What have you been up to lately?
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What have you been up to lately?
I guess you all know where this is headed. We both tested positive on Thursday 12/30. It really sucks because I was scheduled to work NYE and New Year's day which is good money in our union.
I waited to say anything till I was sure we would both be ok and it seems as though yesterday (01/01) was probably the worst of it. I'm actually feeling almost normal tonight, except just a little tired. Same for my wife. Luckily we are both fully vaccinated with a booster.
My Dr. said it's only a matter of time now before everyone gets this and she thinks Covid is with us to stay now because we wasted too much time nipping it early.
She thinks that from now on we'll be just getting a Flu/Covid vaccine every year.
Happy 2022 folks!
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Re: What have you been up to lately?
Man... That's some icky-tasting stuff!
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Re: What have you been up to lately?
At least it's (chess) enjoyable up to a limit and I think I've hit it. The leagues are organized in 8 levels each of which contains divisions. If you turn in a performance that "makes a cut" you get promoted to a "higher" league. Well, I started at the bottom (as all do) and made 4 cuts placing 1st, 2nd (twice), and 3rd. The division of the 5th league is full of hyper achievers. Once you claw your way into the top level there are money prizes (enough to fund a Tak ). But being in a division of overachievers is no fun. Math tells me that some of these guys are doing nothing else but playing chess over the internet.....notFritzArgelander wrote: ↑Wed Jan 12, 2022 10:03 pm Too busy having fun, I made a blunder on the astrophysics board by failing to read through the hype in a threads OP article.
The amusing distractions are AAS virtual meetings, which at least are on topic and my competition in an online chess league event. So far the competition has been fairly successful with placing 1, 2, or 3 in each weekly event. Although I’m not as strong a player as I used to be, it’s still enjoyable.
Anyway unlike the first four rodeos, I simply do not want to make the effort to make the next cut. I'm playing too much chess and it's affecting daily life adversely. For instance on January 12 and 16 I made each day a howler of a gaffe on the astrophysics board. By the tender mercy of editing I was able to repair most of the damage. Posts by @seigell and @helicon alerted me that things were out of hand.
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Re: What have you been up to lately?
Seems my changes and adjustments worked
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Re: What have you been up to lately?
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Re: What have you been up to lately?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eSrQEMoaOCk
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Re: What have you been up to lately?
I started work on a wooden model the "Harriet Lane". She was a Revenue Service cutter pre-US Civil War and played some significant roles during the Civil War. She's a side wheel steam/sail hybrid ship. I figure this is going to take a long time. There is steaming and bending of wood involved - something I've never done. So I will learn some new skills. Right now I'm refining the shape of the hull - it's close, but not perfect. I have some sanding to do now to smooth the wood prior to applying stain. Maybe I'll take some pics and post them here as a work in progress.
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Re: What have you been up to lately?
Man... That's some icky-tasting stuff!
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Re: What have you been up to lately?
I'd love to see the pics! What size will the model be?Star Dad wrote: ↑Thu Jan 20, 2022 3:52 pm Was going to work on the closet - but suddenly realized that I need to get the ceiling up in the den first. So getting someone to do the sheetrocking is now critical. If not, I'm going to spend the bucks and get me a sheetrock lifter which will make my life a whole lot easier (~$250). It's beginning to snow outside. It was kind of clear for a while last night - but full moon too. I'm not going to sink anymore money into astronomy stuff if this cycle of 1 clear night every six weeks continues. I don't know if it's climate change or not but it certainly seems to be getting worse every year since I started AP.
I started work on a wooden model the "Harriet Lane". She was a Revenue Service cutter pre-US Civil War and played some significant roles during the Civil War. She's a side wheel steam/sail hybrid ship. I figure this is going to take a long time. There is steaming and bending of wood involved - something I've never done. So I will learn some new skills. Right now I'm refining the shape of the hull - it's close, but not perfect. I have some sanding to do now to smooth the wood prior to applying stain. Maybe I'll take some pics and post them here as a work in progress.
Regarding the "sheetrock", I agree with getting a lifting frame: that stuff is very awkward! I suspect it would be a lot more than $250 to get someone to do it for you.
(BTW, "sheetrock" is my new American word for the day: I had to look it up. In fact at first I was pronouncing it "She trock" in my head!
Here in Oz we call it "gyprock" (because the main component is gypsum) or "plasterboard". Is it also called "drywall" in the US?)
Have fun with your model: it is great to have a fun hobby to fall back on if you are an astronomer!
All the best,
Dean
Binos: Steiner Wildlife XP 10x26, Swarovski 8x30 Habicht, Zeiss SFL 8x40, Vanguard Endeavour 10.5x45, Fuji FMTR-SX 10x50, Tak 22x60, Orion Resolux 15x70
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Re: What have you been up to lately?
Stardad,
Welcome to astronomy.
One clear night every six weeks works out to 8-9 clear nights a year, 80-90 per decade.
I've made this comment on
cheers
Joe
Amateur astronomer since 1978...................Web site : http://joe-cali.com/
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Re: What have you been up to lately?
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Re: What have you been up to lately?
I did that same thing about 2 years ago. I already had most of the pics and documents my mothers parents had, but my brother turned over all the photo albums MY parents had after my mother passed away. All together I ended up with around 1700 pic and docs for about 28gig of information. Made numerous copies and passed them out as Christmas presents. I think the oldest I have were land deeds from my great grandfather dating back to around 1860 or so. Probably the most enlightening were the letters my grandfather (Dad's side) wrote to my grandmother from Europe when he was in WW1. I was amazed how many documents survived all those years. Same with the pics.Gordon wrote: ↑Fri Jan 21, 2022 6:57 pm My brother just sent me copies of all the photos my mother had stored away in a box. My niece had scanned them and put them on Google drive. (All 990 of them). There are photos of both my dads and mothers families going back to the early 1900's. It's a long term project!
Rob
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I have copies of the grant deeds issued to both my great grandfathers property from the mid 1800's. The remaining property was sold off in 1998. So nothing left of it in the family. There's some 'oral history' about my mothers family being given a surname from the king of Sweden but I haven't found any written evidence of it. But there was a surname change in the late 1700s which was carried down.515bonner wrote: ↑Fri Jan 21, 2022 7:46 pm
I did that same thing about 2 years ago. I already had most of the pics and documents my mothers parents had, but my brother turned over all the photo albums MY parents had after my mother passed away. All together I ended up with around 1700 pic and docs for about 28gig of information. Made numerous copies and passed them out as Christmas presents. I think the oldest I have were land deeds from my great grandfather dating back to around 1860 or so. Probably the most enlightening were the letters my grandfather (Dad's side) wrote to my grandmother from Europe when he was in WW1. I was amazed how many documents survived all those years. Same with the pics.
Rob
Scopes: Explore Scientific ED80CF, Skywatcher 200 Quattro Imaging Newt, SeeStar S50 for EAA.
Mounts: Orion Atlas EQ-g mount & Skywatcher EQ5 Pro.
ZWO mini guider.
Image cameras: ZWO ASI1600 MM Cool, ZWO ASI533mc-Pro, ZWO ASI174mm-C (for use with my Quark chromosphere), ZWO ASI120MC
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Re: What have you been up to lately?
When finished, I created a big photo gallery using the gallery generator in Lightroom and then created a secure space on my web server where family members can view the gallery. I also have downloadable zip files in that same secured space so that family members can download the full resolution files if they want to print anything.
As an example, this is a picture of my paternal grandfather taken in the Port of Colombo in 1930. It was taken by a street photographer and I assume developed and contact printed on the spot from a half plate camera. The original print was 25x40mm and overprinted so that it was so dark it couldn't really be viewed. It's a wonder that it was not discarded. But it found its way to me. Using macro lens, bright side lighting and raw capture, I was able to produce the second image which dragged detail out of the shadows. I then restored some of the blemishes that were on and around his image leaving others to attest to the age and street photographer nature of the original.
I was also able to colour correct some early 1970's colour prints that were turning red. Mum had long ago thrown out the negatives because in her words, "we had the photos so we didn't need the negatives." Some others that were too far gone were able to be turned into B&W images.
Amateur astronomer since 1978...................Web site : http://joe-cali.com/
Scopes: ATM 18" Dob, Vixen VC200L, ATM 6"f7, Stellarvue 102ED, Saxon ED80, WO M70 ED, Orion 102 Maksutov, ST80.
Mounts: Takahashi EM-200, iOptron iEQ45, Push dobsonian with Nexus DSC, three homemade EQ's.
Eyepieces: TV Naglers 31, 17, 12, 7; Denkmeier D21 & D14; Pentax XW10, XW5, Unitron 40mm Kellner, Meade Or 25,12
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Re: What have you been up to lately?
BTW, it is interesting what you find out about your parents when you go through the old photos. I even have one of my Dad on his honeymoon, lounging on the beach in his 3-piece suit (about as close as he ever got to swimming!).
But I think one of the best is one of my Mum in the centre of a formal shot of the scientists and engineers who were working on the development of ballistic missiles at the Weapons Research Establishment in South Australia in 1951, before they were test-fired at the Woomera Range. This was a joint UK/Australia enterprise which was leading the world at the time. Right behind her is Peter Twiss, a British test pilot who at one stage held the world record as the first man to fly a jet aircraft at 1000mph. (This was in the “Fairey Delta 2” in 1956: one of the delta-winged test vehicles on the way to developing the Concorde.) The weird thing is that the photo was taken in Oct 1951, the same month that she got married: and we children always thought she was in a completely different job, running a local flour mill, at that time. She did have a model rocket, mounted on a tail fin from the real thing, that was given to her when she left (only 2 were ever made), but she never spoke about the weapons research stuff. I assume this was because they were told to never discuss things under the Official Secrets Act. She would be able to now that 70 years have passed, but sadly she is no longer with us...
Binos: Steiner Wildlife XP 10x26, Swarovski 8x30 Habicht, Zeiss SFL 8x40, Vanguard Endeavour 10.5x45, Fuji FMTR-SX 10x50, Tak 22x60, Orion Resolux 15x70
Eyepieces: way too many (is that possible?), but I do like my TV 32mm plossl, 13mm Nagler T6, 27mm Panoptic and 3-6mm Nagler zoom, plus Fujiyama 18mm and 25mm orthos and Tak 7.5mm LE
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Re: What have you been up to lately?
I REALLY hesitated, but since Vanessa wants to see a walrus...Butterfly Maiden wrote: ↑Sat Jan 15, 2022 2:08 pmTripod and camera with self-timer?turboscrew wrote: ↑Sat Jan 15, 2022 1:43 pmThat might be a problem. Neither my dog nor myButterfly Maiden wrote: ↑Sat Jan 15, 2022 1:24 pm
Next time Juha, we want to see some selfies of you in the snow, discreetly covered up first of coursecat can operate a camera. And I don't have a selfie-stick either.
No pressure Juha
I'm sorry for the torture to the eyes...
Around midnight, -8°C (17°F). (I'm sill not sure this was a good idea.)
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Re: What have you been up to lately?
But kudos for the effort. It makes me shiver just seeing you with all that snow on bare skin, when I was expecting you to do a 'snow angel' fully clothed actually
I will have to be careful what I challenge members to do in future though
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Re: What have you been up to lately?
You can, probably, see the snow angel behind me?Butterfly Maiden wrote: ↑Sat Jan 22, 2022 1:37 pm Okay Juha, I am sorry for twisting your arm to do that and I wasn't expecting you to go ahead with it.
But kudos for the effort. It makes me shiver just seeing you with all that snow on bare skin, when I was expecting you to do a 'snow angel' fully clothed actually
I will have to be careful what I challenge members to do in future though
I have my swimming suit on, and it doesn't matter that much whether I roll or make snow angel.
For my generation, and older, rolling in snow when sauna-bathing used to be quite common. Especially among children.
Nowadays it's not that easy. People live in cities and towns.
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Re: What have you been up to lately?
I REALLY hesitated, but since Vanessa wants to see a walrus...
I'm sorry for the torture to the eyes...
Around midnight, -8°C (17°F).
(I'm sill not sure this was a good idea.)
[/quote]
6" f/12 Orion 150mm Mak | 4" f/9 Celestron Refractor (Vixen) | 80mm f4 unbranded refractor
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Re: What have you been up to lately?
Harriet Lane model is 1/12th scale = ~1 foot long
In the US sheetrock is also commonly called drywall, and less frequently gypsum board. I wish there was something lighter available... not sure why we use gypsum... it's fire proof, but the paper holding it together isn't.
Orion 203mm/f4.9/1000mm, converted TASCO 114mm/f9/1000mm to steam punk, Meade 114mm/f9/1000, Coronado PST, Orion EQ-G, Ioptron Mini-Tower and iEQ30, Canon 70D, ASI120MM,ASI294MC, Ioptron SkyHunter
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