Ryan Byrd’s Ramblings

People are always forwarding me lists of “funny pics” and well, occasionally, a few of them are funny. I’ve thrown some of the better ones into a gallery for you. Enjoy.

Loyal RBDN fans know about these funny billboards and pics too.

Well, my eastern perambulations are coming rapidly to a close. In the final analysis, over a thousand miles were driven and hundred of photos and nearly six hours of film was taken. I’m excited and exhausted, all at once. I’m glad we’re done, but I found the process thrilling. Here are a few of today’s pictures. Enjoy!

Today we met up with my oldest brother and his family and headed down to an old park we used to visit growing up– remind me to tell you about a race experience I had there once (it involves bullying and a brier patch and a rare photo.) Then we hit up a famous soft-serve ice cream joint– Jimmie Cone. Absolutely fabulous.

And so I arrived this morning in D.C. at 7am. On the way here I took a few photos on the plane and throughout the day, traveling in Virginia and Maryland, I snapped away. The sky is so big here and without the smoginess I’m accustomed to in Utah, it seems much, much brighter. So enjoy… Any favorites?

And so I find myself once again, forced to flee my hometown. Okay, not forced per se, but maybe compelled by a flareup of wanderlust? Whatever the cause, I’m currently sitting in the SLC Airport A terminal, right outside of gate A7, watching people excitedly queue up to get jammed into a sorry excuse for a flying bus. I’ve previously spoken about Southwest and their policy to treat people like livestock. I once even gave tips on how airlines could further mistreat passengers. Today I’m flying JetBlue. JetBlue used to be pretty nifty, what with all their Mormon mom telephone agents. Then they accidentally imprisoned people on an airplane on the tarmac, for, I donno, like a week or so. Then they canceled a ton of flights and now everyone hates them. Even if they do have free in-flight television. Question– when do we get in-flight Internet access? It’s really hard to live without the web, ya know?

When I went to the Ivory Coast, we were VIP and that meant we didn’t have to pass though the airport security (because VIPs never pose threats.) I’m obviously not very important to the Salt Lake International airport, because not only did I have to clear security, they scanned my bags twice. Here’s a new motto for the airline industry; we constantly strive to  make a bad things much, much worse. Don’t get me wrong, it’s very amusing to bathe in the sweet sock stench as the masses uncover their largely misshapen feet and unbelt themselves. It’s curious to think of the geniuses who decided to ban most liquids (state of matter discrimination!) I wonder, too, why they extended the liquid ban to include things which clearly are not liquid– like gels (colloids), pastes, etc. I’d like to know from that same committee of expert security decision makers if it’s okay to bring a bottle of frozen water on board. Frozen water is no longer liquid, after all. Somehow, that nuance I think would be lost on those luminaries. But maybe I’m stirring the pot too much. Troublemakers (and those wearing turbans) get singled out for special consideration (ie, “the wand”, and Mr “I’m going to pat down your private areas with the back of my hand.”)

But here I am, waiting. Not accepting packages from strangers. Not allowing my bags out of sight. anticipating the not-hot stewardesses as they energetically demonstrating the proper workings of a seatbelt (so that’s what that metal buckle does!) Up, up and away!

Flying tip of the day: don’t pack it. You can alway buy there it if you really need it.

Did I resize this blog pic online? yes.

Annually, an exclusive crowd of forward-thinking smart people get together to chat about big ideas and to present themselves prizes. The conference is called TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) and if you missed it, don’t worry. It’s by invitation only and even if you did get an invite, you’d still have to fork over a few thousand dollars for the privilege of attending. It might sound like a pompous clique of scam artists, but actually, the presentations, or at least the ones they release, are pretty amazing. The lectures cover a broad set of topics including science, arts, design, politics, global issues, architecture, and music. Over 200 TED talks are provided for viewing online. Are you watching them? You should be.

A few good ones:

• Crow Vending Machines
• What’s Wrong With What We Eat
• How the Mind Works
• Open Source Economics

I’ve received a fair number of comments from people about my awesome mustache, a disproportionate number of whom were blithely unaware that I am wearing it in support of Mustache May; a time of year where men (women?) everywhere celebrate the majesty of upper lip facial hair. Mustaches are not without their detractors. Back in March of ‘07 a sinister and short-lived blog run by someone who called himself the switchblade physician, had these negative comments about my friends:

Among my favorite T-shirt slogans is the one which reads “Guns don’t kill people. People with moustaches kill people.” The funniest thing about it is that I think that there just might be some truth to the statement. My cursory study of a recent police blotter (with pictures) found that 67% of criminals (fugitives and captures) had facial hair sufficient enough to meet criteria for a moustache. I’m too tired to apply the statistics here, but I think that this finding is significant. The best way to flesh out the issue, of course, would be to follow age and sex-matched (that’s really funny) cleanshaven and hirsute cohorts over time (ten years or so; a so-called prospective cohort study) and see if there’s a criminality difference between the groups.I’m also pretty sure that smoking cigarettes is positively correlated with criminal behavior. I haven’t seen any studies, though. I wouldn’t anticipate a causative pathway linking tobacco abuse and crime, just a correlation (that is, smoking cigarettes is simply indicative of certain personality traits more prevalent in criminal populations). What’s interesting too is that cigarette smokers tend to have better short term memories than nonsmokers. This is perhaps due to the nicotine in cigarettes stimulating so-called nicotinergic acetycholine receptors in the hippocampus. I know, it’s comforting hearing that the chainsmoker sitting next to you is not only a criminal, but can also most likely beat you at chess. The recipe for a true sociopath, then, is facial hair and tobacco. Not to sound the alarm or anything, but I’d recommend putting out an all points bulletin right now for all mustachioed cigarette smokers out there. For brevity’s sake, we’ll call them the moustachioso.

• Wikipedia’s Take on Mustaches
• American Mustache Institute
• Mustache May

Believe it or not, I got a bunch of emails from people who’ve enjoyed the last two monthly photo rambling posts– April Photo Ramblings and March Photo Ramblings. And so I present May’s Photo Ramblings. Any favorites?

As part of my continued commitment to the betterment of the environment, I now drive a scooter (a two-wheeled motorized vehicle with a step-through frame.)

Advantages of a scooter

• Real babe magnet
• Great fuel economy– 100MPG (110 with optional cold air intake)
• Inexpensive ($850 with helmet and year warranty)
• Easy to use (no gears, just a throttle and a brake)
• Better parking — use motorcycle parking or bicycle parking
• Great for giving rides to attractive people
• Convenient for inner-city travel– speeds up to 65MPH
• “Scooterists are a brotherhood and sisterhood of like minded people.”
• Lane splitting is legal in many areas
• Scooters are basically two-wheeled convertibles