At Los Angeles’ new Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels the 6,019 pipes of the organ are being tested and adjusted by a team of “voicers” at a rate of about 61 pipes per day. Dobson Pipe Organ Builders won the organ project by creatively incorporating pipes from the original organ into the new design and meeting space restrictions. The L.A. Times article contains a clear introduction to the workings of a pipe organ if you need to acquaint yourself with this most immovable of musical instruments and also provides the derivation of the phrase “pulling out all the stops”. At 2:30 p.m. each day silence descends in the cathedral which is still under construction, and the voicers go to work, tweaking each individual pipe to perfection. They are also fighting the building’s acoustics which need to project human speakers clearly, while providing reverberation for the organ. Adjustments will continue as an acoustics team fine tunes the cathedral’s speaking and musical voices into peaceful coexistence.

Ricochet wireless Internet access is trying to be a phoenix rising out of the Denver area, home of new owner Aerie Networks. Service is also planned for San Diego in October. Aerie gave Denver’s government some free service and 1,000 modems to help get their support. This fits with their strategy of going after the municipal market, instead of original owner Metricom’s “mobile warrior” marketing. They are also better off launching in areas with less broadband coverage as a viable, though slower, alternative to DSL and cable. The wireless advantage is a big plus for paying $45 a month, comparable to other broadband services, when your only choice is dial-up.

A Review of a Review?
I got a big kick out of Caitlin Flanagan’s review of Christopher Byron’s book on Martha Stewart (Martha, Inc.). A few pages in, I said to my husband “this reviewer thinks the author is an idiot!”. A few minutes later I exclaimed “Oh my goodness, she actually did call him an idiot! She used the actual word ‘idiot’!” And a few pages later, “ohhhh, she called him a jerk too!” Mind you, Flanagan finds Stewart to be “the most unpleasant person on television”, so she’s not defending her love for the domestic businesswoman. But what Flanagan does understand, which Byron misses, is what makes the output of Stewart’s multimedia empire appealing. She boils it down to this: “women like pretty things.” (I’d like to think that many men do too, if they are the type to notice their surroundings.) Byron seems to think Stewart has successfully pulled the wool over her fan’s eyes. But Flanagan points out that the Stewart empire is built on the longing for a reconnection to the tasks of keeping a home in order, elegantly. It’s something of a guilty pleasure to crave domestic elegance as women busy with work and/or children may only find time for the minimum upkeep. We look at the Martha Stewart Living magazines and television shows and we either avoid them because we know she’s selling an unrealistic dream, or we keep going back to them because we want to hold on to a vision. Either reaction is fine, in my book.

Fruit crates used to have colorful labels pasted on them and these artistic prints are now collectibles. Paperstuff.com offers a variety of vintage fruit labels sorted into various categories (type of fruit being one, of course). The prices range from $1 up to $100 for a rare orchid design. Most are in a very affordable range with plenty under $10. Sizes depend on the crate configuration which seems to depend on the fruit type. Avocado labels are narrow, orange ones are 10″ x 11″, lemons 9″ x 12″, pears vary. Hmmm, it’s a chance to collect something affordable (for now) that doesn’t take up much space (yet). (via xBlog, Boing Boing, The Ends of the Earth)

The New Yorker’s food issue is out this week and they have complemented it online with relevant articles from their archives. Defrosted Dinners from 1945 discusses the novel concept of frozen dinners. Developed by William L. Maxton and used for airplane meals, these frozen prepared foods were first popular with the Navy. Maxton obtained permission to market them for civilians and the rest is TV dinner history (with some later innovation from Swanson). Interestingly, Maxton’s dinners were placed in “cardboard treated with a coating of phenolic resin plastic”, whereas Swanson’s dinners came in those once-familiar aluminum trays. We’ve circled back to cardboard now thanks to the microwave oven.

It’s nice when something the government does makes me cry — in a good way. Zhenfu Ge, the 74 year old grandmother whose daughter died last year, walked out of an INS office with her green card yesterday. Ge’s daughter was also her green card sponsor and Ge was a few days away from completing the process when her daughter passed away from cancer. The law at the time provided no way for her to stay in the country and help her son-in-law with his two children. Sen. Dianne Feinstein and Rep. Lynn Woolsey sponsored private relief legislation which was specific to her case, however Congress and the President went one better and signed into law an act (the Family Sponsor Immigration Act, H. R. 1892) that allows anyone with an approved pending green card application to change family sponsors if the original sponsor dies. The alternate sponsor does not have to be a blood relation. This act wasn’t expected to pass in the current climate of strict immigration policies. Ge can now continue to raise her grandchildren and also finally travel back to China to see her other three children for the first time in four years.

Dear Amazon.com,
I am enjoying your beta restaurant feature which shows scanned menus from restaurants in various areas. It is especially nice to be able to search for specific menu items and dishes and to be able to show friends the menu of a place before we decide to eat there. I have one recommendation. I would like to be able to add restaurants to my “wish list” so that I can remember places I want to eat at, or, perhaps allow someone special to surprise me with a visit to one of them. Thank you.
Yours in consumerism,
Lilly

Slashdot is taking questions for their “Ask Alton Brown” interview and the number of postings is healthy (797 as of this writing). I gave up going through and answering all the questions I knew the answers to. The world hates a know-it-all anyway, and geeks especially so. (The most popular recent /. topic is one that was covered closely here in the past: “Diamonds are they really worth the cost?” with 1543 comments. Ahh geek love.)

Atlantis’ plumbing cracks have been welded but now NASA has found a problem with the crawler transporters that shuttle the shuttles between the assembly building and the launch pads. Broken bearings in this 37 year old equipment probably should not come as a surprise. Eight spare bearings are ready to go, but they may have to gather parts from both transporters to create one working one. Atlantis may launch Sept. 28 or Oct. 3.

Bunny Archeologists?
Rabbits who have taken up residence on the remains of a 14th century manor house in England are digging up fragments of a medieval glass window. Sharp-eyed archeologists working nearby noticed what these house renovating bunnies were uncovering and they are hoping to gather up enough sections to piece together the window. The glass deteriorates quickly when it is exposed to air so they are working fast. Unlikely as it is, wouldn’t it be cute if the design had bunny rabbits in it?