I love this music. I love computers. Is it any wonder, then, that I like this video?
I had three blog posts that I wished to create... but unfortunately, I cannot remember what they were about. Wait a moment, I think I feel one comming on...
"Limerick Written on an Early June Morning"
There once was a boy named Ben,
Whose Limericks would never rhyme.
He tried and he tried,
But try as he might,
It never worked out in the end.
The above was actually composed at 12:17AM, just as I was falling asleep, thus establishing the small hours of the morning as the best for creativity. Why is beyond me.
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I was reminded a few minutes ago of a couple of stories of my early childhood, both of which, I feel, pertain heavily to my present status as "Undercover High Nerd." The first, which I believe happened first, started my present loathing of Microsoft as a creator of software.
It was sometime in 1996/7. Either way, I was about five or six, Rachel was about three, and Windows was '95. I was on the phone with my grandfather, aka Granhat; Rachel was on the computer, playing "Ready to Read with Pooh"; Windows was crashing.
As my grandfather recounts it, he heard through the telephone Rachel yelling something to the effect of, "Ben, the computer crashed again."
To which, he heard me reply, "Uh, Granhat, I need to go help my sister."
I then put down the phone and went to go restart the computer, which, as you know, was a very, very, common (annoying) occurrence in the wonderful world of Windows.
Meanwhile, Granhat was left to think "Wow. My six year old grandson just left to give tech support to a three year old."
My status has not changed. I am still the designated IT Tech Guy.
The second story is shorter, but this time deals with the Mac end of the reliability spectrum. Even when I was four, I liked my grandmother's Mac better than the AT&T(!?) Windows '95 death machine at home. For one thing, I liked the fact that I did not have to push the reset button every five minutes on it, and I liked the beautiful music that came from it. No, I don't mean iTunes, as it did not exist at the time. I mean that wonderful chord struck when it turned on, and the strange harmonies that emanated from the mystical silver box (aka modem. yes, it had a seperate modem) beside the window to the world (aka monitor) when one used the internet.
Though the days of the external modem have long since passed, I still remember the strange tune of dial-up: eeeeee-ohgh, hawang-hawang streeeeee-booooong. But I won't put an audio clip here, as it would annoy most other people. Until I think of another way to annoy people, farewell!!!
Well, I'm a bit late in chronicling the adventures we had at the Annual DOS Assembly in Dallas and the awesome time spent at the annual St. Peter the Aleut camp at Possum Kingdom Lake. Fortunately, Jared has already posted a very long description on his blog, so here's that. A few comments about the assembly, though. Or at least the notes during the plenary sessions. There wasn't much else we could do. The acoustics in the cathedral are, well, less than what most people would consider cathedral acoustics to be, and the microphone situation, is well, less than most people... you get it. In other words, we could not here SQUAT back there. So we educated ourselves in other ways. Namely, in my teaching of binary (and no Mom, I did not force feed it to Cristina and Joanna-- they were genuinely interested).
The water park was also extremely fun, hanging around James, John, and Andrew discussing loopholes in various movies, such as the fact that if the Star Destroyers in Star Wars were made of iron, Kaiser Wilhelm II had enough steel in his battleships to make three. The conclusions drawn from this: 1) Star Destroyers are not as big as they seem, 2) Iron must be rare in the Star Wars galaxy in order for there to be so few Star Destroyers, and 3) Everybody in the conversation had put way too much time into thinking about this. Besides this, we also spent a bit of time knocking Superman. Is his suit part of him or something? Sure he's indestructible, but his suit? It never gets damaged. Ever. I can even remember in one of the movies Superman hiding Lois behind his cape and sheilding her from intense machine gun fire. The damage factor to either Lois or the cape? Nada. Anyway, back to subject....
Camp was a blast. It was interesting being a "Junior Councilor" this year. Basically, I had some leadership responsibilities, like getting the smaller ones to go to bed *Shudders for about six minutes at the memory of the chaos*, but also some of the benefits, like helping decide the awards everybody would get. James also got to go to camp, but not John, unfortunately, and we had a lot of fun talking about how every English officer in Pirates of the Caribbean should have gotten shot for incompetence according to contemporary British naval law, and quoting Hunt for Red October back and forth to each other. It was a good two weeks. Too bad they had to end.
Oh, for the Fourth of July, the Pharrthings bivouacked at our house in preparation of their departure to the far, far away land of Pharr, and we had a great time lighting and watching the fireworks, as well as doing quite a bit of star gazing. Unfortunately, Murphey's Second Law of Demonstration took it's effect, and our telescope just decided not to turn on (I found out later that it was because of using two very long extension cords in a row: just as water will not come out of a hose if it is too long, electrons will not flow through too long a wire per ampere). Still, we had the thrill of discovery when we identified the planet Jupiter above the tree line. Speaking of which...
Just last night Jared and I brought out the telescope once again (with only one extension cord, so everything was set) and thought we'd look around. Using our new knowledge of the heavens acquired that Friday, and after much hassle, we were able to align the telescope properly for the first time. Then, noticing that Jupiter was above the horizion, and seeing that it showed up on the hand controller display, we let the telescope do it's thing (the technical term is slew) to the target, which it did with mild, if that, accuracy. We then centered Jupiter in the finder-scope, but unfortunately this was not very accurate either, so Jared proceeded to do the "Square Search," as he calls it, and thoroughly scanned the area. After a while, he posed the question:
"Is the ground soft around here?" To which I replied, in a somewhat confused voice,
"'Sorta. Why?"
"'Cause I think I'm going to faint. Take a look."
There it was. Jupiter in all it's striped, golden beauty. And I do mean striped. With the smaller lens, which on a telescope means greater magnification, one could definitely make out individual lines across the surface. It was truly a sight to behold. What made it even more interesting, though, was the fact that we were able to follow in the footsteps of Galileo and see Jupiter's four brightest MOONS. Yeah. Wow. The memory of that moment will live on in my mind and heart. It was beautiful. If only I had a camera mount for it so I could post pictures. Oh well. Actually, come to think of it, we would need a camera with a detachable lens, too. $$$$$. Maybe sometime later. 'Till then, Ta Ta!!!
It is in all honesty the spice of life. It is also, in fact, the name I have given to the game that Jared and Jeremy made up during the hour-long bedtime ritual known to the kids as "Teeth-brushing," and known to the parents as "Brush TEETH!!!"
The game is simple, and begins with a single word: "Do." The second player will then usually respond with the word "you." Now it gets interesting. The first player now has many choices -- he could say, perhaps, "want," "think," "yellow," "oops," etc., with the intended effect of making the other player(s) laugh. Sentences are permitted, so long as the other player(s) provide every other word, and is not interrupted by an obvious fit of hysteria. First person to laugh looses, or in a three or more person game, is ejected. This is not a game for the strong of heart. I have played this game, and fortunately lived to tell the tale. With words like "Pig" and "Shlamalamadingdong" being thrown around like bomb shells with a close air support of "ouch"'s and "oops"'s, all purposely out of context and peppered with the muffled grunts and convulsions of long-overdue laughter, it is a painful game to witness, much less participate in. Dare to play...
"DO!!!"
]]>Literally. I have a fictional "Harmonies of our House" list, a list of everything that I have harmonized with in our house, namely the garage door opener and microwave. Just now, I found that I can harmonize with the "Busy Phone Signal." I know. I'm weird.
I really don't know how to begin. It is so exciting to all nerds and UFOlogists, words fail me. The Pope, Pope Benedict XVI, has declared that it is not wrong to believe in alien life, or "extraterrestrial brethren." Odd, right? According to the Yahoo! News article, his statement came after the rationale made by Rev. Jose Gabriel Funes, who is the Jesuit head of the Vatican Observatory, who said that since the universe is infinite, there is great possibility that there are other intelligent life forms out there sharing in God's creation. 'Ruling out the existence of aliens would be like "putting limits" on God's creative freedom, he said.' Though he is not Orthodox, I agree, at least in the context of love. To me, since God's Love is infinite, it makes sense that he would distribute it infinitely around the universe to other beings made in his image. The problem with my theory, however, is the Passion on the Cross. If there were other intelligent beings out there, would they have shared in Christ's ministry on earth somehow, or would he have come down on their own planet as well? Since there is only one Theotokos in Orthodox Theology, the former seems to be the only possibility.
I love this music. I love computers. Is it any wonder, then, that I like this video?
It was one of those times I really wished I had a camera. So I made one, so far as flash is concerned.
(Notice: no one was hurt in the following narrative. Nevertheless, those who do not like suspense may wish to skip this post. Oh yeah, and kids, don't do this at home.)
A few years ago, Jordan and I found a motor. A BIG one. Those of you who know me should be reaching for their blast helmets right now. We had the following dialog (or something similar, I can't remember exactly anymore):
"Hey, I wonder if that still works?"
"I dunno. Let's find out."
So, being me, I figured from the size of this motor that it must have come from some household appliance of some kind, and immediately scrounged up some alligator clips, wire, and lamp power cord. The problem was that there were four wires coming out of the motor, and my limited practical knowledge of electricity told me that two of them were completely unnecessary. But which? It did not matter. Trial and Error would tell. *Massages forehead in embarrassment* We connected the insulated (This is important) alligator clips to the lamp cord and every possible combination of motor wires, while I made sure that the cord was unplugged before touching the clips. After all, I wasn't stupid. Seeing that the motor was dead for one reason or another, and, growing bored, on a whim of idiocy, touched the two alligator clips together While they were still plugged in. BANG!!! Jordan screamed something on the order of bloody murder. Jared and Jeremy, too cool to be part of this weirdness, saw the brightest light of their lives come from upstairs. Mom, in her room, thought that someone had taken a picture in the Hallway. I couldn't see squat for a whole minute. And when I did, there were the two alligator clips welded together, with a tiny crater in the carpet where a drop of molten iron had fallen. I had put a whole new meaning on "Arc Welding."
I was thinking about a blog post I wanted to write, but know I can't for the life of me think of what it was! Did it have to do with a robotics experiment that I just conducted? It must have. Therefore, I will bore you to tears with my terribly geeky discovery, which was: "my motors pull .83 Amps at stall! Cool!" This makes sense, because they only draw about .13 while running in thin air.
Who's confused? Good. My job is half done.
The explanation: I came to this conclusion after using the "Universal Power Law," which, far from dictating just how much absolute power can corrupt, is just three letters: P=VI, or in geeklish1, Power equals Voltage times Amperage. (Why I must stand for Amperage is, well, they couldn't use A because it was taken (Area) and they couldn't use C (for current, which Amperes measure) because it was taken with Capacitance and Coulombs. "But wait," you say, "you used C twice!" *Struggles to come up with good explanation*. I guess some nerd way back when thought VI looked better than VA. To continue...) "I hope you are all taking notes because there is going to be a short quiz next period."2Thus, when I fry a 10W (Watt, a measure of power) resistor with a 12V (Volt, analogous to the pressure in a water hose) battery, and solve P=VI for I and get I=P/V, substitute 10 for P and 12 for V and divide, I get .83A (Amp [Ampere], the amount of electrons moving through a wire in a second, which is quite large).
All this just to find out how big my relays have to be in order to slow Beager down.
__________
1 The language of Geekdom, similar to English in most respects.
2 Tom Lehrer, "The Element Song"
(I absolutely adore alliteration)
Well, according to Dr. Joseph P. Farrell, author of Reich of the Black Sun,
Reich of the Black Sun is a compelling web of What If's that surround the end of World War II to Roswell and the Majestic-12 documents to the present, dealing with Nazi Germany's extensive secret project network even after the war. The really scary thing is that Dr. Farrell draws upon declassified--or leaked--documents to support his hypothesis. For example, a recently declassified English newspaper article outlines the precautions to be taken in the event of a German nuclear attack, dated in early 1944, almost a year before Hiroshima. Another document of the same vintage, this time by a former Luftwaffe pilot, recounts how he saw an explosion near Rügen Island that bears every signature of an Atomic Bomb explosion. Combine these with a German map of Manhattan illustrating the best location for maximum damage, and a German flight to within ten miles of New York, and one begins to shudder. However, the question arises: "Why didn't he use it? Why didn't Hitler just drop bombs on Washington, New York, and London and have done with it?" Two reasons: He was saving his atomic bombs for the detonators of something much more powerful, the Hydrogen bomb; and he was perhaps unwilling to kill so many "fellow Aryans." What is even more scary, though, is the extent to which Hitler and his main minion Kammler were willing to go to achieve ultimate supremacy. They were more than willing to expend human lives, for one thing, as evidenced by the large research facilities near concentration camps such as Auschwitz, and strange experiments involving occult theories including the so-called "Hollow Earth" and "Dynamic Aether" which were both disproved quite a few years even before WWII. Still, Kammler and his Kammlerstab had their orders: find everything, anything, that could be weaponized and utilize it. Not that they met with much success in the Egyptian or Atlantean departments of the University of Berlin, but it did bring them the V-1 and V-2, as well as the Me-262 jet fighter, and some other, more startling prototypes, some of the more extreme being radar-absorbing materials, transistors (remember, high technology in 1942), and "fuel-air bombs" which, using conventional materials in unconventional ways (a true hallmark of wartime German research), have the explosive power rivaling that of a small atomic bomb! Such unconventional science also led to speculation--sometimes substantiated-- that it is indeed transplanted postwar Nazis who are behind the UFO phenomenon itself. After all, there were a few German aircraft prototypes that resemble UFO's, like flying wings and even flying disks, both using techniques to drastically improve efficiency at even super sonic speeds, and the Majestic-12 documents uncovered/leaked in the fifties even present supporting evidence that the extraterrestrial side of UFOlogy is nothing but a cover-up for the even more disturbing truth.
The evidence to support this entire hypothesis is admittedly-- even by Dr. Farrell himself-- thin. However, it is fun, in a morbid sense, to connect the dots in new ways and draw a new way of looking at history. This, combined with his engaging writing style that would be easily understood by Über-geeks and Right-Brainers alike, and makes his train of thought quite believable at some times. It still gives me shivers when I think of what even the "Allied Legend", or what the Allies supposedly wrote into history books, admits, and the shivers grow larger when I think of all the What If's presented by Dr. Joseph Farrell.
Sorry, everyone, for my extended absence. All I can say is school, school, school, and did I mention school? Anyway, I wanted to pose this question-- what would have happened if George Lucas had been around to design this WWII airplane (which, if you don't know already, is my favorite of all time):