Over The James River on 895 to 150 interchange

This is looking Northwest from the 895/150 interchange that is over the James River and Interstate 95. If you look into the picture, you will see Downtown Richmond.

Powerline Workers...

What is your opinion?

I have been an Electrician for over 11 years and i have never watched or scene anything like this. I have heard that in Vermont the power company workers will land a bucket and use two of the line to support it, but never anything like this.

Southpoint Mall Durham NC

Sunrise...

This was taken from the 895/150 interchange on Saturday Morning while i was coming home from work.

Shopping?

Isn’t it funny how in a marriage that if the man wants to purchase something the couple does not have the money, but if the woman wants it, they can purchase it? That men do not want their woman to change and the woman wants her husband to change? When I first got with my wife, I wore trendy cloths like Abercrombie and Fitch and I had ear rings as well. My wife hated the cloths and earrings and slowly but surely she got me to change to more "age appropriate" clothing…Dockers and Polo shirts.

We went cloths shopping or my daughter several weeks ago and went into the old stores that I used to shop at and I said I wanted to get some of the clothing and to start to dress trendier. She laughed and said that I was old enough to be some of the people’s father that worked in the store. I felt insulted! I feel like I am still "young" and people guess me for my late 20s. She said that Mark dresses nicely and I said that he dresses trendier than I do; she disagreed with me. Mark is a doctor and we ride mountain bikes together all the time. She asked me if I was having a "mid-life crisis" and I plainly said no.

So, needless to say, I lost that battle. I do dress nice; I just want to dress like a young kid again sometimes. My daughter is like go ahead and get some of the clothes and put your earrings back in! My wife will have none of that…

I love my wife for being herself and for putting up with all my crap...







What is your opinion?

Ashley and Mary-Kate Olsen

Are they all Hobos??

What is your opinion?

RATED THE BEST COMEBACK LINE THIS YEAR

A friend emailed this to me.

Nominated for this year's "Best Comeback" line.

If you ever testify in court, you might wish you could have been as sharp
as this policeman He was being cross-examined by a defense attorney
during a felony trial. The lawyer was trying to undermine the policeman's
credibility....

Q: "Officer -- did you see my client fleeing the scene?"

A: "No sir. But I subsequently observed a person matching the description
of the offender, running severa l bloc ks away."

Q: "Officer -- who provided this description?"

A: "The officer who responded to the scene."

Q: "A fellow officer provided the description of this so-called offender.
Do you trust your fellow officers?"

A: "Yes, sir. With my life."

Q: "With your life? Let me ask you this then officer. Do you have a room
where you change your clothes in preparation for your daily duties?"

A: "Yes s ir, we do!"

Q: "And do you have a locker in the room?"

A: "Yes sir, I do."

Q: "And do you have a lock on your locker?"

A: "Yes sir."

Q: "Now why is it, officer, if you trust your fellow officers with your
life, you find it necessary to lock your locker in a room you share with
these same officers?"

A: "You see, sir -- we share the building with the court complex, and
sometimes lawyers have been known to walk through that room."

The courtroom erupted in laughter, and a prompt recess was called. The
officer on the stand has been nominated for this year's "Best Comeback"
line -- and we think he'll win.

Jury for Michael Vick Trial...

Jury selected for Michael Vick trial
A friend emailed this to me!!!

360& Old hundred

This intersection SUCKS!! If you are trying to get across 360 you will only get 3 cars across before the light turns red again. It is a bad intersection. Many people have complained about it..

Epcot @ Night

Work!!!!

Tonight i have just wanted to SCREAM AND PULL my hair out!!   I have never worked at a place where NOTHING gets fixed!!!   We were getting 2 and 3 errors at a time through out the whole night!!!   Very steady and constant.  I have worked at a lot of places and things always got better, not here.  This place was given a definite lifespan from its parent company to get up and running and from the looks of it, it is not going good.  Sometimes i feel like a baby seal getting clubbed to death while i work a shift with lots of errors. I have been here for about 1 year. It is as bad as it was a year ago as it is now.   The only time that it was good was around Christmas when there was only a skeleton crew working here...  I can always take the work experience with me to another job and it looks good on a resume, not in real time. I wonder what they pay the engineers here with?  Dirt or Grain?  It has been a long night and i have to work another one to fill in.

 

I am stressed enough about relocating and this place only adds to it. I am sure glad that we got some rain so i cant worry about doing any biking tomorrow morning due to trail conditions. I need to go to the gym and work out my back... it has been a few days since my last time.

--
RMSTringer
+++++++++++++++

Finally Some Rain....

Tonight, we have finally received some beneficial rain!!

What is your opinion?

Cool sign!

895 toll booth East

Bkup on 95s

Going 2 work

95 south & 895 to 150 overpass

Morning

Qimonda

Richmond

95&295

95 North

Dead grass!

Rest of The Week...

Well I am off to work tonight and I have to “fill-in” for a different shift on Friday Night.  That sucks.  I am supposed to go ridding on Saturday morning when I get out of work.  I will see how tired I am.  Also I found a sweet ass band called Stromkern and here is the Wikipedia listing of them. The are good if you like some industrial music with a rap beat.  Most of the stuff I have listened to I like. See everyone tonight…

 

RMStringer

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

You have no conscience and it seems you never will - Cyberaktif

 

Dr. Strange

I just purchased the Dr. Strange DVD tonight!! A while ago, there was supposed to be a "live Action" movie, but the did not do it and put out a 6-issue series that was the movie script. Now, they have made it into an animated movie. I can't wait to get to watch it!! I am on old school reader of Dr. Strange.

What is your opinion?

Frontline Assembly Collection...

As a few of you that read this blog mkow i am a very BIG music collector. One such group is Frontline Assembly. I have most all of their projects sich as Delerium, Intermix, Noise Unit, Will, Synaesthesia, Conjure One, Equinox, Pro>Tech, and Cyberaktif. I am going to be in the process of ripping all of the CDs to HQMP3 like 192-256kbp so i can use them on my Creative Zen Touch. I have been a fan of their for many years and i have all of the singles and albums totally over 80 discs in all. It will take some time to finish this.

What is your opinion?

September 1 2007 Meteor Shower

By Peter Jenniskens
Meteor Astronomer, Carl Sagan Center, SETI Institute

 

Around the start of our year count, 2000 years ago, comet Kiess passed the sun and ejected a cloud of dust. Kiess completed one orbit in 1911 when it was discovered by Lick Observatory post-doc Carl Kiess. The dust took longer to return, and formed a continuous stream of dust particles that has been passing just outside Earth orbit ever since.

 

On Sept. 1, 2007, that trail of dust from Roman times will wander in the Earth's path again, causing an extremely rare meteor shower during the short time it takes the Earth to travel through the stream of dust. The meteors radiate from the constellation of Auriga, and are called Aurigids. Only three people alive today are known to have seen this shower before in 1935, 1986, and 1994. After the 2007 encounter, the Aurigids will not be seen again in our lifetimes.

 

The Aurigid shower will last only an hour and a half, with a bright Moon in the sky. The Moon is not expected to dim the spectacle much, however, because most Aurigids seen in the past were relatively bright -2 to +3 magnitude meteors. My colleague, Jeremie Vaubaillon of the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California, and I have performed detailed predictions of the dust stream's orbital evolution. The August 7 issue of the journal EOS, Transactions of the AGU, gives details of the encounter.

We predict that the shower will be visible by the naked eye from the western United States, especially in California, Hawaii, Alaska, other western states and from Mexico and the western provinces of Canada. Prime viewing time will be on Saturday, Sept. 1, 2007, a half hour on either side of 4:36 a.m. PDT. The whole event will last no longer than one-and-a-half hours. Twenty-five minutes long rates will be above half the peak rate.

Sunlight has pushed the comet's ejected particles into wider orbits around the sun in a thin stream just outside of Earth's orbit. On occasion, the combined gravity of the solar system's planets moves this dust trail into Earth's path. Only when Earth and dust trail collide do we see this meteor shower.

As they collide with the atmosphere, the dust grains of Kiess begin to vaporize at around 80 miles (130 kilometers) altitude, with the bigger ones penetrating down to as low as 50 miles (80 kilometers), before they are completely stopped. This fiery process creates a meteor.

Not only is the shower rarely seen, the Aurigid meteors also may be very unusual. Some could be bits of the comet's pristine crust. Comet Kiess returned from the Oort cloud of comets on the outskirts of the solar system only in recent history. Before that, Kiess spent 4.5 billion years in the Oort cloud, where cosmic rays baked its crust over the age of the solar system. Kiess could have shed some of this pristine crust 2000 years ago. Comets that return more frequently to the sun have long lost this pristine crust.

If so, the meteors are expected to penetrate 5 km deeper than normal in the atmosphere and lack a very specific color of yellow light from the element sodium. Such unusual meteors were seen once before during the alpha-Monocerotid meteor shower in 1995, caused by an unknown long-period comet.

 

 

RMStringer

^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Let teachers and priests and philosophers brood

over questions of reality and illusion.

I know this: if life is an illusion, then I

am no less an illusion, and being thus, the

illusion is real to me. I live, I burn with life, I

love, I slay, and I am content.

(Robert E. Howard, Queen of the Black Coast, Weird Tales, May 1934)

 

Perseid meteor shower

Well folks, I was at work during this “event” and went out several times during the night and I did not see a thing.  I was expecting a really great show and I got Nadda…

There is supposed to be another meteor shower around September 1,2007 and I will place some more details up soon.

 

RMStringer

^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Let teachers and priests and philosophers brood

over questions of reality and illusion.

I know this: if life is an illusion, then I

am no less an illusion, and being thus, the

illusion is real to me. I live, I burn with life, I

love, I slay, and I am content.

(Robert E. Howard, Queen of the Black Coast, Weird Tales, May 1934)

 

My Bad...

Anonymous said "I believe Sharon Osborn is on "America's Got Talent"...not "So You Think You Can Dance"....details. Anyway"  Well sorry for that little detail.  To me all of those shows suck so i got the name wrong. Thankx for being so good at pointing out every little error, So you can Think you got Idol Talent is what i think they should call the show and have all of the hosts sit there and argue it out with The Hoff as the ring leader and Ryan Seacrest with a dog collar tied to The Hoff...

--
RMSTringer
+++++++++++++++

August Meteor Shower Will Be 'A Great Show'

Just a reminder for everyone in the USA. Tonight is the Perseid meteor shower. It is supposed to be a great show with lots of shooting stars about 10-12 per hour tonight. Look to the Northern Sky.

It's going to be a great show," said Bill Cooke of NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office at the Marshall Space Flight Center in Alabama. "The Moon is new on August 12, which means no moonlight, dark skies and plenty of meteors."

Observing tips from www.Space.com:
To see the show, one need only find a comfortable spot with a clear view of the northeast horizon, away from local lights. A dark rural location is best. Lie back on a blanket or lounge chair and scan the entire sky. In the late evening, starting around 9 p.m. local time, sharp-eyed observers might see "earthgrazing" meteors that skim the northeast horizon.
"Earthgrazers are long, slow and colorful," Cooke said. "They are among the most beautiful of meteors." But don't expect more than a handful in an hour, he said.

Perseid meteoroids are exceptionally fast, entering Earth's atmosphere at roughly 133,200 mph (60 kilometers per second) relative to the planet, slamming into the air like bugs hitting a windshield.

Top 10 Perseid Facts website.

What is your opinion?

American Idull

American Idull

More people watch and vote on this show than they do for the Election of The President. What a shame! This just shows that America cares more about a person singing than they do on who is running the country. Perhaps, we should make a show called “The Next American President” and make them do a Dog & Pony Show to get Americans to vote for the next US President. It sounds like a viable option to me with several categories like dancing, singing, political issues, general health and mental wellbeing.

Where r they now? Perhaps the only one that has made a career from the show is Kelly Clarkson. She rode the fame and became a true Pop Star with good music and lyrical content. All the way from working in a theater to top of the charts. Where are the rest of them? Ruben Studdard(2003), Fantasia Barrino(2004), Carrie Underwood(2005), Jordin Sparks(2007)

Carrie Underwood has made some impression on the music scene. With her cross over hit from Country to Pop and some success on the Country charts, I would place her as the second most successful act to come from the show.

Taylor Hicks (Soul Patrol)(2006) from Alabama has done a big whopping ZERO in the charts. Why and how did Americans pick such a dud? His soulful vocals were better served in some bar in Louisiana than in front of 50million people voting for his gray haired ass. He is not even in the charts and yet he is an American Idol for this year.

Katharine McPhee would have been a better choice as her voice was good and she really had the looks to make it. She was a very promising upcoming star but due to the draconian contracts they are placed under to do tours and with a major percentage of most of their profits going to the producers, she will not see the light of day for a while either. I wonder if they know they made a mistake in not choosing her? She was much more saleable than Hicks.

Now, about the hosts (from Hell). The Tool(Ryan Seacrest)Train wreck(Paula Abdul), Asshole(Simon Cowell), and on the level(Randy Jackson). Paula, as we all know was a choreographer for Janet Jackson way back in the 80s and at best a B-List star/musical act with her dancing and animated cat in her videos with at best 3 number one hits. Hush-Hush or Lush, Lush little Paula. In some of her actions and looks on the show, you could clearly see that she was trashed and on something by slurring her speech and some of the random comments. In my opinion, she makes no contribution to the show at all, perhaps she needs to go to So You Think You can Dance on ABC and trade with Sharron Osborne. Her randomness is not a good attraction and makes for good conversation. I will give her one thing; she has a good voice, too bad her voice did not carry her through.

Simon Cowell; He is notorious for his unsparingly blunt and often controversial criticism of the contestants. He is estimated to be worth about 200million US dollars. Not to shabby to be an asshole on TV. His personality is that of a piece of cardboard, not too impressive to me and I think that he gets off on slamming people on the show. That is all I have to say about him. Now on to the next one.

Randy Jackson in my opinion is the only one who gives the show any sort of clout. From Wikipedia: “Jackson played bass in violin virtuoso Jean-Luc Ponty's backing band and toured with rock band Journey in 1983 and 1985. His numerous credits range from playing with Aretha Franklin, George Michael , Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown, Billy Cobham, Blue Öyster Cult, Herbie The Car, Richard Marx, Billy Joel, Journey, Bon Jovi and Bob Dylan to playing at the Grand Ole Opry with The Charlie Daniels Band. His production/songwriting work in the San Francisco Bay area with Narada Michael Walden and Walter Afanasieff led Jackson to be quite in demand as a producer himself.

While in the Bay Area, Jackson played in bands with Carlos Santana and Jerry Garcia. He moved to Italy in the late 1980s and produced a record for Italian pop star Zucchero. The record Zucchero and the Randy Jackson Band produced one of Zucchero's biggest hits, "Donne". Jackson was bass guitarist for Tracy Chapman featuring on several Tracks on her 1992 release Matters of the Heart. He performed on the single "Bang Bang Bang", "Open Arms", and "Dreaming on a World". Jackson has also recorded, produced, or toured with many well-known artists and bands, ranging from Mariah Carey (whom he knew when she was still a teenager; he was in her band at Live 8 in London in 2005) to *NSYNC, Céline Dion, Wild Orchid, Bruce Springsteen, Stryper[1], and Madonna (he played bass on her # 1 hit "Like a Prayer"). He has also worked as an executive, spending eight years as vice president of artists and repertoire (A&R) at Columbia Records and four years heading A&R at MCA Records.

Jackson also hosts a radio top 40 countdown known as "Randy Jackson's Hit List" syndicated on hundreds of stations nationwide by Westwood One. Every week Randy counts down his top 30 Urban AC and Mainstream AC hits, gives us a peek into AI with American Idol Underground, and shares what's currently in his iPod.”

So he has the real credentials in the music industry to actually know what the hell could/and should make a star and for what qualities they should look for. He is the leveling factor between Cowell’s cynicism and Abdul’s childishness. Where as he has the clout in the industry, that does not make a star, only gain access to the keys. The final vote is from the viewing public and I think that the three should have more of a final say so in the end. Kind of like a Veto or final vote, but hey, I am not the show’s producer. This is just my two cents worth with a gracious helping form Wikipedia.

What is your opinion?

Some Funnies!!!!

What is your opinion?

Bad For them Good For Us...

A problem at the switch board at a transformer substation led to a power shortage at 2:30 p.m. (0530 GMT), the company said.

Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. said on Friday it shut down six of its chip production lines after a power cut at a plant near Seoul, prompting expectations of tighter supply and a rise in prices.

Some said the incident could wipe out as much as a month's worth of Samsung's total production of NAND flash memory chips, which are widely used for data storage in portable electronics.

"It is probable that at least half of the chips already in the fabrication process will have to be discarded," said Lee Min-hee, an analyst for Dongbu Securities.

"Taking into account another two weeks for ramp-up of the lines after cleanup, Samsung could very well lose a month's worth of chip shipment," he said.

"When the power goes down, some of the wafers die in the process and they ... become obsolete," said Lee.

Overall NAND production at Samsung is likely to be particularly affected by the outage in Line 14, an advanced NAND flash line using larger wafers.(300 MM)

Sometimes Karma is a bitch... They changed 2 of their plants from Flash Memory to DRAM and flooded the market pushing the prices of DRAM down into the gutter. This hurt Qimonda and the rest of the companies that make this product.
--
RMSTringer
+++++++++++++++

Poco Park Tomorrow morning...

Mark and I are going on a ride tomorrow morning at Pocahontas State Park. I think we are going to ride the Red and Blue trails depending on how tired i am from working all night.

Anyone up for a ride?



What is your opinion?

Blog Stuff...

Over the last 2-3 days i have signed up for a few more services to get my blog out there and noticed. I have signed up for the Blogger's Choice Awards, EXLINKS.net, BlogRankings.com and BlogsRater.com

So, please feel free to go to a site and vote for me.


What is your opinion?

Work Thoughts

I am 36 years old and i have been in an industrial/commercial environment for many years. I have worked on all sorts of projects from Chemical Plants to Paper Mills to Semiconductor Fabs and never in all my life have i seen a place not work well after some two years. I have been a tech for nearly a year and this system has only ran well over the Christmas Holidays when the engineers were not there.

I have built units and did install work on complex systems that have started up and ran with a minimal number of errors; systems that ran perfectly after the "bugs" were corrected. I have never seen a system like the one i work on that just runs like hell all the time, no matter what is done or not done to it. I just do not understand it...



What is your opinion?

Radar Jammer...

Very intersting. i always wondered what kind of device could do this? I am suer that a person in the USA would get their self in a very big mess over something like this!!

Error ... Cop laser signal is jammed by the electronic gate controller.

What is your opinion?

Link Exchange

If anyone is interested, i am willing to do a link exchange with him or her. It is a good way to get your blog/site out to different people. Let em know and we can get it set up!!

Thanks...



What is your opinion?

She finally took her own advice...

Amy Winehouse finally went to rehab. The stories of exhaustion and the such were just ways to try and divert the masses from knowing the truth. She was a drinker and partier from the get go and we all knew it. I hope that she gets the help that she needs.

What is your opinion?

120v AC in a car?

Scott Dawson, a civil engineering graduate from the University of Houston put an in-house AC unit on his car. You might have expected this from someone that went to Texas A&M, but not University of Houston. That campus borders a not so good part of the city and he is just asking for trouble…

What is your opinion?

Monster truck makes Monster mess...

When this happened in DEKALB, Ill, it was a terrible shame. What impressed me about this is the fact that no one was killed. If you got to see the video, the truck went very fast over the smashed cars. It looked like it jumped up on the first one and then bounced off the end. I can understand why the driver had such a problem trying to control it. Have you ever watched those shows on TV? The trucks are always crashing and rolling over. They break down often due to the amount of power that the engine is putting out, snapping stabilizer bars and crank shafts due to the torque. It amazes me that we have not had many of these things hurt more people at bigger events.

What is your opinion?

Screen Shots of The Simpson's Movie...

The movie was really FUNNY!! They did a good job on it and if you like them, then by all means go and watch it. All of the characters were in the show. I took my daughter and her friend and we all had a good laugh!!

What is your opinion?

Today

I am going to take my daughter and her friend to go see The Simpson’s Movie today.  Fun Fun!

I am very sore today from my workout yesterday morning. 

My back is kicking my but…very sore, and I need to go and workout again today. 

The weather is very hot once again with no rain in sight…

 

RMStringer

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

The significant problems we face

cannot be solved at the same level

of thinking we were at when

we created them: Albert Einstein

 

Random Space shots...

Uncovering the Veil Nebula
















Galactic HII Region RCW 120















The Sun Loses its Spots















Bullet Cluster


What is your opinion?

Interglatic Crash...

I was reading earlier about the big crash between 4 separate galaxies. They say it will make one big mess of a galaxy much larger than our own Milky Way. With all of those stars and planets, who can there not be any life on them? I am Christian, but how can we think that we are the only people alive? Isn’t that rather presumptuous of us?

I guess that if we are the only inhabitants of this universe, then that is a big waste of space out there. And with us only beginning to explore space, we may never get to those other planets to see what they are all about. If we are the only people, then why did God just make Earth the only planet with a Sun and a moon? I mean that is all we really need. We do not have the technology to be able to go and use resources from that we have found on other planets. Gentlemen, We do not have the technology to achieve this goal. I guess that they give us something to look at during the night.

I kind of boggles the mind to think that when we use the Hubble Telescope to look deep into space that we are looking back in time. The light that we see has been traveling for millions and billions of years to get to the earth. For all we know, some of the pictures we see are no longer there and have been gone for millions of years and in fact, I am sure some of them are that way.
What is your opinion?