Archive for the ‘Home’ Category

Gone Cookin’

Sunday, June 20th, 2010

Dryfuss shows his smile.

Sorry for the recent inactivity here. After 3+ years of blogging about flying, crashing, the Slough of Despond, hats, Baylands, birds, gopher snakes, my misadventures and my friends, I slowed to stall speed.

Nowadays, I fly occasionally, mostly indoors with the members of Bay Area Micros, and I still keep in touch with a number of my flying buddies, but much of my energy is consumed by two major new interests:

  • Managing and participating in a new blog about sous vide cooking: http://svkitchen.com/.
  • Walking, playing with and learning about our new rescued greyhound, Dryfuss.

Thanks to all of you who joined the party. If you enjoy food, good photos and interesting writing, please visit us at SVKitchen.

And don’t count me out yet. I’m still fascinated by our ability to remotely control tiny flying machines, and I may one day pick this site back up like I never left.

Soldering Tiny Wires

Friday, July 17th, 2009

A wide piece of masking tape holds the wires in place.

A wide piece of masking tape holds the wires in place.


In the course of adding a brushless tail motor to a little Walkera helicopter, I had to solder three very small pairs of wires together.

The first solder joint went OK, but as I started to work on the second pair of wires, the first joint came undone.

Then I realized two things:

  • That I should immediately reinforce solder joints with shrink tubing.
  • That I got lucky the first time.

Try as I might, I couldn’t calm my shaky hands sufficiently to solder another pair.
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Goat, Wolf, Cabbage, Boat

Thursday, January 8th, 2009

The farmer crosses the river in a very small boat.

The farmer crosses the river in a very small boat.


An ancient logical problem focuses on a farmer returning from market, where she purchased a goat, a wolf and a cabbage.

She can make them behave as long as they’re within reach, but if she leaves them alone the goat will munch the cabbage and the wolf will devour the goat.

To return home with her groceries she needs to cross a river in a very small boat, just big enough to carry herself and one of her purchases.

How does she safely transport everything across the river?

Our problem is different: Great Dane, Contractor, Bathroom, Winter.

The Great Dane is, of course, Sadie, our regal nine-and-a-half-year-old harlequin queen, a tall hunk of dog weighing about 140 pounds.

Our Contractor is Can, a soft-spoken Vietnamese who is deathly afraid of dogs.

The Bathroom is my ancient toilet facility, one of the two remaining eyesores in our house (my office is the other).

Winter is, of course, the season: cold.

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Turning 1,000,003

Sunday, February 17th, 2008

Flying CloseTomorrow is my birthday.

I like to joke that it’s my 1 millionth birthday, but I’ve made that joke for several years now, so I must be at least 1,000,003.

As long as I’m picking numbers, I’d prefer a prime number. But whaddya know, 1,000,003 is prime, so that’ll be the new age I claim.

How did I get so old?

Actually, I’ll be 68. Leaving a prime year—67—for an age that’s divisible by 4 and 17.

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Rainy Day Thoughts

Monday, January 28th, 2008

Dice

When the weather forecast suggests a 50% chance of rain tomorrow, it means this:

In the past when conditions were similar to today, it rained tomorrow 50% of the time.

What this doesn’t tell you is how often it will rain tomorrow: will you have periods of an hour or two with no showers?

But just as you’re thinking about this you notice that the wind is forecast for 10, 20, 30mph during various parts of the day.

So even though the sun is shining for a moment right now I won’t try to fly today.

Instead, I’ve returned to assembling my T-Rex 450 kit.

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