Saturday
- cold and windy. I actually turned on the central air heater for the
first time since spring. I was tempted to mow the lawn, but failed to
get up the energy. Perhaps tomorrow. I did get the Explorers' oil
changed, at about 4,000 miles.
Other chores:
revarnish the French doors in back,
start painting the garage (with the paint I bought months ago),
trim the bushes in front,
water the dry spots,
clean the Explorer,
read a bit and catch up on TIVO.
Somehow item #6 is getting most of my attention today. Go figure.
My friend Roger sent me a link to an interesting Request for Proposal from DARPA.
It was originally for a flying submarine, only they couldn't get it to
work, so now they want a submersible airplane instead. Okaaaaay.
Sadly my brain has started presenting me with various ideas for this. Stupid subconscious.
Of course, this is just life imitating art. As I recall, in the 1960's
teevee show Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea they had a flying sub
shuttle craft for the USSSeaview. Let's check with the Internet, oh, yes. Apparently a very popular modeling item, even today, check it out. A sample image:
So I've updated the table below, with the additional:
Book#22 is Daddy-Long-Legs, by Jean Webster. Yes, the same book that inspired the 1955 Fred Astaire and Leslie Caron movie
of the same title. The book was published in 1912 and generally the
movie follows the book. Jean is American, not French, and there are a
few other differences (no World War II, or indeed World War I), but it
remains a light hearted and optimistic story, told purely by the means
of the schoolgirls' letters (with illustrations!) to her mysterious
benefactor.
There is apparently a sequel I have not read, Dear Enemy, wherein
her college roomie Sally MacBride takes over Jean's foundling home.
Friday
- worked, but stopped at 5:00pm so I could watch the Dodger's vs.
Phillie's. Only to find that the game had started mid-day, was already
over, and that the good guys lost. My father didn't gloat. Much.
Who would start a championship game mid-day on a Friday, when almost everyone is still at work?
Lunch was at Jessica's Cafe in Camarillo, on Pickwick. Excellent pastrami sandwiches, recommended.
One thing I noticed while putting 'The Barbarians' back on a shelf::
someone had written 'Medieval Military History' on the case. It's not
strictly true, essentially being Early Roman Empire and up to and
including the Middle Ages.
How'd that old song go?
Don't know much about the middle ages, I looked at the pictures as I turned the pages...
Thursday 9 October
2008
Thursday
- watching the Dodger's and Phillie's. The Dodger's have squandered a
two run lead, and it's now 3:2 Phillies in the 8th. Not good.
Update: Acckkk. 25 cents poorer.
Wednesday 8 October 2008
Wednesday
- back at work. A long day, dawn to dusk. Not much to say there.
Working down near Camarillo Airport, where they have a Lockheed
Constellation in USAF livery parked. This has to be one of the most
beautiful aircraft ever designed, near the end of the propeller
aircraft era. Like the tea clippers, surpassed by more different and
more efficient modes of transport.
Lockheed Constellation at Camarillo airport. Note the odd pod on the belly.
Tuesday 7 October 2008
Tuesday
- Stupid Angels. Oh well, my real
team, the Dodgers are still in it. The drive down was OK, lots and lots
of trucks. I guess Monday is the start of the work week for them as
well.
Still in Lancaster. I meant to get in a half day of work down in
Ventura, but with one thing after another ended up staying all day in
the high desert.
Book #46#6 was The Barbarians*, by Tim Newark
It was, as the title suggests, about the various barbarian invasions of
the Roman Empires, East and West. The Huns are covered, as are the
various successor plains tribes & confederations, as well as the
Germanic and Muslim invasions. Very interesting, in a depressing sort of way.
Since it concentrates on invasions, over a span of hundreds of year it
is by nature bloody and repetitive. It starts with the Huns and
ends with, I think, the Magyars.
Monday 6 October 2008
Monday
- How about those Angels, grinding out a win in the 12th? There's hope yet. I didn't think the kid
could pull it out after Krod lost his nerve, but he did. I shall drive home a richer man today.
Lesser Goldfinches: a dozen at a time.
My father noted that the finches generally have no problem in 'sharing'
food,
while the hummingbird four feet away strongly defends 'his' feeder,
driving away all newcomers. But we have noted that there is an apparent
maximum limit to the goldfinches communal magnaminity: beginning at
about 10-12fpf (finches per foot) they do start competing and
driving interlopers
off the
sock.
A longer sock would probably allow more finches, but they are eating about1/2" of food
an hour already.
Extrapolating we would predict that a 2' long sock's content
would be devoured in a single day, and a 24' sock in a single hour. A
sock longer than that would
be dangerous, as we'd be into negative territory, with the finches
swarming and then smashing through the window to eat the Nyjer Seed
that hasn't been put out yet. It's possible that small dogs and elderly
humans could be a risk themselves in such a feeding frenzy. Best not to
go there.
In other news, Wall Street is crashing, as are the fiscal systems of the rest of the world.
Poor Iceland, for example, just took over a bank holding something like 650% of the countries GDP. Kinda makes AIG & the rest look like small potatoes, relatively speaking. But hey, they have a plan...
Me? Maybe I'll take all my money and put it into mackerel.
Sunday 5 October 2008
Sunday
- well, the 49ers' didn't come through for Dad, so sad... Heh.
Book #45 was
Monsarrat
At Sea*, by Nicholas
Monsarrat. It's actually a collection of books, novelettes
and short stories. This was a fairly rare audio edition from Books on
Tape - Amazon.com doesn't seem to even know of it's existence.
The first three novels were written during his wartime duty on
corvettes, and in paper formed Three
Corvettes, these being (1) HM Corvette, (2)East Coast
Corvette, and (3)Corvette Command. Very interesting if you've
previously read The
Cruel Sea, his later and most famous novel. They form the
germ of that novel, and you can see the underpinnings. As they were
written with
wartime secrecy and censorship in mind the author was necessarily
limited in what he could and could not say - firstly there is a frankly
unbelievable
gush on the high morals of British seaman ashore(!) - and of what they
can't say: RADAR is not mentioned, though it is mentioned in one of the
post war stories.
There is also a bit of anger shown at 'petrol wasters' and coupon
dealers. Convoy escorts risked their lives to bring wartime supplies to
Britain, and he speaks of the merchant sailors crewing the tankers with
a real respect. I was reminded of a bit in Nevil Shute's Pastoral,
this
years Book #26,
wherein the airman and his girl take a brief detour to stop at a pond
while using a car for official business. They get caught and
reprimanded by a senior officer for wasting petrol, but let off easily
because of the airmans' bravery.
So, what the heck happened to #6,
#20, and #36?
Did I add them and then delete them in editing the blog page? Did I
just miscount? Either seems unlikely, as I've been doing this for
years, but something
happened.
Update, 10Oct08: It should have been #22, not #20, but still..
