{"id":154,"date":"2008-10-15T09:53:00","date_gmt":"2008-10-15T13:53:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.contrapositivediary.com\/?p=154"},"modified":"2008-12-13T22:56:23","modified_gmt":"2008-12-14T02:56:23","slug":"odd-lots-8","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.contrapositivediary.com\/?p=154","title":{"rendered":"Odd Lots"},"content":{"rendered":"<ul>\n<li>Speaking of sunspots (see yesterday&apos;s entry) The <i>Boston Globe<\/i>                  posted a series of <a href=\"http:\/\/www.boston.com\/bigpicture\/2008\/10\/the_sun.html\">some                  of the most amazing photographs of the Sun<\/a> that I&apos;ve ever                  seen. I&apos;m not sure there&apos;s much more I can say but <i>go look<\/i>.<\/li>\n<li>More sunspot stuff: Wikimedia has <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Image:Sunspot_Numbers.png\">a                  very nice graph of sunspot peaks<\/a> since we started tracking                  them more or less scientifically in 1749. I have sometimes wondered                  if better instruments built in the last 100 years have led to                  higher sunspot counts, simply because we can see smaller and shorter-lived                  spots, but supposedly that&apos;s been taken into account. My one serious                  quibble with the associated writeup is that it&apos;s the Wolf Minimum                  and not the Maunder Minimum that corresponds to the beginning                  of the Little Ice Age. Maunder just made it worse, and Europe&apos;s                  coldest era does indeed correspond to a 70-year near-absence of                  spots between 1645 and 1715.<\/li>\n<li>The Make Blog aggegated an item on <a href=\"http:\/\/www.beam-wiki.org\/wiki\/index.php?title=Seleno%2C_The_Electric_Dog\">a                  beambot built in&#8230;1912<\/a>. It works essentially the same way                  as <a href=\"http:\/\/www.duntemann.com\/january2007.htm#01-27-2007\">the                  <i>Popular Electronics<\/i> Emily robot<\/a> that I built in 1966,                  minus the solid state current amplifier. Relays can &#8220;amplify&#8221;                  current in a snappy, sparky, ozone-y kind of way, and this device                  has a definite steampunkish air about it.<\/li>\n<li>I am two days older than musician\/composer <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/David_Arkenstone\">David                  Arkenstone<\/a>, and we&apos;re both Chicago boys. Didn&apos;t know that                  until ten minutes ago. Will probably forget it sooner or later,                  but not in time to make room in my head for more useful knowledge.<\/li>\n<li>More of what my sister calls &#8220;brain sludge&#8221;: I built                  my first kite in September 1962. How do I know this? I remember                  pulling a sheet of newspaper off the top of the pile in the basement,                  and seeing the ad announcing the premiere of &#8220;The Beverly                  Hillbillies,&#8221; complete with an <a href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Al_Hirschfeld\">Al                  Hirschfield<\/a> caricature of the Clampett clan in their truck.                  I had read of his habit of sneaking his daughter Nina&apos;s name into                  every one of his cartoons (I think in the <i>Saturday Evening                  Post<\/i>) and took time to find it. I then used the sheet in the                  kite, which flew well, and was the first of many to be made of                  newspaper, and other (odd) things. Now, howcome I can remember                  this so vividly, and still have to think hard about where I left                  my damned cellphone ten minutes ago?<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.msnbc.msn.com\/id\/27053487\/?GT1=43001\">This<\/a>                  says something about human nature, and nothing good. Me, I prefer                  cars that don&apos;t go off the road, though I have eaten and enjoyed                  a number of smoked chubs that looked <i>very<\/i> angry.<\/li>\n<li>The email consensus is that the Turtle Wax Turtle was indeed                  atop the Wendell Bank Building at Ashland and Ogden. One correspondent                  asked the obvious: &#8220;Why not email the Turtle Wax people who                  posted the video?&#8221; Duhh. Will do. Sorry.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Speaking of sunspots (see yesterday&apos;s entry) The Boston Globe posted a series of some of the most amazing photographs of the Sun that I&apos;ve ever seen. I&apos;m not sure there&apos;s much more I can say but go look. More sunspot stuff: Wikimedia has a very nice graph of sunspot peaks since we started tracking them [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-154","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-oddlots"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.contrapositivediary.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.contrapositivediary.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.contrapositivediary.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.contrapositivediary.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.contrapositivediary.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=154"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.contrapositivediary.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":167,"href":"https:\/\/www.contrapositivediary.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/154\/revisions\/167"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.contrapositivediary.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=154"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.contrapositivediary.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=154"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.contrapositivediary.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=154"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}