is even a scientific journal called Journal of Sound and Vibration. So naturally, I had to go look it up – here’s the skinny on the journal. Sadly, it appears subscriptions are roughly $1750 for 50 issues. That puts it slightly out of my price range.  Understand, I have no use for the journal, but I thrive on highly specialized knowledge that has no applicability to my daily life.
The article online does not mention specifically if the technology is based purely on lasers, or if there are any frikkin’ sharks involved in building the detector.

[tags]Lasers used in detecting train track flaws, Frikkin’ sharks possibly help find train track flaws[/tags]

New Wii games, pink DS Lite announced

Again with the pink console thing.  I get liking pink, but why all the pink consoles?  That’s the thing I don’t get.  Regardless, Nintendo has announced more games for the Wii as well as announcing a pink DS Lite for Europe on October 27th.  What still has not been announced is a price.

Nintendo announced a new Mario sports title for the Wii, called Mario Strikers Charged (working title). The sequel to Super Mario Strikers is likely to make full use of the Wii controller–the game is playable at Leipzig, and GameSpot will bring you more information as soon as we can. German footballer Philipp Lahm was featured in a video to promote the game, and it was demonstrated on stage by a Germany TV star.

Battalion Wars 2 for the Wii was also announced and will be playable on Nintendo’s stand at Leipzig. Very few details of the game have been released, although Nintendo did say that it was abbreviated to BWii. The original Battalion Wars was released on the GameCube in late 2005.

[tags]Nintendo, Wii, Nintendo Wii, Battalion Wars 2, Mario Strikers Charged[/tags]

Ancient ad gives sound advice

When I first saw this March 1940 advertisement from Popular Science magazine over on the Modern Mechanix blog, I thought it was a foreshadowing of my view of self. Then I realized it’s an ad concerning fire insurance. The thing is, the words of the ad (after the smart/dumb part) are still true today.

“For A Smart Man I’m Pretty Dumb”

“I never realized this until too late—every fire insurance policy states that a complete list of destroyed and damaged property must be supplied before insurance can be paid. I had insurance, but the fire we had caught me way off base. It’s too late now to make a complete list for insurance settlement.

“It would have been easy for me or my wife to make that list before we had a fire. There’s even a helpful booklet that lists things, room by room, and helps you remember articles that you might forget. The book is free. I . hope other families will be smarter than we were and get one of these books before it’s too late!”

MAIL THE COUPON
THE AMERICAN INSURANCE GROUP (Dept. 1119)
15 Washington St. Newark, N. J.

Without charge or obligation, please send me your Household Inventory Booklet.

[tags]Modern Mechanix, Insurance advice, For a smart man I’m pretty dumb[/tags]

Nation of fear

Salon has a good article about how the country has changed since 9/11. I’ve commented many times to many people that I think we have too much fear-based policy since the attacks, and not enough thought-based policy which is needed. The folks at Salon have said that and so much more in their article titled “Cityscape of Fear.”

Aug. 22, 2006 | Within a week after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, officials at New York’s Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts set up a half dozen massive concrete freeway separators in a stately line across Josie Robertson Plaza, the complex’s main outdoor entryway. The security barricades, unsightly white slabs known as Jersey barriers, were intended to protect the center’s performance halls from a speeding truck bomb. Perhaps only the most unusually cultured of terrorists would want to hit Lincoln Center, which sits five miles north of ground zero on the Upper West Side of Manhattan — but in the tense aftermath of the attacks, no precaution seemed too much. Lincoln Center groundskeepers thoughtfully topped the Jersey barriers with colorful potted plants, a rehabilitation technique along the lines of pinning a tiara on Medusa. Almost five years have passed since the attacks. The barriers remain in place.

To appreciate how America has changed since 9/11, walk slowly through any major city. What you’ll see dotting the landscape is the physical embodiment of fear. Security installations put up after the attacks continue to block public access and wrangle pedestrian traffic. Outside Manhattan’s Port Authority Bus Terminal, garish purple planters menace rush-hour pedestrian traffic. The gigantic planters have abandoned all horticultural ambition, many of them blooming with nothing more than trash and untilled dirt. “French barriers,” steel-grate barricades meant for controlling crowds, ring many landmark sites — including San Francisco’s Transamerica Building — like beefy bodyguards protecting starlets. Then there are the bollards, the cylindrical vehicle-blocking posts that are so pervasive you wonder if they’ve mastered asexual reproduction. In Washington, bollards surround everything. Not since Confederate Gen. Jubal Early attacked the city in 1864 has the nation’s capital felt so under siege.

Read more about what we are losing by letting fear run our lives and determine how we act. It’s a long article, but well worth the time it takes to read it. Terrorists win by spreading terror. They don’t win because they destroy some buildings or kill some people. They win because they change how we live and make us scared to live well. Don’t let the terrorists win. Stop fearing what they might do.

[tags]Cityscape of fear, How fear affects the nation[/tags]