"I’ve reached new heights of Nerd-dom," I proudly announced to my 12-year old daughter and her friends.  They all laughed at me for saying such a thing, not foreseeing yet that nerdiness reaps large benefits after the high school nerd-penalties are paid.  But I was undeterred.  "I’ve managed to image the Seafood Watch wallet card issued by the Monterey Bay Aquarium (available in pdf) and upload it to my digital camera for display!"

I became aware of the Seafood Watch after reading the eye-opening Song for the Blue Ocean by Carl Safina, which lays out the magnitude of the challenges facing our oceans and fisheries.  The book is part adventure, part science, part business, and full always of humanity and the stories of those in contact with the ocean in various capacities.  The parts about salmon running the American River before Fulsom Dam was built (to which we owe our lake view) really brought home how broadly these issues affect us.  This message was reinforced by a visit last year to the Monterey Bay Aquarium, which has a relatively new deep-sea tank with bluefin tuna (to which a large portion of Blue Ocean is devoted), and an informational video with a cameo by Carl Safina himself.

My daughter and her friends didn’t understand the myriad benefits, which I will proceed to enumerate in possibly far too much detail:

1. I save a few grams on my wallet weight and thickness.

2. I save a few grams of paper and ink (and the chemical processes that go into making it).

3. I save the publisher the cost of printing this information, while keeping all the benefits that the information dissemination provides.

4. I demonstrate the multi-purpose nature of any sufficiently capable digital device with a usable display.

The last point is really why I get nerd points.  The Casio EX-Z750 2.5" display is large enough  to be used for a lot of interesting purposes besides framing or previewing a snapshot.  It’s at least 3 times the area of my cell phone’s display.  An intuitive UI makes navigating, and zooming in on the Seafood Watch text to a readable size, a breeze.  I already have plans to turn Geocaching pages into images so I can carry my camera as a guidebook instead of my laptop.

So I have to add a final benefit:

5.   I have a reason to interest other nerds (through this blog) in the important work Seafood Watch does to raise the visibility of the degradation of a vital resource. Check them out!

There seems to be a pretty substantial buzz among car customers right now, that I’ve not seen since the new Beetle.  (Being aghast at the Humvee isn’t the kind of buzz I’m talking about.)  It’s surrounding the Toyota Prius.  I live in a fairly rural area, and one of the most conservative counties in California, yet in a county where I’d expect more pickups than beemers, I recently saw 5 Priuses (should that be Prii?) while driving my daughter to school!

Maybe I’m just tuned in since my brother bought one.  The thing that really floors me is the presence of a power button that looks like it came directly off my Media Center.  No longer should the driver (henceforth "user") be concerned with such mundane details as when to turn the engine on and off.  The key just provides authentication, as emphasized by the availability (AIUI) of a wireless key system that detects the key (really the security token) in your pocket and allows you to start the car.  Only thing that might be even cooler is the integrated Bluetooth…

The US automakers don’t seem tapped into this trend at all.  They still seem to think circumventing milage minimums by pumping out SUVs is the way to sustainable revenues.  Last week Ford and GM were put on notice that they were wrong.  At least the blue half of this country, and I suspect lots of export markets, are willing to invest their automobile acquisition budget in a choice that reduces pump costs, unsightly and unhealthy smog, and reduces our dependence on foreign oil, and maybe even get a bit of value appreciation while they’re at it.  They’re even more motivated to vote with their dollars since their election votes haven’t provided much of a visible return.  Yet despite plenty of urging by the environmental community, Ford and GM seem to have ignored the inevitabilities of the long-term.  More and more of those purchasing dollars will head straight to Japan.  I suspect the next 15 years could be pretty rough as our automobile designers adapt.

Don’t hold your breath.  Instead, get your Prius order in now, the waiting lists aren’t short.

[Update 2005-05-17 09:56: Dilbert parodies how out of step our automakers are.]