Some women choose the bear.
Some women choose the gator
One will eat you now,
the other will eat you later.
A photo shoot of a college graduate probably wins this year's contest for cool graduation photo shoots.
The New York Post: Glamorous coed takes insane graduation pics of her kissing 14-foot alligator
The graduate in the picture, in addition to graduating college, is a trained alligator handler and animal rehab worker.
Don't try this at home folks.
A selfie that's not about self-absorption but instead amazing achievement.
The world's first private lunar lander just took a selfie with Earth on its way to the moon
Hat Tip: Instapundit.
Take two high performance aerobatic planes, two pilots with ice in their veins, and an airplane hangar:
Weather today sucks for any flying, so it was an all-work-no-play-day: Low cloud ceilings, rain and general suckiness making it a no cross country, IFR day. It looks like tomorrow won't be any better.
So, for your viewing enjoyment and so I can fly vicariously, here's aerobatic pilot extraordinaire Michael Goulian rocking a performance in a Mudry CAP 230, complete with cockpit footage:
Simply outstanding flying.
The crew of the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower (CVN 69) did a US Navy-style recut of the trailer from The Force Awakens, and it's rather epic:
I'd watch that film.
An Experimental Aviation Association Chapter in Brighton, Michigan is getting teens interested in aviation, not to mention keeping them gainfully occupied, by helping them build an aircraft.
The teens are building an RV-12 light sport aircraft and while doing so learning lots of skills and getting involved in aviation while doing so.
The Detroit Free Press: Michigan teens building airplane from scratch
So the next day after arriving at the Lair it was time to take to the skies.
Murphy's Law had promised an aerial adventure, the weather was good for flying, so after a quick breakfast it was time to go.
First the pre-flight:
Checking the oil, adding some air to the tires, and doing a walk-around the plane and checking the fuel for any signs of water and we were good to start her up.
And then we were up.
Then I got to fly for a good bit, which was just a ton of fun.
We headed towards an airport in Pennsylvania, flying past the Camp David restricted zone at a respectful distance.
We did a touch-n-go at the York, PA airport with Murphy showing me how a slip worked to drop the airplane's altitude to get down like a rock to a proper landing glidepath without rocketing up the airspeed.
After our visit, we headed back and I again got to do a little bit of flying. Much too much fun. Now I really need to take some lessons and become a pilot.
Where we went will be the subject of the next post.
Old NFO had a video posted yesterday of a USMC Harrier pilot earning his flight pay.
Here's a video of another crew earning their pay and demonstrating what happens when the right engine of a Boeing 757 meets a bird on takeoff.
The calm professionalism of the crew, the tower, and rescue and how they worked the problem is impressive indeed. This sang-froid was no doubt helped by having British accents.
Very nicely done gentlemen.
As part of the Law Of Cyberspace class I'm teaching, I have the students do a final presentation regarding some aspect of cyberspace and technology and related legal issues.
A pair of the students decided the future was
Plastics by way of a 3D Printer.
As part of their presentation, they brought in a friend 's 3D printer along with the friend (a prior graduate of the class, I might add) for a demonstration as they presented on both what a 3D printer was and its implications for democratized manufacturing and the legal landscape.
Here's the complete setup: The printer, the laptop for controlling it, the spools of ABS plastic that are the raw materials for the printer, and an XBox scanner used to scan 3D images for printing.
Here's a close-up of the Solid Doodle printer and some of the items made using it:
A GoPro mount, a couple square moving gears that actually work, a couple different iPhone 5 cases, and some legos.
He's also printed working rifle and pistol magazines, so yes, there was Second Amendment content.
The whole setup cost around $1,500 to have it up and running, and it is a very impressive machine. The tech-geek in me practically yelled out "Want!" at the top of my lungs seeing it and what it can do.
Heck, If you want to be your own action figure, there's an app for that. The XBox scanner and software can render you in 3D for printing in minutes as demonstrated by one of the presenters:
While doing their presentation, they had the class vote and decide what to make. The class chose an iPhone case, and the printer had one made in less than the time it took to do their presentation.
Oh, and that iPhone charger station beside the computer-the base is printed on the 3D printer and the iPhone cable is run through it.
The presentation touched on the various implications of copyright, patent and trademarks and both First and Second Amendment issues, such as the Liberator pistol which can be created by a 3D printer, or indeed a complete working metal 1911 made by Solid Concepts on a professional-class 3D printer, and the time isn't far off when such printers will be available on the consumer market. 3D printing creates lots of implications in all of these areas, and the law has yet to catch up.
Think of the Second Amendment applications - replacement of impossible to find broken parts from out-of-production firearms, not to mention creation of complete workable firearms. As 3D printers continue to drop in price, expect gun control to be functionally impossible. Already people have shown you can forge AK47 receivers out of shovel blades, just wait until you can print them out in perfect 3D functionality.
Also think of the implications when a person can simply print out a broken part to fix an appliance in the comfort of their own home rather than having to order the replacement from the manufacturer, or design their own prototypes for their inventions literally "in-house".
3D Printing has the potential to revolutionize how we do things, and it is going to be very interesting to see how the technology spreads, changes the physical and legal landscape while doing so, and how vested interests and politicians will try to stop it. New York, both city and state, for example, has already introduced legislation to ban the creation of 3D firearms. Making such a ban, and then enforcing it once thousands of homes have these devices with the plans easily obtainable form the internet will be as futile as Canute ordering the sea to cease rising.
You've seen cool flash mobs in France, in Moscow, in Israel, at universities throughout the US.
All of those are very nice, but not nearly as cool nor technically challenging as this one.
This may very well be the first Cave Diving Flash Mob:
Way cool.
After laying undiscovered beneath the sands for 4,500 years, an Egyptian princess's tomb found near Cairo
It's currently being checked out by the Czechs:
Czech archaeologists have unearthed the 4,500-year-old tomb of a Pharaonic princess south of Cairo, in a finding that suggests other undiscovered tombs may be in the area, an official from Egypt's antiquities ministry said Saturday.Mohammed El-Bialy, who heads the Egyptian and Greco-Roman Antiquities department at the Antiquities Ministry, said that Princess Shert Nebti's burial site is surrounded by the tombs of four high officials from the Fifth Dynasty dating to around 2,500 BC in the Abu Sir complex near the famed step pyramid of Saqqara.
Quite an interesting discovery. Statutes and sarcophagi have been found in the antechamber and they haven't announced yet if there is an intact mummy and artifacts within the burial chamber itself.
This is very cool.
René Voorburg of OmnesViae.org has created an awesome interactive online map that allows you to plot routes using the Roman roads, cities, water routes, and forts as shown on the Tabula Peutingeriana. The Tabula, also known as the Peutinger map, is a medieval copy of a Roman Road map from 300 AD.
Now you can see how to travel from Jerusalem to Rome (Romani Ite Domum!).
So how do you say Google maps in Latin anyway?
