2010 History

Monday Cat Blogging

Tory and T-Chan catching some rays

Sorry about the delay, I've been trying to get a nice picture of Tory all weekend. It's his turn.

Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:40:03 PST - Link

Recent Tweets

Here's some recent tweets of interest...

Looks like something out of Ghibli! Awesome ground effects Russian aircraft. "Лунь" проект 903 http://igor113.livejournal.com/51213.html

Dear Sen. Inhofe, The media has actually done a great job of promoting crackpots and energy Ind. shills to 'balance' real science.

Of course the GOP thinks government is broken. The 'Tax Cuts [Rich]', 'Deregulate', and 'Fear' buttons don't work anymore.

You want a drug test before a job offer? No thanks. I have no idea where you got those drugs. I'm not testing them.

The Austin IRS plane not 'terrorism" because there was no threat to repeat. What's keeping Wall Street from another meltdown? I'm terrified.

His was that quintessential American Silk-to-riches story...

I just set my Tivo to record the epic "Mega Shark vs Giant Octopus" off Syfy Sat 3/12 10:00. I've heard many bad things about it. =^_^=

Dear CNN, you don't have to call the shooter at the Pentagon "Gentleman".

quite popular.

The allegation that the 'public doesn't want it' is an artificial creation of millions of dollars in disinformation money

Yes, I agree. The tax code SHOULD be re-written. Preferably in c++.

"No climate model currently incorporates the amplifying feedback from methane released by a defrosting tundra."

Leno’s Tonight Show Reality Hacking, adds Laugh Track to Sarah Palin Appearance:

Study: Arctic seabed methane stores destabilizing, venting I'm thinking, "We're those bastards, we finally did it."

Who doesn't pay $150 for haircuts? I do. That's what I pay for a 10-pack.

Q: How many Russian cosmonauts it take to change light bulb? A: Just one, but... why change? Is not broke bad — can Fix!

John Roberts is not stepping down. For some reason I feel no desire to spin this, or lie about it. Does that make me a liberal?

Palin is writing another book? Really? Another Book? She should do it live — like Milli Vanilli.

Pick one: [ ] No health care reform [ ] Imperfect but substantial health care reform.

CNN: Shorter Bill Bennett: Reconciliation may only be used to benefit rich Republicans.

Dear weather.com: Your local radar maps in California are time stamped with Eastern Time.

GOP says next election will be about health care... I'm okay with that.

If the House holds off passing the Senate bill until the reconciliation bill is ready to pass, both could be voted in the same hour.

Good artists copy, great artists patent obvious ideas and sue.

It's immoral to ask a barefoot person to pull themselves up by their bootstraps.

Welcome to the story of the dozen families who live in one of Londons' oldest streets.

Antarctic spits out iceberg the size of Luxembourg - Times Online

Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:40:03 PST - Link

Friday Cat Blogging

Miko: Jeez, Dad. Do you have to do this every Friday? Go bug Tory.

Fri, 26 Feb 2010 16:19:37 PST - Link

Friday Cat Blogging

Miko, asserting his alpha-cat dominance over T-chan.

Fri, 19 Feb 2010 12:07:28 PST - Link

Friday Cat Blogging

Friday Afternoon Snooze

Fri, 12 Feb 2010 15:20:05 PST - Link

Friday Cat Blogging

Miko enjoying the heating vent.

Fri, 05 Feb 2010 14:48:21 PST - Link

Four Mile Island

Soon, we shall be facing an energy crunch that will hit the economy as hard as the banking crisis, except it will keep hitting, and hitting, a little harder every year.

Of course the first reaction is to reach for a band-aid for this sucking chest wound, and right there at the top of the energy first-aid chest is build more nuclear power plants.

I'm not thrilled with the idea, but I wouldn't oppose it either, as long as we face reality full in the face.

1) I am worried about what we are going to do about the waste—but that's a problem we have to solve for the wastes that already exist. The incremental wastes from new plants will not change the nature of that problem, only the magnitude.

2) I'm far more worried about the fuel situation. The industry guide Uranium Resources Red Book predicts about 85 years of uranium supply, and that's only at today's world usage, not a vastly enlarged fleet. There may be another 200 years worth available if lower grades of ore can be exploited, but there are issues. The current uranium mining infrastructure has been on hold for a decade because much of the fuel burned in reactors today was originally mined for military purposes decades ago. Those weapons are now being broken down and the cores diluted to make power plant fuel. This is a very good thing, but it leaves us without enough mining capacity to take up the slack when the time comes. It's not clear a weakened mining sector—facing a world of diminishing fossil fuel—will be able to get to the lower grades of ore.

So on the surface, it appears that we have enough uranium resources to keep the present fleet going to end of life, and enough to fuel a replacement fleet for their 40-60 year life, but not enough to make nuclear the foundation of our energy mix going forward.

Still, I don't think it's going to happen.

The present US fleet of reactors is getting very long in the tooth. They have been getting extensions to their operating permits to run up to 20 years past their original design specifications. They have control rooms full of gauges and equipment plants full of sensors that are hard to replace since the last US plant was started in 1977 and completed in 1997, and sometimes the companies that made these critical parts are simply gone.

These conditions are ripe for another Three Mile Island like event.

Assume one is directly hurt in the incident (but there will be anecdotal reports for decades afterwords). Assume the radiation release, if any, will be below allowable levels. Assume there was no malicious intent, no operator negligence, and the safety systems do exactly what they were designed to do. It won't matter.

For most of us, we'll become aware though a news bulletin over the radio, or a tweet, or "Breaking News" headline on a website.

Then the 24 hour news networks will kick in 24/7. There will be reporters standing outside the plant breathlessly reporting the arrival of each official looking vehicle. There will be press conferences, followed by endless panels of experts speculating as to what happened, and why. It'll spread to the weather forecast - wind directions!! - fallout patterns!! and to the legal analysis shows - who's suing who? - what's the liability? should someone go to jail?

Don't even get me started on talk radio.

The result of such an even in the 24 hour saturated news environment would be the end of revival of nuclear power.

FYI: The Three Mile Island accident happened on March 28, 1979. CNN began broadcasting June 1, 1980.

Thu, 04 Feb 2010 12:03:54 PST - Link

A Tax On Reason

Suppose you have friends who wish to get married and they ask if you can perform the ceremony for them...

You can do just that.

Here in Santa Clara County California you have two options. You can hop online, and if your printer is warmed up, become a minister with all the power to perform weddings in less time than it will take to finish reading this.

A Google search for become a minister online for free yields 50,300,000 results. The top result is from The Universal Life Church Monastery claiming over 20 million ministers ordained worldwide. They've been around since before the internet, and ask very little in the way of faith or dogma of their ordained clergy. I recommend them, they do good work. When my wife and I were married, our minister was from the ULC, and we've lasted over 20 years! No troubles right?

Now suppose your friends are atheists...

Yes, atheists, as in not believing in theism. (If the word atheist bothers you, you might find it more comfortable if you think of it pronounced like the word asymmetrical.) Your friends simply don't believe things without evidence, they base their decisions on facts and reason. This doesn't mean that they are all logic and no emotion. You've seen them shed tears to Mozart, and tremble before a van Gogh, and stare in wonder at the milky way. They are happy and loving people, and they are asking you, a friend, to join them, and they just don't feel comfortable (and perhaps a bit militant) that such a joining should not require that the word church be affixed to their marriage certificate.

There is another way...

Here in Santa Clara (and many other locals around the nation) you can become a One-Time Deputy Marriage Commissioner!

Yes, you can present yourself to the Clerk-Recorder's Office during Marriage License business hours, show your government issued ID, and pay a fee of $80 (it varies by jurisdiction) so you can for a 6 day period perform one (1) ceremony.

Or you could become a minister with the ability to perform as many wedding ceremonies as you wish. Online. Now. Free.

To say it makes sense that a non-religious person must go through these additional steps and costs to perform a wedding ceremony is not only an attack on reason, it is a tax on reason.

Sun, 31 Jan 2010 17:11:02 PST - Link

Friday Cat Blogging

Tory of the jungle.

Fri, 29 Jan 2010 10:55:05 PST - Link

Here's some selected recent tweets...

I don't think that the Republican offsite is quite following their script.

It's so cute when Republicans blame the lack of bipartisanship on The Democrat Party.

Things could have gotten really bad if we actually wanted more oil than the rocks are prepared to produce. Phew.

The only solution is that a 10 question quiz be attached to each ballot. Your vote will be multiplied by you test score. [Poll: Americans pretty clueless about politics, world | Raw Story] http://goo.gl/KKyN

It's so convenient that world oil "demand" happened to peak just as supply is starting to dry up.

Now that's what I call Spirit: http://xkcd.com/695/ (Make sure to hover your mouse over the comic and read the text that pops up)

Decrease of old Arctic Sea ice 1982-2007.Animated gif http://goo.gl/s85I

(During the SOTU)...

Repubs not happy that money passed through wall street might be passed through main street. Really?

Repubs sit firm in support of big co. that send jobs overseas

Repubs on their feet for Gas. (Glad I'm not there.)

"All this was before I walked in the door." Oh yeah!

Holy Crap! Obama just served the SCOTUS

End DADT- YES!

Yeah, he's good.

A real compassionate conservative? I could learn to like that.

RT @ranggrol The silence tells me that the adult is talking and the kids need to listen up

Energy has more to do with the recession & debt than partisan politics... http://goo.gl/o3CA

Maybe we should start funding a maned mission AFTER we have a rover last 6 years in the moon's abrasive regolith. http://goo.gl/RRJf

I'm old enough to remember when "iPod" sounded really stupid.

RT facingsouth Overheard: "If corporations are people, I'm going to marry a bank"

"Not to make light of this, but the reason people want to produce documents is that they are revealing." — Judge Walker http://goo.gl/PND6

Dear UK terrorists: Your last guy - he was kicked in the nuts so hard that the kicker broke his foot. That was a taxi driver. Rugby anyone?

Fri, 29 Jan 2010 10:55:05 PST - Link

Friday Cat Blogging

T-chan enjoying a rare break in the clouds.

As for me, I've been in the attic, installing a layer of R30 on top of the R13 that was already there. Besides, the rain sounds better up there.

Fri, 22 Jan 2010 10:59:43 PST - Link

Catching Up

Wow, another week without any content here.

I had such good intentions, so many good ideas, then I came down with some 24 hour bug on Sunday, so I spent Monday recovering, avoiding the inane wall-to-wall coverage of talking heads babbling about something Harry Reid said, and following the Proposition 8 Trial on Twitter.

By Tuesday I was well enough to rent a 14" chop saw, and attacked the back patio, opening two 4' x 6' holes for planter boxes. My part was cutting and breaking by sledge hammer, while wife washed and removed the debris (Roughly 2200 lbs).

Needless to say, by the end of the afternoon I was weary, and particularly in tune with what it takes to deal with concrete. Then the pictures started to show up of he devastation in Haiti. Block after block of entire homes turned to concrete rubble. I could feel the enormity of the disaster in my bones.

After that, it just didn't seem like any of the subjects I was pondering for blog posts mattered very much.

I'm not a doctor, or a nurse, nor am I trained in rescue, so I gave money to Doctors Without Borders and The Red Cross.

Sat, 16 Jan 2010 10:26:47 PST - Link

Saturday Cat Blogging

Miko, enjoying a sunny Saturday morning.

Enjoy it, puss. This may be the last sun for a over a week, the weather service is forecasting rain for the next 10 days. As I'm typing this the high clouds are rolling in.

Sat, 16 Jan 2010 09:10:49 PST - Link

Friday Cat Blogging

The Bermans stalk an unidentified Squirrel, who has better things to do.

Fri, 08 Jan 2010 10:01:47 PST - Link

Oh Yeah, That Was A Decade For The History Books.

Aughts were a lost decade for U.S. economy, workers

Well, there it is. All of those investment books that claimed that investments always go up have just been proven wrong.

Sun, 03 Jan 2010 11:12:24 PST - Link

U.S. media coverage of climate change certainly has been slanted

The most comprehensive review yet of newspaper climate change articles, performed in 2004 by academics Jules and Maxwell Boykoff, found that 53 percent of them offered roughly an equal balance between the view that humans contribute to global warming and that it's exclusively caused by nature. But the Boykoffs couldn't find a single peer-reviewed scientific study that supported the later view — out of more than 900.

mnn

Sun, 03 Jan 2010 08:43:35 PST - Link

I have to wonder if we'd have a strong public option if the savvy insiders press hadn't been so cocksure that we wouldn't.

Sat, 02 Jan 2010 11:35:02 PST - Link

Saturday Cat Blogging

I was busy yesterday, so to make up for it here's cat and squirrel. (Also, the website just looks too dreary without some images on the home page...)

Sat, 02 Jan 2010 11:15:25 PST - Link

2010 Website Rollover

Since my content management system is hand-rolled, and very, very basic, I never got around to the year-end roll-over as a feature. It's just been too much trouble to write and test code that would only get used once a year.

This year I've been a lot more careful in documenting what needed to get done, so at least I have clear instructions for 2011.

For those looking for recent entries, they are over there on the left, marked "2009"

Sat, 02 Jan 2010 10:24:58 PST - Link