The Evolution of Science Fiction discussion
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I usually clean my shop well over the Xmas break since I usually don't have any urgent projects & I have the time. Even though my shop is pretty well organized, I still uncover items. Peter, I feel for you. Most of my shops prior to this one were horrible in one way or another. Having or building one to suit was one of the main points of moving over a decade ago. The last two were small, uninsulated outbuildings with only 2 shared electrical circuits. I worked in each for most of a decade & was so frustrated!
Your neighbors' sale is like many around here. Rural housing is going crazy. Seems like a great time to sell, but where to buy? Is any place affordable anymore? Probably IF a person wants to live off the grid, but so long as there is decent Internet service (satellite is NOT decent) then the prices seem to be through the roof. I know ours have suddenly jumped since a new wireless company brought in service.
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I'm no longer as happy with the LED replacements in the shop as I was. Even with diffusers (not all have them) only half the bulb is lit so they don't radiate onto the ceiling & over to the walls as well. It makes the ceiling darker than I'm used to & also throws some shadows down below. They're especially noticeable on the workbench when I'm marking joints.We had a 4' florescent fixture die at work. Instead of letting it go to the trash, I pulled the ballast & hung it above my workbench with LEDs in it. I had a tough time finding them, though. All Lowe's had were LED replacement bulbs that need a working ballast. They had a bunch of those, but none that didn't need a ballast. I'm bewildered by this since I've been told by several people that ballasts are a big waste of energy. They're also another point of failure & expensive to replace. I don't know why anyone would want to keep them in play. Any ideas?
Jim wrote: "I'm no longer as happy with the LED replacements in the shop as I was. Even with diffusers (not all have them) only half the bulb is lit so they don't radiate onto the ceiling & over to the walls a..."In our little town, old 4-ft shop-light fixtures show up pretty often on doorsteps/driveways as freebies. Maybe put out the word that your looking, with your townie friends Craigslist also lists free stuff.
And of course, I'm envious you have a real shop to put the lights in.
I only needed the one fixture for over the woodworking bench, so no need to scrounge for more. The rest of the shop is lit well enough & I have smaller lamps scattered around for fine work such as over the scrollsaw. The bulbs were $33, so I might have been able to buy the whole works cheaper. I see some for $25 at Lowe's, but none were in stock when I was there.
I have no problem with the LED's and actually prefer them. have you tried the ones that you can aim?
Jim wrote: "I only needed the one fixture for over the woodworking bench, so no need to scrounge for more. The rest of the shop is lit well enough & I have smaller lamps scattered around for fine work such as ..."Fluorescent tubes: I've noticed the same thing re pricing. Crazy!
I have a 7.5W fixture under the house, that usually stays on for a night-light/finding-aid. Tube lasts a year or more. Last time I went to buy one, the tube itself was (iirc) 2x the price of fixture + tube!! So I did the logical (but wasteful!) thing, & now have an extra fixture to, well, collect dust.
It's like batteries: the Chinese versions are like 1/3 the price of a std American made-in-USA brand. They may not be quite as good, but... Fortunately I got a handful of pkgs at the dollar store pre-pandemic. I suppose Amazon must sell them too? The ones that are pretty good are Sunbeam brand, a defunct American co. that the Chinese bought salvage-rights to the trademark. I still have an Original Sunbeam (made in USA) electric frypan that may be older than our marriage -- and we've been married for 42 yrs! Both of those are impressive numbers! 😎
Random LED light comment: I just bought 3 200-light Xmas-light strings from Amazon-- a Chinese brand that everyone there seems to like.They seem well-made, if not quite so bright as the old incandecsent mini-lights they are replacing. Warm-white, pretty close color match to incandescent, which I MUCH prefer to the cold-blue old-style LED. Anyway, reading the Q&A on Amazon, a guy mentioned he'd put his string on his watt-meter. 1.6 watts for 200 lights! And they're pretty bright! Not enough to read by, mind, but still...
One of the questions there was, how many strings it would take to light a tent! Um. "How high is the sky?"
Light color: lots of 3rd-world rural areas are still off the grid, some WAY off the grid. So, in East Africa, I was reading about an American charity that was helping villages set up solar panels, batteries and LED lights, with enough umph to charge your cell-phone too. Cell phones are essential for banking in much of the third world, and to get market info. The group in Kenya was even using them to schedule rural buses! ITO that the buses in Kenya (and elsewhere?) are owned by local businessmen and leased to the drivers at a daily rate. So the driver is VERY reluctant to leave the (say) Nairobi terminal until he gets enough passengers to make his nut for the daily lease. The guy, a Kenyan-American student if memory serves, wrote a program to schedule buses so remote passengers can make phone reservations & pay a deposit, so the driver will know he has enough people waiting for his bus to be worth his while -- and the rural customers won't have to wait forever for the bus! Pretty slick.
Returning to LED light: the foundation (Rockefeller??) paying for the OTG solar/LED/cellphone setup figured that their customers would want warm-white lightbulbs, to mimic the kerosene lamps they would replace. WRONG. People LOVED the cold-blue light, because they thought it looked modern and high-tech!
Papaphilly wrote: "I have no problem with the LED's and actually prefer them. have you tried the ones that you can aim?"I thought I really liked LEDs too, but not in this case. I have six 8' dual bulb fixtures attached to the 10' ceiling of my 25'x30' shop. The ceiling itself is white metal soffit & the walls are white painted OSB, so I really appreciated the diffuse light since I never had a shadow on the benches. One ballast inside the shop had died, a couple died out in the barn, & one of the two lights in the shop overhang wouldn't come on in the cold. Two of the ballasts failed within days & I found that buying the LED replacements in 10 packs got the price down to $14/bulb, so I replaced them all.
I probably would have put the good ballasts back in, but a friend needed them for the hall where his dance group met, so I gave them all away immediately. I thought that was a good deal since storing twenty 8' florescent tubes seemed like a mess. I was sure I'd love the LEDs. Well, it's not the first mistake I've made.
I have some LED flashlights, but haven't gotten any regular LED lights that I can aim yet because I still have so many incandescent ones around, both bulbs & fixtures. I hate just wasting them & electric is pretty cheap here in KY.
The light above the kitchen sink is constantly on & it's in a globe, so we use an LED bulb in that. It's only rated for a 60 watt incandescent & even that got really hot plus it burned out quickly, so we replaced it with a 100 watt equivalent LED years ago. I've only had to replace it once since then rather than once or twice a year. It's been great.
Peter wrote: "Random LED light comment: I just bought 3 200-light Xmas-light strings from Amazon-- a Chinese brand that everyone there seems to like...."I prefer the mellow light (3500k ?) for the living room & such, but really like 5500-6000K lights for the shop & such. The girls prefer that bluish color out in the barn, too. We all feel that it makes colors pop & details stand out more. I'm not sure if it's true, though.
I read a similar article about the bus scheduling. LED lights are incredibly efficient compared to incandescents, so I can see why they'd be great in situations like that. I have 150 watt bulbs out in my big barn & they put a strain on my little generator now that the electric line out there broke.
I use incandescents as heaters in some situations. No, I don't have an EZ Bake oven, but when the temps hit single digits, the frost-free hydrant outside my shop will quit working unless I keep it warm. I just put a clamp light on it with a trash can on top.
Jim wrote: "I use incandescents as heaters in some situations. No, I don't have an EZ Bake oven, but when the temps hit single digits, the frost-free hydrant outside my shop will quit working unless I keep it warm. I just put a clamp light on it with a trash can on top"Life on the farm! Here in Calif, electric is ridiculously expensive, b/c of the "greens" (soi-disant) insistence on sinking $$$$ into intermittent "Clean Power" that needs 100% backup by good old fossil-fuel gens. Our incoming pres has procaimed, and campaigned on, his belief in this crap.
Compounding the dumbitude of Calif Greens, they are forcing the closing of the last Nuclear plant in the state, which is pretty new, well-maintained, and likely good for another 50 years of service. And carbon-free! And paid for! But, my God, NUCLEAR!!! We'll all GLOW IN THE DARK.
Dimwits.
The whole "climate emergency" is a POS manufactured crisis, to grab more public $$Trillions and funnel them to political friends/campaign contributors. You know, wealthy countries can stand a good deal of mismanagement, but there are limits!
/rant
Yesterday, only two of my Gmail accounts worked & four didn't for over an hour. Gmail seems to have more problems today. I sent myself an email with some info & questions to take up today. It popped right up in my inbox last night & this morning had a undeliverable message from Goggle attached to it. The email was delivered & is readable, though. Weird.
Jim, I got the same message and the mail was delivered. Apparently gmail was having issues yesterday.
I'm glad I don't have to drive into work this morning. It's supposed to be 34 degrees out & it's raining lightly, but it's all turning to ice covering everything. Luckily, we haven't gotten too much & don't expect to. Ice storms can be really bad here. In 2009, we had over a 1/2" of ice build up on everything & it took out power for almost a week. A telephone line that crosses our north field was weighed down almost to the ground.
There was a hacker attack on Google login system, affecting gmail, search, youtube and more
Oleksandr wrote: "There was a hacker attack on Google login system, affecting gmail, search, youtube and more"Couldn't get youtube! OMG! Old song about "I want my MTV!" 🎸
Does MTV still exist?
Peter wrote: "Couldn't get youtube! OMG! Old song about "I want my MTV!" 🎸Does MTV still exist?"
Actually using youtube without logging worked perfectly
Peter wrote: "Couldn't get youtube! OMG! Old song about "I want my MTV!" 🎸 Does MTV still exist?"Lol, now I'm hearing this song during the whole evening 😄
For the younger generations who don't know it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wTP2R...
*Tau* wrote: "Peter wrote: "Couldn't get youtube! OMG! Old song about "I want my MTV!" 🎸 Does MTV still exist?"Lol, now I'm hearing this song during the whole evening 😄
For the younger generations who don't kn..."
Thanks! Never actually watched that before. A great, great song. Why the electric guitar conquered rock n roll! Those snarling riffs!! And that's an AMAZING drum kit. Wonder what became of them?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dire_St...
"album sales of over 100 million." !! They probly could have afforded their own jet airplane! Hope they didn't piss all that money away, as so many did.
Mark Knopfler (lead guitarist) "was estimated to have a fortune of £75 million in the Sunday Times Rich List of 2018, making him one of the 40 wealthiest people in the British music industry." It doesn't look like his little brother David did so well: https://knopfler.com/
An appeal for Patreon donors is seldom a sign of great wealth!
Deep enough. ⚒︎
Peter wrote: "Oleksandr wrote: "There was a hacker attack on Google login system, affecting gmail, search, youtube and more"Couldn't get youtube! OMG! Old song about "I want my MTV!" 🎸
Does MTV still exist?"
You are showing your age.....
Papaphilly wrote: "Peter wrote: Couldn't get youtube! OMG! Old song about "I want my MTV!" 🎸Does MTV s..."
You are showing your age..... "
No doubt. Old fart, and proud of it! In truth, I'm not sure we even HAD a TV then. I've never been much of a TV watcher. I'd rather read -- or waste time on the internet! 💻 😎
Papaphilly wrote: "It has been around 40 years"Since MTV ended? Or since "I want my MTV!" was a hit?
Already on my Spotify playlists. See, I'm not quite a fossil (yet) 😁
I'm friends with another retired geologist in a nearby town. He (like I) likes to walk on the blufftop trails, where a miss-step will land you in the Ocean (at best) or in the graveyard (at worst). He calls this choice "joining the Geological record" and "why there are few old, bold Geologists."
In truth, the local cliff-fatalities seem to be from
A) careless selfies (falling backwards)
B) drunks
Choice (A) was particularly popular at the Grand Canyon, when we lived nearby. Very few survivors!
Peter wrote: "Papaphilly wrote: "It has been around 40 years"Since MTV ended? Or since "I want my MTV!" was a hit?"
Since I was born 😋
Since it's the first day of winter in the northern hemisphere, I've changed the masthead to the winterscape picture.Thankfully, I'm feeling better. This new antibiotic I'm on long term ruined my gut & dehydrated me yet again, so I've had to add another pill to fix the effects of the first. At this rate, I'm going to have to buy bigger pill minders. This getting old crap sucks.
Jim wrote: "This getting old crap sucks."beats the Ayup. Still beats the alternative.
"Life sucks. Then you die."
Peter wrote: "Ayup. Still beats the alternative."Life sucks. Then you die.""
When I'm feeling like I did yesterday, I'm not sure it does beat the alternative at the time. I'd rather break a bone or get stitches than feel like that. Probably because I have more experience with & I understand them. I've been abnormally healthy & active all my life, so this sitting around being sick & tired is new. It's gotten old fast.
Jim wrote: "Peter wrote: "Ayup. Still beats the alternative."Life sucks. Then you die.""
"It's gotten old fast. "
Ayup. I've really started noticing, the last 5 years or so (I'm 74, now.) Starting when I broke my ankle, doing something stupid -- but that I would have gotten away with (likely) years ago. And just general slowing down and lack of energy. Of course, the COVID troubles haven't helped! 🤠 My Dad died a bit before reaching 75. Sobering thought.
So, I hope you're feeling better by the New Year. I suppose you had a COVID test, to rule that out? This last burst has reached into my family, though no one has gotten seriously sick. Flu-like symptoms; a niece lost her sense of taste/smell for a few days.
No, I haven't had a Covid test. I have something similar to non-contagious TB. Basically feels like I have a bad case of bronchitis constantly. Tough to get rid of - 4 antibiotics for a year after I test negative. I get tested every 3 months for that & the last one was still positive. I'm really hoping January's test comes back clean since I'm sure half my ills are just side effects.If you've ever had a Z-pack, that's 250mg azithromycin usually taken for 5-7 days. It can be tough on the digestive tract in that amount, but I've been taking 500mg for 5 months now & it has the least side effects of the antibiotics.
Jim wrote: "No, I haven't had a Covid test. I have something similar to non-contagious TB. Basically feels like I have a bad case of bronchitis constantly. Tough to get rid of - 4 antibiotics for a year ...Ouch. No, never had TB. My family is prone to pneumonia, though I think I've avoided that (so far). My Mom constantly struggled with that in her later years. But what finally felled her was a stroke one night. Went to bed one night feeling OK. Didn't wake up. My ideal way to check out!
Peter wrote: "...Went to bed one night feeling OK. Didn't wake up. My ideal way to check out!"Agreed! Quick & final. I don't want to be tethered to machines like my grandfathers were. Worse, both were revived against their & family wishes to linger for a couple more weeks on them. It was ridiculous since neither had any hope of survival & both suffered greatly.
Have you read Being Mortal: Medicine and What Matters in the End? Gawande is a doctor & does a great job with the subject including his father's battle with cancer. I gave it a 5 star review here:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
Jim wrote: "Peter wrote: "...Went to bed one night feeling OK. Didn't wake up. My ideal way to check out!"Agreed! Quick & final. I don't want to be tethered to machines like my grandfathers were. Worse, both..."
My wife's Mom went through that, for terminal diabetes. No hope, just running up the bill. Grrr
Gawande: Mt. TBR. He weites well.
Mod
On Sunday, at 5:35 pm, I noticed a satellite moving South to North across the plane of the ecliptic halfway between the Moon and Mars (as seen from El Cerrito.) Probably somewhere there is a website that could let me figure out which satellite. But I'm not nerdy enough to try to figure it out.
On a more personal note I suffered a great tragedy last night: my game controller broke! The "Y" button doesn't bounce back anymore. Guess I'll have to go shopping today.
Ed wrote: "I went out on Sunday and Monday nights to take a gander at the Jupiter/Saturn conjunction. ..."When my son got a smart phone, he showed it to us & the only thing that really impressed me was Sky Map or some app like that. He could use it to label stars & even draw constellations. I think there was a version that did satellites, too.
I haven't bothered looking. It's too cold out, late, & our sky has been overcast. Besides, I've seen dots of light in the sky before, even when sober.
;)
Mod
The photos from telescopes are pretty neat.
Ed wrote: "The photos from telescopes are pretty neat. Indeed. Here;s the best I saw, courtesy of my eldest sister (not her photo):
https://www.facebook.co/photo.php?fbi...
Peter wrote: "Ed wrote: "The photos from telescopes are pretty neat. Indeed. Here;s the best I saw, courtesy of my eldest sister (not her photo):
https://www.facebook.co/photo.php?fbi......"
Huh. Firefox declares that a "security risk." I have a copy at my FB page, https://www.facebook.com/peter.tillma...
Jim wrote: "No, I haven't had a Covid test. I have something similar to non-contagious TB. Basically feels like I have a bad case of bronchitis constantly. Tough to get rid of - 4 antibiotics for a year after ..."Go get yourself a probiotic at the health food store. That will help. You antibiotics are killing your gut bacteria, which you need to make you feel good. I went thorough months of antibiotics and was sick as a dog along with the runs. It helped. of course, check with your doctor in case I am wrong.
Ed wrote: "I went out on Sunday and Monday nights to take a gander at the Jupiter/Saturn conjunction. For me, even on Sunday they already looked like one single dot. (But with my eyes, even the Pleiades look ..."It is all clouds here on the East coast. I badly wanted to see this star!
Papaphilly wrote: "Go get yourself a probiotic at the health food store. ..."I started taking a couple immediately & have kept up with them, but my gut has still changed a lot. Everyone's mix is different, so that's not surprising, but it upsets me since I've had a wonderful digestive system all my life. No longer.
In the future, folks with MAC might only take this 4th antibiotic that I'm on. It's delivered via a nebulizer, so directly into the lungs which makes a lot more sense than broad spectrum antibiotics throughout the body. It's very new & there are some kinks to work out with it, though.
One kink are the medicine bottles themselves. They're small & yet require quite a bit of strength & dexterity to break into. They have this little pull tab that will break off if not pulled exactly right to rip off a metal covering. Exactly what you'd want to put on something old, feeble folks have to use, right? SMH Typical of stuff designed by committee.
It looks like the weather wants us to all stay home today & Xmas. We got up to 54 yesterday, so I moved a load of hay from the big barn to the horse barn to fill it up. Heavy winds (40 mph) blew in during the evening, it started to rain, & the temp has plummeted to close to freezing. The high tomorrow is supposed to be in the mid 20s. We're going to get rain turning to sleet & snow, too. We're only supposed to get a little snow, 2" at the very most. Since we really don't have anywhere to go, I plan to ignore it save on the porches. There are few places colder than the seat of an open tractor which is what I use for clearing the lane.
Getting my diesel tractor started in temps below the mid 20s is a PITA now since the electric line out to the big barn shorted out. I don't need electric out there very often since it's just a storage barn. Plugging in the block heater is one of the few reasons & that can be handled by my little generator, although getting it out to the barn will be a chore. Still, I can manage if I have to.
Ed wrote: "My neighbor had that sky app, too. It was neat. However, she somehow thought that the conjunction involved Uranus, so she still pointed it in the wrong direction. I set her straight.The photos fr..."
Glad to hear that your neighbor is no longer looking at Uranus, Ed. HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!
Well, it's funnier if you say it out loud.
Papaphilly wrote: "Merry Christmas to all!"And to all a good night!
Mod
Mo’ fas’er an’ fas’er de’ gator dey came
He whistle an’ holler an’ call dem by name:
“Ha, Gaston! Ha, Tiboy! Ha, Pierre an’ Alcee’!
Gee, Ninette! Gee, Suzette! Celeste an’Renee’!
To de top o’ de porch to de top o’ de wall,
Make crawl, alligator, an’ be sho’ you don’ fall.”
Like Tante Flo’s cat t’ru de treetop he fly,
W’en de big ole houn’ dorg come a run hisse’s by.
http://www.thelouisianaweekend.com/ca...
Merry Christmas to all, till I saw you some mo'!
The Evolution of Science Fiction
Books mentioned in this topic
A History of the English Speaking Peoples, 4 Vols (other topics)Charmian Kittredge London: Trailblazer, Author, Adventurer (other topics)
A City on Mars: Can We Settle Space, Should We Settle Space, and Have We Really Thought This Through? (other topics)
Bleak House (other topics)
A Night in the Lonesome October (other topics)
More...
Authors mentioned in this topic
Winston Churchill (other topics)Roger Zelazny (other topics)
Felix Salten (other topics)
Sam Kean (other topics)
Chuck Tingle (other topics)
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I had a vivid dream last night, of when we last had a house with a shop! We had bought a new place (in my dream) with a BEaUTIFUL shop -- and the guy had left all his tools! Bit of a mess, but hey!
Here in reality, my "shop" is a crappy sheet of fake-presswood under the house, with a gravel "floor". Doubles as storage area (turns into crawl space as you go uphill). In wet winters, I have to watch to make sure I didn't put anything on dirt that's about to get wet. Annoying, but at least we have some space.... No rain yet this winter.
Since COVID, house prices have really jumped in our little coastal town (SLO County, Calif.) House across the street sold recently: I thought it was WAY overpriced, since owners were asking $550K, and it's smaller than ours. WRONG: sold in a week, for full price. That's for 1100 sq ft on a 4,000 sq ft lot with drainage problems! Whoa.