Six Words

Attribution: xkcd

Six words that you never say at NASA.

Dear Reader (if any), you are probably wondering why I'm making a big deal of this.  Since the embedded image above doesn't show what happens when you mouse over the image, here it is again as a screenshot:

This is the equivalent of being nominated, or actually winning, a Nerd Oscar.

Eat your heart out, Sheldon Cooper!

Pizza on the Moon?

"It all started when I found the green meteorite." 

Seriously, this post idea started about 2 weeks ago after reading a thread on Orbiter Forum. It was started by Bloodworth, and discussed food franchises on the Moon - specifically, "on our lunar bases."  I was flattered to see, "Niven's Nachos", on the list.  Not quite so with his entry for "Jules Verne Vegan Cafe".  For you, Dear Reader (if any), not in the "know", Lunar Base Niven resides in the lunar far side crater of Jules Verne.

What really intrigued me was Pipcard's entry.  After viewing the commercial for Domino's Pizza, Japan, and doing a little background research,  I thought I'd add to this Internet meme (however old and/or short lived it may be).  I think that it is a mere publicity stunt in reaction to Pizza Hut's first delivery to the International Space Station.  Estimates for this project are $21 billion...their pizza just isn't that good!




I was struck by the similarities between the artist's conception and my own add-on (yes, another opportunity for shameless self-promotion).  Dome shaped with solar panels in the background.  Turn about is fair play...

So, the following is my first public exhibition of my mesh/texture creation with Wings 3D:

Finally, after adding this mesh into Niven.cfg:

(Click on images to enlarge)

THIS ISN'T an update to my add-on, BTW.   Above view is looking roughly south from the base.

Up Goer Five

Credit to http://xkcd.com/1133/:

Best Moon Landing Hoax Burn

I personally think that Neil Degrasse Tyson is a pompous ass, especially since Pluto's demotion from planet status.  But if the attribution in the cartoon's first frame is accurate, I may change my mind...

Kudos and credit to http://xkcd.com/1074/

377 words

I really hope this post pisses off the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), dear reader (if any).  The following is a list of words and/or phrases that DHS monitors for usage on the Internet.  I assume that NSA either does that for them and/or for their own "uses".

I figure this blog entry will get noticed.  For convenience's sake, I alphabetized it.

2600, Abu Sayyaf, Afghanistan, Agent, Agriculture, Agro, Aid, Air Marshal, Airplane (and derivatives), Airport, Al Qaeda (all spellings), Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms (ATF), Al-Shabaab, Ammonium nitrate, AMTRAK, Anthrax, Antiviral, AQAP (AL Qaeda Arabian Peninsula), AQIM (Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb), Arellano-Felix, Artistic Assassins, Assassination, Attack, Attack, Authorities, Avalanche, Avian, Bacteria, Barrio Azteca, BART, Basque Separatists, Beltran-Leyva, Biological, Biological infection (or event), Biological weapon, Black out, Blister agent, Blizzard, Body scanner, Bomb (squad or threat), Border, Border Patrol, Botnet, Breach, Bridge, Brown out, Brown out, Brush fire, Brute forcing, Burn, Burst, Bust, Cain and abel, Calderon, Cancelled, Car bomb, Cartel, Cartel de Golfo, Center for Disease Control (CDC), Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), Chemical, Chemical agent, Chemical burn, Chemical fire, Chemical spill, Chemical weapon, China, CIKR (Critical Infrastructure & Key Resources), Ciudad Juarez, Closure, Cloud, Coast Guard (USCG), Cocaine, Collapse, Colombia, Communications infrastructure, Computer infrastructure, Conficker, Consular, Contamination, Conventional weapon, Cops, Crash, Crest, Critical infrastructure, Customs and Border Protection (CBP), Cyber attack, Cyber Command, Cyber security, Cyber terror, DDOS (dedicated denial of service), Deaths, Decapitated, Delays, Denial of service, Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Dirty bomb, Dirty bomb, Disaster, Disaster assistance, Disaster management, Disaster medical assistance team (DMAT), DNDO (Domestic Nuclear Detection Office), Dock, Domestic nuclear detection, Domestic security, Drill, Drug, Drug Administration (FDA), Drug cartel, Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA), Drug trade, Drug war, E. Coli, Earthquake, Ebola, Eco terrorism, El Paso, Electric, Emergency, Emergency, Emergency Broadcast System, Emergency management, Emergency response, Enriched, Environmental terrorist, Epidemic, Epidemic, Erosion, ETA (Euskadi ta Askatasuna), Evacuation, Evacuation, Execution, Exercise, Explosion (explosive), Exposure, Exposure, Extreme weather, Extremism, Facility, Failure or outage, FARC (Armed Revolutionary Forces Colombia), Federal Air Marshal Service (FAMS), Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), First responder, Flood, Flu, Food Poisoning, Foot and Mouth (FMD), Forest fire, Fort Hancock, Fundamentalism, Fusion Center, Gang, Gangs, Gas, Grid, Gulf Cartel, Gunfight, Guzman, H1N1, H5N1, Hacker, Hail, Hamas, Hazardous, Hazardous material incident, Hazmat, Help, Heroin, Hezbollah, Home grown, Homeland Defense, Homeland security, Hostage, Human to Animal, Human to human, Hurricane, Ice, IED (Improvised Explosive Device), Illegal immigrants, Immigration Customs Enforcement (ICE), Improvised explosive device, Incident, Industrial spill, Infection, Infection, Influenza, Infrastructure security, Interstate, IRA (Irish Republican Army), Iran, Iraq, Islamist, Jihad, Juarez, Keylogger, Kidnap, La Familia, Landing, Law enforcement, Leak, Lightening, Listeria, Lockdown, Looting, Los Zetas, Magnitude, Malware, Mara salvatrucha, Marijuana, Maritime domain awareness (MDA), MARTA, Matamoros, Meth Lab, Methamphetamine, Metro, Mexican army, Mexicles, Mexico, Michoacana, Militia Shooting, Mitigation, MS13 or MS-13, Mud slide or Mudslide, Mutation, Mysql injection, Narco banners (Spanish equivalents), Narcos, Narcotics, National Guard, National infrastructure, National laboratory, National Operations Center (NOC), National preparedness, National preparedness initiative, National security, Nationalist, NBIC (National Biosurveillance Integration Center), Nerve agent, New Federation, Nigeria, Nogales, North Korea, Norvo Virus, Nuclear, Nuclear, Nuclear facility, Nuclear threat, Nuevo Leon, Organized crime, Outbreak, Pakistan, Pandemic, Phishing, Phreaking, Pipe bomb, Pirates, Plague, PLF (Palestine Liberation Front), PLO (Palestine Liberation Organization, Plot, Plume, Police, Pork, Port, Port Authority, Powder (white), Power, Power lines, Power outage, Prevention, Public Health, Quarantine, Radiation, Radicals, Radioactive, Recall, Recovery, Recruitment, Red Cross, Relief, Resistant, Response, Reynosa, Reyosa, Ricin, Riot, Rootkit, Salmonella, San Diego, Sarin, Scammers, Screening, Secret Service (USSS), Secure Border Initiative (SBI), Security, Service disruption, Shelter-in-place, Shootout, Shots fired, Sick, Sinaloa, Sleet, Small Pox, Smart, Smuggling (smugglers), Snow, Social media, Somalia, Sonora, Southwest, Spammer, Spillover, Standoff, State of emergency, Storm, Strain, Stranded/Stuck, Subway, Suicide attack, Suicide bomber, Suspicious package/device, Suspicious substance, SWAT, Swine, Symptoms, Taliban, Tamaulipas, Tamiflu, Tamil Tigers, Target, Task Force, Telecommunications, Temblor, Terror, Terror Tuberculosis (TB), Terrorism, Threat, Tijuana, Tornado, Torreon, Toxic, Toxic Agro, Trafficking, Transportation security, Transportation Security Administration (TSA), Tremor, Trojan, Tsunami, Tsunami Warning Center, TTP (Tehrik-i-Taliban Pakistan), Tucson, Twister, Typhoon, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (CIS), U.S. Consulate, United Nations (UN), Vaccine, Violence, Viral Hemorrhagic Fever, Virus, Virus, Warning, Watch, Water/air borne, Wave, Weapons cache, Weapons grade, Wildfire, WMATA, World Health Organization (WHO) (and components), Worm, Yemen, Yuma

Mos Eisley Brevity

I'll get right to the point:

Against Organized Religion

Credit to Dan Lietha:

A BYU question.

What is missing from the following photos? (not the question...see below)

(The last photo is reminiscent of the phrase, "Arbeit macht frei", BTW)

(Alternately, "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here")

 Where's the question mark?

I created a "Piece of Flair" on Facebook some years ago, answering my inner need to see those 2 symbols together:

As one can plainly see, this hasn't been too popular.

However, this one has had more success.

Lunar Base Niven v.3.0 FIXED!

I released ver. 3.0 knowing it had a flashing issue with the animated vessels.  I searched both the old M6 forum and the current Orbiter-Forum for solutions and came up with nothing.  I figured that not only would I get smart a$$ comments (here and here) but I would also get helpful suggestions (here and here).

From the 1st suggestion posted by Loru (change COG to >0), I was able to quickly find that it also needed the landing points changed in the original Spacecraft3 config file...as suggested by woo482.  As I was running out of time yesterday morning and had to leave for work, I did manage to get the issue resolved but yet not upload said changes until this morning.  A quick recompile via the DLL converter and changing the documentation and the zip file...and an update on the "Hangar".

Being indebted to both Loru and woo482, my humble and small thanks was to include them in the credits.

Reinforcing my comments about disco, I offer the following chorus from April Wine's, Wanna Rock, originally released on the album, Nature of the Beast:

Don't waste my money driving 'round in a car
Save my money for electric guitars
Disco music's just a social disease
If it don't rock me, then it ain't gonna please me

I flatly refuse to boogie till I puke!  I'll puke FIRST!

Here's the song on YouTube:



Better a smart a$$ than a dumb a$$!

Urban Dictionary: SCE to AUX

From Urban Dictionary:

Narrowly averting a catastrophe by coming up with an ingenious plan. From the Apollo 12 moon mission. The ship was struck by lighting on liftoff and its electronic systems went out of whack. A Flight controller named John Aaron told the flight director to have them switch "SCE to AUX". This fixed the problem and saved Apollo 12 from being aborted.

         "I thought you were going to fail that test?"
         "I stole the test and got an A"
         "Way to switch the SCE to AUX!"

"So I hear your girlfriend caught you cheating" "Yeah but she didn't break up with me" "How did you manage that?" "I switched the SCE to AUX"

 Hat tip to jedimaster1214 for posting this on O-F.

On a personal note, I REALLY need to look for that switch on ATMs.

EDIT: As of 6/25/2012, I haven't located this switch on any ATM, however, I did find it in an Orbiter add-on (NASSP).  I took screen shots and cropped them:

Found on Panel 3, centerline, near the bottom edge.

How to Simulate Submarine Life at Home

The following list was compiled by me and my shipmates aboard USS Flasher (SSN-613) in the late '80s.  This will explain some of the outdated references.

NOTE: Since this is a simulation...SCREEN DOORS ARE OPTIONAL.  Had to get this reference in before a friend points out the lack of mention.

For a MS Word document copy, download here.

How to Simulate Submarine Life at Home

1.  Surround yourself with a lot of people you don't like.

2.  Close all windows and doors tightly and close all curtains.

3.  Seal any openings to the outside world with a suitable vault door.

4.  Unplug all radios and TV's to cut yourself off completely from news, football games, Saturday Night Live, Married with Children, etc.

5.  Hourly, monitor all home appliances operation.  If not in use - log as "secured".

6.  If using the bathroom, don't not flush the toilet for the first 2 days to recreate the smell of blowing sanitary tanks and venting them inboard.

7.  Wear only approved coveralls or a proper Navy uniform.  No hats or special T-shirts, etc.

8.  Cut your own hair once a week, ensuring you make it look like hell.

9.  Work in 18 hour day intervals to really confuse your body's circadian rhythms.

10. Listen to the same cassette (or CD) over and over again until you can't stand it anymore.  Then put in one you can't listen to without nausea setting in.

11. Set your alarm to go off just as you fall asleep - with the alarm set LOUD.  Better yet, buy an alarm with special settings (e.g. battle stations, fire, flooding in the basement).

12. Prepare food with a blindfold on to simulate what real submarine cooks do.  Then try to get your dog to eat it.  Afterwards, break out a can of tuna and/or peanut butter.

13. Cut your bed in half and enclose all but one side using the dimensions of a small coffin as a reference.  When not in it, make up the bed properly so no one will see or care.  For an added touch of realism, have 3 people taking turns sleeping in the bed, one of whom is in two section "appliance" watch.

14. Periodically for excitement:

            a. Open the main power breaker and run around yelling "Reactor SCRAM" until you are sweating profusely - then restore power.

            b. Buy yourself a snorkel and mask and put it on and pretend you are in a smoke filled room with no way out.  For variety, hook up a garden hose and pressurize it.

15. To enable yourself to handle anything, constantly study wiring diagrams and operation instructions for various home appliances.  For no reason at all at specific intervals tear one apart just in case it was going to break.

16. Paint everything around you gray.  Navy gray - no substitutions - or else off white.

17. To be sure you are living in a clean and happy environment, every Saturday night set your alarm on LOUD for a short but hated drill sound, then get up.  Manned only with a bucket and sponge, clean one area over and over again even if it was already spotless.  Then make out a discrepancy list.

18. Once a day after normal programming hours, plug in the TV and watch one movie being careful that it is:

            a. At least 5 years old.

            b. Made long enough ago to ensure you've seen it once before.

            c. So bad you have to install a seat belt in your chair to keep you there until it's over.

19. Since no doctor with be available, stockpile band-aids, aspirins, and Actifed since these are proven cure-alls.  Practice on your dog (surgery, dentistry, etc.).  For the ultimate in realism, kill the dog (or allow it to die) and keep the body in the freezer until the end of the "patrol".

20. Sleep under your coffee table so that when the alarm goes off you can hit your head on the table to recreate actual experiences.

21. All trash cans must be thrown away and trash stored in the shower.  Once every two weeks it will be thrown out the window.

22. Mount your house on a platform that can tilt in all directions - at angles up to 40 degrees.  Once a day, set the platform to rock the house from side to side and turn on air conditioning full blast to simulate ventilating the "boat" at periscope depth.

23. When commencing this simulation, lock your family, friends, and everything else that means anything to you outside.  The test will run for at least two months with no specific end in sight.  The completion will be delayed at least twice for no less than two weeks.

IF YOU CAN DO THIS, YOU MAY ATTEMPT QUALIFICATION IN SUBMARINES!

Procrastination at BYU

I took this photo 5 weeks and 2 days ago:

I finally stopped putting it off and posted it.

It isn't the fall that kills you...

My Orbiter Life

 When I first found Orbiter in March 2006, I was then playing with Eagle Lander 3D (which could only simulate the Apollo lunar missions - and only those portions that happened in lunar orbit), I was elated that I could fully simulate an entire Apollo mission.  As my 1st blog entry states, "I was hopelessly hooked".

 I have spent most of my life being aware that most of the other people around me aren't as smart - certainly not rocket scientist smart.  I had to learn at an early age to recognize that "deer in the headlights" stare in other's eyes when I got too zealous or detailed in my descriptions of the way shit works...and dial it back a little at times.  Then I found the Orbiter community...and now I feel I've found home.

 Since finding Orbiter, I've tried sharing it with friends and co-workers, and have only found one interested enough to even try it.  Orbiter isn't the first topic, but I bring it up when the person has related that he enjoys video games and is extremely computer literate.

 Simulations, as a genre, aren't all that popular with most gamers because, IMO, there's a learning curve (or too steep), too much detail...etc.  It is though most of them suffer, IMO, from some degree of AADD.  Or, they shirk from the realization that they actually have to "plan" something to achieve goals.

 The one person who even tried it, while growing up, was the first of my son's friends to get the latest and greatest gaming console as soon as they hit the market.  This person also showed early aptitude with computers and is very gifted musically too.  By the time he asked me for help with an Orbiter scenario, he had successfully gotten the stock DG into orbit.  Reference here or here.  He stayed with Orbiter another week or two...he didn't quite get how to set up a orbital rendezvous with another spacecraft, so it lost interest for him.  I haven't bother to bring up that topic with him anymore...some people just aren't cut out for it.

As far as what others think of Orbiter...I don't really care.  We're all blessed with different talents...THIS ONE IS MINE.

Even harder to run when your PC is FUBAR!

Back in late September of 2010, I was forced to stop running sims with Orbiter...(quoting from Conrad's Heart of Darkness, and not from that cheesy Apocalypse Now movie), "the horror!, the horror!"  What happened was the cooling fan on my video card stopped working, and shortly thereafter, the GPU did too.  At best, my 8 year old hardware got 85 FPS and at worst 5 FPS on Orbiter 2010.  Most of the time, I'd average 20-30 FPS with Orbiter 2006, which was adequate, except when grabbing video with FRAPS (see here: http://www.fraps.com) - and FPS would drop to a noticeable 8-12 FPS.

It was rather pointless to do anything with Orbiter after that, since the performance on the integrated video is even worse and not worth mentioning.

Even more depressing was the realization that since the h/w was so OLD, I'd have to replace EVERYTHING ELSE attached to the mobo - including the mobo.  Many $$$$$ flashed in front of my eyes - which is why I desperately tried a new cooling fan for the video card's GPU (cost $30).  Which didn't work - the GPU got too hot too long and now is destined for the scrapheap of history.

For reference, specs on the old PC:

ASUS A7N266-VM motherboard AGP4X 266 MHz bus
2400+ AMD Athlon XP Processor
64MB GeForce4 Titanium-4200 Video card
Windows XP Home Edition

So, the only way to get a reduced "fix" from Orbiter since then was:

1) checking in at Orbiter-Forum at least once a day
2) maintaining my Orbiter related website
3) writing on my Orbiter related blog

These were just stopgap methods - I guess there is a, "You know you're addicted to Orbiter" story in here somewhere.

Since then, while saving for the new system, I came across a PC Magazine article entitled, "Build It: A Cheap Gaming Desktop", which listed the following:

Motherboard: MSI 890GXM-G65
CPU: AMD Phenom II X6 1055T
Video card: AMD Radeon HD 6850
Memory: 4GB Crucial Ballistix RAM
Hard Drive: Western Digital Caviar Blue 1TB
Operating System: Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit

I sent the link to this article to a co-worker (and good friend, thanks Mer!), who advised that this was good bang for the buck, as well as highly upgradable for a "little" while.

Yesterday, I FINALLY ordered said parts, and now have to WAIT some more...well, at least one more week before I'm "back in business".  I feel like a little kid on Christmas morning.  In fact, I'm saving $900 in parts and s/w over what I paid Totally Awesome Computers (a once local computer retailer - now defunct) 8 years ago.

Better still, I can move on upgrading Niven (adding UCGO and UMMU support) and perhaps adding Lua scripting to all of my Apollo scenario packs.  Better yet, I can finish teaching myself C++ and add both UCGO and UMMU support to a new spacecraft add-on derived and evolved from my Space Taxi.

Apollo 18? Hollyweird!

As I was surfing today, I read a blog post from a colleague who's blog covers either the "brilliantly stimulating" or the "bu!!$hit" he encounters.  Sometimes, through sheer serendipity, he accomplishes both in the same post...like today...perhaps.

"Apollo 18" is just another sci-fi thriller/found footage genre/"Blair Witch Project" in space/mockumentary directed by Gonzalo López-Gallego or Trevor Cawood, according to the following list of sites found by Google and perused by me in about 10 minutes:

Geek Syndicate
Badassdigest
Wegotthiscovered
Pajiba.com

The best description of this issue, and my personal favorites, are 2 excerpts from Pajiba.com:

Certain people (crazy people) believe that Apollo 18 did actually go to the moon, but was covered up, probably for the same reasons that the whole program was faked, and I am not nearly drunk enough to follow the logic of those two truths co-existing.

And,

In related news, how stupid are people that believe the Moon landings were shot on a sound stage? The correct answer is “Fuck you for this topic of conversation even existing, asshole.”

In a related entry in THIS blog, I said, "I have to show my utter disdain for Apollo moon hoax conspiratorial nut cases".  Though the last comment from Pajiba.com may be harsh...I nevertheless agree with it.

What "actually" happened, per the "official" history, is that Apollo 18 was canceled, along with Apollos 19 and 20.  Thanks to "Tricky Dick" Nixon.

Had it actually flown, per the "Canceled Apollo missions" entry on Wikipedia, the crew would have been:

     Richard F. Gordon, Jr. (Commander (CDR))
     Vance D. Brand (Command Module Pilot (CMP))
     Harrison Schmitt (Lunar Module Pilot (LMP))

And, per same source, would have landed:

According to "NASA OMSF, Manned Space Flight Weekly Report" from July 28, 1969, Apollo 18 would have landed at Schröter's Valley in February 1972

In the NASA report "Scientific Rationale Summaries for Apollo Candidate Lunar Exploration Landing Sites" from March 11, 1970, Apollo 18 is targeted for Copernicus

Another source lists the prospective landing sites as Gassendi craters (Apollo 18, July 1973).

Finally, the Orbiter community is trying to "sim" this cancelled mission, see here and here.  I guess I could take a stab at creating a scenario pack for Apollo 18, since there has been an overwhelming response to my other scenario packs (8,12,14,15,16...REAL ONES), with over 21,000 downloads from Orbiter-Hangar.


@Bob: My online name, "NukeET", has the following derivation.  "Nuclear Power Trained Electronics Technician".  The Navy's way of saying, "Reactor Operator".   Though in "Footfall", by Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle, the ETs are nuked by humans.  Thanks to ole Bang-Bang.  F***ing deserved it too!

The Nigerians GET IT!

They get it because of this news article...actually, just the article's title.

Hail Probe, you ask?  See here and/or here.  It also graced the title screen of this blog for awhile:

I got "static" from the cultists on the forum after I posted this on the screenshot thread.

But it is also certain ethically challenged Nigerians that send emails requesting funds in order for you, dear reader (if any), to obtain even more funds.  Now it seems they're trying to mine the intelligently challenged people who follow space flight activities:

 

Before you send any funds to help this poor soul, I recommend that you research "Salyut 8T".

In closing, I just want to say: "HAIL PROBE"!

The real Drake equation