Climate Modellers, Turn Around!

It may not be a fair observation but sometimes truths reveal in unexpected ways.  Here is a picture from the recent
climate modelling "hackathon."  [Story at  Expanding the discipline of climate informatics]

The problem as I see it is that they aren't looking out the window.  The problem with all climate models IMHO. 

Oroville Spillway Fiasco As Predicted

 

The $500 million and counting Spillway repair has hairline cracks before even entirely set.  The contractor says that's normal for high strength reinforced concrete.  No, it is not.  It's normal for driveways and patios.  Cracks of any type are unacceptable as they allow water to get to the steel.  They also suggest a suseptability to spalling. 

Full story at The ChicoER.

Best/Worst Places to Retire?

Wallet Hub has compiled a list of the best and worst places to retire.  I don't understand their methodology and "gut reaction" says they have it entirely wrong.  See if you can make sense of these rankings:

From what I can tell... scratch that.  It doesn't make sense.  To me. 

Wallet Hub Best/Worst Places to Retire 2017

Greeting from Dark Green 'Merika

From the folks at howmuch.net and their always interesting dives into the ACS, American Community Survey.

New Pict Carving Discovered

From Smithsonian:
Construction on a road link in Perth, Scotland, came to an abrupt halt recently after workers hit upon an unusual archaeological find: a Pictish stone engraved with a large-nosed, weapon-wielding warrior.

As Alison Campsie reports for The Scotsman, archaeologists who were called in to examine the relic believe that it is around 1,500 years old. The carving shows a figure who appears to be clad in a cloak and shoes. He clutches a spear in one hand and what appears to be a club or a staff in the other. The spear is consistent with weapons used during the mid-first millennium A.D., according to Campsie.

 -----

 Fascinating what people leave behind.  In the future blog posts will be as mysterious. 

From Little Acorns...

...Great oak trees grow.  Back in 2015 a single study commissioned by WHO kinda sorta maybe almost found glyphosate the active ingredient in RoundUp® might cause cancer.  

Since then all the well known actors have weighed in.  The government of [California] added glyphosate, the main ingredient in Monsanto’s herbicide Roundup, to its list of cancer-causing chemicals in July and will require that products containing glyphosate carry warnings by July 2018.

California acted after the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) concluded in 2015 that glyphosate was “probably carcinogenic”.

For more than 40 years, farmers have applied glyphosate to crops, most recently as they have cultivated genetically modified corn and soybeans.

Hawk

A few minutes ago while languishing in the garden shed of spousal exile I heard a rustling above the bird feeder just outside the door.  This fellow was just chilling.  I just turned and snapped this pic.  

Launch Photo

Update:  Nov 15th launch scrubbed.  Gave me a chance to improve my time exposure picture techniques.  

The launch was scrubbed due to a "red range" and late alarm.  They will try again tomorrow.
JPSS-1 will be renamed NOAA-20 and handed over After it is settled in polar orbit.

The faint vertical trail lower center left is where I expect the launch. 

JPSS-1

JPSS-1 is scheduled to launch on Tue., Nov. 14 at 1:47 a.m. PST (4:47 a.m. EST) from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California.
The Joint Polar Satellite System-1 (JPSS-1) satellite, the first in a new series of four highly advanced National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) polar-orbiting satellites, now is scheduled to launch on Tuesday, Nov. 14, from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California.
Liftoff aboard a United Launch Alliance Delta II rocket from Space Launch Complex 2 is targeted for 1:47 a.m. PST (4:47 a.m. EST). 
JPSS represents a significant technological and scientific advancements in observations used for severe weather prediction and environmental monitoring. The JPSS system will help increase weather forecast accuracy from three to seven days.

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For once we get a good launch view.  

Pick Your Favorite Feature

Sometimes a property has everything.  Not this time.  What is the worst characteristic?

$320/sf?
4600sf lot?
Built 1932?
Microscopic rooms?
Proximity to a busy road?
Some kind of pipe running through the yard?
The yard?
R-2 windows?
The price?

1440 Betty 92397

Timeshares? Really?

The Timeshare Comes of Age

These vacation ownership arrangements are attracting younger, more educated, more affluent buyers, thanks to consumer-friendly changes in the industry — but risks remain

Ballater, Scotland.  The white windows were our rooms. 

In 2014, consumers bought almost $8 billion worth of timeshare properties in the U.S., with an average sales price of $20,020 and average annual maintenance fees of $880. Though the median age of timeshare owners is 51, the concept resonates loudly with younger people. Among owners who have bought in recent years, the median age is 39. And half of them have children younger than 18 living at home.

...

“You’d be foolish to buy a timeshare for investment purposes,” says Randy Conrads, co-founder of RedWeek, a website that lists timeshares for sale or rent. “It’s a lifestyle investment, not a financial one. You’re buying a vacation property that you thought you’d use.”

...

But consumers who are disappointed that their timeshare has little or no value after lengthy ownership are missing the point. Think of it this way: You enjoyed that once-in-a-lifetime meal at a four-star restaurant. When it’s over, it’s over, and you don’t expect to get your money back.

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 So.  To "come clean."  We own Hilton Grand Vacations timeshares.  Yes, more than one.  Finished laughing?  Good.  We bought them for several reasons.  Not to be poo pooed but to -force- Mr&Mrs Dawg to take vacations.  Far too easy to say "next year" and then the next.  Family obligations aren't supposed to count as vacations either.  Second we got very good deals.  Timeshares are like new cars where once you buy them they lose half the value driving them off the lot.  Not our buys.  Finally, seeing we could be sucked into this type of money pit we bought HGV stock.  Check the HGV stock track record. 

 

 There is a problem.  The third (three way ties for 1st, 2nd, 3rd) nicest place I've ever stayed is the Trump in Las Vegas.  This was before the recent political... ummm...  frictions.  Mrs Dawg declines to ever accept an "upgrade" to stay there ever again.  

Dammit Jim!

When i helped design the first stereo ultrasound the "head" was bigger than the entire mechanism is today. 

Here is the latest from MedTech which you all subscribe:

Butterfly Network’s ultrasound-on-a-chip technology snagged the FDA nod for 13 applications, the broadest clearance to date for an ultrasound transducer. The pocket-size transducer, which plugs into an iPhone, would expand the availability of diagnostic ultrasound imaging.

Traditional cart-based ultrasound machines comprise at least three transducers and are bulky, so they can be hard to get hold of or maneuver in the emergency room. They also use ceramic crystal materials called piezoelectrics to generate and receive sound, the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering says.
Butterfly Network’s iQ device uses its ultrasound-on-a-chip technology, which integrates the capabilities of the three typical ultrasound probes into a single 2D matrix array comprised of thousands of microelectromechanical systems, the company said. This array is overlaid on an integrated circuit with electronics like those found in high-performance ultrasound systems.

Look familiar? 

How to Get to Heaven

The Catholic path to salvation is not particularly more virtuous than others but when it arrives via a Redheaded Irishman...

Paraphrased.

Before I came up here tonight to talk to all you great supporters of the Sister Servants of Mary I was in the back and having my picture taken with the sisters.  Now we all know "you cannot take it with you."  Still, if there is one thing I "can take with me" it would be that picture.   Why?  Because when I get up to the gates I plan on holding up that picture and saying; "I'M WITH THEM!" 

http://sisterservantsofmary.org/contact-us/newbury-park-ca

Twenty Seven Hundred Dollars?

Central Camarillo Rental - Single story home with 4 bedrooms, 2 baths, fireplace in the living room, and an attached two car garage. Home features updated kitchen and bathrooms, tile flooring throughout, dual pane windows and laundry hook ups located in the garage. The private backyard has no rear neighbors. Gardner included in the rent. Walking distance to shopping, restaurants, and parks. Easy access to 101 freeway.-----

"The private backyard has no rear neighbors" means it backs up on a busy street.  $2700/mo. 
Palmer Ave, Camarillo

Full Time Equivalent Estimate

Count the part timers as half-employed. 

More on Full Employment

You have to love the Fred graphing functions.  This is the latest of one I built in 2014.  I shows what happened to the working age population overlaid the civilian employment total.