AAAAARRRRGH

 AARRRGH, cats, Gah., news, US Bomber Projects, US Launch Vehicle Projects, US Spacecraft Projects, US Transport Projects, ಠ_ಠ  7 Responses »
Nov 082015
 

Raedthinn has suffered an injury requiring surgery tomorrow (managed to break his jaw – I think on the basement stairs – and it needs to be wired together). This has turned a “blah” Sunday into a rather dark time.

This won’t be cheap. So, if you’ve wanted to buy all the US Aerospace Projects publications, here’s your shot: all 18 Bomber Projects, all four Transport Projects, all three Spacecraft Projects, all two Launch Vehicle Projects. Normally $115, but until I say otherwise, lets say… $75. Slightly more than 1/3 off. Or if you just want to help with the Raedthinn Restoration, click on the “Tip Jar” and help till your significant other hurts you.

WP_20151108_015 WP_20151108_010

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UPDATE: Raedthinn is back; sale has ended.

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Raedthinn, like most cats, seemed to take his damage in stride. I saw him several times this morning, looking perfectly normal and content, even though his jaw must’ve been broken; I’m guessing he must’ve bit down on something this AM while I was out getting some grub and shoved the broken bit of jaw out of place. But even so, when I came home about noon, he was laying calmly on the bed and just gave me a look like “Sup.” I saw the tooth, checked him out, promptly freaked, called the emergency vet and dashed off.

I suggested to the vet that if he could be patched up so the tooth stayed like that, Raedthinn would look the utter badass. Sadly, the tooth is still firmly attached to a bit of jaw… a bit of jaw that has busted off and need to be put back in place. It appears his lower mandible is in three distinct pieces just now. How *exactly* Raedthinn accomplished this I’ve no good idea other than late last night he went bugnuts and dashed up the basement stairs, banging into everything on the way. I don’t know if the broken jaw is a result of the mad dash, or the mad dash was a result of the broken jaw.

 Posted by at 1:46 pm

This should prove entertaining

 Hmm..., news, politics, russian empire  10 Responses »
Nov 072015
 

Putin Associate Found Dead in DC Hotel

Mikhail Lesin was Russia’s Minister of Press from 1999 to 2004 and founded Russia Today, a propaganda arm of the Kremlin, and amassed the sort of fortune that public servants are generally not expected to amass legally. On Thursday he keeled over at the DuPont Circle Hotel in D.C., cause unknown (or at least unannounced). Let the speculatin’ begin! Hookers? Drugs? Polonium?

popcorn_stephen_colbert

 Posted by at 9:58 am

This won’t last

 blather, Hmm...  3 Responses »
Nov 072015
 

Meridian tops website’s ‘best cities’ list

Meridian, Idaho, is a town outside Boise that the Wall Street Journal has declared the best city in the US. Factors include low crime, low unemployment, that sort of thing.

The problem: by advertising how great it is, you’re inviting the likes of wealthy but dimwitted Californian and New Yorker hipsters to come in and buy up the place and turn it into another overpriced urban hellhole.

Of course, the better thing to do would be to build walls around major urban centers and then begin to slowly take them apart. Places like Manhattan can be appropriated by the federal government under eminent domain; the existing buildings can be emptied out and the whole place turned into a “museum of the dark age of high population density.” The current populations can be dispersed to a multitude of small towns built along the lines of Meridian… this would require the construction of several hundred such new towns. Most of northern Canada seems pretty empty, so the urban hipsters and whatnot can be relocated to the arctic circle.

 Posted by at 9:38 am

Logistics Capsules in Color

 art, history, Patreon, projects, rockets, spacecraft  No Responses »
Nov 072015
 

Color artwork from NASA circa 1964 depicting Apollo-derived logistics spacecraft. The BALLOS (BALlistic LOgistic Spacecraft) was studied by several corporations such as Lockheed and McDonnell-Douglas as well as NASA; the artwork was done *for* NASA, but it’s unclear if it was done *by* NASA.

The full resolution versions of these artworks have been posted into the 2015-11 folder in the APR Extras Dropbox. Please check out the APR Patreon!

S64-06336 S64-01800

 Posted by at 1:09 am

Saturn I/RL-10 art

 art, awesomeness, history, rockets, spacecraft  3 Responses »
Nov 062015
 

A magazine ad from 1963 depicting an S-IV stage (with six RL-10 rocket engines, as separate from the later, larger S-IVb stage with a single J-2 engine) staging from a Saturn I first stage. It should be noted that the RL-10 is *still* a top-of-the-line rocket engine, more than fifty years later.

missilesrockets1319unse_0277

Sure, computer generated art might be more accurate and clear, but good ol’ fashioned paint has a life to it.

 Posted by at 7:46 pm

The Man In The Moon

 art, awesomeness, Hmm..., youtube  6 Responses »
Nov 062015
 

Not sure this ad makes me want to fly to Britain and go shopping at “John Lewis” (apparently some sort of department store) , but it’s sure effective at the feels-hitting.

It’s a beautiful piece of work, with bonus points for showing a little kid interested in astronomy. But why, why, WHY is space (and space exploration) so often depicted as a metaphor for sadness?

9RhlWeI

 Posted by at 2:20 pm

So THAT is how the bomb got on that jetliner…

 aircraft, awesomeness, Crazy, youtube  16 Responses »
Nov 052015
 

Sneaking bombs in the luggage? That’s the obsolete approach.

Note: you can bet your keister that you’ll see just this sort of thing used in an Action Movie in the very near future to plant a bomb on a plane, or remove a passenger from a plane, or sneak onto the plane, or something, even though the jetliner here could easily quickly outpace the jetpacks… and anybody in a jetpack who tried to get close enough to the jetliner to touch it would almost certainly be tumbled into oblivion by the wake turbulence.

All that aside: can you imagine the ruckus that would ensue from an A380 smacking into downtown Dubai, perhaps taking down the Burj? Just wait till ISIS gets it into their pointy little heads that the UAE is too cozy with infidels.

 Posted by at 2:18 pm
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