that other guy’s thoughts

Got another raise today, hoo-rah.

For some reason I went off about when the new guy mentioned that the engineers at Cessna don’t have a union. I mean I really gave the institution of organized labor both barrels; comparing them to a sorority and everything. Not really sure why I flew off the handle, but it felt a little awkward to me afterwards.

Also, 6 to 5 and pick ‘em the new guy putts from the rough. Just an observation.

Got another raise today, hoo-rah.

For some reason I went off about when the new guy mentioned that the engineers at Cessna don’t have a union. I mean I really gave the institution of organized labor both barrels; comparing them to a sorority and everything. Not really sure why I flew off the handle, but it felt a little awkward to me afterwards.

Also, 6 to 5 and pick ‘em the new guy putts from the rough. Just an observation.

Quoting the great scientific source of Yahoo Finance:

As strange as that sounds–push the “Up” button, climb in, and soar off into weightless bliss–don’t be surprised if it happens. The space elevator is where the PC was in the 1960s: The theory is solid, the materials exist, and people in garages are starting to tinker with the next step.

The space elevator is NOT where the PC was in the 1960’s. It’s where the PC was in the 1860’s. And no, the materials DON’T exist. The longest carbon nano-tube ever produced was 4 cm long and the strongest nano-tube ever demonstrated had a tensile strength of 63 GPa. And those were made in absolute ideal conditions.

Right now the nano-tubes have to be grown in the lab and it’s expensive. The world-wide production right now is in the neighborhood of 100 pounds per day. At this rate it would take 109-years to make enough to complete the tether. At current costs, it would also cost around 217 trillion dollars for the material. But none of that even matters.

What nobody seems to have the answer for is the damage that meteorites, micrometeorites, solar flares, and radiation belts will absolutely cause. Your god-sent material turns into a pile of pencil lead when even one single atom of the structure gets dislodge. Radiated particles from sun playing demolition derby with your beautifully efficient carbon-carbon bonds and rocks the size of pin heads traveling at thousands of miles-per-hour does not a pleasant environment make.

It’s a novel idea and I think it will eventually happen, hopefully in my lifetime, but we need a few more breakthroughs. Comparing the development of a multi-trillion dollar structure thousands of times larger and more ambitious than anything on the planet to a box of melted sand is just ignorant.

Quoting the great scientific source of Yahoo Finance:

As strange as that sounds–push the “Up” button, climb in, and soar off into weightless bliss–don’t be surprised if it happens. The space elevator is where the PC was in the 1960s: The theory is solid, the materials exist, and people in garages are starting to tinker with the next step.

The space elevator is NOT where the PC was in the 1960’s. It’s where the PC was in the 1860’s. And no, the materials DON’ exist. The longest carbon nano-tube ever produced was 4 cm long and the strongest nano-tube ever demonstrated had a tensile strength of 63 GPa. And those were made in absolute ideal conditions.

Right now the nano-tubes have to be grown in the lab and it’s expensive. The world-wide production right now is in the neighborhood of 100 pounds per day. At this rate it would take 109-years to make enough to complete the tether. At current costs, it would also cost around 217 trillion dollars for the material. But none of that even matters.

What nobody seems to have the answer for is the damage that meteorites, micrometeorites, solar flares, and radiation belts will absolutely cause. Your god-sent material turns into a pile of pencil lead when even one single atom of the structure gets dislodged. Radiated particles from sun playing demolition derby with your beautifully efficient carbon-carbon bonds and rocks the size of pin heads traveling at thousands of miles-per-hour does not a pleasant environment make.

It’s a novel idea and I think it will eventually happen, hopefully in my lifetime, but we need a few more breakthroughs. Comparing the development of a multi-trillion dollar structure thousands of times larger and more ambitious than anything on the planet to a box of melted sand is just ignorant.

Today I took the new guy out for some rounds on the shop floor and aside from having never trained anyone at anything before it seemed to go alright. Except for one small problem: the guy is probably 5 years older than me.

Want to know how awkward it is to train someone older than you are to do your job? It’s just slightly more awkward than the word “awkward” looks.

Well we’re movin on up,
To the east side.
To a deluxe apartment in the sky.
Movin on up
To the east side.
We finally got a piece of the pie.

Fish don’t fry in the kitchen;
Beans don’t burn on the grill.
Took a whole lotta tryin’
Just to get up that hill.
Now we’re up in the big leagues
Gettin’ our turn at bat.
As long as we live, it’s you and me baby
There ain’t nothin wrong with that.

Well we’re movin on up,
To the east side.
To a deluxe apartment in the sky.
Movin on up
To the east side.
We finally got a piece of the pie.

-The Jefferson’s Theme Song

I spent a good portion of the day moving from one office to another at work. We get a new guy on 2nd shift on Wednesday and thus needed a bigger office. The engineers were forced to move our own things because of ineptitude of others. Grievances will probably be filed with the union.

Me: Who the hell is knocking on my door at 8:30 pm on a Saturday?

*opens door*

Random Door-to-Door Salesman: Hi, I’m with EZ Choice meats. Do you enjoy good beef and pork steaks?

Me: No

Salesmen: Oh, so you prefer Poultry or fresh Seafood?

Me: The wife and I are actually level 6 Vegans.

Salesmen: So you’re vegetarians?

Me: Meat is Murder.

Salesmen: okay, thank you for your time.

Me *while closing door*: …sweet, delicious, and beautifully tasty murder.

I’m crying on the inside.

If you insist on referencing serious mathematical constructs in your lyrics. Please surround them with something less crappy than:

Uh oh, here we go
turn off the radio
come on everybody
to the nth degree.

It sounds like it was written by a two-years old boy.

After messing around with alternate blogging software, I’ve decided to make the change to WordPress. I have however run into a small snag.

I’ve dealt with the scourge of comment spam ever since moving to movable type. That’s why commenting gets disabled 1 month from the post date. Its was a pain to set up, but I’ve got a workable solution. What I didn’t have a workable solution for was Trackback Ping spam. I never really cared up till now, because I don’t use or display the pings anywhere.

Now, it’s a giant pain in the ass. nearly all the entries have 200-400 track back pings tied to them, which is making my webserver crap itself when I try to export the entries over to the new system. It’ll take a little while to figure it out, but a new look is coming.