The most awesomest xkcd cartoon EVAR!!
http://xkcd.com/1110/
Click on the link and then click and drag on the large fourth panel to find out just how big a world it is! I can't imagine the time and effort it took to build this!
Hey! I found an edge!
Wednesday, September 19, 2012
Tuesday, September 18, 2012
Miscellanea: Fauna, Aquatic, Aerial and Terrestrial
It looks like the Mohawk Reef has become a magnet for whale sharks. A second one was spotted there just this past week. It's also become a magnet for just about every other fish within twenty miles.
And it seemed the great turtle egg-laying season from earlier this year might have been compromised by Tropical Storm Debby and Hurricane Isaac but, then again, maybe not.
The sulphur butterflies are all over the yard, about the same size and color as the new lemons on the lemon tree. A few viceroys and some others I haven't been able to identify yet are also hanging about.
The abundance of lizards would seem to indicate that the Cuban Tree Frogs have not overwhelmed our little ecological niche.
And then, of course, there is the cat who has become sleek and fat and demanding, training us to her extremely large vocabulary of grunts, whistles, chirps and mewls as she explains that her food dish needs topping off and her water bowl requires freshening and the door needs to be held open right now while she decides whether to sit on the cushioned chair outside under the oak or remain sprawled on the living room carpet.
Friday, September 14, 2012
All in the Family, Navy Style
My oldest nephew just made Chief Petty Officer today. His kid brother, my other nephew (also in the Navy and the one who went to Iraq), and his dad, my Other Brother and a retired chief himself, were both there in Norfolk, Virginia for the ceremony.
The rule is, if family is in attendance, family get to apply the insignia of promotion so my Other Brother and my nephew's brother got to pin his new anchors on him.
I'm also impressed that Dad can still fit into his old uniform.
The rule is, if family is in attendance, family get to apply the insignia of promotion so my Other Brother and my nephew's brother got to pin his new anchors on him.
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| Yes, he does look a little like Tom Cruise when he smiles. |
Tuesday, September 11, 2012
That Day
Another anniversary. The further along we get the easier it is to identify what changed that day.
After that day we could no longer claim to be the Home of the Brave as we let irrational fear feed hatred of the Other. As we lashed out blindly at innocents because they looked like our attackers or worshiped the same god they did (the same god many of us claim to follow, as well, just with a different name). It is fear that caused some of us to prevent American Muslims from building mosques from California to Tennessee to New York, fear that caused some of us to attack Sikhs because they wear turbans, fear that allowed cynical politicians to manipulate us into an unnecessary war. We were told to go shopping, there was no need to be participating citizens, the experts would protect us. So we bought magnetic ribbons and crying eagle T-shirts and continued to drive as if the gasoline we used had nothing to do with the situation we were in.
Neither could we claim, after that day, to be the Land of the Free as we allowed those same politicians to cow us into accepting what have become permanent restraints on our constitutional liberties in return for an illusory safety. We now submit to scans, x-rays, body searches, various levels of disrobing and yet despite many reports and warnings in advance, the original attacks were not prevented. Despite the continuing security theater, subsequent attacks, starting on that very day, have been foiled not by the authorities but by us, ourselves, the civilians on the scene. And we did not object and believed the ridiculous claim that our risk could be brought down to zero.
Are we safer? After 9/11, the terrorists were never going to use airplanes as flying bombs again. That stunt only works once before the passengers realize the rules have changed, you no longer cooperate with the hijackers in return for a quick stopover in exotic, tropical Havana. Faced with certain death anyway, you fight back, hard. And we did. And will again. Despite our leaders' lack of faith in us.
Mark Twain supposedly once said, "To a man with a hammer, every problem looks like a nail." Well, we own the biggest hammer in the world and we haven't been shy about using it these past eleven years. Did invading Iraq help? Does stripping grandma and feeling up little kids at the airport help? Does collecting every conversation in the world help? Hint: NSA had received a warning about the underwear bomber but couldn't pull it out of the haystack until after the attempt was made and the perp arrested.
The one thing we haven't lost, will never lose, is our innocence but that's just because, when it comes to politics, we never learn from experience.
After that day we could no longer claim to be the Home of the Brave as we let irrational fear feed hatred of the Other. As we lashed out blindly at innocents because they looked like our attackers or worshiped the same god they did (the same god many of us claim to follow, as well, just with a different name). It is fear that caused some of us to prevent American Muslims from building mosques from California to Tennessee to New York, fear that caused some of us to attack Sikhs because they wear turbans, fear that allowed cynical politicians to manipulate us into an unnecessary war. We were told to go shopping, there was no need to be participating citizens, the experts would protect us. So we bought magnetic ribbons and crying eagle T-shirts and continued to drive as if the gasoline we used had nothing to do with the situation we were in.
Neither could we claim, after that day, to be the Land of the Free as we allowed those same politicians to cow us into accepting what have become permanent restraints on our constitutional liberties in return for an illusory safety. We now submit to scans, x-rays, body searches, various levels of disrobing and yet despite many reports and warnings in advance, the original attacks were not prevented. Despite the continuing security theater, subsequent attacks, starting on that very day, have been foiled not by the authorities but by us, ourselves, the civilians on the scene. And we did not object and believed the ridiculous claim that our risk could be brought down to zero.
Are we safer? After 9/11, the terrorists were never going to use airplanes as flying bombs again. That stunt only works once before the passengers realize the rules have changed, you no longer cooperate with the hijackers in return for a quick stopover in exotic, tropical Havana. Faced with certain death anyway, you fight back, hard. And we did. And will again. Despite our leaders' lack of faith in us.
Mark Twain supposedly once said, "To a man with a hammer, every problem looks like a nail." Well, we own the biggest hammer in the world and we haven't been shy about using it these past eleven years. Did invading Iraq help? Does stripping grandma and feeling up little kids at the airport help? Does collecting every conversation in the world help? Hint: NSA had received a warning about the underwear bomber but couldn't pull it out of the haystack until after the attempt was made and the perp arrested.
We lost our minds on that day and we haven't been quite right in the head since.
The one thing we haven't lost, will never lose, is our innocence but that's just because, when it comes to politics, we never learn from experience.
Friday, September 7, 2012
Redneck Studies
My brother had to take his truck in for repairs . . . again.
It is my considered opinion, after careful study, that rednecks make purchases, especially major ones, only after careful study and deliberation which they invariably ignore in favor of the emotions of the moment.
When my brother's car died last year, he looked at a used truck in a repair shop lot as a potential replacement. Since the vehicle was offered without warranty, I went and bought him a CARFAX report on it which showed a clean record with no serious issues. The next day, he came home with his "new" truck--which he had purchased, for cash, on the spur of the moment, at a completely different garage. Since then, he has had to replace/repair tires, fuel pump, radiator, driver's door, driver's window motor, an axle and now the water pump. He makes no connection between the number and cost of the repairs and not doing research before impulse buying.
The same thing happened last weekend with our new freezer. The store advertising the sale was sold out, six to eight days until delivery. So he went out scouting around, found a used one for even less and had it delivered on Sunday. It doesn't fit under the shelf where the old one was and wouldn't go through the front door so we had to dig out a path through the garage (which was actually shorter to its final destination in the laundry room) which caused the local zoning popo to stop by a day later and inquire about all the cartons still scattered across the lawn and driveway because we left the pathway in the garage open but my brother was able to explain them away since they were mostly Christmas decorations which he had decided to take over to the storage unit until needed again. The gasoline cans he explained as precaution against Isaac which the city guy thought was reasonable and said as long as everything was cleaned up within a week it would be O.K.
At least the freezer does have a one year warranty. As for raising/removing the shelf so the freezer can go back against the wall: if it happens before the warranty runs out I will be very surprised.
It is my considered opinion, after careful study, that rednecks make purchases, especially major ones, only after careful study and deliberation which they invariably ignore in favor of the emotions of the moment.
When my brother's car died last year, he looked at a used truck in a repair shop lot as a potential replacement. Since the vehicle was offered without warranty, I went and bought him a CARFAX report on it which showed a clean record with no serious issues. The next day, he came home with his "new" truck--which he had purchased, for cash, on the spur of the moment, at a completely different garage. Since then, he has had to replace/repair tires, fuel pump, radiator, driver's door, driver's window motor, an axle and now the water pump. He makes no connection between the number and cost of the repairs and not doing research before impulse buying.
The same thing happened last weekend with our new freezer. The store advertising the sale was sold out, six to eight days until delivery. So he went out scouting around, found a used one for even less and had it delivered on Sunday. It doesn't fit under the shelf where the old one was and wouldn't go through the front door so we had to dig out a path through the garage (which was actually shorter to its final destination in the laundry room) which caused the local zoning popo to stop by a day later and inquire about all the cartons still scattered across the lawn and driveway because we left the pathway in the garage open but my brother was able to explain them away since they were mostly Christmas decorations which he had decided to take over to the storage unit until needed again. The gasoline cans he explained as precaution against Isaac which the city guy thought was reasonable and said as long as everything was cleaned up within a week it would be O.K.
At least the freezer does have a one year warranty. As for raising/removing the shelf so the freezer can go back against the wall: if it happens before the warranty runs out I will be very surprised.
Tuesday, September 4, 2012
The Sporting Life
I fixed my brother's slot machine yesterday.
It's a table top model, about 2 1/2 feet tall, made, I think, for the Japanese market, or at least a casino expecting a large Japanese clientele. Most of the directions are in Japanese and English although the payout button is in Japanese only. The reason I believe it was for more than just Japanese customers is that the maintenance directions on the inside of the machine are also in both English and Japanese .
This is not our machine but is very similar ours being not "Cherry Bar," but "Probationary Elf."
The black toggle on the middle left takes the place of the standard arm of the "one-armed bandit" starting the three loops spinning. The three red buttons to the right of the toggle stop the corresponding loop when pressed one at a time. It takes either coins or tokens and you can bet up to three at once. It came with a pile of tokens.
The tokens also hint at its origins. They're two types, the size of US quarter dollar coins. One type is kind of plain having the word "World" stamped on each side, the "O" in "World" looking like a ringed planet. The other type is more interesting with Japanese characters around the edge and a stamped picture of the King of Hearts (the one with his sword behind his head) on the face and the initials "NDK" on the reverse.
My brother bought it a few years ago for $20 only because it had the necessary keys. It's been in storage until just recently when, during a consolidation binge, he moved it into his room. Unfortunately, he could not get it to work.
Yesterday, I opened it up and discovered two small push switches, one black, the other red, deep in the guts of the thing. I pushed them both et voila!, it works although it does not lose its mind with bells and flashing lights when it pays out the jackpot. I know because I was playing it last night in an attempt to get all the tokens inside when it started spitting them back out at me.
It seems to be limited to paying out a maximum fifteen tokens per play. Since I had hit the big win, it gave me a series of free winning games so that each time I jiggled the toggle I automatically won 15 tokens until the machine was empty at which point the red LED that normally urged me to "Insert Coin" began flashing "Ho . . .Ho . . .Ho" which was not some St. Nick congratulations-on-winning-it-all message but the code to notify the "Ho"use that the machine needed tending. I opened it up and added more tokens to the bin, pressed the red interior reset button again (which caused the machine to spit a stream of coins across the room but there's no way to push the button with the front closed) and continued "playing" until my payout was complete.
Since it also takes quarters, my brother intends to use it as a glorified piggy bank.
It's a table top model, about 2 1/2 feet tall, made, I think, for the Japanese market, or at least a casino expecting a large Japanese clientele. Most of the directions are in Japanese and English although the payout button is in Japanese only. The reason I believe it was for more than just Japanese customers is that the maintenance directions on the inside of the machine are also in both English and Japanese .
The black toggle on the middle left takes the place of the standard arm of the "one-armed bandit" starting the three loops spinning. The three red buttons to the right of the toggle stop the corresponding loop when pressed one at a time. It takes either coins or tokens and you can bet up to three at once. It came with a pile of tokens.
The tokens also hint at its origins. They're two types, the size of US quarter dollar coins. One type is kind of plain having the word "World" stamped on each side, the "O" in "World" looking like a ringed planet. The other type is more interesting with Japanese characters around the edge and a stamped picture of the King of Hearts (the one with his sword behind his head) on the face and the initials "NDK" on the reverse.
My brother bought it a few years ago for $20 only because it had the necessary keys. It's been in storage until just recently when, during a consolidation binge, he moved it into his room. Unfortunately, he could not get it to work.
Yesterday, I opened it up and discovered two small push switches, one black, the other red, deep in the guts of the thing. I pushed them both et voila!, it works although it does not lose its mind with bells and flashing lights when it pays out the jackpot. I know because I was playing it last night in an attempt to get all the tokens inside when it started spitting them back out at me.
It seems to be limited to paying out a maximum fifteen tokens per play. Since I had hit the big win, it gave me a series of free winning games so that each time I jiggled the toggle I automatically won 15 tokens until the machine was empty at which point the red LED that normally urged me to "Insert Coin" began flashing "Ho . . .Ho . . .Ho" which was not some St. Nick congratulations-on-winning-it-all message but the code to notify the "Ho"use that the machine needed tending. I opened it up and added more tokens to the bin, pressed the red interior reset button again (which caused the machine to spit a stream of coins across the room but there's no way to push the button with the front closed) and continued "playing" until my payout was complete.
Since it also takes quarters, my brother intends to use it as a glorified piggy bank.
Saturday, September 1, 2012
And a Couple Pounds of Dry Ice Until Delivery
In a case of fortuitous timing, our 25+ year old upright freezer has decided to give up the ghost.
My brother likes to buy meat in bulk, ten pounds of this, five pounds of that, whenever a particular type or cut goes on sale (and sometimes I inadvertently "help" which is how we ended up with seven pounds of bacon last week). Everything not destined for immediate consumption ends up in the freezer. He also, for some reason, really likes frozen waffles, and I put the excess chopped mango in there, too.
Last week he noticed his ice cream turning to mush although everything else remained frozen solid. This week the mango started to soften up. Yesterday he called the repairman.
The repair guy was running late so my brother, before leaving for work, gave me his repair price limits beyond which we would junk the old unit but that proved unnecessary as, when the repairman showed up, he took just five minutes (mostly emptying the freezer and taking off a panel) before calling out, "Time to buy a new one!" Turns out the poor thing was chugging along on 10% of its required coolant. Refilling is not an option, not even a possibility, really.
(Everyone keeps calling the coolant freon but I think that's just a case of the word becoming generic, like Aspirin becoming aspirin. In this instance, however, our machine is old enough that the coolant probably was Freon.)
It is fortuitous timing because, this being Labor Day weekend, a number of appliance stores are advertising nice big sales and we can get a larger version of the same model, brand new, with warranty for $500.
Also, I found a nice big forgotten rack of ribs buried down in the back which I transferred to the refrigerator to thaw (further) for our holiday barbecue. So, now I just need to buy the sides and some condiments.
My brother likes to buy meat in bulk, ten pounds of this, five pounds of that, whenever a particular type or cut goes on sale (and sometimes I inadvertently "help" which is how we ended up with seven pounds of bacon last week). Everything not destined for immediate consumption ends up in the freezer. He also, for some reason, really likes frozen waffles, and I put the excess chopped mango in there, too.
Last week he noticed his ice cream turning to mush although everything else remained frozen solid. This week the mango started to soften up. Yesterday he called the repairman.
The repair guy was running late so my brother, before leaving for work, gave me his repair price limits beyond which we would junk the old unit but that proved unnecessary as, when the repairman showed up, he took just five minutes (mostly emptying the freezer and taking off a panel) before calling out, "Time to buy a new one!" Turns out the poor thing was chugging along on 10% of its required coolant. Refilling is not an option, not even a possibility, really.
(Everyone keeps calling the coolant freon but I think that's just a case of the word becoming generic, like Aspirin becoming aspirin. In this instance, however, our machine is old enough that the coolant probably was Freon.)
It is fortuitous timing because, this being Labor Day weekend, a number of appliance stores are advertising nice big sales and we can get a larger version of the same model, brand new, with warranty for $500.
Also, I found a nice big forgotten rack of ribs buried down in the back which I transferred to the refrigerator to thaw (further) for our holiday barbecue. So, now I just need to buy the sides and some condiments.
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