General, Politics

An open letter to my Senator. (one of them)

Dear Senator Allard,

I understand that you were one of nine senators that voted against an amendment to a Defense Appropriation bill (HR2863). This amendment (1977) was submitted by Senator McCain and called for the humane treatment of prisoners by our Defense Forces.

Frankly, Senator, I am ashamed that you would vote against the humane treatment of prisoners.

It is the duty of Congress to provide guidelines on the “Rules of War” to our military. It is not only the duty of Congress to declare war, but it is the duty of Congress to provide oversight on how the executive branch is managing our defense forces, especially in times of hostility. Since Congress has not declared war recently, I am hesitant to call the activities in Iraq and Afghanistan ‘war’, although it sure looks like it from here.

I understand that some of the President’s staff have opposed this amendment because it might restrict the President’s pursuit of war. The President’s pursuit of war should be restricted, especially if that pursuit leads to the inhumane treatment of prisoners. Congress should take the Executive Branch to task for their continuing mistreatment of prisoners during our current overseas military adventures.

You represent the State of Colorado in the US Senate, and, by extension, me, as a citizen of the State of Colorado. I believe you have failed in your duties. I have not run into a fellow Colorado citizen that supports the inhumane treatment of prisoners by our military. Most have been thoroughly disgusted by the pictures and reports that have come out of Abu Ghraib and other detention facilities.

This is not a Republican issue nor a Democrat issue. This is an American Issue and you have not only failed your state but your country.

Sincerely,

Baseball

The Season’s Over

It was a long hard season for some. My team performed about as expected and ended up in 2nd place. They ended up with 71.5 points out of a possible 100. My target all along was to average about 7 points in each category, and I did well in that regard with 6, 8, 7, 9, 6.5, 9, 4, 9, 8, 5. Unfortunately, the Bud Chuggers averaged 8 points per category and took the trophy.

Hard to believe that after 26 weeks, I actually tied someone for Stolen Bases, with 123. 36.5 hitting, 35 pitching points, a good balance.

Reviews, science fiction

Serenity

I saw Serenity this past weekend. I enjoyed it.

Joss Whedon kept the characters from Firefly and continued to develop them, using the movie medium to give some more depth than they got from TV.

The story picks up from the show and continues the Alliance’s pursuit of River. I don’t think you need to have seen the show to become engaged with the movie. The TV show provides back story on the characters but the movie defines the characters within its own view. It is hard for me to say, since I did see the entire series, that if someone walked in without Firefly, that they would appreciate the movie, but I think they would.

The movie quickly establishes the overall conflict between the Tams and the Alliance, and even provides the reason that the Alliance fears River Tam. Within Serenity, the crew continues to deal with a ship that is continually breaking down and with the tensions of living with a group of people they might not otherwise want to live with.

Especially when the goals of some are the pursuit of individual wealth and glory and for others is the pursuit of individual liberty over the commune of the Alliance with its select few who desire mastery and control over the human race. It is this pursuit of the mastery and control that leads to the main crisis of the movie and its tactically satisfying conclusion.

There is no strategically satisfying conclusion that can be reached, a la “throw the ring into Mount Doom”, in a two hour movie. And maybe there never will be. The suppression of one’s humanity in support of an ideal society goes back throughout human history. I doubt it will change much in the future. And there will always be people to take advantage of that blind faith for their own ends.

Whedon blends comedic elements so easily throughout the script. Even in the middle of a tense scene, a spot of homor highlights the moment and heightens the tension. People act as people throughout the script. Even stereotypes and exemplars of virtue have dings around the edges to make them more real.

I will give this an 9 out of 10 and expect to get the DVD when it becomes available.

Geek Stuff, Photography

Why the full size (35mm) solid-state imaging sensor will be a pipe dream.

Erwins Home

I found this site while looking for info on 35mm sized sensors. (See the post below). I don’t know if I agree with his argument. The SLR lenses if have for my camera are designed to project an in-focus image onto the film plane of my camera, whether analog or digital. if the silver halide crystals or digital pixels capture that information with the desired detail then I have captured my image.

I know that analog film can capture a much denser amount of light than a digital sensor. The example used inthe article is that a 35mm neagtive is equivalent to 22Mpixels, which is equivalent to 25.5K P/sq mm.

Hmm. That’s pretty close to the 20D and XT densities. Of course those chips have much less area than a 35 mm frame.

I found it an interesting article to read. Beware of people who warn of pipe dreams.

Geek Stuff, General, Photography

Canon EOS 5D Hands-on Preview: Digital Photography Review

Canon EOS 5D Hands-on Preview: Digital Photography Review

Oh, they are making this so difficult for me. I really want to upgrade to a digital SLR. I already have a Canon EOS film camera with lenses, so I want to get a Canon D-SLR. They are generally reviewed as the best ones out there. Nikon can match some Picture Quality measures, but when you have the excellent lenses that both companies produce, that should be expected.

So, I started by looking at the Canon 10D which has been replaced by the 20D, with even better features. The 20D runs about $1500.

The Canon Rebel XT is running less than $1000. It has a lot of the features of the 20D, but, it has a plastic case. I am leery of plastic cases since I know how rough I can be on cameras while scrambling around looking for the perfect shot.

The one problem with the 20D and the XT is that their sensors are smaller than a 35mm film frame. This means that the sensor will only capture the inner two-thirds of the image seen in the view finder. The outer portions of the image, when the shutter opens, won’t be on the sensor and won’t be captured. I am sure that is something I can adjust to and, with the lenses I have, I can compensate to ensure that the portion of the image I want will be in the area that the sensor will capture. But, it is a waste.

The 5D has an image sensor that is the same size as a 35mm frame, so that 1.6 FOV (field of view) crop isn’t a factor. This is what I want. Unfortunately, the 5D runs about $3300

What to do? what to do? Starting with the 20D, costing $500-$600 more than the XT, seems like a bad starting move, especially if I want to go to the 5D as soon as possible.

Christmas is coming soon, I have to decide.

The 20D and XT have 8.2 and 8.0 M pixel chips, respectively, and the 5D has a 12.8 M Pixel chip. (Although I haven’t really seen anything on the effect of pixel density on the quality since:

the 5D has 14.8K Pixels/sq mm
the 20D has 24K Pixels/sq mm
the XT has 24K Pixels/sq mm

which implies, to me, that the 5D will be more lossy and lesser quality than the other two, especially if you were blowing up the middle of the image.) But I don’t know how many Pixels/sq mm are considered good enough to blow up a digital image into a wall poster, or 16×11 print. Maybe I should start with the XT and wait until the 5D gets its P/sq mm number up to the 25K range.

I just checked the ultimate, top of the line, Canon EOS, the 1Ds Mark II, and see that its P/sq mm number is 19.2K. The 1Ds is a 16Mpixel camera, with a 35mm equivalent sensor, in the $8K range. It is for the pros.

So maybe 24K P/sq mm is overkill, or maybe the 1Ds is obsolete. It’s over a year old now.

General, Preparing for the worst

What’s the Worst that can Happen? Loonies?

Lunar colonists decide to declare their independence from Earth and start flinging rocks, with a magnetic rail gun, at Cheyenne Mountain (need to knock out Space Command).

Hopefully we will have a day warning, since I think I would want to evacuate a few hundred miles in case the boy genius on the moon who is programmming the rail gun misses a decimal point.

So, it is into the truck with the animals and supplies and off on the road.

This one might not be a problem for a few years…

General

AQTrends2003

AQTrends2003.pdf (application/pdf Object)

My brother-in-law made a comment the other day that Colorado Sporings has really great air quality. I drive in from the north every morning and when I pass the AFA I overlook the basin the COS sits in and there is usually a grungy haze hanging over the city. Not nearly as bad as Denver, but noticable. So I had to check it out and, from I have found, COS ain’t Los Angeles, Houston or Denver, but we don’t have the pristine mountain air that some people expect.

An interesting survey from 2002.

General, Preparing for the worst

What’s the worst that can happen? Man?

What if some terrorists decide that Colorado Springs is a target and they set off a dirty bomb or other WMD? After all, we do have Cheyenne Mountain, Pikes Peak, The Air Force Academy, and other symbolic places. But, they don’t often appear in movies.

Then, I could imagine a lot of panic, mass evacuations, traffic jams, people scrambling to get as far away from the Springs as possible. We have a limited number of roads leaving this area. Not sure that I would worry about leaving right away unless the winds weren’t favorable. Then it becomes the snowstorm scenario of being trapped in the house for a week, probably without power or communications.

I did just remember that we have 50 gallons of water in the water heater to use, if needed.

Unless there is a complete breakdown across the state and/or country, we should be able to manage a week or two before venturing out. By then, the traffic should be manageable.

We try to keep the truck topped off with its two tanks of diesel. I think we have about a 400 mile range, with the horse trailer, before we need to fill up again. I wonder if we should plan to tow one of the cars behind the trailer. Nah. That may be excessive.

If we need to evacuate right away, I expect we would head north, towards Denver. My preference would be to head in to the mountains, since I figure that anything drifting in the wind would not be going uphill.

Rather than Denver, I will head up Mt Herman Road and make for Woodland Park. The Rampart Range Rd shouldn’t be too congested since it is a rutted dirt track. The truck can make it, but the horses might not. (Providing it isn’t winter.)

Winter adds a bit of complexity to the problem.

I think for an evacuation scenario, I need to acquire some land somewhere that we can retreat to. A mountain lot would be good, but inaccessible in the winter. A place out east, on the plains, may be more useful, year-round.

Load up the truck with food and water for people, dogs and horses, load up the camping supplies, and take off.

I wonder if I should keep a stash of 50 or so cartons of cigarettes on hand for trading supplies.

It’s Mad Max time…

General, Preparing for the worst

What’s the worst that can happen? Ice?

A winter storm rolls in and dumps 5 feet of snow over the region. The Result: we aren’t going anywhere.

The worst case scenario is that we are unable to leave the valley for a week, the power lines go down, and power crews can’t get to the break(s) to repair them. We are without power for a week.

Power is a critical part of our survival. We are on well for starters, so without power we have no water. We installed a propane heating system several years ago, replacing a set of electric baseboard heaters, but the furnace needs electricity to run the blower motor and to spark the ignition. So, no central heating. The one spot of hope is that the range top is also propane-powered and can be lit without electricity. So heat and hot food is available in a portion of the house.

As the rest of the house freezes, water pipes become at risk, so even when power returns, we may have burst pipes to contend with. It will be necessary to go into the crawl space and empty the pipes as best as possible. I don’t know that we have drain valves on those pipes.

We can stay in the house most of the time, keeping the heat in the house and conserving our energy as best we can.

And without power we will lose access to the internet.

If the power lines are down, the telephone line is probably also down. Our cell phones will have limited power and the cell towers will probably be out, as well. We could use the cars to charge the cell phones if needed. Car radios or battery radios will be useful to find out what is happening elsewhere, but we shouldn’t expect to be able to communicate with the rest of the world.

How dangerous is it to use propane cookers in a sealed house? Need to check it out. I expect that we can put the patio grill in the mudroom/garage and keep those fumes out of the main house. I wonder what the range top will do?

The propane tank is usually filled when it is half empty, so I expect to have at least a week’s worth of propane in the tank, and without the central heating and water tank going the propane should last longer.

I see that there are vent-free propane heaters available. I think one of those in the back part of the house would help keep it warm, and ameliorate the burst pipe scenario.

One option I have considered is getting a propane generator and getting it hooked into the house wiring so I can keep power in the house even if the grid goes down. And I think I would upgrade the propane tank from 500 gallons to 1500 gallons.

This approach would restore central heating and water, end worries about burst pipes and give us a nice comfy nest. Whether communications are restored depends on the rest of the world.

So, is the likelihood of being knocked off the grid for any length of time worth the headaches of installing a home generator? I assume that these things need regular maintenance and need to be actually used every once in while. I can’t even keep my house stained every other year (important for UV protection of the wood siding) and here I am thinking about maintaining machinery?

A quick google indicates that a generator will run up to $3000. I need to calculate how much power I will actually need to back-up. Refrigerators, freezers, washing machines, dryers, etc don’t have a high priority for me. Then there will be some work to get it wired into my home power system, with a cut out switch to the generator when needed. And the new propane tank will need to be located much further from the house and I will need to get the piping run out to the new tank site. Overall, I think it could run up to $4000, plus annual maintenance. Is it worth it?

I should note that an underlying assumption to the stranded for a week scenrio is that we have over a week’s worth of dry and canned food to live on. The five gallons of water in the mud room will come in handy, too.

The Thoughts and Luminations of Jack Heneghan