Science Fiction Friction

I've had occasion to watch some tv and the odd film and have some thoughts about what I've been watching. and no particular order I'm just going to put it out there.

Dark Matter, Ex_Machina, Humans/Äkta människor, Stitchers, SuperGirl, Mr.Robot and Utopia.

Dark Matter.

The spaceship makes this manoeuvre to 'fall' rapidly 'downwards' to avoid a missile. In doing so the ships 'gravitational processor' would not be able to compensate adequately. So in this scene all the characters from the 100lb to the 300lb 'floated' 'weightless' as the ship 'fell'

Moments later the spaceship makes an FTL leap, that's Faster Than Light wherein none of the characters suffered compression injuries due to rapid acceleration from going zero to extremely quickly instantly.

Secondly. Why is it that in every space ship show and film ever all the spaceships fly along the same place in the same orientation. All of them. With few exceptions like in this episode of Dark Matter and one episode of classic Star Trek do you ever see spaceships on different planes of travel.

They never approach from 90 degrees, of directly from above, or below or some oblique angle. Always head to head, face to face. Always the same orientation.

Thirdly. Guns, why so many guns?

Ex_Machina.

A female robot is programmed with self will and though.

There were some interesting themes in this, like the accumulation and endowment of knowledge based on the capture of internet searches and phone communications.

But it's not a startlingly good movie, given that the robot has figured out how to overload the power system by feedback I wondered why it was content to wait to escape by conning a guilliable male into helping it.

Anyway the robot escapes, without a worry about how it'll recharge itself, money, identification, destination or means.

Humans the English Version and Real Humans (Äkta människor) the swedish version.

Robots have been given AI. “Science has created a robot that looks like a human being and is considered a perfect substitute.”

Perfectly articulated robots are programmed for specialist roles in the domestic and workplace, from domestic help, aged care workers, to warehouse stores pick and pack and labourers.

Except some of them have been given freedom of thought, just a few.

Set 'now' this is an interesting study in human and machine interaction. One of the good things is that the robots don't have cellular communication or are internet connected, and they require charging regularly.

One of the strange things is just how well articulated and mobile they are, and just how good they are at things like cooking, which is sometimes a judgement call, they don't posses super sight, super strength, or any other extra powers. Some of them can drive cars, but not many.

'Real Humans' is a movement to avoid or discriminate against 'hubots' in society, and there are plenty of stickers and warnings about where they are welcome or not.

It's a very good theme and it's well acted and scripted, the tribulations of teenage angst and infatuation with the overly pretty house bots, the 'hubots' becoming sexual partners for some, and the anger that some humans have towards being inferior to 'hubots' in some situations.

Then there are the different group, who are free-thinkers and have different personalities, from a psychopath, a religious one, one who wants to be loved and have children, and one that got away with being a police officer, only I have no idea how they passed the medical for that since there are special 'hubot' readers that can pick up identification and ownership ID quite easily. Still it makes for a great plot angle.

Then….. one of the different 'Hubots' uses it's standard USB port to hack into a security network. You knew it was coming, along with the leaping of the car.

Stitchers.

Jump into the memories of a recently dead person and discover why or how they died. Female lead has emotional detachment and the nerds are pretty second rate.

Throw in that the lead has to wear a skin tight suit that covers some of her body and protects her when shes in the swim pool, it's particularly odd. I might not be getting it but when you assume someone memory I'd have thought that you also gain their perspective and not be an observer in their dream, you'd see things in the first person as you are now, not be standing behind you looking at you.

It's not overly different to any number of soft detective shows that are or have been on from Sherlock, Person of Interest, and others. It's not particularly good on story, script or procedural accuracy.

SuperGirl.

This is particulay vexing.

In this new paradigm Super Girl is facing other aliens who happen to be in the same town, and want to cause distruction and mayhem.

Not acts of bravery. So essentially it's a monsters of the week show. Hugely disappointing and rather average thinking.

Mr. Robot.

Introvert hacker with extraordinary skills 'hacks' people to being them to a justice.

Was doing ok, and is quite interesting, realistic perhaps and at one point he used the acronym AFK (away from keyboard) to explain why he was meeting someone in real life and not just via email. Of course gets caught up with some major league conspiracist and mysterious hacking group that disappear, the hunt is on.

Of course gets in a corporate jet to fly to a data centre where he is the only one ....

Has a lot of potential if it stays true to itself and not one of those stupid tap the keyboard hack pastiches, which it will be eventually.

Utopia.

One of the best and quirkiest programs in the last while is the TV series Utopia. Just 12 episodes.

Jessica Hyde on the run and hiding a secret contained in a manuscript that foreshadows or is as a result of and experiment to end or change mankind for good and forever.

It is strange and it is compelling if you can get into it.

Too odd for the network TV people they stopped it sort of stopped it mid story with might of course be a blessing since look what's happened in "Orphan Black' that's turned into a bit of a shambles.

4:11 am and the clock goes tick-tick-tick Musings

I found this, which reminded me of the problems associated with the insomnia musings about being able to shrink smaller and smaller.



I'd thought about the atoms of oxygen needed and set aside the weight issue.

Sadly it seems I'm not the only one with time on my hands in the dark of the night .

4:10 am and the clock goes tick-tick-tick Musings

Thoughts about, flying, being invisible, faster than light, superpowers in general, the opposite side of the earth to you, they come and go.

But have you ever thought what it might be light to be twice your size? Three times?

Three time might be about 5,5 meters  or perhaps 17-18 feet tall. Heck twice might be 3.5 meters or nearly 12 feet.  Even if you're smaller of stature that's not going to be so much different, couple feet here or there.

The tallest man living is Sultan Kösen (Turkey, b.10 December 1982) who measured 251 cm (8 ft 3 in).  Robert Wadlow  was 8 ft 11.1 in (2.72 m), 439 lb (199 kg).  Thing is with unusually tall people is that they suffer from all sorts of health and skeletal problems, and gravity isn't kind. Humans are just not evolved to be taller than we, on average, are.

Putting aside the problems of mass (as always), and some other problems, like clothing, feeding, and shelter does being über tall have any benefits? or Opportunities?

I came to some conclusions.

Work:

Ideal for cleaning the gutters and general roof maintenance. Useless however at arial installation where there are small screws and fixtures required.

Possibly good at house washing, again houses have some fiddly bits about them.

Ideal for being an arborist, or tree maintenance. Not so much lawn mowing, too much crouching.

Seasonal work in pantomime as a 'giant'

Sports:

• Might be handy at basketball, but unlikely to be able to get into any stadiums.


• Should be good at swimming, big flipper like feet, and the diving in should give you a handy advantage.


• Might be good at running, but might not be able to stay in lane and get disqualified a lot. Cross-country running might be more the go.


• Might be good at lifting weights overhead, but not convinced about this.

Travel:

Getting around might be a problem, They don't make cars or trucks for the particularly tall, so you could walk or run, but there would be a fair amount of obstacles in the way, overhead wires, trees, etc. (Before you thing about Monster Trucks, for instance, they're big truck for 'normal' sized people).

Flying would be almost impossible, travelling overseas almost impossible

The only solution I had was to be chauffeured about on the back of a flat bed truck.

Not a lot of dignity in being tall.  Not a lot of jobs, and I don't think there would be a log of glamour.

Related articles

• 4:04 am and the clock goes tick-tick-tick Musings

4:09 am and the clock goes tick-tick-tick Musings

Remember this nonsense? ...

Putting aside the question of mass then, bear with me it's important or not,

There was I thinking

"What if you could shrink yourself"

 

You want to keep shrinking though, smaller and smaller.'

It opens up a lot of thinking

This led me to thinking about falling through the gaps between the threads in the sheet of the bed and falling to the floor. Size is relevant here, that would be a terribly long drop.

But, it then occurs to me this morning that this there is a simple and yet fatal flaw and it's down to lack of planning.

Again putting aside the question of retention of mass, two issues of size, one of which I glossed over. I may not even have mentioned the thing about clothing. But I have plan for that.

(i) Clothing, this is an important thing. It is 4:09 bear with me. or even bare with me.

The idea of shrinkage. Presume it's the physical self and the contained within the body. A closed system. You get around the problem of clothes but putting in your mouth small clothes that shrink with you. Clothes you are wearing don't shrink, they're not in the closed system. This is important, or your shrinking would go badly wrong when you were crushed by an amalgam filling that burst our of you cheek, or the salami sandwich that you had to have coming back to haunt you.

So you tuck a pair of tiny pants in your mouth. I've though this through, I had lots of time. You shrink in increments right, at some point you take the small pants from out of your mouth, and put them on? Am I right?  tell me I'm not?  You can shrink increments so tiny shoes are not a problem, you spit them out at the size you want and put them on. This does however limit the amount of equipment you can take with you, a story for another time.

Moving on ..

1. Size. Say I'm 2.00 meters tall (I'm not, unless I'm wearing heels) but anyway I'm not, ok, and it was the once. And there was no lippy, well a bit but no eye shadow and even if there was it wasn't blue. ok.  Say also  200 pounds

Anyway, say, just do it, say that I'm 200 cm tall (not in heels) and suddenly I'm  20cm tall (don't worry about the mass thing I can't imagine being 90kg/200 lbs and 20cm tall. If you can't put the mass aside then you're pretty much done.So put aside the problem with retention of  mass, particularly if you want to recover to a 200cm 200lb person.

It's important here to mix the Metric and Imperial as maths is so much easier than inches and ounces. And I'm that old that I can pounds and not grams.  And isn't it convenient 100cm and 200lbs. That's cm a lb.  If only I was a chistmas/thanksgiving Turkey how much would I be worth.

Even this thinking is keeping me awake so I shy away and move on.

So now I'm 20cm tall.

The bed I'm on is 100cm tall, with the mattress and everything. Thats a half a body tall right, I'm 200cm tall, keep up. Anyway I'm now 20cm tall.  So the Bed is 5 times my body height.

That's like the 2nd floor in an apartment high isn't it? To get off the bed I have to decent 5 times my height, instead of .5.

I'm 10cm tall, this is now 20 times by height, that's the equivalent of 40 meters (131 feet) in the air.

I'm 1cm tall, 200 times my height above the carpet, in the bedroom, on the second floor (first floor depends on the country you live in), I need a parachute to get off the bed, of I should have planned it better.

1 mm tall. I nearly gave up the maths,

I gave up the maths.

I don't know about this being so small I can see the gaps in atomic structure.

Smaller, and then I call through the cotton threads, it's an awful long drop to the mattress, and then smaller I fall through that, if I get through that there is that huge gap betwixt the bed frame and the carpet...  This wasn't my best plan.

1. Size.

Right I sorted out a better place to 'shrink'

Smaller and smaller, no falling anywhere, it's all a bit safe.

Smaller and smaller what could go wrong

Oh wait I know, at some point my new shrunk fixed lungs are smaller than an oxygen, I can't breathe.

The end.

Related articles

• Us vs universe: Quantum dance enters forbidden zone


• Science Review of Stellar Structure and Nuclear Reactions inside Stars


• A Sword as Sharp - Science vs. The Sword

4:06 am and the clock goes tick-tick-tick Musings

Meditation on sleeping.

Two things.  Being small which I'll get to another day

the second though a dream snippet, which is what I want to write down.

.. The laughing man declares that he's figured it out, and he can do it. There is no indication that the laughing man in under duress or particular strain.  There appears to be some kind of family tree on a large monitor, some of the dots on the tree wink out and fade, the tree withers and re-arranges.

The man looks at the big screen again.  Laughs. 

He's erased someone from history, from ever being, and that has changed his circumstance.

It's not clear if he's happy or not.  

It might be later, it might not be the same man, zoom out the monitor, more dots wink out and fade, swathes of them, a voice says we learnt to go further back in time than just the living.

There are a few hundred people left huddled in a large room, poorly dressed, looking at a large monitor, wondering, waiting. ...

4:05 am and the clock goes tick-tick-tick Musings

Having, sort of, got my head around the speed of light thing, but perhaps not, the next part is the travelling to a new planet or star, somehow.

These are the current questions I muse on as I meditate myself to sleep.

How many of you are there on this journey?

If speed of light travel, or near to s-o-l travel is  possible that would still mean that something 2 light years away would take 2 years to get to? Proxima Centauri is a red dwarf about 4.24 light-years from the Sun, that's a 9 year round trip?

Could be nothing there when you got there.

Who you going to call? – Ghost Hunters (of Auckland)

My eyebrows litterally moved when I saw this article.

The link is here : Mystery at the asylum

It starts badly for them 'Hunted Auckland"........

"With a rise in reports of paranormal activity across Auckland, stuff goes on a ghost hunt with Hunted Auckland at the abandoned Kingseat psychiatric hospital. "

Ghostly figures in photographs, batteries that die suddenly and slamming doors are just a few of the spooky activities occurring at Asylum Paintball.

Owners Vitaly Miheer and Anton Klimenko were worried enough to get Haunted Auckland in for a look at their business premises in the former Kingseat Hospital.

The paranormal investigation and research group is now making a documentary on its three-part investigation.

Asylum Paintball was set up last November in the former psychiatric hospital's maximum security ward.

It's a creepy place, with a past that plays to your lizard brain, the builsings all brick and imposing, trees. It's deserted, it's a long way from anywhere. It is spooky. In fact there is a theme entertainment there called, oddly, Spookers. They have lots of actors in dress up Zombie clothes, blood make-up, and themed rooms of things like mad old mental women, spiders, surgery rooms etc. Again Lizard brain loves this stuff.

Its two two-storey buildings have 20 rooms and are connected by a steel-caged security tunnel. They were locked up for 20 years before the paintball enthusiasts moved in.

Like I said, middle of nowhere, I belive they used to bring patients in by boat and that it ws there for its remote location. I could be making that up, I might research it more.

Then the science kicks in .........

Haunted Auckland's team members arm themselves with electromagnetic field metres, camera and torches to document the paranormal or allay people's fears by explaining the seemingly inexplicable.

electromagnetic field metres - say what they measure is distance....

They found "energy" in many areas of the maximum security units at Kingseat. The eastern wing and the caged walkways in particular had levels that were unexplainable.

Haunted Auckland founder Mark Wallbank says he was standing outside one of the cell doors and saw a shadow move quickly across the wall.

"It was roughly the shape of a person but I didn't notice any arms or legs moving. It just floated from left to right," he says.

Science again ....

Investigators also recorded something that sounded like a man laughing and a number of other strange sounds.

They don't mention EVP recordings?

So more science ....

"It was everything I could've hoped for in an investigation location - soaked in history, rot and decay, signs of the past everywhere, no power, dark corridors, creepy stairwells," Wallbank says.

He won't go so far as to say there are ghosts in the building "but we know something is out there". "We need to learn more about it to understand and that's why we do these investigations."

So.... historical context, history of abuse, the darker side of human nature, untold horrors meeted out to the patients/inmates... 20 years of decay, darkness and "creepy stairwells"

Got to be wary of "creepy stairwells"

Back to the Science ...

Meanwhile, the strange incidents continue.

"Batteries on our cameras suddenly run out of power. Yet away from the building they last for hours," Miheer says.

Eyebrows doing the full disco tango now, and then a bombshell revelation ...

The pair found a key in an old medical box on the windowsill and discovered it opened every door in both buildings.

They found a key to open the doors, every door, which sounds as dubious as it sounds. It was a lock-down facility, each cell would have the same lock, you then have one key per nurse/guard/doctor it isn't a mystery.

Then there is the nonsense that you have to put in to justify yourself

Miheer says he's also captured a shadow figure in a photograph.

"This place may well have something," he says.

"It certainly has a very special energy. There is some sort of feeling that I just want to stay away."

Lizard brain clicks into gear...

 

 

Related articles

• Mystery at the asylum


• Haunted hospital or not?

4:04 am and the clock goes tick-tick-tick Musings

I was watching some youtube things, and you know how that ends up, normally pictures of cats right. Well not in my case.

Hollow Earth Theory : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hollow_Earth

Hollow Earth. Hidden entrances at the North and South poles. Hitler sent expeditions! The claim was that the earth’s crust is only between 8 miles and 200 miles thick

Gravity? Well there is a micro start in the center providing gravity for those on the outside. Not sure how those on the inside get on, perhaps they’re squished to the ground flat, living in 24-7 sunlight

Oh this is where UFO’s come from too.

Which lead me to Expanding Earth Theory http://hollowearththeory.com/articles/expandingEarthAnimation.asp

But before that how NASA made up UFO’s so they could launch loads of satellites and space weapons, and how they use chemtrails to fly holographic aircraft

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chemtrail_conspiracy_theory

http://www.disclose.tv/forum/chemtrails-and-holographic-planes-t37043.html

Which lead me to a video about how the human race is an Alien Experiment….

I’m not judging but the most plausible was the NASA one., well not the holographic chemtrail thing but.

I could expand on that by saying there are many possible scenarios of life on other planets

1. There is life on other planets.


2. Life on other planets is at a similar stage of development to that on Earth


3. Life on other planets is more primitive than that on earth

Now because we don’t perceive or have an explanation for things that can travel Faster-than-light, or an understanding of worm-holes that may or may not get us from one place in the universe to another doesn’t mean they don’t exist or are not feasible.

But the question is that begs is how would you detect life on the 3^rd rock from the sun  at the edge of a spiral arm we call  the Orion Arm, which is about two-thirds of the way from the center of our galaxy to the edge of the starlight?

It was a slow night

The Spin Bike, the Garage and the Knee - And so it continues

Well

I have some minor health issues, Psoriasis related, but it meant I had to go get some further advice

You see Psoriatic Arthritis tends to get you down after a bit, and I have it in one knee and both ankles to a greater or lesser degree.

Having taken to exercise in the last year to combat weight gain I've been a bit up and down with pain management.

Result is that now I'm on some new meds that have some benefits and of course some side effects, but what started out as me wanting less meds has ended up with me on more.

One of the things I have been advised on is less impact exercise, so that's the running,  which means the spin bike will get a work out :-) about time too.

Also and more alarmingly, might have to drink less beers, or limit my beers to three days, Friday, Saturday and possibly sunday if I'm parched, because there is some liver side effect that the new meds might give me, and possibly it's a good thing to drink slightly less.

I'm sure this ends well, with better skin, less aches and pains, and less hobbling.

Stand by for spin bike updates......

Related articles

• The Spin Bike, the Garage and the Knee


• History


• Joint pain may signal psoriatic arthritis


• Frequently asked questions about psoriatic arthritis


• My GOD that's a big toe!

4:03 am and the clock goes tick-tick-tick Musings

This being awake bit is a bit tedious :-)

So I moved on from Super Powers and  the question became  "What's on the opposite side of the earth from me"

Which it turns out is pretty easy to look up.  http://www.freemaptools.com/tunnel-to-other-side-of-the-earth.htm

For me that would be somewhere near Marbella in Spain. Nice.

Then, of course, the question became, what about I dig a tunnel to there?

Then, of  course this leads to some other interesting thoughts and dilemmas and wonderings, as you do.

If you (I) dig straight down then for at least 50% of the journey you're going downwards, you get to the middle and you have to start tunneling\digging upwards?, the floor (?) becomes the ceiling (?)

Does that mean the stuff you chip away at on the upwards bit falls out through the long tunnel hole you just made on the way down?

Or I guess that it just congregates at the middle point, neither up nor down.

Can you imagine if you've nearly completed you're upwards leg and you chip a bit off and it flies out the starting point hole like a shot from a cannon. Can't imagine getting a resource consent for that.

At some point too, halfway you're top must become bottom and your bottom top? Perhaps not, if you were making a 'floor' to drive on then perhaps this would end up being the roof at the other end? But as it's straight down, perhaps now, you'd just have to adjust the one/off ramp bit at either end.

Would you need brakes to slow you down or could you coast all the way through?

On the matter of digging to the other side I Came up with some fun #Facts about the Earth

• Radius of the Earth  is  give or take 6,350 km, that's about half way, depending on where you are though the Earth bulges a bit in the middle, like the most of us.


• Diameter then is, give or take, 12,750km


• Earth has a mantle (crust) that is 2,890 km thick


• The Deepest Known trench is around 11 km deep - that would be the Mariana Trench.


• Deepest Well ever drilled is 10.7km


• Mt.Everest is 8,850 meters tall


• Deepest cave is about 2km - Krubera Cave

So a few technical problems and other observations.

• We've managed to drill less than  0.004% of the way into the Earths Crust?


• We've found all the oil at this depth and much much less?


• We can't have used all the oil? IT must surely be just more difficult to get out?

I might try to think of something else.

Related articles

• 4:03 am and the clock goes tick-tick-tick Musings


• 4:01 am and the clock goes tick-tick-tick Musings


• 4:02 am and the clock goes tick-tick-tick Musings


• 4am and the clock goes tick-tick-tick Musings

 

4:02 am and the clock goes tick-tick-tick Musings

Ok, so I don't have a handle on the speed of light thing, and how an observer would see two objects traveling at the speed of light that are heading towards each other.

So I revisited the super-power thing again. Two more came to mind. They are similar

• Making yourself super-hot - The Human Torch - or turning into flames


• Making yourself super-cold - Mr.Freeze.

Both rubbish.

The calorific output or calories required would preclude either of these two ever bring a thing. Can you image the amount of food you'd have to eat to sustain a body of flames, or how weak and frail you'd become after a quick jaunt.

OF course you could pair both of these up with flying ability for a double-rubbish.

And then one that I'd forgotten about Telekinesis, or the ability to move things with the power of your mind.

Rubbish. Particularly if I understand physics a bit, and force and reaction.

Oh and Remote Viewing, being able to visualise remote places and scenes. Or as most people call it, having a good imagination.

I have to come up with some new things to think about.

Related articles

• 4:01 am and the clock goes tick-tick-tick Musings (pdubyah.com)


• 4am and the clock goes tick-tick-tick Musings (pdubyah.com)

 

4am and the clock goes tick-tick-tick Musings

4am is a weird time, and I've already covered a few things that keep me occupied at that time of the morning , or this. Things like why flying is nonsense, why invisibility would be chilly, walking through walls not floors and the improbability of time-travel.

But now lying awake I'm thinking about Mind Reading,  Mind Control and what I've been thinking of as Trans-Location or Teleporting. Sort of things that you'd think were Holy Grail.

Mind Reading:  Actual mind-reading, not the interpreting the body language and picking up visual clues.  Listening in to people's thoughts. I'm not a scientist but I'm not actually sure that there are voices in my head that you could listen into like a radio, and the mind is processing a lot of information all the time.

Mind Control: Being able to influence people by "talking" in their head. Nice idea the thought of suggestion. I don't know if you'd have to have contact with their head though, like a Klingon mind-meld or something or you could just stand behind them and whisper, brain-to-brain like not actual words.

Trans-Location or Teleporting: Being able to re-locate your whole self into a different or new location. Couple of issues though.

• If you were standing you would arrive standing, if you were sitting you'd arrive sitting, or whatever posture, pose or contortion you had at point A you would arrive at point B the same.


• If you teleported into a solid object, like a concrete wall, that'd be a problem, mostly of instant death, because you're transient state of moving from A to B would be finished.

So would need heaps of research if you wanted to use this 'power' to do anything without injuring, or even killing yourself.  You'd have to extend this to being able to scan or verify the landing place before your re-emerged, then making it a non-instantaneous transaction where you would find yourself outside of the everything.  useful for things like getting from one side of a door or from one room into the next room perhaps (furniture and other objects in your landing space aside).

But it was 4am and the clock went tick-tick-tick

On the Occasion of the 25th Wedding Anniversary

Eventually we were going to get there, MrsPdubyah and me.

5th November 1988, Paeroa Presbyterian Church. A date I chose, it's a long story and I'll scan some photo's and write a bit more about that.

Fast forward through the first house, then the #1 Child, the #2 Child. the 2nd house, and  3rd house, the half-dozen pet cats, the first days at school, the driving lessons, the leaving home. All those things.

Eventually you get  get to 25 years. Which is where the trouble starts.

I'm not sure who thought this up, but for getting to a 25 year marriage you have to exchange traditional gifts of Silver.

It's not clear if this should be solid silver, silver plate, or silver looking. I want to know who was on the committee that decided this, it's a gross oversight.

Then, oh yes then, look for a suitable gift. When was it that matching ceramic mugs were appropriate? or a Crystal Bell?

Who exactly gives their life partner, after 25 years of marriage (not counting the courting and preamble years) a Candelabra, Knives and Forks, Serving Spoons, Silver Platter or Photo Frame?

Which of you thinks that at 25 years you're a bit doolally in the head and have slipped into some kind of dementia where you need to surround yourselves with trinkets and old tat?

Of course yes in olden times you might have. But I don't feel like I've spent half a life with MrsPdubyah. Yes on the outside a bit more rugged, but mentally still in the game.

All that aside however I'm going to be in a world of pain if I don't get a suitable gift, if only I could remember if MrsPdubyah has pierced ears on not I could get her some ear-rings, and on reflection a little bell I could tinkle wouldn't go amiss when I needed a beer top-off.

The one that's all about me.

I'm actually being a bit lazy. I didn't start out thinking I'd post a blog only  about beer, and beer, I had this grand plan to write about other things like food.

I also though you'd all be dead interested in my meanderings towards fitness. in Pdubyahworld all this is true.

So in other non-beer related news:

I went to party for my friend Bruce. He's just got to 50, and is fairly successful and happy. What kind of present to buy? I thought long and hard and in the end it seemed the thing to give him, a thoughtful and personal gift, something to treasure and unique. A picture of me.

[caption id="attachment_5002" align="aligncenter" width="300"] The perfect gift for the man who has everything, a picture of me.[/caption]



That's not all though, I found a book - The Dangerous book for middle aged me. It might give him some inspiration.

It probably won't.

IT was nice to catch up with friends that we haven't seen for a while and  guess what, each and everyone of them lives their life vicariously through the achievements of their children. I kid you not.  Being fair though we did all meet via the said children at sports, and they've all done well and won medals and trophies.

It's a nice thing that keeps us together.

I also discovered that Twitter has a grid view of the twitpics that you've posted  That's a bit of nostalgia there.



Also in haste brought a Polar H7 heart rate sensor.

Yeah.

It's not compatible with the anything I own.

That sucks. Still it was very cheap and I am impulsive. Might try to sell it or even give it away to someone that might use it.

And before you make recommendations I have a work iPhone 4. not the 4S, the 4. And it's not compatible with the Nike Sportswatch either. So really limited in it's use.

I wore my New Balance shoes today, the yellow ones.

I had the brightest feet on the waterfront when I went for a walk with MrsPdubyah. I should have worn headphones and I might not have heard the laughter of children.

But then I'd probably laugh if I saw someone wearing them too, which is why I run a night, people will only see a blur of day glow fluro coming at them at ankle level, they won't notice it's at a snails pace.

I'm also at a flat spot in my weight loss, I managed to get to 92KG at one point, but I think it went to mu head, it certainly went to my stomach, and now I'm stuck at 93kg, I guess it comes down to portion control and self control (see above for story on impulse buying and self control).

On the less impulse and more thoughtful side I did buy some new suits.

The downside to that is that I had to get new shirts, and then it turns out I have more purple and pink shirts than is prudent to have.

And I don't really like the latest thing which os the checked shirt, makes it look like you're wearing a dishcloth or tablecloth.

Also, you know that thing where you say to yourself "don't spill coffee on your new pants", that doesn't work, I spilt coffee on my new pants within the first hour.

MrsPdubyah less than impressed with that.  Also I now how to polish my shoes, another chore I'd forgotten about

Talking of Impulse buys.... Cut-throat razor.

I'm not sure at which point that became a good idea in my head, but I went away and brought an entry level model that you use with disposable blades, the old school type of blades.

Anyway that's a terrible idea unless you have hours to shave. Also slicing a chunk of your face off doesn't have the desired effect on the ladies, and you have to make feeble excuses about why you look like you've been savaged by a mountain lion.

So a roller coaster of a thing, which I've shared for no reason. But then it's not a beer post so I feel I did ok.

 

The less of me for May

The less of me for May- A moth where it ended in abruptly and in tragedy

• 8Runs - that's half of what I expected


• 42.06 kms kms in total


• 5.2kms average per walk-out


• Fastest 5km improves all the time 32:53  - remembering back that it was 44:03 in December when I really started to go for it.


• Weight  dropping slowly - now at 94 kg, but only because I ate to comfort myself in the last two weeks.


• New shoes - I brought some more New Balance shoes M1010, They're still in the box unworn.

So to recap then.

I hurt myself.

I'd got to 498 kms and wanted to get to 500 (in total), and I went out in the morning. I had a "tight" right calf, but stretching seemed to ease it, in my head. I'd got less than 500 meters where I stopped to stretch it again, and nearly gave up, but mistaking the pain as being similar to the pain that shins sometimes give me I pushed ahead.

Then at the furthest point from home I'd stopped to walk a bit, the calf was quite "knotted" and I thought I'd walk it off, but I came to a junction and then the gentle downhill bit that I really enjoy. So I ran accross the road, in the way you do to beat the truck that's coming up. and that's when the tears started :-(





The burning stabbing that indicates some part of your body has given up.  For those of you that know this is both painful, embarrassing and confusing.

So there I was in comparative agony  by the side of the road, unable to walk, and some kind passerby stopped and offered me a lift home, I was sweaty and grimacing but still they stopped. It was incredibly kind and thoughtful and I hope that i'd be as charitable if ever I had the chance.

Cold pads and hot water bottle's for a few hours, compress bandage and rest.

Oddly I had no problems standing on top toes had a full range of foot motion but I couldn't walk in any coherent way, and getting down stairs was pretty impossible for the first day.

In the week since, it's calmed down a lot, only aches if I've been sitting for a while, and doesn't like being cold. I massage it daily and use deep heat (you know that stuff that smells like locker rooms, the opposite of chick-magnet"

I'm really itching to get back and exercise, and will have a gentle walk tomorrow.

And there you have it - May done and dusted, some wins, a few set backs, a few compliments about how less fat I am becoming. It's all good.

Star Trek - Into the darkness - oh dear.

Star Trek - Into the darkness

I just saw the movie.

There are a few things that I have questions about.

Underwater ?
Can fly in an atmosphere?
'short' distance from Earth, well known planet and situation, (they have a debrief about it) and yet un-exploited (by characters like Mudd?)

Tribbles ?
Mudds Spacecraft still in dock and ready to go?

He cries?

The all new Dreadnought class can go faster than Warp?

And can transport people through shields? - "What are you doing there?" and apparently despite shields being up,  you can enquire if the "beam" can be blocked, and it's only a lack of power that prevents you?

Quick phone call to a reclusive and looking a bit worse for wear 'Old Spock' to ask how it ends?

No way of blocking communicator traffic, and they work from one end of space to the other - Can you hear me Scotty ?

Re-animation using a newly extracted "serum" from blood, takes 2 weeks in a human, hour or less in a troublesome tribble.

Carol Marcus - random character - like the mirror of the man in red in the landing party - gratuitous underwear shot, has managed to defeat many security checks and walks onto a spaceship - just like that, oh and how important?

Many and varied 'alien' species, already in contact and employed in Star Fleet.

And Earth has no missile defence system ?

and we finish with a  5 year mission to explore and discover new civilisations  ?

But it's a  jolly good roller coaster of a ride. Khan is great, the new play on the old plot is fantastic and I'd watch it again. For those who remember the Star Trek series the first time around, this play well to the nostalgic and doesn't stray too far away from comfortable. I do hope however that the next film doesn't have a bald woman, whales, and a satellite that's gone all Wal-E, but a Genesis project might go well, if only they could figure out how "old spock" didn't do that bit.

Related articles

• Star Trek Into Darkness.... with a side of Tribble and SPOILERS (filmbyfelix.com)

 

Paleo Diet - The Flaws Of The 'Caveman' Diet

I read this and it makes more sense than the fad diet.

Living like cave men, or at least eating like them, is being hailed by some as an ideal lifestyle. The paleo diet, based on the idea that our bodies have not adapted sufficiently to eat foods that weren't available 10,000 years ago, focuses on eating meat, fruits and vegetables and avoiding grains and dairy.

But evolutionary biologist Marlene Zuk says that idea is flawed.

Paleo Diet | The Flaws Of The 'Caveman' Diet | Stuff.co.nz.

Particulalry this bit :

Q. How much do we know about early human diets?

A. We don't really know what they were eating. It's turning out that they may have eaten more starch and carbohydrates than we had realised. They also ate different things in different parts of the world. ...

I think we mostly agree that less "processed" food would be desirable, and more in season vegetables would be nice.  But better nutrition and health care have allowed us to live to 70, 80, 90 years old.

What the paleo types want is to have a fad diet that picks and chooses from a whole worlds worth of choices. You don't want to go the winter months with no  Salad greens (assuming they had  salad greens) or fruits, and exist only on nuts and whatever you managed to dry and store.

As an aside I wonder what a paleo banana looks like? (nothing at all like the yellow bendy fruit we have today)

You want product A that was from North America, with Product B from Middle Europe, and a Fish that comes from the coast of Iceland. Or something like that, just like Paleo man did.

Oh and paleo man lived to be a ripe old age of about 30.

Go for it if you've really  thought it through, it's a cake and eat it diet.

A Letter to Murray McCully

I expect a form letter asnwer.

 

Mr.McCully,

I understand that you're voted in for your opinions and preferences, but I can't let it pass without comment that you changed your vote to change your support of Marriage Equality to be opposed to it.

As the National MP in the ECB you've secured my vote for the previous elections. Mostly because you're inoffensive and are in a party that by and large suits my own thinking. By and large.

Being the intelligent, well travelled, and well rounded man that you are I can't begin to understand how you can vote against something that I've enjoyed for coming up to 25 years this year, that of being married.

I can't begin to understand how you could support it one day and be against it the next. You're now one of only 4 people who've been swayed, cajoled, or harangued into taking a contrary position to one which you came to on your own.

I'd lay Dollars to Cents that you've been lobbied by the religious element in this. Modern marriage is a construct of religion, religion that does all it can to deny minorities the status that they themselves confer upon themselves.

The world will not end, churches will not crumble, men will not start eyeing me up lustily in the streets, people will go about their lives. Traditional marriage, and denial of it to all people, is about religious dogma. Traditional Marriage isn't for life, as the number of divorces will attest. Marriage isn't for everyone, else everyone would be married.

At a time when Atheism or non-religion becomes more prevalent and religious dogma and teaching become less relevant you find yourself in a position where you are in danger of becoming a dinosaur of a past age.

Mr. MCully I ask you, if you could travel back in time would you yourself would have voted for women's suffrage? And whilst not comparable in moving society forward, I ask you why you would vote against Marriage Equality, something that clearly brings equity to everyone?

I'd ask that you do me the service of not sending me a stock/form reply, because that's just avoidance, and my one vote might not make a difference, but then again it might.

Philip Walter

The one with the budget

It's only in the last couple of years that I've had my own personal bank account. Since before being married MrsPdubyah and Me have had a joint bank account. Everything we do is based on a joint income. Seems fair and proper and works really well. We have joint credit cards too. No surprises in our finances.

But I have now got my own personal "stash of cash" in my own bank account. Monthly I pay myself pocket money from my salary. MrsPdubyah approves of this, as one debit means that she knows how much I have taken and does not tsk every time I do something random and buy something on impulse, or frown at the cost of the beer I'm buying. What the eyes can't see the heart can't grieve. Right.

I've added a few extra dollars in to the account, like when I've had a larger than expected commission payment, I give myself a "bonus" and of course there was some money from the estate of the deceased Mother.

And I've been good.

Except that I haven't been good at all. I downloaded the last 12 months of statements and had a set too with the spreadsheet. And then I got all surprised and a little worried about how much I had frittered unwisely.

Sports related things	-2%
Gifts for people	-2%
Online Auctions	-2%
Unfashionable Clothes	-3%
A Writing Pen	-3%
LP Records	-5%
Coffee from one particular café, and the Coffee van man	-9%
Food from specialty stores for the home entertaining	-11%
Takeaway food, and the Café   lifestyle	-11%
Electronic Gadgets I had to have	-12%
Cash that I spent on who knows what	-12%
Beer from Stores	-25%

The "Stash of Cash" isn't a big amount. I chose a number that would allow me to buy some beer without MrsPdubyah having a tizz about the price, and to be fair I drink less, and better beer, on the whole, than I used to. It was also an amount that should have allowed me to accrue some money for a bigger purchase eventually and with carefull management.

The bigger purchase is still a dream, the budget is in tatters. I hadn't realised just how much discretionary money goes on the Coffee purchases, That alone might have gone some way towards a new Tablet. The Takeaway food is a mix between my needy lunches and family take-away nights when it's all too hard to cook, Although that appears to be a lot more than just occasional.

Electronic gadgets oes include an Android phone for the daughter and a DVD player for the house.

The other big ticket was fancy foods for the home entertaining. These are things like expensive cuts of meats and fixings for a special dinner. I'm gad I do that and I will continue to do so, but as out family changes into a 3 adult house we've been buying better quality things in general, and there is less worse food in the house, Bread is a rare treat for instance, and I have a memory of Ice-cream going with fruit.

I've mentioned in passing to MrsPdubyah my findings, to which she said "don't you have anything better to do?" so I might have dodged a bullet. However since she is the Head of Entertainment and Finance my 2013 budget proposal had better be a good one if I'm to seek at least a cost of living rise in my pocket money.

Robbie Williams - 'Take the Crown' takes the cake

Tragically today for my exercise companion  I listened to the latest Robbie Williams CD -  Take the Crown.

Take the biscuit more like.

It's a set of 3 -6 word "chants" with a background of "anthem" style 80's pop synthesiser music, all with the aim of giving gravitas to lyrics from the secret diary of a pre-pubescent teen.

This really feels like this is music that you do to  fill in time in a contract that demands a new album ever year , or something. there is no heart soul or reason for this, it's floundering nonsense.

Even the worst of albums has a redeeming lyric, or track, or melody that casts light on an otherwise gloomy thing. I failed to find it on this.

That said I'm not really the target audience. But that just adds weight to the idea that this is about the money, it isn't about craft, or skill, it isn't about life experience, or a journey through a linked story, it's a series of 3 minute sound-bites that should appeal to the x-factor-got talent audience who appreciate a poor song to overly wrought backing track sung in the chanty pop style.

So awful I had to share it with you.

Related articles

• [Review] Robbie Williams - Take The Crown (stirringtrouble.wordpress.com)


• #Music Review 3.0: Robbie Williams & Take The Crown (tdmbstd.com)


• Album review: Robbie Williams: Take the Crown (scotsman.com)