Get Your Coats Back Out

From and article in The Financial Post by Timothy Patterson:

Climate stability has never been a feature of planet Earth. The only constant about climate is change; it changes continually and, at times, quite rapidly. Many times in the past, temperatures were far higher than today, and occasionally, temperatures were colder. As recently as 6,000 years ago, it was about 3C warmer than now. Ten thousand years ago, while the world was coming out of the thousand-year-long "Younger Dryas" cold episode, temperatures rose as much as 6C in a decade -- 100 times faster than the past century's 0.6C warming that has so upset environmentalists.

It's things like this that, to me, make me question the modern global warming scare tactics.

The earth's climate by it's very nature has huge swings over time.

We were supposed to have cloudiness and rain all day yesterday, but the sun shone and late in the evening it clouded up and rained briefly.

Today, however it is cloudy with rain coming and going.

If they can't predict the weather accurately from one day to the next, how am I supposed to believe the 50 and 100 year forecasts?

The answer is, I don't.

I Come From a Winning Family

Yesterday, Michelle at Michelle's Spell mentioned having mostly received participation ribbons when she was growing up.

And I got to thinking about all the things that I have won in my life, and it's really a pretty short list, despite the title of today's post.

When I was a kid and lived in Vidalia, Louisiana, I played baseball on the Sherriff's Department Angels little league team. I always thought that was a cool name, even as a kid. Sherriff's deputies mostly deal with anything but angels; know what I mean?

Anyhoo, I think I played two years, and sucked bad enough that both years at the season ending award ceremonies I received a tiny participation trophy. I understood even back then that they were lame, but I sure as heck took them home anyway. Lord only knows whatever happened to them.

I was always a whiz as a kid at memorizing Bible verses, and I won just about every church contest I was ever in. So, although this resulted in no trophies, I won an assortment of candies and whatnot for those wins. I was kind of a Bible nerd as a kid. I liked memorizing verses and had whole chapters of Psalms and various crucial New Testament verses memorized. I just never knew when I was going to have to "commence to convertin'" someone, as my Mamaw Eunice used to say. And as a kid in Baptist churches, the verses in The Roman Road to Salvation were the most important to memorize.

And thanks to the Holy Spirit, whenever I've needed to call up those scriptures, they still roll off my tongue like I'd been studying for a test on them. Of course, reading the Bible helps; I read over them all from time to time.

In around tenth grade, a good friend and I, who attended the same church, went for a week at a summer youth camp way out in the woods and swamps near Shreveport, Louisiana. All of the buildings were built on stilts about ten feet up because it flooded so often. Well, to make a long story short, I won the "best camper" trophy for that week. Which is a laugh. The best camper was the winner of most of the Bible related games, and that's where my memory skills paid off big time. That is if you count being named "best camper" at an obscure Baptist church camp hitting the big time.

Then, in the summer before my senior year of high school (12th), I attended a photography / yearbook staff workshop held at Northeast Louisiana University (now University of Louisiana at Monroe). I won a nice trophy for having taken the "best candid photograph" of the workshop. It was of a campus cop writing a ticket to put on some poor person's VW Beetle. The cop looked up as I had the camera pointed at him and just grinned really big. Like he was so proud to be writing that ticket. I don't know if I still have a copy of that anywhere. I haven't seen the photo in years, but I can still picture him in my mind.

I also won a small trophy at that same workshop for coming in second in the "best overall photographer" category. I was much more proud of the candid photograph trophy than I would have been to win best overall. I knew as soon as I pushed the shutter button on that cop's smile, that was a good photo. Sometimes you know a photograph is really good the instant you take the shot. I couldn't have cared less about the rest of what I did. I was addicted to finding "the shot" every time I had my camera. I guess looking for "the shot" is what still has me out wandering around with my camera all of these years later.

Then years later, this would have been around 1985, Lovely Wife and I were living in Bossier City, Louisiana. We were in our apartment one day when the phone rang. It was the day after Father's Day, and this strange man tells me all excited-like how I'd won the drawing for the rod and reel at the drawing they had had on Father's Day.

I remember being dumbfounded. I told the man that I had never in my life been in that particular sporting goods store before and I certainly hadn't entered the contest.

I asked him to hold on, and asked Lovely Wife if she had entered my name in any drawings for Father's Day and at first she seemed as flummoxed as I was, then I saw her face change as she remembered doing just that. I told the guy I'd come get my rod and reel as soon as I could.

I kept that rod and reel for years, and it moved from apartment to apartment to house, etc., with us for years until, well, I don't know what ever happened to that major award. All I know is I never once fished with it.

I guess we kept moving it with us as some sort of symbol; that it was indeed possible that sometimes good things can happen to us out of the blue.

I know what you're thinking, "Man! This Dude should be playin' the lottery. He'd be a squillionaire by now."

Oh contrare, mon ami.

Years after winning that rod and reel, I took a discrete math course at La. Tech, which is a jumble of maths from different areas that are directly applicable to computer programming and digital logic. Mostly binary math, logic, probability and things like that.

One day in the discrete math class, we all got in there and the professor looked around and noticed that many students were absent. She was a young Computer Science PhD, and immediately recognized that it was a case of Friday-itis that had swept the class, leaving it half full.

She had us pull out paper for a pop quiz. All we had to do was calculate the odds of winning the Powerball Lottery, which is available in Louisiana. At the time, the way the game was played, I came up with a number of 1 in 155Million and something something chance of winning by buying one ticket.

I got the answer right, which was good for my grade, but has been a great incentive for me to NOT play the lottery. Every time the Powerball would get up to one of those $100Million jackpots, and folks were buying tickets like crazy, I would remember that pop quiz in my discrete math class and it was easy to not buy a ticket.

Which brings me to the "family" part of today's title.

Sainted Mother once won an electric ice cream freezer. You know, the kind our forefathers used to have to sit and crank and crank to make homemade ice cream with. Only the one Sainted Mother won was electric. It turned all by it's little ol' self as soon as you plugged that baby into an electrical socket.

Big Brother once "volunteered" Sainted Mother to make homemade ice cream for a team he was on, and said that she would make them chocolate ice cream. Well, it ended up becoming chocolate chips in vanilla by accident, and everybody raved over how wonderful her "accidental" ice cream tasted.

Another true-blue winner in our family is Big Sis.

Big Sis is a member of some Keith Urban Obsessed Stalker Fan Club or something and this year already has planned out four, count 'em four, Keith Urban concert trips all over the country. Well, as a member of this Keith Urban Obsessed Stalker Fan Club, Big Sis's name was entered into a drawing. The people whose names are drawn for whichever concerts they are attending get to go back stage before the concert and meet with Keith Urban. There are only eight Stalker Fan Club members that get to do this before each concert.

Well, Big Sis won herself one of the coveted eight spots before one of the four concerts she's planning to go to, so she'll be able to meet Mr. Talented yet again.

I actually kinda feel sorry for Mr. Urban. He just doesn't know Big Sis like I do. He has no idea what he's in for.

(It's been a while, but I've written about Big Sis's obsession with Keith Urban if y'all care to read them. A Day of Mourning, and Me and Accents and She's All A-Twitter.)

I just thought I'd share the amazing good fortune that myself and relatives have had over the years.

What with fishing rods, electric ice cream makers, and meeting Keith Urban, people should rub out heads for good luck every day.

Tagged for the IMDb Movie Meme

OK. So my spotty blog reading for the past couple of months has finally caught up with me.


I was reading at Emily's blog at Emily@sk, and found out second hand, that I had been tagged for a meme a while back (May 17!) by Sarah K. at IMAO.

I'm so ashamed.

Anyone who reads here much knows that I don't forward tags by name, I just tell anyone who wants to do the meme to just do it on their own.

It's a meme that takes reader participation.

Pick out ten favorite movies, then look them up at IMDb. In the overview at the top of each movie’s page, there are “Plot Keywords,” usually five of them. (Plus more, if you click the link.) Take the first five, and post them. Then the rest of us get to play movie buff and see if we can guess them.

This is not an easy game, the plot keywords for super popular movies can be really cryptic. Some of my favorite movies are old and/or obscure, so I'll try to pick ones that folks can guess the names of.

Because, seriously, Sarah K. posted 50 movie's plot keywords and I could only guess at maybe two out of 50, and I don't know if those two possibilities are right.

Numbers are my thing; this is not the kind of game I'm good at. This one is hard like watching Jeopardy! and they throw in a category of Elizabethan Poetry or Great Composers; I majored in electrical engineering so I wouldn't have to learn useless crap like that, THANK you very much. (Please forgive me if you majored in Elizabethan poetry or love classical music.)

1. Outer Space / Ancient Astronaut / Rebellion / Reluctant Hero / Invented Language

2. Virtuality / Interstellar Communication / No Opening Credits / Seti / Ham Radio

3. Ethics / Biographical / Famous Score / Historical / Olympics

4. Car Accident / Thrown Through Windshield / Mummy / Amazon / Death

5. Bayou / Lawn Mower / Coach / College / Ridicule

6. Alien Abduction / Conspiracy / Desert / Air Traffic Controller / Evacuation

7. Insult / Hopelessness / Sword / Loss Of Loved One / Famous Line

8. Beautiful Woman / Great Depression / Stroke / Old Dark House / Dysfunctional Family

9. Whimsical / Young Girl / Fantasy / Little Boy / Kidnap

10. Louisiana / Jail / Stephen King / Shooting / Film Projector

Now after looking at these, I wouldn't recognize any of them except for one, and I chose them myself!

Maybe this meme should go for the first seven or ten plot keywords to give folks a chance.

If you're looking for a blog post subject, consider yourself tagged and look up ten of your favorite movies on IMDb.

If you're good at things like this, leave your guesses in the comments.

Don't Touch That Dial

The weekend went by so fast it made my head spin.

Saturday, I would look at the clock from time to time and 3 hours would go by. When It was bed time, I was sleepy, but couldn't believe it was time for bed.

The whole weekend went by that way.

Consequently, I have no stories or life changing insights.

Take a minute and check out the photos I posted this past Saturday on my photography blog, as well as today's photos. We had a great sunset this past Friday, and the photos on these two posts on my photography blog are from that sunset.

Also, I've not had the time to get to everyone's blogs the past few days for reading and commenting. I hope to read all of your stuff today. It's like forgetting my watch, I feel that something is missing when I get behind on my blog reading. You guys are my windows on the world.

Picture Post, Sunday June 17, 2007

Happy Father's Day everyone.

I was blessed to have a great Dad, whom we all called Don C., his first name and middle initial. Here's a picture of he and Sainted Mother that I've always liked.

Then later, I had the blessing of my Father in Law in my life. He was a civil engineer and always, always, always put others first.

I've said, and it's still true, I feel like I had two great fathers in my life when so many never had even one. I was blessed to have these men in my life.

There isn't one single day that goes by that I don't think of them, and wish I could talk with them.

Don C., Keith, I love you both still.

Both of my grandfathers were, good men. Both were sweet to us grandkids, and I spent a week or two each summer at each set of grandparent's house.

This next picture is an oldie but goodie of my paternal grandfather and grandmother. We called them Papaw Masters and Mamaw Eunice.
My maternal grandfather, we called Papaw Hinton. He was an auto mechanic and also did mechanic's work on land-based oil pumping machinery that was all over central Louisiana. This is a pic of Papaw Hinton, Big Sis there on the left, and Big Brother there with the sidearm.
My Dad's brother, my Uncle Alden, was also another good man in my life. I usually spent a week with Uncle Alden and his family every summer, and sometimes my cousin Scott would stay with me instead. I loved him dearly, and miss him a lot too. I didn't have any even semi-recent pics of my Uncle Alden that I had scanned, so I'm putting this old one of Uncle Alden (left) with my Dad in their Navy uniforms.
This is one of my all-time favorite photos of my Big Brother. This was taken in approximately 1984, around the time Lovely Wife and I got married. Paul had one daughter, and several step-children.

And last, but certainly not least, is Long Suffering Brother In Law. This old slide I took of he and Big Sis's first son in around 1983. To my knowledge, LSBIL still doesn't have even one lousy gray hair, whereas mine is turning gray at an alarming rate. Thankfully, LSBIL is still with us.

Like I said earlier, I feel like I had two dads, but I've had quite a few really good men in my life.

All have passed away except for my Brother In Law. Hope we have him around a good long time.

I sure miss all of these guys because it's been a long time since their passing. I miss LSBIL due to distance.

Again, Happy Father's day to all.

Early Lunch, Late Launch

Most Americans have certainly heard of Kennedy Space Center on Cape Canaveral in Florida.

Most folks don't realize or know that there is a U.S. Air Force Station adjacent to the Space Center, and is called Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. And Cape Canaveral Air Force Station is where many non-shuttle launches are made into space. Satellites and whatnot.

Living in this area can be strange sometimes too, because many of these rocket launches are not advertised ahead of time like the launches of the Space Shuttle. The reason is that some of the rockets and their payloads are for various U.S. government entities, and they want folks to be as in the dark as possible. That's a nice way of saying that the ones we don't hear about before hand are usually launches of spy satellites.

In 1996, when I was here for my job interview with the company I work for, I was driving around Palm Bay and Melbourne in a rental car. I was lazily driving through this one neighborhood when I just stopped the car on this residential street I was on. There was a rocket going up. I can still remember sitting there watching that thing go.

The point is, the Space Shuttle isn't the only game in town when it comes to rocket launches. Cape Canaveral Air Force Station launches most of the other rocket/payload packages.

This past Thursday, an Atlas V rocket was supposed to "go up" at approximately 11:20am.

When I'm at work, and there is a launch of any type, those of us who are interested usually walk out front so that we have a decent view to the northeast of us, and watch the liftoffs.

I knew this launch was coming up though, and brought my camera with me to work, left it in the van, and took an early lunch to go to the closest Atlantic beach to where I work.

One problem. They ended up scrubbing the launch; in other words, cancel and delay until the next window. (There's a photo of my view of the non-launch of Thursday morning. Nice day at the beach, even if the flight was cancelled.)

Trivia: The Space Shuttle with liftoff boosters and such are less than half the weight of an old Apollo Saturn V rocket, yet has the same thrust that one of those Saturn Vs did. So the Space Shuttle takes off and gets into orbit pretty darn fast in comparison to the Apollo missions. The old timers around here say that the Saturn Vs that took men to the moon looked as if they would never get up into the air. They seemed to hang there and everyone would be urging the thing to just fly. So you take an Atlas V like what was to have gone up Thursday, after watching the Shuttle Atlantis lift off last week, and it's like comparing a Honda Civic to a top fuel dragster. The Atlas Vs are super fast and powerful, a much better power to weight ratio. Delta rockets are the same, really fast and amazing to watch. The show is over really quick.

So, I tried it again yesterday, only because of work, I couldn't get away soon enough to make it to the beach for the launch. When I realized I was running out of time, I stopped at a local park. And although I had my camera ready, when the rocket became visible above the trees, it was a streaking flame that was visible only for a few seconds. The sky was clear but rather hazy, and so although I saw the Atlas V zip on up, it disappeared before I could get my camera to my eye.

Consequently my efforts resulted in one single photo of the trail of smoke left by the Atlas V. Oh well. (Here's my amazingly exciting photo of the Atlas V smoke trail.)

According to spaceflightnow.com, the payload for this one was for the National Reconnaissance Office, and was classified.

At least they can't arrest me for having photos of classified hardware, I was just plain ol' too slow.

It's Time For...

...another frightening look inside my head.

As an engineer I occasionally have to deal with numbers.

Yesterday, I somehow spent my thinking time while I ate my lunch pondering prime numbers.

Just go with me here, OK?

I'll just ask y'all; can one type of infinity be less infinite than another type of infinity?

This is the conundrum that has me asking this.

A) There are an infinite number of integers.
B) Some integers are what we call even numbers, all perfectly divisible by the number 2 (no remainder).
C) Some integers are what we call prime numbers and can only be divided evenly by themselves and the number 1.

With me so far?

Every other integer is an even number; 2, 4, 6, 8, ..., 2200, 2202, 2204, ...

But prime numbers happen less often; 1, 2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, 17, 19, 23, ...

So, again my question, rephrased: If there are an infinite number of even integers, and an infinite number of prime integers, and if prime integers "happen" less often than even integers, are there fewer prime integers than there are even integers, despite the fact that they both continue on to infinity?

In short, are prime integers "less infinite" in number than "even integers" are?

I was just wondering.

Then I finished my lunch and had to go back to work.

I needed a work break to get away from my lunch break.