April 19, 2005
Derek and Amy have already entered.
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April 18, 2005
Teams Will Meet in Fly-Off May 21 Arlington, Va. – The stage is set for a fiery showdown of the top teams in the Team America Rocketry Challenge after AIA announced the 100 finalists Friday.
The teams will meet for a final fly-off on May 21 at Great Meadow in The Plains, Va. for the title. It is the third year AIA and its partners are putting on the worldÂ’s largest model rocket contest. A list of the finalists is available at www.rocketcontest.org.
A total of 712 teams from 49 states and the District of Columbia – and even an American middle school in Germany – took part in the preliminary round of the competition. That represented close to 10,000 middle and high school students.
AIA President and CEO John W. Douglass said interest in the contest shows it is succeeding in reaching out to middle and high school students.
“We are excited to see the enthusiasm surrounding TARC and look forward to another great final day of competition,’’ Douglass said.
This yearÂ’s competition tasks students with launching a one- or two-stage rocket and having it fly for exactly 60 seconds. The payload of one or two raw eggs must return safely to the earth, and each flight receives a score according to performance and weighted for the number of stages and eggs. Teams had until last week to send in preliminary scores to see if they made the finals, which features schools from 28 states.
AIA created the contest two years ago as a one-time event to mark the 100th anniversary of flight, but overwhelming interest turned it into an annual event. The goal is to promote aerospace to students to attract more young people to careers in the industry. The contest is also sponsored by the National Association of Rocketry in partnership with NASA, the American Association of Physics Teachers and 34 AIA member companies. The winning teams share a prize pool of $60,000 in savings bonds and cash. NASA also provides top-performing teams with grants for students to build more advanced rockets and for teachers to attend workshops and meet space program engineers.
For more information about AIAÂ’s Team America Rocketry Challenge, including details on how to sponsor a high school team and to apply for press credentials to attend the finals, visit www.rocketcontest.org.
Mookie and I will be attending again as volunteers. We've worked all three (they hold the finals at our home field), and it's fun and exciting to see the various ways that the student teams solve the challenging task they're given.
Spectators welcome.
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06:50 PM | category: Rocketry
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"Each year, 15 million cases of bacterial food poisoning originate in U.S. home kitchens, resulting in nausea, diarrhea, fever, and even death," read a press release French's issued Monday. "Now, lunch doesn't have to endanger your health! All-new French's Antibacterial Mustard is the perfect way to add flavor to, and subtract harmful disease-causing bacteria from, your family's favorite meals!"
Coming to a television near you:
"Approximately 9,000 deaths per year are attributed to foodborne pathogens, and the most germ-filled location in the house is the kitchen," a woman says as computer-generated footage zooms in to show worm-like spirochete bacteria multiplying on a slice of bologna. "Normal mustards do nothing to combat the germs that begin forming on meats and cheeses as soon as they're taken out of the refrigerator. But an hour after spreading on our powerful French's Antibacterial Mustard, your lunch is still free of everything but zesty mustard taste!"
Not really. It's the Onion.
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12:13 PM | category: Links
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The AHL season concludes today and playoffs begin shortly. Hopefully next year we can cheer for NHL teams once again.
Here's the list of players, thanks to all of you for playing:
Albany River Rats - Victor
Lowell Lock Monsters - Kin
Binghamton Senators - Dr Funk
Bridgeport Sound Tigers - Spork
Portland Pirates - Nic
Hershey Bears - Derek
Worcester IceCats - Heather
Wilkes-Barre / Scranton Penguins - Catt
Cleveland Barons - Ted
Hamilton Bulldogs - Cindy
Manitoba Moose - Gir
Houston Aeros - Matt
Rochester Americans - GEBIV
Milwaukee Admirals - Brian J & Frinklin
Utah Grizzlies - Jenn
For those who don't know what this is all about, the simple rules are here.
If you didn't play this year, you're welcome to join us next year for the Third Annual Hockey Whoopass Jamboree. Not interested? What have you got against tradition?
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12:09 PM | category: Links
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Pole Dancing In the Dark
American Warmonger
Beekeeper
Grumbles
Alex In Wonderland
Weasel Manor
Hola and welcome.
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Toasted Herb Rice
ingredients
2 cups long grain rice
4 Tbsp butter or margarine
20 oz chicken or beef broth, boiling
1 1/2 cups water, boiling
6-8 green onions, chopped
4 Tbsp soy sauce
2 tsp dried tarragon or basil leaves
directions
Put rice into an ovenproof casserole dish with a lid and place into a 325 degree oven. Roast for 20 minutes or until the rice is toasted and golden. Remove from the oven.
Add butter to the rice and stir until melted. Pour boiling broth and water over rice and stir.
Cover and return to the oven. Bake 30 minutes or until the liquid is absorbed and rice is done.
Stir in the chopped green onions, soy sauce and herbs.
Serves 8.
If you're baking a chicken or roast at 350 degrees, this can still be done at the same time, just reduce the baking time and keep an eye on it.
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05:03 AM | category: Recipes
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April 17, 2005
It's a nice enough looking light, all smoked glass and brass with those goofy bulbs that are shaped like candle flame, in fact it would be beautiful in a two-story home entryway or foyer where it could hang above everyone and cast it's gentle light upon the scene.
But in our dining room it's misplaced. It hangs too low. It's not centered in the room. It's not centered over the table. And on those occasions when the dining room table has been taken out (like for painting) I crack my skull on it repeatedly. I hate it for physical reasons. My wife hates it for ascetic. She just thinks it's ugly.
There are only two of the eight bulbs currently burning. I discovered a while back that my wife's plan was to let it die a slow lingering death, and when it finally goes dark it will be replaced by something newer, smaller, neater and easier to keep clean.
I joked that she's probably got the same plan for me. She didn't deny it.
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08:08 AM | category: Square Pegs
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Right now I'm feeling like Rusty's bragging on me, "I am the *Extreme*, Baby. The. Extreme!"
The wireless network is up and running. Yesterday, amongst my other chores, I figured out MAC addressing (even better security) for the laptop, Mookie's PC (she went wireless because her wired connection went wonky) and even for Liz's iPaq!
Yes, I'm feeling rather pleased with myself. And I didn't sit in front of a monitor all day either. Yardwork got done, laundry is almost caught up and I cooked a pretty darned good roast chicken dinner (look for a new recipe in the next day or two). Met Mookie's new boyfriend too. He seems like a nice guy and the dogs like him, which says a lot. Sam has a nitwit detector that's so accurate that it's scary.
At the end of the day I was beat. I fell asleep halfway through Lon Chaney's Indestructable Man, but did see Phantom from 10,000 Leagues first. An excellent Saturday.
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06:47 AM | category: Square Pegs
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April 16, 2005
Posted by: Ted at
09:51 AM | category: Recipes
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The new router switch has wired ports too. Maybe they all do, but when I saw that I did the happy dance because everything that was connected stays connected.
The other day for Liz's birthday I asked her over lunch what she wanted as a gift, and she kind of freaked when I offered her a choice of laptop of DVD burner.
The laptop solves a couple of problems for the family. Liz's embroidery machine uses input files that she stored on her PC in the living room, which meant she had to run up and down the stairs when doing her sewing. Big pain in the butt, metaphorically and physically, especially when her fibro is flaring up. With this new magic beastie, it sits on the desk next to her sewing table and everything she needs is right at hand.
I've also installed the Sims2 on it. I got it for Christmas, and then we realized that we didn't own a PC with enough horsepower to actually run the darn thing. I piddled around playing God for an hour last night. It looks like it could be fun.
It's going to be a beautiful day, so I'll close for now. There's yardwork and rocket fins to cut and laundry to catch up on (still). If you see me outside you might notice something different about me, a certain extra coolness (if that's even possible), because I have a laptop.
Well, I do when my wife lets me use it.
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07:04 AM | category: Square Pegs
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April 15, 2005
She's bouncing off the walls at the moment, and even the thought of spending all of July in school and away from home doesn't faze her.
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09:34 PM | category: Family matters
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Posted by: Ted at
03:56 PM | category: SciTech
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This nuclear-fueled reconnaissance craft is preparing to land on Mars' outermost satellite, Deimos— 12,500 miles away from the "red planet" (center) and 35 million miles away from the Earth.
Under the ad is the (I assume) title of the illustration: Mars Snooper.
The reason it caught my eye - other than it's a rocket - is that Estes used to produce a rocket kit known as the Mars Snooper, and it's remarkably similar and obviously based on the illustration. Cool.
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11:55 AM | category: Rocketry
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John Jacob Astor, the great-grandson of the famous fur trader and financier of the same name, was one of the wealthiest men on earth, with assets somewhere around $100 million (compared to J.P. Morgan, who had amassed a fortune of only $30 million). Astor was an inventor (of a bicycle brake, a storage battery, an internal combustion engine, a flying machine, a machine for removing surface dirt from roads, and an improved marine turbine engine) and also founder of the Astoria (later the Waldorf Astoria) Hotel in New York City. His pneumatic walkway invention won a prize at the 1893 Chicago WorldÂ’s Fair, and he was one of the first Americans to own a motor car. One of his dreams was to find a way to create rain by pumping warm air from the surface of the earth into the upper atmosphere. His fascination with science led him to begin writing his only novel, A Journey In Other Worlds when he was only 28 years old, and spent over two years writing it. He served in the Spanish-American War, and lost his life in the Titanic disaster, leading his wife to a lifeboat but returning himself to the sinking ship.
I'm almost through his book, and it's pretty fascinating. Besides the extrapolation of then-current science (most of which, understandably, is gotten badly wrong), the most interesting part is the difference in attitude and viewpoint compared to today. Piety vs Pragmatism runs as a theme throughout, and the main characters think and act as if the entire universe is already theirs in the ultimate extension of manifest destiny. Americans still possess that can-do spirit, although it's been softened somewhat over the last hundred years.
AstorÂ’s novel, with descriptions of an antigravity device, aeroplanes, television and space travel was widely read and became a bestseller on publication in 1894. Set in the year 2000, the book is a futuristic novel of three utopias: a Christian heaven on Saturn; an Eden-like new world on Jupiter; and a technologically-oriented, businessman's paradise on Earth.
The writing isn't too terrible, and once in a while he really nails it.
"... they looked up at the sky. The Great Bear and the north star had exactly the same relation to each other as when seen from the earth, while the other constellations and the Milky Way looked identically as when they has so often gazed at them before, and some idea of the immensity of space was conveyed to them. Here was no change; though they had travelled three hundred and eighty million miles, there was no more perceptible difference than if they had not moved a foot."
For all we've accomplished, for all our collective greatness, we're still a humble speck in the grand scheme of things. It's good to be reminded of that once in a while.
Most of this came from here.
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05:26 AM | category: Square Pegs
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April 14, 2005
See ya tomorrow.
Ted
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09:51 AM | category: Square Pegs
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April 13, 2005
While you're at it, this might interest you as well: Towards Understanding Islam.
I am a serious ebook junkie.
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When: 9am – 6pm
Who: Northern Virginia Association of Rocketry (NOVAAR)
Weather: 60Â’s, variable gusty winds, sunny.
This was a two-day launch packed full of activities. In addition to flying several contest events, NOVAAR was handling TARC students making flights on the last weekend before qualification closed. Also, there were students from a high school physics class making flights, a scout group, a Junior ROTC group, plus a team from Oakton high school making final test flights for their NASA Student Launch Initiative flight (I supervised construction of their Aerotech I300 motor). All this going on while still managing plenty of just-for-fun launches, both model and high power.
The evening before I called Ken at Performance Hobbies and ordered some high power motors for delivery at the field. He arrived not long after I did and once he got set up I picked up my motors and got ready to fly.
1. Groove Tube Upscale - H165R-M - Beautiful boost (as usual) from this rocket. She coasted to an estimated 1500 feet before ejecting the 36” parachute right at apogee. I’d gone with an undersized chute – normal is 45”, I need a 40” – to minimize drift and she landed softly on the thick grass without damage. (takeoff photo here).
Since I planned to return on Sunday, that was the extent of my high power flying for the day. Everything else was from the Sport Range.
2. Pacifyer - D12-5 - This battleaxe shaped rocket always gets noticed. Beautiful boost and good altitude, sheÂ’s picked up a bit of spin since repairing a broken fin. Recovered nicely very close by.
3. YJ-218 - C6-7 (x2) - Arrow-straight boost for this dual-engined cluster and a perfect recovery.
4. Vampyre - A10-3T - This mini-engined ring-fin always surprises people by how fast it is. 3-2-1 and gone. IÂ’m used to it and followed it all the way. Recovered undamaged on a streamer.
5. Zen Doggie - C6-7 (x3) - It’s been quite a while since I flew this rocket. Remembering that her last flight was a little squirrely (the fins are a tad undersized), I added some clay to the nose to increase stability and asked it to be announced as “heads up”. Only two of the three motors ignited. The delay was about two seconds too long due to missing one-third of the thrust during boost phase, but the climb was stable and she recovered nearby without damage. I’ve regained confidence in the design and I’ll start flying her again.
6. Sparrow Upscale - B6-6 - It doesnÂ’t take much to boost this plain-jane rocket way up there, and the B6 did a nice job. She came down on one fin and slightly cracked it. Already repaired.
At 4:30 I took over as Range Safety Officer (countdown and button-pushing guy) and had a great time announcing and launching some fun flights, including some TARC qualifiers.
On Saturday night it became apparent that I wouldnÂ’t be out flying on Sunday because IÂ’d gotten so wrapped up in events that I never applied sunscreen and wound up with a severe and painful sunburn on my neck and ears. Since I do this every year on the first or second launch, youÂ’d think IÂ’d have learned better by now. Sheesh.
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12:26 PM | category: Rocketry
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Archaeologist finds 'oldest porn statue'.
Over 7,000 years old, depicting a man and woman practicing the world's oldest intramural sport. They even named the male half of the statue, which is described as an 8 centimeter lower half of a man.
"This is such an interesting discovery," said Dr Sträuble, "as these figurines are not stylistic, but realistic.
8 centimeters? That ain't realistic around here, bucko.
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06:05 AM | category: SciTech
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Forgot where I found this. Sorry.
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05:45 AM | category: Links
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April 12, 2005
It's going on now. Check out the unfolding events at Silent Running.
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08:52 PM | category: Links
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