I’ve gotten as far as roughing out the walkway and railing. Does the human figure look properly scaled here? There is some play in this, as there were several models of the Ajax that differ in important respects, and a full scale set which differed even more.
Any dissenting opinions?
Progress on the next model for Fantastic Plastic…
Candida auris is an exciting new fungal infection that has popped up in drug resistant form all around the world. Doesn’t seem to have come from anywhere specific… just *everywhere.* Perhaps unsurprisingly, in the US it seems to be most prevalent in Illinois and New York.
Right now it seems to be a threat to the elderly and others with compromised immune system, killing about half of those admitted with the infection inside of 30 days. And that’s one of the things that creeps me out the most… it can take months to kill you, months during which you are an infection machine. In contrast, ebola does you in in a hurry, while AIDS takes forever… but AIDS is *very* difficult to transmit compared to Candida, which you simply spread throughout the environment. And it doesn’t need to live in you; it’s perfectly happy infecting your hospital room. The bed sheets, the pillow, the tray table, the walls, the floor, the ceiling, the freakin’ window glass.
But don’t worry Millenials, I’m sure it’ll get around to mutating into a form that feast on you too.
The article has a lot of fun numbers about how many could, will and do die. Two that seem potentially contradictory; an estimate that 162,000 die from drug resistant bugs in the US annually… and that 700,000 die from them world-wide. Seems odd that the US would be such a large percentage.
HBO used to play this between movies waaaay back when. It freaked me right the frak out when I was a kid.
A Russian VTOL tailsitting remote controlled airplane built around a 12-gauge shotgun, for blowing pesky drones out of the sky. Load this sucker up with Dragonsbreath rounds, and the fun would be complete.
Imagine the regulatory freakout if an *American* had the temerity to build something like this. Sigh.
No points for correctly guessing what this is. I *suspect* that recognition of this*might* be age-related. But I’d be happy to be proven wrong.
Obviously this is early in the modelling process. But it *should* be recognizable…
Take a look at the photo. Aldrin’s fashion sense is… unique. And why not: he’s been to the moon. Have you?
There is a lot of evidence of bee-keeping out here in rural Utah. You see a lot of mobile beehives parked around certain farms, the bees pollinating the plants; locally produced honey is available for sale *everywhere.* Heck, the local print shop in Tremonton has a section among the printer paper and envelopes for one brand of locally produced honey products. So bees are important.
But bees are also a pest. You get a beehive in your house, you want it *gone.* There are two approaches to that:
1) Kill it. Either hire someone or wrap yourself in bubblewrap and hose the hive down with Raid; or, if you’re feeling frisky and are none too damn bright, burn it with fire.
2) Call a local beekeeper. They are often looking to expand their “work force,” especially with the collapse in bee populations over the last couple decades. Bee keepers will often come and, for free, remove the hives.
Option #2 is obviously the preferred one. You win… you get rid of the problem for free. The bee keeper wins – they get a new presumably healthy hive for little cost. The bees win…. they ain’t dead. So, who would possibly have a problem with this setup?
Oh, look, it’s a politician.
Rep. Theresa “Terry” Meza (D.) of Irving, Texas has authored House Bill 4212 that would make the process of bee removal illegal. Unless of course the person removing the bees has undergone 160 hours of both class room and field training in beekeeping and removals. That amounts to over 3 college semester classes worth of training! A normal college class of 3 semester credit hours is around 45-48 contact hours. This nonsense will make almost all bee keeping removal services illegal overnight! If this bill passes, nobody will be able to legally remove and relocate bees after January 1, 2020 until after they go through 160 hours of training and licensing.
There is currently no agency, organization or authority that is set up to train such licensed bee removers in Texas. The legislation would place licensing and training specifics under the authority of the Texas Department of Agriculture.
Additionally, the “licensed” bee remover must obtain $600,000 in liability insurance. If that wasn’t enough, the bee remover must also have $300,000 in workman’s comp before being able to legally remove bees. Oh and you have to pay a yearly licensing fee and whatever fees are associated with your 160 hours of classroom and field training.
Brilliant! Something humans have been doing for thousands of years, now made prohibitively expensive. *Why* these changes are desired does not seem to be in the text of the bill.
https://capitol.texas.gov/tlodocs/86R/billtext/pdf/HB04212I.pdf
SpaceX’s “Starhopper” testbed for their Raptor engines, intended for use on the “Starship” fired up a single engine and*apparently* lifted off yesterday on a tethered flight. This probably means it got no more than a few feet off the ground at best.