Mar 282022
 

A few months ago I was contacted via email by someone looking for information on the North American Aviation “Rotational Research Facility” built in the 1960’s. This was – kinda – an “artificial gravity space station” built on the ground, designed for long duration human testing. Obviously it would not test human reactions to fractional-G environments, since it started at 1 G and went up from there, but it would test responses to Coriolis effects and the like. When I was contacted, I had nothing on it other than a vague recollection of the concept. Thanks to eBay I recently acquired a book that had a short description of the facility, from before it was built. If that was *you* who asked about it, let me know. If it wasn’t you, but you have more information on it, let me know. Google turns up very little on the RRF apart from a few newspaper articles. The whole thing seems to have been memory-holed; perhaps the name changed before it was built.

 Posted by at 4:20 pm
Mar 282022
 

Legacy socialist Putin has control over the media and the narrative in Russia. But it seems he has not yet shut down the international phone system; you can still call Russian numbers from outside. So… it seems there are people cold-calling Russians to talk to them about what Russia is doing in Ukraine. It’s an interesting idea, though in order to have much impact they’d probably need to call *millions* of Russians, which would require hundreds of thousands of Russian speakers willing to do this sort of thing. it would be rather soul-crushing to try to talk to a bunch of people who have been to one degree or another brainwashed by the government media. Like trying to talk down an SJW or Antifa. Ugh.

 Posted by at 12:18 am
Mar 272022
 

… to keep the Oscars weird. This *seems* like it’s an actual example of him losing his cool and committing assault live on TV. It looks kinda like a scripted joke until he gets back to his seat and starts yelling FCC-unapproved profanities at Chris Rock. The problem seems to be that Rock made a joke about Jada Smith being bald, which is not a fashion choice but a medical issue and Will Smith – who initially laughed at the joke – apparently decided to leap to violence.

Ricky Gervais wasn’t the host, so I didn’t care to watch the Oscars (honestly… who does anymore?). But the YouTube algorithm decided that I needed to see this, so, so do you.

 Posted by at 10:40 pm
Mar 272022
 

I have long bemoaned the fact that interesting aerospace history stuff sometimes sells on eBay at painfully high prices and sometimes even to people who aren’t me (the outrage of it all). Such is the case with this listing:

Vintage NASA Concept Art Frank DiPietro Martin Marietta SV-5D PRIME Lifting Body

Two nice vintage lithographs… one of the Martin SV-5D (AKA, X-23) subscale lifting body, and one of the NASA-Langley HL-10 (an early concept with a raised cockpit, possibly also a Martin interpretation). The initial bid price for these was $100; after a number of recent eBay expenditures, that was more than I was willing to go for. So it’s just as well that the final selling price was $384, which seems really, really high. Perhaps the bidders thought that these were the original paintings? Or perhaps the market for lithographs has skyrocketed.

Well, I guess it’s time that I unload some stuff. Not that I necessarily want to, but the bills lately…. uuuuugh. I recently saw a modestly cruddy Convair F-106 joystick go for well over $700. Well, guess what I have: a *really* *nice* F-106 joystick. Anybody want to bribe me before I put it on eBay? If so, send me an email with your insanely generous offer…

 Posted by at 10:23 pm
Mar 272022
 

Turns out the driver of that truck that got rolled and spun by a tornado a week or so back is just a kid. If he plays his cards right, that old truck could prove a windfall.

Chevy wisely gave him a brand new truck and fifteen grand. The piece didn’t say what happened to the old truck, but I remain convinced that it could do well at auction.

 Posted by at 9:57 pm
Mar 272022
 

This makes no sense to me:

Ukrainian Snake Island sailors who shouted ‘Go f**k yourself’ at invading Russian forces before being captured are FREED in prisoner exchange with Moscow

Supposedly 19 Ukrainians from Snake island were traded for 11 Russian civilian sailors. Prisoner swaps occur all the time. But *these* prisoners seem like they’d be a propaganda coup for the Ukrainains. Trot these guys out on TV, on the radio, online, and in real life, and they’ll probably boost morale something fierce. Why the Russians would give them up is beyond me. Now if they all starting mysteriously dropping dead from never before seen diseases or Polonium poisoning… *THEN* it’d make sense.

 

 Posted by at 1:42 am
Mar 262022
 

It turns out that Russia is littering the countryside of Ukraine with the bodies of dead Russians. One might think that the Ukrainians would be happy about that, but it turns out that there are *so* many dead Russians lying about that once it warms up and thaws, there could be a bit of a stink and the usual nonsense about diseases and such. And the Russians don’t seem to want them back. If I was a Russian citizen, I think I might find this strategy vaguely disturbing and unsatisfying.

The bodies of Russian soldiers are piling up in Ukraine, as Kremlin conceals true toll of war

 

 Posted by at 12:32 am
Mar 252022
 

Great-grandmother charged with second-degree murder after 7-month-old killed in Georgia dog mauling

Lots of “wrong” in this story. but what jumps right out at me: the “great grandmother” here is FIFTY SIX YEARS OLD. mean an average age at spawning of about 18. Certainly not historically or biologically unreasonable… it just seems weird and unwise.

Also what jumps out at me: the great-grandmother was attacked by the dog as well… and the dog wasn’t *her* dog. Important details are left out of the story, such as what the frak happened such that *she* is getting charged with murder for someone else’s dog going buggo on a baby.

 Posted by at 6:54 pm