Yippee I'm back.  Yesterday was yet another _l_o_n_g_ day, starting in Portland and featuring a couple of interesting customer visits (and a visit to my next bike!), and ending back here late, but today I was able to relax at home and get a little "real" work done.

Oh, and psyching up for a big weekend: the finale to the Tour of California (yeah, I rode Rockstore today :), and Megan's party...  meanwhile it's all happening...

Wow!  Craig Venter creates synthetic life form.  "J. Craig Venter and his team at J.C Venter Institute announced the creation of a cell controlled by a synthetic genome in a paper published in SCIENCE. As science historian George Dyson points out, 'from the point of view of technology, a code generated within a digital computer is now self-replicating as the genome of a line of living cells. From the point of view of biology, a code generated by a living organism has been translated into a digital representation for replication, editing, and transmission to other cells.'"  Venter is amazing; while everyone is talking about doing stuff like this, he is doing it.  Wow. 

Late for hair appointment, 72-year-old woman drove 102 mph.  That's happened to me too.  Well, not the hair appointment part, but the late part, and then the driving too fast part.  Whew. 

Yesterday Peter Sagan won ATOC stage 5, and Michael Rogers took over the GC lead.  And Lance crashed out, sigh, after having to answer all those questions raised by Floyd Landis, not a great day for him.  Then today in the "queen stage" up to Big Bear, Peter Sagan won again!  And the GC remained relatively unchanged, with Michael Rogers, Dave Zabriske, and Levi Leipheimer still in the mix.  Tomorrow's ITT in download L.A. will prove decisive... 

So: Is the next Prius going to be a Tesla?  As Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, announces a new partnership with Toyota...  the state of California is in the mix, too.  Wow, good PR for both companies, and maybe it means we will have all-electric Toyotas someday too.  (Keep in mind hybrids are gasoline-powered cars, Tesla are the only ones making electric-powered cars right now...) 

Meanwhile: Small nuclear reactors under development.  "Several start-up and existing companies are developing smaller sized nuclear reactors. While utility-scale reactors cost about $2.3 billion apiece and produce 1.2 gigawatts of power, Hyperion's price tag is $50 million for a 25-megawatt reactor more comparable to a diesel generators or wind farms."  This is very cool, but they're still not quite in range to power cars :) 

Excellent news: Shrek returns to form.  "This may be the final installment of 'Shrek,' the franchise, but Shrek, the ogre, is having a midlife crisis. Screaming children, cake gone wrong, and that pathetic, gnawing feeling that, wait, didn't I used to be cooler than this? Oh, Shrek, we feel you."  A must see! 

From Inhabitat: gorgeous shipping container art studio.  Wow, how cool is that? 

Big news from Google I/O, as their competitive assault on Apple continued with the announcement of Google TV.  MG Siegler gives a great overview of the rivalry including an analogy to Lost which left me, a non-Lost-watcher, feeling rather lost...  (I gather the last episode of Lost is this weekend, and is a biggish deal.)  Whether the analogy is apt I cannot say but certainly the rivalry is interesting and fruitful for consumers... 

Apropos: Daniel Lyons switches from iPhone to Android.

Also related: The 'I'm a PC, and I'm a Mac' campaign is over.  Why?  Because the competition that matters to Apple isn't Mac vs. PC, it's iPhone vs Android.

Microsoft seems to be a non-player in the smartphone world.  Maybe they're too busy modeling the world...

Eric Raymond with a new music update, and I find myself agreeing with 100% of it, including Pandora, Porcupine Tree, Planet X, Dream Theater, and Spock's Beard.  Back to Pandora for me! 

Oh, and courtesy of LGF, Tom Petty's latest: I should have known it.  Indeed. 

ZooBorns of the week: baby otters!