ReconRat

Plus we didn't really know a lot about radiation in space and what it would do to the astronauts, back in Apollo days. What we did know, was that faster was less exposure. And that was from leaving orbit till they got back. Radiation on the Moon is about the same as open space. So we did it quickly. Plus that thing about provisions also. Taking a long time would just mean more air and food to haul along. The alternative is hauling fuel to go quickly. It's a balancing act. Plus... Apollo missions were launched with Saturn V. One of the largest and most powerful rockets ever built. It put a lot of stuff up there, with enough fuel to get to the Moon quickly. The little rocket lauched last night isn't going to do that.

I suppose everyone has heard about the Russia deployment of marines to off shore Syria. After the deployment of US Marines to off shore Syria. But I just read this: http://www.examiner.com/article/chinese-russian-warships-and-marines-heading-to-syrian-waters http://everything-pr.com/us-russia-and-china-increase-naval-presence-off-syria/245690/#.Uisvvn9ChbI The Jing Gangshan was doing pirate patrol duty in the Gulf of Aden. That's about a five day journey through the Suez canal. It doesn't necessarily have the full contingent of 1000 marines on board. Just when you think there can be no more surprises... edit: and no, news like this isn't in the US news. Have to dig a little deeper. Jing Gangshan http://i1.wp.com/everything-pr.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/china.jpg?resize=585%2C424

Watch East-South-East, and really close to the horizon. It will show up maybe 5 degrees above the horizon. That's about half a fist at arm's length.

I just read some dumb comment somewhere, that said we can't attack Syria, because they would attack our embassy in Syria... They would be attacking an empty building... Also would be why we emptied out the Lebanon embassy today. Next closest embassy, that can be reached.

NASA visibilty map for the launch. I'm not going to look, too far away. I think I'll watch the streaming video instead. http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/ustream.html http://www.space.com/17933-nasa-television-webcasts-live-space-tv.html

Yes, probably so. If they have any sense. I'll guess a third of the population left the country a long time ago. And another 25%-30% has left Syria in the last week or so.Why? Not just the USA, that's the kicker. Lots of people/countries in the Middle East want a piece of Syria. Too many enemies and not enough friends. Ones that count anyway. Combined with Iran starting to tap dance on what their response would be (most likely next to nothing).

Yeah, it's mostly a sledgehammer. But there are many different types now. Some are very specialized. The Russians have them as small as rocket propelled grenades, with a blast of only 30 meters diameter. Most are meant for an enclosure, be it an entire valley in Viet Nam, or something man made like a tunnel, building or bunker. If the Syrian Army moved them to a safe site like a bunker, it's pretty much a toast job. If you can find it, and if it isn't a fake. But overall it's not an issue. The dangers of a goof up are so high that generally the chemical weapons wouldn't be targeted. Instead the trucks, tanks, artillery and launchers would be targeted. Along with any personnel trained in the use of, and other tactical targets like communications, command and control (C3). Ranking officers get real squeamish when they realize that they are considered targets. Runways, radar and electronic warning systems often get whacked first. Don't forget that most of this stuff is binary mix weapons. It's inert till mixed and used. And in the case of sarin, once mixed it has a very short shelf life. edit: btw, people don't realize just how serious the Cuban Missile Crisis actually was. It scared the crap out of a lot of people. Military personnel at the top of that list. The USA moved just about every military asset we had to the Gulf Coast and prepared for an intense war in Cuba and the Gulf and Atlantic. I distinctly remember the bombers at Rickenbacker deploying to Florida and Texas etc. and then more aircraft. And then more. A constant stream. Along with trains and highways full of military equipment going South. It was a "no shit" moment. The current situation is not comparable. Not yet it isn't, anyway.

I've been close enough to a lightning strike to hear it click first. A big loud CLICK (and bright flash) with no boom . Too close for the air to have a shock wave. But you'll hear it from the opposite direction, on the return when it comes back in.

I've already mentioned it would be fun to scatter old 22LR shell casings all over the DC area... (Along with crap aluminum casings and Berdan stuff.) pew pew

deflects lightning strikes... Tacoma, Washington freeway, a rider was struck by lightning and continued riding to the next stop. It blew chunks of his helmet liner out... http://www.king5.com/news/local/Motorcyle-rider-struck-by-lightning-on-I-5-222550991.html http://seattletimes.com/html/localnews/2021764645_rainyweatherxml.html Melted the hemet liner and hair. http://seattletimes.wpengine.netdna-cdn.com/today/files/2013/09/090513-Motorcycle-helmet-hi-300x169.jpg Bet there's some burn marks down through the frame and engine somewhere.

Disagree. Consensus is that they came from Iran, or details on how to produce them came from Iran. With a little help from Russia along the way. Granted that we did the same for Iraq. Along with recently discovered parts and pieces of an unknown rocket style artillery round that delievered the payload in the gas attack, is of Iranian design and manufacture. Videos on line show Iranian cadre teaching how to use it to Syrian troops in Syria. Iran also volunteered to take all the gas and launch weapons back to Iran, to defuse the situation in Syria. Nice of them... edit: oops, I do recall compelling evidence that Iraqi chemical weapons were smuggled out of Iraq and hidden in both Lebanon Bekka Valley, and in the remote desert of Syria. Who knows where those are now.

Or, the atmosphere actually somehow makes sounds like trumpets and horns. If it's not all that common, I'm sure ancient cultures would have decided it was "Gabriel". Or the end of the world.

Yeah, one of those sounds like a ship's horn off in the distance. They are loud. But still interesting. More than half are probably fake by now. But other sounds... Some day I'm going to Taos New Mexico, to hear the Taos Hum for myself. I have no doubt that the Earth's mantle and core can produce vibrations, sounds, lights, stuff. Not much different than the atmosphere doing the same. Humans know very little about the atmosphere surrounding the Earth. Who knows. edit: a lot of these sound like malfunctioning freight cars being dragged on the rails. lol, one of them is playing the sound track from War of the Worlds...

target fixation Many do that. I've target fixed before. My best responses were where I saw the problem, and didn't look at it again. Concentrating on a prefered path fo escape. If you target fix, you better have some darn good brakes and not have been going very fast. I admit that riding in city traffic, I will try to see all opportunities of safe passage. As traffic gets crowded or squirrelly, I'l slow to keep those escape pathes available. Yeah, I've turned or pulled off the road before. Even jumped curbs up onto sidewalks and stopped. (Jumping curbs takes practice.) Trouble is trouble. Again I say, smooth is the way to go. Most of the time, anyway. Seriously, I think most sport bikes will go sideways as quickly as forward. I think a bike can go forty feet to the left in forty feet of forward travel. Hopefully that area is clear, since speed didn't reduce, and inertia winds up when doing that, and has to release, usually by coming back to the original line of travel. Or going sideways a few times. You see inertia in car races, where a car suddenly changes lanes to escape. The car will wobble a bit, and then start to spin. The inertia didn't release.

Is why I ride straight at a car waiting to turn in front of me. Either I see they see me, or they move. They move, I'm going behind them, quickly Yeah, I slow for traffic that is turning. One of the road tricks is watch the front wheels of cars. If that wheel turns toward you, it's intent to turn or change lanes. Move, get out of the way. Note that quick manuvering in traffic requires knowing where all traffic is around you. You might want to move fast without looking first. An old stat said that a motorcycle has a good 4 seconds of awareness before impact. In 4 seconds a motorcycle can slow and/or maneuver around the collision. Stats also say most riders do absolutely nothing before impact. They freeze or never notice the threat.

I have better results using the Waze app on a droid to locate trouble, than I ever was running a detector. But for back roads that are lightly traveled, the detector might still be the best bet. I had a Cincinnati Microwave Escort years ago, before laser detection. It worked very well, but I'm not really sure if I used it enough to make it worth the cost of buying it. In traffic most detectors will get false alerts from other leaky detectors around you in traffic. Quite annoying. Using any sort of detector will teach a person to slow down in general. Might be a lot cheaper just to slow down. edit: I also like a vertical display, I can "see farther down the road".

My old neighborhood back in high school. Straight road. Must have been a collision at the intersection. edit: yup, check the photo. SUV turned left in front of the bike.

haha, I saw a friend's 1911 45acp go crazy after he worked on the trigger group. That's not a slam fire though, but about the same results. I would only let him load one round at a time till we checked things out. Then loaded two. boomboom Round number two went straight up in the air. If it had been a full magazine, who knows what direction it would have shot. I was keeping track of where the big thick tree was. I was going to be behind it (and under it). I had a 9mm slam fire for me once. Not sure why it did that. I'd like to think it was a double tap, but it wasn't. That round went a little high... at the sky.

Looks like a happy ending coming up. As happy as dread might be. Iran wants to move the Syrian chemical weapons to Iran for safe keeping under Iranian and Russian oversight. Or disposal. Might move back to Syria later, but that doesn't matter right now. Has to go. US retains the option to strike anywhere at anytime. This appears to be a Russian-American agreement in the works. Iran figured it out and offered as well. I thought the Syrian chemical weapons were of Russian manufacture. Guess not. Maybe not even Iranian manufacture. Iran might have only supplied the supplies and instructions to Syria. Anyway it's looked at, the details originally came from Russia. Not that we can claim innocence. We did the same shipping the same to Iraq, way back in the Iran-Iraq War. A mistake that we have since corrected at great expense. Meanwhile, Congress gets to argue about it for a week or two. It's now their decision, although a presidental decision could still over-ride Congress.

Pyrodex powder is common, loading data --> http://www.hodgdon.com/ml-warning.html Typical loading procedure, including the greasing of cylinder: --> http://hunting.about.com/od/blackpowder/l/aa_loadcbrev_a.htm owner's manual --> https://www.traditionsfirearms.com/data/product_owner_manuals/BPRevolver_manual_1362674422.pdf schematic --> https://www.traditionsfirearms.com/data/product_schematics/1858%20Remington%20Revolver_1364936937.pdf you'll need powder, ball, percussion caps, powder dispenser, grease, maybe wads, cleaning kit, solvents...

Hey, I've got one of those. I forget the model but it's old and ancient. 18? round tube feed bolt action with 4x old school weaver. It's the most accurate 22lr I've seen at 50 yards. Most all holes touching, and I can put a quarter over them. Groundhogs don't like it at all. Found that basic Winchester 22lr was the most accurate with it.

Here is your whitehouse.gov petition to try and stop it... https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/petition/retract-executive-order-against-re-importation-us-military-firearms/Gw1Pc64d I'd like to see the US made M1 Garand be the exception to the rule, and continue to import those back to us.

Yeah, they should keep the trust for qualified families. I suppose it's still there, only going to wait even longer now.

State testing changes now apply to some colleges and universities also. New rules at work. Random testing.

The last time off shore mil spec imports were banned, the production moved to the USA. It was a boost to the economy and a boost to the American gun market. Very probable the same will happen this time as well. Conversely, the previous ban covered this, and not many exceptions were made. This closes those exceptions, I guess. Till another administration's executive order changes it. edit: The registering to corporation? Don't care. Most of it was movie studios wanting authentic firearms. And companies renting to movie studios. And they have plenty of stock already. (And they probably could get an exception anyway, again.)