SitCom Dreams

Working unusual shifts I sleep at irregular hours.  So I often wake abruptly and remember fragments of dreams.  Recently I had the odd experience of dreaming a Sit Com.

I was in the role of younger brother.  My older brother and I were in the presence of unsavory characters.  They were planning a crime, in fact we were casing a bank for a robbery.  Despite peer pressure I had misgivings and left, encouraging my brother to do the same.  On arriving home there was a sub-plot, a somewhat comic bit player who was trying to sell me a leather coat he had “borrowed” from work.

By now I was aware, even as I was sleeping and knew full well that I was sleeping, that the next development would be the police showing up, everyone being very concerned until it became comically evident that they were only after the coat stealing guy, and that my brother had also steered clear of troublemakers.

It is so annoying to dream in clichés.

I can pretty much carbon date the elements of the dream.  As it happens, I and everyone else in the dream were black.  I was the young scholarly kid; my brother the cool type always in danger of being drawn into the criminal world.  The older brother appeared to be an early 80's Theo Huxtable.

But the basic fabric of the dream was mid 70’s, the era of shows like Good Times, and The Jeffersons.  After about 1980 it became politically incorrect to associate being black with living in a ghetto. 

  

This memory strata corresponds roughly to the point in time where I stopped watching TV regularly.  In fact, I think dreams tend to tap not into our deepest memory banks, but to whatever is left lying around nearer the surface.  If you were to apply the Vulcan Mind Probe to me and drill down to the real bedrock of my cultural awareness you would find stuff like this…

And this…

And even, this…

Of course, much of this is black and white dreck older than I am, cultural Coelocanths still swimming lazily about in the mid 1960’s of small market television.  Stuff like this never turns up in my dreams.

I assume people always have, and always will dream.  So I wonder if the dreams as cliche phenomena is a constant.  Did ancient Greeks wake up and grumble about dreaming hackneyed versions of Homer, ever droning on about the “dark, wine colored seas”?

And what will those now young establish as their subconscious clichés?  Since the trend is towards various hand held devices I wonder if they will only dream small dreams.  And will the ubiquitous use of thumbs and wrists to send texts and to play videogames become a factor?  Will they instead of Rapid Eye Movement dreams have Rapid Thumb Movements, twitching away in the human equivalent of dogs galloping off after Dream Squirrels?

Don't Worry those Sheep

A sign in rural England.  It oddly feels like some sort of commentary on the state of our current political system.....

The sheep themselves appear to be oblivious.  I guess its the nature of sheep.

Theories, and other things, growing at Vindolanda

When digging a place like Vindolanda there is never any certainty about what you will find.  So early results always lead to evolving theories.  By which I mean logical sounding explanations that quickly get disproven.

Here for instance is a series of images of the same spot.

The three white tags indicate three bits of wood sticking up out of the ooze.  But what are they?  At this point the theories ran along the lines of perhaps a surviving bit of wooden posts from a small building, or from a fence.  The latter have been found before on the site, sometimes with reeds and sticks interwoven, as if to contain some kind of small animals.

Here is a view that gives the perspective a little better:

Here you can see a wider view of the area.  Ignore the black pipe upright on the left-middle of the picture, it is modern.  The rocky surface above the three posts is a cobbled road surface, felt to be somewhere in the mid 2nd century AD.  The three posts are right on the edge of the road.  The underlying layers of grey and black are silt filling in a ditch, which running under the road can be presumed to be earlier.  Notice how the posts are now a little better exposed, and seem to be splaying apart?  Rather odd construction technique I thought, and where are the rest of the posts we should be seeing?

Here is an image two days after the previous one.  Well, well.  Not a series of posts.  It is a tree.  Note the ball of roots that is now exposed?

A few years back (2006 and 7) some really monumental bits of wood came up at the far west of the site.  Here is a rather youthful looking Justin posing with a gigantic post.  Evidently it once supported part of a very large building of unknown purpose:

And here are a few of these beasts preserved for display next to the excavator's shack:

Dendrochronography estimates put these in the early Second Century.  Oh, and other than some pilings supporting a pier in London, they are said to be the biggest hunks of wood known from Roman Britain.

But getting back to our misplaced tree.  Here is a photo from mid season:

The ancient tree/shrub still stands all by itself, on the edge of a much deeper and still water challenged excavation.  The defensive ditch by the way seems to parallel the road rather than cross under it, so it will require small finds such as coins and pottery stamps to help make some sense of things.

I wonder a bit about the solitary tree/shrub.  Extensive excavations of the area do not seem to show anything like it.  It stood outside the fort proper, and even after the ditches were filled in it would have been standard military practice to keep brush cut to allow clear views.  I mean, there could be a hostile Pict hiding behind that bush!

Was this just an isolated lapse?  Even the efficient Romans must have slipped up once in a while.  Or did this have some purpose, one irretrievably lost to history.  A Sacred Yew being started by the local Druid priest?  Or maybe just the favored curb side spot for the hunting dogs of the Commander to stop and lift a leg on their way off to the countryside?

River Secrets-The Shocking Truth

A recent Friday found me helping out with a DNR electroshocking survey of a local river.  The crew was made up of some college students, some Park Service personnel, the local DNR guys, and me.  Because you see my son is the area Fisheries Biologist, and if there isn't a Take your Geezer Dad to Work Day there darn well ought to be.

It is a fascinating process.  You have a pair of "barges" each with a generator and a holding tank.

The power goes to three "wands" that zip current into the water.  You advance upstream in formation, netting the befuddled fish as they float past.

It is a little like "Ghost Busters" technology, but perhaps with less dire consequences if you "cross the beams"

Here is yours truly in full Ghost Buster mode:

It is actually a little more complicated than I would have thought.  One boat runs an Alternating Current system, the other is Direct Current.  AC stuns the fish if they are close enough, but seems to annoy them into flight at more distant ranges.  DC on the other hand exerts a strange Siren Song to fish, they float along in lazy fashion following the electrical current.  You can reach the electrode under brush piles and actually draw the groggy fish out from underneath.  So when there were islands and such to deal with we used the AC boat to drive fish towards DC. 

It works, but I am always brainstorming ways to improve technology.  I think the whole AC/DC trick might work better if we added a sound system:

This could work.  The AC/DC lads seem like decent sorts, I could see them consenting to a remix of some of their Greatest Hits for a good cause.  But one of the DNR techs is a bit of a heavy metal fan, and I suppose he might have a difficult time-when "Waterway to Hell" came on-not turning the amps up to 11.  And after all, we are just trying to stun the fish.

You find a lot of interesting critters in a pristine river.

A Brook Lamprey.

A Central Mud Minnow, fairly close cousin of pike and muskies!

The oddly named Horny Head Chub.  Lord knows what kind of Google Search traffic that is going to bring to the blog.....

Two species of Sculpins.  I actually felt a little bad laying the electro hurt on these small, innocuous life forms.  But I can happily report that the survival rate at release time was 100%.


Really, the star attraction on this river is Brown Trout.

After being measured and recorded this one was in a big hurry to be released!

I am describing the electro shocking process in greater detail because I recognize that it is not something most people will ever have a chance to experience.  Wading upstream on a delightful summer day I observed that "This is so much fun it should be illegal."

Of course, if you are not working for the DNR it totally is!

Allegory in Bronze, plastic and cement.

When we were in Washington DC we took a tour of the Library of Congress.  Free and quite interesting.  Some of what follows was from our tour guide, make of it what you will.

Supposedly when a new building was needed for the Library it was handled in the fashion customary for Congressional projects.   Sweetheart bids to cronies, ballooning budgets, completion nowhere in sight.  It was supposed to be a simple project.  In fact the managment of the Library said they wanted something nice and simple, no ostentatious glitz.

Eventually the project got so far out of control that Congress called in Brigadier General Thomas Lincoln Casey, the head of the Army Corps of Engineers.  He had just finished off the Washington Monument, another botched project that had languished for too long.  And he brought it in on time and under budget.

General Casey agreed to finish the Library (acutally the Jefferson Building of same) on the condition that he would have absolute control.  Reluctantly Congress agreed.

Well, Casey had a bit of a wild side to him and went on to create an incredibly ornate building crawling with murals, statuary, architectural frippery of all sorts.  So, just the opposite of what was asked for.  But as promised, on time and under budget.

Out front there is a remarkable statue called "The Court of Neptune".  If you like your art work over the top and heavy on the allegory,  this is a real treat.

I'm sure it is better when they have the water running, but here we have King Neptune with snapping turtles, sea serpents, merfolk of various types.

Bull frog and naked guy.

Buxom water nymph being a little harsh with her horse.

More nautically oriented glitz.

I had these photos tucked away for future reference, when I recently encountered something that struck me as just a little reminiscent.  On a hot and dusty street in small town Wisconsin, another interesting and very busy tableaux:

American flags.  Santa Claus, plaster cats, chickens, mice and a swan.  A couple of cement angels were off camera on one side.  General Casey would have liked this.

Our Lady of Rugby

Religion and sport do not comfortably coexist.  After all, if prayers for Divine Intervention really worked then the most devout team would always win.  There would scarcely be time for anything but prayer, and this would make things a little tedious for paying spectators.

Oh, there have been a few minor cultural references to the practice...the movie Angels in the Outfield occurs to me, as of course does the "Touchdown Jesus" mural that overlooks the football stadium of Notre Dame University in South Bend Indiana.

So I was a little surprised to learn that in a small village in southwestern France there is a rustic chapel known as Notre-Dame-du-Rugby; Our Lady of Rugby.

For the past 45 years the little shrine overlooking Larivierre-Saint-Savin has been a pilgrimage for rugby players from France and the wider European community.  It was the project of a local priest who rededicated the abandoned chapel after three players from the area were killed in an automobile crash.

It has some swell stained glass windows:

 This one is named "Above the Scrum".

The Virgin at the Line Out.

A detail of Our Lady holding Jesus....who of course is holding a rugby ball!

Because the Robot Apocalypse Requires Planning

As I have discussed at some length, I teach a middle school robotics class every year.  As this is on a volunteer basis the main reward is my own amusement, so I try and do something a little different each year.

The basic class will be in the fall as usual, and because it is chaos on an industrial scale there is less room for innovation.  Two dozen 1 to 3 pound machines will tear each other to shreds in the name of technology education.

But I also do an Advanced Robotics class with a smaller group.  Each year I pick a different project, and atypically I have actually been thinking on this matter many months ahead.

The projects so far:
1. 30 pound combat robot, back when there was a tournament for these things not so far away.
2. Video controlled Rover bot that delivered a lunch tray to the Assistant Principle
3. RC controlled full sized Barby Jeeps running a Grand Prix race in the hallways.  Lights, sirens, water and confetti projectors.
4. Assorted remotely activated April Fools pranks, including the infamous "Kid banging to get out of a locker".
5. And of course this year's rather ambitious semi-humanoid robot that wandered the cafeteria dispensing M & Ms and squirting water at people.

So, what to do next.

The parameters are a minimal budget.  Maybe a hundred bucks or so.  Most of the tools and components are already on hand.  No more than 24 volts DC current, maybe 30 amps.  That's the max my speed controllers will handle.  Fun.  Educational.  Not overtly dangerous.  No video cameras visiting inappropriate locations. 

Beyond that I have been surprised that the Administration has been supportive of all manner of nonsense.

Here are a few things I have considered, and if you are browsing around and read this please feel free to vote and/or to suggest other projects.

1. Pyramid explorer.  I have been interested in the use of remote cameras carried into spaces too narrow for archeologists to physically enter.  I figure something with tank treads could be built to haul the video camera from my Aqua Vu fish cam around.  Maybe into those spaces above the false ceilings in the school?  Or perhaps I could find a convenient nearby sewer.  I really like to take on a project that has never been done before, and I am pretty sure that a middle school sewer exploration vehicle would qualify.

2. I wonder if you could get a weather balloon full of helium and launch some kind of instrument package.  Aerial photos every 1000 feet perhaps?  Actually, I have no doubt this could be launched, it is the recovery that would be an issue.  And are there laws about dropping things from really high up?  There probably should be.

3. Robot dragster.  At 24 volts we could get some serious RPMs out of a couple of Ford Taurus fan motors I happen to have sitting around.  We could gear them down an bit and likely get a vehicle that could do 20 to 25 mph.  Radio controlled of course.  I know where to get an open track and a radar gun.....but I should think controlling it at those speeds would be nigh on impossible.

4. Underwater ROV.  I was stuck in a hotel room a while back, my plans having been messed up by British train schedules.  So I ended up-for lack of anything else-watching Titanic for the first time.  I really like those camera equipped underwater remote operated vehicles.  Yes, I can see this working out.  PVC pipe structure, Aqua Vu for camera, pond pumps for water jets, maybe a system to adjust bouyancy by pumping air in and out of a resevoir.  This could totally work, but it would involve getting delicate electronics as well as myself too darned close to the middle school pool.  I suspect there is not a middle schooler on earth able to entirely resist the urge to push me in after a successful test....

Thoughts?