SCUBA diving is one of those activities that should be on your bucket list - everyone should experience it at least once! But where should you go diving? ... Coral reefs are always popular - and they are typically in shallow water, making it an 'easy' dive. But, being in
Every presidential candidate has a list of states they’re expected to win, but there are always states that are too close to call because they have similar numbers of registered voters for each of the two dominant political parties: Democrat and Republican. It’s in these “swing” states that candidates invest
If someone proposes a bet to you, then you should be suspicious that they already know they're going to win. And one frequent topic of such bets is the weather... What if I bet you there's a city in Canada with a warmer average January temperature than Raleigh, NC? You
I can tell that my area (Wake county, NC) has a growing population, because the traffic keeps getting worse and worse. But it's a little difficult to quantitatively gauge growth by looking at traffic congestion. Therefore let's have a look at a more direct measurement - the actual population data!
North Carolina is one of those key "swing states" that might possibly decide a national presidential election. And with such an election coming up next year (2020), I thought I would have a look at the voter registration data to see how it has changed since the previous presidential election
Yesterday we had a 'special election' here in NC, to elect new members to the House of Representatives for Congressional Districts 3 and 9. The election got a lot of national news coverage, therefore I thought people might like seeing the results plotted on a map. Before I decided to
Flying drones was a new & exciting hobby, and very cool fad a few years ago. In recent years, the drone manufacturers have added some really nice features to make the drones easier to fly and more capable ... but the government also added some new rules that have curbed
As the sharing economy grows, you can catch a ride on Uber, have meals delivered by Grubhub ... and even stay in someone else's house (rather than a hotel) via sites like Airbnb. And speaking of that last one, I recently read an article listing Airbnb's top 20 'wish-listed' homes
We recently had some severe storms come through North Carolina, which even spawned a tornado in Wake county (the county where I live and work). This got me wondering when and where we've had tornadoes in NC in the past ... and, of course, I had to create a map!
If you live in North Carolina, chances are you have to get your vehicle inspected each year, before you can renew your license plate. The inspection consists of a safety portion, and in some counties an emissions portion. In the past, 48 of NC's 100 counties required the emissions portion
This week I noticed that they've started building the lot where they sell Christmas trees near SAS (at the intersection of Maynard & Reedy Creek Rd). They put up a nice rustic wooden fence, and lights, and maybe even a fire pit to keep their workers warm. They sell some
I recently read an article that said a school in Asheville, North Carolina had the worst chickenpox outbreak in the state in 2 decades. The article was interesting, and it also let me know I had a hole in my knowledge ... "What?!? - There's a chickenpox vaccine?!?" When I
The other day I was playing around with the voter registration data for all ~8 million registered voters in North Carolina (yes - this guy knows how to have fun!), and I got to wondering what last names were the most common. I summarized the data by county, and the
This past Sunday was the last day of the NC State Fair, and we broke some records this year! Can you guess what those records were? I'll ramble on about the fair to give you time to come up with your guess, and then I'll let you know about the
Here in North Carolina, a hurricane recently moved very slowly across our state, causing major flooding, and even closing miles of interstate highways for longer than a week. There is data available online for gauges along the river (or gages, as they call them), but I doubt many people know
"We been through every kind of rain there is. Little bitty stingin' rain, and big ol' fat rain, rain that flew in sideways, and sometimes rain even seemed to come straight up from underneath." Was that a quote from the Forrest Gump movie, or something said regarding Hurricane Florence? Could be either one! Hurricane Florence recently came through
Here in North Carolina (NC), we're pretty much resigned to the fact that many of the hurricanes in the Atlantic Ocean are going to visit us. NC sticks out farther into the ocean than most of our neighboring states, and that just makes a tempting target for the hurricanes. But
My buddy Rick Wicklin recently pointed me towards an animation of some opioid prescription rate data for Illinois. And, of course, I decided we needed a similar animation for North Carolina (with a few improvements...) Here's the original, and here are the problems that jump out at me: Counties with
I recently took a trip to Scotland, to attend the Highland Games! (ok - that statement might be a tiny bit misleading) It was a very cool and interesting event, and I wondered where and when other such events might be happening. What better way to analyze this kind of
If you know me, you probably know that I spend a lot of time on the water. I like speed paddling (dragon boat, outrigger canoe, surfski, and racing SUP), and I also have a big pontoon boat at Jordan Lake where I try to go fishing at least once a
A lot of tourists flock to North Carolina. We have beaches, wreck diving, and lighthouses. We have the Great Smoky Mountains with whitewater kayaking, colorful fall leaves, and snow skiing. We have hot air balloon festivals & Scottish highland games. Oh, and some of the best barbecue you've ever tasted! But
North Carolina is a very diverse state - especially when it comes to outdoor recreation opportunities. This weekend you could go hiking or kayaking in the mountains, watch a hot air balloon festival near Raleigh, and go wind surfing or fishing at the coast. And if you've got your SCUBA
In the aftermath of a natural disaster, most people want to help by donating supplies, money, etc. And then it becomes a matter of logistics - getting all those donations to the people who need them. We recently had several days of rain and flooding in North Carolina, and I
Does your data just look like a bunch of dots? Would you like to bring those dots to life so they can tell their story? This example shows how to make some voter-registration dots a bit more lifelike, so you can see what they're saying. You can apply the same
After the recent presidential election, I was updating my graphs of the voter registration data and noticed that the number of registered voters decreased after the election. At first I thought that was odd, but then I realized that maybe inactive voters were being purged. I wanted to find out
Teacher salaries have been a hotly debated issue in our state for the past few years. In this blog post, I examine a graph that recently appeared in our local news, point out some deficiencies, and create an alternate graph. But before we get started, here's a picture of my
Update: This blog has been updated with the 2016 map. You can use SAS for just about anything - that includes finding a great fireworks show to watch during the US Independence Day holiday! Here's a fireworks-locator map I created using SAS (see technical details below). The red dots represent
Discovery Channel's Shark Week starts July 5, 2015 - and I've created a special SAS map & graph of shark attacks in North Carolina to get you in the mood for their week of shark education! But first, to get you in the mood for my blog, here's a picture
As a kid, I was always intrigued with UFO sightings and I guess I'm still a little that way ... therefore how could I not jump at the opportunity to explore some UFO sightings data! I guess "UFO" doesn't necessarily imply that something is an alien space ship - just
Many states are starting to crack down on the serious abuses of government programs, cutting down on outright fraud as well as reducing abuses and errors. I wanted to highlight one of those, now that they've been on this path for a few years. North Carolina, where SAS is headquartered,
