A 1965 General Dynamics/Convair concept for using obsolete Minuteman I ICBMs as upper stages atop the Little Joe II. This setup would put 2,000 pounds of payload into a 100 nautical mile orbit.
Dec 252015
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Dec 242015
Assuming this is true, it’s not good:
The Typical American Lives Only 18 Miles From Mom
Americans are becoming less and less mobile, staying put where they came from. The article declares this to be a result of a lack of adequate government care for the elderly, but I have to wonder if a big portion of it might also be a result of a drop-off in a culture of ambition and dreams. Used to be that coming of age meant heading towards a brighter horizon, which most often meant to go elsewhere to find your life… because what are the chance that you would be born and raised in that one place you were meant to be? If your dream was to become an astronaut, staying in Manhattan ain’t gonna do it. If you want to be a big rap star, Thatcher, Utah, ain’t the place. If you want to be a forest ranger, Los Angeles seems like not the place to ply your trade. But if you have become convinced to just be a paper pusher, a burger flipper, or some other entirely interchangeable, meaningless career… well, I guess you can do that just about anywhere.
Dec 242015
Yes, I’ve mentioned this TV abomination before, but what the heck. After the success of Star Wars, anyone who had anything to do with it tried to make an extra nickel from it. This included not only George Lucas, but TV execs at CBS. Together, they foisted the “Star Wars Holiday Special” on the public in November, 1978.
Yes, I eagerly watched this the one and only time it was broadcast. Even as an 8 year-old steeped in the misery that was 1970’s popular culture, I could tell that this was just plain Not Right. Still, it was Star Wars in a world desperately clamoring for more Star Wars. Plus it was the very first introduction to Boba Fett. But that couldn’t save it from what t really was… a dreadful 1970’s variety show wearing Star Wars costumes. Perhaps the best reaction to it came from Carrie Fisher her own self, who has said that she starts playing the Holiday Special during parties when she wants the guests to leave.
When last I brought it up three years ago, the Holiday Special was available on YouTube only in scattered and incomplete chunks. Recently complete versions had been uploaded… watch ’em quick, because Disney doesn’t like this practice and gets YouTube to take ’em down. I suggest downloading them and burning DVD’s, to put in pride of place next to your fourteen different formats of Star Wars in VHS, Betamax, Laserdisk, SelectaVision, DVD, BluRay, with the original editions, directors cuts, Special Editions, Japanese Edits and what all else.
And because why not, here’s the RiffTrax (i.e. MST3K) version:
Dec 242015
Two years ago today I was hammered with the start of the worst bronchitis event of my life (it was merged with the H-whatever N-whatever flu for extra fun), which nearly *ended* my life. The day started OK and by the time I realized what was happening the doctors had closed up for the day; the next day was Christmas and they weren’t there; the day after they were full up. So it was only the day after *that* that I got in to get treatment. In retrospect I probably shoulda sucked it up and paid the $600 or so for the emergency room, but when a 104 degree fever is rampaging through your brain, your lungs aren’t feeding you oxygen, and you don’t *have* $600, I guess it made sense to me to stay put and wait.
Since finally getting over that – sometime around March of 2014 – I haven’t had another case of bronchitis. It’s the longest I’ve gone without it for a long time… in 2013 alone I had it three times. You might think that being free of it for an extended time would make a feller dance a jig, but it mostly just keeps me kinda paranoid. Every last cough or headache? Clearly, it’s bronchitis coming back to finish the job.
Dec 232015
Out here in Utah, it’s a reasonably wintery winter. Not so for much of the nation:
9 Maps That Show How Completely Bizarre Your Christmas Eve Weather Will Be
Some highlights:
1: Like the last six months, December will almost certainly be the hottest December on record.
2: 25 states will probably break temperature records for hottest Christmas.
3: A number of the lowest temperatures expected will be higher than the previous high temperature. This means that the moment the clock ticks over at midnight, the new record will be set, and will be broken again later in the day when the temperature rises. NYC is forecasted to have a low of 59 on Christmas Eve; the record high for that day was 56, set in 1988.
4: NYC will be warmer than LA.
5: The high for NYC is going to be about 73. The high on July 4 was 75. A slight possibility that Christmas Eve will be warmer than Independence Day.
6: Southern part of the midwest… Yay! You get tornadoes!
Dec 232015
Creationist Sylvia Allen to lead Arizona Senate education panel
Oy.
During a legislative hearing in 2009, she said the Earth is 6,000 years old, a belief held by “Young Earth” biblical creationists. In 2013, a Facebook post about chem-trail conspiracies gained widespread media attention, as did a March comment suggesting mandatory church attendance.
Oy.
She has been appointed chairwoman of the Senate Education Committee, where she will be positioned to control which legislative education proposals go forward.
It’s weird how many utterly wrong people wind up in positions of political power. Here’s a woman who is seemingly opposed to logic and knowledge, and she’s in charge of education. Socialists wind up in charge of the economy. Bureaucrats end up in charge of regualting new industries. It’s perverse.
Dec 222015
Well, not really.
Remember back in May I posted this:
Atlantic Airlines Flight 423 lost – 2,304 feared dead
This was a made-up headline used on astronaut Frank Poole’s IBM News Pad during the course of “2001: A Space Odyssey.” In the new book “The 2001 File,” a photo shows astronaut Dave Bowman reading an article titled “Archaeologists Find a Viking Ship in Maine” on *his* News Pad. Sadly, the resolution is nowhere near enough to actually read the article. But if the “Atlantic Airlines” episode tells us anything, no doubt a complete story was written describing the finding of a Viking boat in Maine. If anyone knows of a readable version of that, I’d be interested.
Dec 222015
I’ve finally received a copy of The 2001 File: Harry Lange and the Design of the Landmark Science Fiction Film
The scale of the model is given as 1/32″ = 1’0″ which, if I’ve done my math correctly equates to 1/384 scale. Und zo… overall diameter of Space Station 5 is 8*384 feet… 3,072 feet.
UPDATE, two years later: Welp, turns out I made a stupid mistake. The 1/384 scale is correct… but for the *drawing,* not the *model.* The Drawing was reproduced at 1/4 the full scale of the model, so the diameter of the full-scale space Station V would be 1/4 X 3,072 feet = 768 feet, much more in line with understanding and logic.
Around about a year ago I got some vague rumors that one of the forthcoming books would have a reliable blueprint of the Station; awaiting this was one of the reasons why my work on my Space Station V diagrams ground to a halt. I figured the diagrams would show the station to be smaller than I had estimated. I did not expect that it would be *way* bigger. Well, there it is. When the facts don’t match your cherished theory… change the theory to match the facts.
The diagram is a close match for the model as built; it’s not some really early concept (though there are lots of those). So it is as close to “canon” as you can get.
As for the book: this is one of those books us “2001” engineering nerds have been waiting for. it doesn’t commit the dreadful sin of trying the force the pages into some weird shape or size; the pages are about 10″ by 11.” It’s more than 300 pages, *filled* with sketches and art and diagrams, including many of the Orion III, the Station, Discovery, Moon bus, etc. Layout map of Clavius Base, satellite designs, secondary vehicles, the works. If you haven’t ordered a copy, do so. It’s worth the price.
The 2001 File: Harry Lange and the Design of the Landmark Science Fiction Film
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Dec 222015
Coming soonish…
Dec 212015
Holy carp… the first stage made it back to Canaveral and landed itself just like it was supposed to.
Woo!
UPDATE:
Live video from LZ-1 pic.twitter.com/Ve6gEXfOdh
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 22, 2015
