Good Afternoon Ladies & Gentlemen,
Thursday night after work, I went to see my cousin Alicia who was in the hospital. Don't worry, she's fine. She just had a road removed from her leg from a previous surgery...but she was super excited to see me...and I didn't stay long because she almost immediately passed out thanks to the drugs in her IV and I didn't want to stay around and chat with my Aunt Pat for more than I had to. After that, I went home, then met up with JL Clyde for a sam'ich at the Robin's Nest. They have some pretty fine sam'iches there. Oh...and did I mention that she's going to San Francisco for a week with work? Well, she is. I'm not jealous at all.
Friday night, I watched "Dial M for Murder" which is yet another Alfred Hitchcock movie...and oddly enough, stars the lovely Grace Kelly. Surprise, surprise. This movie is pretty awesome though. Basically, a man discovers that his beautiful wife (Lady Kelly) is having an affair while he's been away for the past year...and he devises a plot to have her murdered. However, murder is never like it is in the movies or books, nothing goes according to plan...and then that's when the real story begins. It's actually a pretty gripping tale...and if you're into detective stories (even when you already know all the details involved) I would highly recommend it. There are twists, turns, insights, theories, a dash of humor, and a whole lot to keep you thoroughly gripped. One odd thing is...there was an intermission. Now, epics like Gandhi, Gone with the Wind, Sound of Music, Ben Hur and other 3-4 movies that aren't Lord of the Rings had an intermission...but this one was about 100 minutes long. Did every classic have an intermission? Anyway, just a thought I had. Go rent it if you can. The rest of the weekend was down in Cedar City with the Wingmans...but I'll save that until tomorrow...because I haven't downloaded the pictures yet. In the meantime, here's the news...
Stealing Beaches - Since we're on a mystery trip, here's a little number from south of the border. Surprised tourists found their little piece of Cancun beach paradise ringed by crime-scene tape and gun-toting sailors on Thursday. Why? Murder? Shark attacks? Standard drug cartel shootouts? Nope. Environmental enforcement officers backed by Mexican navy personnel closed off hundreds of feet of powder-white coastline in front of a hotel accused of illegally accumulating sand on its beach. Mexico spent $19 million to replace Cancun beaches washed away by Hurricane Wilma in 2005. But much of the sand pumped from the sea floor has since washed away, leading some property owners to build breakwaters in a bid to retain sand. The practice often merely shifts sand loss to beaches below the breakwaters. "Today we made the decision to close this stretch of ill-gotten, illegally accumulated sand," said Patricio Patron, Mexico's attorney general for environmental protection. "This hotel was telling its tourists: 'Come here, I have sand ... the other hotels don't, because I stole it.'" Patron said five people were detained in a raid for allegedly using pumps to move sand from the sea floor onto the beach in front of the Gran Caribe Real Hotel. The hotel is also suspected of illegally building a breakwater that impeded the natural flow of sand onto other hotels' beaches. An employee of the hotel's marketing office said nobody was available to comment on the allegations. Authorities said the hotel owner ignored previous orders to remove the breakwater. A knot of angry tourists gathered around the closed beach. Some were irked by the sight of police tape and "Closed" signs. Maria Bachino, a travel agent from Rocha, Uruguay, said by telephone that she had booked a beachfront room in Cancun, only to find herself cut off from the clear, bathub-temperature waters that lure millions to Cancun each year. "They promised us a beach. This is very unpleasant, we feel bad. This is intimidating," she said of the armed navy personnel who participated in the raid. Patron said he regretted any inconvenience for tourists, but said the government is planning projects to restore beaches throughout Cancun in an orderly, environmentally responsible way. "I apologize to the tourists for this problem, but it is a question of enforcing the law," which allegedly is a big deal in Mexico. So yeah, that'd suck. Save up for a vacation in Cancun...and then have armed guards on the shores. Nice.
Because I'm a Nerd - New laser propulsion experiments are throwing light on how to build future hypersonic aircraft and beam spacecraft into Earth orbit. Indeed, a "Lightcraft revolution" could replace today's commercial jet travel (as would teleporters). Passengers would be whisked from one side of the planet to the other in less than an hour - just enough time to get those impenetrable bags of peanuts open. Furthermore, beamed energy propulsion can make flight to orbit easy, instead of tenuous and dangerous. That's the belief of Leik Myrabo an aerospace engineering professor at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, NY. He's an expert in directed energy applications, aerospace systems, space prime power, and advanced propulsion. For the past three decades, Myrabo's burning desire has been to create and demonstrate viable concepts for non-chemical propulsion of future flight vehicles through his research and company Lightcraft Technologies, Inc., of Bennington, Vermont. "Typically, a new propulsion technology takes 25 years to mature...to the point where you can actually field it. Well, that time is now," Myrabo told SPACE.com. The brightest new news in beamed energy propulsion is that experiments are now underway at the Henry T. Nagamatsu Laboratory of Hypersonics and Aerothermodynamics at the IEAv-CTA in Sao Jose dos Campos, Brazil (whew...). The work is being sponsored under international collaboration between the United States Air Force Office of Scientific Research and the Brazilian Air Force. Basic research experiments using high-powered lasers are underway in Brazil, with experts investigating the central physics of laser-heated airspikes and pulsed laser propulsion engines for future ultra-energetic craft. At the Brazil-based lab, a hypersonic shock tunnel is linked to two pulsed infrared lasers with peak powers reaching the gigawatt range - the highest power laser propulsion experiments performed to date, Myrabo said. "In the lab we're doing full-size engine segment tests for vehicles that will revolutionize access to space. It's real hardware. It's real physics. We're getting real data...and it's not paper studies. Right now, we're chasing the data. When you fire into the engine, it's a real wallop. It sounds like a shotgun going off inside the lab. It's really loud." The laser propulsion experiments, Myrabo added, are also relevant to launching nanosatellites (weighing 1 to 10 kilograms) and microsatellites (10 to 100 kilograms) into low Earth orbit. Creating and flying Myrabo's "highways of light" has been a methodical and step by step undertaking. Back in 1996 through 1999, he flew Lightcraft prototypes via a 10 kilowatt high-power infrared laser at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico. In 2000 - sponsored under a grant to his company - he established a new world altitude record of over 230 feet (71 meters) for laser-boosted vehicles in free fight. Myrabo points to his new book "Lightcraft Flight Handbook, LTI-20," co-authored with John Lewis and recently published by Apogee books, to explain his quest for low-cost, safe space access with beamed-powered Lightcraft (because seriously, why else would you buy it?). "The physics of high-power beamed energy propagation through the atmosphere...there's not a lot of expertise out there to make this stuff real. It's completely out of the conventional box. I've been working on it for 30 years. I know how to do it." For decades, Myrabo said, what laser propulsion physicists have been hungry to achieve is a couple of dollars per watt of laser energy. "We're here now. It's a matter of will and do we want to do it. This technology is now at the cusp of commercial reality." We shall see. It does sounds like it's COMPLETELY out of the box...but hey, so did flying like a bird...or the world being round...or the possibility of having thousands of your favorite albums of music in something smaller than a credit card...but guess what, it happened. It just took time and ingenuity. Good luck, Mister Myrabo. Now let's see, back to the normal stuff...like nudity in advertising...
Banned in Bama - Alabama's ban on a wine that features a nude nymph on the label became a business opportunity for a California vintner who is preparing a marketing campaign to capitalize on being "Banned in Bama." The Alabama Alcoholic Beverage Control Board recently told stores and restaurants to quit serving Cycles Gladiator wine because of the label. Board attorney Bob Martin said the stylized, art-nouveau rendition of a nude female with a flying bicycle violated Alabama rules against displaying "a person posed in an immoral or sensuous manner." Bill Leigon, president of Hahn Family Wines in Soledad, California, said Thursday that visits to the company's Web site have increased tenfold since news of the ban broke late last week, and callers from across the country have been asking where they can buy the wine. Because of the interest, he's developing store displays that say "Banned in Bama" and "Taste What They Can't Have in Alabama." Hahn said he will never miss the 500 cases sold annually in Alabama. "There is going to be a significant increase in our sales," he predicted. Rosanna Guardagno, a social psychologist at the University of Alabama, said a ban often increases people's interest in a product. "The ABC Board, without realizing it, is going to boost their sales," she said. The wine's label is copied from an 1895 French advertising poster for Cycles Gladiator bicycles. It shows a side view of a full-bodied nymph flying alongside a winged bicycle. Martin said the ABC Board rejected the label last year, which meant the product wasn't supposed to be sold in Alabama. A citizen recently sent a bottle to the board to show it was still being sold in the state, prompting the letter to restaurants and stores to stop sales. Hahn's president said he was unaware of the ABC Board's rejection until the letter was sent to retailers. He said the poster is a classic piece of art, with originals selling for as much as $50,000. Although nude art bothers the alcohol board, it's not a problem for some other branches of Alabama government. The Alabama Tourism Department distributes a brochure with a cover featuring Hiram Powers' 19th century nude statue, The Greek Slave, which is on display at the Westervelt Warner Museum of American Art in Tuscaloosa ("Nope, I use denture grip"). It is available in museums statewide, interstate highway welcome centers and visitors' bureaus statewide. "We haven't had any concerns about it," Tourism Director Lee Sentell said. And Alabama's Capitol has historic paintings on display, including two that show several topless female Indians. Guardagno, who studies social influences, said people allow more freedom of expression in art than in advertising. "With art, you have to be really explicit with how a person's body is displayed before people are offended," she said. So Alabama has a problem with mixing nudity & alcohol. That's okay. I think they're also one of two states with bans on cigarettes until you're 19...with Utah being the other. Whatever. That's their thing. They have to maintain high standards. After all, they are the state of Forrest Gump.
Not So Banned in Bama - A 37-year-old woman was arrested and charged with padding her bra with methamphetamine (police were tipped by the Picasso proportions). DeKalb County, Alabama Sheriff Jimmy Harris said the woman was arrested Tuesday and charged with trafficking in controlled substances. Harris said authorities pulled the woman over for a traffic violation and searched her car. During a pat down, an officer found a pound of meth hidden in her bra, worth about $13,000. She was released from the DeKalb County jail Wednesday on $30,000 bond, James Bond. Yeah, just thought I'd throw that in there. Really nothing else to say other than meth is a bad idea.
Vegas Update - Police in Las Vegas say a tamed tiger that escaped from a magic act has been captured. Police say the residents in the city's northwest section reported seeing the tiger wandering their streets Thursday night. Police Lt. Les Lane says the cat belongs to Fernando's Brothers magic act. He says the cat got loose, but "they got it back into custody." The cat was found in a resident's backyard. Animal Control and Metro Police are investigating the incident. You know, maybe it's not such a bad thing that I'm not living in Vegas right now. The economy's struggling, yet recovering. At least half the drivers on the freeways are over the legal blood alcohol limit (and that's a pretty low estimate honestly). People vomit all over the streets. Now, there's the threat of tigers roaming the streets. TIGERS!!! This isn't India, this is Vegas. Next there are going to be snakes taking over the police precincts...or more fittingly, gangs of French contortionists stirring up trouble, emo magicians stealing our souls and our playing cards, Donny & Marie singing again, The Rat Pack, Elvis & Elton John all rising from the grave, another Carrot Top movie, OH YES!!! Perhaps this is another sign of the Apocalypse. In fact...yes, yes I am putting this on the list...along with snakes commanding Florida, David Spade impregnating a woman and snow storms in Vegas & New Orleans simultaneously.
Anyway, that'll do it for today. I'll update you on the weekend soon...but it was a LOT of fun and we got a lot done too. Big thanks to the Wingmans for putting up with me...and next time, we're making a run to Vegas to celebrate your new home. Have a great day everybody!!!
Thursday night after work, I went to see my cousin Alicia who was in the hospital. Don't worry, she's fine. She just had a road removed from her leg from a previous surgery...but she was super excited to see me...and I didn't stay long because she almost immediately passed out thanks to the drugs in her IV and I didn't want to stay around and chat with my Aunt Pat for more than I had to. After that, I went home, then met up with JL Clyde for a sam'ich at the Robin's Nest. They have some pretty fine sam'iches there. Oh...and did I mention that she's going to San Francisco for a week with work? Well, she is. I'm not jealous at all.
Friday night, I watched "Dial M for Murder" which is yet another Alfred Hitchcock movie...and oddly enough, stars the lovely Grace Kelly. Surprise, surprise. This movie is pretty awesome though. Basically, a man discovers that his beautiful wife (Lady Kelly) is having an affair while he's been away for the past year...and he devises a plot to have her murdered. However, murder is never like it is in the movies or books, nothing goes according to plan...and then that's when the real story begins. It's actually a pretty gripping tale...and if you're into detective stories (even when you already know all the details involved) I would highly recommend it. There are twists, turns, insights, theories, a dash of humor, and a whole lot to keep you thoroughly gripped. One odd thing is...there was an intermission. Now, epics like Gandhi, Gone with the Wind, Sound of Music, Ben Hur and other 3-4 movies that aren't Lord of the Rings had an intermission...but this one was about 100 minutes long. Did every classic have an intermission? Anyway, just a thought I had. Go rent it if you can. The rest of the weekend was down in Cedar City with the Wingmans...but I'll save that until tomorrow...because I haven't downloaded the pictures yet. In the meantime, here's the news...
Stealing Beaches - Since we're on a mystery trip, here's a little number from south of the border. Surprised tourists found their little piece of Cancun beach paradise ringed by crime-scene tape and gun-toting sailors on Thursday. Why? Murder? Shark attacks? Standard drug cartel shootouts? Nope. Environmental enforcement officers backed by Mexican navy personnel closed off hundreds of feet of powder-white coastline in front of a hotel accused of illegally accumulating sand on its beach. Mexico spent $19 million to replace Cancun beaches washed away by Hurricane Wilma in 2005. But much of the sand pumped from the sea floor has since washed away, leading some property owners to build breakwaters in a bid to retain sand. The practice often merely shifts sand loss to beaches below the breakwaters. "Today we made the decision to close this stretch of ill-gotten, illegally accumulated sand," said Patricio Patron, Mexico's attorney general for environmental protection. "This hotel was telling its tourists: 'Come here, I have sand ... the other hotels don't, because I stole it.'" Patron said five people were detained in a raid for allegedly using pumps to move sand from the sea floor onto the beach in front of the Gran Caribe Real Hotel. The hotel is also suspected of illegally building a breakwater that impeded the natural flow of sand onto other hotels' beaches. An employee of the hotel's marketing office said nobody was available to comment on the allegations. Authorities said the hotel owner ignored previous orders to remove the breakwater. A knot of angry tourists gathered around the closed beach. Some were irked by the sight of police tape and "Closed" signs. Maria Bachino, a travel agent from Rocha, Uruguay, said by telephone that she had booked a beachfront room in Cancun, only to find herself cut off from the clear, bathub-temperature waters that lure millions to Cancun each year. "They promised us a beach. This is very unpleasant, we feel bad. This is intimidating," she said of the armed navy personnel who participated in the raid. Patron said he regretted any inconvenience for tourists, but said the government is planning projects to restore beaches throughout Cancun in an orderly, environmentally responsible way. "I apologize to the tourists for this problem, but it is a question of enforcing the law," which allegedly is a big deal in Mexico. So yeah, that'd suck. Save up for a vacation in Cancun...and then have armed guards on the shores. Nice.
Because I'm a Nerd - New laser propulsion experiments are throwing light on how to build future hypersonic aircraft and beam spacecraft into Earth orbit. Indeed, a "Lightcraft revolution" could replace today's commercial jet travel (as would teleporters). Passengers would be whisked from one side of the planet to the other in less than an hour - just enough time to get those impenetrable bags of peanuts open. Furthermore, beamed energy propulsion can make flight to orbit easy, instead of tenuous and dangerous. That's the belief of Leik Myrabo an aerospace engineering professor at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, NY. He's an expert in directed energy applications, aerospace systems, space prime power, and advanced propulsion. For the past three decades, Myrabo's burning desire has been to create and demonstrate viable concepts for non-chemical propulsion of future flight vehicles through his research and company Lightcraft Technologies, Inc., of Bennington, Vermont. "Typically, a new propulsion technology takes 25 years to mature...to the point where you can actually field it. Well, that time is now," Myrabo told SPACE.com. The brightest new news in beamed energy propulsion is that experiments are now underway at the Henry T. Nagamatsu Laboratory of Hypersonics and Aerothermodynamics at the IEAv-CTA in Sao Jose dos Campos, Brazil (whew...). The work is being sponsored under international collaboration between the United States Air Force Office of Scientific Research and the Brazilian Air Force. Basic research experiments using high-powered lasers are underway in Brazil, with experts investigating the central physics of laser-heated airspikes and pulsed laser propulsion engines for future ultra-energetic craft. At the Brazil-based lab, a hypersonic shock tunnel is linked to two pulsed infrared lasers with peak powers reaching the gigawatt range - the highest power laser propulsion experiments performed to date, Myrabo said. "In the lab we're doing full-size engine segment tests for vehicles that will revolutionize access to space. It's real hardware. It's real physics. We're getting real data...and it's not paper studies. Right now, we're chasing the data. When you fire into the engine, it's a real wallop. It sounds like a shotgun going off inside the lab. It's really loud." The laser propulsion experiments, Myrabo added, are also relevant to launching nanosatellites (weighing 1 to 10 kilograms) and microsatellites (10 to 100 kilograms) into low Earth orbit. Creating and flying Myrabo's "highways of light" has been a methodical and step by step undertaking. Back in 1996 through 1999, he flew Lightcraft prototypes via a 10 kilowatt high-power infrared laser at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico. In 2000 - sponsored under a grant to his company - he established a new world altitude record of over 230 feet (71 meters) for laser-boosted vehicles in free fight. Myrabo points to his new book "Lightcraft Flight Handbook, LTI-20," co-authored with John Lewis and recently published by Apogee books, to explain his quest for low-cost, safe space access with beamed-powered Lightcraft (because seriously, why else would you buy it?). "The physics of high-power beamed energy propagation through the atmosphere...there's not a lot of expertise out there to make this stuff real. It's completely out of the conventional box. I've been working on it for 30 years. I know how to do it." For decades, Myrabo said, what laser propulsion physicists have been hungry to achieve is a couple of dollars per watt of laser energy. "We're here now. It's a matter of will and do we want to do it. This technology is now at the cusp of commercial reality." We shall see. It does sounds like it's COMPLETELY out of the box...but hey, so did flying like a bird...or the world being round...or the possibility of having thousands of your favorite albums of music in something smaller than a credit card...but guess what, it happened. It just took time and ingenuity. Good luck, Mister Myrabo. Now let's see, back to the normal stuff...like nudity in advertising...
Banned in Bama - Alabama's ban on a wine that features a nude nymph on the label became a business opportunity for a California vintner who is preparing a marketing campaign to capitalize on being "Banned in Bama." The Alabama Alcoholic Beverage Control Board recently told stores and restaurants to quit serving Cycles Gladiator wine because of the label. Board attorney Bob Martin said the stylized, art-nouveau rendition of a nude female with a flying bicycle violated Alabama rules against displaying "a person posed in an immoral or sensuous manner." Bill Leigon, president of Hahn Family Wines in Soledad, California, said Thursday that visits to the company's Web site have increased tenfold since news of the ban broke late last week, and callers from across the country have been asking where they can buy the wine. Because of the interest, he's developing store displays that say "Banned in Bama" and "Taste What They Can't Have in Alabama." Hahn said he will never miss the 500 cases sold annually in Alabama. "There is going to be a significant increase in our sales," he predicted. Rosanna Guardagno, a social psychologist at the University of Alabama, said a ban often increases people's interest in a product. "The ABC Board, without realizing it, is going to boost their sales," she said. The wine's label is copied from an 1895 French advertising poster for Cycles Gladiator bicycles. It shows a side view of a full-bodied nymph flying alongside a winged bicycle. Martin said the ABC Board rejected the label last year, which meant the product wasn't supposed to be sold in Alabama. A citizen recently sent a bottle to the board to show it was still being sold in the state, prompting the letter to restaurants and stores to stop sales. Hahn's president said he was unaware of the ABC Board's rejection until the letter was sent to retailers. He said the poster is a classic piece of art, with originals selling for as much as $50,000. Although nude art bothers the alcohol board, it's not a problem for some other branches of Alabama government. The Alabama Tourism Department distributes a brochure with a cover featuring Hiram Powers' 19th century nude statue, The Greek Slave, which is on display at the Westervelt Warner Museum of American Art in Tuscaloosa ("Nope, I use denture grip"). It is available in museums statewide, interstate highway welcome centers and visitors' bureaus statewide. "We haven't had any concerns about it," Tourism Director Lee Sentell said. And Alabama's Capitol has historic paintings on display, including two that show several topless female Indians. Guardagno, who studies social influences, said people allow more freedom of expression in art than in advertising. "With art, you have to be really explicit with how a person's body is displayed before people are offended," she said. So Alabama has a problem with mixing nudity & alcohol. That's okay. I think they're also one of two states with bans on cigarettes until you're 19...with Utah being the other. Whatever. That's their thing. They have to maintain high standards. After all, they are the state of Forrest Gump.Not So Banned in Bama - A 37-year-old woman was arrested and charged with padding her bra with methamphetamine (police were tipped by the Picasso proportions). DeKalb County, Alabama Sheriff Jimmy Harris said the woman was arrested Tuesday and charged with trafficking in controlled substances. Harris said authorities pulled the woman over for a traffic violation and searched her car. During a pat down, an officer found a pound of meth hidden in her bra, worth about $13,000. She was released from the DeKalb County jail Wednesday on $30,000 bond, James Bond. Yeah, just thought I'd throw that in there. Really nothing else to say other than meth is a bad idea.
Vegas Update - Police in Las Vegas say a tamed tiger that escaped from a magic act has been captured. Police say the residents in the city's northwest section reported seeing the tiger wandering their streets Thursday night. Police Lt. Les Lane says the cat belongs to Fernando's Brothers magic act. He says the cat got loose, but "they got it back into custody." The cat was found in a resident's backyard. Animal Control and Metro Police are investigating the incident. You know, maybe it's not such a bad thing that I'm not living in Vegas right now. The economy's struggling, yet recovering. At least half the drivers on the freeways are over the legal blood alcohol limit (and that's a pretty low estimate honestly). People vomit all over the streets. Now, there's the threat of tigers roaming the streets. TIGERS!!! This isn't India, this is Vegas. Next there are going to be snakes taking over the police precincts...or more fittingly, gangs of French contortionists stirring up trouble, emo magicians stealing our souls and our playing cards, Donny & Marie singing again, The Rat Pack, Elvis & Elton John all rising from the grave, another Carrot Top movie, OH YES!!! Perhaps this is another sign of the Apocalypse. In fact...yes, yes I am putting this on the list...along with snakes commanding Florida, David Spade impregnating a woman and snow storms in Vegas & New Orleans simultaneously.Anyway, that'll do it for today. I'll update you on the weekend soon...but it was a LOT of fun and we got a lot done too. Big thanks to the Wingmans for putting up with me...and next time, we're making a run to Vegas to celebrate your new home. Have a great day everybody!!!
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