- Amazon is selling hand-made (in Latvia) steampunk thumb drives incorporating copper pipe caps and a Soviet-made pentode vacuum tube. LEDs light up the glass from the bottom of the tube when there’s power available at the USB connector. (Thanks to Bill Meyer for the pointer.)
- Tonight would be a good night to see Mercury. It’s never easy because the planet never gets too far from the Sun in the sky, but with smartphone apps like Sky Map (on all Android phones by default) it’s certainly easier than it once was. Start by finding Venus in the west, immediately after the Sun goes below the horizon. (You can’t miss Venus.) Mercury lies roughly on a line between Venus and the Sun. There are no bright stars in that part of the sky, so if you see a star near that line, it’s not a star but ol’ Merc himself.
- Speaking of the Sun… Here’s a solid overview of the history of solar science. It’s a long piece, and even if you choose not to read it, the photos and diagrams are worth the visit.
- Betelgeuse continues to dim for unknown reasons. It’s fallen from 10th brightest star in the sky to 24th brightest. Orion is the first constellation I can clearly recall seeing, and these days, it just looks…off. This may mean it’s about to go supernova…for large values of “about.” (Hundreds or more likely thousands of years. Stars are never in a hurry.)
- I’ve been following the coronavirus epidemic using a dashboard maintained by Johns Hopkins. Who knows how accurate it is, but one does get a feeling that China is currently in a world of hurt. I got the link from my friend Charlie Martin, and he’s got a good article about the issues involved.
- This is a little weird, but it’s one more telltale that the technical publishing industry I loved for so long is no longer with us. I went searching for a book on installing, configuring, and customizing the MediaWiki software, and found…nothing. There’s plenty online, but I’m talking about book-length treatments. If you know of one let me know. My longstanding heuristic is that if it’s not on Amazon, it isn’t available.
- How to turn a waterway into wine. At least it wasn’t a Zinfandel.
- Ah, but this was a sweet, sweet hack: Some guy wandered around downtown Berlin pulling a little red wagon full of smartphones, all running Google Maps. Wherever he happened to be during his wander, Google Maps reported a traffic jam.
- If politics bores you as much as it bores me, here’s a solid distraction from all the tiresome yelling and screaming: The economics of all-you-can-eat buffets. Eat quick: My instincts tell me that as a category buffets are not long for this world.
- Finally, you’ve heard me say that there’s funny, there’s National Lampoon funny, and then there’s Babylon Bee funny. This may be one of the Bee’s best pieces yet–given this season’s nonstop nonsense.
steampunk
Odd Lots
Odd Lots
- Let me recommend a thoughtful blog on the issues of writing and publishing, which is remarkable for having one of the most civil and intelligent comment sections I’ve ever run across. (In recent years I’m reading blog comments less and less, because they’re mostly content-free tribal hatred.)
- Maybe the Ralpha Dogs had a hand in this: Making tunable microwave antennas from columns of liquid metal. (Somebody sent me this link, but I don’t remember who. Feel free to take credit in the comments.)
- Tom Roderick sent me this link to a video showing the guldurndest steampunk corkscrew ever. I like wine, but maybe not quite that much.
- And while we’re watching movies, here’s the craziest damned thing I’ve seen in awhile: A jet-powered go-kart. His name is Colin Furze. He’s done other crazy things too, and I envy not only his craziness but his youth, energy, and good looks. Here’s hoping he doesn’t wrap himself around a tree at 200 MPH before he lives long enough to go bald. (Thanks to Pete Albrecht for the link.)
- Sarah Hoyt’s reflection on the Golden Age of SFF, and how we writers can bring about the second coming of the Golden Age, if we only choose to. It relates to her concept of Human Wave SF & fantasy, which I did a series on some time back.
- Hurricane season opens tomorrow, and NOAA itself is forcasting below-normal hurricane activity this year.
- We’re finally admitting that open offices (that is, sitting at a table in a field of fifty or a hundred tables without any cube walls between them) are a stupid, self-defeating idea. Productivity requires concentration, and concentration requires privacy and quiet.
- Jim Strickland pointed me to FontSquirrel, a source of free and almost-free fonts. (Nearly all are free for personal use; some require payment for commercial use.)
- I think most of us figured this out years ago: Ideological echo-chambers are self-defeating. I would also add that they are creepy. Pod-people creepy…because what they do is create pod people.
- Stone yourself skinny? No wonder Colorado people are the thinnest in the country!
- Nuts & Volts Magazine (to which I bought a lifetime subscription in 1980!) is posting some of their more interesting back articles. This one, which explains how the Edison storage cell works and how to build one at home, is one of my favorites.
- The coordinator of Sad Puppies 4 lays out her theory of what makes a story Hugo-worthy. To Kate’s list I would add that contenders have something in the way of world-building, which is big part of what I read SF for.
- Ever wanted a Bigfoot blanket? I know where you can get one.
Odd Lots
- A guy is working on 3D printing with molten steel, via TIG welding.
- I’m really good with words. Maybe that’s why a college friend said 40-odd years ago: “The trouble with you, Jeff, is that you’re too damned happy!” Everything is connected, I guess, and now there’s science indicating that human language is biased toward happiness.
- More research on ice ages: They may be made possible by the isolation of the Atlantic and Pacific oceans by the Ithsmus of Panama. (Full paper here.) I’ve heard this before, but there’s more data behind it now.
- Some recently discovered fossilized poop in Spain suggests that I’m not really a Neanderthal after all. Bummer.
- I’ve always been of two minds about Mensa, for reasons I really can’t talk about here. Now there’s a Mensa dating site. I think I’m of three minds about that. Maybe five.
- There’s an exploitable software flaw in the Curiosity rover, stemming from arcane math in the Lempel-Ziv-Oberhumer compression algorithm. I hope the rover isn’t running XP, or (judging by the hype) it would have been totally pnwed since April 10. (Thanks to Pete Albrecht for the link.)
- This guy says he could tornado-proof the Midwest with a couple of 1,000-foot-high walls. Me, I say, implement STORMY. Then stand back.
- Meditation may not always be the unalloyed good that its proponents insist it is. I’m researching this further and will do a full entry on it at some point, as it’s a matter of serious interest to me. I have a theory that meditation is only one half of a single effective psychiatric process, and without its other half it can aggravate psychosis and even cause a drift toward schizophrenia.
- Here’s a terrific collection of photos of steampunk gear from Dark Roasted Blend. Follow the links to the mechanical calculators page if you haven’t seen it before. (It’s old, and I linked it from here some years back.)
- DRB publishes periodic “feel good” collections of visual odd lots that are mostly 50s and 60s nostalgia. Here’s the latest. Too many actresses, not enough classic cars. But if you like classic actresses, well, wow.
Odd Lots
- Wow. Dig with a backhoe, and then spray a target with a machine gun. Only $384. Writers should get out and do all kinds of things that aren’t part of everyday life for writers. I’m not a big fan of Las Vegas, but I could see myself doing this.
- Ok, this is clever. Forgive me if I don’t believe it will work.
- Here’s a service that the world needs, but I don’t give it even a year, especially now that Wired has launched it into high visibility. Big Print doesn’t want us too comfortable with the notion of scanning books we own to ebooks.
- Here may be one reason why: A consortium of tech book publishers is going after two anonymous Usenet posters who have posted literally hundreds of thousands of books (including several of mine) on alt.binaries.e-book.technical, not once but many times over the past several years. I’ve monitored that group since 2008 or so. It’s astonishing.
- Yes, I’m a crank. I hope to be a crank who lasts awhile. Shorting sleep will kill you. There are some excuses (small children at home being the biggie) but I also wonder if college life makes us night people. Most of the morning people I know (Carol and myself included) lived at home during college. (Thanks to Alan Zeichick for the link.)
- And though I’m not a necromancer, I know that you’re bound to answer when I propose: Everything’s SCO’s!
- Baby armadillos are cute, but I’m not sure I’d hold one, because they can carry leprosy. (Ok, ok…just wash your hands afterwards!)
- After all, armadillos are all that’s left of my favorite Pleistocene megacritter, the glyptodont. (Pssst: Mister pinch-hitter, that’s not a good stance to take!)
- Paywalled, but read it if you’re a subscriber: Ford is putting buttons back on their dashboard. I’m having some reliability problems with my new knob-less car stereo, and if I return it I may insist on something with a volume control knob at very least. They exist.
- And they exist in half-height too. Now I’m wondering if I can get a 2M/440 mobile rig that will fit in the other half of the bay…
- I had one of these once. I was called a “young punk” on occasion, by those who had reason to think it was true. So I was a steampunk long before it was cool.
- I was a little early for the Lego phenom, and was quite happy to be a Meccano kid. Here’s a great overview site for all the metal constructions sets I’ve ever heard of. (Except for Buildo, which was obscure even in 1960.)
- That said, don’t tell Certain Small Girls, but one of these may be under A Certain Christmas Tree this year.
- Colorado and Washington State will make this at least possible. But…but…what if your dog is under 21?
Odd Lots
- Yes, I am now writing a Raspberry Pi programming book. Details to come.
- While I do, I’ll be scoping out my next novel. Hard SF, oboy yes. One possibility is something I call Fire Drill, about what happens when you’re mining the moon for nickel-iron and you hit gold. The other, hmmm, let me give you a hint: “Well, hello, Mr. Sangruse! How nice of you to drop in. Please stay awhile. My name is Oscar, and I am a…beautiful…thing.”
- This is why I am very careful about “liking” things on Facebook, particularly memes and idiotic quizzes like “What word for ‘moron’ has two ‘o’s?” It’s all about helping somebody else make money. No thanks. (But yes thanks to Marty Coady for the link.)
- And here’s another item about “like farming.” If I don’t share that photo you’ve posted, it’s not just because I think that Facebook memes make you look like an idiot. (Most of them do.) It’s because you’ve basically sold yourself to someone you don’t even know. (Thanks to Julian Bucknall for the link.)
- From the Governments-Are-Idiots-Squared Department: The city of Provo Utah is going to sell its fiber-to-the-home network to Google…except that nobody kept any records of where the fiber is buried.
- Cripes, guys. I don’t want to run out of energy, and neither do you. If you’re going to crap on nuclear power, you’re gonna be stuck with hydrocarbons. And they won’t run out anywhere near as soon as you think. Live with it.
- From the Words-I-Didn’t-Know-Until-Yesterday Department: churnalism, the practice of publishing press releases verbatim.
- Steampunk short ribs, all the way around! (Thanks to Bill Cherepy for the link.)
- From the same site: Like Mr. Bigweld said, see a need, fill a need!
- Multiple long-term studies seem to indicate that the way to live a long life is to be conscientious and organized. Well, one of out two ain’t bad.
- Southerners may be no fatter than northerners. They just don’t seem as inclined to lie about it.
- Some dads build their kids playhouses. Some of these playhouses look like spaceships. Shades of the Silvercup Rocket. The bigger kids dream, the better their smaller dreams will come true. (Thanks to Bruce Baker for the link.)
- Yet another reason that Woodrow Wilson was the most evil president the Republic has ever had.
Odd Lots
- Carol and I are now home from Chicago, still bumping into walls but doing better. If you haven’t heard from me in a couple of weeks that’s why.
- Chicago burned on October 8, 1871. The cow did it, right? Well, there were a lot of other serious fires around the American midwest that same night. Tucking my ears into my tinfoil hat here: What if a cluster of biggish small meteorites hit the country that night, sparking fires wherever they fell? The more Russian dashcam videos I see, the less outrageous I think the idea is. (Thanks to Michele Marek for the link.)
- And for people who say that the Russians seem to attract meteorites, look at this. I’d say The Curse of the Splat People has been laid upon northern new Mexico.
- Why am I so fascinated by the Neanderthals? Aside from the fact that I may well have a Neanderthal-ish skull and ribcage, it’s hard to beat our big-brained, musclebound brothers for idea triggers. I had never considered Taki’s startling question: Would they vote Republican? Or would they just tear your arm off for asking? (Thanks to Bruce Baker for the link.)
- Search Google Patents for Edward F. Marwick, and you will find 205 different patents filed by my very own late high school physics teacher. He told us about a few of them (like this one) in 1969. We thought he was kidding. The man was a damned good physics teacher, and he thought big.
- Bill Beaty posted a comment on Contra for my September 7, 2011 entry describing a very simple solid-state equivalent using an MPF102 and a 9V battery. A full description is on his site, and it’s worth seeing if you have an unscratched itch for a half-hour project.
- I think I aggregated the Steampunk Workshop before, but it’s worth mentioning again. Beautiful stuff, startling craftsmanship. Like this Mac Mini mod. Wow. (Thanks to Bill Cherepy for pointing it out.)
- Carol and I had to cancel our entry of Dash and Jack in the big Rocky Mountain Cluster dog show for obvious reasons, but one of our Bichon Club members posted a wonderful video of her seven-year-old son Adam showing their puppy, Ruby. Ruby and Adam got a blue ribbon. The kid is amazing. Sheesh, when I was that age I was still throwing mushrooms at my sister at the dinner table.
- I guess this was inevitable, at least in Washington State and/or Colorado. I suppose the research is useful. (Thanks to Frank Glover for the link.)
Odd Lots
- The 64GB Microsoft Surface Pro tablet has only 23GB of open storage. Yukkh.
- Given that I do most of my reading curled up in a monster cushy chair, I’ve begun to wonder if a tablet with a 12″ display (or perhaps even larger) with a charger dock on the adjacent end table would be useful. Such things exist, but not in great numbers and not cheap. Technical PDFs are often uncomfortable reading even on my 10″ Transformer Prime.
- Here’s yet another reason I’m not bullish on the Cloud: If all you have is the Cloud, everything has to include a rain dance. I ruled out Eye-Fi when it first came out for this reason, but the absurdity of requiring global connection to make a local connection needs to be aired every so often.
- Short summary of Bowl of Heaven by Gregory Benford and Larry Niven: Ringworld with an engine, and nowhere to go. It’s the first Larry Niven book I can recall that I genuinely hated. Save your money.
- Here’s a result of vintage calculators (well, if not “result,” what’s the proper collective?) and a pointer to what would be a stunning steampunk model, if it hadn’t been designed in 1788.
- Early heads-up for what may be a really brilliant thing: Pulp-O-Mizer, which is a sort of image generator that spits out convincing Deco/Diesel magazine or book covers. Thanks to Jim Rittenhouse for putting me on to it. I’ll have more to say when I take it for a spin myself.
- I don’t know from personal experience if this is true; I don’t drink enough, nor late enough, to be a good test case. However, I’ve been told by several in my inner circle that too much booze too late at night makes for very bad sleep.
- There are a lot more Steampunk R2D2s out there than I would have guessed. I like the one with the monocle.
- It’s as easy as fishin’? I’ll stick with bluegills. (Thanks to Pete Albrecht for the link.)
- The big movie studios are evidently creating fake YouTube accounts with fake users uploading supposedly pirated movie trailers promoting new films. For the sake of plausible deniability, they’re sending YouTube takedown notices on the trailers. And you wonder why I see maybe three movies a year.
- This may not be a viable business model.
- In times long past, men used to wear high heels. (More recently, I remember seeing guys in platforms when I was in college.) Why? To stay on their horses. Or maybe to avoid being mistaken for Neanderthals. We may never know.
Odd Lots
- Cisco has sold their Linksys home-router business to Belkin. I’ve used Linksys gear for ten years now, know it well, and like it as much as I like any given brand. Getting it out of Cisco’s hands, where it had languished, is a good thing.
- From a long-time Contra commenter I know only as bcl, here’s a very detailed technical review of USB chargers, which are not all the same based on equal output specs.
- I’m trying to figure out what Ten Gentle Opportunities is “like” (a comp, I think they call it) and have asked those who’ve read the first draft. Someone recommended Piers Anthony’s Apprentice Adept series, which I’ve never seen nor heard of. Will begin looking for copies in local used bookstores.
- IBM is perfecting an anti-microbial gel that they claim bacteria cannot develop resistance to. IBM. God love ’em–because the way things are going, we are gonna need this, and need it bad.
- Then again, IBM also says that Steampunk will be the next big thing. Wait a minute. I thought Steampunk was the last big thing. (Thanks to Bill Cherepy for the link.)
- I’m getting recommendations on surplus dealers I’ve never heard of from all corners. Here’s Twin Cities retailer Ax-Man Surplus, courtesy Lee Hart.
- Lee also passed along the sad news that Glenwood Sales in Rochester NY, where I spent a great deal of money 1979-1984, is no more.
- Pete Albrecht sent word of C&H Surplus in Duarte California. I used to have a print catalog from them and it vanished somewhere along the way, but the firm exists and sells mostly industrial surplus (motors, fans, compressors, etc.)
- I stumbled on a nice free wallpaper site while looking for wood texture images, and there’s a lot of very good stuff there. That said, the single picture they have of a bichon is awful.
- Bill Cherepy sent a link to a Steampunk workspace. Looks cool. As with most Steampunk keyboards, it looks uncomfortable. Love the tube amp, though it’s not really Steampunk. He needs a new (old?) mouse.
- Sex with Neanderthals may have ram-charged our immune system and in other ways made us stronger. Genetic diversity is always good. And I’ll reiterate here that I have serious doubts about Homo Sap wiping out the Neanderthals. I think the Neanderthals wiped themselves out. Tribalism is fatal. Make sure your loyalties are diverse. Never throw poop at other tribes. Throw it at your own tribal leaders. If you can’t do that, well, you’re pwned.
- Cats with jet packs…in 1584. Except I don’t think it’s really a jetpack. Given the bird’s unnecessary jet pack, I suspect that they are acting as living firebombs. The past sucked. I’m glad I’m here.
- We’ve had a so-so winter so far; could use more water coming out of the sky. However, it’s about to get cold again. Perhaps I could use one of these. (Does anybody else flash on H. R. Giger looking at that damned thing?)
- There are certified zombie shotgun shells. Haven’t seen Bigfoot flip-flops yet, though.
Does Steampunk Really Humanize Our Gadgets?
Bill Cherepy (and a couple of others since) sent me an interesting link to a piece on Boing Boing arguing (I think) that steampunk makes our gadgets more human. It’s a headscratcher, since I don’t think the article text supports the author’s contention. However, it’s an idea worth some thought. I actually agree, if for different reasons:
- Steampunk gadgets are comprehensible. Most of the tech in our modern phones and computers is black art, even to guys like me with considerable background in electronics. Electric, mechanical, and chemical tech circa 1900 was accessible to anyone with an ounce of brains and some willingness to study.
- Steampunk gadgets are reproduceable. At home. In your basement. Sure, it would take a little research and pratice, but with nothing more exotic than a lathe and basic chemistry gear you could build most of what we connect with steampunking. Dare you to do that with an iPad.
- Steampunk gadgets are personal. This is going to earn me some heat, but I think it’s true: Steampunk thingies are in-your-face, not on-your-friends-ist. One of the charms of the steampunk idea is that people interact face-to-face. This keeps trolling to a minimum and fosters at least superficial courtesy, which certainly beats the slobbering hatred that now dominates Facebook.
All that said, I admit that the majority of what I see under the heading “Steampunk” is a species of fantasy, be it of the supernatural (vampires and zombies) or just wildly off-the-edge assumptions of what 1900 technology could accomplish.
The big turn-off I found in cyberpunk was its coldness. Granted this was cultural and not really necessary, but when I played at the edges of cyberpunk years ago it stopped me in my tracks. Cyberpunk was cynicism writ large, and steampunk is optimism gone nuts. Given that cynicism is cowardice (it is, in fact, the fear and loathing of all things human) you can guess where I’m much more likely to tell my tales.
Odd Lots
- From the Some-Things-Just-Sound-Right Department: “Glitzenstein” is German for “rhinestone.” It suggests an ironic horror novel in which a mad plastic surgeon stitches together an unreasonable facimile of Liberace from pieces of washed-up Vegas lounge singers.
- From the Words-I-Never-Heard-Before-But-Won-A-Word-Of-The-Year-Contest Department: “Omnishambles,” which basically means, “big mess.”
- Jonathan O’Neal found a much better link to the “impersonating marijuana” cartoon from Kliban that I cited in my November 13th entry.
- Bill Cherepy sent word of a $29.95 steampunk thumb drive that appeaars to be mass-produced and not a hand-made work of art.
- And while sniffing around the same site, I came upon a steampunk telescope ring. Oh–and a slightly less compact steampunk wrist monocular.
- Good paper on historical solar activity by Dr. Leif Svalgaard. If you want to work all continents on a Sixer, you might have to wait awhile. (I’m hoping to get some traction on my G28 this max–if we actually have a max.)
- We forget sometimes how diverse old telephones were–because we (mostly) had to get them from the phone company. The others we mostly saw in spy movies.
- There is bubble-gum flavored vodka. Fair enough. Now, is there a wintergreen-flavored cordial of some kind? Or lavender?
- Carol’s sister chills room-temperature box sangria by throwing a few spoonfuls of frozen blueberries into it. Granted, you have to let the glass sit for a few minutes, but it’s way easier than slicing oranges.
- Some may argue that allowing radioisotopes to perform music isn’t exactly music, or if it is, we can definitely call it very heavy metal.
- Just what I want in my Thanksgiving wine.
