Sic Semper Tyrannis

Expansion of Metrorail, a sensible idea

"Northern Virginia’s growth shows no signs of slowing. So two congressmen from our area, Gerry Connolly and Jim Moran, have introduced the “Northern Virginia Metrorail Extension Act,” which would study extending the Orange line to Centreville, the Yellow line down Route 1 to Fort Belvoir, and the Blue line down I-95 to the Potomac Mills mall in Woodbridge."  Washpost

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As an Alexandrian I heartily endorse such a long term plan.  In the city of Alexandria we have the daily spectacle of cars  pouring through our streets in a flood twice every work day.  The pressure of this traffic is steadily increasing.  State and federal government need to act on this proposal.  Much of the traffic is the daily commuting of federal workers to Washington.

At the same time consideration should be given to extending the Virginia Railway Express Manassas line to Strasburg Junction over existing track.  pl  

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-state-of-nova/post/extend-metro-to-centreville-woodbridge-and-ft-belvoir-connolly-and-moran-put-idea-on-table/2013/03/11/76d5603c-8a6c-11e2-a051-6810d606108d_blog.html

Everglades Challenge 2012

"Believe me, my young friend, there is nothing -- absolutely nothing -- half so much worth doing as simply messing about in boats."

Lately we have been especially busy posting and commenting on the antics of grifters, cowards and idiots in both the political and corporate worlds. I guess that's the nature of the game, but I think we deserve a break... or at least a little vicarious diversion.

I would, once again, like to invite the SST Committee of Correspondence to follow this year's running of the Everglades Challenge which begins this Saturday morning. I discovered this event several years ago and have put participating in it on my bucket list. The event is organized by a colorful group of adventurers who call themselves the Water Tribe. The Everglades Challenge is an unsupported, expedition style adventure race for kayaks, canoes, and small sailboats. It starts at Fort DeSoto in Saint Petersburg, Florida and ends at Key Largo. The distance is roughly 300 nautical miles depending on one's course selection. There is a time limit of eight days. Updates on the progress and tribulations of the participants will be posted on the Water Tribe website.  

This year I will be following the adventures of Scott Widmier of Kennesaw, Georgia. His boat, dubbed the ECDuck, is a Puddle Duck Racer (or PDRacer) specifically built for this race. His Watertribe nickname of Plumcrazy is well deserved. The PDRacer is only slightly more technically sophisticated than a 4X8 sandbox with a sail. Puddle Duck sailors as a whole are an interesting breed as evidenced by the tale of the Puddle Duck fleet in the 2008 Texas 200. If Scott completes the gruellng  Everglades Challenge in the ECDuck, he will be a legend among both the Watertribe and the PDRacer communities. No matter what the outcome, the story of this intrepid band of brothers and sisters is both interesting and uplifting.

Enjoy,

TTG

 

FTL? Beam me up.

 
""You could say it's peanuts, but it's not. It's something that we can measure rather accurately with a small uncertainty," Ereditato told The Associated Press.

If the experiment is independently repeated - most likely by teams in the United States or Japan - then it would require a fundamental rethink of modern physics."  Forbes

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Ahah!  I knew it all the time!  Einstein?  There always seemed to me to be flaws in his equations. 

All of us Asimov, Pournelle and Drake readers will be vindicated.  I want to ship over in "Hammer's Slammers," or "Falkenberg's Legion," or maybe those Germans in one of the David Drake books, you know, the Panzer guys.

Sigh...  pl

http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2011/09/23/science-eu-breaking-light-speed_8697484.html

Where is this room?

 
Where is this in Washington, DC.  Thisis not a government building.  pl

 

 

Springtime in Leesburg

Yesterday we made our annual visit to the Leesburg, Virginia Flower and Garden Festival.  It was a bright spring day, a little chill but wonderful nonetheless.  This a two day event.  The little city closes Market and King Streets in the center of town around the old courthouse.  No vehicles are allowed.  Vendors and food stalls fill the streets and musical groups entertain from the courthouse porch.  

It is a grand occasion.  People sit with their children on the courthouse lawn to listen.  The bronze soldier who has guarded the city since 1908 towers above them.  

I bought a birdhouse from a man from Pennsylvania who has sold me birdhouses of his making before.  He reminded me quite specifically that there is a responsibility to continue to speak publicly.

I'm back.  pl 

 

From UBL's point of view, a very good Sunday on TV

Soldiers walk "point " daily all over Afghanistan and Iraq, accepting their share of the risk inherent in the life their unit is assigned.

Today, the talking heads and the television newsies spent the morning (on all channels) seeking to torture from the language an assurance that air travel for the public (read themselves) could be made 100% safe from ANY sort of attack devised by devised by "fiendish" jihadi minds.  This goal was never quite reached.  John Brennan, the president's terrorism man, was not so foolish as to give an assurance like that.

No security system devised by the mind of man can be 100% secure against the minds of other men.  There will always be some chance, however slight, that your perfumed hindquarters may be in a first class seat when the cry goes up, "Allahu !Akbar!" and that could be the last thing you ever hear.  Polticians can fuss and slander each other. Consultants can continue to make seas of money working on airline security, but the possibility will always be there....  "Allahu Ak..."  (Apparent silence, perhaps replaced by a rushing sound on the way from 30,000 feet to the surface)

Sooo,  do you really want to travel by air?  Bin Laden reckons that you don't, really... but that greed or circumstance will force you to continue and that being the case he has gotten a tremendous "bang for the buck" in this operation.  He will continue with this line of endeavor, and hopes that you deploy a few hundred thousand more troops to places like Yemen.  pl

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/04/world/middleeast/04yemen.html?hp