Archive for July, 2019

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Oh the weather outside is frightful…

Wednesday, July 31st, 2019

…actually, it’s not all that bad in Austin. The estimated high today is a mere 99 degrees Fahrenheit (558.67 degrees Rankine).

But I know many of my readers are suffering from the heat, so here’s something that I hope will cool you down for a few minutes:

“The Stranding of the MV Shokalskiy”.

Beyond my interest in polar exploration, there’s a lot of stuff in here that prompted chuckles:

Mawson kept going, covering the last 100 miles by himself. Whether or not he snacked on Mertz is a polarizing question in Mawson scholarship.

…

Reached by the BBC, the poor marketing person for the adventure company put it succinctly: “The hull has a hole the size of a fist and the outlook is not so positive for the ship at the moment.”
The outlook became less positive a few minutes later, when the ship sank.

…

Ernest Shackleton is one of those genuinely admirable people, like Nikola Tesla or Frida Kahlo, who are somehow diminished by the embrace of their posthumous admirers. I think of this as Rick and Morty syndrome. You love the original, but then you look around in horror at the people enjoying it with you and think—is this me? These people are awful! Will I become one of them?

…

In 2013, Turney saw a chance to answer a question no one was asking—what if Shackleton had had a Twitter feed?

…

There had already been choral music, and there threatened to be more.

Posted in Geek, History | Comments Closed

Obit watch: July 31, 2019.

Wednesday, July 31st, 2019

Breaking, but I kind of want to get something up now: Harold Prince, one of the great men of Broadway.

Variety. (Hattip: Lawrence.) Preliminary obit from the NYT, with promises of a fuller obit to come.

…he was known, throughout his career, for his collaborations with a murderer’s row of creative talents, among them the choreographers Bob Fosse, Jerome Robbins, Michael Bennett and Susan Stroman, the designers Eugene Lee, Patricia Zipprodt and Florence Klotz, and the composers Leonard Bernstein, John Kander, Stephen Sondheim, who was his most frequent confederate, and Andrew Lloyd Webber.

Possibly more later.

Posted in Obits, Theatre | Comments Closed

Tweets of the day.

Monday, July 29th, 2019

I was only going to do one, and technically that one was from Saturday (I couldn’t pass it up for reasons that will become obvious shortly). Then the NRA museums put up a second one that also pushed one of my buttons. So enjoy a two-fer:

I’m lucky enough to have been to Springfield twice and have seen that display. I’m also lucky enough to be the custodian of three Model 70s (two pre-64 and one that I think is barely 1964).

I can’t find it in the photo, but one of the Model 70s in that display is, believe it or not, one with a built-in radio. There’s actually a NRA Museum video on this one, if you’re curious.

And the other tweet?

(Previously on Ed McGivern.)

Posted in Guns | Comments Closed

Celebration time!

Monday, July 29th, 2019

What better way to celebrate ten years of blogging than free ammo?

BulkMunitions.com sent me an email about another contest they’re running. It’s been about four months since I last linked to one of their contests, so I figure this isn’t too obnoxious. Plus I kind of like the prize they’re offering:

A $200 voucher for ammo.

“*Voucher is good for a one-time purchase up to $200 on BulkMunitions.com. The voucher will be in the form of a $200 discount/coupon code. There will be zero residual value remaining on the code after purchase.”

They’re also covering shipping up to $50 “if multiple items are purchased when voucher is redeemed”.

Again, I’m not going to enter this contest: as much as I’d like $200 worth of ammo, I don’t feel it is fair to the good folks who read this blog to compete with them.

Here’s the entry form. Good luck to all of you.

(For the record, here’s the winner of the last contest I posted.)

Posted in Guns | Comments Closed

Ten years burning down the road…

Sunday, July 28th, 2019

Today is the tenth anniversary of my first post.

When I started this blog, I was afraid it would end up being a shiny new toy that I played with for a while, then got bored with and set to one side.

(Great. Now I’m depressed.)

3,652 days. 4,499 posts. That averages out to slightly more than one per day. I think that takes this blog out of “shiny new toy” status, and more into the realm of “my favorite GI Joe — you know, the good ones, not that Cobra crap — with the Kung Fu grip“.

(Great. Now I’m even more depressed.)

But I’m not bored yet. (Or tired.)

I’m not proud of everything I’ve written. But I’ve written some stuff I’m proud of. And I’ve always tried to do what I think is the right and fair thing.

I have discovered a few things:

  • The posts that I consider to be short throw-away ones get more attention than the longer ones I put thought into. I believe this is a general principle of blogging that doesn’t have a name. Yet.
  • I’m shocked at how much traffic the list of city council members gets.
  • I seem to have become the go-to guy for obituaries. This gets depressing sometimes, especially when the obituary is for a relatively young person, and most especially when they’ve committed suicide. But I like calling out the people who have meant something to me for some reason, or the people I’ve never heard of who led interesting lives, or the war heros…and, yes, even the criminals who finally went to their just reward.

I thought about doing a thank you list, but every time I do one, there’s always someone I miss. I do want to single out Lawrence and Borepatch as the two bloggers who drive the most traffic here.

There are some people who were early supporters of this blog who have drifted away, perhaps because of political differences, and I regret that. There are some people who seem to have drifted away for personal, non-political reasons, who I miss terribly. There are some people who were early influences on this blog who I’ve drifted away from. And there’s at least two people that I know of who died (died).

Those of you who would be on a thank-you list, you know who you are, and thank you. To absent friends.

Let’s see if I can keep it up for ten more years. I plan to: I’ve got another gun porn post that I’m working on that combines a couple of things. Namely: what I bought at the S&WCA Symposium (a popular question among my friends) and, believe it or not, childhood nostalgia. I’m not sure when this is going to go up, as I have to take more photos first. But at least this one will be shorter than the last one.

I’m also thinking about doing a round-up review of some books I finished recently. I already talked about the Baatz book, but there are two more I’m thinking about covering: one that I liked with small reservations (mostly that I wanted more out of the book than the author was willing to give to his perceived target audience) and one that I found disappointing due to the author’s moralizing. If I can get to those this week I will.

Meanwhile, you can look forward to more obit watches, more random news clippings, more gun crankery, and (of course) a whacky green alien that only I can see (but who will be making some guest posts).

Drinks are on me and the alien next time we’re in the same place at the same time.

Posted in Admin | 5 Comments »

Gratuitous gun porn (#5 in a series)

Sunday, July 28th, 2019

I finally have my Scout rifle set up almost the way I want it.

Savage Model 11 Scout, Burris 2-7×32 Scout Scope. Ching Sling from Andy’s Leather. Scout Rifle Study by Richard Mann.

(more…)

Posted in Guns, Photography | 2 Comments »

Quote of the day.

Friday, July 26th, 2019

I finished Simon Baatz’s The Girl on the Velvet Swing: Sex, Murder, and Madness at the Dawn of the Twentieth Century a couple of days ago. I thought For the Thrill of It: Leopold, Loeb, and the Murder That Shocked Jazz Age Chicago was an excellent historical look at that case, and Girl is every bit as good: I commend it to your attention.

My only complaint is: I wish Girl had come out in 2015, not 2018. It would have made my life slightly easier. (Okay, I also kind of wish that Baatz would have given us at least a mini-review of “The Girl in the Red Velvet Swing“, like Simon Winchester did for “Krakatoa, East of Java” in his book.)

Anyway, there are two paragraphs in Girl that I found particularly interesting. (I think my use of these as a quote falls under the “fair use” category).

Anthony Comstock applauded such initiatives but continued to urge his acolytes to take independent action to combat such social evils as prostitution and pornography. Nothing in this regard was more infuriating to the Society for the Suppression of Vice than the complicity of newspaper proprietors in promoting prostitution, and no one was more culpable than James Gordon Bennett Jr., the owner and publisher of the New York Herald. Hundreds of paid notices, offering various services, appeared in the Herald every day; these advertisements never explicitly mentioned sex, but their meaning was nevertheless obvious. Such notices promoted prostitution, Comstock asserted, yet Bennett had always denied any responsibility, claiming that it was impossible for the Herald to distinguish between advertisements that offered companionship and those that offered sex.
But the campaign for moral purity would not be denied, and on July 7 [1906 – DB], Charles Wahle, a magistrate in the Seventh District Police Court, issued a summons against the New York Herald for printing obscene and lewd matter. Charles Grubb, a pastor of the Methodist Episcopal Church, had initiated the complaint, but it was equally a triumph for Comstock and the Society for the Suppression of Vice.

Does this remind you of anything in particular?

(Historical side note: Baatz doesn’t reveal what gun Thaw used, but he does get a little closer to that end: it is described as a blue steel revolver. It also sounds like it might have been a top-break, since Thaw is repeatedly referred to as having “broken” the revolver after shooting White and held it above his head by the barrel. But I apply a press discount to almost all media coverage of firearms, even from the turn of the century.
There’s no discussion of the caliber or maker in the Baatz book. We know from the trial transcripts that it was introduced into evidence and identified by the man who took it from Thaw, but the trial transcripts I’ve been able to find online do not include that part of the testimony.)

Posted in Books, Guns, History, Law | Comments Closed

Obit watch: July 26, 2019.

Friday, July 26th, 2019

P. Rajagopal, prominent Indian restaurateur.

He founded Saravana Bhavan, a chain of vegetarian restaurants based on Southern Indian cooking:

The restaurant focused on South Indian cuisine, serving freshly cooked dosas, a type of crispy golden rice and lentil crepe. As his chain expanded, the dish would earn him the nickname the “dosa king” in the media. He also sold snacks like idlis, soft round steamed rice cakes, and vadas, a kind of lentil doughnut, serving them with freshly cooked chutneys.
As his tasty, inexpensive food gained a following, his restaurant eventually turned a profit, enabling him to open branches. In 2000, with about 20 locations in India, Saravana Bhavan ventured overseas, opening in neighborhoods where the Indian diaspora had a strong presence. The chain expanded first into Dubai, then to cities like New York, London and Sydney, Australia. Though it operates under a franchise model, its chefs continue to come from Chennai.

But, as you might have guessed, there’s more to the story. Mr. Rajagopal was also a convicted murderer and was trying desperately to stay out of prison when he died.

Apparently, he desperately wanted to marry the daughter of one of his assistant managers: she wanted nothing to do with him and took up with another guy. (Mr. Rajagopal is described in the obit as a “strict disciplinarian”, so I imagine that must have make the work relationship awkward.) Anyway, Mr. Rajagopal did not take kindly to being rejected…

In 2001, after several attempts to separate the couple, associates of Mr. Rajagopal forced the man into a car and drove off. His body was found in a resort town in the Western Ghats mountain range. He had been strangled.

At first, Mr. Rajagopal was convicted of “culpable homicide” in 2004 and sentenced to 10 years in prison. However, he didn’t serve any time, for medical reasons.

In 2009, an Indian high court upgraded the conviction to murder, and the sentence was changed to life in prison. He spent the rest of his life trying to avoid jail, until India’s Supreme Court rejected his final appeal this month.

If you’re confused about how a court can “upgrade a conviction to murder”, well, I am, too. But I freely admit to being unfamiliar with the Indian legal system.

Ill health had kept Mr. Rajagopal away from his business in recent years. He had diabetes and hypertension and also had a stroke. By the end of his life he was almost completely blind.

He was 71 when he died.

Posted in Food, Law, Obits | Comments Closed

Obit watch: July 25, 2019.

Thursday, July 25th, 2019

Rutger Hauer: NYT. Variety. THR.

I don’t have much else to say, really. He was memorable in “Blade Runner”…and that’s the only thing I’ve ever seen him in.

Posted in Movies, Obits | Comments Closed

Obit watch: July 24, 2019.

Wednesday, July 24th, 2019

Art Neville, of the Neville Brothers.

Among those announcing the death was Louisiana’s governor, John Bel Edwards, who said in a statement that Mr. Neville “took the unique sound of New Orleans and played it for the world to enjoy.” Mr. Neville’s brother Aaron, in a post on his Facebook page, called him “the patriarch of the Neville tribe, big chief, a legend from way way back, my first inspiration.”

David Hedison, who had an interesting career. He played Felix Leiter in two Bond films, was pretty fly for a white guy in the 1958 “The Fly”, was in “The Lost World”, and turned down Robert Reed’s role in “The Brady Bunch”.

He was most famous as the submarine captain (opposite Richard Basehart’s admiral) in “Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea” (which you can still catch very early Sunday morning on ME TV). He also did some soaps, “Love Boat”, and “Fantasy Island”.

Oddly, from my point of view, he apparently never did a “Mannix”, though he did do other 70s cop shows. Both Mr. Hedison and Mike Connors were of Armenian descent: I’m sure he didn’t directly control the casting, but you’d figure Mr. Connors would want to help a brother out.

I don’t want to seem obsessed, but I thought this tribute from Stephen Wolfram to the late Mitchell Feigenbaum was worth sharing, especially since it gives a good explanation of the math behind his work.

Posted in 1970s, Movies, Music, Obits, TV | Comments Closed

It’s Baltimore, gentlemen.

Tuesday, July 23rd, 2019

The gods will not save you from being mugged. Even if you are a police.

(Hattip: Dean Bradley on the Twitters.)

Posted in Cops, Law | Comments Closed

Obit watch: July 23, 2019.

Tuesday, July 23rd, 2019

Christopher Kraft, NASA flight director and legend.

For 25 years, from the dawn of the space age in the 1950s to the threshold of almost routine launchings in the 1980s, Mr. Kraft played crucial roles in the space program. He devised the protocols for exploration beyond the Earth’s atmosphere, orchestrated early orbital missions and spacewalks, and developed projects that put astronauts on the moon and into the first reusable space shuttles.
Aside from the astronauts who made history — including Alan B. Shepard Jr., with his suborbital flight; John Glenn, in orbiting the Earth; and Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, the first to land on the lunar surface — Mr. Kraft was the most familiar face of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s early years, the steady ground commander who often explained missions to a rapt world at news conferences.
In an era of perilous experiments hastened by the Soviet success of Sputnik, the first artificial satellite, Mr. Kraft presided over triumphal breakthroughs in the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo projects. He also stood by helplessly when a fire killed three astronauts on a launchpad in 1967, but he helped devise the ingenious plan that saved the Apollo 13 crew after an explosion crippled their spacecraft en route to the moon in 1970.
At a time when there were no rules or procedures for space travel, Mr. Kraft, a brilliant aeronautical engineer, virtually wrote the book for NASA. He originated the concept of mission control, with authority vested in a ground-based flight director, not in a pilot-astronaut soaring through space at 7 miles a second who might be overwhelmed by pressures, especially during launch or re-entry.

NASA. I think this is a great story:

With the advent of the jet age of the 1950s, he was assigned as project engineer on flight tests of the Navy’s high-priority Vought F8U Crusader, which was exhibiting numerous birthing problems in its earliest versions. The problems uncovered by Langley flight tests included unacceptable g-force control behavior during maneuvers, which was determined to result from unintentional pivoting of the unique movable wing used by the configuration. Working with Langley test pilot Jack Reeder, Kraft identified the structural source of the problem, and took on the unpleasant job of telling the Navy that its new first-line aircraft was potentially dangerous. His warnings were heeded by Navy management, resulting in grounding of the F8U fleet, much to the chagrin of many operators of the new aircraft. He then encountered one of the most contentious members of the Navy’s Bureau of Aeronautics, who questioned the Langley results and doubted the conclusions drawn by the NACA. That Marine Major was named John Glenn. Following a detailed examination of the Langley study results with Kraft and Reeder, and interviews with Navy pilots who flew the aircraft, Glenn was convinced and became a believer. The F8U was subsequently redesigned, as recommended by Kraft and his associates at Langley, and served the nation as an outstanding fighter during the Vietnam War.

Houston Chronicle.

In an interview in February with the Houston Chronicle, Kraft said he never wanted to be an astronaut.
“I liked my job better than theirs,” he said. “I got to go on every flight, and besides that, I got to tell them what to do.”

Edited to add: I don’t like linking to Ars Technica, but I’m making an exception in this case: Eric Berger, the author of their Chris Kraft obit, was also a personal friend of Mr. Kraft.

Every few months, I would make a pilgrimage to Kraft’s home, and we fell into a routine. We’d be seated upstairs in reclining leather chairs. Kraft would ask what I had been hearing about the space program. Then it was open season: I could ask anything I wanted, from his experiences at Virginia Tech and his early years of NASA, about which astronauts he had liked—and which he hadn’t—to his thoughts on current affairs at NASA. Somewhere along the way, Betty Anne would bring us glasses of Coca-Cola with ice.

Posted in History, Obits, Planes | Comments Closed

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