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Connecting The Dots

Two remaining curious dots from the satellite "shoot-down" this week.  First, a couple of expert emails from genuine rocket surgeons:

"I used to work at a Rocket test facility, were we testes satellite engines. There are 2 type of engines Bi-propellant and Mono-propellant. No matter which type the engines were the explosion would burn both the Oxidizer and the Fuel.

The typical liquid fuels used for a Bi-propellant engine are N2O4 (Nitrogen tetroxide) the Oxidizer and and UDMH (Unsymmetrical Dimethylhydrazine) the Fuel. For a Mono-propellant engine MMH (Monomethylhydrazine).

The bi-propellant engine mixes the 2 liquids together in the combustion camber. The mono-propellant uses a heated catalyst bed and the liquid passes through the bed to ignite the fuel.

Here is a link to a bi-propellant engine http://www.astronautix.com/props/n2o4udmh.htm "

Now, after your spelling quiz on the chemical names is turned in, it gets more interesting with the second email:

"Dear George,

I read your blog frequently and wanted to comment on the intercept. 1st--oxygen is not required. There is a lot of kinetic energy in this kind of impact and it would make a lot of light. 2nd--having said that, it didn't look right to me.

I was the ***** ********* on the first successful space intercept on June 10, 1984--the Homing Overlay Experiment. This kind of collision should produce a prompt plasma flash which I did not see here.

When objects hit at those speeds, the materials actually ionize. I'm suspicious that it did not hit. There are other ways to make it look as if it might have hit. It could well be a deception operation."

With headlines like "Pentagon: Satellite Debris Not a Danger" the folks outside of corpgov land are left wondering if "Satellite shoot-down fuels fears of arms race".

The Nice, Quiet War

That Turkey has invaded Iraq is not yet getting the same kind of prime time MSM coverage that we'd expect if it were a little less NATO-friendly country involved. Say, Iran for example?  Where's the neocon outage here?

Bigger War

We read how the Kremlin's boss (although soon to be man-behind the curtain after March 2 elections) Vlad Putin is warning the West over Kosovo's "independence".

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This whole Kosovo-Serbia thing is a marketing battle for now.  The West is selling "democracy" which the rest of the world views as 'gunpoint diplomacy' on the one hand, and selling "economic redevelopment" instead of natural resource exploitation, on the other.

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Positioning, positioning - back to my nap: In the end, it doesn't really matter, because both sides are owned/controlled by the ultra-rich, better known as the globalist PowersThatBe, who have learned over the centuries that conflict is a dandy tool of economic exploitation, population control, assurance of wealth, and to label as traitors those who see through the fog. 

Speaking of seeing through the fog...

AWACS Lite

"Israeli Air Force integrates home-made miniaturized, long-distance AWACS."

Yahsoft - Microhoo

Microsoft promises not to uproot Yahoo.  I'm Santa Claus.

Any Port In a Storm

The decline of the markets into the close Friday was masterfully orchestrated with a report that an Ambac Financial bailout come come next week.  So could the Easter bunny, so we'll pay less attention to rumors and more to hard facts.

Questions From a Headline

"Urinary tract infections may com from pets" proclaims a headline this morning.  Hmmmm...maybe people are a lot more familiar with their pets than I thought...

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Another thought-provoking headline:  "Saudi men arrested for 'flirting'".

The Runs: Planning Genius

"Rice says has no plan to run for vice president"  Fine.  I didn't have plans to vote for her.

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Today's McTempest:  The republicorp wannabe "McCain hopes for Castro's speedy demise".  Isn't that just the kind of tact and sensitivity you want to see running US foreign relations?  Here's my suggestion where McCainites ought to be clicking...Hint: Wishing ill for others has a way of 'blowing back' and linguistically health issues will come calling on McCain before election day.

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And, while we're in a presidential wannabe high risk window, the Secret Service denies giving the stand-down order to relax security to speed up lines at a recent Obama rally... This is making a big enough noise in the MSN that it might be the linguistic read, or something along the line of these fears is still ahead - very hard to read this stuff.

Free Speech Issue?

The headline "Canada: Afghan Debate Endangers Troops" can be read two ways.  One is that the Taliban are reading Canadian media and taking comfort - or there's an attempt going to stampede Canadians into a more US-like footing.  Your call, eh?

Truth Leaks?

"Diana inquest will go on despite accusations of farce, says coroner"  Why, of course it will - the story is still selling papers.

Mandatory DNA Tracking

The UK government has ruled out a national DNA database on "practical and ethical" grounds. The Brits are perhaps a little less easily fooled, than we in the land of corpgov.  My bad pun of the morning which would make a fine headline:  National DNA Database: Idea of a few pricks, swabs.."  'Course we'll never see it in MSM...

Stealth Crashes

Remains have been found of a crash in Venezuela that took 46 lives.  The crash of a B-2 last night on Guam cost about $1.2 billion.  You're the bank on that one.

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Coping: About Utilization

Call it turning a lemon into lemonade, if you will, but about a month ago, while wandering through Lowes I spotted a six-light halogen light system on sale for something like $13-bucks.  Never one to pass up a "good deal" I tossed it into the cart and didn't give it a seconds thought.

A couple of weeks rolled by and I got tired of bumping into the box on the workbench, so I decided to open it up and have a look.  The key thing I had gotten from the box was that it was 'spot' lights and they were '20-watts' and I was thinking "You know, these would make dandy workspace lights in the shop..."

Unfortunately, as I got to looking at what I had purchased, it became clear that I should have read the fine print - I've always been slow to remember to do that.  "12 VOLT SYSTEM" was there clear as the dickens and I didn't have the required 12-volt power supply to run the system.  Everything went back in the box and I vowed to come up with a 'creative solution' at some unspecified time down the road.

Well, yesterday was the 'end of the road' apparently:  As I was cleaning up the shop (or at least starting to) it occurred to me that I should put the battery charger in the automotive cabinet.  "Wait!  That's a 12-volt power supply!"

Sure enough - six 20-watt bulbs would be a load of 120-watts total and remember Power divided by volts equals amps (P//E=I)  (120w/12v=10amps) I knew that the light load (pardon the bad electronics pun here) would be a light load on the 15 amp charger.  This particular charger was a Wally-World $39 unit which will do a 5 amp trickle, a 15-amp medium, and a 100+ amp start - so I figured it should do just fine as a light source.

True, the makers of the ground stakes probably hadn't figured on their lights being mounted off studs, but that was easily rectified at the drill press in a minute or two.

Because we keep a well-stocked small hardware store's worth of parts around the ranch, coming up with a few utility boxes for a switch and a switched outlet was no problem: Most battery chargers don't have an on/off switch.

How to connect the 12-volt system to the battery charger was easily solved, too.  A 12" piece of 1/4-inch by 1-inch  fiberglass antenna insulator was pulled out of the parts bin.  Three holes to mount, some crimp-on ring connector and a couple of 1/4-inch stainless steel bolts 2-inches long gave the battery charging clips something to bite; the charger can be unplugged in seconds and ready for use the once or twice a year we need it for its intended purpose.

An hour and a half later, it was done.  Walking into the shop is a regular looking switch,  which provides from ;damn fine task lighting  If you squint at the upper right on the post you can see where the charger lives - the switched outlet is right above it. ('scuse the messy bench...many projects underway...that's a drill press on the left, a chop saw on the right and all kinds of things in between... and one light doesn't show because it points to the drill press...)

The point of all this?  (*I assume you are bright enough to use only a charger heavily enough rated, and I suppose you wouldn't want one of these lash-ups where the kids can grab it, but this is a ranch, for heavens sake...and yes, there is a point here somewhere). 

Utilization!  One of the main keys to getting more out of life is utilization.

Does it make sense to have a $35,000 car to drive 5,000 miles a year?  Not to me when I can get a $15,000 cat, no mileage limit, and save more than 50%.  I'd much rather spend the difference on important stuff - like building out the ranch, food and tequila.  Maybe even some travel one of these days.

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The only way I could justify a large sailboat was by living on it full time.  Unless you do that, owning a boat really is "a fiberglass-lined hole in the water into which you throw money."  If you want the true feeling of sailboat racing, you can go stand in a cold shower and tear up $100 bills for a while...

Similarly, does it make sense to own an airplane?  Only if I needed to travel on my own schedule and don't want to buy a first-class ticket.  Yeah, flying used to be fun when I was younger, but nowadays, you need to fly so many hours a month to keep your IFR ticket, and damn near everywhere is IFR worth going.  And there's the hangar, the annuals (maintenance) and all the rest of it - right down to the nearly constant updating of the NAV system.  If I really needed to go somewhere in that  much of a hurry, I could charter a jet and be money ahead, I reckon.

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This might set you off, but...tie up $40-thou in an RV?  Not unless I was going to live in it half the time, or more - and then you've got the RV'ing equivalent of a tie-down or moorage - $30 a night is not uncommon in a good RV park to 'dock' that land yacht.  And, you get marvelous gas mileage - what, 6 or 8 MPG?  At least on the boat I had a sanitation service come around and pump the holding tank for me.  I'm too old to be dumping a port-apotty.

Why, just the interest or investment potential of $40-grand - hell, just the depreciation on a $40-thousand dollar rig - pays for how many first class hotel nights where if you can spell priceline.com?

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Something to be pondered:  Look at everything in your life, find the expensive under-utilized things, and see if there's not some way to get more use out of them.;  It may seem a bit Rube Goldberg'ish, but it's really fun...besides, like Pappy used to say "You can only spend it once.."

But some things, like my battery charger, I can use twice...

OK, maybe it wouldn't be fair to fault you for owning a plane, a big sailboat, an RV or 10-rifles to hunt one deer each season.  Yup, if I did that you might fault me for owning (let me count...hmmm) 10 complete HF ham radio stations.  Hell, I'll readily confess that I only really need eight or nine of them...

Besides, three of them have big DC power supplies and those are backups for the battery charger...where's my coffee?

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Credit Cards to Avoid

Forbes has a dandy slide show on five credit cards to avoid.

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Send snip & save ideas to george@ure.net

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Friday February 22, 2008

War's Here

Well, our War in the Middle East has kicked off this morning. Far enough ahead of schedule that this is more likely foreplay than the main event. Turkey has invaded Northern Iraq.

To be sure, this is only the first round of what's ahead in modelspace.  In the meantime, as the war meme spreads regionally a couple of things to take note of:

• The US seems likely to have given a wink, wink, nod, nod, to Turkey because the PKK separatists are listed by the US, EU and NATO as a terrorist organization.

• Will the Iranians attempt to take advantage of the northern distraction?

• Will Israel wait till this all ramps up a bit more before its expected 'lashing out that doesn't go well' on the Gaza or against Syria (or both)?

• What will this do to gold prices?  (I expect over $1,000 shortly) and

• Will OPEC get involved in what's ahead?

Lots of questions to be sorted out by events in the coming weeks...

The Weak End's Almost Here

Not to sound like a whiner, but the markets are continuing to act range-bound and it's boring the hell out of me.  so much so ,that last week I ditched the usual ChartPack for Peoplenomics subscribers explaining that there wasn't enough going on to justify the work required to update the charts.  How many ways can you say "sideways" before sounding repetitious?

This weekend, the ChartPack is back, although until we exceed 12,744 for a couple of days, or drop below 11,634 on a daily close, or under 12,099 on a weekly basis, there's not much reason to do anything beyond surf the web and do projects around the ranch.   Putting in spot lights for the major machines in my shop is really high on my list today; yesterday I put together a roll around crib to hold plywood and other sheet material.  Believe me, that was way more exciting than watching the Dow drop 143 on weak economic indicators.  Duh.

The report that Oil is back under $98 will likely soften any further declines today.  Wake me up later...

Lucid In The Sky

Yes, the "Pentagon is Confident Missile Hit Satellite Tank" goes the report in the NY Times.  The same story is being  heralded elsewhere, and overseas.

But, as you might expect, UrbanSurvival readers continue to be almost as skeptical as Moscow.  "Where's the oxygen to cause the explosion in those pictures coming from?" asked on reader.  Tisk, tisk.  Hey!  Speaking of which...

Photoshop Goes Linux

Google is funding development to make Photoshop run/better on Linux.

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\Students of corporate strategy (or b-schoolers who are looking for an easy paper to write) can almost infer the graceful balance of the Lao Tzu/ness (Laozi'ness) of this move on the one hand, or the Sun Tzu'ness of it.

If you're too lazy to think deeply at this hour, consider the delicate balance - corporate jujutsu (柔術, jūjutsu) if you will -- of the Search Monster board seeing the Operating System board going after control of the Search Monster's rival Yahoo. 

Google puts a little emphasis on open systems- a message and a strategic threat to the operating systems portion of guess who's balance sheet?

As we read how Microsoft is going fishing in silicon Valley for new Yahoo Board members, might we ever so humbly suggest they check the local dojos?  This is shaping up as a corporate episode of Kung Fu.

Banker's Lifestyles

I don't suppose I need to point this out - especially if your family finances are stretched rubber band tight, or worse, you're facing foreclosure - but the ABC headline "As Economy Slips, Yacht Sales Skyrocket" just screams "denial" by the well-to-do / Ruling Class / PowersThatBe.

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A person prone to high blood pressure might also want to skip the Wall Street Journal story about how "Countrywide Treats bankster to Ski-Resort Trip" next week.  Blood not squirting out of your eyes yet?  Try this quote on for size, then:

"The first items on the agenda for guests arriving Monday evening: Cocktails and ski fittings. Next is dinner at the Spago restaurant, whose menu includes Kobe steak with wasabi potato puree for $105. (For the budget-minded, pan-roasted buffalo filet with Kabocha pumpkin flan is $54.) "

I don't know if they have their "working sessions" filled up yet, but Elaine and I wouldn't mind a little skiing.  besides, I could do a ...er......PowerPoint on socially responsible finance?  You just tell us when the corporate jet will pick us up in Tyler...

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I don't know how many times I have told the linguistics team that "imagery of stringing banksters up from light poles sounds a bit overboard..."    Now, I am beginning to see it....and speaking of which...

McPained

Pies and prolog are not my idea of a party, but Cliff and Igor at www.halfpasthuman.com are just about beside themselves with the McCain story out in the NYT this week.  So much so that they sent me an email about it...

"the linguistics about the 'major candidate' who would be 'caught cheating' about this time came out in the mccain being accused of cheating on his wife. I had thought it would be more like cheating on votes, but universe delivers what it wants. Soooo....this may be the 'stressor' which creates the 'illness week' for mccain also detailed in that same area of the last report. Part 6 or 7 I think. This can also be the pivot for the later in sept illness period of the same sort.

anyway, just saw the linguistics on the mccain cheating thing on teevee, ran the language off the cable news sites and we had better than 87% correlation, so bob's-your-uncle, and now onto the other areas linked temporally to this event.

tres cool, eh? "

Well, yeah, the time machine/predictive linguistic seem to be fitting nicely.  Which is not good news for a presidential candidate (*the scholar) or Middle East countries, but we'll get to these upcoming events in time. 

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Subscriptions are open for the next linguistics run.  First time you subscribe is $240 and then $70 per run after that.  The future ain't free - hell it ain't even cheap.

Trading The Future(s)

To be sure, while there's lot of interesting newsy stuff in the linguistic runs, the part which holds my (monkey mind) fascination continues to be the strong prices foreseen for grains.  So far, this has been a near genius-level investment decision on my part.

Yeah, nice to know when a war is going, when people are going to turn on banksters, debt-peddlers, and such, but I can't do anything about those issues.  And you can bet your last cent that my views on the one error the Framers of the Constitution made (*see Around the Ranch)  aren't going to change policy.

Instead I will focus on the grain prices and buying low, selling high (buying near and selling dear, if you prefer that);

• "Wheat prices could defy a recession"

• "Wheat price hike could bring rice-flour boom"

• "States [in India] get extension to act against wheat hoarding"

• "Maple Leaf (Foods) losses grow as wheat prices soar"

• "Price of bread rising on wheat shortage."

Coffee and the other 'softs' aren't doing an thing in modelspace, but reports of coffee hoarding seem to justify our call options there as "Robusta coffee heads for fifth weekly gain on funds, hoarding"

And word that Starbucks is testing $2.25 and $2.50 coffee is just delightful news.  Still, the 4% rise in my account overnight could just as easily go the other way.  Good thing I don't give investment advice.  Elaine asked me why I don't offer advice even to our kids.  Answer:  If I lose money, it's my responsibility.  I don't want to be responsible for losing someone else's money - that's their job.  The crack-up boom ends this fall and shortly thereafter, to borrow Jim Kunstler's book title, we'll all be in a "World made by hand".  It's a big flash in the pan, but likely just a flash.

For now, a tradeoff between collecting food, paper (*as in money), and things seems in order. Which infers a balance between gardening, commodity charts and the farm hand tools at Lehman's and elsewhere.

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