My Desultory Blog

Posted By RichC on September 9, 2014

Tavurvur is an active volcano and the current eruption on August 29, 2014 sent ash clouds into the atmosphere disrupting flights to Australia. Rabaul residents have been advised to remain indoor to avoid ash. The video demonstrates the power within our planet and the silent danger when and where pressures are released. We humans seem pretty small considering the power (and splendor) displayed by earthquakes, hurricanes, tornadoes and volcanic eruptions.

In 1937, Tavurvur and another nearby volcano, Vulcan, erupted, killing 508 people. On October 7, 2006 the volcano erupted again, and an initial blast shattered windows up to 12 kilometers away and sent an ash plume 18 km into the stratosphere.

Tavurvur is located on the Papua New Guinea map below near Rabaul.

Category: Nature, Travel, Video | No Comments »
Tags: papua new guinea, rabaul, south pacific, volcano

Posted By RichC on September 8, 2014

New York Times auto guy Lawrence Ulrich seemed to be please with Volkswagen’s new 2015 Golf TDI …

But no crossover, and no hybrid for that matter, can do what I managed in the new diesel-power Golf TDI: 60.6 miles per gallon over 75 highway miles along the Jersey Shore. That’s my personal highway m.p.g. record for any American-market car I’ve tested, including the Toyota Prius.

…

Diesel Golfs come only with four doors, though every trim level offers a manual transmission. VW’s diesel brigades will notice that the least-expensive TDI S starts $3,000 less than its predecessor, at $22,815. That rises quickly to $26,315 for the TDI SE and $28,815 for the TDI SEL. For every diesel version, add $1,100 for the dual-clutch DSG automatic.

Entire article

Thanks for the “heads-up” link Charlie.

Category: Automotive, Diesel, Volkswagen | No Comments »
Tags: 2015, diesel, golf, tdi, volkswagen, vw

Posted By RichC on September 8, 2014

It is not that I’m thinking about replacing my 2006 Honda Pilot just yet, but I was curious this past weekend if the “slightly aggressive” Meguiars polishing compound I used on the old Mercedes-Benz 300D would help return a shine and more importantly remove a few scratches on the Pilot. It definitely improved the shine and after a little light Carnauba wax, looks good … but the deeper scratches are still noticeable. While buffing the paint, I also took the time to touch up a few stone chips on the lip of the hood (hard to avoid).  All in all the 6 hours spent buffing is hard to justify, but it might attract a buyer looking for reliable and low maintenance Honda Pilot “appliance” someday?

Now if I can find a little advice on repairing leather seat seam split, the car will be as good as new. It definitely not bad for a car with almost 200,000 miles!

Category: Automotive | No Comments »
Tags: buffing, honda, meguiars, pilot, polish, rubbing compound

Posted By RichC on September 7, 2014

Most of us see a few posts or images that seem interesting, thought provoking or just surprising. The Desultory tidbit title is a way to toss those collect bits into a miscellaneous post. This week a “size of Africa” map caught my attention as did an post titled “Money can by happiness” in The Economist.

A final photo that had me thinking and tweeting about union labor in the United States made me realized just how difficult life was for some “working” American children before the 1938 Fair Labor Standards Act (and 3rd world children today). To the credit of Labor Unions, conditions are much better for workers in today’s United States than they once were, but today’s unions are no longer combating the same conditions, wages or benefits. Unions needs to maintain their oversight, but return a few of the wasted dues to workers and both rise and fall based on membership by choice (Right to Work).

Category: Misc, Photos, Tidbits | 1 Comment »
Tags: africa, desultorytidbits, graph, graphic, labor, satifaction, union

Posted By RichC on September 6, 2014

A very telling graph discloses three things (see story in Fortune) :

1. A college graduate will on average make $1 million more than a worker with a high school degree over the course of his lifetime … even though the cost of education has gone higher.
2. Wages across the board, adjusted for inflation to 2013 dollars, are down from 1970 – and have seen a sharp decline since 2010.
3. Just because you earn a Bachelor’s degree from college, there is no guarantee that your income will be all that much different than those with high school diplomas (blue line vs. green line for 20% of college graduates).

Be particularly careful when evaluating your readiness for college, the field of study and how much debt is being taken on before assuming higher education is the ticket to a higher income – for 25% of degreed graduates, it is not.

Category: Education, Financial | No Comments »
Tags: college, Education, fortune, graphic, tuition

Posted By RichC on September 5, 2014

Having an interest and studying a little bit of astronomy with my daughter when she was a teenager, I can’t help but share this spectacular Hubble Space Telescope image from NASA Goddard’s pix feed showing the galaxy PGC 54493 in the constellation of Serpens (The Serpent). Click for larger as its definitely worth seeing full screen … although almost looks unreal?

This galaxy is part of a galaxy cluster that has been studied by astronomers exploring an intriguing phenomenon known as weak gravitational lensing.

This effect, caused by the uneven distribution of matter (including dark matter) throughout the Universe, has been explored via surveys such as the Hubble Medium Deep Survey. Dark matter is one of the great mysteries in cosmology. It behaves very differently from ordinary matter as it does not emit or absorb light or other forms of electromagnetic energy — hence the term "dark."

Even though we cannot observe dark matter directly, we know it exists. One prominent piece of evidence for the existence of this mysterious matter is known as the "galaxy rotation problem." Galaxies rotate at such speeds and in such a way that ordinary matter alone — the stuff we see — would not be able to hold them together. The amount of mass that is "missing" visibly is dark matter, which is thought to make up some 27 percent of the total contents of the Universe, with dark energy and normal matter making up the rest. PGC 55493 has been studied in connection with an effect known as cosmic shearing. This is a weak gravitational lensing effect that creates tiny distortions in images of distant galaxies.

Here’s a an impressive video snippet (photo below) of an August 29, 2014 coronal mass ejection showing the sun spewing plasma into space. Watch the gravitational pull from the sun pulling plasma back after the initial ejection.

Category: Photos, Space | No Comments »
Tags: goddard, hubble, nasa, space, telescope

Posted By RichC on September 5, 2014

Now running WordPress 4.0,  “Benny” (for Benny Goodman) … send me a message if there is a problem on my site.

Category: Blogs | No Comments »
Tags: benny, blog, blogging, mydesultoryblog, update, wordpress

Posted By RichC on September 5, 2014

Apple’s CEO Tim Cook had a rough week on Wall Street as investors seemed a bit nervous ahead of next week’s “product offensive.” The tech giant will announce their updated iPhone 6 which will at minimum have a larger screen (rumored photo right). Secretly I’m more interested in what the operation software might bring to make “all” mobile devices more useable. MacRumors also hints at a new iPad Air that could be coming (probably later in the fall) that will be thinner and offer the fingerprint reader (security and purchases).

Another missing and much rumored gadget is a wearable device. Analysts anticipate the iWatch in a usable form, but it is hard to tell. Most want a small, lightweight devices with extended battery life that interfaces with iDevices. I’m not sure how “productive” an iWatch would be, but then we’ve all purchased fashion accessories that serve little purpose for far more money.
  
Probably the biggest unknown is whether Apple will introduce a secure mobile payment system utilizing their iPhone … that would be a big deal.

MarketWatch has been watching and reporting as well … and Apple’s competitors are not taking the 9/9/2014 product release resting on their laurels.

The company is facing stiffer competition from the likes of Samsung and Google in a fast-evolving mobile market. Cook has responded by taking a more combative and aggressive posture. At Apple’s developer conference, he poked fun at Google (GOOG), whose Android operating system is dominant in the mobile world.

"More than 130 million customers who bought an iOS device in last year bought their first Apple device," Cook said. "Many of them were switchers from Android. They bought an Android phone by mistake. And then sought a better life."

Bajarin, a veteran Silicon Valley analyst and Apple-watcher, noted the change, saying that while Cook had once been "rigid and mechanical," he has slowly become "more relaxed, more confident."
"I do believe that he has found his voice," he told MarketWatch. "He has transformed from a nuts and bolts operations guy to a true CEO figure."

Category: Apple, Cellphone, Computer, Technology | 1 Comment »
Tags: air, apple, ipad, iphone6, rumors, techfriday

Posted By RichC on September 4, 2014

Here’s an idea that came from one of those “pagination” oriented list sites … which has become the bane of Internet reading; I’m talking about those sites with multiple pages of photos or news sites requiring a bunch of page clicks in order to read an article – in my opinion the practice needs a social protest movement in order to stop it. Obviously the more clicks, the more profitable the website becomes, but it sure is a pain for readers. For my part, I refuse to participate 95% of the time.

That said, here was an interesting water saving idea posted on such a site (refuse to credit them) and promoted on Twitter (this water saving faucet concept would be great for the boat):

The sleek curve of this faucet makes you think it belongs on some gravity-controlled spaceship. In fact, there’s nothing futuristic or high tech about this faucet beyond it’s look. The 1limit faucet is just an elegant way to conserve water. The see-through glass tube of the faucet holds exactly 1 liter of water, which is supposed to be the amount of water one needs for a quick hand wash. The lever simply turns on or off, permitting or stopping the flow of water from the tube. Problem is, once you’ve used up the water you need to turn it off to refill the 2 liter tube.

Category: Archive, Innovation, Social Media | No Comments »
Tags: bathroom, conservation, faucet, kichen, sailboat, water

Posted By RichC on September 3, 2014

One of the reasons, besides age and appearance, that I replaced the halyards on our sailboat this year was due to the stiffness of the double braided line. Here’s me holding up the line demonstrating just how “stiff” this old mainsail halyard was.

Question: Is there a way to find out what kind of rope this is; because the “core” material cut like steel … very tough stuff (just age and weather or was this a premium low-stretch line?)

Category: Sailing | No Comments »
Tags: cordage, encore, halyard, line, rope, sailing