Category Archives: Paul

March 19, 2023 · 23:35

Sixty-Seven

Today was my sixty-seventh birthday. 🎂🍾🎁🥳🦆 I celebrated by going off to the Point Mugu Airshow in Ventura County with some family members and friends.

NOT the sort of thing you want to be driving through on the way to an airshow! I had doubts that we would see any flying, but we persisted.

When we got there about 09:30, it was quite…moist.

The Navy Blue Angels were there. So were the Air Force Thunderbirds! It’s something like only the fourth or fifth time EVER that they’ve performed together at the same airshow.

Thus the urgency to get out there – it’s like if the Beatles and Rolling Stones were doing a double bill concert. You would stand in the rain for that, wouldn’t you?

Our local CAF SoCal Wing was there with static displays (the SNJ in yellow, the PT-19 on the right in grey, others not shown) and our PBJ bomber, F6 Hellcat fighter, and Zero fighter all flying.

A Harrier on static display.

The business end of an F-18 Hornet, both for going fast and for stopping faster.

One of the local F-18s that’s stationed with one of the Point Mugu squadrons.

An E-2 Hawkeye on static display.

Despite my doubts, the CAF SoCal planes, a biplane aerobatic routine, the Red Bull helicopter performance, a California Air National Guard C-130 demonstration, and most importantly, the Thunderbirds and Blue Angels all flew.

It was spectacular!

It was amazing!

It was wonderful!

It was REALLY FREAKIN’ LOUD! (Which is really freakin’ great!)

Followed by the current leader so far for worst traffic jam of the year. From the time that the Blue Angels finished their show until I got to my car was 25-30 minutes. From the time I got to my car until I got onto the road outside the base gates, another 90+ minutes. From the time I left the base until I got to the 101 Freeway (normally 10-15 minutes) another 30+ minutes. (Worth every second of it.)

My thanks to those who sent birthday wishes. I had a great time at the airshow and took a gazillion pictures and videos.

If you don’t care about seeing any of those airshow pictures, this might be a good time to mute this website for the next week to ten days. Just sayin’.

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Filed under Airshows, Paul, Photography

February 17, 2023 · 23:46

Sticking Out Like A…

There’s a reason that phrase sticks around.

A stupid, tiny little nick from cutting my thumbnail too close on my right hand. I’m so right handed that if I broke my right arm I would starve to death before I learned to feed myself with my left hand only. So now, nearly a week after my horrific thumbnail clipping incident, I still am extremely aware of my sore thumb every single time I try to type (and I’m typing all day long), or use my computer trackball, or try to get my phone or wallet or keys out of my pocket, or try to use a pen, or eat with a fork or spoon, or…

You get the picture.

How can one itsy-bitsy little nick cause so much grief and trouble even a week later?!

I swear, next time I go to a manicurist and let them do it professionally. I’m not sure how that makes sense, but this is ridiculous.

(Yes, I’m a whiny woosie boy. This isn’t news.)

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Filed under Health, Paul, Photography

February 7, 2023 · 23:54

Persistance Awards

I’ve mentioned before (here) that WordPress gives you an “atta boy!” notification any time you post more than five or six days in a row. And, as a reminder, I’m easily amused, so it becomes a thing to keep the streak going.

With me, that can go on quite a while! I was at 420 days on June 4, 2021 when I missed the midnight posting deadline by a few seconds and re-started the streak. I was at 245 days in a row on February 5, 2022 when again, I missed the deadline by a minute or so – and started over.

I haven’t missed since.

If not for those two missed deadlines (and to be clear, I did post on those days, just not by midnight local time) it would be 1,032 days in a row. But I’ll take the 365.

Remember getting “perfect attendance” awards at school? Yeah, I was that kid.

And yes, I got beat up for it. *shrug*

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January 31, 2023 · 23:48

Paul’s Septuple Slit Experiment

If you’ve studied physics, or even have a casual layperson’s interet, you’ve probably heard of Young’s double-slit experiment. It’s an early exploration into the nature of light and demonstrates some effects of quantum mechanics.

Now in my backyard I seem to be accidentally creating a far more macro-scale experiment of my own.  Soon after it started to drizzle and rain lightly, I noticed that underneath this lawn chair it was still dry. Shouldn’t SOME of the rain drops get through the slits in the chair’s webbing, leaving wet strips instead of one big dry spot underneath?

There are seven openings in the webbing, so instead of a double slit experiment it’s a septuple slit experiment.

Underneath the far side (better seen in the first picture), between the front and back right-hand legs, there are seven spots or holes, spaced about right for the seven slits. I’m guessing that’s from the heavy rain recently, where water is accumulating and dripping down into the dirt from the seven straps?

I’m also guessing that I’m easily amused. But that shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone reading this site for very long, now, should it?

 

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Filed under Curiosities, Paul, Photography

January 29, 2023 · 23:48

On To Super Bowl LVII

First of all, the most important question – why do we still use Roman numerals to identify the Super Bowls? What a stupid affectation!

Regardless, as anyone interested will know, my beloved Chiefs won an incredibly tough battle against the Cincinnati Bengals and won the AFC Championship this evening and will be going to the Super Bowl in two weeks to face the Philadelphia Eagles. That game is expected to be epic and practically a toss up, although the Eagles are favored by two points in the inital Las Vegas betting line.

I’ll need the two weeks to rest and recover. It was a high stress game and wasn’t decided until there was only eight seconds left in the game. It had a little bit of everything.

Suddenly, as January winds down, February starts to look busy. Possibly bordering on hectic. After an extremely busy December and January I was thinking there might be a chance to throttle back a bit, but there’s a family thing, and now the Super Bowl is more than just another game and might require a party (if the pieces can fall into place, primarily COVID related), and oh, did I mention, I applied for a three-day NASA Social in Florida for the Crew 6 launch currently scheduled at the end of February?

The odds of getting selected to participate in the NASA Social might be slim-ish, maybe 1 in 10? (A wild guess, at best.) But if that comes through, then A) I’ll have some truly fantastic things to share on this site for weeks and months to come, and B) when March rolls around I’ll need about a month’s nap.

It’s one of those “theory vs reality” things, also known as, “Be careful what you wish for!” In theory, it’s great to be getting to my age and still be really active and living life with gusto. In practice, it can be daunting and occasionally exhausting. However, when presented with the options (c’mon, NASA Social selection committee!!), I’m hoping I continue to come down on the side of the “YOLO!! LEEROY JENKINS!!” response.

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January 17, 2023 · 23:31

And The Flip Side Of That Is…

Yesterday I talked about “once in a lifetime experiences” and how I thought that some things that are fun and exciting (my example was hot air ballooning) shouldn’t necessarily be done just once. I thought that perhaps we should re-examine things we’ve done in the past as a “life list” thing (or “bucket list” to some) and maybe go do some of the really good ones again.

First thing this morning, serendipity reared its ugly head and I saw the flip side of that argument.

Twenty-nine years ago today, at 4:31 AM on the morning of of January 17, 1994, the Northridge earthquake ripped through the San Fernando Valley and beyond at a magnitude 6.7. There were 57 fatalities (72 if you count the heart attacks) and over $25B in damages. Our house was 5.88 miles from the epicenter. We got rocked pretty good, had shelves & things knocked over, were without power and water for a few days, but otherwise came through it okay.

(Image: Google Earth)

It was, I most sincerely hope, a “once in a lifetime” experience. I know, living in SoCal, that there could be one as bad or worse at any second, and there have been dozens and dozens of noticable but much smaller earthquakes that I’ve felt here, but the odds say that’s probably as bad as it gets.

Probably.

So “once in a lifetime” experience has a flip side. Ask anyone who’s had their life scrambled for a couple of days to a couple of years (or more) by a hurricane, tornado, brush fire, flood, earthquake, landslide, or any of a dozen other life-changing forces of nature that can just jump up and slap you at any time.

Hot air ballooning, trip to Asia, solar eclipses (thanks to Jemima Pett for that suggestion!), flying in a B-25 – all GREAT things that I’ve gotten to do once and can’t wait to try again!

Major earthquakes or other natural disasters? Thanks, once is enough.

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Filed under Disasters, Paul

January 6, 2023 · 23:44

In Search Of Something New

I’ve been working on a tight deadline that’s going to keep me busy all weekend, and while plowing through it I found a Stanley Kubrick film fest on some cable channel. Three truly outstanding films that I’ve seen a gazillion times and they can just be background, comfort food for my soul while my brain is occupied elsewhere.

“2001”

“A Clockwork Orange”

“Full Metal Jacket”

This obviously isn’t new to anyone who’s been reading this site for nearly ten years. I started by titling this post as “Kubrick” and WordPress gave it a filename of “kubrick-3” which means this would be the fourth time that I used that exact same title…

It would be great to be watching something new. I’ve got a “to be watched” list of movies and streaming series that could keep me busy for years. I’ve got a “to be read” pile of books that could tip over and cause a 9.3 earthquake. But any of that, while intellectually stimulating, would require me to pay attention. And my attention needs to be focused. I don’t get to attack that “to be read” pile until I get past a couple of deadlines.

I hate making Chuck Wendig wait. (Read “Wanderers,” it’s outstanding. And once I get done with my re-read of that, I get to start the sequel, “Wayward,” which I am hearing amazing things about.)

Onward.

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Filed under Entertainment, Paul

January 4, 2023 · 23:41

Another “Set SCE To AUX” Day

If you know, you know.

“Miles to go before I sleep…” as they say. Tomorrow will be another day.

So far 2023, four days in, is “more of the same” mixed in with “Say, WHAT?!” When the going gets weird, the weird get going.

Stay weird, freindos!

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November 29, 2022 · 23:54

No Context For You – November 29th

A few small triumphs, some gains, a few deadlines met – it all helps.

Step by step. It’s all progress.

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November 28, 2022 · 23:30

A Wall Of Green

While putting up Christmas lights on Saturday I had the most odd visual experience. In order to run an extension cord from the garage roof across a sidewalk and over to the tall, thin, Italian cypress trees that line the yard, I was right up against the trees, reaching in for the extension cord that I was threading down through the branches.

I looked up…

…and my perspective switched 90º, gravity be damned. I would have sworn that I was floating or hovering two inches above a horizontal bed of kelp or some sort of sea grass, looking off above it into the ocean – not looking straight up, vertically, at the sky above the wall of tree branches.

Even just looking at this picture my brain snaps back to that other viewpoint, like one of those optical illusions where you can either see an old woman with a huge nose or a young girl with a scarf.

Maybe I’m just having a nervous breakdown. It would explain so much…

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Filed under Christmas Lights, Paul, Photography