One of the outside kittens hanging around under my back deck. This cat… well, he judges people.
Aug 032009
Aug 032009
Cash for Clunkers has claimed another victim. Click pic to get the article.
Mater could not be reached for comment. It is reported that he is hiding in an undisclosed location.
Aug 022009
The sum total of my knowledge on this craft comes from this single illustration, found in the Boeing Historical Archives. It’s a 1965 drawing of a rocket/scramjet vehicle that made use of a few X-15 bits and pieces. Clearly it was designed to test high-speed airbreathing systems in a stepwise fashion… get to high speed on rocket power initially, with the scramjet engine either removed or faired over, and only later fire up the scramjet. To get up to speed, the rocket would use propellants that would be stored in tanks that served as fairings for the inlets. Presumably this vehicle would be carried to altitude by another aircraft. It looks big for B-52 carriage, but that was probably the intent.
The inlets appear to be “inward turning” style inlets, recently made popular in the “Falcon” program. The liquid hydrogen tanks appear to be pretty small, so it clearly was not designed to test long duration cruise of the scramjet.
Once again, I’m offering valuable and priceless rewards: $40 in APR and/or Drawings & Documents downloads for whoever can provide source material that gives a definitive ID on this, along with dimensions and, preferably, more illustrations.
Aug 022009
… on expensive beds for your pet cat. I have several of them, and for the most part my cats have never really had much use for ’em. But these cheap (under ten bucks) “beds” made out of cardboard… oh yeah, they think these things are just the coolest.
Aug 022009
Anybody old enough to remember “Read my lips: no new taxes” recalls how well *that* worked out for the first President Bush. Now, remember this firm pledge from the campaign trail last year:
“I can make a firm pledge. Under my plan, no family making less than $250,000 a year will see any form of tax increase. Not your income tax, not your payroll tax, not your capital gains taxes, not any of your taxes.”
And then keep this in mind:
To get the economy back on track, will President Barack Obama have to break his pledge not to raise taxes on 95 percent of Americans? In a “This Week” exclusive, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner told me, “We’re going to have to do what’s necessary.”
Geithner was clear that he believes a key component of economic recovery is deficit reduction. When I gave him several opportunities to rule out a middle class tax hike, he wouldn’t do it.
Aug 022009
The next two models for FP to be CADed up have been confirmed, and the next two after that have been tentatively agreed on. In order of when they’ll be worked:
1) 1/72 VTOL
2) 1/72 hypersonic research
3) 1/288 launch vehicle topped with BLAM
4) 1/288 launch vehicle/serious Marine Corps badassery
In a few days or so I’ll post very preliminary images of what’s to come.
Aug 012009
One of the interesting things about this particular brainstorm is just how… governmental it is. While the merits of paying people large sums to swap a less fuel efficient car for a more fuel efficient car can be debated… the requirement that the old car, once delivered to the dealer, must be destroyed seems irrational. Can we not sell these cars to, say, Mexico? Or Cuba? Even our old beaters are likely to be far more fuel efficient than their antiques.
<> But, no. The engines must be drained of oil and then filled with sodium silicate, then run at full blast until the engine is trashed. As some of the videos show, there is a risk of fire doing this. And the clouds of smoke sure don’t look real “green.”
Does this make *any* sense?
Here’re some YouTube vids. These cars aren’t that old. And they’re being destroyed.
Here. And here. And here. And here. And here. And here.
Aug 012009
Apparently popping up around Los Angeles.
A less enthusiastic article on the same topic nevertheless provides a clearer image:
Posters that equate Obama with socialism are hardly new (just do a Google image search on “obama” and “socialism”); they’ve been around since long before he was the Dem nominee. And given his associates and his history, they’re hardly an unlikely concept. But to see them sprouting up in LA of all places could be telling.
Aug 012009
From the Globe and Mail. Put simply: California’s economy sucks. The central valley, some of the most fertile ground in America (and place where half of Americas veggies are grown), has seen a three-year drought. California is in dire economic straights, and needs everything that can be productive to be productive. So what is California’s solution? To shut off water to the central valley to protect a 3-inch fish.
Mendota, population 10,000, was once famous as the “cantaloupe capital of the world.” Today, it is the jobless capital of America, with an unemployment rate of 41 per cent. … Towns like Mendota are already emptying out. What began a trickle now feels more like a torrent, and as people leave, Fresno County’s tax revenue evaporates.
Yeah, good plan.
I’ve always boggled at the cognitive dissonance of a water shortage in California. California, after all, has an extremely long border… with the Pacific Friggen’ Ocean. Here, for example, is an Israeli desalination plant:
My proposed solution: divert all inland or mountain water sources (including the sadly neutered Colorado River) away from coastal cities, redirect back to inland cities and farms. Tell the coastal cities that if they want water… there it is. Build some desalination plants and some nuclear reactors to power them, and problem solved. If they don’t want to do that – which they will *have* to do anyway, given grown trends – then they can feel free to dry up and blow away like Fresno.
Aug 012009
… this here is a vision of hell. And crazy.