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efaardvark

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Status Updates posted by efaardvark

  1. Now this is cosplay!  :D

     

    1. Animedragon

      Animedragon

      That's one awesome piece of cosplay. 😎

  2. Trick or treat!
    2022-10-30_22_23_33.thumb.png.c43761038c393e54e21d9c38b17e8529.png

  3. Some days it just isn't a good idea to leave your house.  

    2019-09-09_17_22_59.thumb.png.8cc2e60728ac9e44a9648d7e5bd89a2d.png

  4. Went to visit my mom last night for Saturday evening dinner.  She's in a memory care / assisted living situation and when I got there they were doing a karaoke(?) activity.  I'm not a great singer myself but this was ... something else.  🙉   At least everyone seemed to be having a good time.  :D

    1. Deeath

      Deeath

      Sorry to hear about your mother, Mr. Vark - but I'm glad there was a good time in the mix! Positivity always brings out the light at the end of a dark tunnel. :angel:

  5. Talking with a co-worker who doesn't like the ocean.  He won't go near it.  He won't travel by ship.  He won't go to the beach.  He doesn't even like flying over it.  The weird thing is he has no problems with a swimming pool or river.  He's a really good swimmer in fact.  Even used to be a lifeguard for the pool at a nearby YMCA.  So I asked him why he's afraid of the ocean.  He said, "I'm not afraid of the ocean.  I afraid of big things in the ocean."  :)

    1. viruxx

      viruxx

      This is what blows my mind about the ocean. That, and the critters that lurk within the depths are the things of nightmares. 😱

       

    2. efaardvark

      efaardvark

      @viruxx

      If you think that's unnerving..

      Imagine extraterrestrial oceans like on Enceladus or Europa.  Even though it is a moon, Europa alone has more than twice as much water on it as Earth does.  It is permanently covered by ice so you would have to dig down maybe a couple dozen kilometers to even get to it, and from there it might be another 150km (90+ miles) or more before you'd reach the bottom of Europa's ocean.  That's over 10x as deep as any ocean here on Earth.  Of course being so far from the sun and covered by kilometers-thick ice besides those oceans will be completely dark from top to bottom.  However, at the bottom are probably hydrothermal vents like there are here on Earth.  It is quite possible that there is life - of some sort - lurking in those oceans as well.

       

  6. Just read that there may be enough uranium in coal that it might actually be marketable.  Of course uranium isn't flammable so when you burn the coal the uranium just winds up in the ash pile with the rest of the unburnables, like cadmium, arsenic, and lead.  But that's ok because the regs say it is.  😱

    BTW, I never understood why radioactive material is EVIL while stuff like arsenic is ok.  I mean, just the fact that it is radioactive means that at least it'll all go away.  Eventually.  That's what "half life" means.  Something that has a half life of 10 years will be half gone in 10 years.  As opposed to the arsenic which will be around literally forever causing trouble.

    Not that I'd want to eat either one of course.  :D

    1. Deeath

      Deeath

      Your argument is valid, Vark - and thanks for the info too! 
      And "Half-Life" I haven't heard anyone say that in awhile---- ^^' a lot of people don't really believe in that stuff, the way that chemicals can affect things...

  7. A hallway at work with robotic vehicles pained on the walls.  I think that one at the end looks distinctly tachikoma-ish...


    signal-2022-09-22-230428_005.thumb.jpeg.8a2b1f330170aef942b18841f3687d5e.jpeg

  8. Got up, got dressed/showered/ready for work, drove in, parked, walked the few blocks to the SFOF, grabbed a cuppa, then sat down in my assigned seat at the console, only to have the director call a launch scrub.  Hadn’t even finished my coffee.

    Well, it isn’t like I don’t have other things I need to do as well.  I just hope we don’t have another power failure at home like we’ve had for the last 2 days.

  9. Over 60 webex hours in 4 days.  Isn't that a violation of OSHA rules or something?

    1. Wodahs

      Wodahs

      Hmm not sure tho thats 15hrs a day , but in my field im allowed to drive up to 17hrs a day long distance max 128hrs in 14 days i think it is

  10. So Artemis-1 is (hopefully) launching on the 29th.  On it will be 8 smaller cubesats, which will be deployed by Artemis at 2 "bus stops" on its way to the moon.  The cubesats will then find their own ways to fulfill their various missions, with NASA's Deep Space Network of tracking stations providing the data link for them all.

    Or at least that was the plan.  Someone recently realized that with 9 new spacecraft all vying for time on the DSN's already overbooked downlink stations it might be a good idea to see what additional options for tracking time might be available in the world in case something doesn't go as planned and one or more of the cubesats wind up needing additional tracking time due to problems post-deployment.  Yeah.  So now, only a couple weeks before launch, we're doing cross-support testing with the European Space Agency to make sure that's at least an option.

    Let's see, 8 cubesats x 5 ESA tracking stations, uplink and downlink, call it 5 data rates and 2 or 3 different encoding schemes per sat.  Maybe 10-12 hours of testing per cubesat if we're quick about it.  Then there's equipment and manpower availability to allocate and schedule, factoring in the time zones of the various mission operations centers (JAXA, Italy, Goddard, etc.), the stations (Goonhilly, New Norcia, Cebrerus, etc.), and of course JPL in California.

    Um.. how long did you say we had to finish this?

    1. Show previous comments  3 more
    2. Wodahs

      Wodahs

      and i know my way around the erea

    3. Wodahs

      Wodahs

      hope alls going good with your section with whats been going on 👍

    4. efaardvark

      efaardvark

      @Wodahs we’re in something of a holding pattern right now until engineers decide what’s necessary to fix or bypass the problem on the vehicle.  We’re in the launch configuration and a configuration hold (no changing anything) so really we’re just waiting.  Latest word is we’ll probably try again Saturday.

  11. 806F41BD-B077-4BF8-A564-7EEC0858D22E.jpeg.e71d7667d4fe42ad8c0272c06f236846.jpeg

    1. Ohayotaku

      Ohayotaku

      For those who don’t get the joke image.gif.a3782cc83506977507e5abffa58b727c.gifnot a single day goes by when I’m not reminded of a Simpsons reference 🤣 

      … or Loony Tunes (don’t remember how old I was when I learned Ride of the Valkyries wan’t subtitled “Kill the Wabbit” :P )

       

  12. Sony *really* needs to vet their funimation transfers better.  Half of them have subtitles that don't match the video!  They also need to add descriptions in the appropriate places, though that was something the old crunchy had issues with as well so I've learned to do my browsing and planning on places like MAL and only hit the streaming sites once I have already decided what to watch.

  13. "But as the theme progressed, it came into the heart of Melkor to interweave matters of his own imagining that were not in accord with the theme of Ilúvatar; for he sought therein to increase the power and glory of the part assigned to himself." The Silmarillion, JRR TOLKIEN

    1. Kōyamaki

      Kōyamaki

      I always thought the name Melkor sounded eerily similar to the Tyrian deity Melqart, though there seems to be no relation to their respective stories.

  14. Blade Runner, The Wrath of Khan, E.T., Conan the Barbarian, Poltergeist, and TRON.  Some decent music too.   I also graduated high school.  '82 was a good year but... damn, now I feel old.

  15. Really annoyed at Canonical and Ubuntu.  Again.  (Still?)  Among other stupid things the latest LTS version of ubuntu linux installs Firefox as a snap!  As if FF wasn't stupidly huge already.  Also, the "new" default desktop also breaks all sorts of things and introduced numerous weird "features".  For instance, if I right-click on the firefox icon (any application really) in the dock I get a popup menu that used to allow me to "open a new window" for that app, which appeared on the display containing that dock/icon.  Only now instead of opening a new window it teleports the popup menu itself to my second display.  If I then (again) select "open a new window" in the popup, it opens the window on the second display, not the one where I wanted it.  I can then drag the new window to the display where I originally wanted it but, WTF Canonical????

    Also, selecting text for cut-and-paste only highlights the first word in the selection.  The rest of the selected text doesn't highlight until you release the mouse button!  This means you can't see what you're selecting until you stop selecting it!  AGAIN, WTF????

  16. I know this isn't the forum for this type of thing but for us out here in the southwestern US the region's water situation is getting critical.  That's me so I'm thinking about this a lot.  Full disclosure, I'm in a suburb of Los Angeles here in So. California.  If you're also in the region, or know someone who is, get informed.  Basically, several of  the region's critical civil engineering systems related to water use and distribution are either having or going to have multi-mode failures over the next decade or so.  At this point even a radical change in the weather severe enough to solve the water supply problem would itself create major issues of its own.  We need to get ahead of the problems and come up with a plan to deal with all of them that can be implemented in the time available.

    I'm actually glad to see this video.  The cover/thumbnail image might be a bit click-baity but I think they kept the listed title and the content itself reasonable.  Right now things are still status-quo in most people's minds.  Showers work.  There's water to drink.  You flip the switch and the power still flows to light the lamp or brew the coffee.  For anyone not paying attention nothing would seem to be wrong.  The scariest scenario for me however would be if nobody paid attention until the faucets run dry, then everyone panics without knowing the situation or having a plan.  The people who made this video seem to be normal folks throwing up a flag saying, "hey, something serious is happening here". 

    I especially like that they're making the food connection.  Las Vegas golf courses are not really the problem here, though the mindset that says that's a good idea in the middle of the desert (and the politics that allows it) might be part of the reason we got to this point.  Farming is by far the biggest issue.  California farms supply a large fraction of the country's food.  Of the world's in fact.  Those farms also use about 80% of the water in the region.  If you can't grow food because there's no water or can't transport it to the customers because fuel is too expensive then that's a serious problem all by itself, even for people outside of California, Nevada, etc..  The water is also used to generate electricity, and energy is a major input to and driver of any economy.  Expensive energy and low revenues from exports is an economic disaster in the making for the region.  And of course water is also used for drinking and sanitation.  The amount of water used for this last is (relatively) tiny but obviously extremely critical.  I doubt we'll ever run out of drinking water, but it might get extremely expensive, and/or take a while to build out an alternative supply system.  Did I mention you'll be dealing with high energy prices, power problems, and an economy already staggering from the costs of a pandemic, bankster abuse, and political mismanagement while trying to implement your solution?

     

     

  17. Any of you older nerds out there remember these?  And care to admit it? :D

     

    1. Show previous comments  2 more
    2. Otaking66lives
    3. viruxx

      viruxx

      Ahh... 56k....... Those were the days. Although, I think I came in at the tail end of the dial-up days. 😅

    4. Animedragon

      Animedragon

      I never had an acoustic modem, but do have a 300pbs modem and that picture of all the Sportster modems brings back memories I had the 14K4 and the 28K4 models my 56K modem was a US Robotics unit.  I have a couple of other modems but I can't remember the details and speeds of them.
      And yes, I did say "have" there's lots of old computer bits somewhere up in my loft. 😃

  18. OMG.. I'm agreeing with something a Congresscritter is saying about nuclear power . What is the world coming to? Beware low-flying porcines.

     

  19. Somebody - an anime virgin - saw the picture below on my computer, provoking the remark that "70% of the world's weirdness comes from Japan".  I could not refute this objectively, but neither do I accept the premise that such a situation - should it be proven factual - is necessarily a Bad Thing.  :)

    Elias.thumb.png.453d189a0d2279ddf8867e80ba85fc23.png

    1. Deeath

      Deeath

      So what?! I mean...weirdness is what makes this world go round' ! 
      Let's not talk about the dubbing of older anime too..now THAT is weird...BUT AMAZING!

  20. So now we here in the southwest US are having to choose between water or electricity.  Over in Utah they said they're going to be stopping the water flow out of Lake Powell because if they don't then they'll have to shut down the Glen Canyon hydro plant there as well.  Lake Powell water levels are currently at 3527ft and they have to shut down Glen Canyon at 3,490ft.  Here in S. California we get a lot of power from Lake Mead's "Hoover" dam - which is downstream from Powell on (what used to be) the Colorado river - but Mead is itself already at the 1050ft the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation says is needed to keep the generators going there and we're already past the January peak in rainfall.  (And every foot drop in water level has already meant 6MW less electricity for the grid even before we get to full stop on the turbines.)  The Hyatt power plant in northern Calif. was shut down from August to January last/this year due to low levels in Lake Oroville but at least then we still had flow on the Colorado river keeping Glen Canyon and Hoover going.  With Powell shutting its outflow gates so early this year it is only a matter of time before water and power both become hard to find around here.  It looks like they're prioritizing electricity for now but either way it seems this summer is going to be "Bad" around here.  Word of advice for anyone looking to move to S. California - or anywhere in the US southwest really... don't.  At this rate we're going to wind up like Venezuela.  😱

  21. Somehow wound up on a tiger-team to troubleshoot/fix James Webb telemetry latency issues they've had since launch.

    You know that old gag where everyone lines up and then someone asks for volunteers and everyone but one slow guy takes one step back.  I *think* that's what happened.  Either that or I was volunteered in a secret meeting that I wasn't invited to.   Either way... just shoot me now.  😭🔫

  22. Went over to the "SAF" - spacecraft assembly facility - today at lunch & saw NISAR being built in the bay. 

    IMG_1895.thumb.JPG.98c998406d01bf9efcb49192f05b6e29.JPGIMG_1898.thumb.JPG.e5cc9dd9d5e59efccb2080cd6e18937f.JPG

    Also saw the color-by-numbers version of the first picture of another planet from space, and the crayons that were used to color itFun bit of history on display there. :D 

    IMG_1896.thumb.JPG.d476ab7b61abd794846c87dd6d9ea610.JPGIMG_1897.thumb.JPG.e469d55f0435750d75d92840eaf0ec7d.JPG

     

  23. I like being alone. I have control over my own shit. Therefore, in order to win me over, your presence has to feel better than my solitude. You're not competing with another person, you are competing with my comfort zones. — Horacio Jones

  24. Looks like I have to go out to Goldstone on the 10th.  Damn.. I thought I was done with that when I switched jobs.  :(  

    1. Show previous comments  4 more
    2. Wodahs

      Wodahs

      think i drive thru places like that regularly

      image.thumb.png.3becf9684deeea793d3285675c666f0a.png

    3. efaardvark

      efaardvark

      @Wodahs Yes, it is very much a drive through (and hope you don't have to stop) sort of place.  :D

    4. Hällregn

      Hällregn

      @Wodahs Mad respect for your line of work! What do you normally end up hauling if you don't mind me asking?

  25. Can't fool me!  I know what's in the green.. and it isn't "mint chocolate"!

    IMG_1822.thumb.jpg.4602b1ae3d3ca6ae05b96c16add9b2bd.jpg

    1. Hällregn

      Hällregn

      I love that movie. 😆 

      You never know. 👀 Haha.

    2. Animedragon

      Animedragon

      Makes you wonder how much research companies put into their product names.

    3. efaardvark

      efaardvark

      @Animedragon I wonder too.  I think companies just look at a table of names vs sorted by the %age of people who recognize that “brand” and go with the top entry.  Otherwise, yeah.  Why pick that one?

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