James Lileks on changes in American childhood: I don’t think they had soccer balls in North Dakota until 1981; it was brought in on a special train and placed behind glass and people got to walk around it and get close, if they felt comfortable, and become accustomed to its strange surface. It is faceted, […]
The US Navy and the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization have compiled a nice collection of video from this past winter’s shoot down of a broken NRO satellite known as USA 193. It includes footage aboard USS Lake Erie (the cruiser who took the shot) as well as cameras that show the moment of impact with […]
Most people think of stars as constant entities in the sky, seldom changing. In reality the are huge elemental and quantum machines that form, burn their fuel and die. Most die by sputtering out, but large ones sometimes explode in Nova or Supernova bursts. Mankind has witnessed stars exploding in the night sky, but images […]
My first job out of college (1978-79) was at General Dynamics/WDSC down in San Diego, where I worked on a variety of projects. One such project was an effort to distinguish between wheeled vehicles (like trucks) and tracked vehicles (like tanks) using stand-off radar. It seems the Soviets had built plywood shells that looked like […]
OK, so here’s the latest kerfuffle over the Democratic National Convention due here in Denver in a few months: Fried foods are forbidden at the committee’s 22 or so events, as is liquid served in individual plastic containers. Plates must be reusable, like china, recyclable or compostable. The food should be local, organic or both. […]
There are mixed reports in the press about the state of the US economy. While the majority of the national media seems to be rooting for a good economic downturn (perhaps to spice up the election cycle this fall) The data from the government is also somewhat conflicted, perhaps because the powers that be would […]
Having lived in the Washington DC area for a total of nearly 8 years (and in the District itself for six of those years), I was a big fan and user of the Metro, their subway systems. However, the Metro was was always struggling with funding and maintenance issues, which puzzled me a bit since […]
This is one of the earliest (1993) ‘mainstream’ (non-tech-magazine) cartoons about the Internet and still one of the most famous: A Google search on the caption yields nearly half a million hits. ..bruce w..
The good news is that Google has taken me off their badware list (as of May 1st), though it took them over a week to do so (along with multiple review requests and a posting at the Google Webmaster groups). You can see quite clearly the impact of this blog having the label of doom […]
In 2008 – It’s Tough To Be A Republican
For the past several months all eyes have been focused on the ongoing mess that is the remains of the Democratic primary. The untold and emerging story is the impending beating that the Republicans are likely to take in November. In interest of full disclosure I consider myself a conservative and tend to vote Republican […]
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