Camping For Astronomers

May 22, 1963

2011-05-23T16:38:00.000-07:00

Well... yesterday was my birthday and I am glad that is over with....

Mysteries Veiled and Wonders Obscurra

2011-03-20T11:58:00.001-07:00

So these are thoughts I had at the beach. In the last 24, well 19 hours, I have been given much change to ponder. Let us start this at the movies…

Paul. I went to see Paul which turned out to be a delightful film but mostly because of the chemistry and talents of Simon Pegg, and Nick Frost. There were a couple things that irritated me, but I forgave them sort of. Lot’s of references to all things geeky, and way too many gay jokes that made it childish, and a measure of bashing of the Intelligent Design model. (They missed a really good opportunity here to connect faith and fact here but instead firmly drove a wedge into the issue.) I’ll probably see it again, but probably on Netflix, or if someone goes with me this time.

The trailers rocked! My run down;
Your Royal Highness- Must See! Natalie Portman is hot!
Thor –Must see! Natalie Portman is hot!

I stood in the middle of my street late last night staring into the glow of the moon. As you all know it is at is closest approach in years. To me it was noticeable, but I have to wonder, how often most of the world looks up to even have a reference to its fluctuations. I had the telescope out but only for a couple minutes. I really didn’t want to have anything standing between the two of us. The most beautiful part of jumping out of an airplane is when you are under the gentle cradling of a fully deployed canopy is looking at the curve of the earth and there is nothing between you and the horizon. That was just the mood I was in last night. I looked upon the face of Selene and caressed her cheek, and closed my eyes.

There is this thing I do with the moon, which I haven’t done in a long time. It will probably get me killed because I usually end up doing it in the middle of the street in the middle of the night. I close my eyes and try to void my mind. All I try to sense is the moonlight piercing my eyelids and will the moon to use it’s gravitation to pull me to it. I have mentioned before that I feel like I have had some small measure of success with this practice but just when it feels like it is working something grounds me to Terra Firma. Normally a vehicle honking.

So at the beach this afternoon the first realization I had was that I need a better chair. I had my trusty camp chair and that is great for sitting around in parking lots after golf, or at work, or where ever but it lacks any convenience at the shore. I had a full-length, fully-adjustable chaise for the longest time and I in a more Bohemian age would use it as a cot. I really need to get one now and I am thinking it is actually something I have to do for my new part-timer. I can not realistically portray a proud member of the Timiquan nation if I am pasty white. Which is why today has found me sitting there in a Speedo. I went to Guana State Park. It is primitive, but not as desolate as I could hope for but desolate enough for me to go there with a reasonable chance of being able to throw on a pair of jams if there is a passer by. I read 20,00 Leagues under the Sea, saw dolphins and took a smallish nap.

So here is a fashion mystery I wish someone would explain. Since the weather has been nice, I ride my bicycle along 1st Street pretty often. 1st Street being the street next to the beach access so naturally bathers are frequenting the bars, and restaurants along the way, I noticed a young woman in a bikini top and small shorts. Not unusual except she had a pair of handcuffs, a manacle each, close around her belt loops in front of her shorts. I tried not to stare, but I am was not that strong. I did ride faster. Today, same thing. Young woman in a bikini but this time bolt manacles were attached to a single belt loop.

Why? What is the statement? Please forgive me if it seems I am judgmental. As a matter of fact, I am in the camp of the far other direction.

I am officially sick of St. Patrick’s Day. In much the same way I am sick of Thanksgiving and Valentines Day. All the mucky muck that goes along with it just seems to me to be a mockery of something that at one time was something good and noble. With a name like Jon Ryan you have to figure, and this was pointed out to me already, that I should be all into this day. I’m not. I don’t even claim to be Irish anymore. As far a s relatives have figured out the Ryan’s, my fathers side have been here since the mid 1700’s and the family of my mother were native to the land. I am as American as you can get. So don’t ask me to get excited over one more day to deal with the shitfaced wrapping themselves in the colors of green, white, and orange.

Now I sit writing this journal. One that will be posted to my blog and linked from Facebook and Deviant art. Much of this will be copied into other applications where appropriate. I am sick of my 365 project. It has driven home two things. 1) I am sick of doing everything alone. 2) I am highly repetitive.

Could I get any boringer? Have I finally gotten over myself? No need to answer that.

Hello Cosmo.

2011-02-21T16:04:00.001-08:00

There is a song by the band Animal Bag called Hello Cosmo and it starts like this.

Hello Cosmo didn't mean to go astray
Took life to serious began to slip away
One must conform to expectations of the mass
Need to relax awhile and lie down in the grass

Good day sunshine can I share in your warm glow
Put trust in people that I did not even know
Almost convinced me to regret the things I've done
Need to redeem myself and sit here in the sun

I know it’s been a long time since I have written anything. Honestly I feel like I haven’t had anything significant to write about.

Today you find me with a lot of self-inflicted loathing. A LOT! Don’t get me wrong. I still love me, and thing I am a great guy. I’m just not happy.

Keep in mind I love to cook. Yet, for some reason I haven’t eaten anything other than pizza, hot dogs, and nachos for the last four days and I am now paying for it. 30 years ago I could have survived off of a weekend binge of crap food but not now. Plus... I had a couple of cigars… so I have done all of the bad things that won’t kill me instantly.

Spiritually I have been lacking also. I’ve blown off Mass the last couple of weeks, I still haven’t finished off my penance from my last confession, haven’t been to water polo in a month and still haven’t fixed my telescope yet.

This brings me to a too familiar crux. I generally get to this point and I visualize standing at a fork in the road. I keep getting on the fork that loops back to this point and as I write this I am staring at a guidepost that says, “Change-Your-Life” or “Stay-Comfortable-and-Miserable”.

Change-Your-Life is the one with the loop in it.

I want to say this is my big re-commitment. In some ways it honestly feels like it is another opportunity to blow things off again that are truly good for me. Again. To be fair and not beat myself up to bad a lot of the things I did last time have stuck with me, and that I take as a good sign. Just need more practice. Still, normal procedures are to ditch all previous attempts and plunge deeper in to the bad.

I learned these lessons from last time. Church is good. Friends are good. Exercise is good. Science is fun. Rope is fun. Eating like a pig, goat or Wampa is bad. Smoking is bad.

These are the things that should be at the fore front of my mind. In those instances where I think doing the opposite is a really great idea. Life would be a lot easier if I knew why thinking not good is a grand idea, and that is part of the challenge of life isn’t it? With out a challenge there would be no reason to progress right!?!? I do wish I were more evolved though….

This all leaves me with what I am going to do about myself. As I am looking at the Change-Your-Life sign it is well lit, has these cheesy red chili pepper lights hanging off of it and sits on a nice shiny post in well manicured grass. The other one is hanging by one bold on a rusty and bent pole surrounded by weeds.

We all know I am going to take the loop again.

I need to place more emphasis on my faith. Not anyone else’s, because I firmly believe that this is a matter of personal choice. I chose Catholicism because it felt right and I stole a rosary when I made a pact with God. I have friends who happen to be Wiccan, Jewish, Buddhist, At-One-With-The-Force, and heaven forbid Protestants. They are as true to their beliefs as I am to mine. Probably more so if I have to really admit it. We are friends because we don’t hide behind failed lives, fear, or ignorance. We know faith is love and that is why we are who we are.

My faith serves to make me feel better about myself. With that in mind I feel like my body was a gift from God. A loner I am supposed to be taking care of in this corporeal plane until I head off to green grass and high tides. The sin is in how I have been abusing it, and that kinda hits upon part of the penance I am lagging behind on. I need to run more. Cycle more. Damn it.. I joined a water polo team. I chose a team sport for once and I committed to a group that expects me to show up and practice, play and improve. The worst thing is I haven’t failed myself. I failed them too.

This brings us to the way I have been treating my friends. When I am at work, or commit to a gig, I am so there ready to work. When it comes to my social life I exert a lot more flexability. Seriousl, it never enters my head that people want to spend time with me. I just don’t think I am that special. Honestly. I am a blessed man that they still invite me out to bars, parties, their homes, and movies because lately my response has been a) No, or b) Yes, with the option to blow you off unless there are nachos involved.

The day is going to come and I am going to look back ad read this and know exactly why, and know that I only had myself to blame for this. I really need to get back into some sort of community, and I am not talking “Social Media.”, although there are a few people out there I really like but don’t live anywhere near me that I would like to stay in touch with. Mostly they live in Canada. The answer to this is easy. Get off the couch and out of the bed, and move off of the driving range and move on to the greens. Make the water polo team a priority. Start running more races. Go camping with actual people. Get involved with a ministry.

I am going to start cooking at home more. Hell, I am going to start cooking at my friends houses too, because honestly I really don’t think I can stand anymore pizza…

So this brings me to Arts and Science! I love astronomy. In particular planetary and lunar observation. Do I know a lot about them? Nope. Because I am as big a slack as about science as I am about my diet. I started this blog intending it to be a journal regarding my scientific pursuits and outdoor activities. Instead it has turned into this thing you are reading now. I am assuming you are reading this if you got this far.

Not to keep you tied up this long, I wrote all of this just to tell you this is me once again taking the fork with the chili pepper lights. We’ll talk again when I come around the bend.

My best,

Buzz

Novelling Afterlife.

2010-12-13T14:58:00.000-08:00

It has been two weeks after I finished the first draft of my novel, and without the pressure of the contest to accomplish the 50K word count in 30 days I feel a strange void. Sure it has something to do with the listless lack of a goal, but in the 30 days I met with other contestants at least twice week for a whole month and I found that I genuinely liked them. More than having a finished manuscript I thing the biggest bummer is not being in their company. I really miss the social engagement.
What I did do to try to fill in that void and do something for my well being is look for a new hobby I can get into. Running is hard on the already abused knees, it’s too cold and too dark for me to comfortably ride my bicycle, so I turned to the life aquatics. I was looking for an underwater hockey team, but we don’t have anything like that up here. I looked into some of the Masters swim programs but something wasn’t clicking then I had a vision pop into my head…

Dinoshark.

I have a very loose association with one of the actress’s that was eaten by the title character, Dinoshark, during a water polo match. The association is so loose I don’t even know her name! None the less the spectacularly lavish death scene popped into my head and I decided to see if there was a water polo league or something and sure enough, fate smiled upon me, and yesterday I went to my first practice. It was just as gruesome.

Not to go into too many details but I am back on Facebook and I wrote this as my status yesterday.

There were good valid reasons why I should not have joined a water polo team today. I am 47. I am out of shape. I quit smoking two weeks ago. I never played water polo before. BUT there was one over-riding reason why I did it anyhow.
I did it because I shouldn't. I'm a rebel like that.

It was fun! What an amazingly patient team! They let me scrimmage when I could and sit out when I was dying. By the time it was over I was beaten! This is going to be fun. I have to get ready because there are a bunch of tournaments coming up I want to be a part of, even if it means handing out water bottles.

The evil part of my brain wants to change the team name from the Makos to the Dinosharks…

I am really starting to develop an unnatural fixation on track suits. It’s got to do with the fact that I hate pants. I love Florida because I spend all my waking hours in shorts and a tee shirt. Sometimes shorts and a nice shirt. Yet with the weather as it is wont to do this time of year a chill takes to the air I am forced out of a lingering sense of self preservation to wear jeans everyday to work. I try holding you as long as I can but below 50 degrees I am miserable. So when I get home I jump into a pair of sweats. My sweats are nasty and I don’t like leaving the house in them so now I have to put pants back on. But now… I have discovered track suits. Sporty, warm, wind-breakable track suits. I would say I turned into my grandfather, but both of them wore coveralls of bib overalls their every waking moment. I am gonna score a couple pair for Christmas!

Here is a feeling I have been developing about the human body. Our bodies are gifts from God. Each and every one are perfect the way it is, and it is only human vanity that allows us to believe any different. To not take care of this gift, is a sin. So the smoking, the entropy (Yes Jay… I used the right word), the poor diet all took its toll, and it is time I start reconciling my grievance.

I saw the Trans-Siberian Orchestra concert the other day, and while I have always been a big fan, I have never seen them. It was hard to keep myself restrained out of consideration for the patrons who thought they were in for a Christmas concert instead of a rock show. I really wanted to jump up and sing and dance and do all manner of primal unleashing! I was even trying to scout out a place in the venue I could do that at. What a fantastic show. They had a singer named Kayla Reeves who at the tender age of 17 sang a medley from TSO’s previous life as Savatage album Gutter Ballet, and like she was… she was indescribably AWESOME!!! I commented her talents were proof of God.

I did an incredibly fun photo shoot with some incredible artists! Bob and Mary Carver of Red Velvet Photography shot some awesome images and the ones I am posting were given the post treatment by them also! More will be on the way! A big time thank you to Kimberly Previtt for her bottomless patience with the weirdness that spins out of my brain!

I am already cooking up the next batch of weirdness!

The Prize!

2010-11-25T06:43:00.000-08:00

I am a WINNER!

2010-11-20T06:31:00.000-08:00

Hello dear readers!

This is my caveat... I am writing this after a very late night or early morining depending on your persopective so no jokes about a novel contest winner making abundent typos, and spelling errors... snirk.... I am just to happy to wit to write about this though!

As you know I am participating in the National Novel Writing Month Contest, whose only criteria for success is to grind out a work that is 50,000 words.

Last night at my municipal writers group event The Night of Writing Dangerously I accomplished that goal thus enabling me the bragging rights as a NaNoWriMo 2010 Winner!

At the Night of Writing Dangerously we collected money to support the NaNoWriMo organization, an non-profit, that of course supports the annual contest but also youth writing, reading, and literacy programs also.

Now the reality sets in. My 50,000 words are a loosely connected rabble of letters strewn together in a semi-coherent mess. This is my primordial ooze! I can live with that, as this is the first draft.

I gave myself a moment of to bask in the glow of the accolades but all I have are 50,000 words, and now I have to write the story. I love a goal oriented challenge, but now the hard part begins.

I have to get it worked to the point where I will enjoy reading it, and I sincerely hope others will too. At birthday party for a friend of mine I gave her a gift coupon for an autographed copy of my book when I get it published.

Oh yes I went there! Published. I will be published one way or another.

Then after that I will be looking for movie rights and an action figure line!

Tomorrow it Starts!!!

2010-10-31T15:10:00.001-07:00

Tomorrow is the first day of what is going to be 30 days of grueling creative challenges as I begin to write my 50,000 word novel in a month!

It is going to be a space opera is all I really know. I have a character map and some sketches I ddid for world building purposes but that is all! I have been trying to keep my mind fresh and ready to let the characters develop into what I hope is a publishable masterpiece! At the very least something that won't cause any lasting damage in anyone that reads it!

Buzz

My Modelicious Hallowe’en!

2010-10-18T17:33:00.000-07:00

Good evening dear readers…

Hallowe’en came early for Buzz! Saturday night, the 16th, made this the greatest October of my long-lived life!

First and foremost I spent it with and incredible group of artisans and I am humbled to have been able to work with them. I am going to thank the following gifted and wonderful people for sharing their time and energy with me right up front because they never should be in the back ever again;

- Bob and Mary Carver of Red Velvet Photography For setting up the massive photo shoot. Thank you for not letting me drop out of modeling.
- Rachel for making it so easy for me to scare the tar out of the gathered mass, and for being an exceptionally fly geek girl. I always count my blessings to be meet someone so intelligent, well read, funny, sweet, and as big a fan of The Last of the Mohicans as I am.
- Justin Simpson, you are my brother now! Physics jokes that I could get! You were amazing sir!
- Patrick Charthern, another brother I never knew I had! I thank you for keeping my energy going as I started to wear out towards the end. The continuous cries for Van Helsing was almost a battle cry that kept me rallied!
- Stu… Thanks for keeping stoking the coals of my already fevered imagination going!

Most of all though, Lady Rosetta. You make me warm on a chilly night. You make me quenched when I thirst. You make the world stop spinning when I feel like I am going to be flung from its surface. You make me more than who I am, and for that I would stake myself. Blessed am I to call you friend.

So, here we go!

You may have guessed that Saturday night was a photo shoot of majestic proportions. Bob and Mary, set up a location, gathered the finest stylists and make up artists in the WORLD, and turned us models into Vampires, zombies, a jilted bride, a witch to be burned, and a crazed serial killer. (Okay… I should let those of you that know me, know that I was not the crazed serial killer. I was something much worst.)

The location had no small number of shooting locations set up. A chandelier was hung from the limb of the most magnificent tree in Florida over a red velvet arm chair. A grave was dug in the ground, a green light backlighting a Celtic cross grave marker, and accented by a fog machine. A stable was set with mutilated dolls. A single torch lit the crazed serial killer (Dude... I forgot you name, not your face or how cool you are!) to a remarkable effect. A free hanging white drape and two tall candle holders gave purchase to the bride beneath a Rustler’s Moon. A Crucible for the screaming with that would be later set ablaze for a bonfire warming all present. (Sans witch. Got plans for her.) A real life hearse that was at one time started not to take away the dead, but to warm the living. It and its owner gave comfort to living that night.

Then there was the casket. The Lady Rosetta and I, as Barry Van Helsing Vampire Chaser, were in and on and all over the casket on that set. I wish I could tell you all of the different sets we did for the multitude of photographers that were invited but honestly all I remember is laughing and great conversation for five hours. We have worked together on a few previous occasions and thanks to here I actually became a published model. I know my heart would break if this were to be our last.

So this is creepy. I also got to be the Puritan. So I will let this out. I am Catholic. If there is one thing I hate, HATE, is religious intolerance. I hate fear, prejudice, intolerance, and failed lives justified under the guise of wrath laid down by a loving Creator. So… being the Puritan became a little more livid that I had thought. There were a couple of times that Rachel and I were screaming and yelling so convincingly that the flashes stopped and I looked over and I perceived that the assembled mass was quite stilled. Even the crazed serial killer looked a little freaked.

I am so sorry if anyone was disturbed by that, but I had an ax to grind, and hope I looked sexy doing it. Rachel was just flat out hot!

It was a wonderful evening. I wish it could have lasted longer, but as it happens lives are needed to get back to, beds need to be occupied and children have to be told that they are safe from the creatures lurking in the closet.

I am so grateful that I was allowed to be a meager part of this massive endeavor. I am lucky and I am blessed, and I thank you all.

Buzz

A Contest with No Prize.

2010-10-09T07:35:00.001-07:00

So I am at Wal-Mart yesterday looking to replace my missing wedding ring with something that can serve as a reasonable fill-in until my real one shows up, or I get me a true replacement.

My feeling is a ring is more than the symbol of my union, but is a sign of my humbling before the institution of marriage. Lest I never forget that I chose to walk through this life with another and I have a blessed responsibility to be a part of something greater than myself.

Back to Wal-Mart. It is Hallowe'en and the cheesy costumes are on full display. I as an avid costumer find these things sooooooooooo awful! I realize I should not be so inclined to think this because it harkens back to that lack of humility that I have been working with Gods help to get over.

What I was thinking though is this... Instead of looking at something and taking it as a poorly constructed, mass produced, deficent in quality material ensemble, why not look at the potential it has and make it something better than it is?

So here is what I am proposing to anyone who reads this. Go out and buy a off the rack costume at Wal-Mart, K-Mart, Target or these seasonal Hallowe'en stores that pop up. Take that raw shell and fix it up, and supply me with before and after pictures. I swear I will post them on this blog.

My best,

Buzz

Feeling better.

2010-09-25T05:48:00.001-07:00

So... Yes. Life took a dramatic change as of late. I think the worst thing for a self-absorbed egomaniac to admit is that he isn't all that. Fragile is the ego without id and mine is. I'm trying to get over it.

I grew up the son of a Baptist preacher, loathe as I am to assign sterotypes, I filled the bill for the typical PK. I have spent the better part of my life and possibly free time rebelling against all things theological. There are pockets of time though I did my best to conform to Christian ideas and living but eventually I got into my own way. Not cool.

Around 12 years ago I became Catholic. There is a much longer story to that but let us just say I gave it my all for a long time and didn't do much to honor God or my life in general. I loved the rituals, and I loved the feeling that I felt I could get away with more on a higher plane than I could as a Baptist, so go figure disaster was looming for me. God is loving, merciless, but above all else very patient.

So now I am trying to arrange my life in a manner that is befitting someone who portends to be a decent upstanding member of the community. I have removed my ego from the things that are in the top one percent of things that I should be looking out for. I've given up the adult material I more often or not frequented. I am in the process of extracting myself from my own prison of social networking. For me the accolades I could fish for and the more people I could trick into admiring me was becoming an opiate. I spent hours a night chumming Facebook, Myspace, Twitter, and a few other sites begging people top pay attention to me and getting very depressed when they didn't.

The good news I can be saved from my personal trap, the internet. I feel so much freer now that I prefer to cook, spend time with my wife, read a book, draw, write, meditate, and I even had time to pray a Rosary the other day. I must confess this. I have become a SitCom junkie.

This is the priority stack as I have ben trying to live my life the last few weeks, and Lord willing if I stay out of the way, by his grace the rest of my life:

1. God
2. Family
3. Work
4. Everything else.

Not that I think I am a really horrible creature. It's just that I did everyting so I could say "Look at me! Look at waht I did!" or "I did it becasue it made me feel good." That complete lack of humility in the past has been my downfall and very nearly did it again.

Nowadays I am attending Mass regularly, re-learning what faith is all about, and letting my wife, children, and the rest of my relitives, mine and in-laws, know they mean more to me than a conveinence.

In looking at ministries that I may better serve the community I discovered the Vatican Observatory! Naturally I gravitated towrds that because basically the purpose of this blog in the first place was to report on my then budding, now stalled, explorations into the heavens.

This like so many other things will in time come around if it is His will. I have asked to take better advantage of my skills and talents so that I not spend my days pissing around seeking shallow thrills. What it comes down to is I know that I can be more than I am.

Be well, and be Blessed my freinds!

Life Changes.

2010-09-10T03:51:00.000-07:00

I have strived to be a good man. Never better. Today I seek a path that is true, and humble myself before God.

This is my submittal to be become closer to my faith and my family.

Without too many details...

2010-09-03T14:16:00.000-07:00

It pays to have an empty Gatorade bottle in your car on a long road trip. Unfortunatly I did not pay enough....

The good news is the FAA has approved me to take the test for my Senior Parachute Riggers Liscence!

I Really Do Camp!

2010-07-18T09:01:00.000-07:00

We Don't Own It.

2010-07-10T18:58:00.001-07:00

So... my brother, I do have one of those, likes to bait me with accusations of extreme liberal bias. So in the first conversation I had with him in years he brings up global warming and environmentalism. Of course he knew I was going to bite on this one given my pat associations with such radical organizations as Greenpeace, The Sierra Club, and the U.S. Navy.

So I pretty much went off. I wish environmentalist would just be honest about the planet. Mass extinctions are a long part of our planets history and will until the Sun expands into our orbit and engulfs our small world. The good news is before that happens everything on the surface is going to be fried.

I want environmentalists to just be straight up and say we want to preserve the ecology so we don’t die prematurely by our own hand. If they were truly earnest in protecting the creatures of the air and land and sea then they would be pushing for a massive effort to migrate humans off of the planet and turning the Earth into a zoo.

So my brother is now accusing me of a conservative bias now. The thing is, yes, we are going to be extinct one day. One day the planet will be gone. So why does any of this matter? Because what matters is the way we live right now. Even on a individualistic level and not something as grandiose as world-saving, the important thing is how we live our lives in the moment. Yes, I loved drinking, smoking, and wanton sex, but in the long run it will pretty much destroy me. I choose to opt for the fading away scenario than the burning out.

Here is something else that I have been thinking about. I read something in passing some where that stuck in my head. I wish I could remember where, but it boiled down to human kind does not own space. So when you get right down to it we don’t own the land or the seas or the skies either. I mean I pay some guy a lot of money every month for my house, and pay taxes on the land it sits on, but I will never truly own my chunk of dirt and neither does he-who-has-me-bent-over-a-barrel.

The land will be here long after I am gone. I am just taking space upon it for the time being.

My Love Affair with the Old West

2010-07-04T11:32:00.000-07:00

My daughter asked me the other day why I have been watching a lot of westerns lately.

I told because they rock! And with that ended the longest conversation I had with her in a month.

I got to thinking about it though, and the easy answer is because there is a dedicated Encore Westerns channel on Comcast.

It’s more than that though.

Before the discovery of Dungeons and Dragons there were westerns. In my day that was as escapist as you could get. I watched these films with the same rapt attention I would later turn to space operas. For me these were the landscapes I wanted to be in.

I grew up on farm and camping beneath the stars was a weekend activity in the summer. I would lay there on my bed roll and cowboy hat dreaming of riding into that frontier. This was all at a time of humanities greatest journeys into the night.

I come from a long line of gunfighters. I have ancestors on both sides of Mason-Dixon, and for the kin out west both Native and European. I couldn’t watch a John Wayne flick without some relative waxing poetic about what my line was doing back then. I miss those days of rich oral histories.

Then I discovered girls, beer and Dungeon and Dragons! Me and my geeky running mates lapsed into our own styles and I was of course the Cowboy. They were the punker, the ninja, the soldier, the princess, and a whole host of other one-named tags. Westerns were shown less and less, wither that or I was watching less and less TV and spending less and less time alone. Well all of those things to be honest.

Now that I am older, with descendents making their own way into the world, I have a little bit of time to fall back into my altered dreamland. I’ve even started writing a novel. It’s a sci-fi western.

You can’t take the cowboy out of me as long as I can still see the stars.

WHEN I win the lottery

2010-06-18T06:30:00.000-07:00

I am going to, by priority:

-Pay off my debt.

-Split the winnings four ways between the kids, their mother, and myself.

-Set up trust funds to pay fo the kids, and all of my nephews and nieces colleges.

-Fix up my frined Jays house.

-Help out my friend Mark with his debt load.

-Buy my own house with a pool and a workshop.

-Match whatever I pay for a new car with a donation to the Wounded Warrior fund.

-Take my friends on a cattle drive/dude ranch.

...and probably have to keep working after all of that.

Becasue every Star Wars Geek needs a cantina!

2010-06-04T17:01:00.000-07:00

I love this place!

The Burrito Cantina at 22 Seminole Road in Atlantic Beach Florida.

Great food, good drinks, and including Jennifer the best staff anywhere!

I eat here like twice a week and you should too!

You can visit them online but the experience isn't going to be the same.

http://burritocantina.com/

(904) 246-2000

Spacesuits.

2010-06-04T04:32:00.000-07:00

Admitting you have a problem is the first step...

I love spacesuits!

There I said it. Over the years I have written many writings about spacesuits and my utter fascination, ne... fetish, for them. Sadly, over the course of time and periods of manic iHousekeeping I purged those writings from several blogs journals and what not with out saving or backing them up.

Professionaly I work with aviation life support and survival systems. Parachutes, life rafts, survival kits and items, ejection seats, and oxygen systems so it is understandable that I would have a affinity for spacesuits.

It all started when I was a kid. Robert Heinlien's Have Spacesuit Will Travel. I made my first spacesuit when I was 12 and it freaked my mom out when she saw me wandering around the house it it. She thought I was an alien. Personally I think that proved I was adopted, much to her persistant protestations!

I wanted to travel. I wanted out of Ohio and my imagination was the ticket out. Yet curiosity to this day drives me so I have compliled books and drawings and blueprints about spacesuits. As far as real space science and engineering goes I have more source material concerning this topic that any other.

I am a fanboy too.... so I made my own. It's a work in progress.

Remaining true to my inner 12 year-old I wear this around the house to when no one is around. I am fat and a traditionalist so I stuck with making something akin to modern era ensembles. Emphasis on fat. If I was in better shape or not so sqemish about tight clothing I would have made a replica of a Mecanical Counter Pressure spacesuit.

MCP's maintain the needed pressure to ward off a whole host of physiolgic atrocities. They do that by being skin-tight and using the suit and not what is in it to perform it's function. Traditional spacesuits are a bladder you wear that inflates to create the atmosphere to work in.

I found this picture at The Original Rocket Dungeon, ( http://rocketdungeon.blogspot.com/ )a site I am falling in love with and resonates with me on so many levels.

Here we have a traveller with her spacesuit and rocket.

Yes.. I've already admitted to being a fanboy, but there is a loose and tepid connection to this subject. Bathing suits are made from Lycra/Nylon which is the same material that Liquid Cooling and Ventalation Garment (LCVG) that astronauts wear under thier spacesuits to maintain a constant body tempeture are made out of.

The most exciting part of travelling for me is packing. Packing is the essence of adventure! The things I take are indicitive of the events I am going to be partaking! If it's the back pack and tent I am packing I am camping. If I am crating my telescope I am plannig on stargazing.

If I had to prep a spacesuit... it means I am going to space. That excites me!

Happy Birthday Sir Christopher Lee!

2010-05-27T06:54:00.000-07:00

This is my Jesus of Cool!

Belated Geek Pride Day

2010-05-26T04:47:00.000-07:00

So yesterday , the 25th of May, was and is Geek Pride Day. I did not know this until it was almost all over, but since I geek all the time anyways it wasn’t a day without celebration. It was also Towel Day in celebration of the life of Douglas Adams, but bad geek moment I had no towel.

None the less I take the day after to raise awareness of Geek Pride Day and pass on a couple of things that I did that was genuinely geeky yesterday.
First, I posted in the previous…erg… post the really awesome ad for Louis Vittian featuring Astronaut legends Sally Ride, Buzz Aldrin, and Jim Lovell. That posting was purely accidental and while I am opposed to geeks shilling for commercial enterprise I am not opposed to making spaceflight more socially aware.

Second, on Twitter, I proposed harnessing the power of geek and fighting the oil spill. Because I propose this under the auspices of Geekhood good works while done by many is an incredible social consciousness, when we do something we have to do it in costume. Ergo, I began the devolpment of a Zissou Society Chapter for Florida to be proponents of aquatic awareness, conservation, education, and advocacy. And to do it all in red caps.

From the Wikipedia site since I was trying to make up for my ignorance of Geek Pride Day I came across this.

Basic rights and responsibilities of geeks

A manifesto was created to celebrate the first Geek Pride Day which included the following list of basic rights and responsibilities of geeks.

Rights:

1. The right to be even geekier.
2. The right to not leave your house.
3. The right to not like football or any other sport.
4. The right to associate with other nerds.
5. The right to have few friends (or none at all).
6. The right to have as many geeky friends as you want.
7. The right to be out of style.
8. The right to be overweight and near-sighted.
9. The right to show off your geekiness.
10. The right to take over the world.

Responsibilities:

1. Be a geek, no matter what.
2. Try to be nerdier than anyone else.
3. If there is a discussion about something geeky, you must give your opinion.
4. To save and protect all geeky material.
5. Do everything you can to show off geeky stuff as a "museum of geekiness."
6. Don't be a generalized geek. You must specialize in something.
7. Attend every nerdy movie on opening night and buy every geeky book before anyone else.
8. Wait in line on every opening night. If you can go in costume or at least with a related T-shirt, all the better.
9. Don’t waste your time on anything not related to geekdom.
10. Try to take over the world!

There my friends and readers I submit to you this day to prepare for next year along with the encouragement to bare your geek the year long through. Next year, I will have a towel.

The Coolest Ad Ever!

2010-05-25T06:31:00.000-07:00

Celebrate the International Day of Buzz!

2010-05-22T03:57:00.000-07:00

Happy Birthday to me!

Golf for Astronomers!

2010-05-15T05:41:00.000-07:00

So as you know a few days ago I joined Moon Zoo and started cataloging craters, mounds and other geologic features on the lunar surface as a volunteer citizen scientist.

Well... this morning at the driving range I dropped a bucket of balls into the sand trap to work on my bunker shots. By the time I got to the second ball I was starting to identify the various impact craters as "Fresh White" "Dark Halo" "Eroded" Boulder Trails".... Yeah I should have brought my camera.

Go to the link a few blogs back and check out Moon Zoo for yourself.

Pushing Metal.

2010-05-14T07:39:00.000-07:00

I have a new bicycle. "New" meaning I bought it used off of one of the guys in my cycling club, when his wife bought him the mother of all road bikes. I love his wife. Because she spoiled him I got a much needed upgrade!

My old one has served me well, but we are no longer compatable for each other. I shall add her to my samll fleet of bicycles and take her off of the wall when I just want to bang around, but no longer will I be using her for these really long and fast runs we used to do.

No, my new ship is a Trek 1000 and a few minutes ago I installed the clipless pedals, and for the first time ever, clicked into the bike. Not slip my feet into the toe cages, but mechanicaly attatch myself to this machine. I nearly had an orgasm....

Because I think of bicycles as spaceships, you know this dear flolowers and lurkers, I can only relate the experience like this. In some space operas the ships pilot plugs his/her brain and nueral net into the ships computer. In this case I connect to my ship through the balls of my toes. I am the power plant, the guidance system, the sensor suite, and the communications system. My bicycle is the motor, the computer, flight controls, and the airframe. Where my feet connect to the pedals, that is the matter/anti-matter chamber. Thats where potential energy converts to kinetic and BAM!!! I am movining!

Before sitting down to write this I have spent the last half hour practicing engaging and disengaging the toe clips. I am sure some adjustments need to me made, but I will play with those on Sunday when I got out for the really long ride.

I look forward to this adventure!

This explains a lot!

2010-05-13T10:35:00.000-07:00

This explains why I am still married! We've been breaking everyone of these for years!!!

http://shine.yahoo.com/channel/sex/9-marriage-rules-you-should-break-1387877/

But in the end... does it all still mean you are happy about it?

Explore the moon. This time for real, really!

2010-05-13T03:25:00.000-07:00

As we all know this entire blog started off as a guide for astronomers who camp, and then devovled into the externalisation of my internal monologs and other musings...

Well I am happy to say I am bringing the science back! I've blogged about the moon. Shared my daydreams about the moon. Now I am going to do more than look for Selenites.

http://www.moonzoo.org/ states,

The aim of Moon Zoo is to provide detailed crater counts for as much as the Moon's surface as possible. Unlike here on Earth where weather quickly erodes any signs of all but the most recent impacts, craters on the lunar surface stay almost until eternity. That means that the number of craters on a particular piece of the surface tells us how old it is. This technique is used all over the Solar System, but the Moon is particularly important because we have ground truth — samples brought back by the Apollo missions — which allow us to calibrate our estimates. Planetary scientists have always carried out this kind of analysis on large scales, but with your help and the fabulous LRO images then we should be able to uncover the finer details of the Moon's history.

This is unprecidented! I have already regestered!

Additionally on the exploration front...

NASA has a program called Analogs which tests proposed equipment in extreme environments. One of these projects is called NEEMO or the NASA Extreme Environment Missions Operation project in conjunction with the University of North Carolina at Wilmington, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric center.
They operate out of the only undersea laboratory left in the world, the Aquarius, in the Florida Keys. It’s kind of a scientific time share with the U.S. Navy and other communities.
I being a big fan of the sea and the stars have been following every NEEMO mission for the past few years and the point of this is to wish the new crew of NEEMO 14 the best of fun and good science over the next two weeks!

Something I needed to read.

2010-05-11T03:31:00.000-07:00

So... Read this first.

http://undrowning.blogspot.com/2010/05/crowded-boat-on-murky-waters.html

The last paragraph

In our everyday life, we all believe we are alone fighting our battles, but we only need to look around to realize that, in these murky waters full of our demons and our struggles, we are all in the same boat.

This is something that has been in the far back of my skull. For some reason I have been sulking the last few days and it wasn't until I read this that I snapped out of it.

Thanks Arkelanor! You rock me!

God Speed Mr. Frazetta.

2010-05-10T13:10:00.000-07:00

There are a lot of people who inspire me, my art, my imagination, and the general sense of adventure I get.

There are very few that influenced me. Influenced who I am.

Frank Frazetta was, is, one of them.

When I was very young I liked to put everything in a box, figuritivly and litterally, and it had to be that way becasue I could deal things better when they were someplace I knew and could control. It drove my parents and teachers nuts.

Then one day I discovered the illustrations of Frank Frazetta. Such fire, such passion, such UnContained talent! The entire width and bredth of the universe opened up for me in a few short moments!

Thank you Mr. Frazetta for helping me to see that there is more to the world than what I am actually looking at.

My quote of the week.

2010-05-08T06:47:00.000-07:00

Before we get to the brightest thing to be spewweed out of my skull this week let me reflect on this...

Coming back from a morning at the driving range at the Naval Station Mayport there was some clown walking down Mayport Road. An honest to God clown at 9:00 am walking down the street. Having been stationed at Mayport before and making frequent sojourns there over the past many months I am used to seeing wierdness there.

But I have never seen a clown. In the breif time I saw from the light I was stopped at he chatted up a couple of homeless guys, a group of people waiting on a bus and the button you push at a crosswalk in the vain hope it turns the lights for you.

Welcome to Saturday mornig Buzz Ryan!

I went to the vet hospital where I picked up most of the rescued animals in my care to get so special cat food, because most of the felines on my stead all have urinary issues and need a special food.

Plus I have a freind that works there. A very intelligent, energetic, possitive, and if I dare say HOT, freind. She asked me how it was going and I said my quote of the week. I guess it may make more sense if you know the context is which it flew out of my head.

I said, "If it wasn't for golf, bicycling, reggae, and God I would have lost my mind by now!"

Todays big OMG moment...

2010-05-03T16:58:00.000-07:00

Today I had a headache and a slight sinus situation all day so I decided what I needed was some fresh air after being trapped in the hanger all day so I went to Windy Harbor after work.

The Windy Harbor Golf Club is the 18 hole gem on the Naval Base Mayport and where I will frequently drive balls from the wee hours in the morning til just before noon. They also have the BEST $3.50 breakfast plate anywhere!

Well this afternoon I am browsing through the pro shop and I finally did it. I bought golf shoes. Honest to God golf shoes! I guess it is official.... I am hooked.

Now if you will excuse me.... I have to go knit some club covers for my drivers.

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way from the Point of No Return

2010-04-29T17:08:00.000-07:00

So this afternoon I got a couple of fillings at the dentist. No Novocain or anything! It was awesome and the whole process went a lot faster because of it.

This meant I could go for a ride!

A couple of days ago on Twitter or someplace I mentioned getting a new road bike I was itching to try out and since Thursdays are the day I ride with my crew from work why not go solo today.

So okay... nothing sexy ever happens before you cross the Rubicon. When I write my great space opera I am going to open it up with being at the place where it is to late to turn around.

Which is how the rest of this blog is going to be.

17 miles out and I am at the Guana River State Park! This bike rocks! Smooth Tricked out. Seat isn’t killing my ass. I turn around and enjoy the wind to my back for the ride back to the house.

When I am riding I seriously try to believe I am on my spaceship blowing though the cosmos. This dear reader does not make me nuts. What does that is when I am swimming I try to imagining that I am spacewalking!

There is this interface between the open stretch of A1A and the back street that runs though The Sawgrass Country Club and The Ponte Vedre Inn and Spa called Micklers Landing. Micklers Landing is a county park with awesome parking and great beach access. It is also a very high traffic area.

So here I am riding a little to close to the shoulder. Well there wasn’t really a shoulder. It was the white line then the grass. So there I was to close to the edge when the car got a little to close to me. He had to deal with me and opposing traffic, so I lost. The front tire slipped off of the shoulder and I tried like hell to bring my vessel around but it went and conveniently I with it. I launched and rolled into the small ditch that is part of the retention pond system. Not to worry the vines kept me from rolling to far but they did secure me in a fashion that would make most Dommes proud! Problem is I was under a low lying largish variety of indigenous flora. So I am looking up at the bike in the tall grass not seeing any sign of the road.

I should mention at this point I kinda chose to stay tied up in thorny vines while I was waiting for my wind to return and trying to decide if I wrecked my rotator cuff again.

By the time I got disentangled and crawled out of the muck the gentleman that really didn’t have much to do with me winding up in a mini swamp had turned around was trying to help me up. The funny thing is evidently I had an audience when I frapped in! There were three other vehicles pulled over the side of the road. Of them only one of their occupants had bothered to exit his vehicle. When the other two saw me walking on my own they left. Kinda irked me. I was only good enough for you to stop, but not actually do anything for????

I fixed the bike. Cleaned the mud off, and got my butt back to the ranch.

Then the really amazing thing happened!!!

It’s not that I felt I was bullet proof that I was riding as fast as I could the last 15 miles. It was the pain and stiffness we starting to make their presence felt. As I am writing this in preparation for its eventual posting I am dining on a cocktail of Ibuprofen and left over prescription strength pain reducers… I think. Whatever they are they are crushed and dissolved in a bottle of fierce watermelon Gatorade. Thank God for MS Word and spell and grammar check.

So her we go!!!! I would suffer a hundred more wrecks to fell this again! It was perfect!

There reached a point on a long straight stretch of road that the wind was perfectly at my back not one degree off in either direction. So I kicked my speed up and suddenly all was still.

Very still.

The air stopped moving across my skin. Even though I was moving at 18 miles an hour there was nothingness. No sound. No pain. The sky was brighter and bluer. My senses we overloaded and underwhelmed. I was transcendent. I broached time and space, and everything stood still. For a few brief monuments there was nothing, but there was everything.

Dude…. It was magical

I am Going to Lose Guy-Points...

2010-04-28T08:05:00.001-07:00

So I am Googling and Yahooing "Spacesuits", Space Suits", "Moonsuits", "Moon Suits", and "SuitSat One" images becasue I just have a thing for this... and I kept getting images of various bathing suits instead. I am not really complaining. The LCVG (Liquid Cooling and Ventilation Garment) worn under all of todays spacesuits is made from the very same material that swimsuits of all varities are made from today.

There is a skintight spacesuit under develpoment also called the Mechanical Counter-Pressure (MCP) suit that is more agile, and less figure flattering....

... so yeah It was real distracting ....

To Epic Not To Share

2010-04-27T16:07:00.000-07:00

God and Kims parents made her and I thank them all for that and to her for being part of this picture!

The photograph was taken and post edited by Bob and Mary at Red Velvet Photography!

The steampunk inspired bikini, the steamkini and the dive suit were both made by me.

Inspiration goes to the brilliant visionary that is Jules Verne.

Best part.... You can't see me becasue I am in the suit!

Enjoy my frineds! Enjoy!

"Kill the bad guy. Save the girl. Steal a spaceship!"

2010-04-26T06:52:00.000-07:00

Picture if you will... you have just successfully lead a revolt of alien miners on a far away planet. One that you crashed your ship into weeks before and thrown into the pits with.

Your allies, aren’t. Your enemies, still are. Your rescued miners need constant adult supervision. She-Whom-You-Were-Hoping-To-Get-Hooked-Up-With, was just taken away to another planet by your Nemesis.

The conversation went like this:

Fellow Earthman (Who thinks you are nuts, wishes you wouldn’t have started the revolt, and now wishes you would stop taking credit for it’s success): What do we do now?!?!?!?!”

You swagger, looking for a way off this planet and onto the next: Kill the bad guy. Save the girl. Steal a spaceship!

Fellow Earthman: Who do you think you are?!?!?!? Steven Seagal!?!?!?!?

You: No! I’m Benny Leibowitz!

Thus was the climax of this years Live Action Role Play of Stargate SG-1 hosted by Stargate Atlanta this year. With in the next our after this exchange I was captured, tortured, and got blown up taking out an alien battle tank and its soldiers.

Still… accomplishing zero out of three ain’t bad! Getting tied to a chair and beaten with Nerf clubs was just icing on the cake. Grin… something I learned in Boy Scouts was it isn’t a great camping trip until someone gets tied to a tree!

I will shut up and let the pictures that can be found at http://house-koloth.smugmug.com/Stargate/StargateAtlantaFTXLARP2010/11852926_bLdD4 do the talking.

B.

Kill the bad guy...

Got him right where I want him!

...Save the girl...

Of course she may have objections to her rescue....

...Steal a Spaceship.

It may look like a hihgly-advanced tactical space fighter but it drives like a golf cart!

Planet Space!

2010-04-22T05:58:00.000-07:00

I am now on Planetspace.com!

http://www.planetspace.com/profile/Spectre

From what I have seen Planetspace.com is a Ning (The same service that provised for my Steampunk Empire and Daytona Beach Browncoats groups) social network site for space enthusists. Most of the activity at the moment seems to be spammers who sign up to pimp perfumes, but there are quite a few members who work in the feild and fellow citizen-scientists.

If you ahve an inkling.... go check it out!

So this is why I am so damn happy!!!!!

2010-04-21T18:00:00.000-07:00

So I have spent the better part of the evening chasing a subject I stumbled across... Smoking causes depression.

So oky, maybe not in everyone but from what I read it does so in a significant portion of those that do. My guess is since depression runs in my family in the first place the practice found sound purchase.

Without going into a lot of pull quotes and an extesive bibliography, from whay I have read this totally explains why I have been happy as a lark since I went through the process and finally stepped off the patch.

I mean there are some signifcant aspects of my life that truely suck, but I am just bouncing through life right now! I mean I am really, realy happy!

Thanks for letting me let that out!

My Art.

2010-04-20T05:41:00.000-07:00

I shouldn't say it is my art. I made the costumes, and I was one of the models, and I played around in post with the images, but My darling Kim Prevatt helped wear my wears and bring a soul to the piece, and Adam Whites incredible photography made it so much easier to capture the image.

Most of all to the unknown artist who made the background and posted it up as a creative commons item for all to share. Thank you for your generosity.

Please enjoy this ensemble effort.

B.

Last Nights Migraine Attack.

2010-04-19T08:43:00.000-07:00

I should honestly consider it a sad state of affairs that when I get a migraine attack there will come a point that I will out of a sense of tradition pray for death, and as the custom with the ritual accept that it will not come and I just have to lay there suffering the pain of the light, the assault of sound, and the general feeling of being trapped in my own skin.

Good news is I usually wake up feeling good to be alive. Except this morning when my daughters mother goes off wondering if I am going to go to work or not, in which case I am feeling pretty good I have a job to go to.

I did a photo shoot Saturday that was so freaking awesome! I was invited by a very dear friend of mine to join her and a few other models and photographers at a wonderful Victorian mansion. I thank you soooooo much for that Lady Rosetta!

I haven’t shot anything since December when I was 20 pounds lighter, but now I am a happy fat man so I sang, and danced, and quoted Shakespeare throughout the shoot! At one point I was talking smack with some photographers that specialize in boudoir photography. I may have said something like, “Yeah… Anyone can take great pictures of naked hot girls… how well do you think you can do with a 46 year old naked fat man?” So they did. Sorta… In the modeling biz darlings it is called an implied nude. No one really wanted the full Monty if you know what I mean. So there I was in a very tastefully decorated century old boudoir in a muddy pair of rubber boots and a red beanie cap! A carefully placed red beanie cap. (Earlier I was standing in a marsh getting out door pictures taken of my 20,000 Leagues under the Sea inspired diving suit)

Because when I model anymore it is to get very good quality pictures of the various costumes I create and not so much fashion I also did a great set with my Jedi suit because the only other male model showed up with a Darth Vader suit. We got a ton of pictures of us having lightsabre battles in the streets of St. Augustine. That and playing basketball with one of the lady models.

But yesterday… jeez.. somewhere between doing the colors and the darks during my standard Sunday laundry fetish activities the mild beat of distant drums got much closer and then the Zulus, normally bunch of guys I love and respect, started running rampant in my skull. I didn’t pray for death until they started partying with the Apaches. (This should be taken as a warning not to fall asleep watching The Deadliest Warrior)

But you know what? It is good to be alive! I just read a report on how nicotine is linked to depression. Here I spent all of these years smoking because I thought nicotine was my anti-depressant! There were times I actually started smoking again because I thought it would help me get me over a slump. Talk about using an anchor to help you float!

Bummer too. I didn’t get to golf yesterday.

But by the grace of God, smokes and migraine can’t stop me from being alive enough to see The Big Bang Theory tonight and play golf this Friday.

190

2010-04-13T03:16:00.000-07:00

I saw a fat guy in the miror this morning and spun around ready to defend myself and noticed the only thing standing there was the towell rack.

Hmmmmm... So I weighed myself and I am at 190 pounds. I have never, ever weighed this much, and you know what? I am still pretty happy. I don't smoke, I am much more active than I have ever been, and I am almost 50 years old. Still pretty happy? Hell...I am very happy!

Not only is it good to be alive, it's good to be me!

Pure Sexiness.

2010-04-12T06:03:00.000-07:00

It’s Yuris Night!

2010-04-12T04:02:00.000-07:00

In this age explorations are only done if there is a profit margin involved or there is a reality show being filmed let us take the opportunity to celebrate when adventure was fresh, and done for the sake of doing it!

Today is the anniversary of the historic broaching of our terrestrial bonds by Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gargarin in 1961, and there are parties all around the world that are celebrating that! In the United States alone there are multiple celebrations! Check them out at http://yurisnight.net/partylist/

I spent my celebrations this weekend re-enacting Stargate SG-1 with my fellow geeks. But you can either attend family friendly events or even a cocktail party at the Astronauts Hall of Fame in Titusville Florida tonight! No matter what you do tonight go outside and look up. Look up and tell yourself, “We’ve been there. We are there to stay.”

I'm heading for space!

2010-04-07T18:33:00.000-07:00

It is unfortunate circumstance that I am not actually getting on a rocket and heading up. I am getting in a VW Bug and driving to Atlanta for the annual Stagate Atlanta Live Action Role Playing game!

Yep. I am going to spend the weekend playing make-believe spaceman!

This is an awesome event. A huge part of it is the puzzle and problem solving. That and not having the other characters try to kill you.

The food is great and the copany couldn't be better! I am looking forward to being the guest in the home of my frineds Ben and Leslie, and having much geeky goodness!

Be well my friends!

Hardwired.

2010-04-07T05:36:00.000-07:00

I watched probably the best movie I have seen in the last couple of years last night with my youngest. At first I thought it would be much the same pre-teen grist that Disney grinds out, but I was entirely wrong.

The film is called “Bandslam”. I highly recommend it.

None the less, after a rather traumatic confrontation for our protagonist, he comes to question everything he knows about people and the subject of if you can actually change or not. If we are hardwired to be the way we are at any given point then what is the point of living the rest of our lives?

My response to this was even though significant aspects of my world truly suck… I have a great life! I don’t mind it being wired this way too much! This I do know, it is the way I have tried to shaped it into being.

I believe in chaos more than I do order. I can’t remember anyone telling that is the way things are meant to be when something good happened. I can not believe we are who we are because that is the way it is. Unless you let yourself become that person, but I like to think we are a little more proactive in becoming who we are. So, okay… I will buy settled over hardwired.

What kind of made this all so poignant is a guy at the plant I work at died this week. My age, great shape, upper management. Now dead. Heart attack at his desk. Normally I take this kind of thing hard and start looking at my own mortality, but not this time. Since I started cleaning up my act I don’t fear Grim the Reaper as much which has me wondering if it’s not death I was afraid of but living?

Do you know what I want right now though? I want to feel sexy. I feel healthy, I feel energized, I know I am fairly handsome. I just don’t feel sexy... wanted.. desired! I guess it is becasue I am to tired from trying to put two young adult women through college.

LOL… You know, I am alright with that. Now, how weird is that????

A little night music…

2010-03-30T08:19:00.000-07:00

She sings me to sleep, but at some point gets me up again.

I give you the uncompromising majesty that is the lovely and talented Diana Krall.

60 Days.

2010-03-22T08:57:00.000-07:00

Today is 60 days without a smoke! Two days ago I finally weaned myself off of the patch which is why over the weekend I went sports crazy. I played a lot of golf, I ran, I rode my bicycle with slight incident 25 miles, and costume geekage, and knitted club covers for my drivers.

I feel really good!

How was your day, Dear?

2010-03-19T15:26:00.001-07:00

Normally I am loathe to just write nonsensically about the little things that go on in my life. I like looking at the macrocosm that makes up my fluid operating system.

But today I had the day off and the house to myself. The kids went to Disneyland and took their mother with them. So what did I do….?

-Woke up!
-Made coffee and a breakfast burrito!
-Sat in the sand and greeted the Sun as she made her way skyward.
-Non-Fished for a couple hours. (I don’t like eating fish so I don’t use hooks, but I still go through all the motions!)
-Picked up medicines for the Mother-in-law.
-Took the meds across town to her house and dropped them off. It wasn’t a strain to be pleasant today!
-Stopped by Harbor Freight, Radio Shack and Lowe’s for a new geeky costuming project I am working on!
-Went to the Windy Harbor Golf Club, hit a couple buckets of balls, practiced my puts and played the back nine!
-Went to the Viet Nam Vets Thrift Store and scored an old back pack! The pack it self is rotted but the aluminum frame is in awesome shape! I have the material to make a new pack and lumbar pad and it will be awesome!
-Ran four miles.

I am finally home. I have fed the animals and now I have to clean the house and change the cat litter. After that I am assassinating a large pineapple/ham/onion I have coming from Pizza Hut.

So tell me… how was your day, Dear?

It’s the end of the world….

2010-03-17T09:44:00.000-07:00

I didn’t realize that in the aviation industry we had fashion faux pas.

I have had three guys, two mechanics and a pilot ask me why I was wearing a Ghostbusters ball cap and an Green Lantern sweat jacket. If only they knew what underwear I had on….

My Tribute to the Greatest Actor of All Time.

2010-03-16T07:44:00.000-07:00

James Hong.

In watching Balls of Fury again the other night I got to reflecting on how fearless a performer James Hong is. I sat there for a long time afterwards thinking about his body of work and I couldn’t believe it. Naturally one turns to the IMDB to verify such things, and he was in things I completely forgot about.

You know, some of the flicks he was in were not the greatest, but he was never, ever, bad in them. (Operation Golden Phoenix. Not a bad action flick, but he played his role dead on, South Beach Academy, played for yucks, but you still feel the emotional underpinnings of the part.) His work is sterling through out!
According to IMDB he has been in almost 350 works. He has portrayed, funny, evil, diabolical, dramatic, and the whole gamut of the human experience, and in ever single instance where I have seen him he was also believable. I can’t say that for most of those that share his craft.

He has been called one of the greatest Asian-American actors of our time, but the thing is I have a very hard time seeing any ethnicity at all. Sure it is obvious where his ancestry is at, but he doesn’t shove it thought you face. He is who he is. No hype. No insults to my intelligence telling me this is who he is. Unlike Will Smith who constantly makes a point of reminding of his ethnic origins even though it is pretty apparent to me.

Maybe it was because he didn’t come to the craft until later in life. After being born and raised in Minnesota, getting a degree in civil engineering and working in L.A. designing roads. I would love it one day if there was a James Hong Highway.
Now as an acting coach he is still paving the way for talent out there. Jeez… if I had a lick of talent in me I’d be a proud devotee of his schools!

I thank you Mr. Hong for your body of work and I look forward to everything you do in the future.

Dinoshark......

2010-03-14T05:40:00.000-07:00

After watching the latest... ummm.... special from the SyFy network I would have to say they achieved the same level of sub-par film making they usually do. Which is a shame becasue I really, really, really wanted to like this film!

To be fair, I only caught the last hour of the show, as I was delayed getting back to my digs. I liked that they film a movie set in Mexico, in Mexico. Generally Mexico looks a lot like Vancouver on SyFy. I hope they continue to go south for production purposes. I really liked the actress Iva Hasperger! I thought she had a lot of potential and in the future I would really love to see her as more of an action heroine type. Eric Balfour.... not so much.

Roger Corman makes a nice cameo! I didn't think the Dinoshark looked to bad wuring the underwater sequences. Obviously there were some extra suspension of disbelief going on wiht the computer effects integrated into the actuals. But not bad. At least with the dinoshark you can tell they tried.

All in all.... Far superior to Gosford Park! If Dinoshark shows up at Wal-Marts $5.00 bin I will most likely score it.

Thank God! Some Geeks Get It Right!

2010-03-13T18:33:00.001-08:00

You know... there are lots of people who do good works. I don't thing good works get enough air time or media coverage. I can go and get all of the sensationalized accountings of sex, and greed, and corruption I want to for free from Fox News, but I have to pay for content from The Good News Network.

I always see someone doing something nice for someone or the community because I keep my eyes open and my preconceptions at rest. When I read the papers I look at the community events section to see what organization has what going on and there is a lot of great stuff going on.

But I am a geek.

Being a good guy in this world that the mass media muckrakers would not have me believe is really a great place to live isn't weird enough for me. I need to do it in costume.

So I was reading the other day about how many units of blood was donated at Dragon Con last year and how much money was raised and I started noticing things.

Ghostbusters that actually hunt ghosts.

Real Life Superheroes. I found this group when I was looking up alternative superhero characters. It turns out the only thing that makes these good people who do good deeds any different than other good people who do good deeds are they do it in costumes of their own design. Much like fictional supers wear disguises to hide their identities so do they.

There is the 501st arguably one of the greatest costuming fan groups out there, but all of the good work they do isn’t based around what their genre is all about. They do not actively suppress a rebellion and destroy planets and part of their activities.

There are also the Can’t Stop the Serenity events that various Browncoat organizations have going on to support Equality Now. Still they don’t fly around in spaceships sticking it to the man. Good works still, but not conducted as the basis for their inspiration.

In my heart of hearts what I would desperately love to do was set up a Zissou Society team that not only added to the established mythology as set forth by The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou, but did real oceanic ecologic activities also! I imagine a crew in red hats and Speedos cleaning up a beach, or taking acidification readings and analysis of marsh lands.

Truth be told, all of this has my head spinning. I just see so many ways to go with this train of thought. It is not that I believe it is the responsibility of every sci-fi costume geek out there to have to do something productive with their wears. It’s not. It is a purely personal reason to do what ever they wish. It is just for me I believe that the most important element you can put into a costume is the mind, body, and spirit of it’s occupant. If you are going to be a hero, then be a hero damn it! I didn’t notice this, but on days when I am wearing my Green Lantern sweat jacket I am much more perky, agreeable and all over the place helping out. This was brought to my attention by the guys I work with and confirmed by family and friends. I may actually put on my Zissou suit and go and pick up trash on the beach someday soon.

You will be kept posted…..

7 mg

2010-03-11T03:05:00.000-08:00

This morning. a couple of hours ago I placed a 7 mg nicotine patch on. I am on the next to last step of my smoking cessation program. The last step being remaining tobacco free for the rest of my life.

While my plan isn't a raging sucess at this point as I have not solved my finacial woes, lost a whole lot of weight, and don't look Hollywood hunky yet progress is being made, but I count as a major success is I haven't smoked!

My New Favorite Environmentalism Poster

2010-03-08T08:47:00.000-08:00

I found this gem at..

http://giantmonstersattack.blogspot.com/2010/02/deal-with-dinoshark.html

The Man-Child in Winter

2010-03-06T05:01:00.000-08:00

SAVING MY LIFE UPDATE!

The hardest part about this whole Clean-Up-My-Life thing is the living within my means aspect. I will admit it. I like to buy things. I like to eat well. I love to get my geek on. What I have been doing is instead of running out and buying something then worrying about what I took money from, or if I should have spent it on my daughter is I write it down and try to budget it like I would any other bill.

There have been some small successes along the way and I just have to continue to live frugal, and look for ways to generate more income. I have a couple of opportunities I am exploring. Well one I already started on, and the other two I am strongly considering.

First off I am selling Advocare now. Advocare are nutritional supplements for athletes, people that want to loose a little weight, or anyone that really wants to just feel better. I have started using some supplements that help cleanse the body of toxins, and a product that encourages joint health.

I have high hopes for the joint health because quite frankly I am not young and I have had a lot of damage that is impeding my work outs. Most notably the knee I had surgery on, and the rotator cuff I tore that never healed the way it should have.

I will let you all know how it works out but first and foremost I want to see how the products work before I start selling them part time, and possibly sharing the wealth.

I am thinking about setting up a Café Press store. We all know I love to geek! Geeking rates right up there with good loving. I belong to an online community called The Steampunk Empire, and with in the empire I started a couple of groups. One is for the aficionados of the undersea world as inspired by 20,000 Leagues beneath the Sea, and another group that takes much glee in the Victorian visions of space travel. I created logos for these groups, made iron on transfers and produced a couple of t-shirts to see how they look. Pretty SWEET! In looking at Cafe Press, digging up some other designs I have come up with over the years I am pretty sure I can generate a small income, and unleash my creative spark but having this art printed on shirts, hats, mugs, and steins.

My other potential income opportunity I am not going to go into here….

GO ME!

I do have an appointment now with the FAA to receive my temporary license and get permission to take the Senior Parachute Riggers exam on April 16th.

I also stopped by the Post Office and picked up a passport renewal form!

THIS WEEK IN GEEK!

I model as a hobby. I started of just goofing around with lifestyle and fashion work, but as my costume creations became, quite frankly, better made and more complicated I wanted decent pictures of them. So the last year it has been working my personal costume epics. In the beginning I needed modeling to show off my costume, but now I need costumes to further my modeling. Funny how that wheel spins!

Right now though I am involved with a Browncoat group. Browncoats being hardcore fans of Joss Whendons Firefly/Serenity productions. Once a year this group like many others put on an event called can’t Stop The Serenity, which creates a festival culminating with a showing of the film Serenity. All proceeds for the extravaganza go to Joss Whendon’s charity of choice Equality Now.

Equality Now supports human rights for women worldwide. Not just equal rights but the right not to be violated, of have their genitals mutilated or any number of heinous acts that are degrading and violent to women.

Naturally my geek is an immersion based geek so I have to create a character, costume, back story, and even some fan fiction. I am looking at ways to pull off a photo shoot also.

I am passionate about the film The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou. This work speaks to me on so many levels. But mostly about a man who has had a full life and is coming into winter. Like the protagonist, I often find myself wonder what have I really accomplished. I know, he knows, and still have to consider if the life of being a Man-Child was all worth it.

So my Man-Child made a Zissou costume as soon as the film came out and haven’t worn it except to get pics in the backyard. (I even have a baby blue Speedo!) The other day I sat down with the DVD and cataloged ever marine creature, location, and major event in the film. Then I started looking for other Zissou fans to no avail. Recently I had a wonderfully talented model contact me through my wardrobe designer page on Model Mayhem wanting to collaborate on one of my costume epics and right now I have a fever to do a Life Aquatic photo shoot.

Because I have daughters Equality Now speaks to me. I never wish to see my children go through what many women around the world have to endure, and I spent the best parts of my life raising them to believe they can become anybody they want to without having to be a second class citizen and I believe between their mother and I we are successful.

Because I am a water baby, being a swimmer at times, a diver, the world’s worst surfer, a water survival instructor, a former volunteer at the Cousteau Society, and a retired Navy veteran I have a passion for the seas. What breaks my heart are marine mammal entrapments. Creatures that get caught in the garbage we dump in the oceans.

I won’t go into the specifics about this atrocity, but know that it is prevalent and that it is starting to affect human beings now too.

So if I can combine geek, art, and a social statement, then I will!

BIG DAMN APPOLOGY

I am sorry I did what I did. Most of all I am sorry not so much for enjoying it but for not acting like I didn’t. I am sorry. It was never my intention to be malicious, or violating and for that there is a special place in Hell for me.

Wishing Upon Mars.

2010-03-03T05:22:00.000-08:00

So the other night I was out trying to get a good look at our red neighbor with little luck. Light pollution was at its worst for some reason and as much as I would have LOVED to leave the driveway I had an appointment coming over to the house.

But in looking at Mars with the naked eye, wishing I was there, I decided on a couple of things.

This being the year I am changing my lifestyle and all, I should proabaly do a coulpe of things I have needed too. First off, I need a passport. Need that for a Mars trip after all.

Next, I am going to finally get my FAA Senior Parachute Riggers Ticket. I've been covered by a contract for years to do what I do, but I think it is now time I get my external bonifides in order. Not that I need that to go to Mars, but there have been plenty of parachute systems intrumental in delivering our earthborne mecha there.

New blog I am in love with! Undrowning. you can find it on my links, but I often feel like the author does. Except she uses swimming a the catharsis for her growth. Which brings me to a movie I am in love with, The Big Bad Swim. Fantastic small film that deals with issues the same way.

Then there is The Competitive Girls Swim Team Vs. The Unliving Dead....

I Dare YOU!!!

2010-02-26T13:36:00.000-08:00

Even if you do not play role playing games that do not involves MMORPG, I dare you in this little social experiment I found on the Geeks Are Sexy Blog;

http://www.geeksaresexy.net/2010/02/26/read-an-rpg-book-in-public-week/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+geeksAreSexyTechnologyNews+%28%5BGeeks+are+Sexy%5D+technology+news%29

Go out and buy an RPG book, or borrow one, but for the love all things geeky get out there and give it a whirl! I plan on camping my keester at Starbucks with a well used copy of Spaceship Zero.

Like the sponsers of this event I am curious about the reactions you get also!

http://www.theescapist.com/readrpgsinpublic/

says;

READ AN RPG BOOK IN PUBLIC WEEK
February 28th - March 6th
July 25th - 31st
September 26th - October 2nd

Read An RPG Book in Public Week is an event that happens three times a year, during the weeks surrounding March 4th, July 27th, and October 1st (starting on the Sunday on or before, and ending on the Saturday on or after). During these weeks, roleplaying enthusiasts are encouraged to take their favorite RPG rulebooks out with them and read them in public - on the bus, in the coffee shop, at lunch, at the park, or anywhere (as long as it isn't disruptive to work, school, church, or any other functions).

What's the point?

The point is to make the roleplaying hobby more visible, to get it "out of the basement" and into public areas where more people can see it. This will make others more aware of the hobby - some may ask you what your book is about, giving you the opportunity to explain the hobby to them. A few of those may be interested enough to try it themselves. Former gamers may see what you're reading and think about the great times they used to have with roleplaying, and possibly even try it again.

What book should I read in public?

It's your choice. Personally, I like to choose books with nice covers that catch the eye of bystanders. One of the great things about RPG rulebooks is the incredible artwork that can be found on most of the covers. I've read books like Nobilis in public places and have always had someone comment on them.

Try to stick to more tasteful RPGs. Most people who aren't familiar with the hobby might not see the humor in Kill Puppies for Satan or Kobolds Ate My Baby, at least not right away. Don't read something that will obviously offend most of the people in the environment (such as reading Demon: The Fallen in a church). Sure, these games are as fun and harmless as the others, but it's counterproductive to the purpose of this project.

Why three weeks? Why not just one?

The problem with annual events is that they're so far apart. If you miss one, you've got to wait a whole year for the next one. Since this event is so simple to participate in, I wanted to make it frequent enough that anyone could join in, even if they've recently missed it.
Why these three weeks?

March 4th was designated as GM's Day in 2008, and was coincidentally the same day that E. Gary Gygax, the co-creator of Dungeons & Dragons, passed away. July 27th is Gygax's birthday, and October 1st is the birthday of Dave Arneson, the other co-creator of Dungeons & Dragons. It is also common for the American Library Association's Banned Book Week to happen on or close to this week - and RPG books have been banned from some schools and libraries in the past due to many misunderstandings about their content and nature, which is the exact sort of thing that this event is hoping to clear up.

Why a special event? Can't I do this whenever I want?

Sure! Do it all the time! That would be awesome! The point of the event is to encourage gamers to make their hobby more public, to answer questions that non-gamers may have, and to generate interest in others who may want to try it for themselves. Making it an event like this encourages people to participate. If they continue to do likewise the rest of the year - maybe even going as far as PLAYING some RPGs in public - more the better!

But I already read RPG books in public all the time!

Great! Keep up the good work!

I read an RPG book in public and I have a great story to tell about what happened. Would you like to hear it?

Of course! Email it to me at RPGadvocate@gmail.com so I can share it with everyone on the Escapist Blog. Send me pictures of you reading an RPG book in a public place, share your stories of where you did it and what happened (good or bad) - just remember to let me know if I have permission to post any pictures and stories on the blog, and if you would like me to change any of the names or locations for privacy reasons.

Other than reading an RPG book in public, how can I help promote this event?

Mention it on your blog or website, with a link to this page. If you like, you can use the following banner or button to help promote the event. I may even work up a print flyer for conventions and other events, if there is enough interest in such a thing.

Praise from My Peers.

2010-02-25T05:44:00.000-08:00

Peer recognition is a wonderful thing. For me I put a lot of time into crafting and creating my own little chunk of the Steampunk world. I build costumes and props. I write cheesy little bits of fiction, but by far I spend most of my time developing an infrastructure of like minded fellows and ladies to build their mythologies on.

One of the leading Steampunk Bloggers smiled upon us yesterday, and was highly complementary to the work my crew at the Steampunk Empire site has been doing.

http://voyagesofdrfabre.blogspot.com/2010/02/steampunk-reconstruction-vulcania.html

I say “Thank you Dr. Rafael Fabre and the Heliograph Blog for looking our way.” And I ask everyone look at the above link, and follow it to our group The Sons and Daughters of Nemo.

Buzz

You Can't Take the Sky from Me.

2010-02-22T06:10:00.000-08:00

So.... I scanned a bunch of my action guy pics this weekend so I could talk a lot of smack on a board I belong to, but a funny thing happened.

I forgot how beautiful the world can be when you are suspended above it. Even if it is in New Jersey.

Cowford Steampunk Fanfic.

2010-01-30T14:57:00.000-08:00

The Strange Days of Winslow Beggley.

When Winslow Beggley disappeared into the lost worlds of the West Africa it he was gone from society for almost four years. When the next time he disappeared for almost four years it was only from the time he went to sleep and awoke few days later.

It was hard on most spectators to take in an overly active man approaching middle age. In a way shouldn’t he be comporting himself according to his years and his station? It was even harder when you were that energetic pre-ancient. In particularly when his secret mutant power was looking much younger than he really was. Winslow always had the feeling people looked at him like an irrational youth instead of one with years of wisdom and experience. He was perpetually bored and not a single day went by that he didn’t wish he was running near naked through the jungles of the Dark Continent.

So one day Dr. Chronotis asked him to accompany him on a journey, and he jumped at the chance! They journeyed to a world far away a long time from now, and an adventure was to be had. On their way back to Cowford Florida of 1889 Winslow felt a pang of curiosity and asked if they stop in the future Cowford so he could see what would become of this town.

This is when things took a left instead of a right on the vectors of time and space. In the mid 1960s Winslow got separated from Chronotis, and spent the next three years living as Jim Morrison, the famous front man of The Doors. He ended up becoming best friends with Jimi Hendrix and in the end they saved the planet, not only from the perfunctory alien invaders, but also demonic overlords, and resurrecting the Aztec Empire which historians would site as the major exodus of Americans sneaking into Mexico in the early 21st century.

Still, eventually he did get homesick. He had left behind brothers, sisters, and a passel of nephews and nieces he was fond of. He was also armed with the knowledge that he and a stunningly beautiful woman were to be the first people to settle on the moon. Now if that wasn’t a Dark Continent he didn’t know what else there would be!

By the time Chronotis found him the sex, alcohol, sex, drugs, sex, concerts, sex, and more sex were just beginning to take its toll on the adventurer. The Time Lord assisted him in returning back to the time the real Jim Morrison died and he assumed his life, and returned, then deposited the deceased American poet in a Paris hotel room and made one stop before returning to Cowford of 1889.

They stopped in the medieval era to retrieve the Vice-Mayor of Cowford, Professors Fate and Foto who were engaged in some unknown endeavor. While there Winslow, who was now insisting upon being called Jim Morrison, sang, fought, danced and wooed the women of ancient times.

Finally all parties were returned to their proper place and their proper time and Winslow, now Jim, slept for three days. All at the Beggley Manor were quite concerned when he did rouse and found naked in the kitchen one morning singing “L.A. Woman” preparing a very big breakfast.

Then again, maybe things were not so different after all.

The Changing My Lifestyle Update!

2010-01-22T08:23:00.000-08:00

I quit smoking today.

Starting my every other day run this week has helped out a lot. Mostly becasue I needed the body and the mind to be in agreement that something had to give, and the habit would be missed.

I have done pretty good with keeping the eating under control. I feel kind of guilty about last night though. When I got done running I was starving, and my daughter hadn't eaten yet so I took her to Subway. Now this sound rather beniegn but the fact of the matter is I violated my pact to live within my own means and to save half my meals for the next day. I dug out a credit card and stopped by Walgreens before we went to Subway becasue I neede to buy nicotine patches.

Today has been scheduled to be my quit day. The supplies my employer is sending me won't be here until Tuesday next week, so my choice was to put off my quit day or spend someone elses money at a high rate of interest. There was no way I was going to be able to not do my quit day today. It is too entrenched in my head to do other wise.

So I got a foot long meatball with extra pickles and black olives. When we got home I went ahead and packed up half of it for lunch today, but ended up eating it none the less. I am still maintaining that the diet aspect of the plan is going to be the hardest.

So there I am, the end of my first week of the plan, and the begining of my first day with out a smoke.

The Anthropologic Significance of Hotel Swimming Pools

2010-01-18T09:52:00.000-08:00

Yeah… so…. This blog started off as something completely different but I ditched it to write this. I kept the title because I loved it so much though. Besides I figure no one reads this blog anyways so I can get away with anything!

Smoking is the worst habit I have, but to break it I have to do a few other things first. Please keep in mind my quit date is January, 22 2010.

Not to make myself feel special or anything but over the years I have come to believe that this is much more complicated that it is. It is one thing to identify the triggers, but if I don’t do something about the trigger before hand it’s gonna pack a wallop when it hits.

So here is my plan.

1- Quit Smoking:
a- I joined a corporate sponsored program that is providing me with a coach, and materials to assist me in this effort. Truth be told this is the part that sounds the simplest and in a way it is.
No cigars, no cigarettes, and I can forget about ever becoming a pipe smoker now that I have abused the privilege.

2- Work on the Body:
a- Loose fat.

I recently had a very good friend of mine who is a photographer tell me to loose some weight and tone up a lot. I have done some modeling or him in the past but there are a couple of ideas we have that require me to be less than clothed. I was embarrassed at first, but if I really want to pull these concepts and make great art, then he is right.

Solution:
Ride- At least once a week. 30 Miles minimum.
Run- Start training and signing up for 5K’s again.
Swim- The Mayport Naval Base has a pool I can use for free since I am a retiree of course.

b- Add muscle.
I have been meaning to do this for years. When I belonged to the gym last year the personal trainer told me I didn’t have that much weight to loose. I was pretty lean because as I had quit smoking then too I was big into endurance sports. I had a closet full of t-shirts from all the 5K races I did. So lean wasn’t an issue. It still isn’t. Looking under-toned on the other hand….

Solution:
Get my Gym membership back and do the weight training at least three times a week using the Body Change program. I’ve done this before and it worked out great while I was sticking to it. I can also use the treadmills if circumstances prevent an outdoor run.

c- Eat right:
This is the hard one. I love to eat. I love food! I don’t even eat for the enjoyment of it. I just eat to eat. My problem is I go into starvation mode then I rebound by gorging myself. Lacking any kind of core abdominal muscles it becomes pretty obvious that I did it to myself again.

The problem with gorging is that it is my biggest trigger. Every time I have started smoking again in the past it was after a big meal. I wish I could say if I never eat again I can remain nicotine free but I have to eat. I kind of need to if you want to live. Believe me, I want to live.

Solution:
Control my cravings. Quit buying sodas and Reeces Cups every time I pass the gas station. While I am at it… Tornados and chili dogs from the said gas stations are not adequate meals either.
No gorging. It is alright if I eat out to put half of my meal into a doggy bag and save it for tomorrow. I do not have to eat the entire thing there. I also don’t have to play beat my brain. (It takes approximately 20 minutes for you stomach to signal your brain that it can’t take anymore. The trick is to pound down a whole rack of ribs and fixing before that happens. Just an example of course.
Plan everything I eat. This I do every day when I make my lunch for work in the evenings. All I have to do is expand that to cover the rest of the day and the weekends.

3- Get my mind right.
This is the hardest part of the entire process. When I teach survival I teach them that the mind is terrible thing. One a bad idea gets in there it blooms like ragweed. For me, my mind hates a void. It will fill in the details that are missing from anything. So when I get bored or restless, it resets to the worst possible ideas I can come up with. The trick is to stay ahead of myself, which for me is kinda tough as I am always like three sentences into the future before anything comes out of my mouth.

My secret mutant power is I don’t have ideas. I have plans! I spend a lot of time planning all manner of things in my head, and sooner or later they make their way to paper, and when the time is right… I do it. So instead of feeling bad about having big ideas I just need to get on with it. If I am the only person going along with my schemes then so be it.

Solution:
Get re-acquainted with my spirituality. A long time ago I belonged to a support group, and I left them. I really need to go back there and just shut up and listen to what they have to say. I realize I am not unique in this world so I pretty much can learn everything I need to if I don’t let myself get into the way.
Learn to be at peace with myself. I introspect too much. I get to the point where I question everything that is going on in my head, and I should just stop and accept that is the way it is. I don’t know if anyone is familiar with the Serenity Prayer, but there is so much truth in that. I would probably sleep better at night if I said that to myself when I retire for the evening.
I need to start writing more. I have dusty journals, half a dozen short stories I have written, and a stack of lost travelogs I have been meaning to clean up a bit. It is more than that though. I need to get them published. I have about three friends that have been telling me I need to do that. Particularly my geeky short stories. I love to write. I love to create worlds or take off kilter looks at the one around me. It would make me happy to share that with the world.
I need to go back to college. I am two classes away from an A.A. degree in Professional Aeronautics at the Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University. I am pretty sure once that is out of the way I can breeze into my B.A.degree.
There is something about the winter months and the longer nights that causes my brain to shut down. This time of year is not a happy one for me. Last winter I belonged to a gym so I got out of the house a lot and I used their tanning beds. Something about the artificial sun made me feel good. I know I risk skin damage because of it, but I would rather look like dried jerky than have a mind that doesn’t want to function.

4- Fight Boredom.
I am the first to admit to a short attention span, and that I am easily distracted, or I get tired of things pretty fast. The thing is, there is so much in this world that fascinates me or intrigues me that I have some small talent for that I should never be bored. I have all of this written down in a book! I need to get tattooed on my arm READ THE BOOK just so that it will remind me to look at it when I start thinking about how bored I am. The sad thing is most of it is free. It won’t cost me a cent to get up and do it because I already have all of the materials to do it, and it all ties in with one of the four habits I need to change for a better life!

Solutions:
Forza-The Samurai Sword Workout. Yep. Got the boken and the backyard everything.
Montel Williams Body Change. For me it worked when I was following it to the letter. I fell apart when I stopped ardent adherence to the program. Oh… fuck it if the guys at the gym look at me funny because I have the book and a training and nutrition journal with me when I am working out.
Apache Knife Fighting! So I don’t know where to learn this but trying to find out will keep me pretty occupied.
Art! I am an artist of little skill, but it doesn’t stop me from cartooning, painting, drawing, sculpting, sewing and a few other things.
I am going back to that support group I have long abandoned.
I have to learn to live with in my means. It just isn’t financially which is a big deal right now. But also with in my emotional means. Just because I can offer a lot of love and attention, doesn’t mean anyone else is ready to receive it. I can not make anyone like me. I can not charm the world. I can wish them well though, and accept that is the way it goes sometimes. I spend too much money on things I can’t afford, and I spend too much effort trying to over come incompatibilities.
Embrace my fetishes. By fetish I mean something that you spend more time thinking about than it has value for. Pretty much this is my definition of fun. There are some things in this world that turn me on more than anything else. It is a pretty big list to, but something’s stand out on it. Id doesn’t make me evil or demonically possessed. It means I have exotic tastes, and I am willing to admit that now.

Lest I forget most of all... camp and star gaze more often.

YES!!!!!!!!!!!

2010-01-13T03:51:00.000-08:00

This from MSNBC.... I am so happy!

Fla. airport gets OK for spaceport license

Cecil Field becomes country's 8th approved venue for space tourists

By Irene Klotz

updated 8:10 p.m. ET, Mon., Jan. 11, 2010

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - The sky's no longer the limit for Cecil Field airport in Jacksonville, Fla. The airport was awarded a federal license on Monday to fly commercial space vehicles being designed to ferry tourists, researchers and others beyond Earth's atmosphere.
The Jacksonville Aviation Authority, which worked to get its commercial spaceport licensing for four years, plans to offer Cecil Field's 12,500-foot long, 200-foot wide-runway — one of the biggest in Florida — to a range of commercial space operators including Virgin Galactic.
The company, owned by Richard Branson's Virgin Group, last month unveiled the first of six planned suborbital spaceships which initially will fly out of a commercial spaceport in California. Virgin Galactic, which is selling tickets for $200,000 per seat, is building a base in New Mexico.

Steamkini

2009-12-17T08:06:00.000-08:00

It’s not a dive suit per se. It is by what many on both sides of the authenticity issue consider an abomination.

On the Brass Goggles Forums earlier this year someone joked about something called the "Steamkini". A steampunk bikini. Granted that comment was made with salacious intent, and I being a salacious person with an over active imagination ran with it.

I talked much bravado of being able to produce a steamkini that blended the garb of ancient coverings with that of the minimal we know of today. I got called on it. I protested that even if I made said article I had no one to wear it! Well suddenly I had volunteers. My fate was sealed.

So I started doing research on bathing costumes of the Victorian Era, and I have to tell you back then with the rules of propriety and what not going to the beach was no picnic.

Heavy ankle and wrist length wool garments that tripled in weight when wet! Black to boot making an already hot day miserable! Then the bathing machines! A contraption that would trolley the ladies into the water so they could step out into the ocean and then bring them back into shore free of the gaze of men? I shant go in to the etiquette involved!

In the end there were a quite a few compromises made. Indeed it looks like a bikini, but there nautical skirts and flaps that give it just enough Victorian flair.

I made three. The first two went to Ohio and the Netherlands and I did get pictures back. But the third one is my masterpiece. I have been tweaking this one for months now and for me is an art piece unto itself. I am seriously considering getting a shadowbox and framing it. This one I made to fit into the theme that runs though my head quite often.

In my steampunk world I have a submarine. A steam-powered submarine. Steam-powered submarines were wrought with issues in the beginning, and very few were produced. What they did do in the beginning of modern submarine design was proving the concept, and urged designers to come up with new power sources.

In steampunk world though steam is king, so naturally the steam-powered submersible is a full realized and functional craft. One thing you are not going to get away from is steam-powered submarines are hot. Very, very hot. So in costuming to support this imaginary vision in my head, I have a dress uniform for events outside my hidden submarine base, and a dive suit when leaving my submarine for the murky depths below, but what were my crew and I to wear when sweating bullets when at sea? Well my seawomen get to sport steamkinis. That is my justification for the concept.

For myself I made the Steamo. Yep. I have a Steampunk Speedo. Now that you have winced…It is the long legged bicycle styled swimsuit instead of the tiny kind most associated with the style.

When I first started getting into steampunk I asked myself what I truly want to be. I wanted to be a submarine captain. I wanted to be an undersea explorer. I wanted to make discoveries, and rise up to challenges! I made a complete wardrobe to support this vision. Someday I am going to a Steampunk convention and eat drink, breathe, and wear nothing but my nauticals! Instead by necessity to preserve the character I wound up being the Mayor of my group, and had to produce a completely different persona.

In my heart I am Vice-Admiral Rudolph Begley, a name the Steampunk Name Generator at Brass Goggles gave me. I am an oceanic explorer. I am a brother to my own characters. I am the Father of the Steamkini.

Dr. Strange: My Hero, My Self.

2009-12-06T09:41:00.000-08:00

I didn’t really give much thought to Dr. Strange as a character until I turned 40. Back in the day, that of my High School days I was Captain America in the re-written World of Marvel we were doing. At the time I superficially identified with hum because I was on delayed entry for Naval service. That was it. It was the only connection I had to the character.

Having crossed over into my early winter as a full on costumer, I started looking or characters that were older. Besides portraying the Grandfather of any chosen anime character my options were pretty limited. Dr. Strange stood out though. The more I read about him the more I started looking at myself.

Short version of the similarities between the two of us. We were both at the top of our professions and we knew it. Then there was our falls from grace. We had to learn who we were beneath the ego, either to embrace it, or to change it. We both hooked up with a hottie, and we both grew distant from her. We are both currently looking at our lives once again and figuring out what we are going to do.

Marvel comics have take Dr. Strange on a long and twisted journey and now there is a new four part series concerning his adventures. He is no longer the Sorcerer Supreme having experienced another lapse in judgment and fall from grace. And he is no longer a doctor. He is just Stephen. Turns out in issue 1 of 4 he likes baseball! Amazing how I have nothing to do with the way his story is written that the similarities between us continue.

This series simply titled “Strange” starts as he is picking up the pieces of his life and moving on. Naturally he is a skilled practitioner of the mystical arts, but not THE practitioner. Stephen goes to a ball game and what at first appears that he is there to enjoy the game until the reveal. The game is cursed and possessed form beings of the mystical planes. The price the Yonkers Larks will pay is their souls if the lose the game.

He saves the game, and as it turns out everyone in the stadium, by playing ball himself. He is at the game in street clothes and not his normal colorful attire, but the artists have made a nice nod to his costume by keeping the colors of the Larks jerseys the red and yellow scheme o his Cloak of Levitation. A jersey Stephen is wearing to the park.

The battle scene between the Larks and the demonic possessed visiting team is brilliantly rendered psychodelia that we are accustomed to. In the end he may not be saving the entire world from the grander forces of the ethereal world, but he is saving a small part of it from something more intimate. You get the sense in the last panels that he is satisfied.

Steve… we are going to be alright.

Aftermath: The Thanksgiving Trials!

2009-11-30T06:30:00.000-08:00

This is what is sad to say and I really shouldn’t.

I’ve been a slack ass all month. No scientific pursuits. No getting out there and enjoying the cool air that is associated with a winter in North East Florida. Minimum geekery.

My major extra curricular has been part of being a Band Booster for my daughters High School Marching Band.

I was invited to a couple of parties and blew those off. In retrospect I should have went but I have a hard time about beating myself up over it. I spent so good quality time with my daughter instead. LOL… she said I should have went!

In the last few weeks I have been getting my superhero geek on. Last year when I joined a gym they asked me what my fitness goals were. I told them I wanted to be a superhero. You know someday I am going to join a gym or health club that well go “COOL! We can do that for you!” instead of “Uhhh….. How about looking better?”

I almost scored Iron Man armor and that would have been bad ass, unfortunately I wasn’t able to pull it off. But what I did do was make a pair of sweats that look like the Iron man suit! Personally I think they are a fabric work of art more that anything else! While I was at it though I made a Dr. Strange hoodie. Dr. Strange is my favorite superhero so I had to do it, but in the process of making the hoodie I was also practicing for when I make the real Dr. Strange costume.

There are a couple of groups that do a lot of charitable events I may hook up with in the future. What is the use of taking on the persona of a superhero if you don’t do anything to honor the source material?

I am also looking at doing a supervillain and a henchman too! Pretty much for the same reason I am doing the superhero.

In Cowford we had our monthly meeting and it was quite good! I posted the details to all of the particulars so I really am not going to go into that here. I love steampunk! I love my crew! I am living for your Christmas party!

Thanksgiving isn’t my best time of year. I spend everyday grateful that I woke up. I have wonderful children and a roof over our heads. I am blessed to have at least three really, really good friends that get me by. I spend all my time acknowledging these facts to the appropriate particulars that I don’t think I should be pressured into believe this is a special time of year. Besides, bad stuff always happens around Thanksgiving.

The Thanksgiving holiday, I joke about, is the last time one half of my ancestry got along with the other half until my parents met. Yeah, that usually takes a little explaining, but I only joke about it with family so they get it.

I went to dinner at the home of some of my in-laws where I ran in to a “cousin”. I use quotation marks because I am still not sure what his relationship is… I got his mothers number and last night I called her. I am pretty sure I made my cousin-in-laws widow pretty happy. If I did then dealing with familial drama made the entire weekend worth while. I haven’t talked to her since Roberto passed and truly felt like a shit for it. She is one of the most gracious Mami’s I know and a real class act. If feel warm and humble for reconnecting.

Part of my Thanksgiving traditions is digging the tree out of storage and getting it set up the day after. I love Christmas trees! If I could I would leave it up al year. While we are at it I would leave up some of the Hallowe’en decorations up all year long too. I want a room of the house where my Christmas tree sits amongst the tombstones. The fog machine continually churns out… erg… fog. Where the howls of Rudolph the red nosed werewolf punctuate his eerie glow….

A Most Wondrous Hallowe’en!

2009-11-02T03:17:00.000-08:00

I joke about it being Hallowe’en all year long for me. As an art form that is compatible for both my aptitude and interests, costuming is something I am most adept with. Not to mention it is fun to play and make-believe.

I do go to a lot of conventions, and I do soak up the adulations of my work, but mostly I enjoy the collective role-play with my groups of like minded and themed kin-of-awesomeness.

Granted, it truly isn’t Hallowe’en all year long. The traditions get shelved for another year to make way for Thanksgiving and Christmas. Children’s costumes are piled in the corner as they get wired on candy delight, and adults barely function from the results copious alcoholic libations, and the stripping of an identity that a costume encourages.

This Hallowe’en in particular was most spectacular! My daughter, a senior in high school, wore my spacesuit to a friend’s party! Her geek and mine resonate on two completely different waveforms so it was a proud moment for me that she wanted to wear one of my creations. She got into the part to as she spent a lot of time laughing and doing this slow exaggerated walk around the house and to the car. Evidently at the party she received mad accolades!

The Cowford Steampunk Society attended a special event at the Karpeles Manuscript Library Museum. On display for this time of year were vintage Hallowe’en artifacts from 1903 to 1911. How very educational! The peoples of this Victorian age put so much in to the holiday!

The Hallowe’en cards were more decorative than our own modern Christmas Cards! The costumes spookier and not surprisingly home spun! Games I had forgotten about, Bobbing for Apples to name one, unheard of these days. In the photographs and the illustrations from the day huge gatherings of community to celebrate this day!

A gentleman and his daughter were on hand to play old 78’s records on a Victrola. Many of the artifacts on hand were ones that he brought from his own collection. Masks made from clay and paper for old Europe, the cards, the 78’s were all his. They even brought reading of old Halloween poetry that was read by Gene, a sophisticated gent and a caretaker of the museum that marked the greatest event of the evening!

There was a vast gathering of people partaking in the festivities, and astonished by the artifacts! To have a crowd on hand minutes after the finish of the Florida-Georgia Game was fantastic! Truth be told from what I saw as I was driving the 30 minutes it took to cover the 10 blocks to the museum was the fans of the game were wearing their own costumes by way of the college colors of the Gators and the Bulldogs. It was fascinating in the anthropological sense to observe this bit of tribalism in urban Florida. Without knowing what lurked in the soul of the stranger you were either marked as a friend, or a foe based solely in the colors of the skin you put on.

I was talking to my friend Jay about this. He is a die hard Gator, being an alumni of that prestigious university, and he agrees that a lot of sports fans are costumers. I may never ever be a goalie for the Tampa Bay Lightning, but it doesn’t stop me from wearing the jersey. I saw on a conservative level about 30 people wearing what I believe to be Tim Tebow jerseys and not a single one of them was Tim Tebow!

The thing that made the greatest impact on me though, is all of the writings of the time. Be they the handmade or manufactured cards, the posters, the lobby cards, or even the newspapers all spelled Halloween, Hallowe’en. This made me think about how this grand holiday has been dumbed down and robbed of its elegance. This shall be the last time I ever spell Hallowe’en, Halloween.

Proof I am a Fanboy.

2009-10-29T08:27:00.000-07:00

This writing isn’t so much about astronomy or camping but is going to be loaded with geeky goodness. But mostly it is my way of coping with the impending time change coming up this weekend, and how it completely screws with my system.

I am not going to say I have S.A.D.S. because I have never been nor desire to be tested, but I loathe it when the days are shorter and cooler. Some people are affected by it much worst than I am and if you will please allow me to toss these tidbits out there, maybe it can help you help someone else.

Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD), also known as winter depression or winter blues, is a mood disorder in which people who have normal mental health throughout most of the year experience depressive symptoms in the winter or, less frequently, in the summer, spring or fall, repeatedly, year after year. In the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-IV), SAD is not a unique mood disorder, but is "a specifier of major depression".

The US National Library of Medicine notes that "some people experience a serious mood change when the seasons change. They may sleep too much, have little energy, and crave sweets and starchy foods. They may also feel depressed. Though symptoms can be severe, they usually clear up." The condition in the summer is often referred to as Reverse Seasonal Affective Disorder, and can also include heightened anxiety.

There are many different treatments for classic (winter-based) seasonal affective disorder, including light therapy with bright lights, anti-depression medication, cognitive-behavioral therapy, ionized-air administration, and carefully timed supplementation of the hormone melatonin.

I find letting my brain run amok and on tangents that I can fixate on helps! Hence the rest of this blog talking about something that will make me feel better.

Hit it Mr. Announcer…. BIKINIS IN SPACE!!!!

There was this TV series in the late 70’s called Space:1999. It starred Martin Landau who would later get an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor in Tim Burtons movie Ed Wood. (Mr. Landau played Bela Legosi.)

Anyhow… the moon gets blown out of orbit and gets sent sailing across the stars and every week it was all about which alien hated us. But on the moonbase they had tanning beds which I think is awesome!

The particular episode that featured the moon bound bikinis was called Force of Life which guest starred Ian McShane (Yep… Al Sweringen himself). I provided a link to the pictures. !

http://www.space1999.net/catacombs/main/epimg/tifol6.html

So here I sit in soon to be not so sunny Florida wishing I was on Moonbase Alpha. Hell… I would settle for Moonbase Bravo!

Hmmm… There is no Moonbase Bravo but if there were I would imagine it would be on the Farside of the moon.

It’s not the Darkside as Pink Floyd and so many others would have you call it because it actually gets as much sun as the Nearside does. On night with a New Moon, or no moon at all you ever wonder what it is doing? The moon is sunning its buns!

The phenomenon of the moon not rotating on its axis is referred to as Tidal Lock.

The moon sits on the shores of the cosmic ocean in tidal lock, where we need tanning salons on our moonbases to prevent SADs.

Astronomy totally stokes me dude!

Adventures - A Short Story

2009-10-19T06:26:00.000-07:00

I wrote this for a podcast that was asking for flash fiction submissions. It got rejected, but I love it becsue I wrote it for a friend of mine and it has a special meaning.

Adventures
By Jonathan Ryan

The snorkeler didn’t wake up this morning thinking she would be bent over a gunwale, struggling with an anchor line wrapped around her wrists. She looked through clear waters at Bill trying to untangle the fouled rope from the rock below. A sly grin cracked as she fondly reminisced about the last time she found herself in a similar position. Barbados. Pirates. Planks.

Her day had actually began waking to the gentle tropical breeze wafting through the vacation bungalow snuggling next to Bill. His snoring has stopped since he quit smoking making him just as pleasant to be asleep with as he was when he was awake.

Beth knew that he knew she was watching him, as a grin cracked his face. “Good morning, beautiful.” He croaked.

“Hey there, baby.” She smiled back.

The plan was to rent a boat, get wet, get back and go dancing after a fine evening feast. Beth agreed to her boyfriends bet that she didn’t have the nerve to spend the day in just her black bikini. She devilishly raised the wager if he would in a matching Speedo. She knew he dreaded his imminent embarrassment.

Internally she chided herself for at least not bringing towels to use to shelter themselves for the sun. A few days in paradise was making her soft.

Bill signaled with crowbar in hand he was coming up as she unbound the rope and greeted him as he breached on the starboard side of the Zodiac.

“I think… we are… making progress.” He said a little shallow.

“Are you all right? She asked.

He nodded. She bent over the soft hull gave him a soft quick kiss on the lips.

“You make saltwater sweet.”

“I think we need a break.” She winked.

He gave her a lingering kiss back. “Lets get the anchor free and then we can take as long a break as we need.”

“Okay!” and Beth slipped on her mask and fins and joined him underwater.

The anchor disappeared with the mid-day sun, and everything went black as she was left holding a suddenly slack rope. She was slightly disoriented when she surfaced.

“Bill!” Beth called grasping the boat, and pulling her mask up.

“Beside you babe.”

“What happened?”

“Beats me. I paid the power bill. Climb aboard and we’ll figure this out.” He said, forcibly throwing his mask into the boat.

It took a second for her eyesight to adjust to the pitch black; pinpricks of starlight began to twinkle. She pulled the mask off her forehead around her neck. It was a security blanket in the new unknown.

“Beth. We’re moving.”

She looked around. None of this made sense. “We can’t be. The waters flat and we don’t even have a wake.”

“Look over there.” Bill pointed over her shoulder.

The center mass to which he was pointing began to elongate and streak. It was even more disorienting as the field was being played out broadside to the Zodiac, and Beth lurched back into her companion’s chest and arms. “Not to sound all damsel-in-distressy, but what happened?”

“I know we’ve seen weird before, but I want you to know that I am truly freaking out on the inside, so the best I can come up with at the moment is somehow we have been flung out into space.” She felt him hold onto her a little tighter than usual, “That makes us the first interstellar astronauts.”

She paused. They had a breathable atmosphere. There was no air currents one would assume came with the movement. Checking the luminous dial on her ladies dive watch, and digesting all of the facts she finally said. “We read too much science fiction when that makes sense.”

Bill genuinely laughed “You rock.”

She looked up at him. “No the fact that you are sitting on my spaceship in a Speedo rocks!”

“Seriously?” he replied quizzically.

She kissed him. “Very European.”

“I meant this being your spaceship.”

She welcomed her own giggle, “It’s rented it on my credit card!”

“Aye, aye Captain!” Bill laughed. It was the laugh he had after he got over a bad show and that made her feel more comfortable.

She shed a little of her nervousness, and grinned how everything always reverted back to Barbados, “Behave mister or I’ll have you walking the plank this time.”

He laughed a little more naturally, “It looks like we’re coming up on a star. I’m starting to make out the shape of whatever it is we are in.”

Beth surveyed the illuminating surroundings; it was interesting because whatever machinations that were at work were also slowing them down as they approached the sun of another world.

The trapped Caribbean waters began to glow as if someone turned on pool lights. “It looks like the ocean only goes on for twenty feet all around us.” She noted.

“We are in a bowl!” He said reaching for a paddle as she saw the shell take on a faint nebulous glow.

“I’ll forgo the obvious joke.” She retorted sardonically.

“That is one more reason I am nuts about you, babe.” He turned the boat into the direction they assumed was forward.

They both leaned over the port gunwale as they tortoised their way around the star quietly taking it in what was going on, they couldn’t help but succumb to the wonderment of it all. Beth suddenly reached over and grabbed Bill’s arm, “That’s a spaceship!”

“Jeez! We’re going to pass over it!” hurriedly the slipped back on their masks and snorkels before diving back into the water. At the bottom of the translucent bowl they stared breathlessly at the fellow spacefarer and waved as they passed over her. It sank in that they were not only were they far from home, but they were not alone. Prickled nerves and a rush of adrenaline took hold and they surfaced when they could no longer hold their breath.

“This is so cool!” Beth exclaimed

“I know!” Bill replied.

“Still scared?”

“Oh hell yes!! I’m too amazed to let it show!”

“If this wasn’t such an adventure I’m pretty sure I would be unglued by now.” She looked into the water and at the vessel below she knew her face was tense, but not hard. Beth knew this because he had once told her that watching her concentrate was one of the things he loved about her. “Do you think anyone saw us?”

“You know? I would like to think so.” He climbed back into the boat and helped her aboard. The unusual spacecraft began to accelerate again as the star field began its elongated processional.
In the decreasingly unfamiliar darkness she stroked his still damp arm, quietly as if not to disturb the passing scenery, stated, “I feel frisky.”

He rolled onto his knees to keep from tripping on the fins and took her into his arms. She latched onto his embrace and shifted beneath him and beneath the stars.

“Let me get these off.” She suggested reaching for the straps on her fins.

“I have a confession to make.”

“What’s that?”

“I think they’re sexy.”

“You’re crazy!”

“They make your legs longer!”

Beth laughed, leaving the flippers on and took him hungrily and with great abandon. They lay there in the bottom of the boat goofing about things like what their first words to the first native species they ran across would be, or if they could eat each other if they were going to be trapped in the sphere forever. It helped to ease the disquieting reality that was setting in again. They talked until slumber took them over.

A sunrise came with a gently flowing breeze over the gunwale. Beth stirred and looked at her watch. It had stopped. She hadn’t even noticed that sometime in apparent night he had sat up and laid her head in his lap. She looked up at him, his back against the tube.

“Good morning, beautiful.” He grinned.

“Hey there, baby.”

“I think we’re back.” Nodding over his shoulder.

She sat up to see. “Is that our island?”

“I think so.”

“It looks smaller.”

“Everything is going to look smaller after that tour.”

“No hon, it just doesn’t look the same.”

“Baby? Nothing is ever going to look the same.”

“Why?” She cocked her head quizzically. There was something in his voice.”

For the first time, ever, he said, “Because I love you.”

Beth squealed! “I love you too!”

It was that moment right there they knew it was a different world.

100 Words- Short Story

2009-10-19T06:24:00.000-07:00

This was done as part of a Star Wars FanFic contest where the story had to be 100 words exactly.

The wall opened violently. Lady was grateful for the protection of the pillar to which she was tied. The harsh sand and air of Tatooine entered the towered cell.

To her rescue he came. The single window of the TIE fighter peered into the blasted hole, a pilot emerged from the domed hatch.

Garbed in a slave bikini her bonds cut and gag removed, legs weakened, he carried her to the craft. The Hutt’s ire incurred, ground fire pursed the withdrawing spaceship.

On his lap Lady kissed the helmets frown. He came like an archangel, but left like a Spectre.

Athene - My First Epic Poem

2009-10-19T06:23:00.000-07:00

I am a HUGE fan of the Chicks in Chainmail anthologies by Margaret Wies an Esther Friesner, so I wrote this for a friend of mine that inspires such madness in me.

My majestic Athene,
Of this I wanted bad.
It was a dream
That I did not have.

Stood you stong and mighty,
In stocks and shackles!
Garbed in chainmail bikini tighty,
Waiting the pyres future cackles.

Stood I before the torch,
Prepared for the fight.
In my hand a weapon to scorch,
I ask, “Dude. Gotta light?"

“Gasp!‚ is what I hear,
Your indignation flagged!
Kill me with your peer,
Is all one can do bound and gagged.

Grin so playful,
The villain I do smash.
The torch his hand I pull,
And leave a fatal gash.

From my side unseen,
An assassin you do clock.
In his chest explodes the spleen,
The impact of the wooden block.

With haste! I free your legs,
Race away we in earnest flight.
Leaving a pack of confused dregs,
Not for long the lull in the fight.

Escape we find on dragons wings,
A beast not docile, but is it seems.
Away from danger our breath we sing,
A favor owed now redeemed.

Thank the fiery serpent with my kiss,
To shelter that of a stony shack.
To free your bonds was my wish,
Not your desire you pull back.

Wicked smile around the cloth,
You nod come here.
Leave you bound I do doth,
To devices we love so dear.

Retro-Futurism is Here!

2009-10-12T13:48:00.000-07:00

This just in.... Moon Canon!!!

Steampunk is coming to life! I knew it would happen!!!!

Please enjoy the following link;

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn17931-blasted-into-space-from-a-giant-air-gun.html

Blasted into space from a giant air gun

13:26 07 October 2009 by David Shiga

When Jules Verne wrote about a gigantic gun that could be used to launch people into space in the 19th century, no one expected it to become a reality. Now physicist John Hunter has outlined the design of such a gun that he says could slash the cost of putting cargo into orbit.

The gun is based on a smaller device Hunter helped to build in the 1990s while at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) in California. With a barrel 47 metres long, it used compressed hydrogen gas to fire projectiles weighing a few kilograms at speeds of up to 3 kilometres per second.

Now Hunter and two other ex-LLNL scientists have set up a company called Quicklaunch, based in San Diego, California, to create a more powerful version of the gun.

At the Space Investment Summit in Boston last week, Hunter described a design for a 1.1-kilometre-long gun that he says could launch 450-kilogram payloads at 6 kilometres per second. A small rocket engine would then boost the projectile into low-Earth orbit.
Huge g-forces

While humans would clearly be killed and conventional satellites crushed by the gun's huge g-forces, it could lift robust payloads such as rocket fuel. Finding cheap ways to transport fuel into space will lower the cost of keeping the International Space Station in orbit, and in future it may be needed to supply a crewed mission to Mars.

The gun would cost $500 million to build, says Hunter, but individual launch costs would be lower than current methods. "We think it's at least a factor of 10 cheaper than anything else," he says.

Franklin Chang-Diaz, a former astronaut and physicist at the Ad Astra Rocket Company based in Webster, Texas, says a launch gun might make more sense on the moon, where there is no atmosphere. "You don't have to worry about drag or heating or anything like that," he says.

Welder's torch

Hunter acknowledges that the projectile would be slowed by its passage through Earth's atmosphere. But he says drag would be minimal on a pointy-nosed projectile, causing it to slow by only half a kilometre per second.

He also admits that the heat generated by the high-speed passage through the atmosphere is "like a welder's torch". However, it would be relatively short-lived, he says, with the projectile clearing the atmosphere in less than 100 seconds. Designing the projectile so that it could survive having some layers of its outer skin burned off would get around this problem, Hunter says.

Observation Report for 29 September, 2009

2009-10-08T06:05:00.001-07:00

This is my report of my astronomical observations for the night of 29 September, 2009.

The observations began at 8:00 pm (EST) in my back yard at Neptune Beach Florida. The impromptu session began while I was smoking a cigar and enjoying a rare cooler autumnal Florida evening.

All observations were conducted with a Bushnell, NorthStar model three-inch reflector mirror telescope with a 114mm focal length and viewings were performed with a 4mm and 20mm lens.

Primary observations began with the Moon. Our moon. Why do all of the other planets have beautiful names for their moons and ours is named “Moon”? Come to think of it, we named Earth, Earth synonymous with “Dirt”. That is not an original idea by the way. I got it from the novel Illegal Aliens by Phil Foglio.

The Moon on this night was a Waxing Gibbous (Bit of trivia, Gibbous is Latin for bulbous) at 85% of full. Position was 181 degrees by an elevation of approximately 50 degrees.

On the moon I once again identified The Lighthouse, (Palus Somni) and Luna’s Crater (Albategnius Crater), and began making a concentrated study of Mare Tranquillitas, Mare Crisium, and the Copernicus Crater.

At this point I interrupted my observations to test my friend Allison, to let her know I was looking at the Moon. She texted me back asking if that was Jupiter hanging below and to the right of the moon. She had heard about it that day and switched my focus.

Most of my observations of Jupiter were conducted with the 4MM eyepiece. At 8:55 pm (EST) I the planet and 4 Jovian bodies under view.

According to the Jupiter calculator at homepage.ntlworld.com/mjpowell/Astro/Naked-Eye-Planets/Jupiter-Path.htm the mirror reversed line up was Ganymede, Jupiter actual, Io, Europa, and Callisto.

Ganymede began to eclipse. By 9:10 pm (EST) it was in totality. Prior to its eclipse I observed a body rising up over the horizon of Ganymede and after the eclipse that body was left in its place. I have yet to identify it. (Flight of Fantasy; If I discovered a new moon I am naming it Cowford.)

Research and seeking peer advice I wanted to know what I saw. I was directed to this article at SkyandTelescope.com. Jupiter’s Moons Dance For You! It reports that Jupiter’s point in relationship to ours an event called “Mutual Phenomenon” occurs where the Jovian moons will occult and/or eclipse each other due to our two worlds being almost exactly edge-on with each other.

According to their chart this occulting and eclipsing occurred on the 23rd, and the 30th of September. Not on the night of my observations. It’s reporting on the 30th that Io occulted Europa to a percentage of 49% at 5:18 pm Universal Time (UT) and at 7:07 pm (UT) eclipsed it to 81%

I was diligent about documenting everything I saw as it was happening. I verified every sighing two or three times, and texted Allison so I could slow and not get carried away. I have since purchased her a pair of binoculars so we can try to verify each others observations, and share in grand discoveries!

Research continues…

Expeditionary Failure

2009-10-06T05:58:00.000-07:00

I am sorry readers. It’s me whining again after so short a time.

A couple blogs ago I outlined my plight about the conflicts between the hike and the day of astronomy outreach, and the decision was made for me. I figure I had here choices in the matter. A) Support and participate in the Astronomy Day events, B) Go on the full-moon hike or C) Do the day events for Astronomy Day and then leave from there and do the hike.

The funny thing is I never considered that there would be a Plan D, or the You-Are-Going-To-Get-Totally-Screwed option. My impulse drive on my 1998, at-one-time-white, VW Beetle failed to engage. Leaving me and my teenage daughter stranded in the parking lot at Town Center, after paying a Victoria’s Secret Bill. So we did what anyone else does when stranded at the mall.

Hang out at the Halloween Store, Movie Stop, Game Stop and Barnes and Noble!

We made it home sometime Saturday afternoon, but other than my much abused mountain bike (to which I am grateful for the chance to fix again.) I had no means of traveling significant distances. Well I do in the road bike I take out for anywhere between 30-60 miles at a shot a couple of times a week, but fat chance on throwing on a back pack and a 17 year-old on the handlebars and covering any significant distance.

Grin… Let me tell you about the mountain bike! I have wrecked this thing a dozen times. Mostly something mild like bunny hopping curbs, but here has been a couple of significant wrecks! One involved flipping over a bridge… Anyhow, I got it for twenty bucks at Target years ago because evidently who ever owned it before stripped off the good parts and replaced it with the bad parts. So I replaced the bad parts with ones I bought! I put some additions on it also. Head and tail lights with a generator to power them up, a rear wheel rack with a milk crate, a license plate with my Parachutist Wings. I need to replace the brakes, and the cam that holds the handle bar in place is stripping to the point where one respectful bump or wheelie if it doesn’t actually com off will twist in a way where steering is no longer an option. I have plans for the upgrades…

This all got me to thinking. Some people burn the candle at both ends, but what do they use to light them? I am pretty sure at this point my candle is a birthday cake sized candle and I am firing it up with an oxy-acetylene blow torch.

So I sat down and made an inventory of all of the great stuff I do and tried to prioritize them all. I don’t lament being a part of any of these bodies and I celebrate that fact that these groups actually want me around! My list;

- Family. My oldest daughter away to college, my youngest daughter still at home in high school, their mother my domestic partner, and her mother.
- My J.O.B.
- The Paxon High School Band Boosters.
- The Sweet Briar Outdoors Program. Not that I am a significant part of their activities, but I feel invested in the bright future and safety of these young women.
- The Cowford Steampunk Society to which I am the Mayor of.
- NEFAS, the North East Florida Astronomical Society
- NFTB, the North Florida Trailblazers, to whom I have yet to engage with.
- The Florida Garrison of the 501st Imperial Legion
- The G.I. Joe Costumers

And, every now and then try to fit in some fitness, do a modeling gig every now and then, draw, sew, paint, write cheesy space operas and steampunk fiction, watch the Big Bang Theory, and sleep.

Why don’t I have more to write about?

Now, here is the one thing I left off of the list. Camping For Astronomers. I started camping and stargazing to lend more credence to this blog. This blog is my hobby. I know right? Shouldn’t it have been the other way around!?!? Anyways I want to support it and make it something most righteous, and entertaining, and to do that I have to live a little. Provided I have a functioning vehicle.

If I have to I am thinking rocket motors on the mountain bike. Now you know the upgrade I have in mind!

A Wonderful Night of Observing!

2009-09-30T03:12:00.000-07:00

I spent last night from about 8:30pm to just before 10:00 in the backyard with the telescope observing Jupiter and the moon. I took pictures and very excited notes!

As soon as I get this information distilled I will publish my observations!

I'm Screwing Up.

2009-09-29T06:09:00.000-07:00

So this one has really nothing to do with Astronomy or camping, but it has a lot to do with my current mental funk.

So Friday I blew off the Paxon High School Band Boosters to go to the Meeting with the North East Florida Astronomical Society. My daughter was sick and couldn’t go to the game so I took advantage of that opening in my schedule to go hang out with my fellows.

It was an outstanding meeting. The major topic of discussion was the misconceptions surrounding astronomy. In the end the question was asked, “Why are these misconceptions there?” My answer was because most people just are no into astronomy. This goes back to the entire outreach issue. How can anyone expect to know the answer when they don’t even know the question to ask?

Saturday I re-plumbed a house. I was helping someone out and it was quite the learning experience but I was so smoked from laying pipe in the attic on a traditionally hot Florida fall day that I blew of the public observing session at Hannah Park. Some say I was justified at this but I woke up after sleeping for about 12 hours feeling like a dismal failure.

So I blew off band for astronomy. I blew off astronomy for human weakness. Last week I totally blew a good time at the beach with my Steampunk crew because I was pissed more people didn’t show up.

I am not liking this trend. Dammit… I should have said screw it and we should have had the Victorian Beach party even though there were only two of us there. I should have honored my commitment to the marching band. I should have gone to the park and shared with the public what little I know about the heavens above.

I think this shows just how petulant and self-absorbed I am. These are traits I loathe in other people, but here I am... exhibiting the same behavior.

I have been told I am dull and distant. I understand that now.

Now, to remind myself that not all in the world has fallen to my own waste, there have been good things going on too.

My daughter and I set up the PS2 in my room, and I have been playing copious amounts of Star Wars: Battlegrounds. I joke about how I think Star Wars is a documentary and being a 46 year-old parachute rigger in North Florida is my LARP character. After playing SW:B the last couple days I have really started to immerse myself into it! I wish there was a sightseer mode where I could just walk around the joint and not worry about getting killed. I should write the powers that be to come up with Star Wars: Tourist.

In the end his reminds me of someone else I have been blowing off. The 501st Imperial Legion. It is an imperative that I reconnect and aid in their good works. Especially since I blew off a gig with them a couple months ago.

I have a Big Book of Geek. It is pretty much a legal sized journal I have been keeping track of all of the various projects I have going on. It also gets me out of my head and reminds me of what a full life I really do have, and being grateful for that. When reading it doesn’t pull my head out of my ass I can use it to beat my skull in.

The other day when I was on my ritualistic 30 mile bike ride I wished I had my camera. Even though it is a road bike and I am supposed to be riding my ass off I do a lot of sightseeing. I took a turn at the Baldwin Trail Depot Park and actually rode into the Town of Baldwin and found the High School where my daughter was playing last week!

But nature also unfurled her wonders to me and allowed me a passing opportunity to see her wildlife. I saw wild turkeys, squirrels, snakes, raccoons, and most majestic of them all a red fox. The fox was beautiful! I have never seen a fox up close but there she was!

But there are a couple of things I learned from this. One, Bees will sting a moving target. Two, if you can not avoid running over a snake, aim for the head. You ride over its tail and it is going to rear up on you. The latter is theoretical as the last time I almost hit one I wrecked the bike dodging it. The former… oh that truly sucked.

I like sports. I don’t understand the ins and outs of football, basketball, baseball or hockey, but I do enjoy watching them. Truth be told I enjoyed watching the Tour de France, the World Swimming Championships, the World Track and Field Championships, Women’s Pro Beach Volleyball, and Formula One Racing more.

Still. The other day we were all at Dicks Wings and the final quarters of three different NFL games were on and my daughter and her mother sat there talking about the plays. I grew up a Browns fan, and even though I had long since moved from Ohio, I was crushed when the Browns moved their franchise to Baltimore. I am so eternally glad the Cleveland fought and won the right to keep the Browns name in Cleveland.

So naturally they were busting on Cleveland, and I am in the position to defend them when the score of that game came on… they 34-3…. They lost Baltimore. Here I am anthropologically fascinated by the experience of American tribalism. Most of the patrons are wearing their jerseys of their team. To say they chose their tribe would be a disservice to their loyalty. No, they chose not to leave their tribe, even though they sit in the middle of another’s territory.

This caused me to reflect on where my loyalties and my tribe are. In the end, I am a Cleveland Brown. I am a Cleveland Indian. I am a Cavalier. These are my tribes. For better or for worst they my kin.

I got the new Campmor catalog in the mail yesterday! I totally drooled over it and have a budding wish list going. DROOL!!!! This Saturday is a Full Moon hike down by Camp Blanding. I had tentatively signed up to go on it, but that day is also National Astronomy Day, and NEFAS is hosting a wonderful fair at the Florida State College Kent Campus.

So here I am trying to decide if I should go on a hike with a group I am not even a paid member of based on a provisional RSVP, or volunteer at the astronomy gig where they have already put the call out for help.

We all know that I am going to do the NEFAS event.

It’s not like I am blowing off the hike right? Or maybe! Just maybe... I can do both.

Oh boy… this is going to be a learning experience.

A Telescope for Every Child. What you Can Do.

2009-09-23T06:13:00.000-07:00

What I love about you dear readers, and most of you are friends of mine, is I have no idea if you are actually reading any of this. I know some of you are because I you let me know. It is my hope though that if you respond it will be by supporting this effort.

So this is why this is important.

In a world with pressing issues like a neglected ecology, potential social ruin, a financial Diasporas, degrading third world countries with in our own borders, and over inflated health care why should we care if someone has a telescope? You know, it is my hope, that by seeing past our own horizon, we actually begin to see the world around us and we become appalled enough to do something about it.

Besides our children pick out our nursing homes. Our children will be the ones working said nursing homes. If we do nothing to teach them well, expand their minds and look beyond artificial boundaries we are all fundamentally screwed.

I direct your attention to the following link. https://www.galileoscope.org/gs/

I direct your attention to the following blog written by Dr. Pamela Gay, who you may have seen at Dragon Con, and certainly have read about in some of my previous scribblings. http://www.starstryder.com/2009/09/22/galileoscope-a-dream-of-1-telescope-per-child/

She makes a very passionate plea for the cause, as well as a chance to score some incredible swag in the process. This is a very easy and very simple, and incredibly affordable opportunity to provide kids from the ages of 4 to 104 something unique and of great intrinsic value.

If at a minimum help me get the word out I will be a happy man. If not, I am still going to love you. Just not like I used too…

It’s true… television does rot the brain.

2009-09-12T18:51:00.000-07:00

After spending the day watching Man vs. Wild hosted by Bear Grylls I would like to make certain observations.

I need to stick a few caveats in here first and foremost I am jealous. There, it’s out in the open, I am jealous professionally and personally. He's younger, better looking, gets paid to travel...

I have taught survival for many years but it has been all open water survival to well-equipped pilots and flight crews. Land survival isn’t my strong suit, which is why I joined a camping and hiking club.

Bear Grylls does know what he is talking about. Nothing he has ever said will kill anyone. I understand certain allowances have to be made for better television. My comments are only meant to show an admiration for his work and not condemn it. As a mater of fact, I follow his blog.

Things I learned from Man vs. Wild.

1- Fires are fun and should be started at every opportunity, and in as many and inventive ways possible. Staying warm and dry is just a perk.

2- How to eat anything.
a. Step #1 Bite the head off.
b. Step #2 Squeeze out the guts because you don’t want to eat the poo-poo. It taste like.... bad... I mean really bad, and all of the nasty stuff is in there!
c. Step #3 Chew on one side of your mouth and close the opposite eye.
d. Step #4 Say “Yuck.” Not with any kind of enthusiasm, but just as a blanket statement.

3- Gravity sucks.

4- A little Spanish gets you a long way.

5- Han solo had the right idea on Hoth.

Now...if Bear Grylls were me… (remembering the above caveat that certain allowances have to be made for better television....)

1- DO NOT DITCH YOUR PARACHUTE!!!!!! The Ram Air parachute assemblies he uses are zero-porosity air foils. They make for wicked shelters and the suspension lines have a tensile strength of over 500 pounds.

2- Rope, while fun to play with, is a finite source.

3- Don’t eat anything unless you have enough water to drink with it. Digestion requires water to break anything down. Even if it is a grub.

4- Beat his Outfitter! Unless it is Mrs. Grylls in which case .... erg... anyway... Dude! Wear Underarmor underwear!!! Do not underestimate what crotch rot will do to your spirits. Underarmor will wick away moisture from your privates and dry much quicker. While on that subject... Tinted Safety Glasses. Not only will they protect you from the sun, but flying rocks, cobra venim, bee's, ice crystals, bats…. You get the point.

5- A big part of what I teach is not only surviving, but getting found also. There are many different signaling methods out there, both things you can carry and things you can make on the fly. It looks dramtic to run across the Icelandic tundra. But I can think of a couple ways to mark the snow so someone would know I was alive! (Not the first thing that popped into your mind...)

In all honesty, thank you Mr. Grylls and the Discovery Channel.

Game Called on Account of Weather.

2009-09-12T14:17:00.000-07:00

Jonesing have I been to attend the Dark Skies Observation Session with NEFAS that I may have over prepared. I blame the Man vs. Wild Marathon I have been watching all day.

Tonight’s much anticipated session was cancelled because of weather, and quite frankly that is the breaks that come with open sky observations. It is still kind of a bummer. I had a wish list of objects I wanted to observe, and all the necessary reference materials.

I also had bug spray, a camp chair, a small work table, khaki cargos, a long sleeve shirt, a tent if necessary, red lens flashlight, a 2 quart canteen with water, and probably most important… toilet paper in a Ziploc baggie.

Dragon Con

2009-09-08T06:56:00.000-07:00

So.... I didn't do that much related to science or camping at Dragon Con 2009, but there was much to be done on both fronts. Especially camping... that is standing in line for hours for almost everything.

In this epicenter of wonderous geekery there were solar telescopes attended by an outreach program for the Air Traffic Controllers Association, many panels regarding the status of space exploration, and even a night at the Georgia Aquarium.

But..... It is a science fiction convention and fiction must not get lost in the science, and one of my most awesome experiences was wandering around in my Steampunk Dive Suit!It was quite teh hit!!! I love it! Wait til next year when I have the other major sub-assemblies done!

I have designs to build a Moon Suit.... a Steampunk version based upon the 1966 Grumman Moon Suit so wonderfully adapted to the Major Matt Mason toy line back in the day.

Dragon Con!!!

2009-09-02T05:05:00.000-07:00

This will most likely be my last entry before Dragon Con so with that dear readers, be safe, have fun, and wear sun screen!

My annual foray into the real and fantastic will be significant, and I assure you fun.

Be well all.

Two things that irritate me.

2009-09-01T07:37:00.000-07:00

1- The desecration of the pristine environment that is outer space and the short-sighted failure to take advantage of a fantastic commercial venture by cleaning it up and recycling the parts.
2- Crappy remakes of science fiction classics and neo-classics.

My Solution!

Re-boot Salvage One but with a twist! Let’s make it a reality show!!!

Retro-Blog; 29 August 2009 NEFAS Public Observations

2009-09-01T04:56:00.000-07:00

PROLOG:

When Neil Armstrong stepped on to the moon I was in Louisville, Texas sitting on my Grandmothers lap. This is the Grandmother that crossed the Red River in a covered wagon. It is her legacy, and that of her people that has prompted such wanderlust and starry dreams.

This is the first blog where I am passing on my observations and research, but I am finding that looking towards the skies is only part of the party. NEFAS was there for a purpose and that has as much relevance to my astronomical pursuits as the actual astronomy and I choose to include them as part of my science.

After that there will be my obligatory flight of fancy….

NEFAS:

Statler and Waldorf live! Straight from the Muppets into a parking lot at Hannah Park for the public observation sessions. Dennis and Don are fellow astronomers and NEFAS members who helped me set up my telescope and gave me a lot of laughs! I have inestimable gratitude for their help, else frustration would have ended things pretty quick. They are funny, extremely knowledgeable, and played off of each other like a seasoned duo! They had me cracking up the whole time. Especially when they referred to their wives, who were lovely ladies sitting on comfortable chairs, as a couple of chicks we picked up off of the street.

It may be serendipity that lead me to this moment as I have been listening to a lot of Bob Marley and the Wailers, plus a whole host of other reggae talents. I have to warn you if you fall asleep listening to Nappy Dread in the headphones…. Man you are in for some funky ass dreamin’!!!

The motto of the Virginia Air and Space Center is “From the sea to the Stars.” and that is just as appropriate for here. The public observations are an outreach program geared towards stimulating interest in the science of astronomy and is held at the Hannah Park State Park, lot #8, right on the beach. Clean salt air Mon… sorry about that… and the lap of waves while pursuing astronomical investigation! Not a more appropriate quote to look upward, really upwards in and for a very long time.

I have always felt that for any organization to survive it has to promulgate itself some how. In the scope of the Astronomical League the Outreach Chair Dr. Mike Reynolds states that, “Outreach is paramount to the survival of our hobby.” If there is one thing I am good at is talking to complete strangers.

The whole time my favorite Muppet characters are helping me out I kept saying let’s point it at the Moon! Let’s point it at the Moon!!! Well I did after I figured out how to center the secondary mirror. And I stayed there all night as my fellows were directing theirs towards Jupiter, Saturn, stars, and nebulas. So I had the moon covered for NEFAS and took great delight in sharing some eye piece time with the public. Particularly the children.

They all asked what my name was. I’d say Buzz. Then they would reply Lightyear! Grin… I knew that was coming. So there they were with Buzz Lightyear looking at the stars. Part of me is hoping that was the sitting on my Grandmothers lap moment or them.

But the next time I will have the tripod lower and a step stool for them to stand on. I was there for them and not me.

OBSERVATIONS:

To conduct my observations I was using a Bushnell, NorthStar model three-inch reflector mirror telescope with a 114mm focal length and viewing it through a 20mm lens. I got the telescope at K-Mart years ago.

The times of the observation were from approximately 8:00 pm to 10:00 pm.

The moon was at 72.05% illumination and was waxing gibbous.

These were my two significant observations for the night. Lacking a chart or map of my own I created my own geography, well selenography, for one feature jumped out at me, and the other I had an inspired purpose for. After the fact I have researched the real names and other significant data, but I am stiff referring to these objects by the names I gave them, the Lighthouse, and Luna’s Crater.

Palus Somni (The Lighthouse) jumped out at me as the very first thing I thought when I saw it was “There is a lighthouse on the moon.” It is a plain on the northeast side of the Mare Tranquillitatis, close to Mare Chisium. There is a point, a very distinct point of light that had two”rays” running approximately 165 degrees northwest and near southeast or it’s origin. Palus Somni has a higher albedo than the rest of that plain.

I could cheat this out a little more and find out if it is a mountain ridge or a lip of a crater, but I am saving that for future research. All in all it has to be some kind of reflectivity coming off of the landscape, but then again I don’t know because the rays were pretty straight.

The selenographic coordinates: 14.1 degrees North, 45.0 degrees East

Albategnius Crater (Luna’s Crater) did not jump out at me as I had decided I was going to name a crater after my friend Allison. I wanted something unique that I could quite frankly find later to show her. Albategnius is slightly out of round and had a dimple. That dimple I find out is actually another impact crater called Klein.

Selenographic coordinates: 11.2 degrees South, 4.1 degrees East.

Diameter: 129 km.

Depth: 4.4 km

FLIGHT OF FANCY:

So I texted my friend Allison to let her know I just named a crater after her. Allison has a special connection to the moon much like I do and I wanted to do something nice for her. So I let her know. Much texting later she calls and we get to talking.

We have our Steampunk Beach party in September, and that was discussed in between bouts of “Wow” from me looking at the moon, she pausing long enough to say “that is so cool!” and then go back telling me about this neo-Victorian bikini she is making…. So the train of thought went like this…

Allison is making a bikini, and I am at the beach. I am at the beach looking through the telescope. The telescope is looking at the moon. Then I am suddenly hearing One Love/People Get Ready and imagining a beach party on a distant shore.

Jeez… Real astronomers are going to hate me.

Retro-Blog; 28 August 2009 NEFAS and the NFTB

2009-08-31T17:35:00.000-07:00

I have joined two significant groups this month. The North East Florida Astronomical Society, and the North Florida Trailblazers. The reasoning behind this will come in a later blog. (a.k.a. cheesy way to keep you reading these things!)

I am really glad that NEAS is still around. I checked them out 11 years ago but ended up traveling a lot after that. In my newly resurrected astronomy journal I was amazed at how much time had passed.

But this being the Age of Way-Too-Much-information finding them again was easy. Lo and behold… they had a meeting a few days after I made this little discovery. So I went!

I got there late! I entered boldly and took a seat near the front! It is part of my commitment to the International Year of Astronomy.

Awesome presentation and I adored it! Dr. Mike Reynolds gave a fantastic travelogue/dissertation about his trip about his expedition to Fiji to observe the total solar eclipse in July.

There were awards given out also, and I think it is fantastic to be part of a group that recognizes the achievement of its members.

After all was said and done I handed them a check for membership. Truth be told I had written it when Dr. Reynolds was showing beautiful slides of the simultaneous sunrise and sunset that occurs with a total solar eclipse…

Now I only I can get them to make t-shirts and patches….

I joined the North Florida Trailblazers to enhance the survival training I give. Granted I camped a lot as a kid and some as an adult, and while I am told I am an expert in water survival training I kind of lick in land survival. I am always beating up my students to prepare themselves for just as much of a land survival scenario as a water survival. Yet I lack the critical skills they need, and I can’t provide.

Plus I have been wanting to get out into the great unknown. It is my response to Star Trek.

Unfortunately with my schedule and commitments I am probably not going to be able to hit the trails with them until October. Still in the meantime I can prepare for that expedition. Four day hike. Could be sexy!

By this point you are probably beginning to see where I got the idea or the Camping for Astronomers blogs….

Retro-Blog; October 2008 Kitt Peak National Observatory

2009-08-31T10:20:00.001-07:00

My company sent me to Tuscan, Arizona for a gig at Davis-Mothan Air Force base, and there were three things I wanted to get done while I was there besides my job.

1- Troop an event with the Dune Sea Garrison of the 501st.
2- Visit the Kitt Peak National Observatory
3- Eat as many enchiladas as I could.

I am happy to say I was successful on all fronts!

I made friends in Tuscan pretty fast. My first night there I put on my TIE Pilot costume and trooped a Game Stop with the Dune Sea Garrison, and they are the most open and inviting crew you could meet. It didn’t take long for them to peg me as a Southerner because everywhere we went I kept asking for sweet tea and no one out west serves sweet tea. I don’t know how many times I told them I was from Ohio they continued to refer to me in a grand western tradition as “This fine Southern gentleman!” Well at leas I made some one look good.

As I had them taking me from one Mexican resteraunt to the next they gave me the low down on Kitt Peak too. Besides being open and inviting they also were very tolerant.

When I was a kid on the farm I came across a picture of the McMath-Pierce Solar Telescope. I was completely fascinated but the idea of a telescope. I wondered if they had a swimming pool there because studying the sun had to get hot and wondered if they wore bathing suits under their lab coats when they weren’t trying to get a tan. I would like to say that these were just pre-teen musings but hey carried over in to my adult hood also.

So here I am in Tuscan, time to kill and a plot to hatch and I take off across the dessert towards the mountain. It took about an hour to get there. Take water with you when you go. You will get thirsty and there are no vending machines on top of the mountain. Once you clear Tuscan and you can see all the way across the desert and see the observatories across the plain. Distance it the first deception in the high desert. The next is the speed limit. I didn’t see a single speed sign except when I was approaching the U.S. Border Patrol stop. I just set the rental on cruise control and jammed out to XM radios Hair Band Heaven.

Driving up the mountain is majestic. Tuscan itself is already a couple of thousand feet above sea level, but Kitt Peak is 6,880 ft above the ocean, and there are signs going up elling you at which 1,000 you are at. ON the way I came across a gentleman who somehow laid his Harley down and I stopped to help him out. Once we got his hog righted and he made sure it started we talked a little. I gave him some water because he had been there for over an hour waiting for someone to show up. Then he asked me, “So… are you one of the scientists up there?” I laughed so hard! I told him, “Sir, you give me too much credit for being that smart!”

Once at the mountain the first thing I noticed was the helipad in the middle of the parking lot. Not sure why this jumped out at me, its faded marking in the cracked asphalt but it did. I took it all in. I was the only vehicle in the visitor’s lot. I stood there for about 20 minutes and didn’t see a single person. I could have been on the moon.

Very nice visitors center. Clean, air conditioned and a very cordial staff. They asked me if I cared to wait for a guide and most of you know me, I do my best work on my own. So I commenced my exploration.

Obviously you are not going to get into any of the actual working areas of the telescopes, but there are extensive galleries protected by thick Plexiglas window for you to see thought. When I was there, actual experiments were being conducted and you were watching the professionals do their business. The Mayall 4 meter telescope was incredible! I could move in there. You really have see this for yourself!

I got to the McMath-Pierce Solar Telescope and saw the solar scientists at work, and they weren’t wearing bathing suits. They were not even wearing lab coats. No swimming pool either! Just street clothes! My childhood delusion permanently despoiled… well not really. It’s a fun idea that has been in my head for so long I am not letting it go.

What amazed me is for a place with limited visitor traffic almost every available surface that one could access had some kind of historical or educational exhibit on display and it was all in great condition. You can learn a lot about astronomy just by reading the walls and you can come to know the local cultures by looking at their artifacts.

On the way down I stopped at the picnic area below the large telescopes, and in the middle of it was ARO 12 meter radio telescope. It’s the one in my profile pic. Because I had brought lunch with me because my noble guides in Tuscan told me so, I ate it. I was all alone there. I could have gone streaking and truth be old I had actually considered it.

I did run into a couple of astronomers there. They were great guys. I told them they had the best job in the world and when they asked me what I did for a living I told them and they told me I had one of the scariest. I love intellectual discourse!

There are cabins there that have signs far away from them that say “Day Sleepers. Keep all noise down.”

It was all incredible! I thought about taking a couple hours more to write this to give you all of the technical details about the equipment up there but it would jut be numbers. As I was sitting on the picnic tables thinking how small I am to the observatories, and how little, they were compared to the mountain, and how tiny they were to the desert, and how absolutely dwarfed it was to the skies… seriously… after that what difference dos a 50+ foot focal length mean… To quote the man, “For the world is hollow and I have touched the sky.”

There is no serious way I can give this wondrous place of heavenly pursuits it’s due without and IMAX or just taking you there. If Kitt Peak is not on your list of 1,000 places to visit before you die then it should be.

But to leave you with this…. On the way back to Tuscan I got stopped by the U.S. Border Patrol and they asked me “So… are you one of the scientists up there?” I laughed my ass off!

Seriously… I’m not that smart.

Retro-Blog; Dragon Con 2008 Labor Day Weekend

2009-08-31T06:28:00.001-07:00

So okay… it’s been almost a year since these events transpired and I am getting ready for my annual celebration of geek as I am writing this.

In my meanderings around the web and world I know there is a bristling of emotions when fantasy, fiction and reality collide. I like to think of Dragon Con as a the Large Hadron Collider of science fiction and science fact.

With this in mind I am dressed as the Sand Storm Han Solo form a deleted scene from Return of the Jedi, and I am seated with my special friend Karen attired in a Princess Leia bikini participating in the live recording of episode 104 of the Astronomy Cast. (www.astronomycast.com)

Panelist for this…erg…. panel were Dr. Phil Plait of Bad Astronomy (http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/) and Dr. Kevin Grazier, science advisor to Battlestar Galactica and Eureka, and the topics were about what science fiction gets right, and what they get wrong, and how in some ways it is almost forgivable to make certain allowances for entertainment.

Now this isn’t something that happened then but makes an interesting note is my favorite TV show right now is The Big Bang Theory, and it is the only comedy to have a science advisor on staff….

Leading the panel was Dr. Pamela Gay to who’s podcast I have been a big fan of for a very long time. In her comments before and after the main topic she pimped the International Year of Astronomy, to which began the slow burn which is resulting in this very blog page.

She said get involved and I decided I would. Starting with distributing the collection of buttons and flyers she gave me for that very purpose when I met her at her table!!!!! I think it was at that point I became an Astronomy Cast groupie.

You can read about her adventures at Dragon Con at http://www.starstryder.com/2008/09/02/dragoncon-there-and-back-again/ and listen to the episode at http://www.astronomycast.com/astronomy/episode-104-science-fiction-at-dragoncon-with-plait-and-grazier/ .

This was fun. I sincerely hope that anyone who has this stereotyped, and you will soon come to know that I loathe, absolutely LOATHE stereotypes, as nerdy, dark-dwelling, socially stymied science geeks should listen to this episode. It’s funny! As a plus, not to discredit Dr. Gays works, or her intellect… she is quite beautiful.

Testing.... Testing....

2009-08-30T17:09:00.000-07:00

As part of my promise to do something for the International Year of Astronomy, and the advice of Dr. Pamela Gay.... I am starting my very own science blog!!!

I am hoping this works!!!!!!!!!

Thanks

Buzz