Supposedly it will still be sold for a few more months, and the one lab in the world that still processes it has promised to keep processing it through the end of next year. After that, no more.

Kodachrome is an amazing film. I've only shot a few rolls of it; I saw this announcement coming and figured I had better experience it while I could. In some ways I wish I hadn't, because I absolutely fell in love with the film. It got me to start shooting with better cameras than the toy cameras I've been playing with for the past several years. It's a picky film; it absolutely wants to be properly exposed, and loves bright sunlight. It's not so crazy about the shadows, not in my limited experience. When you get it right, the colors are astonishing.

This is probably my favorite out of the few rolls of Kodachrome I've shot. I took this in Reynoldsburg, Ohio, back in February, with my dad's old Kodak Retina Ia. I love it because it looks like it could have been shot for a postcard from 40 years ago, the kind that shows up in books like Boring Postcards, at least until you look a little more closely at the cars in the background.

Unlike some of the people mourning the impending death of Kodachrome, I don't have a lot of history with it. I've really only shot a few rolls of it. But wow, am I going to miss it. I'm glad I got to shoot some while I could.

I know film is a business, and nowhere near the size of the business it used to be. I know Kodachrome is a niche product. I know the process of developing Kodachrome is horribly toxic, something that has driven all but one photo lab in the world to stop processing it. But the colors....

Tags: kodachrome

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I've been seeing that yellow line and my feet a lot lately. This is the train station where I catch the train to work. This is my third weekend in a row working on a project. Until today, it was feeling like it might never end, but we made a lot of progress, and now I can say the end is in sight, instead of feeling that the end is near.

That's one reason why this is my first blog post this month, in the evening of the last day of the month. Bleah.

Tags: work commute train

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April 9 is CSS Naked Day, where standards-aware web developers drop their CSS to show the beauty of their semantically marked up pages. It's like one of those charity calendars or something.

Tags: css naked

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I love being able to tell people about what Laura does for a living. Say the magic words "my wife breaks in to computers for a living," and eyes get wide. My wife is a white hat hacker.

Her interest in technology probably manifested itself first in high school when she got her ham radio license. She's maintained it all these years, although it's been a long time since she was active (okay, she was never all that active). No doubt that had something to do with her being accepted into one of the toughest and most prestigious colleges in the country, Cooper Union. She received her Bachelors in Engineering (BEng) in Electrical Engineering.

After receiving her degree, she started work designing and implementing turnkey solutions for a piece of electrical test equipment. From there, she moved through a variety of jobs, including working as a C programmer and programming SAP solutions. That's what she was doing when we started dating. From there, she moved into security, where she has performed a number of functions. For the last several years, she has been part of a Tiger Team, specializing in penetration testing for her company and outside clients. In the middle of all this, she managed to study for a masters degree via telelearning and received a M.S. in Telecommunications from Southern Methodist University without ever travelling to their campus in Dallas.

Laura has been on the net since the mid 1980s. We first met online in 1990, and started dating in 1995. I couldn't be prouder of her, and I love having a partner I can discuss technology with.

Tags: laura technology engineer AdaLovelaceDay09

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Dr. Eleanor Baum has been Dean of the Albert Nerken School of Engineering of The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art since 1987. She was the first female dean of engineering in the U.S. in 1984 when appointed to that post at Pratt Institute and the first female president of the American Society for Engineering Education.

In addition to being the Dean of Engineering at Cooper, she also sits on the Board of Directors of a couple of companies and works as an engineering consultant. Her list of accomplishments is amazing.

But this short biography with a big list of accomplishments doesn't give you a sense of who she is. Here are some words I would use to describe her: Nice. Friendly. Approachable. Tough when she needs to be.

For at least as long as she's been an engineering school dean, and I suspect a lot longer than that, she has been a tireless promoter of getting more women and minorities to enter the engineering field.

Her life story, including the story of how she came to be a female engineer in the 1950s, is fascinating.

Although I graduated with an engineering degree from The Cooper Union, it was unfortunately a few years before Dr. Baum became the Dean! I only had the occasion to meet her once. It was 1990 and I was plunked on to my company's Engineer's Week committee as a last minute replacement. I was told that my responsibility was to quickly find a speaker. I immediately thought it would be a great idea to have Dr. Baum speak about recruiting more women into the engineering field. She graciously agreed to speak. I just can't tell you how wonderful it was to meet her in person and to hear her speak so convincingly to an audience of mostly men about the need for more women and minorities in the engineering field.

Who knows how many people have been influenced by hearing this wonderful woman speak? The engineer in me wishes there were some figures or statistics I could quote. "Nine out of ten young girls surveyed now believe an engineering career is possible for them." "Five thousand high school girls decided to major in engineering because of Dr. Baum." But as far as I know there are no statistics available, so I'll just have to go with the warm fuzzy feeling that this woman has touched a countless number of lives!

Tags: AdaLovelaceDay09 engineering cooper union eleanor baum guest post

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Pure form. Real Gone. Like wild. Good vibe. via dULLblog.

Tags: pylon randybewley death music

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An elderly man in Washington, DC, walks by the White House each day. On January 21, he approaches one of the Marine guards in front of the White House and asks if this is where President Bush lives.

The Marine replies, "Mr. Bush is no longer President. He doesn't live here any more. President Barack Obama lives here now."

The following day, the man returns. He asks the same Marine the same question, and gets the same reply: "Mr. Bush is no longer President. He doesn't live here any more. President Barack Obama lives here now."

The third day, he returns and asks his question yet again. The Marine replies, "Sir, I have explained to you yesterday and the day before. Mr. Bush is no longer President. He doesn't live here any more."

"I know," says the man. "I just love hearing it."

The Marine smiles. "Same time tomorrow, sir?"

Tags: inauguration president obama bush

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Why do I mention this? Because with the economy in the doldrums, Shelley's looking for work, either writing or helping build sites. Check out her "hire me" page.

Tags: shelleypowers job work recession

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Tags: "new york" "newspaper box" sign blogging

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It's a new day.

Tags: fela kuti barack obama president

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