The Red Brick Times

Neil Young is allowing his new album Living With War to be streamed in its entirety. Sweet.
Posted 12:46 PM by whatley (3) comments

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Thank you for sharing. I may have to fall asleep to that tonight. Just bought Prairie Wind a few weeks ago. Forgot how much I liked him.
Had a very strange dream a few nights ago that I was sharing a single malt scotch with Neil and some Guatemalans. Kind of Twin Peakish.
Don't know what that means. Is Dr. Freud in the room?

# posted by  Terri S : May 01, 2006 6:29 PM
 
Single malt = purity, connection to roots, age, experience, nostalgia. Guatemalans = xeno-friendlia, welcoming strangers, especially those who have suffered at the hands of others, a sense of the warmth and richness of Hispanic culture. Neil - continuity with progress from youth to maturity, non-verbal communication (music), feeling for the stories and experiences that have built us through the years.

Vat is this "Tvin Peeks"? Some sexual-somatic imagery, hmmm?

Love, Sigmund.

# posted by  Andy : May 02, 2006 9:15 AM
 
I feel better now.

# posted by  Terri S : May 02, 2006 5:57 PM
 
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What may have been the last remaining neighborhood mailbox in Elyria Ohio was taken down recently. It was 4 or 5 blocks from my house, a pleasant little stroll if the weather wasn't too bad. Now the only place to mail a letter is at the main (and only) post office, almost two miles away. Driving there is a major hassle, and not just because of the now greatly increased traffic. It's located in a way that makes getting in and out downright dangerous. Unbelievable. I can't imagine how mailing a letter could have been made any more difficult. I really can't.
Posted 5:45 PM by whatley (1) comments

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There used to be little tiny painted cast iron mailboxes about four feet off the ground on wooden posts. I used to walk with my grandmother from Ohio Street to the corner of Glenwood and Harrison Streets where one stood. I had to reach way over my head to open the weighted slot and slide the letters in. When you let go, the iron door would clank closed. That was how you knew the box was not too full with the envelope halfway in. Then we would go into the little wooden neighborhood store on the corner to get a loaf of bread and an orange popsicle that made my tongue an odd color for the next hour or so.

# posted by  Andy : May 02, 2006 9:27 AM
 
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Good pictures of the Jamestown bridge being blown down, Tony. There is a brief early 20th century History of Jamestown and Newport, RI posted as part of the Jamestown RI visitor information page that puts the area in perspective for us foreigners. Or you can Design your own bridge truss. Then check A bridge spotter's guide to bridge design which offers 60 different types (including covered bridges) at the Bridges and Tunnels of Allegheny County and Pittsburg site. And lest we forget, there is always the Tacoma Narrows bridge to remind us. Since 2002, they have been building a new Tacoma Narrows bridge (open spring 2007) to parallel the current (1950) suspension span, that replaced the one that fell down four months after it was completed in 1940. See the construction cameras with different views of the current project.
Posted 12:11 PM by Andy (1) comments

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I have been using the bridge truss designer with the bridge spotter diagrams to figure out the static stresses that our predecessors knew from trial and error when they built the wooded covered bridges. And then I started thinking about the early builders (Roman, Medieval) who got it right from a lifetime of absorbing from a previous master builder and of working up to the big leagues from benches and footbridges. Then I translated to the Tacoma Narrows bridge where the work that might have taken a century in the middle ages is being done in half a decade. The two Tacoma bridge towers are over 500 feet tall, and were built in stages of 17.5 feet of discrete concrete pours. There are 18,000 miles of wire strands in the 2-mile long suspension cables. And everything was put together, one stick at a time, by hand. The more things change, the more they stay the same.

# posted by  Andy : April 19, 2006 8:07 AM
 
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Well, after years of vacillation, head rubbing and ball scratching the theoretically responsible parties have gotten their collective acts together to effect the demolition of the Old Jamestown Bridge. Watch it happen live at 10:30 here or here
Posted 9:24 AM by A. O. (1) comments

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Sounds like a job for the Rocket Dawgs!

# posted by  whatley : April 18, 2006 10:43 AM
 
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The ides of April? Well, take THAT! and THAT! and even THAT! So there. At least, we'll always have parrots. That's the halibut.
Posted 8:32 PM by Andy (0) comments

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Niki, my dog, turned one year old this month. I suppose that’s just a best guess, her being a shelter puppy and all, but it seems pretty accurate. Just last week I noticed that she’s starting to leave scent marks around when we’re out walking, a sign my little girl’s growing up. I was so proud. For her birthday treat I took her for a walk at the Carlisle Metro Park. It was a treat because that park has an equestrian area and Niki, devoted smeller of poop piles that she is, has never had the chance to investigate a pile of that particular origin before. The quantity! The aroma! She was thrilled.
Posted 10:04 AM by whatley (2) comments

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She's also recently discovered her mission in life. It is to shed. Constantly. In large amounts.

# posted by  whatley : April 14, 2006 10:28 AM
 
I went through that phase myself. Years ago. Are you capable of having litters? Not that there's anything wrong with that.

# posted by  Andy : April 14, 2006 8:30 PM
 
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Enjoying your day? Want to keep doing so? Then don't read this: "THE IRAN PLANS", by Seymour Hirsh.
Posted 4:12 PM by whatley (4) comments

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OK, I'm sick to my stomach.

# posted by  A. O. : April 09, 2006 1:05 AM
 
Sorry. Here, maybe this'll make you feel better.

# posted by  whatley : April 09, 2006 6:00 AM
 
Well, I get the Times On-line and had that this morning, which made me feel better. Then I read this, which didn't. Neither did this.

# posted by  A. O. : April 09, 2006 10:00 AM
 
Thanks. I needed that.

# posted by  whatley : April 09, 2006 11:02 AM
 
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On Wednesday at two minutes and three seconds after 1:00 in the morning, the time and date will be 01:02:03 04/05/06.
Posted 6:36 AM by whatley (6) comments

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Which begins a sequence that will end at 9:10:11 12/13/14. Is this a mystical message about the end of ________ in eight more years? Fill in your own dire prediction.

# posted by  Andy : April 04, 2006 9:24 AM
 
If you use the European date notation (day/month/year), the sequence will end at 8:09:10 11/12/13, 13 months earlier. I forsee the formation of a cult, and a subsequent schism over the "correct" Ultimate Date. The resulting media-enhanced conflict will permit our government to divert attention from rising poverty and social unrest in this country. Let them eat cake. Politics as usual, boys and girls.

# posted by  Andy : April 04, 2006 9:33 AM
 
You're still unemployed aren't you, Andy?
This may help occupy you're time. This is a hydraulic motor from Poclain Hydraulics. Think it could work as a diesel?

# posted by  A. O. : April 04, 2006 10:10 AM
 
There doesn't seem to be any point where the piston chamber is sealed as it is moving. Every time any piston is moving, there is a port connection open. All intake and exhaust. No compression or expansion. Since fluid is incompressible, that was not part of the hydraulic design. An internal combustion engine is largely an air pump. You can use an IC engine as an air compressor if you drive it externally and add a couple of check valves in the plumbing.

Still idle. Communing with the fluids and fiddley bits on my motorcycles. Had some days of 60-degrees. Now hovering near freezing.

# posted by  Andy : April 04, 2006 12:50 PM
 
I thought you might be able to reconfigure the valving and make it a four-stroke process with each cylinder firing three times per revolution. If you remove every other pair of valves it gives you a compression and firing cycle. The timing would be a bitch but the torque would wicked high.

# posted by  A. O. : April 04, 2006 3:53 PM
 
Why not a two-stroke? Already have the sliding port details in the central flywheel/rotor. Sealing against combustion pressures is an unkown (was the bane of early Mazda Wankels). Timing would be an expensive development, since each change would require re-machining the side-wall plates. Keep piston stroke short for better side-loading control. For emissions, current diesel technology uses direct injection (DI) at max compression/ignition point. With the combustion chambers rotating, high-pressure injector feed is another unknown.

# posted by  Andy : April 05, 2006 12:07 PM
 
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