And just who didn’t see this coming?

 dumbassery, humor  1 Response »
Aug 242012
 

School’s ‘Señores and Señoritas’ day deemed offensive

For some reason, the administration of Canyon High School in Anaheim Hills, CA, thought it would be a good day to have “Señores and Señoritas Day.” Apparently the idea was to celebrate Latinos/Hispanics/Mexicans/Chicanos/Whateverthehellthey’recalled by having students wear “Latino themed” outfits. What’d they get?

gang members, gardeners, border patrol agents and pregnant teens.

Well, duh. What the hell did they expect? If they had a “Herr und Fraulein Day,’ who thinks they wouldn’t have at least one smartass dressed up like Hitler?

 Posted by at 7:56 pm

XB-70

 aircraft, history, photography  2 Responses »
Aug 242012
 

A slide found in the NASA HQ archive. It’s not spectacular image quality, but it might be of interest.

Does *anyone* know of good, high-rez, accurate and *official* layout drawings for the B-70? The best available are the Paul Matt drawings, but those aren’t “official” NAA drawings; all the NAA drawings I’ve ever come across have been pretty small and/or inconsistent. If anyone has such blueprints, I’m ready and willing to talk turkey. Please advise.

 Posted by at 11:04 am

BALLOS

 art, projects, spacecraft  4 Responses »
Aug 242012
 

From the NASA HQ historical archive, a 1963 illustration of a large 12-man Ballistic Logistic System capsule. Such capsules were designed by NASA and various contractors to go atop Saturn boosters to provide crew and cargo transport to and from the large space stations that NASA fully expected to have in orbit in the early to mid 1970’s.

 Posted by at 10:23 am

The Wiki Weapon Project

 awesomeness, news, politics, weapons  8 Responses »
Aug 242012
 

My faith in the American spirit is restored:

‘Wiki Weapon Project’ Aims To Create A Gun Anyone Can 3D-Print At Home

The goal is a firearm printable on a RepRap that will safely fire at least one shot of a .22. Granted, as guns go that’s not much, but the goal is a noble one:

But he doesn’t deny that the project’s goal is to subvert gun control regulations in America and around the world. “It’s one of the ideas of the American revolution that the citizenry should be the owners of the weapons,” says Wilson. “Every citizen has the right to bear arms. This is the way to really lower the barrier to access to arms. That’s what this represents.”

Defense Distributed website

 Posted by at 10:10 am

Parabolas

 awesomeness, blather, humor, youtube  1 Response »
Aug 242012
 

This is FAR more entertaining and awesome than it has any right to be. If grade-school math teachers were even a tenth as interesting as this one video, maybe  we might actually start producing students capable at math.

[youtube v-pyuaThp-c]

 Posted by at 12:12 am

Smokey Bear Effect

 blather, Gah., I'm from the government  1 Response »
Aug 232012
 

How The Smokey Bear Effect Led To Raging Wildfires

In short: analysis of thousands of years worth of tree rings showed that in the southwest, fires sprang up every five to ten years, blitzed through forests, burned off the shrubs and dead stuff and left the trees and forests alive to pick up and carry on. But starting around 1900, forest fires became rarer, but turned into monsters that burned full grown trees right down to the ground, killing the forests, sometimes permanently. What happened? The Forest Service happened.

Translation: nature can take care of itself, thank you. As the man said: “Oh yes, that’s it! You finally learned your lesson! and now I am off to spread my teachings to more sissy do-gooders!”

 Posted by at 9:29 pm

XCOR setting up shop in Florida

 aircraft, blather, news, rockets, spacecraft  No Responses »
Aug 232012
 

XCOR Aerospace to Establish Operations and Manufacturing Base in Florida

Hmmm. XCOR is expanding… but not, it seems, in the heavily taxed and overly regulated state of California. I’ve read rumors – but no primary sources, to take it for what it’s worth – that the California Air Resources Board has made it very expensive and difficult to work with kerosene in that state. And since the XCOR Lynx engines burn kerosene… Texas and Florida win out.

Of course, flying out of Florida just makes sense. When you think of “space tourism,” Cape Canaveral certainly comes to mind; the Mojave desert, not so much. And it appears that that’s the way it’ll stay.

Given the regulatory environment in California, I shudder to imagine what it would be like trying to fly passengers there.

 Posted by at 8:32 am

Moonbase

 art, history, rockets, science fiction, spacecraft  10 Responses »
Aug 232012
 

Found at the NASA HQ archive was a slide showing an artists conception of a moonbase. Sadly no description was attached, so date, designing organization and whether or not this was a serious concept or just artistic noodling are all mysteries.

My suspicion is that this was promotional art produced at a major contractor such as Douglas, not based on a serious engineering design. It has a very definite Clavius Base vibe to it.

 Posted by at 12:19 am
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