72F and wet.
Yesterday was mostly overcast with some spotty rain, which was not the forecast. Forecast was for T storms. I ended up running all over town, driving both vehicles, and barely making it to school to get the kids on time.
I’ve got smallest child home with me, while wife and older child got to Girl Scout sleepover camp. LOTS of stuff packed into the car and the add on trailer hitch carrier thing.
My non-prepping hobby meets this morning and I’ll be taking smallest child. She’s got cookies to deliver, and she can sit with a tablet or book for a short while… then we’ll find something to do in between sportsball and an Easter egg hunt at our rec association. It’s gonna be a long day and I won’t be getting much done.
Maybe I’ll get her to help me put the bird netting over the blueberries. Or help getting the beds ready for planting….
Right.
BTW, does anyone else think the whole caterpillar to butterfly thing is INSANE? It’s like an alien species here on earth. No one seems to give it much thought, but DANG that’s weird. One creature enters, and another emerges. What would it mean for us if we could harness whatever that process is to change ourselves or refresh our bodies without changing our dna. And how in the heck can two creatures so different be the same, with the same DNA? Legs, mouth, feeding, wings, skin- everything changes.
There are some really weird things about radio and electromagnetism too that I’m seeing with new eyes as I study more about radio and electronics. I’ve got lots of questions that I don’t even know where to ask…. like ‘why does an em wave continue at the same speed, basically forever, even though it interacts with the environment it passes thru? What EXACTLY restricts the speed of EM waves, but doesn’t cause them to run down? What are they moving thru when all the other waves we know about need a medium? There seems to be a lot of arm waving involved…. (how can light be a particle and wave? Where does the energy come from to keep the oscillations happening?) How does light (a discrete particle traveling in a straight line) emanate from a POINT SOURCE, yet completely fill the volume in an ever expanding cone? The more I learn about it, the more it doesn’t make sense (and forget the ‘lightfield camera’ that thing is just magic.)
Anyway, talk amongst yourselves….
n
There are some really weird things about radio and electromagnetism too that I’m seeing with new eyes as I study more about radio and electronics. I’ve got lots of questions that I don’t even know where to ask…. like ‘why does an em wave continue at the same speed, basically forever, even though it interacts with the environment it passes thru?
I’m sure you’ve seen Fields and Waves textbooks at Goodwill. See how far you can get with one of those. Leithold’s “The Calculus” is the place to start if you need a math refresher — that’s the book used by the “Stand and Deliver” teacher and should be just about anywhere with seven editions before he died.
(Leithold wasn’t just punching a cash register. He was a serious educator.)
Stallings “Wireless Communications” boils down the math into something understandable for practical applicaions.
If you really want your mind blown, find a Modern Physics book with a chapter on Special Relativity. General Relativity has crazy math, but Special Relativity is strictly algebra.
High end CS is also fun. While the practical applications are thin, reaching the point where you have a favorite “NP Complete” problem can be interesting.
My favorite is Minesweeper. Sssh — I’m conducting important research.
At some point, I’ll have to look at Lambda Calculus again. Sadly, the department chair taught the course for my Masters’ program, and he was a stiff. The only reason I got an ‘A’ out of that course is that the grades were curved to keep the diploma mill flowing — I did better than the Indians understanding the concepts on the first pass.
yeap I was thinking on the short answer, mathematics
thanks Nick, really, the only difference yet is I am not smoking (yes I know) and eating with low Na, maybe because I am 189 cm/85kg but sedentary, the stents were through my arm.
Mathematics is a way of describing what we observe about the universe. If we observe enough and fiddle with the equations enough it can become remarkably predictive. But it doesn’t tell us why.
Newton had good equations to describe motion but with more observations they had to be fiddled with to account for very high gravity and very high speeds. And they still don’t work very well with things that are very, very small.
Fundamentally this is why, as a scientist, I disagree with the statement “settled science”. When my father was born the continents didn’t move. Not that he is ancient, just that almost no geologist accepted the notion of continental drift. Now they all do. When I was born there was no dark matter nor dark energy. Those have been added to the mathematics to try and get them to be more predictive. But nobody can seem to actually find either of them…
I have a niggling thought that by the time I’m my father’s age dark energy will be looked back at as we look back at phlogiston; an interesting idea but wrong.
The universe is weird. I love that, it keeps me interested.
“Fundamentally this is why, as a scientist, I disagree with the statement “settled science”.”
–this in spades. SO MUCH of science was “settled” until finally the establishment couldn’t ignore the new thinking any longer.
“everyone knows….” is a thought killer.
There’s an article about the discovery of radio and early physics in Nuts And Volts this month that is interesting. Maxwell invented something so that EM made sense to him, but Heaviside dropped that something to make Maxwell’s equations simplify down into the 4 that we use today.
AGW simplifies craptons of things to make their computer models work, for values of ‘work.’
Orbits as perfect circles worked as a simplification for a while… the epi circles worked, then finally ellipses did the trick better….
Heck even the acceleration due to gravity is simplified to 9.81m/ss instead of using a local value.
Caterpillars still bug me though, that transformation doesn’t make sense….
n
Just a note, the site seems to be acting normally this morning. I did however just get a 500 error on a refresh.
g in MKS? wait, someone moved this to EU!!!!
yes math describes, and everything is falsable Kuhn, Popper etc., but, we are going genlemen in this path to cultural discussion and so on
Its true and Godel was right, but, we are a long way after epicicles, nothing is settled science, but, and this is a big but actual physics describe more or less accurately the world, and, settled means, perhaps, the better tool we have today
maybe MKS and cultural discussions someone is revolving in the tomb, the only thing that lacks is deconstruction?
ps I have too much free time
We are a long way from epicycles and we progressed in the right direction. The New Horizons probe traveled ~7.5 billion kilometers (37.3 billion furlongs)** and was right on target. But that doesn’t me that all modern investigations are in the right directions. There seems to be a lot of buzz in some parts of the physics community questioning some basic aspects of string theory. That is way over my head, so I’m not going to comment on it other to say some very smart and respected people are saying “hmmmmm, maybe not”.
Sometimes what seems like progress is down a dead end street. It’s hard for some to acknowledge when what they have been doing is going nowhere. Especially when opinions begin to masquerade as facts.
being currently unemployed I also have too much time on my hands, ayj. I have been taking some long solo hikes in the woods and that lets my mind wander into odd territories. I’m questioning so much lately.
** I’m an American and a scientist. I am equally at home with the US customary measurements and metric.
Caterpillars still bug me though, that transformation doesn’t make sense….
Caterpillar:
“Caterpillars have been called “eating machines”, and eat leaves voraciously. Most species shed their skin four or five times as their bodies grow, and they eventually enter a pupal stage before becoming adults.[18] Caterpillars grow very quickly; for instance, a tobacco hornworm will increase its weight ten-thousandfold in less than twenty days. An adaptation that enables them to eat so much is a mechanism in a specialized midgut that quickly transports ions to the lumen (midgut cavity), to keep the potassium level higher in the midgut cavity than in the hemolymph.[19]”
What Do Butterflies Eat:
“Actually, butterflies do not eat at all. Well, at least not in the traditional sense. What do butterflies eat? Instead of eating, butterflies get their nurishment (sic) from drinking. They have a long narrow tube in their mouth called a proboscis that acts as a straw. They usually set on top of a flower and drink the nectar. To see a congregation of many kinds of butterflies together they feed on small puddles on the grouind (sic) or wet areas on leaves and plants.”
There you have it: The two forms of the animal exploit different ecological niches. Additionally, the more mobile and wider-ranging butterfly form increases its chances of mating with an individual whose genome is dissimilar to its own, thus facilitating the evolutionary process.
Added: One might think of the butterfly as the caterpillar’s sex organs. 😉
When you have to pile unobservium on top of unobservium and handwave after handwave, you probably are lying to yourself or mistaken.
String theory, dark matter, dark energy…. “hey, we can’t make the math match our theory, so let’s include this fudge factor to make it work….” or it could be the theory is wrong.
n
Re the ongoing 500 problem.
I got one this morning, although there seems to be less of them yesterday as I monitored the site. (I can only see the errors by refreshing the page and sometimes the error occurs.)
Had one this morning, so looked at the server error log for the domain (different from any error.log file that WP makes). Found one that looked suspicious:
that had my IP address and appeared to be about the same time as the one I saw.
That error was interesting, so I contacted DreamHost support (again…) and the tech suggested moving to fastcgi for that PHP version. So that was changed, along with some settings to increase various memory settings.
So, today will be monitoring things. If anyone has the time, and you get a 500 error, please send me the timestamp of when it happened, along with your public IP address. Send it via email only to rhellewell at gmail.com (don’t want to have your IP address here).
If you would rather comment here, just obscure the last two ‘octets’ of your IP address in your comment (as I did above), along with the approximate time of the error.
I’ll use that info to poke into the error log again for any corresponding errors.
(The struggle is real, and it continues…)
In other news, I’ve finished the final version of Light Blink Book Two. I have to add some back matter, and check formatting. And completed the first draft of the prequel, which will be released at the same time as Book Two. The prequel might be a freebie, or at 99 cents. And I have to do final work on the Book Two cover, along with a cover for the prequel.
Keeping busy…
@Nick: Am I correct in thinking that your non-prepping hobby != ham radio?
Ok, taxes are weird this year. I made a profit on my commercial property. So, the new tax law of 2018 allows me to deduct 20% of my profit as an expense. Wild. That is not a true expense but it is a bennie thrown to us hard working landlords.
https://www.mlrpc.com/articles/new-tax-law-affects-rental-real-estate-owners/
Plus I have to amortize the $2,250 that I spent refinancing the commercial property loan over the 15 year term of the loan. I knew that I had to do this, it just pisses me since that was cash that I paid to the bank. But, I got a locked interest rate mortgage for 5.48% that is only for 1/3rd of the current value of my property. My previous mortgage was starting to float and I could not stand that exposure.
I consider ham radio to be a prep. That’s how it started, and later it turned into a hobby that I enjoy. Gear whores LOVE a hobby that lets you buy gear!
n
@rick, I haven’t gotten one in the last couple of minutes, so that’s better already. IF the change fixes it, it tells me the host changed something that broke what you had running here…
n
“The two forms of the animal exploit different ecological niches.”
two forms so completely different that they look like different creatures! And how does the DNA get controlled to express one form over the other? Where does the DNA for the butterfly form live while the DNA is making and running the caterpillar?? Alien life form. Heard it here first…
n
Younger child’s softball game ended with a freezing downpour. It was hot hot hot and humid with a strong wind. Like being in the sun at the beach with the breeze off the ocean. Then the wind shifted, temps dropped 20 degrees, and the rain came.
Don’t know what that will do to our rec association event tonight. The grounds tend to flood following downpours.
n
” the caterpillar’s sex organs” — sex organs that FLY AWAY!
n
But, I got a locked interest rate mortgage for 5.48% that is only for 1/3rd of the current value of my property. My previous mortgage was starting to float and I could not stand that exposure.
Did you get your trim notice yet?
The ranch next to our neighborhood was sold and divided up into a subdivision catering mostly to H1Bs. The houses still aren’t cheap, however, so our comparables are through the roof. I may appeal this year since my house is over 20 years old.
It would be considered racist to make the argument before the property appraisers that the H1B families won’t touch a 20 year old house, but it is the truth about the local housing market.
The Legislature is working on a “deal” to increase the sales tax a percentage point in return for some kind of nebulous property tax relief.
The Legislature is working on a “deal” to increase the sales tax a percentage point in return for some kind of nebulous property tax relief.
You are being kind. There will not be any property tax relief in Texas. The school districts will see to that. But the sales tax will rise by a complete percentage point, more than ten percent.
I would love to see commercial properties get their property taxes locked down also, like residential homestead properties. That will never happen either as the school districts will see to that also.
Property tax is a drug stronger than heroin to all of the taxing authorities in Texas.
Just wait until Texas flips from red to blue in 2022 or 2024. We will get a state income tax in the first year. But, only the “rich” will pay will be the battle cry !
What is a trim notice ? Do you mean notice of new value ?
What is a trim notice ? Do you mean notice of new value ?
I don’t remember the exact wording on the document, but it was an official estimate of the value of my house from the county for tax purposes.
We have five years before my youngest graduates high school. My wife keeps her FL license current in order to have options when the time comes.
I certainly don’t see us returning to Tampa Bay. The county where we lived most of our adult lives just started a drive to add another percentage point to the sales taxes.
No one p*sses away money like Hillsborough County. They tore down the Buccaneer’s original stadium with five years left on the bonds paying for the thing.
I ordere a sprinkler controller from open sprinkler.com. It arrived yesterday and I installed it this morning. Web base control, but local – no cloud connectivity required. Looking forward to playing with it.
Storms predicted for overnight tonight, with the potential for tornadoes. We were out of propane for the grill, so I went and got a refill, and a second bottle. It will be helpful to have a spare, even during normal times. Also filled up the gas tank in the car.
I just received a tax refund check from the UK Inland Revenue. They had been charging me tax on a State Pension I never received. I got that sorted and now I have a check drawn on HM Revenue & Customs for 177 pounds sterling. So what can I do with it? I’m pretty sure my bank, a regional, won’t accept it. I could hold on to it till I have my stopover in Heathrow on our way back from Italy and hope a bank in the airport could convert it to currency. What would you do?
@jlp it was a joke, if it bothered you, forgive me. Rhe reason as you could see years ago here was a kind of ongoing discussion that someone ended more or less, the world uses MKS we send more than once people to the monn (more or less was this)
I hoper next week th physicians let me back to work, if not will be boring, a lot, and I will must choose something to do, maybe convince my daugther to buy apartment in NY (I dont know yet)
cheers
Nick: or it could be the theory is wrong.
My view exactly. Dark matter & dark energy are completely unobserved. They are inferred by the actions of distant stars and galaxies. Those observations don’t match what the current theories say they should be, so we invent dark (stuff) out of whole cloth to fill in the missing bits. We have seen this before when the Copernican model had to be jiggered this way and that to fit actual observations. I expect the REAL answer is that one (or more) of the basics of the universe, time, gravity, Strong Force, doesn’t work uniformly across the universe and we are seeing effects of the variations in what we believe to be a constant.
For example. If gravity varies with the age of the universe the gravity effects we observe on the young universe will not match what we observe in our present one.
@jlp it was a joke, if it bothered you, forgive me. Rhe reason as you could see years ago here was a kind of ongoing discussion that someone ended more or less, the world uses MKS we send more than once people to the monn (more or less was this)
There are two kinds of nation on this planet: The ones that use the metric system, and the one that put a man on the moon.
Went to near Austin today. Jonestown area. It’s my truck now, for sure, I had a grip on the wheel the entire way…. my hand is still cramping. It’s a twisty road and for fun it started to rain. And hail. And rain even more so that high speed on the wipers didn’t help much.
On the plus the side, the friend’s new to him boat did not need the bilge blowers removed and taken apart. A few minutes of working the fan cage loosened the bearings. Nice weather coming home. Sorry Mr Yankee riding my ass the whole way but I’m going the speed limit and a bit more and just where do you expect me to pull over so you can pass?
It was 60F at 1PM. Down to 48 at 8PM and the wind seems be slacking a bit. Windy as heck today. Maybe the pollen has been blown away. Hopefully.
Actually they will accept the check. They will not deposit the money immediately but put it in a sort of holding account. Get a receipt for the check. Then the bank will send it to a federal reserve bank who will do the conversion to dollars and clear that back with your bank. Once the money arrives the bank will deposit the money in your account. Usually takes about a week.
I did something tonight I had never done before. I went to a local wrestling match. It was a fund raising event for the school, strictly local wrestlers. I was taking pictures and was next to the arena on a rolling chair to move around easily. No walking or kneeling and put my camera a little higher than the mat. I set up strobes in the bleachers.
What surprised me was that it was more entertaining than I thought it would be. The wrestlers played to the crowd and egged the crowd on. Of course it was all faked, performance if you will, but those people are really good at what they do. And some of what they do has to hurt.
What was also interesting was there were several people in the audience that still considered the stuff real. Chewed out the ref for making bad calls or missing calls. Complained about infractions, etc. I did not know there were any rules, silly me.
Anyway, a lot of pictures. I will post a link when I get them processed sometime late tomorrow, maybe Monday.
Home from our Glo in the Dark Easter Egg hunt… and movie night.
was not the 500 person mob of previous years, so a nice night.
Rain stopped, sun came out, and we had a beautiful evening. Some of the members reported getting hail during the earlier storm. I felt like it was cold enough.
Late night though by the time I got the fire pit out and the movie projector and screen put away. Kids had fun.
n
Ok, before bed I will share this music.
Pirate metal is apparently a thing….
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OrXOb7xao2A
and sometimes it comes with a hurdy gurdy….
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZCnttPJHt6s
who knew??
n
Hot chicks and bagpipes–oh my!
“One might think of the butterfly as the caterpillar’s sex organs.”
This. We think of the flying critters as the “adults”, but many (most) species spend far more time in the larval form. Sometimes the flying form isn’t even capable of eating (Mayfly) – it really is just there to reproduce, make more grubs, and die.
@Harold: If you’re dealing with Her Majesty’s government – you don’t have any sort of UK bank account? That would be simplest – just deposit it by mail.
Most US banks will take it, if I recall correctly, but it may take weeks for the money to appear in your account, and the fees will be high. It would be odd if they completely refused, but it’s hardly normal daily business. If the cashier doesn’t know what to do with it, ask to speak to a manager.
If you have time in the UK, you can go to the issuing bank and cash it. I don’t know what your chances are of finding a branch of that particular bank in Heathrow. Any other bank is unlikely to cash it for someone who is not an account holder.
@ayj No offense taken, I knew you were joking. That is why I converting kilometers to furlongs, a semi-obsolete old English measure. My attempt at a joke back.
That is a problem with on-line communications, none of the little subtle clues of inflection and facial expression. I guess I could have used some sort of winky smiley emoji thing (;-p) but I’m not really into that.
That is why I converting kilometers to furlongs, a semi-obsolete old English measure. My attempt at a joke back.
My favorite length unit is barleycorn.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barleycorn_(unit)
Furlongs still used in horse racing…
n
For the discarding old science discussion, this is a good article,
Could All Our Scientific Knowledge Come Tumbling Down Like A House Of Cards?
Ethan does a good job of explaining most of the topics mentioned in this discussion.
.mg