dispatches from TJICistan

NASA is going to send a probe to with in 4 million miles of the Sun’s surface.

More NASA information here.

The Earth orbits at about 100 million miles above the Sun’s surface.

…so the probe is going to close 96% of the distance.

That’s pretty awesome.

Wikipedia link.

Now, one thing that’s a bit hard to wrap one’s head around is that “falling into the sun” (or, if you’re in earth orbit, “falling down to Earth”, is a lot of hard work. If you’re not used to thinking about orbits (or even if you are), you might be inclined to think “OK, I’m already pretty close, and the gravity wants to pull me in …so I just have to let it.

The thing is, though, you’re not just looking at a 2-D or 3-D space; you’re looking at a 4-D (or, arguably, 6-D) state space, where your velocity vector is as important as your location.

…and in this state space, your orbital velocity, which is sufficient to keep you from falling into the center mass, is a huge deal.

It’s easier to get from the Earth to Jupiter’s orbit than it is to get from the Earth to the sun. To get to Jupiter’s orbit, you merely (“merely”) achieve escape velocity from Earth, and then drift at 1 mile per hour out to Jupiter.

To get from the Earth to the Sun, you have to kill all of your forward orbital velocity.

“Good enough” isn’t good enough. Kill just some of it, and you fall in to a somewhat lower orbit … but an orbit none-the-less.

How fast is the Earth moving with regard to the sun?

If you remember your They Might Be Giants and recall that we’re 8 light minutes from the sun, and you also remember that a year has ~ 365 days, you can do the math yourself (c=2πr, etc.). The answer – I recall from the last time I worked it out – is something like Mach 90. Looking it up … yup ~30 km/s.

That’s three times the escape velocity out of Earth’s gravity well.

So, let’s talk about brute forcing it.

Think about a giant multi-stage stack booster that gets an Apollo mission out of Earth’s well.

…and now realize that you’ve now got that payload in solar orbit.

You now have to accelerate to Mach 90.

That’s a lot of work, and you’re using a huge percent of your solar-orbit payload for fuel and rockets.

…which stinks.

So, what’s the smart solution?

Early conceptual designs for the Solar Probe mission used a gravity assist maneuver at Jupiter to cancel the orbital angular momentum of the probe launched from Earth, in order to drop onto a trajectory close to the sun. The Solar Probe + mission design simplifies this trajectory by using multiple gravity assists at Venus

Cool.

My previous musings on gravity assist maneuvers.

My review of the movie Sunshine.

http://booksbikesboomsticks.blogspot.com…

I have successfully leveled up in Mall Ninja…

For what it’s worth, my tactical pants in the class were by Wrangler, and they come with two single 30-rd mag pouches, one right over each butt cheek. I can about guarantee that, should the balloon ever go up for real, those will be the pants in which I’ll be fighting,

Plus a bonus Blade Runner reference in the subject line.

http://www.boston.com/news/local/massach…

School official loses job after marrying partner

Christine Judd, who served as dean of students and athletic director at Cathedral High School, tells The Republican newspaper that she met with school officials on Wednesday and was given the choice of resigning or getting fired.

Judd said she was “hurt,” and is exploring her legal options. Although gay marriage is legal in Massachusetts, it is against church policy.

Geez, if the government allows this policy in a private group to stand, next we’ll see outrages like the NAACP firing a CFO or Vice President every time one of them writes and publishes a book called “N***er Go Home: a White Separatist Manifesto”.

Clearly the State should stop private ideological organizations from discriminating on basis of belief or behavior!

http://tjic.com/?p=16476&cpage=1#comment…

One reason we don’t see that many middle-aged Jewish Republicans is that many American Jews who voted Republican at 20 are voting Likud at 40.

Hah!

Spun off from an earlier thread:

http://www.amazon.com/dp/

Estwing Mfg Co. E3-28SM Framing Hammer, Metal Handle

5.0 out of 5 stars

By Travisji Corcoran “anarcho-capitalist” (Arlington, MA USA)

I’ve used this hammer for years, to do everything from building a new addition on my house to demo-ing a bunch of old plaster.

Plus, it’s the hammer used to bludgeon someone to death by the Trinity Killer in Season Three of ‘Dexter’ (available from Amazon on DVD!), so that’s a third use to which it can be put. Good to know!

I don’t agree with everything that The Last Psychiatrist says, but I always find his posts interesting. This one has a huge potpourri of different topics, all of them covered in fascinating ways.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/02/fashio…

WHEN cosmetics began disappearing from her bathroom drawer a few years ago, Gretchen Bain, who lives in Merchantville, N.J., knew the culprit.

Her husband, Jarrod.

It turned out that Mr. Bain, 34, a Customs and border-protection officer who is 6-foot-3 and weighs 240 pounds — and whose uniform includes a 9-millimeter handgun — had developed a fondness for his wife’s under-eye concealer, which hid his occasional dark circles. He was also swiping her face lotions and mud masks.

“At one point I just started buying stuff for him because I don’t want him stealing mine,” Ms. Bain said. Now she orders products online for him at Menaji.com, which bills itself as a “masculine” and “undetectable” line of cosmetics and skin-care products.

His favorites are an eye gel and stick concealer that target dark circles, and an anti-shine powder that comes (shhh!) in a compact.

I try to limit my skin-care products to “soap” and “forge dirt”.

P    ified government employees apparently have a different regimen.

At 4Voo, a seven-year-old Canadian company, sales have tripled over the last four years, according to Marek Hewryk, the founder. Its products — all targeted to men — include a lipstick-shaped concealer called Confidence Corrector ($34); a Lash and Brow Styling Glaze, applied with a mascara wand ($23); and even an eyeliner ($19).

OK, as a good live-and-let-live libertarian, it’s wrong of me to feel this way.

…but I really want to go get a hunk of iron pipe and go correct a few attitudes.

some men are not even self-conscious about using them. Jeffrey Lederer, 63, a principal in several investment partnerships and a former Wall Street trader, openly applies Menaji products — including a Bronze Star facial bronzing gel, concealer and anti-shine powder — after his workouts at a private Manhattan club.

“People are reticent to ask what they are, even though I think they’re interested,” Mr. Lederer said. “It does take a certain amount of self-confidence to use it in public.”

Ahh, now I get it.

It’s a counter-signalling aid. You have to be manly enough to not give a      about how folks perceive you…which demonstrates just how bad-ass you really are.

So, I guess I fail. I’m not as manly as this Wall Street trader and his purse full of makeup.

Or…wait.

Am I allowed to claim counter-counter-counter signalling, or something?

http://www.boston.com/business/ticker/20…

Rosengren urges holistic approach to foreclosures

Federal and state policy makers should take a broader approach to the foreclosure crisis, not only adopting measures to prevent foreclosures and stabilize housing, but also providing aid to help the hardest hit communities address underlying social and economic issues, said Eric Rosengren, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.

Huh.

Holistic.

This contrasts strongly with the homeopathic approach to bailouts that the Feds have taken, where they dilute the worthless stock of General Motors with with $50 billion (diluting it at about 50 billion : 1), then diluting it again and again.

I guess the theory is that a good ~ 12X dilution will reverse the initially toxic nature of General Motors business / welfare / union model and create a new auto industry that is profitable and ‘on the move’.

Woodworking tools are sold to two demographics: small shops building high end custom furniture, and upper middle class white guys collecting tools in their workshops.

Both sectors are doing poorly in this climate.

Bridge City Tools reports on the white line nightmare:

http://www.bridgecitytools.com/blog/2010…

Just wrapped up exhibiting at the 2010 IWF show at the World Congress Center in Atlanta.

I have been coming to this show since 1984…

This show could never be completely walked in two days, and there was always something to learn.

This years show however is a different story.

First, the square footage of exhibition space was down over 60% from 2008. YIKES!

Second, attendance was dismal…

In 2008 there was a company (which shall remain unnamed) that did $78.8 million in annual revenues. This year they will not break 8 million.

I spoke with a small business that sold power equipment–in 2008 they did $8.2 million. The first six months of 2010 their sales were $420K.

A REALLY BIG company that I will not name, and I know you know their products, is down 92% from 2008. Ouch. And from what I can triangulate, a significant percentage of the attendees were at the show looking for…jobs…

Ouch.

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/MeganMcar…

The chart at left, for example, shows by size the percentage of schools in North Carolina which were ever ranked in the top 25 of schools for performance. Notice that nearly 30% of the smallest decile (10%) of schools were in the top 25 at some point during 1997-2000 but only 1.2% of the schools in the largest decile ever made the top 25…

Wait! Wait! Wait! Wait!

Oh…OK. Megan did catch the error…and, in fact, that was the entire point of her post.

(

The error is obvious to anyone who’s spent some of their misbegotten youth around polyhedral dice – on a single roll, which is more likely to have the highest possible value? 1d6, or 100d6?

1d6 will hit the highest possible value (a six) 1 time out of 6, or 16% of the time.

100d6 will hit the highest possible value (600) 1 time out of 6¹⁰⁰, or 0.00000000000000000000000000000000000000000
0000000000000000000000000000000000147% of the time.

)

OK, carry on.

http://volokh.com/2010/09/01/obama-impor…

The Obama administration approved the sale of the American-made rifles last year. But it reversed course and banned the sale in March – a decision that went largely unnoticed at the time but that is now sparking opposition from gun rights advocates.

A State Department spokesman said the administration’s decision was based on concerns that the guns could fall into the wrong hands.

“The transfer of such a large number of weapons — 87,310 M1 Garands and 770,160 M1 Carbines — could potentially be exploited by individuals seeking firearms for illicit purposes,” the spokesman told FoxNews.com.

“We are working closely with our Korean allies and the U.S. Army in exploring alternative options to dispose of these firearms.”

We certainly wouldn’t want the epidemic of violence that would inevitably flow from high school kids hiding 10 pound, 4 foot long, wood-stocked rifles in their back packs.

Those easy-to-conceal dimensions, plus the easy reloading, high-capacity 8-round clips that you can jam into the rifle, one after the next after the next, with only a few weeks of practice aligning the clips into the open action, pushing them down, and getting your thumb out of the way before the bolt smashes forward, threaten to destroy society entirely.

The crappy finish on the wood, the iron sights and 50 year old canvas slings just make these weapons even more deadly.

http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Hyperbole…

You are going to have to talk about soybeans. A lot. And you are going to have to pretend that you like it.

You know, from time to time I’ve said something like

“I apologize, but I really can’t understand what you’re talking about and – to be honest – even if I could follow, I don’t care. I’m sorry.”

Doing this definitely winnows down the number of people who are social acquaintances … but it also spares one from endless piles of nonsense.

Speaking of framing hammers, I was amused that in the third season of the TV show Dexter, a framing hammer is used as a murder weapon , and the brand must be determined forensically to track the killer.

…and it’s an Acme brand hammer, or somesuch.

…except anyone who’s actually swung a framing hammer can tell that it’s a 28 ounce Estwing, right down to the signature blue-green moulded on vinyl handle.

The prop guys did place a nice little Acme sticker over the logo, though, so there’s that.

Also, the Trinity Killer was using a Stanley flatbed jack plane when he was making a coffin in his garage, but there were only two frames where the logo was visible, so I can’t tell the year or other details about it.

I can’t say that I much care for making a coffin out of a recently downed tree – you’ve got to let that stuff season for a year or two first, or you’re going to get all sorts of distortion and wracking.

I wanted to hit myself in the head with a framing hammer, but I can’t find mine, so instead I read this New York Times article about fashion and the San Francisco scene.

ARGH.

I will note that it reminded me a lot of the one ecotopian book in Kim Stanley Robinson’s Three California’s Trilogy. Pacific Edge, I think it was? Anyway, in that one there’s a character from back east, where they’re all cynical and wear black clothing and don’t get the importance of destroying the technological infrastructure and smoking pot all the time (man!).

…and that interaction of worldly sophisticate idiot from back east and California ab initio “creating our own new world … with rock climbing” idiot from out West was strongly triggered by reading this article.

See also, of course, Callenbach’s seminal Ecotopia..

(….man!)

http://www.boston.com/news/local/massach…

Governor Deval Patrick declined to say yesterday whether he would implement a tax rollback if the voters mandate it in November, pitting him against all three of his campaign rivals, who say they would abide by the referendum.

The MA Democrats illegally ignored the last referendum that rolled back taxes.

Of course they’ll ignore another such referendum.

This is why we should stop voting, and start shooting politicians.

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articl…

SALT LAKE CITY — The Mormon church says it has changed its genealogical database to better prevent the names of Jews killed in Nazi concentration camps from being submitted for posthumous baptism by proxy.

I tend to fall on the Jewish and the Israeli side of just about every debate, but I think that the Jews (or, rather, that small subset of them that’s getting riled up in this issue) are being silly.

To be upset that Mormons are “retroactively baptising” people is to admit the legitimacy of their behaviors.

If a bunch of Moonies told me that they had telepathically aligned my Chakras, I would not get upset, go to a doctor, and ask for a MRI to make sure that nothing had been moved out of position.

If a bunch of Scientologists told me that they’d cleared me of body thetans, I would not ask for my thetans back.

…and if I learned that a fifth cousin on mine lived in Utah, and had immersed himself in a dunking pool to “turn my great great great great grandfather’s soul Mormon”, I would not get upset.

I regard all three of the above behaviors as basically nothing but writing fan-fic.

“Oooh, in this one, old Sheamus Corcoran of a small village just west of Tipperay … becomes Mormon by the power of prayer and time travel”.

Any response other than “whatever” sounds like it needs the same lecture I got from mom in first grade “Ignore those jerk kids. What they say can’t hurt you.”

http://www.aolnews.com/nation/article/dr…

BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (Aug. 31) — A doctor involved in an “on-again, off-again” relationship apparently tried to force her way into her boyfriend’s home by sliding down the chimney, police said Tuesday. Her decomposing body was found there three days later.

Dr. J___ K______, 49, first tried to get into the house with a shovel, then climbed a ladder to the roof last Wednesday night, removed the chimney cap and slid feet first down the flue, Bakersfield police Sgt. Mary DeGeare said.

While she was trying to break in, the man she was pursuing escaped unnoticed from another exit “to avoid a confrontation,” authorities said…

For a second, I was about to say “Well, as weird/creepy as that is, you’ve got to admit that there’s something flattering about having a crazy woman 10 years your junior who’s infatuated with you and just will not take a hint”.

…then I remembered Voldemort a woman I dated a while back.

…and I recalled that – no, it’s pretty much entirely horrible.

Yesterday, 10:40 pm, I blogged about two comments in The Atlantic (‘Oedipus didn’t have to sleep with his mother, he just got a ‘Strengthening Our Communities by Strengthening Our Families’ grant from HHS to do it.’), and used the subject line “Comment of the day over at The Atlantic”.

Today at 11:25 am, Megan McCardle blogged the same two comments, with the subject line “Comment of the day”.

I’ve got just one thing to say, Megan: glad you’re reading my blog!

Oh, OK, two things: if you’re prepared to admit that this whole “getting married” thing was just a sham to make me jealous, and if you apologize, it’s not too late for us.

…that I should refer to myself as a “hemp activist“.

Current progress on 2010 goals:

• write a novel: one page per day – 0 pages done; goal scrapped
• lathe: one item per Saturday and Sunday – goal back from the dead; will resume turning this weekend!
• learn guitar – 8 months of lessons. Know dozens of scales, dozens of songs. Lessons prepaid for through 31 December.
• corporate debt by $100k – more than complete: down by $150k; house mortgage paid off as well
• start brand 3 – robot is mostly built; ecommerce website selling robot is mostly built
• remodel the bathroom – replaced with “remodel master bedroom” – gutted, supplies on order
• Lose 50 lbs – got 21 lbs down; relapsed and gained 6; back on the plan 2 weeks ago, lost those 6. Hoo-ah!

Onward!