patrickdaley.com

The Vikings finally secure a new stadium; goodbye Metrodome!

prdaley — Sat, 12 May 2012 20:02:41 +0000

After nearly a decade of trying the Vikings organization has finally found a way out of the Metrodome. (A recent Time magazine writeup listed it as the WORST venue in the country.) As a lifelong Packer fan I couldn’t be happier. I work in the Legislature so I was fortunate enough to witness all of the ups and downs firsthand during the course of this year’s session. My joke to the senators who I work with was that I really hoped the stadium deal would get done…..because the Packers need those two division wins every season! In all seriousness, though, the NFC North wouldn’t have been the same without the Purple People Eaters. Sure, the Packers could have beaten up on the Rams, but what makes the NFC North interesting for the Packers is that Wisconsin shares a physical border with Illinois (Bears), Minnesota (Vikings), and Michigan (Lions). The only other team that can claim this distinction is the Pittsburgh Steelers, who share a physical border with all of their division rivals. So congratulations Vikings; I look forward to watching the Packers beat you for decades to come.

A handful of the Viking faithful rally in front of the Minnesota capitol. Can you imagine what would happen in Wisconsin if the Packers threatened to leave?

I don’t get Instagram

prdaley — Thu, 10 May 2012 03:53:16 +0000

I’ve had it on my iPhone for a while and I just don’t get it. This is worth $1B? I’m in the wrong line of work (you know complaining about technology instead of developing it). I don’t mean to minimize the talents of the Instagram team, but I just don’t find it all that useful and here’s why. I feel like whenever I try to find a good filter for a picture I’ve taken that it just ends up looking too weird or distorted. I’m not entirely sure why I would want to completely wash out a picture as though it was taken decades ago with a low-def film camera. Our parents and grandparents weren’t trying to be artsy way back when; their equipment just stunk compared to the endless megapixels we now have at our disposal.

Fun Facts – NSA’s New Cyber Spying Facility

prdaley — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 03:21:09 +0000

The cover article for the latest issue of Wired takes a look at the NSA’s fancy new cyber-spy facility being built in the Utah desert – The NSA Is Building the Country’s Biggest Spy Center (Watch What You Say. I’m assuming that just posting about its existence will get me immediately thrown onto a watch list. If that’s the case, to whomever it may concern, I am available for hire and would love to work at the NSA! Now, some facts that I thought were kind of cool about this new facility.

- 10k construction workers are on the project
- $2 billion price tag
- Two football fields worth of servers
- Fence that can stop a 15k pound vehicle going 50mph (that’s the equivalent of 6.5 Smart cars!)
- Nearly eighteen football fields devoted to technical/administrative functions
- The electrical substation is estimated to use $40 million in electricity per year (the heat from their servers could definitely fry a lot of eggs)
- The government is dealing in yottabytes of data otherwise known as 1000000000000000000000000 bytes. Yeah, that’s a lot.

Famous!

prdaley — Fri, 24 Feb 2012 19:16:36 +0000

I’ve finally made it to the big time!

http://www.startribune.com/politics/statelocal/140229353.html

(That’s me standing in the upper left.)

Radeon 5800 Graphics Cards Have Disappeared

prdaley — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 23:01:21 +0000

A year ago I wrapped up a build on a new desktop machine. At the time a Radeon 5830 made a lot of sense. I didn’t have the need for a CrossfireX setup at the time so I only bought one card. Heck, I still don’t even need a second card, but out of curiosity I set out to do some pricing only to find that the 5800 has basically disappeared from the market in all shapes and forms. The card I have now is an XFX and their website still shows 5400, 5500, 5600, and 5700 cards but nothing for the 5800 series. SLI and Crossfire are both a blessing and a curse. It’s a great way to boost performance, but in a sense it deincentivizes consumers from buying new cards since they can milk an old one for longer. Still, this situation seems odd to me given that there are plenty of other 5XXX series cards still out there for sale.

If anyone has insight on this I’d love to know what happened.

Costa Rica

prdaley — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 11:01:42 +0000

Pictures of the trip.

Costa Rica was great! It’s definitely not a cheap country, though, and due to how mountainous it is getting around can be expensive. Some things are a little too Americanized in the touristy areas, too. We decided not to rent a car so we had to pay for expensive cab rides, which limited how much we were able to get out and about.

We kicked off our trip at the Los Suenos Marriott on the Pacific side of the country. It’s a really beautiful resort although it does cater heavily to Americans so if you’re looking for more authentic cuisine and people keep that in mind. Pictures speak louder than words so I’ll let them do the talking. We kind of just spent our time here relaxing and didn’t really leave the resort since a one way cab ride into Jaco was $35.

After a couple of days at the Marriott we moved a little down the coast to Punta Leona. It’s a family oriented vacation spot that a lot of Costa Ricans go to for vacation and it has a really nice beach. It’s quite a ways off the main road and is situated more or less in the jungle. While staying here we arranged for a tour company to drive us out to one of the country’s most popular national parks, Manual Antonio. Our driver and tour guide (Ronny) via www.costaricatouroffice.com did a great job. The place we stopped at for lunch had the best food we ate the entire trip. We didn’t get to see any monkeys in the park, but the beaches there are out of this world. We did get to see some raccoons and sloths, though.

After the park excursion we spent the rest of the time at Punta Leona. We decided that spending $70 to get to Jaco and back wasn’t worth it. I was starting to think I wasn’t going to see any monkeys on this trip and then at breakfast the morning we were to leave a bunch of capuchins descended on the breakfast area trying to scrounge up food. One of them even jumped right onto the middle of our table to steal sugar packets when I got up to get more coffee; check out the videos/pictures from the trip!

2011 Wisconsin Badger Football Recap (Disappointment)

prdaley — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 16:45:01 +0000

Boy did the addition of Russell Wilson change expectations, especially after the rout of Nebraska in the first B1G game of the year. We looked unstoppable. As it would turn out, Nebraska wasn’t as good as advertised, especially on defense. Heck, some pundits thought they could with the conference in their first year. We all know how that story ends, with Nebraska getting killed in their bowl game. But I digress.

This year was supposed to be different than others. I’ve long lamented the fact that many Wisconsin fans regard the Rose Bowl as the pinnacle of college football. It’s a big game, but it’s not the biggest game. For the first time in the Alvarez era pundits and fans alike were talking about Wisconsin as a possible national title contender. It was not meant to be.

In all three losses we were within a score of tying or taking the lead as the clock reached zero. The Badgers’ average margin of defeat was a measly 5.6 points. An extra third down conversion here, one less turnover there, and things might have played out differently.

It begs the question, can the Wisconsin program ever make it to the big dance? Will the Rose Bowl forever be as good as it gets? Don’t get me wrong, two consecutive Rose Bowl appearances would be a mark of success for most programs in the country so I don’t mean to minimize the team’s accomplishments. But in a year with one of the best QB/RB combinations in the country, something Wisconsin has arguably never had before, it just seemed like this team was destined for more.

The recent shakeup on the coaching staff is a little scarey, but I’m going into it with a glass half ful approach by viewing this as a great opportunity to bring in some great new coaches. Plus Montee “Money” Ball will be back next season and who knows, maybe he’ll bring home the Heisman this time.

See you at Camp Randall in the fall!

Good enough to make you care; bad enough to break your heart.

prdaley — Sun, 30 Oct 2011 04:53:33 +0000

Our season is more or less over unless you count a trip to the Capital One Bowl a giant success. You’d hope we’d be ok against Purdue, Minnesota, Illinois, and Penn State, but from what I’ve seen in the past two games it’s possible we drop another game. (Minnesota beat Iowa today so watch out). Our special teams are atrocious. I know Wisconsin wants to use Wilson as a pocket passer, but why not use a few more designed runs? 3.1 yards per rush compared to 4.6 for Ohio State. Our passing game was better, but the end result didn’t show it. Braxton Miller, a freshman, was largely limited in the passing game until it counted at the end as he pulled out a big 40 yard touchdown. Ah, it will feel good to drop to about 21 in the polls; familiar territory for Badger fans. On the release of the newest rankings we’ll be back to where we belong.

Another Badger football season, another giant letdown.

prdaley — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 18:09:16 +0000

This will sound sappy, but I really believed the hype this year. I ran out (via the Internet) and bought a Russell Wilson jersey after clobbering Nebraska. This year was going to be different, I told myself. It was not like past years when we were clearly ranked too high early on only to get upset by some unassuming opponent. This year we seemed to have all the pieces to do something really special. (Sorry, I am not one of those Badger fans who pretends the Rose Bowl is the top of the mountain).

Then we went to MSU. I still remember in 2004 when we were undefeated and in the driver’s seat for the Rose Bowl when we lost to them. There was the 2008 debacle and then our only loss last year coming at their hands. Who would have thought MSU could provide so much heartbreak in recent years? I would honestly rather play OSU given the way we have matched up with them lately. On top of it all we had to lose the way we did. A blowout would have clearly told us that once again the Badgers were ranked way beyond their weight class, but the game was decided on a single play.

This one will sting for a while.

Wisconsin dominates Nebraska; solidifies status as #1 college town.

prdaley — Tue, 04 Oct 2011 16:37:40 +0000

Boy that was fun! R-dub continues to dazzle us. You can get on the Heisman train here.
@RussellManiaXVI

Jump Around!

Buttercup (long)

Buttercup (Herbstreit/Musburger returning from commercial)

The cornnation.com perspective on Madtown.