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Paper_jam

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Posts posted by Paper_jam

  1. FWIW, my uncorrected distance vision is decent, but not 20/20, more like 20/30. For reading newspaper-size text on paper, I need glasses (I think they are  x1.5 or 1.75) unless I have good lighting. I still passed the eye test (or so they told me) without too much trouble. Maybe I guessed at a few of the letters or numbers.

     

     

  2. Thinking about Hale-Bopp reminded me of something else--back then, I went up on Mount Bonnell to see it, and even though it's still in the city, just getting above the predominant city lights helped. So if you live near there and don't want to drive far out into the country, that might be an option that's better than the average back yard. But that was 20+ years ago.

     

     

  3. I have a smallish (102 mm)  GOTO motorized telescope that's been sitting idle for a couple of years and tried to get it going last night, but the electronics and motor drive seem to be dead. How does something made with solid state electronics, that was working when you put it away, just up and die?

    But that being said, from looking at Hale-Bopp in '97, I found that a telescope (at least a small one) didn't add much over good binocs. It made a small fuzzy ball into a larger fuzzy ball.

     

     

  4.  

    7 hours ago, HackerHorn said:

    Here is a Pic from a Friend 

    Image may contain: night and sky

    Jesus, is your friend the Hubble Space Telescope?

     

    Even looking back towards the Austin lights, I managed to see it for about 30 seconds last night (with binocs) before a thin cloud wiped it out. Was about 9:28 pm. Timing is somewhat important because you need to catch it when the light from sunset is mostly gone, but before the comet gets too low in the sky.

    • Like 2
  5. 1 hour ago, Captainant said:

     The numbers WILL be fucked up, and it's going to adversely impact the ability of decision makers to make fully informed policy decisions. Fuckin 2020, man

    No CR but some of our decision makers are making policy fully unencumbered by any consideration of data or otherwise being "fully informed."

     

    • Like 1
  6. I tried to catch this Saturday and Sunday morning, but it was too hazy, then I tried last night and I could not pick it up out of the skyglow just above the horizon. A guy with us had a camera that was sensitive enough to get a faint image, but to the naked eye and binocs it was just too faint.

    If it was up to me, we'd have draconian laws and punishments to control light pollution.

     

  7. This is more of a rant than a call for help; the IRS is bad at writing instructions in a clear, unambiguous way. The instructions for 1040 Schedule B say that filing Schedule B is required if "You had over $1,500 of taxable interest or ordinary dividends."  I tend to interpret this as meaning that Schedule B is not required unless you had over $1500 of interest, or over $1500 in dividends. (i.e., if you had $1000 in interest income and $1000 in dividends, Schedule B is not required--the $1500 threshold applies to each category, not to the combined total.)

    However, I did some searching online to try and verify my interpretation, and found at least two sources -- one from a major tax software site, and one CPA website, that say it actually is based on the combined total (interest + dividends). I found at least one other online source that supports the first interpretation that it applies to each category individually (interest, dividends) not the combined total.

    If the IRS meant for this criteria to apply to the combined total, they should say "Schedule B is required if your combined total of taxable interest and dividend income exceeds $1500."

    If the first interpretation is correct, the instructions should say "Schedule B is required if you had taxable interest over $1500, or ordinary dividends exceeding $1500."

    It just seems lazy to leave it potentially open to misinterpretation.

     

     

     

  8. 5 hours ago, Dnaguy said:

    Wife: Hey are you still taking that timed portion of the test

    Me: No. 

    Wife: Ok, good because I thought her crying was distracting while you were taking this test and I wanted to know if I needed to take her out of her room to help you concentrate because I didn’t want that to hurt you or slow you down.

    Me: Seriously? How is what you’re doing any less distracting. Let’s think about this whole scenario for a second. What if I was in the timed part? By you coming in here, you’ve made the situation 10X worse if I was indeed being timed.

     

    Frs3.gif

    • Like 1
    • Haha 2
  9. On 5/30/2020 at 3:23 PM, Ths71 said:

    https://iss-sim.spacex.com/


    Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

    Argh its just killing me that the controls are not pilot-style (reversed in pitch). Down arrow should make you pitch up, and vice versa. Maybe I should try my joystick but I'm guessing this does not support joystick control.

    Also I don't see any visual indicator of your translation thrust setting/intensity. Without that it's hard to keep track of how the thrusters are set. 

     

  10. 1 hour ago, atomheartbevo said:

    There were some horrible jokes going around our school within a week or two.   We were living in a fairly remote place/small town, and I don't know where the hell the parents came up with those jokes to tell the kids (no way the kids came up with Head & Shoulders jokes on their own).  It wasn't like there was internet, and the nearest decent-sized town was two hours away.

    I swear I remember hearing the "what does NASA stand for" joke from other kids at school the next day.

     

  11. Like TwiceHorn, I was decent enough at math, physics, etc. to muddle through an engineering degree at UT. There are many problems and concepts in engineering and science which you can visualize or relate to real-world situations that you can understand intuitively, even if the math is difficult. But when it comes to this level of abstract math, or quantum physics, or relativity--it's all complete greek to me. It might as well be magic or witchcraft.

     

    • Like 1
  12. 3 hours ago, Revolution512 said:

    Sounds like FM 3349 in Hutto is where they are looking

    Dammit, that's a nice stretch of country road to haul ass down and do an Italian tune-up.

     

     

  13. At 1:41, there's a building with a golden dome which I think is probably the University of Notre Dame. Immediately before that is a shot of either a racetrack or some kind of stadium, which I thought might be Indianapolis Speedway (esp. since it's in Indiana, like Notre Dame). But the shape and buildings around the track don't look quite right for Indy.

    At 4:28, I can't tell exactly, but those oil derricks are probably at Long Beach or Venice Beach, CA.

     

     

    • Like 1
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