Martinis at Midnight

2007-03-24T23:35:00.000-04:00

life got busy

i haven't posted in about 7 months... dang! where does the time go?

i guess once the kids went back to school, things sorta got crazy. then before i knew it the holidays were upon us and immediately after that, it all got insane (but in a cool way).

since the beginning of january, i've been a part of FIRST

take a moment and check out the link; it'll do a much better job of explaining than i can do.

it's been the busiest, craziest and probably to most enjoyable winter i have ever had. i've been a mentor for the Creston-904 team. we kicked butt in chicago last weened and will kick more butt at GVSU next weekend. our team was on the winning alliance in chicago and will be going to the Championship in atlanta in three weeks. i'll be at both competitions, and i intend to blog the entire event. it'll be a little delayed, since i won't have immediate internet access.

anyhow, i'm back and i will post more in the near future. sorry for the absence, my life got busy...

2006-08-25T23:43:00.000-04:00

Pluto

yesterday Pluto was "demoted" (as all the press headlines read). it is no longer called a planet, but a "dwarf planet". so what? i guess why i'm writing this is the press' use of the word demoted. it seems like they are telling the world that Pluto now is less important than it was the day before. that is utterly ridiculous!

i feel that most of the most interesting places in our solar system aren't on planets at all. the moons of Jupiter and Saturn are without doubt some of the most interesting places we know of. actual liquid was recently discovered on Titan (a moon of Saturn).

so what if they change the classification of Pluto? it certainly isn't because it is less interesting, it is only because it doesn't really conform to the characteristics of the other 8 planets.

let's all get over it and move on.

2006-07-17T23:28:00.000-04:00

observation log ++

this past saturday my family and i attended the summer picnic at the graaa and had a real nice time. it was a clear evening and even though the observatory was going to be available, i decided to bring my family (and our guest) home for some observing here.

i set up my scope in the warmth of a typical july evening, only to realize that Jupiter had already moved further west than i expected. to avoid the trees i needed to move the scope down the driveway (south) . i took the tube off the mount and moved the mount + counter weights to a better position. now, sweating like a pig, i proceeded to mount the tube and balance the system. things worked out well from there, we viewed Jupiter and moons for a while. the bands shown nicely, however the red spot (and jr) were not visible. after a while of observing Jupiter i moved on to the Ring Nebula (which i can find now given a little time). i tried all my eyepieces on the Ring and decided that my 10mm worked pretty good, given the conditions. all in all it was a short/sweaty night of observing, but well worth it.

yesterday we took in the al gore movie "an incovenient truth". i'm not going to post a review, but i "got" the movie and i think people need to see it. our worlds future is at stake, we need to keep it safe. life is not all about money, but helping keep the Earth around for a while longer might be part of it.

today i watched the shuttle land; i was at work (i watched NASA tv online), it was a beautiful thing. i'm very glad that everything went well for this mission. keep it up NASA, you guys are awesome!

2006-07-05T19:47:00.000-04:00

a few months ago i told myself that i would be more committed to writing in my blog, and obviously that hasn't happened. hopefully i'll get back on track and continue to log my thoughts and adventures.

over the last few days i've kept one eye on NASA TV while going on about my normal fourth of july weekend activities. i wasn't too surprised that Discovery didn't launch on saturday or sunday, but i was hoping that i'd get the chance to watch the full coverage at home rather than secretly watching it online at work. i really hoped it would go either monday or tuesday. well, as everyone knows, Discovery took off yesterday in a flawless launch. i was glued to the tv for about 2 hours before lift off and about the same after. i did watch a little tennis and cycling in there too, so that my family didn't think i was completely nuts. before lift off, my kids would just look at me and shake their heads as i intently listened to the sporadic technical chatter and watched the shuttle on the pad; the only visible motion - gas venting out it's back end.

before launch day i learned the ISS and shuttle would both have an orbit that would allow them to be visible during the evening for the next day or two. once the shuttle launched i checked heavens-above for times and trajectories of its orbit and it turned out that we just might be able to see it.

to top off a great independence day, we went downtown to watch the fireworks. armed with shuttles local itinerary, we sat patiently waiting for the fireworks to begin, while watching the sky for Discovery. the city lights were bright and a thin layer of clouds formed around the moon and westward. my daughter sat with her camera, hoping to snap a picture of the shuttle amidst the blaze of fireworks, but the show didn't start when we thought it would and it was my son who first spotted the faint glow of Discovery emerging from the cloudy haze. the shuttle moved steadily across the sky but was too faint/small to show up on the digital camera. unfortunately we didn't get the picture we hoped and i only saw the shuttle for a few brief seconds, but nevertheless it was very cool.

the huge crowd downtown was oblivious to the event that had just taken place. would people have been interested if they'd have known what was happening, or do people just not care about science and space anymore? the fireworks started a few minutes later and were quite spectacular.

so, as NASA has returned to flight, i've returned to blogging. i hope that i'll have a few more posts before NASA launches Atlantis in late august.

2006-04-16T22:43:00.000-04:00

nothing to report

so it has been a few weeks (at least) since my last post. i've been kind of busy, but nothing unbearable, and i haven't really had a lot on my mind to write about.

i was close to posting an entry about my evening seeing nickel creek at the end of march, but i never got around to writing it. nickel creek (if you don't already know) is probably my most favorite music group (maybe of all times). i saw them in concert a few years ago and then again just a few weeks ago. i may also get the chance to see them again this summer. anyhow, this last concert was almost indescribable, and that's all i'm going to say. it was the best concert i think i've ever seen.

the breaks in the clouds we've had have come on nights that i've been too lazy to get my telescope out. the clear nights are coming a little more frequently now and hopefully i'll get back out to do some observing again soon.

thanks for reading and i'm going to try to be posting a little more regularly in the coming days.

take care my friends.

2006-03-18T23:56:00.000-05:00

back to kisses

lately this blog has been completely devoted to my feeble endeavors into the world of astronomy and astrophysics, but not this post...

today i returned to my roots (sorta). you may know that i am a self taught (extremely amateur) musician. i've been playing guitar for about 25 years, and writing some songs along the way. i am (by training) a software engineer (computer dude). i've been developing software to put food on the table since i graduated from college. i can still remember sitting in my dorm room with my commodore 64 thinking "it would be so cool to write music with a computer".

that technology came into the publics grasp not long after, however, i then heard the calling to write acoustic folky songs; i needed to be a purist, at least for a little while. i put away the amps and invested in a nice acoustic guitar. i learned some finger style guitar work and actually had a lot of nice comments on the songs i wrote. then came the drought.

for the past 3+ years i haven't accomplished anything musical; until today. today i sat down with my computer and some cool high tech software and cranked out some music. it was fun. it was a lot of fun. finally, again to be in control of what i was listening to. if i didn't like what i heard, i could change it. i could make it what i wanted.

i wrote a couple simple electronica tunes (remembering in the beginning to give them a kiss "Keep It Simple Stupid"). i can't wait to try something more complicated and maybe even play guitar along with the computer. maybe tomorrow... :)

stay tuned, more science stuff coming soon.

2006-03-04T23:16:00.000-05:00

good night

in my last post i mentioned that the next post would be about stardust @ home. well, stardust @ home is running a little late and so am i. i haven't had the time to go through the tutorial, but i plan to do that in the next week or so.

tonight i did get the telescope out and this time i had the patience to polar align it and also to set the setting circles. i'd never really taken the time to learn how to use setting circles but tonight i decided i'd give it a try. it was actually very easy once i figured out a few basic things. maybe i'll post an entry in the near future about what i learned.

after my scope was aligned, i jotted down the RA and DEC coordinates of a few objects that i wanted to find, and headed back out into the crisp, clear evening. the first thing i headed for was M1 (the crab nebula). wow, it was incredibly easy; i could have never found this without using the coordinates and the setting circles. M1 was very very faint in my slightly light polluted sky, but i could still make it out.

the next object on my list was M35 which again appeared very faint, and i am not totally convinced that i found it. however, i guess it did look something like some of the amateur astrophotography images i later found online.

since i was in the neighborhood i took a look at Saturn, and it was quite beautiful tonight. after a nice gaze, i moved along to M45 (the beehive cluster). this was again easy to find and a nice object to view. finally i located M67, which is another dense open star cluster.

all of these objects were quite easy to find once the scope was properly aligned; provided you have the coordinates.

all in all it was an excellent evening to be looking up. i found a few new objects that i've never seen before and i am anxious to get back out and try it again. there are 2 words that come to mind right now, and they are "good night".

2006-02-14T23:18:00.000-05:00

where's george?

today i learned of an interesting and unique place in the internet. i guess it's unique; i've never seen another site like it. apparently this site has been around for about 8 years. (that must have been the 8 years i spent under my rock)

anyhow, the idea is quite simple - but may have some cool scientific value. the idea is to track dollar bills and see where they go. if you have a dollar bill, you enter the serial number and the site tells you if the bill has been entered into the system and if it has it can tell you some history about where it has been. you also include your zip code when entering the information. it sounded like a fun and harmless experiment, so i entered the serial numbers of 10 - one dollar bills that i had in my wallet. then i immediately spent 9 of them. :)

apparently the site will email me when any of the bills get re-entered into "where's george", and it will tell me the general area of where it is. i suppose by now you are either bored to death because you already now about this OR you are ready to start entering your bills info. (you possibly might think it's some sort of scam for someone to try to steal your dollar bills, but i doubt it)

the web site for this project is at:
http://www.wheresgeorge.com

now for the science... it was brought up that studying how money travels between people might be a good indicator as to how viruses travel. this idea has some flaws (i usually give viruses to people i know, and money to people i don't.... go figure) but i guess the concept is pretty good overall. some scientists are quite concerned about how an avian (bird) flu outbreak might travel. i'm all for helping scientists, so i joined up. if my dollar bills end up somewhere, i'll certainly post the details.

next time i'll be posting about stardust @ home.... till then.

2006-02-09T22:53:00.000-05:00

kwajalein rockets

i'm posting the link to the blog that already has some cool information about the spacex launch.
http://kwajrockets.blogspot.com/

i'll be watching this site all day tomorrow. :)

2006-02-08T22:45:00.000-05:00

the falcon is ready to fly

the next couple days could be an exciting time for the private space flight industry. friday february 10 is the newly scheduled launch date for the falcon 1 rocket developed by spacex. spacex, founded by elon musk, is aiming to put the first privately funded spacecraft into low earth orbit.

tomorrow they will conduct a full system test of the rocket, which includes a brief ignition of the engine. the engine burns a potent mixture of liquid oxygen and purified kerosene.

december 19 was the original launch date, however that launch had to be scrubbed due to a faulty pressurization valve on the first stage fuel tank.

tomorrow i will try to have a blog source for the launch. to the best of my knowledge, that may be the only available coverage of this historic event.

2006-02-07T22:12:00.000-05:00

time is money

yesterday i posted a blurb about the state of science education in the united states. i rambled on about how most science teachers are not properly preparing our children in the areas of science and technology. go read it if you haven't.

today i want to veer off in the direction of science application in the workforce. so many times i've heard that if we don't do a better job of educating our children (in science and math) we'll be over taken technologically by other countries. then it's predicted that the next great wave of wonderful advances will not be made in the united states but by countries that have educated their children to a higher level. this all makes sense, and in no way am i stating that the united states should have the sole power to invent every last thing that mankind will ever need.

now here's the part for discussion. how many times have you heard of someone that has devoted a huge amount of time (and money) to school, only to graduate with a phd in astronomy, physics or math and not be able to find a job. what the hell?!... then they end up teaching at the university where they did their doctorate. this should make no sense at all, but it probably does.

in some ways it sounds like most kids today are smarter than we give them credit for. we wonder why more kids aren't pursuing careers in the sciences, but yet when a few of them do, they struggle to land that job they had in their dreams.

but when that science dream job never comes above the horizon, there's always the business side of the world. the united states is so incredibly in love with business and making money that it makes my stomach turn. it's all over the news (enron), it's in prime time tv (the apprentice) and it's changing the culture of america. in order to make money, you need to be a ruthless s.o.b. and not get caught. the united states is focused only on what makes money (right now) and not what makes a healthy and growing economy.

as long as our intent is immediate gratification, long term subjects like science and research will unfortunately never be rewarded. these things take time... and time is money.

2006-02-06T23:17:00.000-05:00

science in the public schools

on a recent science friday podcast (12/30/2005) [website] the argument of why the number of scientists graduating today is much less than it was in the mid 1950's, when today there are more people than ever are graduating from college. i found this topic quite interesting, since i once had the idea that it might be fulfilling to teach high school science.

the guests discussed reasons which mainly focused on students in high school not being properly prepared. this is partly stemming from a lack of teachers that posses a passion for science, and also the no-child-left-behind act forces schools to teach memorization of science terms in order to pass achievement testing (and get government funding). science classes no longer have the opportunity to teach problem solving and from my experience, high school science rarely uses the laboratory. everything is theoretical bookwork. science today forces (or makes it desirable) to always get the right answer. in real life scientists rarely get the right answer. conversely they come up with ideas (problem solve) and then try to prove each other wrong. i also suggest that it is much less clear to a young adult what career choices are available to people with highly skilled science degrees. if you lose your job, there are not many want ads in the paper for an astrobiologist.

do you have an opinion on how our public schools teach science? if you do, i'd enjoy reading your comments.

thanks.

2006-01-26T22:42:00.000-05:00

roving mars

wow, tonight i had the privilege of getting a sneak preview of the new disney / imax movie roving mars. through the entire movie i was totally taken in by the mix of real film footage and computer animation. disney did a pretty good job making the transitions to and from the animated sections of the movie, however i was hoping to see more of mars in real life. the real life stills they had in the movie seemed like shots i had already seen.

of course they had a number of cool, big, loud scenes when the delta 2 heavy put the rover on a path to mars, and topped it off with cool effects when the rovers entered the martian atmosphere and bounced to a stop.

amazingly, i think the best part of the movie was when they were building the rovers in the clean rooms. the clarity of the film was stunning and the robots were absolutely beautiful. it kind of makes me feel weird to write that. stunning, beautiful robots... (ok, i'm a geek)

the big bang for this movie will be with kids. i took my 12 year old son and he is now (or again) inspired by space and science. i think this movie has the potential to do the same thing to a lot of young people across america. inspiring young minds is an awesome thing!

2006-01-23T23:31:00.000-05:00

question of the day

lets say that in the near future we gain the expertise to travel out of our solar system and to a nearby solar system. lets also say that we travel to a planet that is inhabited with a plethora of small un-intelligent creatures (wild animals). lets add that it took us a fair amount of time to get there. the question of the day is as follows: do you think our space travelers would kill and eat these alien creatures? especially if it looked better than the nasty dehydrated food they brought with them? this has probably already been dramatized in a book or movie, but i haven't seen or read it. please post a comment if you have an opinion or know of a book or movie i should enjoy.

2006-01-18T00:00:00.000-05:00

comments welcome

the new template is done (for now). leave me a comment on what you think. i'd appreciate it!
thanks,
roger

2006-01-15T22:59:00.000-05:00

observation log - January 14, 2006

last night it was clear again and i took the scope out to more solid ground (the driveway).

the moon was wicked-bright! dang, i needed sunglasses to view it for very long. i'm going to have to invest in some sort of filter if i want to do that again.

considering the conditions, it was a pretty good night. i viewed the moon in my 2" x 35mm eyepiece and it was really beautiful. i cranked up the magnification with the 1.25" x 10mm and took a long look at tycho and copernicus. the moon is simply amazing!

during my time out i also viewed saturn with the 10mm and the 2X barlow. that seemed to be too much magnification for the sky. i spent a bit of time on the orion nebula (m42 & m43) and also the pleiades (m45).

all in all it was a good night of observing. i packed things up rather early (i hate hauling that thing inside when it gets really late).

2006-01-13T23:15:00.000-05:00

observation log - January 12, 2006

finally the clouds cleared last night. this was the first time we've seen hardly any of the night sky since mid-november. right after dinner i decided to set up the scope, only planning on viewing the moon. i didn't think there would be much else to see since the moon was full and majorly polluting the sky.

i also have a new eyepiece that i've been wanting to try out. about a week ago i ordered a 2 inch - 35mm eyepiece from orion. it's not a high end eyepiece, but i had a few $$ and wanted something that could get some nice views of the winter nebulae.

since i was only intending on viewing the moon, i set the scope up on the deck and waited for it to cool. i did view the moon as it was rising through a couple naked maple trees, but couldn't get a good clear view of this criminal that was trying to steal what could be the only clear(ish) night all winter. as i waited for it to rise above the branches, i took a quick gander at mars. i needed more power to see it clearly, but then the slight wobbles of my deck made getting a steady view of mars almost impossible.

i didn't have a lot of time or patience, and decided to cut my observation short. before packing it up for the night i viewed andromeda for a while with my new eyepiece. it was extremely faint and quite un-impressive. this was only due to the moon and the slight haze in the sky. i'm quite happy right now with my eyepiece. i can't wait for a good dark, clear, cold night. however our forecast is quite murky for the next few days.

2006-01-08T23:22:00.000-05:00

Martinis at Midnight - 2005 Top Ten List

it's been a week since the beginning of the new year, so i've waited long enough to hear of any last minute additions to this years top ten list. remember, this site is about physics, music, martinis and pretty girls, but mostly astronomy. :)

drum roll please....

10. cosmos 1
the russian attempt at a solar sail spacecraft. read more about this nifty disaster here.

9. e=mc^2 + 100 years
did you know that it has been 100 years since Al Einstein came up with all his crazy ideas? well, most of them have been proven as fact.

8. nickel creek releases - why should the fire die?
awesome third album from the trio (not counting any solo albums or the MAS release)
http://www.nickelcreek.com/

7. space elevator comeptition
a healthy competition to build a machine that will climb a ribbon and eventually walk off into orbit. if you'd like to enter the competion, go here.

6. darpa grand challenge
almost 2 years ago i watched and waited to see if teams (mostly from universities) could build an autonomous vehicle that could (on it's own) navigate through a series of GPS points on a course that covered over 100 miles in the desert of california and nevada. i was dissappointed then that none of the vehicles even made it 10 miles, but i was thrilled to watch this years race when 5 teams completed the 132 mile course. the team that did it first walked away with $2 million. find out who won here.

5. danica patrick at indy (here's the pretty girl portion of the list)
i have always been a supporter of equal rights for everyone. i firmly believe that gender should not be a factor in type of competition. danica is an awesome indy car driver. she has single handedly regained my interest in indy car racing. in the past few years i have gravitated slightly towards nascar, i bite my tounge. indy car racing rules.
http://www.danicaracing.com/

4. the 10th planet? 2003 UB313
rewrite the science books; well maybe they should wait another year or so. who knows how many planets we'll have in our solar system by the time it's all said and done. xena? really?
find out more.

3. deep impact kisses tempel 1
there were more than just ordinary fireworks on july 4, 2005. deep impact was a mission to discover the mysteries inside a comet. deep impact did more than kiss comet tempel 1, it became "best friends forever" with that dirty snowball. read the whole story on the deep impact website.

2. nasa - space shuttle return to flight
space shuttle discovery returned to flight under enormous scrutiny. there are inherrent dangers with flying in space, and somehow most people think it should be like walking to the fridge for another can of pop. in my opinion, nasa is doing an incredible job with the money they have to put humans in space. in the near future, being an astronaut will be a dangerous job. with the information gained, someday space travel will be safe for everyone.

1. cassini/huygens
in my opinion, the most amazing things from 2005 all revolved around cassini/huygens. from inserting cassini into orbit around saturn (through a tiny gap in saturns rings) to the huygens probe dropping to the surface of titan to the images we are now getting back from cassini, this mission topped the best of the best for 2005. nasa and esa make an awesome team.

read more about the european huygens probe at esa.int

2005-12-15T23:30:00.000-05:00

there's gonna be some changes around here

it just takes a good dose of Christmas to get you thinking about the past year. i don't know if its writing Christmas letters or the thought of all the new years resolutions that were not realized or if it is just the snow, but i've been thinking about the last year a lot lately. my blogging hit rock bottom. i actually thought i'd have more time to devote to writing, but that time seemed to evaporate.

i really do feel like things are back on track now. once again i have been bouncing some science things around in the old noggin'. i hope to have some new fresh posts in the near future.

being unemployed all summer was rather stressful, and starting a new job has been stressful too. however i am very glad to have had a break in my career. i think i have a jump on my holiday projects, and hopefully i won't be up till 2am on Christmas eve putting an air hockey table together this year.

i don't think i have many readers of my blog anymore, so if you have been a reader in the past be prepared for some changes. i am planning on revamping my layout and trying to start over. i hope my comments stay in tact, and i appologize in advance if they don't. i want to thank Lar for posting some nice comments. i had to go back through the archives to find everything you wrote. i hope you are who i think you are.

have a merry Christmas everyone. come back soon, there's gonnna be some changes around here.

2005-10-30T22:49:00.000-05:00

Finally...

last night i took the telescope out to the veen observatory to do a little mars observing. it was a visitors night and they were anticipating big crowds. i just wanted to see mars as something more than a red dot and my wish came true. i set up my scope in the dark and waited patiently for mars to rise above the tree tops. once it was entirely visible you could clearly see the darker middle section of the planet. even though it was early and mars was only about half way up in the night sky, i could make out more detail than i had ever imagined. the sky was pretty good for seeing, but i don't think it was as good as it could have been. needless to say, we were pretty happy with what we saw.

also, last week i became one of the non-unemployed! i started work last monday at a small software development company that i've had an eye on for a long time. they develop CAD software for designing interior layouts and my background in CAD was what helped seal the deal (i think). i'm really excited to be working with this group of engineers. i hope that this is the beginning to a new start in my life.

on may 20, 2005 i lost my job to corporate downsizing. on october 24, 2005 i started what i hope is a long term relationship with what looks like a great company. i've gotten things back on track. i've been observing with my telescope. i've finished a bunch of projects around the house. i feel like my life is beginning to come together... finally....

2005-07-07T23:51:00.000-04:00

letterboxing

today i crudly and quickly made myself a custom rubberstamp suitable for letterboxing. this evening we set out on our first letterboxing adventure.

we arrived at the park where the letterbox was hidden shortly after 7pm. we followed the clues and were quickly able to tell that we were on the right track. with every passing minute and each new bug-bite we thought we were getting really close to finding the box. our sparkling new rubber stamps were aching to find a notepad somewhere amidst the trees and bugs.

we felt that we were closing in on the target, when suddenly our clues seemed to become jumbled. when once there was order, all of the sudden things didn't quite make sense. we thought we found the place where the letterbox was hidden, but we could not find it, and we were not sure of some of the turns we made. we left without finding the box, but we were all sure that it had to be there somewhere.

we followed the clues out of the area and ended up walking for at least 2 miles. we ended back at our truck after having spent more than an hour and a half walking through the bug infested woods of west michigan.

we all feel that we were close to finding the letterbox, but we were not completely prepared for the hunt that followed once we got to the site. we will probably try this again in a day or two, but tonight it's just good to sit and rest for a little while

2005-07-01T23:41:00.000-04:00

who said being unemployed is boring

i guess it's been 6 weeks now since i was down sized, and i haven't had a boring moment yet. it seems like looking for a new job has become almost a full time job in itself. i've had a number of interviews and a lot of phone conversations, but nothing has turned into an offer. this week has been a bit slower, i suspect the upcoming holiday has dampered the prospects.

there are only about a million and a half things i need to do around the house while i'm without a job. i've already painted the living room and now i'm getting ready to clean and seal the driveway. the valve on the swimming pool filter cracked and i fixed that last week. i've got a dead apple tree in the back yard and a couple huge tree branches that have broken off that need to be cut down. not to mention, i'm now the official mr. mom.

i've made it my goal to give my kids a great summer, but in this particular area, i think i'm failing. i keep trying to do cool things with them, but all i hear is "i'm so bored..."

when i was told that my company didn't need my help anymore, i immediately saw sights of rest and relaxation in my future. i don't know where that went, i've been busier than ever the last 6 weeks. maybe one of these days i'll get a job and have the chance to relax a little again.

2005-05-30T23:15:00.000-04:00

photography

photography has been an interest of mine since i was but a mere munchkin.

i experimented a lot with cameras and techniques and took a few pictures that were published in our school yearbook. then, for the reasons of life, my purpose for photography turned from "artistic and action" to "capture every moment".

so anyhow, i've been using firefox for quite a while now, but just recently started using the plug-in stumble upon. stumble upon lets you randomly hit a website based on preferences you set i picked that i enjoyed photography.

i have been randomly hitting websites that are devoted to artistic photography and just completely loving the different sites i've found. it has inspired me so much that i've started looking for places to buy ssslllooowww film.

i really want to start trying to take some artistic picures. hopefully i'll have some in the near future. i'll keep you posted.

2005-05-29T00:25:00.000-04:00

this week

i've survived my first week of being unemployed. i went to the unemployment office, updated my resume and responded to some want ads that i found. i also posted my resume on hotjobs.com and within a few hours i had a phone call and a very promising opportunity. after a few phone conversations and had an interview on friday morning. there may also be other opportunities in the works. next week i will know more.

last night i set up my telescope, however there was an abundance of light pollution which made seeing any deep sky objects almost impossible. i did view Jupiter and 4 of it's moons for a while. i packed up early since i couldn't see much of anything.

tonight we went to the observatory to help out with visitors night. everything went pretty good, and it was nice to get back out there. i am looking forward to spending more time there this summer.

it's funny, i thought i was going to be bored and not know what to do while being unemployed. it seems like last week i spent as much time working toward getting a new job as i did working at my previous job. plus i've had the added responsibility of being mr mom. it's all good though... i think that this week was just a mere turning point. next week all of the fun begins.

2005-05-20T23:48:00.000-04:00

the end of another chapter

it's been a few months since my last post. i suppose today it's time change that.

my life has been incredibly busy and stressful and i think being completely run-down hasn't helped the situation. anymore i search for a few minutes of time to myself and i never find it until very late at night. it seemed like every day i prayed for a break from all of this, but everyday things just seemed to get worse.

last summer i was worried about having surgery. i worried that there would be scars on my face and that i would be in pain for weeks. as it turned out there were no scars and the pain monster never reared it's ugly head. then, after Christmas, i apparently came down with a sinus infection which caused a lot of swelling around my eye and played havoc with my vision again. i was worried that i may actually have to go through the surgery with all the cutting and pain.... once again i saw the sinus specialist at U of M and he perscribed some antibiotics and steroids which worked wonders and my sinuses and sight have been just fine every since.

but just when you've dodged one curve ball, life tends to throw more just to see if you're on your toes.

this morning i finally became the victim of corporate downsizing. (at least that is what they told me) i've never been laid off before, and i am still not sure how i am supposed to react. in one view i feel a sense of relief and in another i am quite worried (again, i worry a lot). i was always a misfit at this company. suckered by a bait and switch job offer, i could never get to a point to prove my worth. so in one respect i feel relieved that this is finally over, on the other hand i am worried about an uncertain future.

with more time on my hands, i'll be posting more in the days ahead.

so as the unemployment rate continues to rise in the state with the highest unemployment rate in the country (michigan), i quitely end another chapter in my life.

2005-02-10T23:38:00.000-05:00

observation log

finally, after being stored away in a dark closet for 5 months, i took my telescope outside for a gander at the winter sky. i might say the sky was behaving very nicely tonight.

it was crystal clear and cold, probably between 15 and 20 degrees F. to me, the sky seemed very clear and seeing was very good. disclaimer: i'm an amateur, so i may not understand all the details about how the atmosphere should behave for optimal viewing.

tonight, my goal was to view the Orion nebula. i've seen countless pictures of this beautiful ball of gas, and even seen it through the telescope at the Veen observatory this past weekend, but i've never observed it on my own with my own equipment. it was incredibly easy to find tonight, and i had good clear contrast even through my 10mm eyepiece. so, i've now found M42 & M43 with my telescope, next to find something different.

the Pleiades (M45) seemed like an easy quick target, so i viewed this open cluster briefly.

i've also wanted to find/view comet Macholz. again, i saw this at the observatory last weekend, but i've wanted to "get it" myself. i did, and again it was amazingly easy. i think i'm slowly starting to learn the sky.

before taking down my equipment i viewed Sirius. this incredibly bright star just rose above the roof of my house before i need to pack up. i almost need to get my sunglasses; this star was almost as bright as Venus.

an excellent night at the scope; wish it could have been longer and hope to have it out again soon.

2005-01-16T23:19:00.000-05:00

solar flares, aurora, and huygens - oh my!

a couple days ago a major xclass explosion happend on the sun at sunspot 720. this sent a heap of sun junk (a coronal mass ejection or CME) our way. this sparked a nice little aurora tonight in west michigan. i could see nice spikey green rays shooting upward toward a single point directly over head. it was quite nice. i hope tomorrow night is clear again, we may be able to see more.

congratulations to the esa (European Space Agency) for successfully landing the Huygens probe on Saturn's moon Titan! i followed your progress minute by minute friday morning (eastern standard time) and was delighted to hear that the mission was a success. the pictures are awesome, and my hat is off to you.

for more information on the aurora and huygens, visit http://www.spaceweather.com/

2005-01-13T23:29:00.000-05:00

going to see the doctor (of physics)

yesterday i attended a lecture given by Dr. Brian Greene, professor of math and physics at columbia university. Dr. Greene is a leading authority on superstring theory and is the author of "the elegant universe" and "the fabric of the cosmos". he could also very well be my hero. he has an incredible wealth of knowledge and an uncanny method of sharing that knowledge.

yesterday's talk started off with quite a technical introduction given by congressman vern ehlers, however Dr. Greene quickly pulled back on the technical reins and began his lecture with a short humorous story about his mismatched socks.

Dr. Greene gave a concise hisory of gravity as described by Newton, and evolved that into Einstein's general theory of relativity. once again the concept of gravity was likened to a rubber sheet containing rocks and marbles. the funny thing about this analogy, is that the reason the rubber sheet warps in the first place is because of gravity. this is what we are trying to conceptualize... i've never heard anyone say that the reason space/time is warped around large masses is because the universe is expanding (which is what i suspect is happening).

Dr. Greene covered a lot of teritory in only an hour, so he didn't dwell on any particular subject for very long. he switched gears at this point and dove into quantum mechanics. he explained Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle with an analogy to a Chinese restaraunt, which i'm still trying to figure out. At any rate, Heisenburg said that we cannot know the exact location AND the exact speed of a particle at any one time. if you think about this long enough, you'll see that life at the quantum level is very unpredictable.

scientists have long tried to find a theory of everything that will bring together the very very predictable behaviours of gravity with the very very unpredictable behaviours of things that are extremely tiny. this is where Dr. Greene introduced String Theory.

he states that one explanation would be that everything is made up of tiny vibrating strings of energy. all sub-atomic particles are made up of a little piece of energetic string that vibrates in a particular way. each different particle has a string that vibrates in a unique manner. the catch here is that there are more particles than there are dimensions for these strings to vibrate in. Dr. G says "that's OK", "what if there were more dimension, maybe even as many as 10 spacial dimensions". he gave some examples and explanations describing how this could be.

if what he describes is even partially true, there could be a single explanation of how physics works within our universe.

personally i think Dr. Greene is on the right track, however i feel that there is a lot more to learn about the universe than what we can even dream about right now.

i am looking forward to reading his newest book "the fabric of the cosmos". i will certainly be posting articles with my thoughts, concerns and questions.

2005-01-11T23:34:00.000-05:00

the fabric of the cosmos

it's been quite a while since i've posted and tonight seems like an appropriate time.

tomorrow i'm planning on attending a lecture given by Brian Greene, the autohor of The Fabric of the Cosmos and The Elegant Universe. The Elegant Universe has to be the most fascianting book i have ever read. i plan on reading The Fabric of the Cosmos in the very near future.

look forward to a post real soon describing Dr. Greene's lecture, or my attempt to attend the lecture.

also look forward to a post regarding the huygen's probe entering the atmosphere of Saturn's moon Titan.

2004-12-25T12:00:00.000-05:00

Merry Christmas

it's been a busy few weeks around here, but last night was the "big night". we had a million things to do, and try to keep the kids in bed. it was a night i'll never forget, yet it is so hard to describe.

i moved all the stuff in our basement around to make room for our new air hockey table. afterwards i had the pleasure of putting the air hockey table together. it took me a good part of the evening and into the wee hours of the morning to finish my project.

i didn't get much sleep last night, but in the end it was worth it. i got the smiles that make my heart sing. my kids were super happy with their new gifts.

just seeing kids smile can make a Christmas merry for a father.

i hope your Christmas was nice.

2004-12-05T23:25:00.000-05:00

how far down the rabbit hole do you want to go?

yesterday i saw the movie what the bleep do we know!?
a friend from work told me about this movie and since then i've wanted to see it. it is a documentary about quantum physics and how it relates to everything in the universe, including God.

i strongly recommend seeing this film. for me this movie is going to be a life changing experience. if you can open your mind to some extreme ideas, then i think you'll like it too. some parts may be a little hard to grasp if you haven't experienced quantum physics. however i still suggest seeing this movie if you can simply open your mind and believe the things that are being considered.

from my experience, most of the things that are brought up have been proven scientifically. some things get pretty hard to believe, but nearly everything in quantum physics is hard to believe.

the concepts in this film are quite deep and only limitted by your mind. so, how far down the rabbit hole do you want to go?

if you need a life changing experience, and you can open your mind, you need to see this film.

2004-11-20T00:24:00.000-05:00

sinus surgery update

it's been 3 weeks since my sinus surgery and all is very well. i have not had any pain or discomfort since waking up after the surgery. it has really been amazing. i've been breathing better and feeling much better ever since.

i've been on antibiotics for 3 weeks now, and i still have another few days to go. the only thing i'd kinda hoped for was to regain my sense of smell. it's been more than 5 years since i lost my sense of smell. i only regained it for about 2 weeks when i was hospitalized for pneumonia about 2 1/2 years ago. it was assumed that the antibiotics and steriods i was given, cleared my sinuses long enough to smell again, but only to have it fade when the medicine wore off.

yesterday and today i've been noticing faint scents of things. it hasn't been dramatic, but i've sensed smells every now and then and i'm very happy about that. when i try to smell something, i still get nothing. nevertheless, i'm very optimistic.

this morning i was welcomed by the smell of coffee when i walked into the break room at work. that was a very nice surprise. i also caught a whiff of the pizzas i was bringing home for dinner tonight. i think i'm beginning to feel normal again.

wednesday i return to my doctor for a final sinus cleaning. i've got my fingers crossed that afterwards i'll be able to smell thanksgiving dinner on thursday.

2004-11-09T23:41:00.000-05:00

northern lights

sunday night was the first time i really saw an aurora (the northern lights). we had a spectacular show that began in the north-north east and converged into a spot towards the southern sky. there were spikes and rays of light (mostly green) that looked like special effects from hollywood. in short, it was very cool.

i just came in from my back-yard where i saw again an entirely different show. tonight the sky was green to the north-north east, but there were waves of light whipping across the sky. sunday night was quite slow and romantic. tonight the sky was full of energy.

nature is simply amazing.

2004-10-30T21:16:00.000-04:00

home sweet home

i had read too many horror stories and hear too many peoples accounts of what sinus surgery was like. every story that i heard was not a pleasant one, and with my luck i was expecting the worst.

thursday night we drove to ann arbor (UofM) and stayed in a hotel that is right in the hospital. set the alarm for 5am, as i had to be at the surgical check-in place at 6am. strangely enough, i wasn't as nervous as i thought i'd have been, but my heart rate and pressure were quite high. once, i was checked in and taken to the pre-op area i packed away my clothes for the standard issue hospital gown. shortly afterwards the pre-op nurse came around and asked several questions, as did the anisethieologist. they hooked my up to an IV and finally my doctor came around. he had taken another look at my scans and said that he might not even have to make the little cut above my eye. at any rate they dumped something like a martini into my IV and i was finally nice and relaxed.

they pushed me out of the pre-op area and down the hall to operating room number 4. i was trying to get a good look at all the gadgets but i really didn't know what any of them were. they scooched me from the hospital bed onto the operating table, and did a time-out check to double check who i was and what they were all going to do to me. from there it all went really quick. they held a mask over my face and told me that it was only oxygen. and that is the last thing i remember.

i think i entered the OR at roughly 7:30am, and the next thing i knew is i was really groggy and trying to see what time the clock on the wall said. it looked like it was 11:05am and i think i drifted back off to sleep for a few minutes. my throat was a little sore, they said it would be after having a breathing tube in there for a few hours. once i could move around a little it felt up around my eye and realized that they didn't cut and drill into my head. that was a nice feeling. i also wasn't feeling any pain at all, but i figured that would wear off with whatever medication they had given me.

by noon they told me i could start getting dressed, and the post-op nurse came around and game me my prescriptions and answered all my questions. they had used a type of gel to pack my sinuses and i could breathe, even better than when i went into surgey. it wasn't long after that that they released me and i was on my way home. i got back to grand rapids before 4pm, and was actually feeling pretty good. i drank some juice, ate some soup and finally a ham sandwich before going to bed last night. i took some pain pills last night, but didn't really need them and today i sat around and watched TV most all day.

i didn't have any problems with bleeding, or pain. i didn't have any nausea or really any problems at all.

i'll post more tomorrow, it's good to be home.

2004-10-27T23:48:00.000-04:00

all my problems (part 3) - a visit to the ENT

if you haven't read the first 2 parts, go read those first. thanks.

my appointment with the ent was around the third week in july, and i was a little nervous going to see him. i had done some research on sinus surgery on the internet and it didn't sound like a lot of fun. this doctor was pretty good, but once he looked at my MRI, he said - "i really think you need to go get a CT scan (cat scan)." he said that there appeared to be bone damage and it was hard to tell from the MRI. he seemed almost excited when he told me that this surgery might require a cut from ear to ear across the top of my head so they could peel my face off and work on my nose and above my eyes. this sent chills through my body and eventually led to a panic attack.

so.... back to the hospital for yet another dose of cancer causing x-rays spinning around my head.

on my return visit to the ent (after the CT scan) he said i had some uncommon things going on and he suggested that i see an ent specialist in this type of area. he referred me to a doctor at the university of michigan. the only problem was, that this doctor was a busy man and it took 2 months to get an appointment with him.

i saw the specialist at the end of september, now very nervous and having slight boughts of panic attacks every so often. actually this doctor turned out to be very good. he knew exactly what to do for my situation, and told me what would happen. he didn't think i needed any bone reconstruction, nor did he want to cut across the top of my head from ear to ear.

i am scheduled for surgery this friday morning. i will have sinus surgery along with a procedure to drill into my sinus cavity above my left eye and clear it of any polyps and blockage. i feel this doctor knows what he is doing; i am scared, but ready to have this operation.

this will be my last blog until after the surgery. tomorrow night i will be staying at U of M and early friday morning i will be having surgery. if all goes well i should be home friday night.

i intend to blog all the details of my surgery and recovery, and hopefully what it's like to get ones sense of smell back.

2004-10-27T00:43:00.000-04:00

all my problems (part 2)

last night i posted the first installment of this saga, go read it before you read this.
thank you.

i made an appointment to see an eye doctor towards the end of june. my double vision wasn't getting any better, and i was beginning to think that i had some sort of nasty sinus infection that was pushing against the upper-rear part of my left eye. i still wasn't too worried. i figured my diagnosis would consist of some antibiotics and a little rest.

when i saw the eye doctor, she was really nice. she thought i had something in my sinus cavity above my eye, and she thought i needed to see an ENT. due to insurance reasons, she could only refer me to an opthamologist. i was feeling like i was beginning to make progress.

i asked my boss if i could leave work early one day at the end of june. i told him i had to see an opthamologist. as long as i made up my time, my boss didn't have a problem.

i sat in that damned opthamologists office for 2 freakin hours only to finally see him and have him say to me. "i can't tell you anything right now, you'll have to go get an MRI". so they scheduled me for an MRI one morning early in july at 4:30 am! and i needed to be there 1/2 hour early. what the hell! i sleep at that time. so i went to bed at midnight, got up 3 1/2 hours later to go to the hospital. if you've never had an mri of your head, you don't wanna know what it's like. simply, it's long, ugly and freaky.

so after the mri, the 2 hour dingbat opthamologist called me back and said i should see a different opthamologist. what!!! he refered me to a new opthamologist that specializes in problems around the eye socket. i was starting to get pissed, but i thought i may be finally on the right track.

this new opthamologists office looked like a plastic surgeons dream office. she had advertisements of botox hanging on every wall. when she looked at my mri she said, "your sinuses look pretty rough, i think you should see an ENT" they might want to do sinus surgery.

i was getting more pissed off, but i still wasn't too worried, this was now mid-july (2004). she made me an appointment to see and ENT towards the end of july. i was just ready to get past all of this and get on with my life.

a visit to the ENT will be posted tomorrow. thanks for reading

2004-10-25T23:16:00.000-04:00

all my problems

a little more than 5 years ago, for some unknown reason, i began to lose my sense of smell. i never really worried about it, which is weird because i tend to worry about everything. it was just one of those things. i always figured it was because of the job switch i had made a few months earlier, or it was because we were building onto our house and stirring up many dusts, molds and toxic whatchamacallits.

i did mention this situation when visiting my dr. office, and they suggested i get a CT scan and visit an Ear Nose Throat (ENT) doctor. i followed their directions and was less than impressed when i saw the ENT. he told my i needed sinus surgery, but wasn't sure if i'd ever get my sense of smell back. i told him goodbye, and didn't see him again. this was almost 2 years ago.

at the beginning of this year, i started having problems with my vision too. i was seeing a double (ghost) image of everything. again when i was at my dr for a check up, he told me that i might be having ocular migraines, and that i should see an opthamologist. this double image thing only seemed to be happening first thing in the morning, and after a few weeks it totally dissappeared. i figured i was good, however there seemed to be a slight bit of puffiness above my left eye. i had too much on my mind, and i didn't want to worry about it.

towards the end of may (2004) i began having more vision problems. my double vision came back, but didn't go away. it was causing problems just about all day long. it was at that point that i decided to go to the eye doctor.

(continued tomorrow)

2004-10-20T00:30:00.000-04:00

dark matter and dark energy

this past saturday was a general meeting of the GRAAA. we had a guest speaker that gave a thought provoking disicussion on dark matter and dark energy. the speaker was Dr. Kirk Korista, an associate profressor of astronomy at Western Michigan University.

i'd like to recap the most interesting parts of his discussion, and include a few of my thougths.
Dr. Korista began the discussion with a brief history of something that would eventually be called dark matter. Fritz Zwicky made a discovery in 1933 that showed a cluster of galaxies that were moving about far to fast, the only reason that seemed to explain this rapid movement was that there must be a lot more mass wthin this cluster of galaxies; mass that we cannot see.
later on there were other discoveries that showed the emittance of an enourmous amount of heat in the area where the suspected dark matter collected. keep in mind the dark matter is extremely sparse, it's just the collected glob of it is held by gravity in an area of several thousand light years across.

with theories of dark matter now commonly floating around, studies began to show that the universe wasn't a static space. scientists suspected that the universe wasn't static, but they often thought that if the universe was expanding, the rate of expansion would be decreasing over time. what studies have shown is that the universe is expanding, and the rate of expansion is not decreasing, but it is increasing. now with the mass of every object within the universe, and they are all tugging on themselves (gravitationally), there must be an enormous amount of energy pushing the universe apart. here enters dark energy. in fact it is now estimated that the universe is made up of at least 73% dark energy and at least 23% dark matter. that leaves 4% for everything that we have ever seen or touched. astronomoers say they have been studying the universe, however it appears that they may have only been studying about 4% of the universe.

questions arise as to whether dark matter and dark energy are somehow related.
in my opinion, the two could not be directly related. since dark matter tends to clump with gravity, and dark energy is causing the uinverse to expand at an accelerating rate (apparently evenly), it would seem that the universe would be only expanding where the dark energy was causing it to expand. at this point dark energy seems to be everywhere, while dark matter may tend to clump with galaxy clusters.

2004-10-06T23:10:00.000-04:00

Shock & Awe

i remember the days just prior to the war in iraq when saddam hussein tried to make some sort of a deal with the us government. at that time he claimed that he had no wmd. i remember that day because i suddenly had mixed feelings about what would become the new war in iraq. until that day i supported the president because i felt his judgement couldn't be wrong.

today, the new york times reports that iraq elliminated all wmd a long time ago. maybe the president should have taken a little time to listen. apparently hussein was only trying to bluf iran.

i wonder how many human lives would have been saved if george w would have taken it one step at a time. nevertheless he was proud to show the world shock and awe.

from all of this, what will you remember?

2004-10-06T22:59:00.000-04:00

Congratulations Scaled Composites! - winner of the $10,000,0000 X Prize.

i have been "out of it" for a while, but i'd like to publicly congratulate Burt Rutan & all the team at Scaled Composites for building Space Ship One, the first privately built vehicle to leave the earth's atmosphere twice within 5 days!

2004-09-17T23:57:00.000-04:00

4 minutes - 3 minutes

who knows... my clock says it's 4 mintues into today, blogger says its still 3 minutes away. who knows...

the point is - whenever midnight arrives, i'll reach another milestone. it's happened 3 times before in my life, and it's happening again today.

i remember the first time it happened. my father patted my back and said "Son, it now takes 2 digits to show your age." (i went from 9-10 years of age) my son turned 10 last year and i think i said the same thing to him.

the second time it happened i was in college. i had met the girl i wanted to marry, we were in love. we still are. i turned 20 on september 18, 1984.

the third time it happened, i was working at computer design, i had 2 small kids, mortgage payment... i didn't think things could get any tougher. busy taking the kids to day care, my wife and i both had to work. it seemed like we were running endlessly to catch hold of the rope that we were once "at the end of". we were young, healthy, but i guess we weren't actually at the end of the rope.

today i turn 40. the father of 2 wonderful kids; a daughter turning into a teenager tomorrow... a son that turned 11 a few weeks back.

seems like yesterday i'd plop down on the couch and watch cartoons after spending the day in 7th grade. responsibilities were a little homework and boy scout meetings. where did those twenty some years go?

well, this day is finally here. where will i be in another 10 years? what will i be doing? i hope i'm happy.

2004-09-13T23:30:00.000-04:00

ISS

saturday evening was another visitors night at the veen observatory. this time we left our telescope at home and went with the intent to help the club in any way we could. we didn't actually help out very much, but we did see some awesome things and learn a little at the same time. using the telescopes at the observatory we saw many deep sky objects and learned a bit about the night sky in mid-september. for me, the highlight of the evening came early. not long after we were seeing distant planets like neptune and uranus, it was announced that the international space station (ISS) would be passing over in about 10 minutes. i've seen various satellites before, but i've never seen the ISS. it was quite amazing to see, well rather think. it was only a bright dot in the sky. it was moving north-north east at a steady rate. not fast, not slow. the thing that was amazing was thinking about the people that are living in it. it was just another bright dot in the sky, but it was full of human life.

there has to be other life out there. all those beautiful dots in the sky are there for a reason. they're not just there to make us wonder.

a bright dot in the sky was the home to life. i wonder how many other bright dots in the sky are helping support life.

2004-09-10T23:22:00.000-04:00

letterboxing

lately i've been intrigued with letterboxing. if you've never heard of letterboxing before, check out this site http://www.letterboxing.info/

in short, letterboxing is like a treasure hunt. you get clues from the internet, then you need to be able to navigate yourself to the specific area where the letterbox is hidden. if you can find the letterbox, you stamp it with your rubber stamp and stamp your journal with it's rubberstamp.

today i purchased the supplies i'll need to make my rubber stamp along with a pad of paper to use as a journal and a royal blue ink pad. i plan to design my own stamp using stars and guitars.

if you're still curious about letterboxing, go to the official site:
http://www.letterboxing.org/

i will be posting the results of my endeavors; check back again soon to see my progress and/or failures.

2004-09-07T00:40:00.000-04:00

happy labor day

i hope everyone had a happy and safe labor day. i spent my labor day at home with a funky little red machine. this morning, first thing, i went to our meijer store in search of something that could help our carpets and rugs. their solution was rugdoctor. apparently i needed a rug doctor to help me celebrate labor day. unfortunately, there was no such thing as a "rug nurse" to accompany the good doctor. i think all i really needed was the help of a good nurse.

at any rate, it's back to work tomorrow. so long from the clean rug captial of the world.

2004-08-31T23:31:00.000-04:00

we're all light

i think it was XTC that wrote that song, but when it comes to finding planets outside our solar system, it's all about light. you gotta measure the amount of light from a star, then when it gets ever so slightly dimmer for a short period of time, then that was when a planet passed in front of it. we (humans) have been finding planets in other solar systems only for a short time, but we've been finding them at an astounding rate.

put the spotlight on the RNC, it's all light. i wish i could put as much spin on my serve as the republicans can on the topics that effect our lives (in the usa). wake up W, you don't run the world. i guess the RNC was on TV tonight. i watched arnold talk for a few, and became un-interested. i can't wait for some good old fashoined televised debates between W and the Senator.

in the words of XTC, "the grass is always greener when it bursts up through concrete"

2004-08-23T00:16:00.000-04:00

asking for directions

isn't it normal for the male not to want to ask for directions? i've been there, and i understand it. i hate asking for directions. i feel like i should always know where i am, and it's embarrassing when i don't know where i am.

i've been looking for the intersection of science and religion, and i can't find it. i keep going, but i feel like the tank is gettin' low.

i don't know where i am right now, i'm lost somewhere, miles from anything i know. i hope tomorrow i find one road or the other. i've no idea which one i'll find first.

2004-08-22T00:53:00.000-04:00

andromeda

i just returned home from another night at the observatory. again, i took my telescope and tried to see what i could see. after looking at a few stars, we decided to look for m57 (the ring nebula). m57 is a planetary nebula and can be found in the constellation lyra. to view a nice picture of m57 click here:
http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/newsdesk/archive/releases/1999/01/

we looked at the ring nebula with all our eyepieces and filters and found that tonight we were able to get the best view with our highest power eyepiece and our light pollution filter. there were no clouds tonight, and the atmosphere was clear and stable.

next we decided to try to find andromeda (m31). this is our sister galaxy, the galaxy that most closely resembles our own. after a little searching, we did find andromeda. follow this link for a nice picture of m31:

http://www.seds.org/messier/Jpg/m31.jpg

i have certainly learned a great deal in the past week about finding deep space objects. i cannot wait to try to image some of these beautiful objects.

2004-08-16T23:58:00.000-04:00

m17

saturday evening was the first time in a very long while that i was able to get the telescope outside. i did so with the help of my kids at the Veen Observatory in lowell michigan. the skies were much darker than what i get living closer to the city of grand rapids, which made for a lot better viewing. we could actually see the milky way.

as the sky began to get dark, one of the first stars that appeared was Altair. we viewed this star for a while, but as the skies grew darker we headed deeper into space. we decided to move on in
search of the double star Alberio. with a little work we managed to find this beautiful star combination.

finally we set out to look for nebulae and other deep space objects. with my daugher guiding the scope, she found our first deep space object. all on her own she found messier object 17 (M17), also known as the swan nebula. i did find one other nebula, however we are still not sure which one it was.

if you'd like to see a view of m17 from the hubble space telescope then follow this link:
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap030425.html
this picture is absolutely breathtaking.

2004-08-03T23:40:00.000-04:00

Liquor Well

old and torn black vinyl seat
sticky, sweaty, august heat
on acres of scorched concrete
lord, it's hotter than hell

sweat dripin' to the ground
miles and miles from any town
lord, how i wanna go down
down the liquor well

chorus
the honey pot, the liquor well
cream and ice this dream desire
the thighs disguise is now on fire
take me down to liquor well

semi-trailer, a diesel breeze
dispensing aromas of cheddar cheese
wind on sweat, an august freeze
a prisoner of this smell

alone with the august sun
doin' time, till time is done
this old car will hardly run
hardly down, the liquor well

chorus
the honey pot, the liquor well
cream and ice this dream desire
the thighs disguise is now on fire
take me down to lick her well

searchin' for a final burst
to quench this killing thirst
and if i die, i won't be first
to die searchin' for liquor well

and sittin' on this vinyl seat
amidst the scorching august heat
looking for a crossing street
on the quest to liquor well

chorus
the honey pot, the liquor well
cream and ice this dream desire
the thighs disguise is now on fire
take me down to lick her well

2004-07-30T00:11:00.000-04:00

the man comes around

the past 10 days have been filled with worry and anxiety. i think i'm doing a little better tonight, but it's only because my problems have been deferred for another 8 weeks.

i'm listening to cash - Johnny Cash "the man comes around" this record puts all my feelings right now into a nice little package.

i think i'll blog the events of the last month or two over the next few days or so.

every day, it seems like "the man comes around"

2004-07-29T00:21:00.000-04:00

there's been a lot on my mind the last week or so.
i may have to visit a couple hospitals to have some operations that i'd rather not have.
i suppose in the long run, it'll be beneficial to have some problems corrected, but at this point these problems seem rather minor. what do i know though....

i'll know tomorrow (today now) what i need to have done.
i'm scared....

2004-07-22T00:15:00.000-04:00

changing

things are changing. that would normally be a good thing, but not this time. i may have to go through some things that i don't want to, and that scares me. more on this subject at another time.

i've recently uploaded martinis at midinight to myspace.com. if you haven't checked out myspace.com, you should.

i have a cool new place at myspace, check it out: http://www.myspace.com/rogersmith

anyhow, my life is changing. i'll keep blogging through all of this as much as i can.

2004-07-15T00:10:00.000-04:00

livestrong day 1

today i got a package in the mail from Lance Armstrong.

since the mid 80's i've been a huge bike racing fan. seems like yesterday i was rooting for 7-11 in the tour de france. i tried my hand at racing and was completely humiliated. it seemed better for me to ride a chair behind a computer.... regretfully that's what i have done for the last 15+ years.

i felt the euphoria when Greg LeMond became the first american to win the tour. i watched every weekend and read in the newspaper the results of every stage. LeMond was my hero. if an american could win the tour, things would certainly be changing.

then along came Lance. cancer survivor. bike monster. i'm sure by now, you know the story.

last week i ordered a livestrong wrist band, and today the mailman delivered it. it is my way of helping Lance help people with cancer.

a long time ago, a very close friend of mine died from cancer. there was nothing i could do.

hopefully, the drop in the bucket that i made will help somebody beat this disease.

i'm on day 1 and i don't ever plan on taking it off.

thank you Lance

2004-07-01T23:49:00.000-04:00

i have never been more impressed with such a great string of major accomplishments. NASA, my hat is off to you. the past six months have been incredible!

putting the cassini-huygens into saturn's orbit was an astounding accomplishment. i can't wait to read the stories that will follow.

everything and everyone has good times and bad times, it is just part of nature. NASA has shown the world, the universe, how to come back. NASA has earned a level of respect from me that is not easily matched.

i'd like to congratulate NASA and all the countries involved in the cassini-huygens success.

the women and men that make days like today are my heroes.

2004-06-24T23:45:00.000-04:00

music
tonight i'm listening to rickie lee jones' latest release "the evening of my best day". i've been a fan of hers for a long time and it's great to hear new stuff, although it's not that new anymore.

movies
last night i watched "i am sam" staring sean penn and michelle pfeiffer. i like movies but i'm not hung up on them. most movies don't find there way into my heart. i have a small collection of movies that i like, but 99% of movies i see, i don't need to see again.

when this movie started, i thought "this is an unlikely role for sean penn" and i was curious how it would play out. well, sean did a fantastic job in this role. his performance equaled that of dustin hoffman in "rainman". however, this movie touched me a lot more than rainman. a father needing to be with his daughter. i understand that love. i can't compare my life to that of sam, but i understand the love. then to contrast it with the life of rita (michelle) who played a beautiful rich lawyer whose family life was falling apart. it brought tears to my eyes. i know i'm being over-sensitive, but this movie is one of the few that touched my heart.

stars
i have never seen so many clouds in my life. i had the telescope out a few days ago, but couldn't manage to find anything outside our solar system that was very interesting. my new plan is to start learning all the constellations and what deep space objects can be found within each.

stay tuned, the sky will begin to clear... it has to!

2004-06-12T23:45:00.000-04:00

sea change

have you ever had times when life just seems to get hung up? when it seems like you never have time for the "normal things" in your life. i feel like i've been through that for the last month or more. i finally feel like i'm getting back to normal.

i'm listening to beck tonight. the album: "sea change". this is an awesome cd. it's great music for my current state of mind. i especially like track 2 "paper tiger". i wish i could write music like this.

i have been working on new music. hopefully one of these days i'll have something new and ready to record. hopefully one of these days i'll be working on music again with an old friend.

2004-06-11T22:49:00.000-04:00

last tuesday morning we attempted to see venus moving across the disc of the sun (the transit of venus). we walked up the road to a higher point, where we could see the eastern horizon over the trees. it was about 6:35 am and the sky was amazingly clear considering the months of crummy weather we've had. we had our instruments that we wanted to use to safely see the transit, however we did not use the telescope.

we began with using the pin-hole box, which produced a small reflection of the sun, but we could not make out venus. the binoculars mounted on the tripod would be our last resort. after a few minutes of fumlbing around with aiming and focusing, we spotted venus. we had a very nice reflection of the transit on a simple piece of paper. we made several tracings of the image. we also tried taking digital pictures of the reflection, however the images did not show venus.

i plan to post the images and scanned drawings of the transit on my website. compared to many of the other images of the transit i have seen on the internet, mine are very basic. it was still a very exciting and spectacular event to have seen.

2004-06-07T23:35:00.000-04:00

transit of venus

it's many days since i've posted and tonight is an appropriate time for a post. in about 90 minutes the transit of venus will begin with first contact. the transit of venus is when the planet venus is directly between the earth and the sun. venus should be in front of the sun for about 6 hours, however i'll only be able to see the last hour or so of this extremely rare event. first contact is when the outer edge of the planet venus appears to touch the outer edge of the sun. if i'm lucky and the sky is clear, i should be able to see 3rd and 4th contact. this is when venus appears to be moving out of the disc of the sun.

there is a ton of history about the transit of venus, which is all entirely fascinating. i'd suggest browsing the site http://www.transitofvenus.org for more detailed information. you can also view the event online from a link on this site.

i have 2 simple and crude devices that i plan to use to see a reflected image of the sun and venus. remember, you can never look at the sun witout the proper solar filters (which i don't have). first i have a box with a small hole in one end. the hole will let light through and display a small image of the sun on the back wall of the box. i also have an old pair of binoculars fastened to a tripod. with this i can hold a piece of white paper or cardboard several inches away from the binoculars and see a reflected image of the transit. i plan to take some pictures of the process, and make some drawings of the reflected images if the weather is clear. i'll post whatever images i get on my website and post a complete description of how the morning unfolds.

think clear skies.

2004-05-20T23:43:00.000-04:00

quick post

i finally made it to a real meeting of the graaa tonight. it seems like a great group of people, and the speaker did an outstanding job of presenting the history of the transit of venus. i have gained a whole new level of respect for the event that is going to take place on june 8. it makes me want to go out and buy a solar filter for my scope...

2004-05-19T23:34:00.000-04:00

the rain stopped (temporarily), and the clouds parted and today was a beautiful mid-may spring day. i think we can look forward to more rain tonight, but i did get back outside with my telescope tonight. since the weather has been so crappy, and it likes like it'll be crappy for another week or more, i was hoping to see and possibly photograph comet NEAT. i searched high and low and couldn't find that little bugger. darn!

i took a look at jupiter and saw 4 of it's moons. it looked quite nice, however i wanted to see something that i've never seen before. i decided to search for some galaxies.

since ursa major (the big dipper) was the only visible constellation (due to a hazy atmosphere and a lot of light pollution), i decided to look for m109, m108 or m97. i figured i'd at least be looking in the right area even if i couldn't see anything. and that's exactly what i saw, nothing.

it's hard to believe that charles messier discovered all these deep space objects in the 1700's. i guess the skies were darker back then...

if all goes as planned, tomorrow night i'll be finally attending a meeting of the graaa and hopefully joining. i've been planning on doing this for at least the last 12-18 months.

2004-05-17T23:30:00.000-04:00

saturday night we ended up going to the local race track to watch some great stock car racing. our hometown racing hero, johnny benson was back at his home track for the first saturday of this year. his regular schedule of nascar nextel cup(winston cup) and busch racing has given him a break and allowed him to come home again. you can read all the stories at http://www.berlinraceway.com

for the first time in a month the skies cleared up and would have been good for sky watching. last night i didn't have the energy to move after 9pm and tonight there were thunderstorm watches all evening but when i closed the garage at 10pm the sky was crystal clear. go figure... if i would have known it was going to be like that i would have set up the scope. oh well, there will be plenty of clear skies this summer, right?

i've been reading more about string theory. i'm slowly plugging my way through "the elegant universe". this is an incredible book. i can't wait to start reading the next one by brian greene.

2004-05-14T23:35:00.000-04:00

tomorrow night is going to be the first clear night in a long time. should i stay home and set up my telescope? i could try to get some images of some deep space objects.

should i go to the observatory for super saturn saturday? that would certainly be a good time.

or should i go to the local racetrack for some good old fashioned saturday night stock car racing? our local racing hero, johnny benson, will be there and we've been big jb fans for a long time.

no matter what is decided, i will be happy, unless it rains...

i haven't been in a very creative mood lately. i apologize for the lack of substance in this last group of posts. i'll try to return to some simple level of intellectual entertainment.

2004-05-10T23:23:00.000-04:00

does a wise man plan for tomorrow,
or live life today?

planning for tomorrow seems the conservative approach.
what if tomorrow doesn't come?

living life today seems more reckless and carefree.
it also seems more exciting.

what about those who aren't in control of their lives?
what about the people that can't plan for tomorrow because it takes everything they have just to get through today. what about the people that can't live life today because it takes everything they have just to live today.

our world is full of too many people that can't plan for tomorrow, OR live life today.

i hope in the time that i have left, i can help someone plan a future, and live life everyday.

can you do the same?

2004-05-07T22:57:00.000-04:00

i sure am slippin' on my commitment to my blog.

in the long run, it's probably a good thing that i've taken a few days away from my night sessions online. i've really needed to catch up on my sleep, and i have somewhat.

tonight i'm listening to the new cd from diana krall, "the girl in the other room". i stumbled across diana's music a couple years ago at the library, and i've been a big fan ever since. i really like her new work, it's a great next step. if you like jazz, you'll like this cd.

on the astronomy front, we've had more clouds than i have ever seen before. i haven't had the telescope out in about 3 weeks now. i am looking forward to some clear night skies and hopefully finding some deep sky objects.

i keep slowly plugging away at reading about string theory, but i don't seem to be getting very far with it.

it seems like i'm so busy, but i don't know where the time goes. i rush there to wait for that, and back to do this, that, and one other thing. then i get my fifteen minutes of peace and quiet to share my life with you. i'm not looking for pity, i just think there's gotta be others that can relate.

i'll go to bed in a little while, and tomorrow it all starts over again. even though tomorrow is saturday, the game is the same, just the pieces are different.

2004-05-04T22:41:00.000-04:00

i can't believe that i haven't blogged in a week. now that i'm actually awake past 10pm, i'll try to at least put a few words down. it may be a quick post, because it sounds like there is a nasty thunderstorm about to roll in.

i've read a little more about string theory, and the things that i proposed in my last post have already been pondered by the string theorists. i love reading about that stuff though; it just makes you really stop and think about where we are, where we came from, and why we are here.

i've been listening to some new music lately. i hope to write some brief reviews in the next few days.

quote of the day:
"stress is like an old lumpy bed. once you get the lumps pushed down in one place, they only pop up again some place else." - roger smith

2004-04-27T22:34:00.000-04:00

more thoughts about string theory

i read more about string theory today. basically learned more about the notion of extra dimensions. back in 1919 when Einstein was working on relativity, the idea for extra dimensions was introduced. Einstein didn't come up with this idea and seemed to waffle on it but ultimately gave it his stamp of approval. the extra dimension was proposed such that every single point in space had a dimension that circled back onto itself (like a ring). with this thought, there could be 4 spacial dimensions and 1 time dimension. i guess that would have given us the 5th dimension, or was that an R&B group from the 70's....

at any rate, formulae were developed that described how this extra spacial dimension would behave, and these equations turned out to be the same as the equations that had already been developed for electromagnetism.

with this in mind, it seems only logical that there may be other time dimensions. there may be a way for time to curl back on itself. we may be living in a universe that only sees one dimension in time and in reality there may be multiple.

how would your life change if you could move as freely through time as you do through the 3 spacial dimensions that we know today? think about it, it gets interesting...

2004-04-26T22:53:00.000-04:00

martini records

my website "martinirecords.com" is in the process of an update. i've created a new section specifically for photography (digital astrophotography to be more specific). i currently have some pictures of a few planets and one of the moon. if the clouds ever go away, maybe i'll get some more. it won't be long and i'll be starting my journey to image all 110 messier objects. i'll be posting them here as i capture them.

there are some broken links on martinirecords.com right now, but i hope to get things fixed in the next few days. i know that specifically the links to download my songs from my server will not work. if you want to listen to my songs, you'll need to go to either songramp or soundclick for the time being.

if you have any comments about my site, let me know. i appreciate all feedback.

link to my site http://www.MartiniRecords.com

2004-04-23T23:13:00.000-04:00

about time

friday night, time to relax, listen to some music, write some nonsense and have a beer. i am having a grolsch, premium lager imported from holland, and it tastes just fine. friday finally came, it's about time.

my new bed was delivered today. it's an air filled mattress from "select comfort" (i think). i adjusted my side to 60; i'm not sure what will be the best thing for my back right now since it is in pain from the wrenching i put it through last weekend. anyhow, it's about time we had a new bed.

i am listening to a new cd tonight (at least new to me). it's the new effort from steve winwood, titled "about time". i was a bit of a winwood fan about 15-20 years ago, and i wasn't sure how his music would have changed. i was a little skeptical about picking it up, but i'm glad i did. "about time" sounds distinctly steve winwood, but yet has a bit of flavor that i don't recall winwood using in the past. his work on the hammond sounds awesome. i have no idea if this album is getting any air play on commercial radio, i only listen to a small independent listener supported station. i recall they played a cut from this cd a few months ago, i guess that's why i ended up with it. my final words on this recording; if you liked steve winwood back in the days of steve winwood, then i think you'd really like this cd.

it's about time.

2004-04-21T23:20:00.000-04:00

tonight i went to a lecture on our solar system given by Dr. Anita Cochran. it's simply incredible how much we have learned in the last 30 years, and it's even more incredible the things that we will learn in the next 30 years. i've just begun my journey into astronomy, and i wish i had started this many years ago.

i always told myself that i didn't want to be bothered with taking guitar lessons, but i regret that today. i wish i had put forth the effort to learn when i was younger. my excuse was that i didn't want it to become work.

i wish i had started learning more about our universe when i was younger.

i wish i had done a lot of things when i was younger, because as i get older i fear that i may not have the time in my schedule (or life) to do them.

if you work hard when you're young, you WILL appreciate it when you are older. believe me.

2004-04-20T23:06:00.000-04:00

i'm looking forward to tomorrow evening. hopefully i'll be attending a meeting/lecture on the planets and objects in our solar system. i'm also intending to join our local astronomy club.

i think i wrenched my back this weekend trying to either take out or put away my telescope. i now have a knot in my back the size of rhode island. it doesn't help that my mattress is about dead too. the good news is that the mattress is about to change. friday i should be getting a new bed, one of these new fangled things that is filled with air. you can pump it up for a firmer surface, or let some out for a softer sleep. that's what i like, science and technology helping me to sleep better.

2004-04-18T23:44:00.000-04:00

i sat down tonight to watch tv for a change. i flipped through the channels for several minutes wondering why i pay over $40 / month to get commercials on almost any channel i pick. a few months ago i couldn't live without my daily fix of fox news. i trusted them to keep me in the know on the war and economy. lately i've even been disappointed with fox news, and i feel like i'm not getting the true un-biased picture of the world.

maybe it was just because sunday night isn't a popular time to watch tv. maybe all the good shows are on tomorrow.

when i was a kid, it seemed there were always shows with a family theme. that was great. i loved sitting down with my parents and we all watched tv; shows that we all found entertaining.

today there are so many cable tv channels that everyone can watch whatever they like whenever they want it. just get everyone in your family a tv so they can go watch their own personalized story or show. there is nothing to draw families together anymore. we wonder why families don't communicate, and we wonder why today's youth is under such stress...

maybe i'll save my $40 a month and take my family to dinner more often or buy some more board games.

what would you do with an extra $40 a month?

2004-04-17T23:51:00.000-04:00

i just got my telescope put away a few minutes ago. i really only wanted 2 things tonight; a great picture of jupiter and i wanted to see a DSO (deep sky object).

after i set up my scope tonight, i collimated it with my laser. it worked pretty good and i think the image i get through the scope is a bit sharper. i took a ton of pictures of jupiter and every one of them stinks - overexposed, blurry and gooey. i don't know what i'm doing wrong.

i then took off for deep space looking for galaxies, nebulae, and other star clusters. the sky and atmosphere seemed very clear to me, but the light pollution around here kept the sky from lighting up. i didn't see anything like i had hoped.

i'm looking forward to the first visitor night at the veen observatory next weekend. i hope i can go. time to go read my astrophotography email.

2004-04-16T23:31:00.000-04:00

the history of the martini

i thought i'd do a little research and learn something about where the fabulous combination of gin and vermouth came from. turns out that it was first concocted in the mid to late 1800's and was primarily vermouth with a little gin. apparently vermouth has been around since 460 bc. in the early 1900's the first dry martini was introduced, but it seems that there is no record of where the olive came from. personally i like a crunchy onion in mine. :)

check out http://www.nm4u.com/martiniworld/page6.html for the source of this information.

2004-04-15T23:27:00.000-04:00

the skies finally cleared up enough tonight to take the telescope back outside. for the past week and a half i've either had things i've had to do, or it has been cloudy.

i've had trouble getting a good sharp focus, and i've thought it was probably that the scope needed to be collimated. last week i bought a laser collimator and tonight i stuck it in to see what it would do. i didn't see what i had expected to see and thus confirmed my suspicions of needing to adjust the primary mirror. maybe i'll try to do that this weekend.

tonight i took several pictures of venus, jupiter and mars. my intent was to stack them, however every picture seemed to be overexposed again. i need to learn how to use the camera in manual mode so i can try different speeds. i also need to buy or build an adapter so that i can attach my camera directly to the eyepiece. i am still setting the camera up on an independent tripod and trying to get it close to the eyepiece. this has proven to be a very frustrating method.

every time i take out the scope i try new things, and i learn new things. i can't complain about that.

2004-04-14T22:59:00.000-04:00

what do you say when you don't know what to say?

some people try to verbally dance around the subject. they fumble for words until they find a few that may fit in with whatever the question was, then they drive a tangent into orbit around the center of the question. once they are dancing around, they can say whatever they want and it never seems to matter.

why?

every day i'm asked questions that i don't know how to answer. the thing is, i can admit it. i can admit what i've done wrong and when i don't know what to do. i guess i'll never be president.

2004-04-13T23:08:00.000-04:00

resolution re-assessment

Q1 has passed and we are now 2 weeks into Q2; how are your new years resolutions going? like a lot of people i decided i would drop a few pounds this year. i guess that's going ok for me. i'm staying away from the atkins fad and i'm trying to diet the old fashioned way - fewer calories, less fat, and more exercise. i've lost about 13 lbs since 1/1/04, and i'm almost on track with my goal.

the resolution that i'm behind the most in is my resolution to write and record six new songs. i've barely picked up my guitar this year. i just seem to lack the drive i once had. i still haven't given up, but every day i am getting more behind.

once a person has committed to a new years resolution, and if mid-way through the year it appears that this task may not be achieved, there should be some time set aside for working on or re-evaluating ones resolutions. for the working class, i propose a new holiday, resolution re-assessment day. since students get spring break, the working class should have an equal amount of time to delve into ones personal tasks or to evaluate and update ones list of resolutions. think of all the new hallmark cards that could be written...

put the cake down,
the ice cream away,
wipe away that frown
it's resolution re-assessment day!

maybe i should turn this whole thing into a song. let me get my guitar...

2004-04-11T23:25:00.000-04:00

questions about string theory

last night i was exhausted. fell asleep on the couch about 8pm. noticed the clouds had broken up, but the sky was still hazy. decided i was too tired to take the scope outside and i slept on the couch. i didn't wake up until 1am. then it was all i could do to drag myself off to bed.

anymore it seems that when the weekend rolls around, i am so tired i fall asleep as soon as the sun goes down.

i think i need more exercise.

so i'm thinking about string theory., and wondering about the different elements that make up wood. at the same time i'm wondering where the energy comes from when you burn a piece of wood. what happens to the individual elements? are they only released as heat and light? and smoke? does any of the energy released go into other dimensions? what happens to time where light energy is being produced?

since i went to bed so early last night, i'll probably be awake for a while tonight. worrying about some of these things... if you have any answers or theories, let me know.

2004-04-11T00:10:00.000-04:00

2004-04-11T00:06:00.000-04:00

2004-04-10T23:23:00.000-04:00

2004-04-08T23:25:00.000-04:00

contrast

songs are boring if they simply state how much the singer/writer wants something. movies are boring if there isn't some tension created by opposing goals or views. paintings and pictures are boring if their colors are faded and washed out.

to make the boring not as boring, you need something that is in contrast to the main plot, idea, view. you need a second opinion, a second side to the story, a different color or a new perspective.

last night i wrote about exclusivity and how contrasting sides tend to battle wtih each other.

tonight i think about that same contrast, however the result can be beautiful and not violent.

open your mind to new opinions. let contrasting ideas form new visions. don't fight it, but work with it. see the beauty in the world.

2004-04-07T23:11:00.000-04:00

exclusivity

how many groups dictate that you can belong to this group, but you can't belong to any others like it?

isn't that how college students usually feel about fraternities? they are the best and are in constant battle with everyone else.

it probably started thousands of years ago with children. one of them decided that his or her group would hang out by the big rock or tree, but if you started hangin' out with them, you couldn't go hang out with the other group by the stream. the kids that did probably got pelted with stones.

that mentality has grown to be the taproot of society. you can't belong to two different gangs... same way with politics; you can't be a republican AND a democrat. you also can't be a Christian and a Muslim, even though both groups claim that if you believe in what they say, you will have ever lasting life. they both say that the ONLY way to have everlasting life is believe what they say. one of them must be wrong... or could they both be right?

i think it takes more intelligence to see both sides of two groups and form your own opinions. remember what i said the other day about opinions?

violence breeds in exclusivity. form your own opinions, and break down the walls of exclusivity. peace awaits.

2004-04-06T23:30:00.000-04:00

tonight i decided to get serious about digital astrophotography. i ran into some problems with the equatorial mount for my telescope. it seems to not be working properly, which made it a real chore to follow the planets and take photos.

i took a few pictures of venus before the sun was completely down and they didn't turn out very good. i also took a group of pictures of saturn, with the intent of "stacking" the images. the raw images are quite nice, and as i write this i am trying to figure out this program i downloaded that will help combine the raw images into a single and hopefully better image.

i will be creating an area on my website real soon that will be devoted to my photography. i'm looking forward to publishing my images.

2004-04-05T23:16:00.000-04:00

opinions

follower... if you're in the game, you are either a leader or a follower. i'm in the game, are you? maybe you're a leader, maybe you're a follower. i'm a follower. always doing what i'm told and rarely given the opportunity to have an opinion.

i started thinking today, what are my opinions... what are my opinions about politics, religion, corporate usa, my career, popular music. i rarely think about my opinions, but they matter, at least to me.

think about your opinions, they are who you are. even if your time doesn't allow your opinion, let them form in your head. nurture them and let them grow.

the world needs some new opinions. the world needs to know how you feel.
most of the world seems to be obsessed with money and power. make war for oil and make money from the loss of the life of someone's son or daughter.

make mediocre music and force people to listen to it then tell them that they like it so they'll buy it....

tell people that they'll have ever lasting life if they give you money.....

what are your opinions?

2004-04-04T23:40:00.000-04:00

since our skies were crystal clear this evening, i had to set up the telescope and try to get some pictures. i already have pictures of saturn, jupiter and the moon. i wanted to get pictures of mars and venus. these proved to be a little tougher to get than expected...

once it was dark i zeroed in on venus. she was reflecting almost too much light, but i still took two pictures of her. i then realized that the battery in my camera was at the dieing point. i quickly put it on the charger, but the 90 minutes that it took to charge allowed mars to sink behind my garage. i was able to see mars, however it wasn't that great of a view. maybe next time i can get a picture of it.

i then took another picture of saturn, however it didn't turn out very nice. it was overexposed. i also tried to take more pictures of jupiter and it's moons, however i was running out of time and it was difficult to get the camera lined up so that i could take the picture. i did take a few shots of jupiter but none of them are better than the ones i took the other day.

i plan to post my astrophotography on my web site when i have a few decent pictures.

2004-04-04T00:14:00.000-05:00

good stuff

tonight i need to divert slightly from the standard i've been setting. tonight i must return to my roots of music.

i'm listening to "hamell on trial" and i just feel the need to write a little about music.

i've been playing my guitars again, and been trying to write some new tunes. i haven't been extremely productive, but i have been inspired. it will all begin to come together again soon, i can feel it.

i'm actually feeling a bit inspired listening to "hamell on trial", this guy has written some great songs. i really like his lyrics and guitar playing. if you haven't listened to "hamell on trial", check him out {acousti/electri folk-punk for the 21st century}... good stuff

2004-04-01T23:24:00.000-05:00

2004 pinewood derby - final chapter

well, it's been a few days since i've had time to blog. i promised a final chapter to the pinewood derby timer saga, and i'm finally going to write it.

recap-
a week ago i was stressin' about this timing system i had created to time and manage a pinewood derby. the pinewood derby is a race of small hand made cars from a block of pine. they roll down a short track (32 feet) and the first one to cross the finish line is the winner. i volunteered to build a switching system and write software that will manage the entire race. the switch is an array of infrared leds and phototransistors that connect to a laptop via the parallel port. the software reads the parallel port and takes care of all the race management duties to run the race. two nights before the race (1 week ago today) i found some potential issues with my code. the next night we set up the track and timer and confirmed my suspicions that the software does not run properly on windows xp.

race day-
i installed the software on a good old windows 98 machine and it seemed to load OK. i did an initial test with the infrared switches and they all seemed to be working as well. so far so good, but i kept telling everyone that i was certain there would be problems at some point. we had about 41 entries in the race, and i sat diligently at my the windows 98 laptop entering names, numbers and car nick names. as noon approached i saved the data often. i wanted to make sure i had enough copies of the original data in case of a major melt-down during the race. i wanted to avoid this situation because i know what it feels like having 50 cub scouts and 100 parents staring at me wondering why "it doesn't work?" because that's what happened to me 1 year ago.

with data saved many times, in many places, the first heat of cars were lined up on the track. the announcer called "read, set, go!" and the starting gate fell. i looked at the laptop display, the numbers began running away at 1/1000th of a second intervals, and all timers stopped roughly 2 1/2 seconds later as all the cars streaked across the finish line. my breathing relaxed a little, the first heat was successful, now only about 100 more to go.

as the day went on, there were a few hiccups with the laptop, but nothing major went wrong with the switch or the software. we ran the entire race without any problems and we didn't even have any upset parents.

i do need to fix the problems that i know of. luckily i was able to make sure that we never got into a situation where we saw any of these problems. next year shall be even better.

2004-03-29T23:06:00.000-05:00

hello jupiter!!

after over a week of having my telescope, and almost a week of cloudy weather, tonight i finally had clear skies with enough time to learn how to handle this monster. to refresh your memory i just bought a 10" reflector and an equatorial mount from Orion. big scope... ~120lbs assembled. it took me about 20-30 minutes to set up and balance the entire system. once it was all balanced and the drive motors were activated, the remainder of the evening was incredible.

first i wanted to take a look at the moon. i've always been fascinated with the moon. i even named a band i was in LunaBlue. anyhow i found the moon and it was awesome. the best views were through the 25mm eyepiece. the 10mm eyepiece showed a lot of detail on the surface of the moon, however i liked the less magnified view of the entire moon.

next, i tried again to find saturn. i tried this a week ago without much luck. all i could see was a large bright dot that could have been anything (airplane, ufo, duck with a flashlight). i know it wasn't venus, i know where venus is... anyhow, tonight i found saturn and i was speechless. the rings shown nicely through the 10mm eyepiece, and i even attempted to take a digital picture right through the telescope simply by holding the camera up to the eyepiece. it didn't turn out too bad for my first attempt.

at this point i was extremely satisfied with what i had seen, but i decided that i'd make a quick attempt to find jupiter. not only did i find jupiter and see it's big spot, but i also could see two of it's moons. it was simply breathtaking!

i'm now looking forward to getting some shorter (higher powered) eyepieces. i'm never satisfied, i always want more.

-----

for anyone wondering how the pinewood derby timing system work, come back tomorrow. i'll be posting an final installment to that chapter.

2004-03-27T00:03:00.000-05:00

i've not much to add tonight. i am tired, and ready for bed.

it was hard to tell how the pinewood derby software is going to work tomorrow. one of the software's shortcomings is that it is only compatible with win 9x or me. the computer we had tonight was xp. my software didn't work, however i'm fairly confident that it will work tomorrow when we get a low-tech computer. there are still bugs in the software, but hopefully they won't wander and we can steer clear of them.

i'm a tad bit torqued about the weather we are having. it's been cloudy every freakin' day since monday... according to Mr. Weatherman, we may not have a clear night until next weekend... i am very anxious to try my telescope in good conditions.

thanks for reading.

2004-03-25T23:47:00.000-05:00

quick post

i thought the pinewood derby timing program was "in the bag". tonight i compiled a release build, pumped it all through install shield to make a CD installation, and then i find a major bug (issue, problem, defect, screw up).

i was simply testing the version i installed off my cd and what did i find... half my data isn't being saved when i do a save. i may try to fix the bug tomorrow evening, but i think the best approach may be to write all the data down with pen and paper. tomorrow night we will be setting up the race track along with it's timing hardware and software. saturday morning is the race.

ahhh.... stress raining down keeps the flowers of hypertension blooming.

2004-03-24T23:42:00.000-05:00

string theory introduction

i like the string theory website http://superstringtheory.com/basics/basic4.html because they analogize string theory with guitar strings. that rocks!

back to business. string theory states that on a sub-atomic scale, everything is made of up tiny vibrating strings of energy. that means that all the things we learned about protons, neutrons, and electrons being the smallest pieces of stuff, is all wrong. in fact protons, neutrons and electrons are make up of quarks, which are held together with gluons. it's the quarks and gluons that, according to string theory, are made up of these tiny strings.

what's really cool about string theory, is that it brings together the facts and theories of Einstein's general relativity, and the facts and theories of quantum mechanics. the laws of general relativity and quantum mechanics are quite different, and this has troubled physicists for years. why would the laws of physics be different for something that is very very small and something that is very very large? what physicists have been searching for is a theory of everything (toe). string theory is still a theory, but it does provide possible explanations for why the laws of physics change based on size.

string theory predicts that these little vibrating strings of energy make up the smallest constituents of matter. the direction and rate at which the strings vibrate dictate the type of particle it creates. the odd thing is, that in order to create the necessary number of particles that are known, the little vibrating string must vibrate in more than the normal 3 dimensions that we understand. in fact it may require as many as 10 dimensions or more to allow the strings to vibrate in as many ways as needed.

so where are these other dimensions? nobody knows for sure. they may curl back inward upon themselves or we may not have the capacity to fully understand where they are.

one thing is for sure, the universe in which we live is much more complicated than we ever imagined.

the more you know, the more you know you don't know...

2004-03-23T23:21:00.000-05:00

pinewood derby timing program update

as i mentioned earlier, i have been trying to put the finishing touches on a piece of software that i have been writing. the software manages a pinewood derby race (for cub scouts). it keeps track of each car, and the times that are accumulated for each race. it also provides a way to enter cars into the race and it automatically creates a race schedule. using the parallel port on the computer, it reads a switching device that i made which uses infrared leds and phototransistors to detect each cars elapsed time. the software times each race, and eventually computes a winner.

all major problems have been fixed in the software, however there are still a few lingering minor problems that need to be addressed. i have 3 more days to fix and test.

the hardware has been stored away for a year and hopefully it will still work when it is hooked up.

this may seem rather mundane to you, however it has been a huge source of stress in my life over the past few weeks. i know, i need to get a life... i just don't think i can afford one right now.

2004-03-22T23:09:00.000-05:00

second night out with the new telescope. i tried my hardest to see the rings of saturn, but couldn't do it with the conditions here or the eyepieces i have. i'm not even sure if more powerful eyepieces would have helped. i found saturn (i think) quite easily. once spotted with the naked eye i honed in on it with the finder scope. tonight was the first time i connected up the battery pack and hand controller unit to try out the equatorial drive. this has to be the sweetest thing i have ever seen. friday night it must have taken me a half an hour to get venus on the 10mm eyepiece without using the drive motors. tonight i had saturn within a minute or two. anyhow, the sky was kinda hazy and there was a lot of light pollution which made it difficult to see any detail. from saturn it was a quick hop to look at betelgeuse. i gave betelgeuse a once over and then it was time to pack up. tomorrow i think it's going to be cloudy and maybe rainy.

wubba wubba

2004-03-21T23:50:00.000-05:00

i have no new bits of science to offer today. i don't have any new songs, poems or music to offer either.

today was shot with trying to remove some nasty spyware from my computer. this stuff caused my computer to continually lock up and try to open a lot of web browsers and made my computer completely useless for almost the entire day. i finally managed to run my virus scan which showed nothing and then i downloaded a spyware detection and repair tool which found a whole lotta wrong. this tool righted the wrong and eventually my computer came back to life. i don't think i've ever tickled that little reset button more than i did today, and i don't think my computer liked it very much.

well tomorrow is another day, with all the wonders and joys of a monday.

2004-03-20T23:19:00.000-05:00

it was too cloudy tonight to look for saturn, which was a drag because it was clear most of the day.

i have 1 week to finish changes to a pinewood derby timing system that i have been working on for a long time now. a week from today is the race and i still have some bugs in the software. i built the hardware for last years race, which consisted of a battery powered circuit that used infrared led and phototransistor pairs to detect when a race car passed over the finish line in each lane. for the most part, the hardware worked really good, however the software had a few problems.

i've just about solved all the problems, but i'd like to have it as clean as i can get it for the race. i'm hoping to offer the software for a reasonable price over the internet. if you have any interest in this type of software, or how i built the hardware or designed the software, contact me through email.

i'll be making another post about the outcome of the race and the success or failure of the timing system.

2004-03-19T23:21:00.000-05:00

venus

a few days ago i posted that i had ordered myself a telescope. the fed ex guy made the delivery today, and i ended up with 4 huge boxes on my porch. i now have an Orion Atlas 10 EQ to use as a window on the universe. after setting it up in my house, with cloudy skies hanging low, a minor miracle happened. the clouds all seemed to go away. i rushed to take down the scope and move all the components outside then began re-assembling the unit on my deck. with my new eye pointed toward venus i began searching through the finder scope to locate something besides the tops of trees that venus was slowing sinking behind. eventually it all came together and venus showed herself before setting behind a line of trees in the west. before she sank away i did manage to get some good views through the 25mm eyepiece and then finally through the 10mm eyepiece. venus appeared as a half lit sphere, not very big but impressive considering my novice astronomer status. you can tell i'm a novice because i set the scope up on my deck. that wasn't a good idea, since every step i took made the whole thing vibrate. my scope is now packed away waiting for tomorrow night. tomorrow's goal: saturn.

2004-03-18T23:10:00.000-05:00

if i had a million dollars

a few weeks ago i posted a quick way to win $1,000,000. all you have to do is enter and win the grand challenge. if you don't remember what the grand challenge is, go back through my archives till you find it. the first ever grand challenge was held this past saturday, and i watched the action unfold over the internet with my own web browser. the funny thing was, there wasn't much action. all 15 entries had disabled within 4 hours into the race. the farthest anyone made it along the course was 7 out of the 142 miles.

with that in mind, i've begun to plan for my own entry in next years race. if anyone wants to be a sponsor, let me know...
as i start to piece together the details of my plans, i'll try to post them. if anyone has any good ideas, i'd like to hear them.

so what i want to know is this: when i win the 1 million dollars from the government for inventing their next wave of defense technology, how much of that do i have to pay back to them in income tax?

2004-03-17T23:29:00.000-05:00

a little more 5-7-5

terror on tv
election ads run rampant
when will it all stop

cold weather again
the young sun hides from spring sport
flowing sap drips slow

good tv is gone
plain sketches on paper view
radio plays on

industrial folk
mix emotional cocktails
martini records

2004-03-16T23:20:00.000-05:00

i think it's amazing that we can use the hubble space telescope to see the formation of galaxies at the beginning of time over 13 billion years ago. at the same time we can discover something like a 10th planet in our own solar system. maybe not really a planet, more like a minor planet, a chunk of frozen dirt, that's orbiting the sun a long ways away. if you want to go there, take a coat, it never gets above -400f.

in some ways the human race seems so highly advanced. yet when it comes to understanding the universe that we live in, we are just scratching the surface. we need to continue to explore the universe with tools such as the hubble space telescope. in my opinion, we gain a lot more information from the hubble than we ever could by attempting a manned mission to mars. i'm glad the president places a high value on space research, however i'm not sure that going back to the moon and then to mars is the right path to take. an extended vision of space exploration, such as the president has defined, may be exciting, however i think it's only cheap way to pocket votes in november.

if you want to know more about hubble check out http://www.hubblesite.org/

2004-03-14T23:16:00.000-05:00

pictures in playboy

since 9th grade i've had an ever-growing fascination with astronomy. back then i learned that there were more than just planets and stars in the universe. in fact some of the most beautiful things ever imagined are simply clouds of gas that span light years. there are some very interesting galaxies too. all of these things i've wanted to see, with my own eyes. not an image on a computer, or a printed page in a book. i want to see the real thing. pictures in playboy are really nice, but they don't compare to the real thing. what i've wanted for many many years now, is a telescope that will allow me to see with my own eyes, the true beauty of our universe.

for the past two years i've been hiding money away, waiting for today. i didn't know it would be march 14, 2004 when i started, i didn't know when the time would come. but today, the time came. i ordered a telescope. a huge telescope. one that will allow me to see the heavens. one that will allow me to take pictures of the heavens.

so from time to time, i'll be writing about the trials and tribulations of a very amateur astronomer jumping in way over his head in the vast oceans of space / time. i'll be posting details of my scope, and all the problems i have setting it up, and getting it to my back yard for the first night of viewing. hopefully some day i'll be posting links to my photos of deep space.

as for the pictures from hubble, there's nothing that can compare. pictures from playboy, there's nothing that can compare.... unless you seeing, with your own eyes.