S. Evan Townsend's Blog, page 8

3 Body Problem Review

 I recently watched 3 Body Problem on Netflix. And, wow, what a great show. My sole disappointment was that it was only ten episodes and it ended on a cliffhanger. I believe it covered the events in the first book it's based on. There are four books in the series so maybe there will be four seasons.

The show starts with the Cultural Revolution in China in the 1960s. It's a scary scene as it is so reminiscent of what happens on college campuses if someone who's not woke enough (in the eyes of the students) tries to speak. It then jumps to the present and someone (or something) is trying to shut down human science by screwing with experiments and driving scientists insane. Many are committing suicide.

As the mystery deepens, clues are found, including in a VR video game like no other.

I don't want to give any spoilers, but just watch the series. It's amazing. 

Have you seen it? Let me know in the comments below what you thought.

The above photo is being used under Section 107 of the Copyright Act: fair usage.

Transition to a Mac

My old Dell PC was starting to act up. It was almost five years old and almost daily it wanted to fix problems with the hard drive. So I decided to buy a new computer. 

For years, people have been telling me to get a Mac. And I thought about. I even drove to Spokane to talk to the people at the Apple Store. The person there was very helpful but tried to sell me a MacBook Air. Instead I bought an refurbished MacBook Pro from Amazon. It was supposed to arrive Monday the 12th of February. Which was okay. I had a big deadline on the 15th. So my thought was to finish the deadline and then slowly work my way into the Mac.

The morning of the 12th my Dell died. Wouldn't boot up. Kaput.

The Mac arrived that afternoon. I set it up and took it to my office, unplugging the Dell, and plugging in the Mac. I was glad to learn that it worked with my monitor, keyboard and mouse. Except the mouse died and I had to buy a new one.  (Later my keyboard died and I had to buy a new one. A new experience for me: both the mouse and the keyboard hook up to the computer via Bluetooth.)

There was a steep learning curve. All my documents were backed up to the cloud and to an external hard drive. The Mac wouldn't recognize the hard drive (probably because it was formatted for Windows)(or I couldn't figure out how to find it). So I found and downloaded the files I needed in the cloud for the big deadline and, not knowing where else to put them, put them on the desktop.

When I'd google stuff, it kept talking about the "Finder side bar." So I kept looking to the left of the screen for a side bar. Then I looked to the right side. Nothing. Finally I found the damn thing in the Finder window, on the left side. And there I found Documents. So I loaded everything into it.

Then, I couldn't open a Word document, modify it, and then save it. All the files I downloaded off the cloud were locked as "read only" and so were the folders. Took me a while to figure that one out.

So slowly I'm learning more and more. It's often pretty easy. But sometimes it's frustrating. Once, most of my documents were grayed out so I couldn't open them. I don't know why and I don't know why the gray went away eventually.

Do you use a Mac or PC? And why? Let me know in the comments below. And why you chose that computer.

Why Star Trek?

Star Trek is a billion dollar property for Paramount Pictures. And I've kind of wondered why. It's not the only science fiction show in the 1960s. I remember Land of the Giants and The Time Tunnel. 
There was also Lost in Space which lasted three seasons (the same as Star Trek). It spawned a movie in 1998 and a series in 2018 that lasted three seasons of ten episodes each. I suspect it was shown on a streaming service. I remember my older siblings wanting to watch Lost in Space but I didn't like it because it scared me (I was around 6 years old).

In the '70s there was Space 1999 (which was syndicated) and the Six Million Dollar Man along with The Bionic Woman. Space 1999 lasted two seasons and got worse as the seasons got longer. Then there's Battlestar Galactica. I think it lasted one season. It wasn't very good. (The reboot in the 2000s was much better.)

In the late 70s there was Buck Rogers in the 25th Century. It also lasted two seasons. The last season they totally screwed it up.

So why Star Trek? It wasn't that good. Some episodes were amazing. But a lot of them were just awful. Campy. A friend of mine recently watch the original series (TOS) for the first time and found it... lacking. 

When I was a teenager, I wasn't surprised by Uhura, a black woman on the bridge: a woman who had authority over white men. I just accepted that's how it was. I grew up in a very white area (I didn't see a black person other than on the TV until I was 12 years old). And Sulu didn't bother me at all. My sister dated an Asian boy in high school. Was that part of what made Star Trek special? It probably was at least part of it; I was just too isolated to realize it.

I was watching the "The Apple" episode and Chekov (an obvious Russian) compared the planet to the Garden of Eden. My mother, who happened to hear this wondered why a Russian believed in the Garden of Eden. I said, "Because communism is dead by this time." And that a Russian and Americans could work together is also part of the magic of Star Trek.

A lot of people cite the hope Star Trek displayed. People get along. We don't blow ourselves up. Maybe that is it.

I frankly don't know.

Do you? Let me know in the comments below.

The above photo is being used under Section 107 of the Copyright Act: fair usage.

UFOs and Other Paranormal Activity

If you've read this blog, you know I try to think scientifically. I believe natural phenomena have a scientific explanation.

But what about paranormal activity? I have seen things in my life that I can't explain away. Such as a possible UFO sighting.

For example, when I was a kid, a friend and I were sleeping outside in my backyard. It was the late 1960s or early 1970s, you got your entertainment were you could. Anyway, we were talking, looking at the stars, when suddenly a fireball rose from the horizon and shot into the sky. I don't remember if there was any sound associated with it. My friend I and scrambled out of our sleeping bags and hurried into the house.

Or, sometime in the seventies, I was playing in my room on a bright sunny summer day (even then I didn't like the outdoors) when I heard a sound like a jet zooming into the sky from outside. I ran to the front door and my brother was standing by the family car and people were coming out of their houses. My brother said that as he parked the car, a fireball zoomed from the radio antenna into the sky. What was it? I have no idea.

I don't jump to conclusions such as "it was a UFO" or some other paranormal activity. They simply remain unexplained in my memory.

Do you have any UFO sightings or other paranormal activity in your life? Let me know in the comments below.

Why Does Car Exhaust Sound so Good?

A while back I was watching a reel on Facebook of a Shelby Daytona replica running. Not moving, just sitting there idling. And the sound of its V8 engine was... almost erotic. I loved the sound. Then I watched another reel of what looked like a Shelby Cobra accelerating.
And it got me wondering: why do I love the sound of a car engine and its exhaust. And I know I'm not the only one who does.

In fact, I feel sorry for future generations who will only have the hum of electric motors coming from their cars.

I have a theory about why some people, such as me, like the sound of a car's exhaust and engine noises. We associate the sound with good times we've had in cars: accelerating, cornering, braking. For example, when I drove on a racetrack. Doing those things for some people releases dopamine. And that makes me love the sounds associated with them. Such as engine exhaust.

And that's why, I think, some people love the sound of car exhaust and engine noise. I know I do. 

For a lot of exhaust and engine noise, watch this.

What do you think of my theory? Let me know in the comments below.

I Was a Victim of Censorship

I remember watching a few episodes of Star Trek (the Original Series) in first run. The one I remember most is "The Changeling." I would have been six at the time. I didn't get to watch Star Trek a lot because my older siblings didn't like it.

But then when I was a teenager, a local station started showing reruns of Star Trek in the afternoon, right after I got home from school. They showed them every weekday. And I watched them, every weekday. There are 79 TOS episodes (of varying quality). But I only saw 77 of them. 

(If they only showed 77, it must have only taken 15 weeks to show them all. I know I watched them all multiple times.)

A kid moved from the Los Angeles area to the small town I lived in in Idaho. Don't ask me why. We became friends. And one day he said "What are Little Girls Made Of" was one of his favorite episodes. And I had to admit that I'd never seen it. He was shocked. I was shocked. I didn't know that episode existed.

Apparently my local television station wouldn't show it. They finally decided to show "Turnabout Intruder" at some point but only once or twice. 

I was mad that my local station decided to censor my Star Trek watching. Admittedly, I grew up in a pretty conservative part of the world (southeast Idaho). But why should a TV station decide what I can and can't watch? It might have been what Sherry Jackson as Andrea was wearing (see above photo). I don't know.

How do you feel about others making decisions about what you can read or watch? Let me know in the comments below.

The above photo is being used under Section 107 of the Copyright Act: fair usage.

A Little Story

Sometimes (well, often) being a writer brings some fun to the world. For example:

Since we've remodeled our shower, my wife has decreed that the last person showering in the morning will squeegee the glass doors. And most of the time, that's me.

So to entertain myself, I made up a little story about it. And here it goes:

"Here's the brave, world-famous window washer thousands of feet above the street. One false move and he'll plummet to a gruesome death on the asphalt below. Or worse, the windows will have streaks."

And that's it. I find that entertaining while I'm squeegeeing the glass doors.

Appliance Hell

Recently my appliances have put me through hell. 

First, the freezer seemed to be going too high a temperature because I was finding ice in the ice bin that looked melted and refrozen.

So I bought a thermometer that recorded temperatures. And I was right. Temperatures ranged from 29.7°F to -14.3°F. I called my appliance repair guy and told him about it. He said he'd look into the cost of the new thermostat but he thought it might be as much as $400. And since the fridge is old, we might want to consider just buying a new one (which would be about $1,000). 

The day after I talked to him, that fridge stopped making ice (and I love my ice). So I called him about that and he said let's figure out if we want to replace it or not. So we were buying ice and keeping it in our other, older fridge which seems to work fine.

Then, about the same day, our dishwasher wouldn't drain and smelled like something plastic was burning. I didn't call the guy this time. I decided to wait until he called back about the fridge. But I was worried I might have to buy a new dishwasher now

The broken pumpSo he shows up and puts a new thermostat in the fridge. Then he discovers the water line to the ice maker is frozen (likely happened when the temp in the freezer reached -14.3°F). So he cleaned that out too and now the ice maker is working.

And then he found the dishwasher's drain pump is not working so he's going to order a new one and put it in.

So a few days later he brought in a new pump, installed it. And everything worked fine... for about two weeks.

Then the dishwasher wasn't filling. Repair guy came and ordered a new filter because junk in the recirculation pump wasn't letting the dishwasher fill.

A few days later he returned and put in the new filter and the dishwasher is working fine (and more quietly). So far, so good. Let's hope that stays.

Have you had problems with your appliances? What was the outcome? Let me know in the comments below.

February Wasn't That Bad

At the beginning of February, I posted on this blog how that month is the worst month of the year.

Except this year. While January had frigid weather (down to -5F at night once), February was rather mild. Lots of rain, however. In early February, highs almost reached 50F. In the middle of February, highs did reach the 50s. Amazing. 

It snowed once but it melted off fast. 

The biggest problem with this February was fog. It seemed ubiquitous, especially in the mornings. We did have a few days of sunshine, but dang few.

Toward the end of the month it got cooler but sunny. Which is much better than foggy.

How was your February? Let me know in the comments below.

Five Thursdays

This is the fifth Thursday in February. February only has five Thursdays because this is a leap year and it's the 29th of February.  I started wondering how much that happens. And I think, it happens every four years to a different weekday. So I investigated.

In 2020, February had five Saturdays, and the last one was the leap day.

In 2016, February had five Mondays (groan) and the last one was the leap day!

In 2012, February had five Wednesdays, and the last one was the leap day.

So apparently this is how leap days work: they are always the fifth day of their weekday.

I'm in my 60s and I never noticed that before. That's amazing.

What about the world did you not notice until late in your life? Let me know in the comments below.

And why do leap years have to be election years? Another day of campaigning. That we don't need.