October 2004

Here are some of the [165 photos that I took](http://eecue.com/images_archive/eecue-album-823-1-ncrc_eecue_2004.html) at the National Cave Rescue Commission Traning...

A TV set in Oregon [broadcasted a strong enough signal to send searchers to a man's apartment](http://www.cnn.com/2004/SHOWBIZ/TV/10/18/odd.television.reut/). > > "They'd never seen signal come that strong from a home appliance," said van Rossmann. "They were quite surprised. I think we all were." > > > Authorities had expected to find a boat or small plane with a malfunctioning transponder, the usual culprit in such incidents, emitting the 121.5 MHz frequency of the distress signal used internationally. > > > (Via [rhianblock](http://www.rhianblock.com/archives/000048.aspx).)

A TV set in Oregon [broadcasted a strong enough signal to send searchers to a man's apartment](http://www.cnn.com/2004/SHOWBIZ/TV/10/18/odd.television.reut/). > > "They'd never seen signal come that strong from a home appliance," said van Rossmann. "They were quite surprised. I think we all were." > > > Authorities had expected to find a boat or small plane with a malfunctioning transponder, the usual culprit in such incidents, emitting the 121.5 MHz frequency of the distress signal used internationally. > > > (Via [rhianblock](http://www.rhianblock.com/archives/000048.aspx).)

I was reading a [related trackback](http://xrlq.com/archives/2004/10/01/1913/arnold-drinks-the-gator-aid/) for new the spyware law. And I found out that the bill was sponsored by [Claria](http://www.claria.com/), the company formerly known as [Gator](http://simplythebest.net/info/spyware/gator_spyware.html)... here is [what I found](http://netrn.net/spywareblog/archives/2004/09/30/anti-spyware-law-signed-in-california/trackback/).

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I just got back from Sonora, California after a fun weekend of caving and partying at the [NSS](http://www.caves.org/) [Western Regional](http://www.caves.org/grotto/diablo/westernregional2004/). It is an annual meeting of all the grottos on the west coast... mostly from California. I had a great time and met some really cool people. I took a bunch of pictures from our trip to Crystal Palace cave. The gallery can be [found here](http://23b.org/gallery/nss_western_regional_04/) in its entirety.

The govinator has signed into law [several tech related bills](http://www.socallawblog.com/archives/001840.html) that are great moves in the fight against spam and spyware. First of all is the law that bans the installation of spyware on computers and secondly the law that makes the senders of spam [liable for $1000 per email sent](http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/news/archive/2004/10/01/financial1658EDT0108.DTL) that doesn't include the email address and contact info of the sender. Who wants to join with me and become spam bounty hunters? (Via [topix los angeles](http://www.topix.net/city/los-angeles-ca).)

I've been tracking us on our trip using my [Rhino](http://www.garmin.com/products/rino/), which is a cool FRS/GPS radio from [Garmin](http://www.garmin.com/). It's quite cool, as it allows you to broadcast your location to your friends who also have Rhinos. You then show up on a little map on the screen of the radio. It is also working well to give my G4 laptop a GPS fix so the program [TOPO](http://maps.nationalgeographic.com/topo/) can show us exactly where we are on a nice topo map (which have almost no use for driving and are really meant for mountaineering). When i was in [Hong Kong](http://jp.eecue.com/photos/show_group.php?Id=37), I picked up a cheapo USB to Serial Port adapter that looks like a little dongle with USB on one side and a Serial Port on the other. It worked great on my PC laptop which i never use, but the [Keyspan](http://www.keyspan.com/support/macosx/usa/) software for the Mac didn't recognize it. I decided to check [VersionTracker](http://www.versiontracker.com/macosx) to see what was available to drive it and I still had no luck, then i googled and found a company that offered a [similar generic USB-Serial adapter](http://www.serialio.com/products/adaptors/usb_serial.htm) and low-and-behold it worked great.

This weekend is the [NSS](http://www.caves.org/) [western regional](http://www.caves.org/grotto/diablo/westernregional2004/) in Sonora. Here is a list of caves trips that will be available... > > Located in the heart of the Mother Lode, we have an excellent lineup of fun caving trips planned. We're currently planning on trips to the following spots: > > > Grapevine Gulch Caves (Grapevine, Bobcat, Porcupine, Rabbit Hole, Clutch) > Volcano Caves (Santa Claus, Mushroom/Lulubel, Connie's) > Rippled > Natural Bridges > Pinnacle Point > Toppled Table Talus > Crystal Palace > > > I drove to SF last weekend so Penelope is giving me a break and driving up this time. I just got the new EVDO wireless card from Verizon and it works great... so far i have had a signal and have been on the internet the whole trip!!! That's really spiffy if you ask me... actually i'm speaking too soon because as i type this we are driving through La Vina on our way to Madera and there is no signal here... guess i will have to wait a minute to post this!