Truly random thoughts

thoughts
  • Commute traffic sucks
  • Good health is important – more than anything else
  • Designing for reset is hard (my recent headaches at work)
  • Life is getting more complicated by the day as you get older
  • Cool Texas weather is great .- The heat? Not so much.
  • Pre-Bangle era BMWs are awesome
  • Don’t believe oil spill numbers. They went from 1000 barrels/day, to 5000 barrels/day, to 40 000 barrels a day and we still don’t know how many, since there’s no gage 🙂
  • Politics are just that
  • The rich want the middle class to *feel* rich, so they can get them to vote in their favor
  • American democracy was hijacked by corporations – one man one vote went out the window long time ago
  • Internet corporations are promoting information asymmetry
  • Juicy steaks are yummy!
  • Nature continues to amaze me – we have so much to learn
  • Religion helps control the masses
  • There are two popes, so why can’t there be gay marriage?
  • Patents only benefit large corporations – they cement (temporal) monopolies
  • The older I get the more I realize how little I understand
  • Flying is great – I feel so connected to everything up there
  • Music has amazing effects on the human brain
  • Friends matter more than money

BMW musings

car

I went through another round of car lust that almost convinced me that it was time to let go of the Diva, my beloved 2001 BMW 740iL with now 149k miles on it.

I went as far as test driving six different cars: An Audi Q5 TDI, a BMW 335d, a VW Passat TDI (US edition), a Lexus 460L, a Porsche Cayman S and a Honda Accord. While these are all impressive cars in their own account, I couldn’t make myself spend the money. Every time I got back in my 740iL I felt right at home. But over the years it had accumulated some flaws that would be expensive to fix. More expensive than what the car was worth. But in the end I remembered a good friend’s advice that it doesn’t matter what it costs, but what it’s worth to you. So I dropped off the Diva at the local independent BMW shop to have her fixed up good (as we say in Texas) – which meant a set of new high performance tires, a front suspension rebuild and a new BOSCH water cooled alternator. Then I had her detailed at a car wash. Now she’s almost new again – so I tell myself. And I enjoy driving her every day to work again. What a majestic ride! And that loooong hood!

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Spinning – Trudeln

flying

The following post is fiction:

Yesterday I went out to fly on a mission to test a theory that has bugged me for quite some time. Can you and should you spin through clouds if you’re caught on top of a closed cloud deck without any gyros. Spinning is considered a stable maneuver (Flugzustand), that deletes altitude at a fast rate, without stressing the airframe.

So yesterday, after we had rains, we had a closed cloud deck at 3000ft AGL that broke up into 5-7/8 Cu. I climbed through a hole on top of the clouds, carefully noting my position, cloud base and cloud thickness. I spun first in the clear, to make sure the plane and pilot are up to the task. The second spin I initiated from above a closed cloud deck. I entered a stable spin (2 revolutions) before diving into the cloud. As soon as I went into the soup I focused on not moving any of the controls. It was very disorienting, not being able to see anything. Suddenly the plane felt different and the airspeed started increasing on the ASI. I had lost the spin somehow, but was still in the cloud!!! I neutralized the rudder and released the stick, when I came shooting out of the cloud. I had no idea why I had lost the spin, but it sure didn’t feel good inside a cloud. So I climbed back up, this time a little higher and tried again – this time the other direction. Spin was stable, this time four revolutions before going into the cloud. Again the fog was very very disorienting. And after what felt an eternity – the same thing: rising airspeed – I had lost the spin again, this time right before coming out of the cloud on the bottom. I suspect the turbulence inside the cloud has something to do with it, but I’ve decided that spins are not a good maneuver to punch through a cloud layer in a safe fashion. I wouldn’t recommend it as a “safe out”. Instead I’d setup for a stable decent with flaps and reduced power and hope for the best.

Hopefully I’ll never have to find out.

End fiction.

My thoughts on this topic are real though.

 

We know it all!!

thoughts

So, why is it that we humans need to sleep every night?
Why is a halo round and shows all the rainbow colors?
Why is the sky blue and not red?
How do catalysts work?

Seemingly trivial questions. Do we really have all the answers?
I’m worried that our math vocabulary might be in its infancy.

Which concepts are we even unable to describe with our existing languages and their limiting grammar and restricted vocabulary. What can’t we talk about? What’s the unreachable state space – language wise?

Instead of torturing my small brain I’ll go back to watching a hollywood movie with a predictable happy ending after a short suspense. Patterns are pleasing.