Wednesday, August 31, 2016

Old school selfie


Chicago iphone


Kids, gotta love 'em!


Yeesh! What could this mean?


Those meddling kids!


Missah T don't mess around


The pitch drop experiment - world's longest experiment of any kind, and which could continue for another hundred years

Begun in 1927 by Professor Thomas Parnell, this experiment was meant to reveal the surprising properties of an everyday material: pitch. Pitch is the name of a number of hard tar-like substances and in this case bitumen was used. Though at room temperature pitch appears to be a solid and can be shattered by a hammer, it is in fact a very high-viscosity liquid, and Professor Parnell wanted to prove it.

He even looks like a professor!




Just getting ready to perform the experiment took years. First the Professor heated a sample of pitch and poured it into a sealed funnel. Then, he waited. For three years Parnell let the pitch settle in the funnel, until in 1930, when he felt the pitch was settled enough, he cut the bottom of the funnel, freeing the pitch to begin its mind-bogglingly slow downward escape.


Parnell died in 1948, but the pitch experiment kept on going without him. As of 2009, the pitch has dripped only eight times. 79 years after the experiment was begun, the ninth drop is only now forming. Pitch has now been calculated to be roughly 230 billion times more viscous than water.
Listed as the longest running lab experiment by Guinness World Records, the pitch experiment not only outlived its creator, but will likely outlive us all. It has been estimated that there is enough pitch to keep it dripping, ever so slowly, for another hundred years.

Native to the area around Perth, Australia, these dudes are quite the showman.



Look at me, look at me!

Three hurricanes from the ISS

Pulled this orange habanero off the bush today

I took a nibble.  HOT!  Still burning.


Yes






Both versions would probably overmatch our LCS.

I say, bloody rotter!




Nuked too much, or not enough? Pretty amusing.

Not my commute, thank God.

Tuesday, August 30, 2016

Fire whip


Clan?


Ulvik, Hardangerfjord,Norway


The meme lives



Dunk your sweaty head in that


Heh


Cloud Fall


Semi auto 12 gauge?

I want one!


Beaver Dam Mountains, far southwest Utah



Azurite specimen from the old Apex mine near Jarvis Peak.


Zowie!


Seen on Interstate 15, a few miles south of Baker, California.  Zzyzx (pronounced Zye-Zix) is a word made up by Curtis Springer, owner of a health spa built around a spring on the edge of Soda Dry Lake.

More than a little worrisome.

Even before the FBI identified new cyber attacks on two separate state election boards, the Department of Homeland Security began considering declaring the election a "critical infrastructure," giving it the same control over security it has over Wall Street and and the electric power grid.
"We should carefully consider whether our election system, our election process, is critical infrastructure like the financial sector, like the power grid," Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said.

"There's a vital national interest in our election process, so I do think we need to consider whether it should be considered by my department and others critical infrastructure," he said at media conference earlier this month hosted by the Christian Science Monitor.
I don't trust this administration at all with this authority, and certainly not under a guy who can't even spell his own first name (Jeh, pronounced "Jay").
This is tailor made for election fraud and theft, and I would not put it past these bozos to try it to keep their girl Hillary in power.  
Ugh.

Sometimes it seems that way


Embers from a wildfire smolder along Lytle Creek Road near Keenbrook, California by Noah Berger.


That fire was hot on the hillside, not quite so bad in the foreground.

The nation of Georgia - less known than it should be.








Monday, August 29, 2016

Gene Wilder at the University of Iowa in 1954. Rest in peace.


Ok, this is getting worrisome. Really worrisome

I like to minimize politics here, as multiple other sites do it way better, but this just has to be spread around.

There's this journalist, David Seaman, who published a story on Huffington Post that questioned Hillary's health, and in the article linked to a video that purported to summarize the issues we know about and speculate somewhat based on that.

For that, in true secret police fashion, Huffpo pulled the article late Sunday night, and made a strong attempt to remove it all from the internet, so no one else can find it.

No warning was given to the author, Mr. Seaman, who found out when it went off line.  He's creeped out, and posted this video about it.  It is chilling indeed to hear him suggest that harm might come to him, and to know that if there is an accident, it's not an accident.  Sounds like what's happening in Russia right now, right?  At least he hasn't been shot on his birthday like Putin's political enemies.  Yet.



Here is the Paul Joseph Watson video he linked to:



Then there's Dr. Drew Pinsky, whose show was abruptly cancelled after he strongly questioned the narrative on Hillary's health.  Add in his Twitter account as well.  Silence, you Kulak!



Ever see an election like this before?  I haven't.

As one of the commenters noted, if his Uber car comes and it's an older Crown Vic with tinted windows, don't get in!

Hat tip: American Digest


Sunday, August 28, 2016

Mondays, they're like that


Lesson learned: Don't feed the trolls.

Remember that gorilla that the Cincinnati Zoo had to shoot when a little boy got away from his mom and jumped into the enclosure with him?  Apparently this incident spawned a runaway internet meme contest based on the gorilla's name and this incident.

I wasn't all that aware of the meme fun, but the zoo folk were not amused.  So not amused that they said as much and asked the internet to stop it.  Naturally, this was like throwing red meat to a hungry lion, or gorilla, if you will.

“We are not amused by the memes, petitions and signs about Harambe,” Thane Maynard, the zoo’s director, said in an email to The Associated Press this week. “Our zoo family is still healing, and the constant mention of Harambe makes moving forward more difficult for us.”
For example, replying to a Twitter post about zebras and their unique stripes, one user wrote: “U had a unique way of killing Harambe.”
On a post celebrating Elephant Day, another wrote: “Harambe loved elephants.”
Mr. Maynard’s words of protest seemed only to make things worse. His Twitter account was hacked with pro-Harambe messages. 

Well, I looked around the internet and found a few of the memes that so annoyed the zoo, and there are some howlers.  Behold, and enjoy:






Lucky shot


Memories


Another bucket list item - fishing for barn door halibut in Alaska.

Just look at those filets!  Man alive!




The Rope Trick



Via Maggie's Farm

Other tricks: Magic: The Complete Course

Now that's an awesome sport I had never heard of before.



Hat tip: Lloyd Kahn

One of Jupiter's moons, Europa, photographed in front of the great red spot.


Saturday, August 27, 2016

American Artillery is Pounding Islamic State in Iraq and Syria - U.S. troops are prepping the battlefield around Mosul

No boots on the ground?


Note the name of this gun.

When Islamic State swept into Iraq in the summer of 2014, militant fighters seized a great deal of equipment from the Iraqi army garrison in Mosul. Between equipment seized from Syrian and Iraqi troops, the group had amassed a large arsenal.
As an air-defense-artillery unit, the Dragon Slayers specialize in counter-rocket, counter-artillery and counter-mortar operations. Their job is to help keep friendly bases and units safe from enemy strikes — something Bravo Battery had been doing in Afghanistan just a year prior.
Much of the news on the America war effort in Iraq and Syria has centered on Special Operations Forces and air strikes. But conventional artillery troops on the ground — providing indirect fire support to Iraqi forces and protecting coalition installations — have also played a huge role in the slow-boiling war against Islamic State.



A bit too close for comfort - Glacier National Park



Wings of the Hughes H-4 Hercules, known as the “Spruce Goose,” are moved from Hughes’ Culver City plant to Long Beach at the pace of two miles per hour .


Getting away with the best piece.


Need to mount something like this on the deck - for repelling boarders, don't you know!


Interesting trailer for Terrence Malik's Voyage of Time movie.

The Slovak National Highway Company released this video of dramatic tunnel crashes, and put a cool soundtrack to it as well.

Dude eats world's spiciest noodles - immediately regrets it.



Satan's Blood Hot Sauce, 1.35 Ounce

Hot Sauce, Gift Set, Blair's Mini Death Hot Sauce 4-Pack 2.oz Bottles

Take it from me, Yucateco is good stuff.

El Yucateco Variety 7-Pack

A lot of folk today could learn from this.


About right for today


Although I've got to install one of those "fence energizers" to keep the dog in the yard today, so I won't be completely unproductive.  It's the last resort to prevent our canine escape artist, Rascal, from roaming and annoying the neighbors.

As seen in LA (note the reflections of palm trees in the window).