Catch Up Cafe Pt. 3

got to about 84 here, I think we are in spring for sure, pollen everywhere, a light yellow dust on everything.

but it will get better, hang in there.

It just gets better sooner way down here in the south.

Hugs

Shirtsleeves, low 80s. Spent my day inside, at the north Charleston Coliseum, setting up the field for the FIRST Robotics Palmetto Regional Competition.

Starts tomorrow. On my feet for the next three days...

Over here thunderstorms are definitely a summertime phenomenon...
Someone decided to take climate change to its logical conclusion... next; fog becomes a sign of dry weather. :p

It's them eggheads.
But, out of interest, is it because you're pissed or because you're pisshed?
Both?

Well, sort of. Smart Planet, TR's sister site, published this neat little article on the radiation dangers in Japan from the leaks at the Fukushima nuclear plant.

The bottom line? Right now, in central Japan, you'd need constant exposure for 10,000 weeks (almost 200 years!) to reach levels of exposure that could cause radiation sickness.

But when the radioactivity in the environment is increased, that "anytime" does go up. I don't subscribe to the panicmongering, mind you, I just don't want my local radioactivity to be any higher than it is from nature's hand...

I mean, you referred to radiation sickness as if that's the danger of radiation... it's not. Radiation sickness is an effect of acute exposure to massive radiation... most dangers of radiation come into play with far less exposure, and just as certainly... radioactive isotopes having an unfortunate tendency to get stuck close to the cell nucleus, on account of the chemical transport systems only partially recognizing them.

It's great to have you back, Purple. You've been missed.

Hope your March break was fun. Are you going to travel anywhere this summer? Maybe to the Gathering of the Clans in Halifax?

"I can't control the actions of others. I can only hope to control my actions." Very profound words, worthy of Ghandi or Buddha.

One day at a time, one step at a time.
:-)

We have just received word of a Code Orange Traffic Leak into the streets of New York, reportedly due to "End of Work Day", death toll is three and is expected to rise as the leak spreads into neighboring areas.
Senator Joseph Lieberman is calling for Workdays That Do Not End to prevent recurrences.
This bulletin brought to you by Schweppes - the best a man can get!

Don't store your depleted fuel rods at your power plant. I think that might be a lesson learned, but where do you put them? They're dangerous everywhere. There are a lot of lessons in this, but maybe the ultimate one is why should we use nuclear energy?

AV

I doubt the big cheeses will be swayed, anywhere.
Public opinion may, and that may sometimes change things, in places like Libya.
In the free world, I'm not so sure.

But the fuel rods need to be stored in such ways that they don't require active cooling. That's expensive, as is doing quality work on the steel.
The public's best chance is in demanding quality checking to be boosted through the roof (floor)...

You were prescient elsewhere without perhaps knowing it. I [i]have[/i] directly constructed steel "cans" to hold so-called "exhausted" nuclear fuel according to AEC/ NRC standards at the time (mid-70s). I was struck then by the realization that the best, advanced shot of humankind relied, still, on 19th-Century plumbing, neutron-capture section figured out on the fly.

Remind me? Was that lead pipes?
I hear that for chemical reasons a certain organic compound has excellent damping qualities, what was it now, something surprising. Not formaldehyde, I think, but something like it, white and waxy... but with the carbon chains packed in tight matrices... (Edit: it was paraffin, don't hold me to the rad-blocking, it's a snippet I know to be recalled from twenty years back)
But demanding proper methods and proper overseeing will help make other power generation methods more competitive.

It was in the low 80's F and just perfect. I only got to sit outside during lunch, but it felt so nice to be warm again. Love this time of year. The flowers and trees are starting to bud and the birds are singing again. Of course, our warm weather will disappear after today and then we'll be back in the 50's, but it won't be long before everything is bloomed and the nice weather starts to kick in.

AV

25 hours on site over three days. PC can't communicate to host through third-party network. Much firewalling and NATting involved. First time supporting this equipment for this customer.

Ticket is to FDISK, FORMAT, and reload PC to fix comm problem. Did so, still no comm. Discovered I followed instructions exactly and wasn't supposed to. Then discovered the store config and the PC config were incompatible. Made appropriate changes, still no comm. Then, did essentially the same thing over and over again with the same results, just higher levels of support involved. Learned a lot. Refrained from giving equipment flying lessons. Walked away from it yesterday afternoon.

This morning, I get an email from the top-level SME at corporate: we have comm. No changes made at our end since yesterday. WTF? ?:|

Thank the FSM for a good sense of humor and Tetris on the phone!

Slows down neutrons enough for them to be useful for various things.

Which is useful if there is to be lead involved...
On the other hand, I doubt paraffin stays in paraffin form for even a tenth of the halflife, so it's not useful for the long term.
Here in Finland they're soon done building the world's first final storage for nuclear waste... that is, if we don't count the Italian Mafia's dumping of the stuff off the coast of Somalia, directly leading the fishermen there to stop catching fish and start catching ships instead.
Isn't it scary though, that we've been making this waste for going on one century, and only now is one deposit getting ready for use... within the next decade?

A moderator isn't going to help.

As for Onkalo, it's at depth now, but I don't think it will be finished for quite a while. That is, construction, as I understand it, is to continue, but storage will be available "soon". But get your radionuclides in now, you only have a 90-100 year window before it closes.

And wavelength and the ability to slip through solids?
I thought so, but then, maybe you mean it slows it down in a different way?

I've been away too long!

Did no one see, elsewhere, his ploy with "ploy" and "employee"?

They do a Tiger and Bounce everywhere and because of their Center of Gravity being so high get scooped into the cockpit of the car very easily.

I remember once feering a Lotus Europa up north when I hit a big Grey Roo the Europa took it's legs out from under it and it slid up the bonnet through the glass into the cockpit which I was in the process of evacuating as quickly as possible.

Unfortunately as I had the Cops behind me at the time I wasn't breaking any laws till I jumped out of a moving car which this cop took very badly. He was more than a bit flustered but when he looked to what I was pointing at the roo kicking the crap out of the inside of the car he decided that I needed Medical Attention and he brought me back latter to discover a write off as the roo had destroyed the interior of the car before departing the scene.

The car had to be trailered back and the insurance company refused to believe that it was a write off as the exterior damage wasn't so bad. When their assessor looked inside all he could say was what happened here? Nothing recognizable was left. ;)

Col

it never came down.
Not crashing, at least. Just melted away safely.

Likely Sunday morning...I'm thinking I need to start a new Cafe blog....thoughts? suggestions?

And .... Happy Friday everybody :D !

I've been reading, but not participating. Back in early March, it came to our attention that my mother-in-law was not at all well, out of her mind to be precise. I headed to FL to reconnoiter. Wowsers. :0

Advancing senility, congestive heart failure, super low serum blood sodium, and untreated diabetes combined to hospitalize her for four weeks, followed by three weeks of Rehab and notice from the doctors that if someone isn't living with her she'll only be released to an old folks storage facility. So I stayed, and stayed, and stayed, getting the process of moving in with her underway. *gulps*

The SO finally could retire at the end of May, and is now with her. I got to come home! :D At least long enough to take care of getting this place marketable (a considerable length of time given its state of disrepair and the sheer amount of STUFF Mr. PackRat has accumulated over the years).

Home! I am so relieved to be here. So relieved. :)

This multipage thing almost made me miss the new posts... :(

I'm almost settled here now. Trying to get back into a life again.

Hope you're all well.

this format. Really hate it.

Stick the old folks on an ice floe at spring and wave bye-bye?
Too much trouble, really, we're just worn out, exhausted from trying to care and getting nothing but used in the process.
We had to simply amputate and cauterize, wishing all the time we'd been left with another choice. Live and let live - sometimes it means live and cut off.

I do commend you for taking care of yours, and certainly some storage facilities are like Romanian orphanages, little forecourts of hell.