Messiah: Halleluiah!!

 art, awesomeness, models, news, Nuclear Pulse Propulsion, nukes, rockets, science fiction, spacecraft  6 Responses »
Apr 172015
 

Finally done modelling this thing. Took long enough!

2015-04-17d 2015-04-17c 2015-04-17b 2015-04-17a

The multiview layout drawing generated from the model would take a good deal of effort to clean up proper, but it’s needed for the “Nuclear Pulse Propulsion” book. Now that the model is very nearly complete (I need to convert each part, individually, into a separate STL file… bleah), I can devote more time to other stuff, including potentially getting back to work on NPP. But before I let the Messiah go entirely… anyone interested in large format blueprints based on the layout drawings?2015-04-17h

 Posted by at 1:34 am

The lesson here: there shall be no Mexicans in space

 AARRRGH, Crazy, dumbassery, Forward!, politics, science fiction, ಠ_ಠ  8 Responses »
Apr 162015
 

College Apologizes for Serving Mexican Food During Sci-Fi Event

In short: Stevenson College in Santa Cruz, CA, held a sci-fi themed “Intergalactic Night.” Along with a “well, i guess they tried” series of sci-fi decorations, they had food. In the form of  buffet. Of Mexican food. Because even in a sci-fi setting, tacos are awesome. But guess what? People got all offended. I gather the illegal aliens on campus got in a snit about the association between Mexican food and science fiction aliens.

So, of course, sensitivity training all around.

Kinda curious how this effort to separate Mexican cultural elements from science fiction would play into the recent effort to enforce diversity in the Hugo awards… hmm…

 Posted by at 9:48 pm

M-o-o-n, that spells “moon”

 art, awesomeness, news, photography, science, spacecraft  5 Responses »
Apr 162015
 

The USGS has recently released new maps of the moon based on Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter data, both photographic and radar altimetry. They are things of beauty, and only 472 megabytes!

Image Mosaic and Topographic Map of the Moon

I think I might try to coax the rectangular portion out just on its own and have it printed off in large format. That’d look spectacular.

 Posted by at 10:55 am

Everybody (in the UK), PANIC!!!

 blather, Hmm..., news  7 Responses »
Apr 162015
 

REVEALED: The signs and symbols burglars are using to mark YOUR home before breaking in

A police department in a town with the unlikely name of “Lanarkshire” has posted a handy guide to the marks that criminals are going to leave on *your* property, right before they break in, steal your stuff and kill you:

11129831_378768275661513_295739262396813112_n

Assuming that this is in fact a real thing, it opens up a number of questions:

1) Why not just label your *own* home as “too risky” or “nothing worth stealing” preemptively?

2) Why not label your despised neighbors house as “vulnerable” or “good target?”

3) Why not label your *own* home as “vulnerable” if you are looking for some excitement, adventure and donor organs?

neighbor-has-no-guns

 Posted by at 10:26 am

Bouncing Al-Beti

 awesomeness, Crazy, dumbassery, news, youtube, ಠ_ಠ  4 Responses »
Apr 152015
 

So what happens when a car bomb gets blown straight up into the air a hundred feet, then detonates? Let’s find out:

This was apparently an ISIS car bomb going after Kurdish forces near Kirkuk in Iraq. I imagine the driver was killed or knocked unconscious at the first blast which tossed his vehicle into the air, but it’s amusing to imagine what he would have been thinking had he been awake and aware.

 Posted by at 8:33 pm
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