racing to the red light

So today we’ve got a few things from various places. First up is a video entry featuring two very skilled, fairly fearless and frankly hubrisric young ladies hauling ass down a beautiful, sweeping road in the countryside someplace, on longboard skateboards.

As incredible a display of balance, line selection, and nerve as this is, all it would take is one errant bit of gravel on the road to cause either of these gals a trip to the hospital for skin grafts. Tale it from a motorcyclist, that is way too much exposed skin (although I’m sure the guys won’t mind too much).

Next up is another video entry, if I can get it to post right. This is about a man named Daniel Suelo in Utah who has decided to “quit money.” 

People who know me well know that this is a concept that appeals to me on different levels for different reasons. I can’t say that I would be willing to try it – at least not under my current life circumstances – but it is refreshing to read about a guy who really has done it.

http://player.vimeo.com/video/40669770

Click here for the video

A book was written about him, which I just ordered. I will report back on the book once I have read it.

In the meantime, Boing Boing ran an article about them (thanks BB!), and he also writes a blog from the library near the cave where he lives. True story!

Finally, linked from PhysOrg.com, a piece about how analytical thinking leads to more secular tendencies – funny how that works, right?  This, I am sure, is part of the anti-intellectualism that pervades the conservative thinking in this country, manifest particularly in the assertion that higher education is “anti-religion”.

http://medicalxpress.com/news/2012-04-analytic-decrease-religious-belief.html