Recently in Images Category

I'm testing my Olympus E-1 Zuiko 35mm macro lens with a new diffuser lamp assembly:

A few days ago I ordered an Ebisu/Yebisu beer at Tanto Japanese Restaurant (an izakaya) in Campbell, California, and was told by the waitress that it's now being sold under the label "Sapporo Reserve":

Yes, that's a Japanese beer sold at a Japanese izakaya, served in the glass of a Korean competitor, Hite.

My buddy Tom shows off a crazy Japanese t-shirt recently:

"OTHER PLAMS No thank you has lost many a butter cake okY? work step by step toward you goal step by step enjoy!"

The back says: "rupture of diplomatic relations good"

Is someone channelling E. H. Bronner?

Yesterday I attended the Pleasanton Highland Games, the largest event of its kind in North America, with my friends Dale Seago and Garland Glessner. I'd missed a few of these over the last few years, and I'm likely to miss several more, so I was especially happy to have attended this one, since 1.) I serendipitously met some friends I'd not seen in years, 2.) I got to hear the Wicked Tinkers live, and 3.) I met this sweet young lady, selling handmade silver whiskey flasks:

She'll be working at the Northern California Renaissance Faire this fall; find her and say hello. Sorry, won't tell you her name, you'll have to work for it...

Gunshot taken at 7:07am east Texas time, photo shot taken at 8:43am, Tuesday last week:

As mentioned in a previous post tonight, this was taken from about 110 metres, from a blind near an identified hog trail, on a very large ranch of a friend of mine. I waited for 20 minutes before determining that none of the hog's clan would be following in his hoofsteps before calling my buddies (also in blinds about a mile from mine) for retrieval.

Last week, I took a coyote, a feral hog, and assisted in a friend's take of another feral hog, using one 150-grain Remington Core-Lokt in .308 caliber shot from a Jeff Cooper edition Steyr Scout in each encounter. This particular round (or remains thereof) I dug out from underneath the skin of the one I took:

This particular round hit the hog midships, high, and completely busted the spine, spleen, and vented the lower lobes of the lungs, causing pneumothorax evidenced by a "deflating balloon" sound when I first moved the hog carcass. Intererestingly, the lead core seems to have punched through the hog, leaving the copper jacket:

Here, I show the path of the bullet, taken by the hog from about 110 metres, entering starboard and (partially) exiting port:

You know, in this shot, I look almost as (literally) knackered as the hog itself. East Texas is hot and humid this time of year...

How does this look? I picked up a new Olympus Zuiko 35mm 1:3.5 macro lens for my Olympus E-1, and this was my first test shot, the Citizen titanium watch I wear nowadays:

Once again:

"A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects."

Robert A. Heinlein
The Notebooks of Lazarus Long

I like this one:

This quarter's physics lab is my favorite, covering topics in classical electrodynamics. Here's a characteristic curve for the charge/discharge of a capacitor:

Seen on an office window in a walk through San Francisco, Dr. Baldwin Louie's "dental warrior" mascot:

...yesterday at Vertical Challenge 2006 at San Carlos Airport, California, a car hoisted down the length of a runway, then dropped it:

Taken a few minutes ago, on Castro Street in downtown Mountain View, California:

There's nothing like hauling your ass out of bed, making the trip to the airport or marina, and just getting out:

So I'm at my friends' house in the East Bay, and I'm teaching their toddler son Josh how to use my Sony CyberShot digital camera. Lesson #1: pointing the camera, keeping fingers off the lens (a hard one to teach); Lesson #2: composing the scene:

The Dissident Frogman has incorporated my Japanese translations of his popular "Support Denmark" banners into his multilingual contributions archive page.

My thanks to knowledgeable friends Mariko and Garth for their thorough critiques of my pre-final draft. Thanks also for feedback on the issue of translating the original phrase "the legacy of the West", which was problematic, by these people on the honyaku mailing list: Richard Thieme, Peter Durfee, Benjamin Barrett, J.C. Helary, and James Sparks.

Here's another from my collection, a 1960 Signet Books edition of the 1949 classic of George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four:

Now that I've wrapped up what turned out to be a surprisingly subtle and difficult volunteer Japanese translation job (which I'm very happy to have done, I should note), I'm going to blog a bit more for fun. Combing my bookshelves, I pulled another several titles with interesting cover copy and art. Here's one: "Strike From Space: A Megadeath Mystery" by Phyllis Schlafly and Chester Ward, 1965, Pere Marquette Press:

Yesterday, I visited Ramen Rama in Cupertino, California, with my longtime friend Suzu. Here's another of what Brian Micklethwait refers to as a "Billion Monkeys" moment:

Some other tech industry friends of Suzu have started a company called Yelp, whose product is a business reviews website, where Suzu and I have reviewed the ramen shop. I've not populated this blog with restaurant review entries to my satisfaction, since the blog format is not granular enough (without hacking) to support a taxonomy for star ratings and such, so I'm going to experiment with posting my reviews on Yelp and pointing to them from here. Putting my own reviews in the context of others' should add value to the opinions.

I've caught the "Billion Monkeys" meme from my English blogger friend Brian Micklethwait (whom I met during my London sojourn in the early 1990's), who coined the term to describe those who take digital photographs of, well, others of those who take digital photographs of others. Here's one from my trip last spring to Beijing, a tour guide in the Forbidden City:

Yesterday, I scanned the cover of a pocket WWII English-Chinese dictionary published by the U.S. War Department in 1943, at the height of the war. Today, I've scanned the cover of another from my collection, published shortly after V-J Day, in September 1945: TM 30-481, "The Supplementary Japanese-English Dictionary", this one a very large hardcover which I just barely fit on my scanner's flatbed:

This dictionary of 43,000 terms is supplementary to the following six standard Japanese-English dictionaries with which it forms a complete set of seven:

• a technical manual of about 100,000 terms which was in "final editorial stage" at the time;
  
• another technical manual of about 4,000 terms which was claimed in a similar state;
  
• Kenkyusha's New Japanese-English Dictionary, Harvard Univ. Press;
  
• Kato's Medical dictionary, 1944, German language edition (!);
  
• "Ozaki's Sea Terms";
  
• "Creswell's Military [Dictionary];
  

I'd love to see a copy of the 100,000 word technical manual... anyone know if this was ever actually published?

In preparing yesterday's "Little Red Book" post, I discovered that my US $99 Canon all-in-one scanner/printer/copier is an excellent proxy for a macro lens on an expensive camera (I have an Olympus E-1 but don't yet have that lens.) Here's another old school example from the many I have in my personal book collection, this one from 1956, "New Worlds of Modern Science":

A few hours ago, I went on a somewhat controlled shopping binge at one of my favorite used book shops, one in Sunnyvale, California. I found this little gem, TM-633, "Chinese Phrase Book" published by the U.S. War Department in 1943:

Meant to put this up a few weeks ago: me and Dale Seago at a recent (21 January 2006) Rabbie Burns Birthday celebration in front of San Francisco's Edinburgh Castle Pub:

The festivities were well worth the trip up to the city. The piper was very good - and looked every bit the part, wish I'd snagged a good shot of him - and the Burns poetry readings were rousing, marred only ever so slightly by some rather self-consciously narcissistic political posturing on the part of a (I'm not making this up) Scottish socialist lesbian Buddhist working class nun.

The night culminated in a hearty reading of "Address to a Haggis" followed by a free-for-all of flying forks in a frenzy of delectation. I managed to snag a small amount, happy I had any, and returned to the booth to enjoy it... and discovered to my gratitude that Dale had managed to snag double servings for both of us! I quite enjoyed it, and may even keep a small stock of it in cans for emergencies.

How do I even begin to explain this one...?

Still going through my burgeoning archive of travel photos. Here's a ride I took - a bungee chair - in Beijing's Wangfujing shopping district. The guy on the chair is not me:

I'd had a bit to drink when I decided to do this myself; the boisterously friendly Chinese guy who shared the chair with me (since it was cheaper for 2, cheapest for 3) was plastered. I bought a copy of the video taken by the elderly, cage-mounted VHS camera, without having taken into account (I'd been drinking, remember) that the camera was recording in PAL format... doh! Eventually, I'll get it converted to NTSC, or directly to MPEG. Should be fun to see.

I'm going through a year's worth of iPhoto archives and found this, taken in organic chemistry lab by my friend Jenny... me in Maximum Nerd mode:

Yes, I've descended into kittyblogging. This is my friend Jen's cat Willow about to pounce on my camera lanyard:

Something about all this Mohammed image craziness has gotten under my skin. Large, nasty, violent crowds of adherents to a pre-medieval death cult have made it their mission to nullify the very concept of "freedom of speech," and this really, really pisses me off (notice that I'm now blogging again?) and I have chosen to vent. So, inspired by Michelle Malkin's courage in posting "the 12 forbidden cartoons, I've decided to lash myself to the mast and join my fellow blogbursters in posting all of them myself. Here they are:

I took a break from studying this evening and visited a number of local stores to buy Danish food and booze products. Here's what I came back with, minus duplicates (I had to buy more than one of the tins of ginger cookies):

From Trader Joe's:

• Rosenborg Danish Blue cheese
  
• Silver Goat Organic Feta cheese
  
• "The Queen's Cookies" Ginger Spice Cookies (made in Denmark for Trader Joe's)
  

From Whole Foods:

• Denmark's Finest Havarti cheese
  
• Denmark's Finest Havarti cheese with dill
  
• Rosenborg Danish Blue cheese
  
• Blue Danish Castello Triple Cream cheese
  
• Fontina Danish Cheese
  

From Safeway:

• Denmark's Finest Fontina cheese
  
• Denmark's Finest Blue cheese
  
• Primo Taglio Havarti with Dill cheese
  

Especially notable and tasty are the ginger spice cookies made under contract in Denmark for Trader Joe's:

I encourage all of my readers to participate in this Danish buycott.

The Dissident Frogman has updated his "Support Denmark" banner blog posting with banner versions in additional languages such as German and Simplified Chinese.

I've been too busy to blog the last few weeks: heavy school load and lots of travel. Your guess where I was last weekend:

I picked up a decent sword stand in San Francisco's Chinatown yesterday. It's 23 inches high, $25 (apparently non-negotiable in the store from which I bought it) and comes in four matt-lacquered wood pieces with a set of wood screws. Power screwdriver in hand, I assembled it in a couple of minutes. Here it is with my Bugei Samurai Koshirae Katana:

The base is indented to hold the end of the saya in place, and seems fairly sturdy. They're available in most of the tourist gift shops in San Francisco's Chinatown. Not as common as the conventional over-the-mantlepiece (or in the tokonoma) horizontal stand, but has a nice "shotgun ready rack" aspect to it.

Four weeks ago, I had the pleasure of attending a Halloween party in Manhattan. I wasn't prepared with a costume, unless you count my normal get-up below as, um, "Visiting Silicon Valley Guy." On the left is Perry Metzger who is, ahem, a eusocialist insect:

I'm just about to crash soon, having come back from the first of a multi-day Bujinkan training seminar by Arnaud Cousergue of Paris (Vincennes, actually) at the Bujinkan Martial Arts Center in Sacramento, a couple of hours' drive from here.

That's Dr. Pete Lohstroh, a UC Davis reproductive biologist, and myself. Pete's interested in medical nanotechology too, by the way, but that's deliberately off topic. I really do meet cool people in this art.

The shiner I acquired Thursday night is even more pronounced in this photo, but it doesn't hurt at all anymore. On a related note, Arnaud ended the day insisting on the use of padded training weapons through the end of the year, for various reasons with which I entirely agree. To that end, on the way back from Sack-of-Tomatoes to Saint Jose, I stopped at the Home Despot near the Sacto dojo and acquired the requisite materials:

- a $1.97 bag of thin 6' bamboo rods from the Garden section
- a $1.97 6' section of 5/8" inside diameter foam copper pipe insulation

I then duct taped 3 pinky-width lengths of the bamboo together at 9-inch intervals, put that inside the foam, and placed styrofoam caps at the ends, duct taping those. I finished by taping the entire thing lengthwise.

Looks surprisingly good, and not at all like a late-night vodka fueled project. I took photos of every step of the project which I will be posting in a few days.

Time to crash now.

A gift from my training partner last night, and proof that padded training weapons are a good idea for some types of waza:

I'm rested now and recovered from last weekend's attendance at the 4-day tactical shotgun course at Front Sight Firearms Training Institute near Las Vegas, Nevada. I surprised myself by making Distinguished Graduate, so I'm now qualified to come back to attend the 4 Day Advanced Tactical Shotgun course. On the second day of training, Greg Carroll snapped this pic of me after the two of us had done our respective runs through the outdoor canyon "clean the hostage takers out" simulator exercise:

The (visible) firearm is my Benelli M1 Super 90, with a nylon tactical sling and a GG&G M3 Tactical Illuminator mounting rail in the 2 o'clock position on the foreend, not the 10 o'clock position GG&G recommends on their website (experience in a previous course having shown me that, as a right-handed longgunner, the 10 o'clock position allows the light to bump on.)

I'd last done a tactical shotgun course about 4 years ago, and so I was quite interested to see how training doctrine had changed in respect of that weapon at Front Sight. The men in the evolution I attended - those 13 in the class who were there for the full 4 days - were all at least previous attendees at another weapon systems class (e.g. defensive handgun, practical rifle) so the class was run at a slightly accelerated pace befitting the audience. Attendees were about evenly divided between cops, active duty military (a Marine heading back to Iraq soon) and private citizens, all of whom were treated exactly the same by the instructional staff, the excellent Chuck Burnett and John Pierson.

One difference I noticed was the much heavier emphasis on incorporating movement, keeping the fight dynamic, and training that way to the limited extent allowed in the "square range environment." I was particularly pleased that, after the Monday (4th day) afternoon skills test, and the "load and go" indoor tactical simulator, I was allowed to do several rounds of 2-man team shooting on the move, with my new friend David L. Loads of fun, and I was pleased to find that a walking skill I'd been cultivating the last few years, walking fast with very short tank-tread heel/toe action to keep the hips and shoulders on level planes, allowed me to get good hits moving both forward and backward, without muzzle bob.

I'm at a level of membership at Front Sight that allows me to take any firearms course free for the rest of my life, much like some golf club memberships. So, I get to take these courses again and again, which allows me not only to revisit, revive, and refine my skills, but also to work out equipment issues. I've discovered I really don't like the Lyman TacStar SideSaddle mounted on the left side of the receiver: it catches on my clothing, when loaded it dampens recoil (and hence reliability) on this recoil-operated weapon, and with the standard provided cross-receiver screw, was coming loose even though I'd installed it properly and Lock-Tited it. I guess a couple of thousand rounds will do that to the Lock-Tite. That, and I'm leery of over-tightening that screw for fear of impeding bolt travel. Oh, and there's the issue of potentially "egging out" the screw holes on the aluminum receiver. My friend David assures me that, should I care to keep the SideSaddle, I can send the weapon to a gunsmith who specializes in Class 3 firearms with aluminum receivers, experienced in setting up weapons to resist receiver failure, but I'm going to switch to keeping my slug rounds on a belt carrier anyway.

Nor am I going to solve the "problem" of having extra ammo by changing out the tube magazine from a 5 to an 8 round capacity. This is my home invasion repellant device... if I can't solve The Problem with what's available in that weapon, then I'm in a very serious situation indeed. I'm more and more preferring lighter, more maneuverable weapons the more I train, with as few bells and whistles as I can get away with. I've heard more than one long arms instructor over the years comment on how students will arrive at a course with their all-singing, all-dancing Space Gun rigs, everything mounted everywhere, only to find themselves quickly shedding equipment after the first day... especially when training in the 105 F degree desert heat. Heh.

Recommendation: check out Estate Cartridge's low-recoil 12-gauge 9-pellet 00 SWAT loads. I've used this buckshot at a previous shotgun course, and had made the decision to attend this most recent course with too little lead time to order more of the same for this class. So, I had a mere few dozen of them to use at various times during this course, instead using a mix of Winchester and Federal buckshot for most exercises. No comparison. At half the price of Federal, the Estate-branded cartridges gave outstandingly tight and nicely distributed (e.g. no annular "donuts of death") patterns, turning heads on the firing line and eliciting a number of "what are you shooting, man?" enquiries.

I had the pleasure of remaking the acquaintance of at least one old friend, who was taking a course on an adjacent range. Additionally, I was happy to have a couple of libertarian friends, longtime (but previously untrained) gunowners, take the full 4 Day Defensive Handgun course on the same weekend. Both men, Alan and Chris, came away from the experience very much more competent than when they arrived.

Seen on a trip to the supermarket:

I walked into math class a few months ago and saw this folded cardboard box propped up in the back of the room, pulled out my Treo 650, and snapped this shot.

No, I don't understand the labelling either. My guess is that some Chinese packaging engineer was channelling Dr. Bronner when he wrote this.

My friend L. Neil Smith emailed this today:

"Russell --

I thought you and Dale [Seago] might enjoy seeing a project I put together a long time ago, possibly before you came to Fort Collins the first time. As you can see, it's a Camillus Marine Corps knife wedded to a bayonet. It fits my M1 Carbine, the standard issue bayonet for which is a disgrace.

Note the serrated portion at the base of the blade. That was done with a
checkering file. Ahead of my time, I guess."

Here's another:

My Bujinkan teacher Dale followed up:

"Very sweet piece of work -- nicely done!!

BTW, the Marine Corps has adopted a new official-issue bayonet which largely retains the look of the old Ka-bar, but with a longer blade (8" instead of 7"). It's an issue item for Marines, but available commercially for private purchase as well."

This is the new Marine issue item, the "ON3S ONTARIO Marine Bayonet Khaki Brown Handle And Sheath 8" Blade":

Another image from my recent trip to Beijing, this one a sign at Beihai Park admonishing visitors not to do or bring certain things into the park. I'm still trying to figure out what it all means. One is a pictogram apparently forbidding rifles in the park:

Seen in an elevator in the office building where my friend Serin works:

In the heart of Beijing is the huge, well-stocked Wangfujing Bookstore. If you need maps, there are thousands of them available on the first (ground) floor, just inside the main doors. English-language books can be found on the 3rd floor. Here's a pic I snapped with my Treo 650 cameraphone:

Thanks to Anton Sherwood for pointing this out a few minutes ago on a mailing list:

In Sunday's "Beetle Bailey" strip (linked today by FFF), Pvt Plato writes a minarchist screed on walls, even supporting selfishness.

For non-American readers, Beetle Bailey is a very well known American icon, syndicated in newspapers for decades.

Not only did I indulge myself with scorpions in Beijing last week, I also had snake meat and silkworm pupae. I've eaten plenty of snake, and this one was undistinguished (they're usually pretty rubbery), but the silkworm was new to me: a soft, pulpy interior in a paper-thin skin. I didn't have more snake later, but I did follow up with another silkworm grub skewer a while later.

Beware, beware of Baijiu! Within my first two hours in Beijing, I was taken out for kebabs and beer by my friend Serin. We met this affable guy, Ken, who'd enquired "Naguoren? (where ya from?)" and offered me one of his sealed shot glasses of baijiu. This was an 80-proof (40%) standard formula. After two shots, he brought out a bottle whose name translates from Chinese simply as "56 Percent." We shared that bottle. Apparently, I pulled out my Sony CyberShot to Capture the Moment:

I tried red eye reduction in iPhoto in an attempt to clear up my eyes in this photo, but apparently, the red-eye in this case is not a camera artifact.

I paid dearly the next morning for this act of intercultural male booze bonding, comparable only to an episode I experienced after boot camp, half a lifetime ago, when I swore, "I'll never drink that again."

With an endorsement like this, I had to visit. It surprises me to find out that this palatial facility (literally: it's on the grounds of the Summer Palace) is not listed in Frommer's.

A little walking-around food (or "little food that was recently walking around") in Beijing's Wangfujing: Yanjing beer and scorpions. These little buggers are actually very good indeed. I've had scorpion once before, a different variety with a thicker, blacker thorax, in Thailand, also spiced, and also very good.

Last night, before leaving Beijing, my friend Serin and I had a late night snack at a small neighborhood shop specializing in kebabs and Hui specialties. It was pretty chilly outside, so we ordered some comfort food, such as this mutton bone soup, with the shafts cracked to expose the marrow, straws provided for convenience:

I'm a big believer in getting out of town on spring break:

I am really, really enjoying my biology class, a concentrated term of cell & molecular biology. Students in this program spend about four times as much time in lab, learning industrially useful techniques, as do students in comparable programs in the University of California system. In the last three weeks, I've had hands-on time doing protein electrophoresis, conjugation (bacterial DNA transfer), and DNA electrophoresis. Here's an image of our team's first DNA gel:

The DNA is from purified coliphage Lambda virus, 48,502 Kb (kilobases) in length. Lane 1 is pure, uncut DNA. Lane 2 is DNA restricted (cut) by Eco RI enzyme, Lane 3 restricted by Hind III, and Lane 4 by both (the restriction sites are different, resulting in more, smaller DNA fragments.)

Lanes 5 through 7 are subsamples taken from 2 through 4, subjected slowly and thoroughly to the action of the enzyme DNA ligase, resulting in outrageously long, randomly recombinant strands.

The gel is purified agarose treated with ethidium bromide. The image above is a high-contrast Polaroid of the gel UV-transilluminated to fluoresce in the visible spectrum (reddish orange, here shown in black and white).

This stuff is outrageously fun.

This is rather funny.

Last Tuesday night, I had the interesting, frustrating, enlightening experience of training in a few pieces of modern armor. My teacher, Dale Seago, had some observations which he wrote up on MartialTalk.com. The pics of him in armor were taken by me with my Olympus E-1; the other pics were taken by someone else with their camera.

I'd love to find an affordable set of well-constructed, wearable, Warring States Period yoroi I could train in, but the most popular set of modern-made gear, Hanwei's "Nobunaga" style armor, has gotten reviews which pretty much sum up to "good basic craftsmanship, very poorly conceived & ahistorical design." Still looking.

We finally started into dissections in biology lab tonight. My own specimen was this rather stout, well-endowed female Ascaris lumbricoides, an intestinal parasite of humans:

I'd suspected that although our college's brand-new science center was state of the art in facilities, our gear would be knackered, so I brought my own gear (probes, pins, scalpels, various forceps, etc.) just in case. I was correct in my assessment: all the school-supplied gear was thrashed. One other guy in the lab, an Air Force PJ (USAF Pararescue) who's med-school bound, brought his own gear too; it was interesting to compare kits.

Since this specimen was pseudocoelomate in its body plan, there was no mesentary tissue to complicate the incision process. I was able to do really well with a #15T surgical blade: small enough, with a fine tip for starting an incision, but a sufficiently curved blade belly to continue incisions without nicking the viscera.

One gets the impression after laying this open and spreading its innards with a blunt probe that it is all uterus, wrapped in oviduct... two strands of Top Ramen cloaked in angel hair pasta. This thing is even more dedicated to reproduction than it is to feeding. Brrrrrr.

Lucy:

I bought a used speargun and scuba regulator assembly at a very good bargain price from a really cool Korean guy who's an incredibly experienced freediver and spear fisherman. Here's a nifty little device he cooked up for managing gear, "diver down" flag, and temporary stowage of fish (as well as for paddling out to kelp forest, of course):

This Giant African Millipede, or "Scaphiostreptus parilis acuticonus," is one of my biology instructor's personal pets:

A couple of weeks ago I wrote about my discovery of the cactus pear as an edible fruit. Here's a picture of that succulent delight:

By the title, I mean I didn't expect that my friend Andy would be taking a picture of me at this moment:

It was pretty dark in the shade of the shooting stall, in stark contrast with the sunny range, and no fill flash was used. I managed to extract a bit more information using the GIMP.

Firearm was a full-frame H&K USP in .45ACP, firing on a "hostage rescue" metal silhouette at 15 meters. Hard shot, wouldn't want to have to do that for a living. I would never seek to be in such a horrifying predicament, and certainly wouldn't want to have to use a pistol, at relative long range, unsupported, to try pulling it off. Still, one should always train for the unthinkable.

Thanks to Monica for passing this on: Rory Blyth on his Chihuahua Power Source Conversion Project.

I was another one who couldn't help myself: I too downloaded thingy.

About three weeks ago, I wrote that my friend Monica White had indirectly informed me (through her blogroll) of the existence of the Quent Cordair Fine Art Gallery in Burlingame, California, about a mile from San Francisco International Airport.

Well, on Saturday - on a whim - I suggested to Peggy that we head up to the gallery for the short remainder of the afternoon. We arrived about two hours before closing... and left about an hour after closing.

I'd called ahead to confirm that the gallery was, as indicated on their website, indeed open for the afternoon. When we arrived, a friendly lady greeted us and, upon hearing my voice, recognized me from my call-ahead. When I mentioned my name, she remarked that it sounded familiar, and that she'd actually - somehow - come across my blog recently and had even recommended that a friend of hers named "Carter" (whose contact I welcome) contact me about gun-related issues! I was happily astounded. I quickly found out that this friendly - and sharp - lady is Linda Zimmerman, the director of the gallery.

Linda spent the better part of three hours talking with me about the purpose of the gallery, the only one of its kind in the world, specializing strictly in high-quality painting and sculpture of the Romantic Realist variety (see Ayn Rand's "Romantic Manifesto" for an in-depth introduction to the genre.) I was deeply impressed at the operation, the selection, and the director. The storefront has had 8 years of profitable operation, but its recent years of online operation alone keep it sufficiently profitable that it can continue in business, without diluting its collection with low-quality pieces which would otherwise meet "school of art" requirements or with technically high-quality pieces which are outside those stated requirements.

The gallery itself has on display about one-third its total collection, the other two-thirds of which is in storage, but pieces of which can be viewed by the seriously interested. The walls are arrayed with paintings, as would be expected, and a number of bronzes are also on display. Linda encourages a healthy, tactile approach to the sculptures: touch them. At one point in our long, animated chat, she took my right hand and placed it on the hip of this statue, "Gratitude" by Danielle Anjou:

This is a lovely piece, and was strangely reminincent of the 1987 Boris Vallejo cover art for the Robert A. Heinlein novel "To Sail Beyond the Sunset," itself a triumphalist riff on Sandro Botticelli's "The Birth of Venus." I love it, probably as much as Monica White loves Bill Mack's alto-relief sculpture "Forever," which was not on display the day I visited... but which I hope Monica can eventually acquire.

Linda and I talked each other's ears off, happily, while Peggy enjoyed one of the overstuffed leather couches near the front of the gallery. We talked about the business of art, and the multifarious ways the gallery has connected Romantic Realist artists, including the recently immigrated Chinese master Han Wu Shen, with deeply appreciative customers, including passionate-but-temporarily-impecunious college students who've arranged payment plans for their "must have" pieces. We talked about a great many other things, with most of the conversation led by Linda cheerily educating me in the business of her gallery, and with me responding with semi-articulate "Wows!" and "Cool!"

I do plan to spend quite a bit more time in the gallery, and may even hold a party of friends there in the near future. Yes, I did say "party"... anyone interested? It would be a great excuse to gather a few dozen of my closest friends and acquaintances in a fantastic setting near the near San Francisco. This is a very real possibility, since Linda did say that the gallery encourages people to hold their parties there. I'm thinking sometime in September, when my good friend Tom Burroughes is in town visiting from London with his girlfriend: first a morning sailing on the Bay (Tom's a qualified yachtsman), then shooting at the range, then a catered affair that night - after cleaning up - at the Quent Cordair Fine Art gallery... sounds like good living to me.

Last weekend, walking the very walkable streets of San Francisco with Peggy, I couldn't resist this shot of One Maritime Plaza (formerly known the Alcoa Building):

Yet another reason I keep a very small digital camera in my pocket whenever I leave the house. Hmm... I'm wondering if my good friend and New Yorker Perry Metzger does the same? I'd certainly love to see the occasional building or street shot from New York City on his blog.

Last weekend, walking the very walkable streets of San Francisco with Peggy, I couldn't resist this shot of One Maritime Plaza (formerly known the Alcoa Building):

Yet another reason I keep a very small digital camera in my pocket whenever I leave the house. Hmm... I'm wondering if my good friend and New Yorker Perry Metzger does the same? I'd certainly love to see the occasional building or street shot from New York City on his blog.

Kristopher Barrett passes along this amusing photolog of colorful AR-15 furniture. Someone should inform the Pink Pistols.

Just a few short days after the 35th anniversary of Neil Armstrong's historic moonwalk, we learn the unalloyed truth about what he really said on that occasion:

In 1969, Neil Armstrong made history by becoming the first man to walk on the moon, uttering the immortal phrase, "One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind." Or did he? Previously suppressed footage discovered by blogjam shows that Armstrong's reaction was a great deal more uninhibited than history suggests, and that a hasty editing job was needed to prepare the astronaut's moment of glory for broadcast.

This hiliarious photo comes to me courtesy of James Rogers.

Duncan Frissell just today posted a jaw-dropping bit of what he claims is history, the 1953 testing of an atomic cannon, "Shot Grable 10" at Frenchman's Flat, Nevada:

When I was looking for a nuclear weapons photo for a previous post, I immediately thought of the only live firing of an atomic cannon (in the US, that is). So I hunted up the famous photo of Shot Grable 10 (isn't the Net convenient?) and found that most of the images were poor scans. Finally I "borrowed" a good one and thought I'd actually post so you don't have to follow a link to see it. This is an actual photo of an actual atomic cannon firing an actual atomic shell. No editing or fakery involved.

Whoa. There's more here and also here.

Anyone who thinks Objectivists are lacking in humor haven't met some guy named Steve. Heck, I just noticed that an acquaintance of mine (and friend of my friend Alan Weiss), Amanda Phillips, is featured on this page, "Hot Objectivist on Objectivist Action" (or, for those of us steeped in Monty Python, "The Society for putting Objectivists on top of other Objectivists".)

I had the pleasure of first meeting Barbara Branden very briefly at the November 1987 Future of Freedom Conference (FoFCon) in Culver City, California, but didn't engage her in conversation, since she was on her way to a talk at that convention centered around "The Passion of Ayn Rand," her biography of novelist Ayn Rand, with whom she had been associated professionally and personally for a number of decades. Her book had been published the year before, and I'd bought my own copy as soon as it hit the bookstores (this was the pre-Amazon era).

At the end of March this year, a few weeks ago, I finally got the chance to chat with Barbara in a comfortable venue where she was wasn't being shuttled around to talks, in the course of other business: her apartment in southern California. What a lovely, intelligent, funny and benevolent lady she is! I must once again thank my friend Glenn Cripe, who had business to conduct with her that afternoon, for allowing me to tag along with his crew, and of course to Barbara for her warm hospitality... and for autographing that book I bought 18 years ago.

My thanks to Monica White and her annotated, super-selective blogroll for my discovery of the jaw-droppingly wonderful site dedicated to female grace, "Body in Mind: Ideas of Female Beauty." Fantastic!

A few days ago, my Bujinkan teacher Dale Seago announced on our dojo mailing list that some kilts he owned, including one he'd recently ordered, no longer fit him due to the continued success of Atkins on his waistline. He said he'd like to give the new one away to anyone who'd claim it. I'm a pretty fit guy, but I'm naturally broader-beamed than Dale, and the size he mentioned was exactly my size, so I spoke up for it. Last night in training, I received it:

These are modeled on the traditionally-constructed, khaki canvas kilts issued to the Black Watch during World War I. And for $99, you can't beat 'em.

Y'know, there was a time when proper clothing was outlawed, from August 1747 to July 1782. For Russell and the rest, here is a translation from the Gaelic of part of a proclamation that was issued upon repeal of the prohibition:

"Listen Men. This is bringing before all the Sons of the Gael, the King and Parliament of Britain have forever abolished the act against the Highland Dress; which came down to the Clans from the beginning of the world to the year 1746. This must bring great joy to every Highland Heart. You are no longer bound down to the unmanly dress of the Lowlander. This is declaring to every Man, young and old, simple and gentle, that they may after this put on and wear the Truis, the Little Kilt, the Coat, and the Striped Hose, as also the Belted Plaid, without fear of the Law of the Realm or the spite of the enemies."

I hadn't mentioned that the sense of "F-R-E-E-D-O-M-M-M!!!" (Dale's words, channelling William Wallace) which I got after trying on the kilt - and then returning to the bathroom to correct it, having put it on backwards - was fantastic! Yep, it's a man's garment. So, I wore it for the entire training session, leaving my gi trousers in my training bag. And for some reason, I just felt more bellicose, a feeling my training partners got to enjoy. Heh.

Thanks Dale!

My friend Peter Chang called a few minutes ago to let me know he was getting ready for a 100-mile bike ride/race in Tahoe in a few weeks, and mentioned along the way that he'd been asked to play the male of an Asian couple in a Jaguar television commercial. Here are pics from the recent filming; his "wife" Lily Chai is certainly a lovely woman!

I first heard about this on the local news today or yesterday, and through one of "small world" circuits I've gotten used to since I discovered the Internet in the late 1980's, my friend Steve Pegram forwards me the local news station's coverage of it, "Mountain Lion killed in Palo Alto neighborhood":

The media think this footage is graphic. The officer made a good shot. She used an M4 with an EoTech. Based on my limited knowledge of cat physiology (from reading hunt reports and watching OLN) it appears to be a lung shot. I surmise this from the cat's reaction based on known lung shots I've observed on hunting shows.

Perhaps we should rename the 5.56 Poodle Shooter to Kitty Killer?

The video does go on to say that the shot was lung/heart/lung, which is almost as good as such a game shot can get (additionally breaking one or both scapulae to keep the cat from running would have been even better, and a brainstem shot would have rated "perfect".) The only thing that would have made this better is if the householder had dispatched the threat herself. By the way, I should mention that there have been several recent public accounts of mountain lion attacks on hikers in the nearby Stanford hills (The Farm really is farmland)... good riddance to bad cats.

I mentioned to Andy Chen this morning, when I saw him in front of our cancelled chemistry lecture, that I'd actually seen Géricault's The Raft of the `Medusa' on a visit to the Louvre in 1990. Hell, you can't miss it: it's gargantuan. Andy had mentioned yesterday on his blog that his biology teacher had discussed the work in class as a lead-in to a discussion of the urinary tract.

I'd read a bit of the sordid backstory of the tragedy of the Medusa, but never in depth. I just found a fascinating and tragicomic account of the wicked mess of blundering incompetence that inspired this monsterpiece of Romantic painting, an article on History House:

In 1819, when French painter Theodore Ge'ricault first exhibited his dramatic masterpiece, "Scene of Shipwreck" to Paris society, he could little imagine the reaction the painting would receive. Onlookers were fascinated and horrified, rather the way they'd react if they saw a particularly large and hairy spider. The painting is enormous. Sixteen feet high, twenty three feet, six inches wide (about 5x7 m), it depicts a group of desperate men floating on a few planks of wood, trying to get the attention of a tiny little ship on the horizon by waving their shirts around. There was a sordid, true tale behind this raft, and everyone knew what it was. It had taken place three years prior. It involved desperate men, howling stupidity, and cannibalism. And, with the painting looming over them, everyone was talking about it.

Just peeled off yesterday's entry on my Sports Illustrated desk calendar to reveal the lovely Jessica White. Nice!

My friend Dave sent me a pointer to an updated version of the "Have Geiger Counter, will travel" site maintained by Elena, the Ukrainian biker (see my original post of 2 days ago).

Curt Howland passed on to me this chilling travelogue of Chernobyl from a Ukrainian motorcyclist named Elena.

I always go for rides alone, because I do not want anyone to raise dust in front of me. I have never had problems with the dosimeter guys, who man the checkpoints. They are experts, and if they find radiation on you vehicle, they give it a chemical shower, and this eat ya bike. I don't count those couple of times when "experts" tried to invent an excuse to give me a shower, because those had a lot more to do with physical biology than biological physics...

Seen in a restaurant loo last night:

I took this shot two hours ago. These are the digital and tape audio recorders of a number of students in our chemistry lecture section:

Look familiar? Anyone else remember that running sight gag from the 1985 Val Kilmer flick "Real Genius"? As one writer describes the scene (yay Google, saved a bit of typing on my part):

Do you remember the scene in the movie "Real Genius" that showed students at the beginning of a university semester sitting in a large lecture room listening to the professor? As the semester wore on, one-by-one each student left a tape recorder on their seat. The scene ended with the professor's recorder pontificating to a room full of other recorders.

I found a screenshot of that scene, which looks amazingly like our chem lecture hall, down to the same phenolic resin desktop:

Whoa. Life converges on art. Fortunately, ours is a very dynamic professor... most of the students are simply trying to capture his superb lectures for replay later. As a matter of fact, on most days the professor records his own lectures with studio-quality equipment for posting on his personal website. If only more of the good ones did that, we'd have more "Feynman Lectures on Physics" preserved for posterity.

My friend Glenn Cripe today informed me that he and his Russian business partner Dmitri Kostygin have good news to share: "The next printing of Atlas and Fountainhead in Russian is due out next week!" In his mail he also send copies of the cover proofs for the 3 volumes of Atlas; here's a copy of the cover for volume 1:

Glenn notes:

We are also looking for sponsors. For $500, you get your name in all future editions of the books, a few free copies for your own use, a tax deduction, our undying gratitude, plus the chance to participate in changing the course of history! Inquiries should be sent to randinrussia@yahoo.com

It's worth noting that copies of Rand's works have found themselves into some interesting places in Russian society, such as the lending library of Vladimir Putin's chief economic adviser, a strong advocate of Rand's economic philosophy.

Another excellent flick to add to your Netflix rental queue: Millenium Actress AKA "Sennen joyu" (2001). If you enjoy epic Japanese animation such as Spirited Away (Studio Ghibli's "Sen to Chihiro no Kamikakushi"), and film in the style of Kurosawa-style chanbara, you'll really enjoy this labor of love from Satoshi Kon, the director of the 1997 psychological thriller Perfect Blue.

Of course, I do have a lot of Japanese cinema and history under my belt, which I think might be a requisite to truly enjoying this piece, which does very heavily rely for its humor and grandeur on that cultural grounding. Still, I think even the uninitiated can thoroughly enjoy this film for its spectacular sweep and touchingly benevolent sense of life. As a reviewer on one fan site puts it:

Millennium Actress has the stylistic sophistication of Perfect Blue with the empathy, warmth and truth of a Ghibli movie!

If this film had been done with live actors & live action you'd be seeing it awarded on Oscar night. It's that good. The editing is superb. Likewise the animation. As for the "confusing" flashbacks, my daughters (8 & 9) watched this and after explaining that the old actress is telling her life story by using the films she starred in as parts of her actual life, they had no problem following the story. I didn't find the story to be depressing although it is bittersweet. The characters are so strongly drawn that halfway through I found myself forgetting they weren't real people! Strong, gentle story, superb visuals, pacing & editing make up one of the best anime movies ever! In fact, forget anime, this belongs in the top 100 films period.

My good, longtime friend Romana Machado Reynolds has aroused my envy by taking a long trip to the Galapagos Islands:

The guy on the ground is Raj Apte, brother of Arun Apte (whom I've met). According to Romana: "[The] only way you can get close to the big turtles is by creeping toward them at their level, or from behind."

That's so cool. I had my childhood fascination with the Galapagos re-kindled last year when I read a couple of Darwin biographies, and really stoked a couple of months ago when Hollywood made history by filming the fantastic and epic Master and Commander in the Islands. I'll be hitting up Romana for many more vacation photos in the near future.

Yesterday, we had a Lunar New Year's exhibition on campus. Here, my chemistry classmate Minh, a Kuk Sul Do practicioner, is caught in some type of flying leap (I really love my digicam):

He's shoeless: both shoes flew off within a few seconds of starting his demo. The guy's a ball of energy. He ended the demo covered in concrete abrasions and sweat; it all looked pretty cool. I know nothing about the art he practices though.

A couple of days ago I was working in the chem lab under time pressure, preparing a number of buffer solutions for a kinetics exercise prior to a tedious and time-consuming spectroscopy run. I'd very carefully delivered fixed amounts of various reagents when, at the last phase of preparation, I added minute amounts (0.3 mL each) of bromocresol green indicator (AKA 3,3',5,5'-Tetrabromo-m-cresolsulfonphthalein), this happened:

I had to stop at this moment and pull out that little digital camera I keep in my cargo pockets when I'm clothed. These little moments of unexpected beauty (to my eyes, at least) should be appreciated, and sometimes shared with friends. Here's what they looked like after mixing but before analysis:

This reminds me a bit of before and after shots of a line of carefully prepared cocktails in a Vegas casino bar.

As the regular reader may notice, I've changed this blog's front page a bit. I stumbled upon a picture of myself I like much better than the "guy with an Uzi" photo, which I've scanned and added above. I've also added curmedgeonly text in the sidebar emphasizing that "this is a personal blog, deal with it."

Oh, and I ripped out some affiliate logos. I've decided that affiliate programs don't generate their own income (doh!) without taking over your site... with the happy exception of Amazon Marketplace.

I have a few pet peeves, one of which is shopping cart thieves. I think this particular crime pushes one of my outrage button because it's an everyday occurrance, out in the open, that many people witness and almost no one does anything about. That type of thing rankles me. So, when I was driving through Cupertino (which like many American towns has a well-known problem with this type of thing) a few days ago, and saw this guy crossing the street across from Long's Drugs with the latter's property, I had to do something.

He was on the corner, and I was stopped at the light waiting to turn. I opened my window and told him he should return the cart. He was startled, and blurted out that he was moving the empty cart to a "collection center" a block away! Nonsense, and I told him so. He was visibly shaken, and turned around to return the cart to the nearby store. I pulled into the parking lot nearby to watch, and saw him making motions to resume his theft (thinking me absent), at which point I pulled up nearby and took some photos with the tiny digicam (a Sony CyberShotU) that I keep in my pocket whenever I leave the house. It's in this photo where I've informed him that I have pictures of him, and he's objecting that since I don't work for the store, I have no say in the matter.

He eventually returned the cart and did a bum-swagger off the lot. In the meantime, I parked my car and walked into the store seeking the manager, who was happily surprised, and requested that I use the store's memorycard-to-film converter to leave him copies of the photos I'd made. I took the Memory Stick from my camera, stuck it in the front of a neat little kiosk with a surprisingly idiotproof user interface, and within minutes we had a set of hardcopies for myself and for the store management, to be posted on what I assume is the "deadbeats bulletin board" where many retail operations post photos of bad check passers and other BOLO (Be On the Look Out) notices.

Yet another reason there are certain things I carry with me regularly.

I've been slightly busier than usual the past few days. I did manage to meet up with friends Mark Quon ("Genghis Khan") and Alan Weiss on Friday before Alan's departure for Austin, for lunch and for some indoor shooting at the excellent Reed's Indoor Range in Santa Clara, California. Here's Alan with his EAA Witness in .45 ACP with Wonderfinish coating (he favors the isosceles stance):

I have one more entry to write after this one, an actual writeup of my impressions of the event, but as promised earlier today, I'm putting up the rest of the (useable) pics from my tiny Sony CyberShotU digicam, after a bit of cropping, enhancement, and redeye reduction:

In the foreground are Alan Weiss ("WINBEAR2" on the Fox Firefly Forum) and a nice lady whose name I've forgotten (apologies!) Alan is a libertarian friend of mine from the smith2004-discuss list, visiting from Austin for the week on business, and the mystery lady is a Democrat activist... proof that disparate fans can booze together and have fun! Old friend Dr. Kurth Reynolds ("yes, I actually am a rocket scientist!") is lurking in the background over her shoulder.

I'm still waiting for permissions to post some more of the pics from last night's Firefly shindig. In the meantime, while I'm waiting, I'll post one of the pics from the set which Fred Moulton handed me on a CD when we met at the event:

That's Anton Sherwood on the left, who was also in attendance at last night's Firefly shindig. I think he's dressed as "The Man with One Brown Shoe." Me, I'm dressed as myself. Really. Or, at least an aspect of myself. And yes, the blades are real. Party was at the home of Romana Machado Reynolds and Dr. Kurth Reynolds, Halloween 2003. Romana has always held cool parties.

I have about half a dozen or so photos I took at last night's Firefly MicroMiniShindig. I have to identify some people and get some people's permissions to post before I put them all up. Here's one for starters, though:

From left to right: Kim ("EARTH2KIM" on the Prospero Firefly Forum), me, and Mark Quon ("Genghis Khan").

From "cats on grass" to "cat with brass":

There's nothing a kitten doesn't find interesting. I'd just laid out 15 expended .50 BMG cases for photographing before putting them in the cleaning tumbler, for before-and-after pictures. Not a minute had passed before the kids jumped on them and started batting them around.

I was rummaging around a couple of boxes trying to find my Steyr Scout's owner's manual when I ran across this photo, which I popped into my Epson flatbed scanner:

That's me about 7 years ago hanging out with my good friend in Arizona. I like this picture.

We all have our preferences, and that's a great thing, but speaking only for myself, I really need a little pussy in my life:

Yes, it's "cats on grass": even obligate carnivores need a little salad every now and then... think of it as "digestive shotgun wadding" for the little fellows. I'm given to understand from ethologist Desmond Morris that the big cats indulge in this behavior too.

On the left is 9-month-old Lucy (full name "Dr. Samantha Carter", which confuses the vet's office still) and on the right is her brother Selmak... Peggy is a Stargate SG-1 fanatic (well, so am I): she named them. Selmak has the interesting characteristic of managing to shut his eyes every single time the camera's flash lights off! I know of one human friend of mine who does exactly the same thing, my old extropian buddy Perry Metzger.

By the way, I did this on a whim, remembering Michael Reed's comment about our being "ailurophiles"; I have no intention of being branded a kittyblogger.

I was hungry after a hard workout a couple of days ago, and on the way home my muscles were screaming "food! food!" so I stopped by the first fast food place I saw, Carl's Jr., expecting to have to do the "big burger hold the bun" thing, when I saw this:

I had to try this: advertised at 6 grams of carbs, eliminating the 66 grams usually found in the bun. Of course, it was the same price as the combo (U.S. $6.05) with the bun, but I'm glad they were offering it at all. I didn't get a "diet" cola with the meal - I hate sweet colas - settling on an iced tea instead. Yes, I know that caffeine stimulates insulin production in the pancreas, but I'm not an Atkins purist, and I still hold on to some habits of a Southerner's childhood.

The "sandwich" was excellent, essentially the stuff between a standard "Six Dollar Burger", a fairly decent sandwich which lives up to its billing. Of course, they need to work on the wrapper concept a bit: it's a bit difficult to eat around, since it's not meant itself to be eaten. I think. The garden salad side order is your standard bland lettuce & cherry tomato with shredded carrot thing. I treat these salads as culinary digestive shotgun wadding whenever I come across them, eating them last in opposition to the standard American convention.

This was a good deal for the money, and I noticed that I didn't feel at all drowsy later, since I'd avoided the bread. Oh, and no fries, of course, which helped.

After having finally seen "Return of the King" (the best of the three, in our opinion), Peggy and wandered across the street into the fabulous Santana Row shopping development, which seems finally to be on the rebound from the fire which ravaged it during construction and also from the local economy's 2-year downturn. I saw this sign just inside a ritzy art gallery on the Row:

Cartoonist Scott Beiser has this to say - or portray - about the Jeffrey Jordan situation in Ohio.

After seeing "Master and Commander" in Saratoga, Peggy and I stopped by Peet's for coffee. Leaving Peet's, I saw this on a payphone outside:

Yes, I do carry a tiny digital camera with me always.

The sticker reads:

Your conversation is being monitored by the U.S. government courtesy of the US Patriot Act of 2001, Sec. 216 of which (sic) permits all phone calls to be recorded without a warrant or notification. For more information, visit www.crimethinc.com.

A visit to the CrimethInc website reveals them to be nasty little collectivist, monkey-wrencher wannabe "anarchists" who speak what passes for the language of lefty protest nowadays. See their "operating instructions" for deploying these stickers, where they decry private property. Still, they do this one thing interestingly well, as evidenced by this photo: the isolated point they make in this sticker is true.

This is something I saw passing a number of art museums and civic buildings in downtown Portland, Oregon on my trip there last week. When's the last time you heard a politician utter words like this? I'm not familiar with Governor Charles A. Sprague, but I found some sources that the interested may follow up on.

This was a color digiphoto on my Sony CybershotU. I accidently clicked on "B&W" while cropping the original, and liked the black & white effect on the wall, so I'm preserving it here.

I'd promised Michael Reed I'd send him and/or post for him the additional photos from our meeting, taken by our (rather cute) waitress at Sungari. There were two photos. I'm posting the least worst. Michael looks presentable in both, but in this, the least worst, she pushed the button on my Sony CybershotU and, thinking the shot had been taken, moved the camera as the CCD activated:

The other photo, while slightly more clear, caught me in the middle of an utterance instructing the waitress in the use of the camera... so I look like I'm sucking on a lemon. That photo I'm sending privately to Michael, since I'm pretty sure he's an archival completist like myself.

This was snapped a few days ago on the way up through northern California on the way to Oregon. In the background is the beautiful, 14,162 foot, potentially deadly volcano people around here call "Mt. Shasta". I have some of these shots from the way out to Oregon, and some taken under snowy conditions on the way back to California, taken yesterday on New Year's Eve... maybe I'll post them sometime, entitled "Thirty-Six Views of Mt. Shasta" under the artist name "The Cowboy Hokusai". Or maybe not.

In the lower right hand corner, in the foreground, is my trusty Valentine One radar and laser detector. Excepting a year I spent in Japan, I've used this thing in three different vehicles - and numerous rental cars - for five years, and am incredibly happy with it. I spent about $450 for it and its accessories, but I'm sure I've saved several times that price in speeding tickets I didn't receive.

A few days ago, I mentioned that I was visiting Portland, Oregon, and was updating my blog from my hotel room. One of my readers, Michael Reed, offered to buy me lunch in downtown Portland. Right before I left, we did meet up, and spent over two hours exchanging interesting bits of information, ranging from restaurants to books to DVDs - he'd bought Firefly based on my blog entry earlier, which was gratifying - to insights on concealed carry in Oregon and other states. Michael gave me a great deal follow up on, and I'll be posting some of his recommendations soon.

Speaking of recommendations, I would be remiss not to mention that the place we had lunch was Sungari, a Szechwan restaurant in Portland's Yamhill district. I had the Rainbow Scallops, which were huge, succulent, and wonderfully spicy. Thanks for lunch, Michael!

I saw this in a Portland shop window today... a cheering sight in the cold downtown rain.

My Bujinkan teacher Dale Seago asked me to take some pictures of his new custom dirk last night. This is the first pic I snapped as he was about to place it on the tartan plaid backdrop on the dojo mat on the floor between us. I thought this captured one aspect of Dale so well that I have to share it (the spots on the pic are from the camera lens.)

A couple of weekends ago, I finally took out my Armalite AR-50 .50 BMG for a spin. I've owned it for quite a while, but I hadn't gotten around to shooting it: I wasn't yet convinced until recently that I wouldn't break the scope I was hoping to mount on it, a Leupold Vari-X III mil-dot model with a Premier Reticle (3.5-10 x 40mm). Once I was convinced, I mounted the scope and took it out for a bit of fun, using some surplus South African ammo I'd ordered a couple of years ago. No intention of serious zeroing, but I figured it would be fun to get at least a rough zero at the longest range I could manage.

The range was only about 300 meters deep, so for fun I set up to shoot at a vertical paper target, figuring I'd try to adjust for about one foot over point of aim. My first shot, with the elevation and windage on the scope set to "0", resulted in a hit right over the target... 4 feet over. It didn't take me long to get the hits down to roughly where I wanted them. Like I said, this was simply a set of warmup shots (also remembering that the first few shots through a new barrel will change point of impact.)

One of the things that amazed me about this weapon is how light the recoil was... and how loud it was! Both aspects make perfect sense given the combination of the weight of the weapon (37lb/16.8kg) and a well-designed muzzle brake (the size of a Coke can.) The muzzle brake, in the course of doing its recoil reduction job, introduces a lot of noise to either side and back of the muzzle. You do not want to be within 10-15 feet on either side of the weapon when it lights off! Interestingly, in the shooter's position behind the gun, it's much more bearable... but less so 6 feet behind the shooter. Interesting acoustics.

I plan to take this lovely piece back out to the range in the next few weeks, under more controlled conditions. I'll write about it at length, and may even have someone do a video of the firing sequence, so you all can see and hear it in action. This thing is fun!

This is just simply embarrassing. In the spirit of Chinese Communist Party Self Criticism, this being the day the Soviets - er, the Chinese - launch their first cosmonaut into space on a 40 year old Soyuz design, I'll criticize this blunder of mine:

About a week ago, I mentioned a scuba diving trip I made to Monterey, California. If you look closely at the picture in that article, you'll see attached to the left side (my left side, as pictured) on the BCD (bouyancy control device [vest]) a Cold Steel Recon Tanto in its Kydex/Concealex sheath. Well, I was so knackered from the surf zone re-entry that I didn't immediately clean off my gear with fresh water and dry it. I did that the next day, forgetting completely that I'd clipped several caribiners (which survived unharmed) and one nice high carbon steel tanto (which suffered) to my technical BCD.

If you look closely at the snapshot above, you'll see rust spots on the exposed cutting edge of the blade. I took that photo as a record, before I cleaned up the edge. It took me an hour of careful work, but I was able to stone out and hone the rust spots. If you ever have anything like this happen to your blades, fix it thoroughly: one oxide spot will catalyze a larger oxide surface. I can say, however, that I'm really pleased at how the rest of the knife held up: flawlessly. The black epoxy powder coat finish protects the body of the blade extremely well.

I'm still going to try to dive this knife again, but next time I will 1.) pre-treat the entire blade surface with oil and 2.) immediately clean and dry the blade as soon as I doff my diving gear. Also, I'll use the same Nonox rust cleaner/preventative I use on my swords as an additional level of prevention in the cleanup.

I couldn't resist this: phenol.

G'nite.

I'm playing with RasMol, a molecular visualization tool. I'm starting with small inorganic molecules right now; since I was talking sulfites today, here's sulfur dioxide (SO₂) for you, in the standard space-filling model:

I'll be playing with RalMol some more. Visualization of macromolecules should be interesting in this tool...

I spent the weekend with friends in Monterey Bay, California scuba spearfishing. More on this later, but I figured I'd put up this picture right away. This was taken on Saturday when suiting up before a surf entry into the Bay from Del Monte Beach:

My good friend Franklin (AKA "The Big C.I.G.A.R.") is the one without his hood on. I'm the sweaty one on the right with all gear ready for entry (diving 34.9 percent enriched air/Nitrox, by the way). I could not wait to hit the 57 Fahrenheit degree water... I was boiling! More on this trip later.

Someone on the smith2004-discuss list said he'd like me to post a picture I had taken last year of an MBA Gyrojet 13mm rocket carbine. Here it is. The owner had it on display at a gun show in San Jose, and was kind enough to allow me to have a couple of photos taken.

"warren_et" on the same list calls the projectile a - get ready for this - "Single-Stage-To-Obit rocket".

Here's something you don't see everyday: "Rare Mid to Late 19th Vampire Killing Kit", on auction at gunbroker.com, the original 19th century text from the enclosing wooden box:

Vampire Killing Kit

The accoutrements for the destruction of the Vampire

This box contains the items considered necessary for the protection of persons who travel into certain little known countries in Easter Europe where the populace are plagued with a peculiar manifestation of evil, known as Vampires... Professor Ernst Blomberg respectfully requests that the purchaser of this kit carefully studies his book. Should evil manifestations become apparent, he is then equiped to deal with them efficiently... Professor Blomberg wishes to announce his grateful thanks to that well known gunmaker of Liege, Nicholas Plombeur, whose help in compiling of the special items, the silver bullets,etc., has been most efficient. The items enclosed are as follows...

1. An efficient pistol with its usual accoutrements
2. A quantity of bullets of the finest silver
3. Powdered flowers of garlic (one phial)
4. Flour of Brimstone (one phial)
5. Wooden stake (Oak)
6. Ivory crucifix
7. Holy Water (one phial)
8. Professer Blomberg's New Serum

At last night's dojo training, I showed this knife to Russell Whitaker. If you visit the Northerner.com site, you can see they have a few others as well.

The Suomi people would call this knife a puukko. The people themselves live in Finland and the northern parts of Sweden, Norway, and a bit of Russia. (BTW, there is a Tornedalen dialect of Finnish or Suomi spoken by about 30,000 people in Sweden.)

For comparison, here's a pic of another traditional Suomi-style knife with the sheath made from reindeer antler and leather, and yet another using both curly birch and reindeer horn for the sheath. These sheaths, by the way (mine included) are made with a small drain hole on the back side at the bottom, in case water should get into the sheath. Deep pouch-type sheaths are the norm throughout Scandinavia (not just in the Suomi country), to avoid loss of the knife.

Being made without finger guards, the overall design of Suomi knives favors "pulling" or draw cuts (important if you're out in the cold with numb fingers or wearing mittens, etc.), but the size and shape of the Tornedals knife handle also makes it easy to brace into the palm of your hand if you need to use a pushing motion.

I don't know whether the blade of my Tornedals knife is carbon or some sort of stainless steel, but either way it takes an incredible edge. I tried to test the edge last night by shaving a little hair off my arm, but it was hard to measure my success because the hair appeared to be leaping off in terror before the blade could quite reach it.

I'd also recommend checking out the Scandinavian & Lapp knives from various makers here (scroll down the main page).

Y'know, with just a knife like this and a good tomahawk, such as the Rogers' Rangers Field Grade Spike Tomahawk from American Tomahawk Co., I'd feel very well equipped for any situation I might run into in the boonies.

Damn, just wish I had that 'hawk... :-)

Steve Pegram pointed me to this site, which - among other things - sells Kydex holsters.

I'd enjoy seeing more of these shots on their site... I may have to lobby them.

"...and I'm a selfdefenseaholic."

A few days ago, I discovered the Self-Defense Forums, and have been reccommending that high-quality site to a number of people. My teacher Dale Seago has been doing a lot of posting there, including this introductory piece with lots of great photos of Scottish dirks.

In a February post, "An ancient Japanese hideout gun", I showed a grainy picture of a "tanto pistol" which Jeff Sherwin had photographed recently in the arms museum at Matsumoto Castle in Japan. Tonight at the dojo, Jeff lent me a small stack of photos to scan with the better scanner (an Epson 1260 Photo) I picked up a few days ago; here's a sample:

Still a bit indistinct, but here's a breakout of the image on the left:

And the one on the right, which appears to be a mortar/rocket assembly:

I'm not able to make out any detail of the text on the placards in the display case, so I'll have to take pictures of the text on my own visit, whenever I get back to Japan. I promise a translation: my kanji knowledge has been getting reasonably adult in recent times.

I recently bought a new pistol, one that I have craved since it was announced nearly a year ago. It is a Sig-Sauer P226ST chambered in .357 Sig. It is the all-stainless configuration. It differs from the standard P226 in that the frame is made from stainless steel, whereas the standard P226 frame is alloy. It has heft, to the tune of nearly 40 ounces. Shooting it is a dream. The action is very tight, recoil and muzzle flip are reduced by the heft, and delivers outstanding accuracy. It also has the new M1913 Picatinny rail for attaching a light, if desired. It is also available in 9mm and .40 Auto.

YES! Just out today: Burt Rutan unveils Scaled Composites' SpaceShipOne and its drop-ship, the White Knight.

Just saw this mentioned on Fox News, figured I'd Google for it immediately. I wonder if there's a "Fox News effect" similar to the "Slashdot Effect". Some of this is just plain goofball, some of it's stuff I've seen and done in climbing gyms and on rockfaces. Good fun, in any case: House Gymastics.

Looks like I'm going to need to "bust at least one classic Harrison & Ford move" to get into their gallery; watch this space...

Now that I'm mostly recovered from this weekend's training - though still moving slowly - I'll mention this weekend's training I attended in Concord, California, conducted by Soke Don Angier of Yanagi Ryu Aiki Jiujitsu at Aikido of Diablo Valley, graciously hosted by Rick Rowell and Shari Dyer (who provided the photo below).

Mr. Angier is the only American soke of a Japanese family martial art, Yanagi Ryu Aiki Jiujitsu, an offshoot of the Daito Ryu tradition. He'll be turning 70 this year, and has been doing his art since 1958. He has an interesting story to tell, recounted in the article "'So Sorry! Jiu-jitsu Please, Not Judo!' My Career in Yanagi-ryu Aiki Jujutsu", originally printed in the May 2001 edition of Aikido Journal, and reprinted by the Journal of Combative Sport (an interesting venue, since Yanagi Ryu, like the Bujinkan arts I study, utterly lacks sporting elements).

My American teacher in the Bujinkan, Dale Seago, some years ago strongly recommended that his students take advantage of the fact that Mr. Angier was visiting San Francisco for a weekend seminar on the principles of his art. A number of us did indeed take Dale up on his recommendation, and a small core group of us make a point of training with Mr. Angier on the roughly yearly schedule he visits the San Francisco Bay area.

Don Angier teaches these 2-day seminars with a very small number of very specific techniques, which are vehicles for the important lessons: the principles behind martially effective movement, e.g. commutative locking, finding the opponent's weak lines, taking advantage of hardwired mammalian and reptilian visual responses to misdirection, etc. All physics, all anatomy & physiology.

As is usual at these events, we had a larger (18-20 people) group training the first day, and a small group of about half that size training the second day. Mr. Angier and his direct students Jeremy and Mort (great guys) circulated the room giving intensely minutely specific directions for correcting our movements.

The attendees were predominantly aikidoists, with a much smaller number of Bujinkan students. The purpose of the training was not to make us practicioners of Mr. Angier's art, but rather to take home the lessons of his training to our own arts and our own movement. I can't recommend his training highly enough. At $70 for the weekend, too, it was practically given away free. Train with him, if you have the opportunity.

I've had the pleasure of taking firearms training twice with Eric S. H. Ching: once in a day-long special defensive pistol session I put together for my friends, and once in a 6-day defensive pistol course, where he was a line instructor under Col. Jeff Cooper.

Eric is an educated, methodical, and analytical man... who first started shooting in his 30's, but is now a world-respected firearms innovator. Those of you who've not yet taken the first steps in firearms ownership and training, take heart: Eric is your paradigm example. You can do it.

Eric has followed up his invention of the 3-point Ching Sling (featured on the Steyr Scout iconic to this blog: the favorite in my personal collection) with a 2-point version of the same, the "Safari Ching Sling", intended for mounting on rifles without the extra sling point (I'm thinking of the Savage Scout in particular).

Last night at the dojo, our teacher Dale Seago held an auction of a number of his blades. I picked up a very nice and extremely stout little Linder (Solingen) skinning knife, and this interesting piece, a Kris Cutlery Visayan Pinuti:

I sometimes go places where a machete could be useful. I really hate standard machetes: flimsy, clumsy, and crude. This piece is much better: attractive and servicable, weighted toward the tip (as befits a bolo), and a good enough practical travel short sword. I agree with Jeff Sherwin who commented to me last night that Kris Cutlery does these types of blades best: quality Filipino blades made in the Phillipines. Interestingly, the Kris Cutlery description mentions that the tang is simply glued in place, which is not true: it's also pinned. Oh, and the pommel as you can see in this picture is a nice, oversized knob: great for striking.

I've also owned one of their 26" Japanese-style katana, which was a great little piece for the price. I eventually sold it when I made the leap to a Bugei Samurai Katana last year, for about $800 more.

Thanks to Steve Pegram for passing along this tale of an M-16 kb. Learn the signs!

This is eerily familiar to my experience with S&B ammo in a Glock 23 a few months ago.

Thanks to Michael Duey for sending me this digipic he captured at a recent training event with Bujinkan shihan Bill Atkins.

I've cropped the face of my victim training partner per request of He Who Must Not Be Named (AKA "Robert"), who's tangled in my training kyoketsu shoge ("ring & dagger"), a most amusing weapon system.

Thanks to "Buyu Kurt" for posting some photos of Dale Seago's "Guns 'N Blades" seminar to the clubbuyu mailing list.

Thanks to the Liberty Belles for the image above. Relatedly, read "The Racist Origins of US Gun Control" by Steve Ekwall, as well as Tim O'Brien's shorter piece.

Thanks to commenter Dirk for pointing me to this excellent resource! I highly recommend pointing your friends to this site, Oleg Volk's "A Human Right", especially potential new shooters - females, particularly - and political fencesitters.

Aside from being an excellent source of pro-rights arguments, there are so many superb, powerful images worth reproducing. For fellow Bujinkan practicioners, there's an interesting article by a Texas shidoshi on martial arts & firearms.

The Liberty Belles issue this challenge:

Which would you choose?

Thanks to fellow Bujinkan practicioner Jeff Sherwin, who knows my interest in firearms, for giving me copies of a couple of photos he took on a recent trip to Japan. Pictured here is what is apparently either a flintlock or percussion blackpowder single-shot pistol, artfully concealed to resemble a tanto. This would be worn in a samurai's obi, even in a castle, where longswords were often not allowed. This is a digital scan of a low-contrast analog photograph, so please forgive the lack of detail:

Here's a blurb from a Japanese tourist guide:

The simple yet magnificent castle has become the symbol of Matsumoto. The 5 tiered 6 storied castle tower is approximately 30 meters tall and is the nation's oldest among existing castles. The dark stairwell leads to a viewpoint of the Matsumoto plains. The moon-viewing turret and all sorts of crenelations for stones, arrows, bullets and such still remain. The battlements and the scarce windows are all parts of the historic war strategies which display the intense power struggle of the times.

On the 2nd floor of the Matsumoto-jo Castle tower is an exhibit of 106 historic guns [emphasis mine - ed.] as well as references regarding modern weapons.

All the times I've been to Japan, and the year I lived there, I never thought to visit this museum near Nagano. I plan to make the trip sometime, and take a very good digital camera with me. Jeff has enticed me with descriptions of grenadier samurai armor and lacquered blackpowder grenades. I really must see this stuff.

Oh, and relatedly, I guess it's about time I get around to writing a review of Noel Perrin's Giving Up the Gun: Japan's Reversion to the Sword, 1543-1879, as I'd mentioned a while back.

I watched the 2003 State Farm U.S. Figure Skating Championships in Dallas last night, and as usual was fascinated with all aspects of the competition - this is one of the few sports I watch - particularly the Senior Women's Free Skate. 22 year-old Michelle Kwan was even more spectacular than ever, placing first as expected and picking up an unprecedented 28th 6.0. She owned the ice that night, and it showed on her face and in her performance.

There were a number of other, notable performances, including that of 6th-place 18 year-old Ye Bin Mok, a Korean immigrant who moved to Los Angeles with her parents around age 9. What really piqued my interest in her was when one of the sports commentators mentioned in passing, "she's being home schooled". This was one of the last things in the world I expected to hear from a commentator, my mind being on the performance, so I did the metaphorical jaw-drop and made a note to check up on this assertion later.

True to the commentator's word, her USFSA bio page confirms her non-traditional status, with her school listed as "Laurel Springs Independent Study", which has quite an interesting website.

An interview with Ye Bin shows her to be normal, bright, ambitious (she's UCLA-bound), and apparently well-socialized in the sense of being able to relate to other human beings, adding yet another piece of data contrary to the erroneous assertions of the government-school pushers, many of whose inmates turn out to be righteous little loser sociopaths, which Ms. Mok most evidently is not.

I wish her all the best, and hope other homeschoolers use her as one of many solid examples of "it can be done, and furthermore, we can do it much better".

My friend Tom Burroughes visited me earlier this fall in order to attend a 4-day defensive handgun course at Front Sight. Before and after he headed out to the Nevada desert to learn weaponcraft, we spent some time at northern California airfields and aviation museums. I'm a private pilot, and Tom, like me, is a an aviation enthusiast. Tom's the son of a retired RAF navigator, and loves historical aircraft, like this 1937 Beech 17 Staggerwing:

This is one of the classiest aircraft ever produced, and silent testimony to an era before the liability explosion which brought Wichita to its knees.

Thanks to the circulation department at the Morgan Hill Times, which ran this photograph on its front page 8 October 2002, and recently provided me a print from their "Wings of History" feature, which predates by 2 months their online presence.