The Mosquito – kids can hear it, most adults can't

Ok, I’m a little late, almost 2 years late, but I just heard about this and think its really cool.  I read this article and this one is also good, and got curious, so from there, I came across this link which will let you download a tone generator with which you can generate your own custom tones and test your hearing abilities.  I tested myself and can hear up to 18Khz (18000.00Hz), but nothing over that.  So I should be able to hear the teenager mosquito ringtone just fine, which is around 17Khz.  I could hear all the sample sounds out there on the internet, and with the tone generator I mentioned, I found the limits of my hearing abilities.  Just a warning here that listening to these tones is annoying, its not a pleasant sound, and leaves a bit of a ringing in your ears.  I would advise moderation here when playing around with it.

Tags: audio, sounds, mosquito, frequency, tone

Liz's new phone

For the first time in our cell phone history, we were able to take advantage of a cell phone upgrade offer from Cingular. Liz’s line was now ellibible for a new cell phone upgrade. We went online and checked out the various models and both picked out the LG CU400. It was totally free aside from an $18 activation fee. Its a nice little phone, a bit thicker than the RAZR but had most of the same features and was actually lighter with more talk time. We’ve had some quality issues with her RAZR and the battery was going bad. So it was the perfect time for an upgrade. I received the package from Cingular yesterday and got it all charged and setup. When I got home from work she had me transfer her custom ringtone and display picture to the new phone. I was able to transfer all her contacts from her RAZR to her new 3G SIM and then put it back in the new phone and transferred the contacts from the SIM to the phone. I gave her a quick tutorial on how to use it and she was set. While the RAZR is a cool phone, it was time to make a change. My phone is elligible for an upgrade at the end of the month, I wonder if I’ll get to pickup a new device? 🙂

Star Trek

Over the last few days, Liz and I have been watching a few episodes of Star Trek Voyager here and there. We both love that series and decided to watch a few episodes. Well this seems to have triggered a desire in both of us to watch the whole series all the way through. But it didn’t stop there. Now we are talking about starting with Deep Space Nine and watching it all the way through first, then do Voyager and then re-watch all of the Next Generation again. Now this is no small task, as it will likely take us a full year to watch all the episodes. We ususally can get in 1 or 2 episodes a night if we stay up a little late. I have a feeling this year will be our most busy year ever, so I have a feeling it might take us a while. For those of you who might be reading this and rolling your eyes (you know who you are), you don’t know what your missing. Star Trek is a very optomistic view of what mankind could become and accomplish in a distant future. Its full of great writing, fantastic characters and good moral lessons. The different flavors of Star Trek are quite different from each other and offer a diverse view of the Star Trek world. One thing thats almost a constant in Star Trek, is that you can’t give up on it after just watching the first or second seasons. In my opinion, each Star Trek series didn’t really become exceptional until the 3rd or 4th seasons, some earlier, some later, but you can’t just watch the first few episodes and judge it. It takes time to develop the characters and catch up on the history of Star Trek to really appreciate it. Star Trek the Next Generation is one of my favorites, that show has some awesome stories and wonderful characters. Voyager was hard for some people to take, because it had a female captain, but if you give it a chance and get into the 2rd and 4th season, you’ll see its a fantastic series. Deep Space Nine was the most like a soap opera, simply because it was always in the same place (usually), on a space station. It had a lof of drama, and some strange alien religious overtones, but the stories are great, the characters are great and its a great addition to the Star Trek world. I especially like the episodes with James Darren in them, since I like him anyway, he made a great addition to the end of the series. So give it a chance, if its on TV don’t just turn it off because you “don’t like it”, give it a chance and you’ll find its inspiring and optomistic and really a great piece of Science Fiction.