Billlls Idle Mind

Getting Married

2009-12-10T20:48:00.004-07:00

Not me, having been married for some time now*, but I wish I could have had this topper on a cake at my wedding:
It summarizes everything I hoped a marriage would turn out to be. A couple competently covering each others backs.

Actually, at the time I was probably thinking of Conan and Red Sonja. In retrospect, I would have made a better Bond in a tux than a Conan in a fur Speedo.

There's a whole collection of unconventional toppers here.

*January 1st will be 30 years. Seems like forever. Oh wait...

Star Wars

2009-12-09T20:03:00.002-07:00

Yeah! Duck you suckas!

Sign of the Times

2009-12-09T17:16:00.002-07:00

Two days ago, people lined up in Colorado Springs before sunrise, in bitter cold, to get a place in the next line to have Sarah Palin sign their copy of her book. The mall owner let them in out of the cold.

The bookstore could have helped by providing a burn barrel into which the people could toss remaindered copies of Earth In The Balance to try to keep warm. A singularly good use for it.

Is there an editorial cartoonist in the house?

Medical Marijuana and the Great Experiment

2009-12-08T16:23:00.002-07:00

We in Colorado now have a chance to perform two of the great un-run experiments of all time. Medical Marijuana is now legal, and for the most part, unregulated. The Dems are proposing vast new fields of regulation covering the stuff, so we'll soon see if, with government help, even dope dealers regularly go broke.

Secondly, we get to test the hypotheses that if drugs were legalized, the Libertarian party would never be heard from again.

The challenge facing the Donks currently running the state is to keep the jackboot of regulation planted firmly enough that nobody dealing pot makes any money, while at the same time, making enough of it available to eliminate one of their staunchest enemies.

Now taking bets.

Global Warming

2009-12-07T20:51:00.003-07:00

Now here's a problem well on its way to solving itself. At the rate the winter is progressing, by January, the white crystals falling out of the sky will be CO2. All that will remain is to hire one illegal alien to shovel it into a city truck, and give raises to the guy with the "slow" sign, the truck driver, and an intern to take notes on how many shovels full of CO2 it takes to fill a city truck.

Also raises will go to a county clerical type to agglomerate the data together, a state-level wonk to massage the numbers, and a director-level personage to present the power point presentation to the feds showing how many jobs were "saved or created" in the prevention of global warming, and the stimulus money spigots will be wide open.

Oh yes, did I forget to include the guys at the landfill who will be covering the crystals up? Bonus! I bet that comes to 100-150 jobs per county times 85 counties, one per congressional district. Do the math, and don't forget the fudge factors, and you've got 850,000 new jobs here in Colorado alone.

As an extra added bonus, the CO2 removed from the atmosphere will stop the evil warming in its tracks, keeping temperatures this low all year round, which means: permanent employment for all. I tell you it doesn't get any better that this.

CSU Gun Ban

2009-12-07T20:42:00.002-07:00

The board of governors at CSU has voted to ban guns in any form from the campus. I am informed by a friend with a Law Degree that this is equivalent to a local mayor ordaining a municipal assault weapons ban in the face of a state preemption law.

A student despairingly asked what is to be done, as even though what they do is illegal, it takes a long time to correct the problem, and as we know, by the time the problem is corrected, the public has forgotten who was responsible, and the guilty parties get reelected. Is the solution to enroll at another school?

To paraphrase Margret Thatcher, while leaving town is the path of least resistance, the problem with it is that you eventually run out of other peoples towns to run to.

Gun Show Report

2009-12-07T20:19:00.002-07:00

Worked Saturday instead of Sunday this time. Seemed to be fairly well attended, but I didn't see a huge amount of money changing hands. If you're looking for a gun, it seems like a favorable time.

Problem is that after the buying panic in the first half of the year, people are now worried about being employed in the first half of next year, and aren't buying as much. Notable observation was the large number of people carrying guns to sell. If what you're looking for seems hard to find, I'd say wait till next month, then check the pawn shops.

Engineering Math

2009-12-06T10:52:00.004-07:00

It is widely known that engineers are good with numbers. The better you are, the more money you can expect to make in this line of work, as XKCD points out here:

A clever engineer knows how to work with the available resources.

And of course, by the time you've been in the biz for a while, you have derived, using your own calculator, the famous truth, used by statisticians the world over: 44.6% of all statistics are made up on the spot.

Copenhagen Confrence

2009-12-05T19:52:00.003-07:00

OK, this is too good not to report. iOwn The World, among others, is noting that the mayor of Copenhagen's efforts to discourage the local sex trade has resulted in the local girls offering a freebie to anyone with the mayors postcard.

Elsewhere, which now I can't find, I saw that Brazil was sending a 700 person delegation to Copenhagen. New converts to the "green" cause, I'm sure.

Found it here.

Going Postal, Mr. Bond?

2009-12-03T20:37:00.003-07:00

The deadline being over, the details of our special mission can now be revealed. 3 of us visited the range, just a few days after a significant snow storm to try our luck. The mud was unbelievable.

Paula and I both used a Remington Nylon 66 .22 rifle with a BSA scope
(class 6). Paulas rifle target had 26 holes in it, 1 too many. This is
my fault. I put up multiple targets, and she lost track (repeatedly) of
which one she was supposed to be aiming at.

I used a Ruger Mk 1 .22,Paula used a Ruger Mk 2, and James used his Ruger Mk 2, a newer version with a heavy barrel. I submitted the targets, and the results are here.

Looks like I won class 1, and finished a respectable 3rd with the rifle.

The Icons on the target are:
Upper Left: Blimp from View To A Kill
Lower Left: Habitat Atlantis from The Spy Who Loved Me
Center: The boat Disco Volante from Thunderball
Lower Right: Death Sphere from Moonraker
Upper Right: Lifeboat from Diamonds are Forever
Bond Girl: From the movie poster for For Your Eyes Only

Disclosure and credit: Anonymous, who posted to my blog identified 4 of
the icons, and thanks for the assist, whoever you are.

I'm not sure how this part was scored, but I got 8 tiebreaker points for those answers. Danno got 11 and Engineering Johnson got 9, so there may be some problem with my answers.

Air Guns

2009-12-02T21:10:00.002-07:00

They come in all sizes, from BBs to pea shooters, to pumpkin-caliber units, and in varying degrees of complexity. Ready Line has one constructed by the writers nephews, who are in engineering school.

It looks complicated enough to have been made from pilfered parts from somebody's prototype FTL drive.

The Workshop

2009-12-01T20:33:00.003-07:00

The removal of the pumpkin gun from the inventory brings up the question of "What's next?".

Currently the can crusher is on the bench
The exit ports have been cut away, and some guarding has been added. It runs well now. A larger magazine feed is in order.

The 2-bore muskets are languishing in the shop. Since I got called back to work for a while, I can't work on them. Oh well, Money will get you through times of no muskets better than muskets will get you through times of no money.

Contest

2009-12-01T17:25:00.004-07:00

Basically a silly guessing game of no import at all, but anything for a laugh. Penetrating Insights (I never heard of them either) reports that a new Obama poster is showing up in Downey, a suburb of Los Angeles.
That would be it on the right. When the middle one came out, people actually got busted for "posting bills" or whatever it's called for putting them up. Sure, it's illegal, like littering, but you seldom hear about people getting ticketed for it.

Anyway, the new one has everyone baffled as to what TWAP might possible stand for. Perhaps The Worst American President ever could enlighten us?

Quote of the Day

2009-11-30T19:58:00.004-07:00

Here lies a reproduction of one of the e-mails brought to light in the East Anglia global warming kerfuffle. The author is offering a course of labor to a colleague, involving an attempt to reconcile the works of several competing, and very thin-skinned post-docs.

After going through six complex steps, which may or may not involve some or all of the others, step 7 is:

7) Publish, retire, and don't leave a forwarding address.

Probably good advice, as some of the people whose data you'd be massaging control your share of the government millions they get to come up with results, and if you suggest that any of what they have so far is anything but pure gospel, you'll soon discover how nice it is, comparitively, to be a mini-skirted hooker in Mecca.

Which brings us to the actual quote. The writer is already familiar with the available data and notes:

We know with certainty that we know f**k-all.
Edward Cook

Which is what many of us suspected all along.

Gives me an idea for a book: "Pontificating for Fun and Prophet"

End of an Era

2009-11-29T18:54:00.004-07:00

After all these years, the Bomberos, the second most powerful air cannon in Colorado* is leavinbg for a new home in Nebraska.
Good bye and good luck. You folks in Kansas be very afraid.

P.S. If any of you know who those folks in Arvada who have the new centrifugal machine are, let me know. We need to meet.

*#1 is Johnny Pumpkinseed, also a product of the Denver Mad Scientists Club.

The Future of Transportation

2009-11-29T13:39:00.002-07:00

Say Anything, who posts out of South Dakota, has a piece noting an unintended consequence of government planning in the fuels / agriculture industry. It seems that the mandate for ethanol in motor fuel demanded a certain amount of ethanol to mix with the fuel, and production was based on predictions of fuel demand.

Guess what? Fuel demand has dropped, but nobody adjusted the ethanol quotas. Now we have a surplus of ethanol to go with the shortage of animal food that goes along with converting corn to likker.

In the face of a recession that drives up the cost of everything, including food and fuel, the obvious solution to this problem is another government stimulus program. This time, everyone will be entitled to a free quart of government moonshine to help get them through the hard times. That would be 1 quart per registered voter in the household.

OK, in some places in Chicago, that would amount to enough cheap booze to keep a low-rent bar open for the whole year. Everyone in the bar will be counted as a job created or saved, I guess, so win-win.

Exercise

2009-11-27T15:12:00.000-07:00

It's a whole lot more fun if you don't need it.

Etymology Of Names

2009-11-27T08:39:00.003-07:00

A -gate scandal is one in which the media will relentlessly pursue the (conservative) guilty party until he or she is publicly ruined and driven out of town, as it were.

A -quiddick scandal is one which the media will pointedly ignore until the (leftist) central party dies in high public office, which he holds all his life. No mention of the scandal will be permitted in the eulogy either.

Hence "Climaquiddick".

In a way the scandal was predictable. A researcher frequently is an academic who gets his money from the government. If you're looking for government money, the surest way to get it is come up with a problem that will be best solved with more government intervention. The larger the disaster which can be expected to ensue if more government intervention is not applied, the more grant money you can ask for with a straight face, and expect to get.

I know that industry isn't real big on never-ending studies, as they generally want to get a product to market at some point, and get on with the business of making money. Still, you have to wonder if GM or Chrysler aren't missing an opportunity here:
"Buy a Chevrolet and save the earth!"
"Buick! Keeping the worlds oceans down!" (Picture Tiger Woods up to his ankles in a water hazard here.)
"Don't let Jeep drown!" (Picture of a Jeep on an ice floe, possibly with a polar bear behind the wheel.)

I should be in marketing.

Happy Thanksgiving

2009-11-26T20:22:00.003-07:00

Turkey with the fixins, Newcastle beer, and a visit from a new puppy.

To top it off, the Science channel had on 2 hours of this years Punkin Chunkin, including coverage of a centrifugal machine from right up the road.

Maybe it will inspire someone to buy our pumpkin cannon.

Hope all of you had a nice Turkey Day too, and thanks for stopping by and reading my rants.

Tilting At Windmills

2009-11-25T20:57:00.003-07:00

The continuing saga.

A few years ago I observed that the real hardcore politicians were the people who never saw a constituent problem that couldn't be turned into a revenue enhancement, usually without fixing the problem. Last weeks shot was to the Littleton councilman who also reps Littleton to the DRCOG. James Taylor responded to my petition for assistance by suggesting that the HOV lane be turned into a HOT (High occupancy / Toll) lane.

Sure, if the taxpayers are inconvenienced by congestion and pollution while 1/3 of a roadway they paid for goes essentially unused, just charge them for the privilege of using it.

In Chicago it works like this:
A businessman is selling fruit from a pushcart when a stranger bumps the cart, spilling the merchandise. The businessman protests this, but the stranger has an easy solution. Simply pay him $20/day, and he guarantees that the inconvenience will never happen again. The merchant, of course, happily pays the tariff, secure in the knowledge that his problem is solved.

Right.

When most of us take a job, there is an underlying assumption of loyalty the whomever has his name on the bottom of our paychecks. We provide our services in the hope that the enterprise will succeed and our contribution will be recognized downstream. In the case of government workers, the loyalty too often goes to the agency whose name appears on the check rather than the people the agency is supposed to serve, and whose money is behind the check.

Perhaps government checks should be written from the people of (insert city, state, of country here) rather than just City of Springfield, to remind the recipients of who exactly they are working for.

Musical Interlude

2009-11-24T19:47:00.002-07:00

I like good music, well blended harmonies, full, rich chording, and the image of Al Gore spending time in the joint with a couple of roommates who look like they may have been born there.

M4GW have several bits like this. Go here for a top lever look / listen.

When Things Go Wrong

2009-11-23T18:00:00.002-07:00

Now I admit I've had things go wrong, once or twice. Usually it has to do with something completely unforeseen. I mean like I've never ever heard anyone suggest that "you could see that coming". At least not that I can remember.

Now this:

Was there ever any doubt? Whatsoever?

Found at Jawa Report.

Global Warming

2009-11-22T15:13:00.003-07:00

Who knew that nuclear weapons were measured in Megabytes?

Science and Technology Marching Forward

2009-11-22T15:03:00.003-07:00

Computer World is announcing that Intel is predicting that chips implanted into the human brain will soon be used to replace the keyboard and mouse as an interface at your computer. To me this sounds promising. Just think, a small implant, and I never misplace a tool again, or forget that last item on the grocery list.

With the addition of a small hole in the top center of the head, one of those camera memory cards can be dropped in to provide the recipient with spell check, XL and a dictionary, rendering high school grads employable for the first time in ages.

Some people worry that these chips might eventually extend to include processors, operating under government control, but given the slow reaction of government to the introduction of new technology, what would more likely happen is that enhanced cognitive abilities will render the Democratic party obsolete before they can mandate specific software.

Star Wars

2009-11-21T07:39:00.003-07:00

Not that funkey movie, but the real thing. Boeing, who seems to have picked up a lot of the old laser-based programs, is working on the refinement of the concepts to forms that can be profitably used on todays battlefield.

Boeing leads the way in developing laser weapon systems for a variety of U.S. Air Force, Army and Navy applications. These systems include the Airborne Laser, Advanced Tactical Laser, Free Electron Laser, High Energy Laser Technology Demonstrator and Tactical Relay Mirror System.

Having worked on some of the Star Wars stuff back in the day, I can tell you that making it actually work as advertised was more of a timing challenge than a technological one.

The congress, dominated by Democrats, didn't want the Soviet Union to think we were acting too aggressively toward it. The President (Reagan) was industriously banging away at their foundations with any sledgehammer he could lay his hands on. The ground-based laser system decsribed at the link traces its ancestry back to the R2D2-like air defense systems now mounted on most Navy boats. The Armys version was a 40mm gun on a tracked vehicle with a radar to direct it, and a computer to prioritize targets called DAVID. The review of the DAVID systim I saw showed a very aggressive system that would find anything that moved in the air, point the gun at it, and demand that the operator either pull the trigger or designate the target as friendly. Operators were warned to fasten their seat belts securely, because the machine didn't waste time moving from one potential target to the next. When they said "neck-snapping speed" they weren't kidding.

Recent versions of this have been able to pick off targets down to small mortar shells and RPG rounds, as moving mirrors and prisms is easier than swinging a 40mm gun barrel. It would seem that the target acquisition system is about ready for showtime, and the laser is quickly catching up. It's not that big lasers are difficult to build, as such, but that the support systems for them are prohibitively bulky. Progress is being made here, too.

If Boeing wants to do a real-life test, they could park their system just north of the Gaza border with Israel, and take pot-shots at the Iranian rockets Hamas is launching. If this works, they will quickly be able to expand to shooting at the mortar shells Hamas will certainly be aiming at their test rig, too.

H/T to Bijou Renaissance Man, who has some further details and pictures.