Wednesday, August 31, 2005
Descending snow
The snow is gradually spreading down the mountains.
It was into October before we got snow last year, so it's very early this year and has already reached the 500m mark of the lower ski lodge. Perhaps this means we're going to have a good ski season, unlike the previous couple of years.
It appears that this summer has been particularly poor, especially when compared to the record-breaking summer we had last year. Not that I mind, you understand. I rather like the weather here. Autumn and winter all year round suits me fine.
I just hope that the ring road remains clear over Öxnadalsheiði until October 3rd so that Syed and I can drive down to Keflavík for the Klakavirki Troll Hunt event on the 1st and back on the 2nd. The pass is notorious for becoming heavily snow-bound; for most of its length the road has double-height edge-markers so that they can be seen even during bad weather. It's quite sobering to think that these poles are the only things between you and a fifty foot drop.
It was very tempting to go up to the ski lodge today just to see the snow. I might do it
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It was into October before we got snow last year, so it's very early this year and has already reached the 500m mark of the lower ski lodge. Perhaps this means we're going to have a good ski season, unlike the previous couple of years.
It appears that this summer has been particularly poor, especially when compared to the record-breaking summer we had last year. Not that I mind, you understand. I rather like the weather here. Autumn and winter all year round suits me fine.
I just hope that the ring road remains clear over Öxnadalsheiði until October 3rd so that Syed and I can drive down to Keflavík for the Klakavirki Troll Hunt event on the 1st and back on the 2nd. The pass is notorious for becoming heavily snow-bound; for most of its length the road has double-height edge-markers so that they can be seen even during bad weather. It's quite sobering to think that these poles are the only things between you and a fifty foot drop.
It was very tempting to go up to the ski lodge today just to see the snow. I might do it
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Tuesday, August 30, 2005
Counting the departmental beans
Today we had our interesting meeting with the university Rektor and two members of the finance department, where they attempted to explain to the students and staff of the faculty just why we didn't get any first year students this year.
It turns out that the university has a budget shortfall of about 135 million IKr - that's about a million pounds sterling - or 13.5% of its operating budget. Even after a partial government bail-out they still need to make cuts of at least 40-50 million IKr. Perhaps the salaries of the incompentents in finance and administration who let it get that bad would be a good place to start. A well-run university in the UK operations on 4% administrative overheads. A poorly-run one spends 6%. We have overheads of 10%.
Two other faculties, Natural Resources and Law & Social Sciences were also threatened with the loss of their intake this year but in the end they have got their students. Monetarily, our lack of students doesn't actually save much money, as the money the university has saved by making two lecturers redundant is not balanced by the money the university has lost in student fees from the governement. Over all, we were told, we need 75-80 students in the department to break even, a number that was agreed as the target for a five-year plan that the university has reneged upon.
Interestingly enough, the university is officially aiming for 5% of its student population to be international students, which is about 75 students. Given the numbers of international students who speak Icelandic, this pretty much means that the faculties who teach in English will have to take in most of that number. And which faculties teach entirely in English? Er... IT. And IT. And IT. Law and Social Sciences offers a few modules in English but most are in Icelandic. An act of parliament is due to go through the Althingi this year to allow universities to charge fees to foreign students, so the university is, by cutting back the IT faculty, killing the goose that's about to lay many, many golden eggs.
The rent that the faculty pays on the new building - which is supposed to attract huge numbers of new Icelandic students - is considerably more than the faculty's other running costs (including salaries) put together. Each department in the building pays an equal share of the rent, which is higher than the Icelandic norm partly because of the extensive chemistry and biology labs on the ground floor. The new building = new students approach doesn't seem to have paid off either, as our students have reported that people to whom they talk are regularly surprised that HA even has an IT faculty. We can't advertise as we don't have the money, therefore we don't get students and so don't get the money we'd need to advertise to get students and so...
For the last three years we could have made a saving of about 5 million IKr a year by offering an introductory IT course to all students within the university. This hasn't happened because the other faculties don't want their students to take any of our modules unless our students take some of their modules. It all has to do with the strange way that funding is applied. The non-fixed cost faculties get paid per student. Lecturers are not only paid by the hour, but also by the student. So if you teach lots of hours to lots of students you make lots of money. It would be terrible if some of this money went to another faculty just because the students want some IT training, wouldn't it?
The committee that will decide our future makes its report on October 15th. The university council will then, in collaboration with the ministry of education, make its decision as to the future of the department. Personally, I don't hold out much hope for us unless there is a major restructuring of the entire university and its administration. At least Thorsteinn (the Rektor) had the grace to look uncomfortable about the entire matter. He gives the impression that he doesn't want to close the faculty. Unlike the two goons from finance.
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It turns out that the university has a budget shortfall of about 135 million IKr - that's about a million pounds sterling - or 13.5% of its operating budget. Even after a partial government bail-out they still need to make cuts of at least 40-50 million IKr. Perhaps the salaries of the incompentents in finance and administration who let it get that bad would be a good place to start. A well-run university in the UK operations on 4% administrative overheads. A poorly-run one spends 6%. We have overheads of 10%.
Two other faculties, Natural Resources and Law & Social Sciences were also threatened with the loss of their intake this year but in the end they have got their students. Monetarily, our lack of students doesn't actually save much money, as the money the university has saved by making two lecturers redundant is not balanced by the money the university has lost in student fees from the governement. Over all, we were told, we need 75-80 students in the department to break even, a number that was agreed as the target for a five-year plan that the university has reneged upon.
Interestingly enough, the university is officially aiming for 5% of its student population to be international students, which is about 75 students. Given the numbers of international students who speak Icelandic, this pretty much means that the faculties who teach in English will have to take in most of that number. And which faculties teach entirely in English? Er... IT. And IT. And IT. Law and Social Sciences offers a few modules in English but most are in Icelandic. An act of parliament is due to go through the Althingi this year to allow universities to charge fees to foreign students, so the university is, by cutting back the IT faculty, killing the goose that's about to lay many, many golden eggs.
The rent that the faculty pays on the new building - which is supposed to attract huge numbers of new Icelandic students - is considerably more than the faculty's other running costs (including salaries) put together. Each department in the building pays an equal share of the rent, which is higher than the Icelandic norm partly because of the extensive chemistry and biology labs on the ground floor. The new building = new students approach doesn't seem to have paid off either, as our students have reported that people to whom they talk are regularly surprised that HA even has an IT faculty. We can't advertise as we don't have the money, therefore we don't get students and so don't get the money we'd need to advertise to get students and so...
For the last three years we could have made a saving of about 5 million IKr a year by offering an introductory IT course to all students within the university. This hasn't happened because the other faculties don't want their students to take any of our modules unless our students take some of their modules. It all has to do with the strange way that funding is applied. The non-fixed cost faculties get paid per student. Lecturers are not only paid by the hour, but also by the student. So if you teach lots of hours to lots of students you make lots of money. It would be terrible if some of this money went to another faculty just because the students want some IT training, wouldn't it?
The committee that will decide our future makes its report on October 15th. The university council will then, in collaboration with the ministry of education, make its decision as to the future of the department. Personally, I don't hold out much hope for us unless there is a major restructuring of the entire university and its administration. At least Thorsteinn (the Rektor) had the grace to look uncomfortable about the entire matter. He gives the impression that he doesn't want to close the faculty. Unlike the two goons from finance.
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Monday, August 29, 2005
And so it begins
The semester, and hence my lectures, have started.
I'm lecturing two modules this term, both to the second years. HCI - human-computer interaction - is my pet subject as it's where my reseach interests lie. It was supposed to be taught to both first and second years this year, but as we've had our first years pulled from under us, it's second years only.
The other module - databases - is one I inherited from the Moose when he went on sabbatical. Sadly, the Moose was one of the first victims of the university's cost-cutting exercise and so I suspect that I've inherited it permanently. Or as permanently as the department survives. Of course, as a second year course I wouldn't be teaching it next year anyway... no first years this year means no second year next year. Still, at least I'll have it written when I move on.
We have a meeting with the Rektor tomorrow at which he is due to explain to the students what has happened and why. It should be interesting. As it is we appear to have lost a couple of students over the summer, at least one of whom seems to have transferred to another course at a different university. I can't say that I blame them, given the uncertainties at present.
Morale is, naturally, pretty low. Whether tomorrow's meeting does anything to assuage that we'll have to wait and see. But I seriously doubt it."Morale is, naturally, pretty low. Whether tomorrow's meeting does anything to assuage that we'll have to wait and see. But I seriously doubt it.
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I'm lecturing two modules this term, both to the second years. HCI - human-computer interaction - is my pet subject as it's where my reseach interests lie. It was supposed to be taught to both first and second years this year, but as we've had our first years pulled from under us, it's second years only.
The other module - databases - is one I inherited from the Moose when he went on sabbatical. Sadly, the Moose was one of the first victims of the university's cost-cutting exercise and so I suspect that I've inherited it permanently. Or as permanently as the department survives. Of course, as a second year course I wouldn't be teaching it next year anyway... no first years this year means no second year next year. Still, at least I'll have it written when I move on.
We have a meeting with the Rektor tomorrow at which he is due to explain to the students what has happened and why. It should be interesting. As it is we appear to have lost a couple of students over the summer, at least one of whom seems to have transferred to another course at a different university. I can't say that I blame them, given the uncertainties at present.
Morale is, naturally, pretty low. Whether tomorrow's meeting does anything to assuage that we'll have to wait and see. But I seriously doubt it."Morale is, naturally, pretty low. Whether tomorrow's meeting does anything to assuage that we'll have to wait and see. But I seriously doubt it.
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Sunday, August 28, 2005
The last snows of summer
Iceland has two seasons - autumn and winter.
Or so Joe claimed on the way to dinner last night. He has a point - the last couple of days have been quite pleasant - sunny, relatively warm and not too windy. Perfect autumn days in fact. That is what passes for summer in Iceland, and I rather like it. If you'd like to see Iceland in autumn, I've got the glacier and iceberg pictures online in the usual place.
Today though, we are returning to winter. I completed my drive around the island - a total of 890 miles - up the west coast and through the Öxnadalsheiði pass. Everywhere I went there was snow on the mountaintops. Even the mountains of Eyjafjörður here in Akureyri are dusted with snow along their ridges. Whether this is the last snow of summer or the first of winter I cannot say.
On the way up I stopped at IKEA in Reykjavík. It's a lot smaller than the one outside Warrington - mind you, its catchment population is probably about an eighth of Warrington's - but both of them seem to be a magnet for people looking for something to do on a Sunday afternoon. Hmm... what shall we do today? I know, let's have a wander around IKEA.
I didn't get the futon, as it turned out, because I couldn't find it and wasn't enjoying the crush. I think I shall order it online and have it delivered by the IKEA round-Iceland weekly van. I did get some useful kitchen stuff over the weekend though, as well as the Star Wars: The Clone Wars Risk set. Purely for work-related reasons, you understand. :) My current two sets will only take ten players, and I may have more than that sitting the module for which I need Risk sets this semester.
So I'm back at home, the mountains I can see through the livingroom window are snow-capped, and the local church bells have been ringing as discordantly as usual. Tomorrow term proper begins with an early cup of coffee and a 10:00 HCI lecture.
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Or so Joe claimed on the way to dinner last night. He has a point - the last couple of days have been quite pleasant - sunny, relatively warm and not too windy. Perfect autumn days in fact. That is what passes for summer in Iceland, and I rather like it. If you'd like to see Iceland in autumn, I've got the glacier and iceberg pictures online in the usual place.
Today though, we are returning to winter. I completed my drive around the island - a total of 890 miles - up the west coast and through the Öxnadalsheiði pass. Everywhere I went there was snow on the mountaintops. Even the mountains of Eyjafjörður here in Akureyri are dusted with snow along their ridges. Whether this is the last snow of summer or the first of winter I cannot say.
On the way up I stopped at IKEA in Reykjavík. It's a lot smaller than the one outside Warrington - mind you, its catchment population is probably about an eighth of Warrington's - but both of them seem to be a magnet for people looking for something to do on a Sunday afternoon. Hmm... what shall we do today? I know, let's have a wander around IKEA.
I didn't get the futon, as it turned out, because I couldn't find it and wasn't enjoying the crush. I think I shall order it online and have it delivered by the IKEA round-Iceland weekly van. I did get some useful kitchen stuff over the weekend though, as well as the Star Wars: The Clone Wars Risk set. Purely for work-related reasons, you understand. :) My current two sets will only take ten players, and I may have more than that sitting the module for which I need Risk sets this semester.
So I'm back at home, the mountains I can see through the livingroom window are snow-capped, and the local church bells have been ringing as discordantly as usual. Tomorrow term proper begins with an early cup of coffee and a 10:00 HCI lecture.
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Saturday, August 27, 2005
Hails and farewells
Today we had a stronghold meeting where I met six newcomers to the stronghold and said goodbye to one leaving for a posting back in the US.
This afternoon was something of a demo rather than a normal meeting as our newest recruit was bringing five friends along with her. It turns out that all of the interested folks are Air Force rather than Navy, which is probably a good thing as Keflavik is in the process of changing from a naval base to an air force base.
As a result we did a lot of the show-and-tell stuff and I also did the hands-on stuff with the tablet weaving, which went down pretty well. The new blood is particularly welcome as we've got four of the current populace leaving the island this month. Casey has already left, which was disappointing in that I'd hoped to see him again before he went back to the US.
Next meeting - in a fortnight - we not only have to organise the event on the 1st but I must bring my fencing kit with me. We now have enough masks and gorgets to get some real fencing done. And one of the new fencers is a leftie. Mwuh-ha-ha...
One of the other departees is, the recipient of the hat and one of the pouches I finished last week. He will be sorely missed, although I'm hoping to see him again at LACon, if not Pennsic next year. After the meeting we - Matt, Rebecca, Joe and I - went to Three Flags, the resteurant complex that used to be the Officers' Club, for dinner. I had what I must admit was the best steak I have ever tasted. On top of that the mood music was also particularly good - Glenn Miller and a selection of other jazz and blues greats.
Afterwards we returned to Chez Eusey for chat and a game of Igor, the mad scientist game I picked up in Lancaster, which Matt won a hair's breadth ahead of Rebecca. Poor Joe was, er... collateral damage in the fight to stop Matt but it didn't work. Ah well - it was an excellent game all the same.
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This afternoon was something of a demo rather than a normal meeting as our newest recruit was bringing five friends along with her. It turns out that all of the interested folks are Air Force rather than Navy, which is probably a good thing as Keflavik is in the process of changing from a naval base to an air force base.
As a result we did a lot of the show-and-tell stuff and I also did the hands-on stuff with the tablet weaving, which went down pretty well. The new blood is particularly welcome as we've got four of the current populace leaving the island this month. Casey has already left, which was disappointing in that I'd hoped to see him again before he went back to the US.
Next meeting - in a fortnight - we not only have to organise the event on the 1st but I must bring my fencing kit with me. We now have enough masks and gorgets to get some real fencing done. And one of the new fencers is a leftie. Mwuh-ha-ha...
One of the other departees is
Afterwards we returned to Chez Eusey for chat and a game of Igor, the mad scientist game I picked up in Lancaster, which Matt won a hair's breadth ahead of Rebecca. Poor Joe was, er... collateral damage in the fight to stop Matt but it didn't work. Ah well - it was an excellent game all the same.
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Friday, August 26, 2005
Seals and Icebergs
323 miles yesterday, 282 miles today.
I had something of a rude awakening at 05:30 this morning when the mobile phone belonging to one of my room-mates at the hostel went off. No matter how much I tried to turn over and go back to sleep, I was then further disturbed by alarms every half hour until 07:00, at which point I gave up and got up myself.
Soon I was back on the road towards my first stop of the day, Jökullsárlón, the 'glacier-river-lagoon' famed for its boat trips amongst the icebergs calved off by the retreating glacier.
The lagoon is a recent phoenomenon; in 1903 there was no lagoon, only a much larger glacier. Global warming over the last century has now produced a lagoon about a kilometer or so in length, It's very easy to freeze the lagoon by cutting off the supply of salt water at the sea end of the river, which makes it a popular place for filming chase sequences for James Bond films and other action thrillers.
The tour takes place on an amphibious craft escorted by a rubber dingy - not only to rescue anyone foolish or careless enough to fall into the 2° Celcius water, but also to retrieve a fresh piece of iceberg to be handed around the visitors. The ice is remarkably clear and smooth. I discovered that the luminous blue colour that you sometimes see in icebergs is only present within the first twenty-four hours or so of that section of the berg coming into contact with air. The air causes localised heating, which in turn causes many small cracks in the ice which therefore increases the berg's opacity and turns it white.
After that it was the long slog along the southern coast. The Vatnajökull glacier is very impressive, tongues of ice snaking down every pass towards the sea then, shortly after the Vatnajökull glacier comes to an end, the Myrnajökull glacier begins. It's a lot smaller than Vatnajökull glacier but still quite beautiful.
I've decided that summer is definitely the right time to see the glaciers; the stark contrast between the rivers of ice and the bare mountainsides would be lost were those mountainsides white with snow.
Along the southern coast you can see just how much Iceland is an inhabited coastal plain and a deserted interior. The coastal plains are flat - very flat - with nothing more than a few boulders dropped when the glaciers retreated. Behind these the mountains rise sharply to a plateau that reaches all the way across back to Akureyri.
It may be spectacular, but again, too much of a good thing can get boring, and I was very glad to reach civilisation (in the form of a Subway at Selfoss which didn't have any meatballs) again.
From there it was only an hour and a half to Keflavik, ready for tomorrow's SCA meeting.
0 comments
I had something of a rude awakening at 05:30 this morning when the mobile phone belonging to one of my room-mates at the hostel went off. No matter how much I tried to turn over and go back to sleep, I was then further disturbed by alarms every half hour until 07:00, at which point I gave up and got up myself.
Soon I was back on the road towards my first stop of the day, Jökullsárlón, the 'glacier-river-lagoon' famed for its boat trips amongst the icebergs calved off by the retreating glacier.
The lagoon is a recent phoenomenon; in 1903 there was no lagoon, only a much larger glacier. Global warming over the last century has now produced a lagoon about a kilometer or so in length, It's very easy to freeze the lagoon by cutting off the supply of salt water at the sea end of the river, which makes it a popular place for filming chase sequences for James Bond films and other action thrillers.
The tour takes place on an amphibious craft escorted by a rubber dingy - not only to rescue anyone foolish or careless enough to fall into the 2° Celcius water, but also to retrieve a fresh piece of iceberg to be handed around the visitors. The ice is remarkably clear and smooth. I discovered that the luminous blue colour that you sometimes see in icebergs is only present within the first twenty-four hours or so of that section of the berg coming into contact with air. The air causes localised heating, which in turn causes many small cracks in the ice which therefore increases the berg's opacity and turns it white.
After that it was the long slog along the southern coast. The Vatnajökull glacier is very impressive, tongues of ice snaking down every pass towards the sea then, shortly after the Vatnajökull glacier comes to an end, the Myrnajökull glacier begins. It's a lot smaller than Vatnajökull glacier but still quite beautiful.
I've decided that summer is definitely the right time to see the glaciers; the stark contrast between the rivers of ice and the bare mountainsides would be lost were those mountainsides white with snow.
Along the southern coast you can see just how much Iceland is an inhabited coastal plain and a deserted interior. The coastal plains are flat - very flat - with nothing more than a few boulders dropped when the glaciers retreated. Behind these the mountains rise sharply to a plateau that reaches all the way across back to Akureyri.
It may be spectacular, but again, too much of a good thing can get boring, and I was very glad to reach civilisation (in the form of a Subway at Selfoss which didn't have any meatballs) again.
From there it was only an hour and a half to Keflavik, ready for tomorrow's SCA meeting.
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Thursday, August 25, 2005
Rocks and Reindeer
It is surprisingly difficult to tell rocks from reindeer.
You see, your basic reindeer is grey. And like, your basic volcanic boulder is also grey. On top of which gravity and glaciers have joined forces to dump big grey rocks in the middle of greeny-brown fields just where you'd expect reindeer to be in areas with beware of the reindeer signs. Which means that if you're driving though an area at fifty miles an hour trying to spot reindeer you get an awful lot of false positive sightings. :(
So no reindeer then as I drove across the northern expanse of the desert on my way to the bottom right corner of the country. I'd done the desert section before in the other direction when I first arrived on the ferry, but this time I got to Egilsstaðir on route 1 and kept on going.
After Egilsstaðir I continued south through the National Forest. Which is a bit like a forestry commission site with lots of pines in straight lines, occasionally interspersed with a clump of silver birch. The birches were looking quite impressive as their leaves gave the impression that half the tree was covered in cotton wool.
The road then continues - through the now-expected stunning scenery - another hundred and thirty kilometers to Höfn... unless you take the interesting pass at Öxsi. This is a three-figure road number, so it's one of those that is fine in summer but will close as soon as the snow hits, and I'm not at all surprised as it has 17% gradients in several places. The fifteen km of pass cuts over sixty km by avoiding a long coastal loop. In a country where spectacular scenery is the norm, this stands out.
It brings you out down in the southern fjörds to rejoin route 1. I thought that route 1 was supposed to be tarmaced right the way around, but there's a big section practically from Egilsstaðir to Höfn that isn't.
There is good reason for this in some places. For instance, while I am used to snowploughs I've never before seen a rockplough. Yes, on the southern coastal road rockfalls are so common that they have modified snowploughs patrolling the roads to clear them. When things get really bad they use bulldozers and lifting machines, but it was only windy today so there weren't any problems that the basic rockplough couldn't solve.
After that you start crossing the river deltas where the jökullhlaup happen. A Jökullhlaup is a flood caused by volcanic action under the glacier. There was a big erruption back in 1998 that swept away several of the major bridges - I crossed their replacements today. These river deltas are more beachlike than anything else, and when the wind funnels down the valleys it picks up the black sand and sandblasts your car, bicycle, bare skin, whatever.
The area is also home to literally thousands of swans. I have never seen so many swans, grouped in anything from tens to hundreds along the shoreline.
Höfn is the large town in the area... probably the size of Cupar. If that. To get to it from the east nowadays you go through a bright shiny new 1.3km tunnel which brings you out... face to face with three glaciers in valleys across the _fjörd. I'd begun to get rather tired with fantastic scenery (sad, I know) but these certainly got through to me.
I'm now esconced in the hostel at Vagnastðir; for the night. Tomorrow I plan to get a bit closer to one of these nearby glaciers.
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You see, your basic reindeer is grey. And like, your basic volcanic boulder is also grey. On top of which gravity and glaciers have joined forces to dump big grey rocks in the middle of greeny-brown fields just where you'd expect reindeer to be in areas with beware of the reindeer signs. Which means that if you're driving though an area at fifty miles an hour trying to spot reindeer you get an awful lot of false positive sightings. :(
So no reindeer then as I drove across the northern expanse of the desert on my way to the bottom right corner of the country. I'd done the desert section before in the other direction when I first arrived on the ferry, but this time I got to Egilsstaðir on route 1 and kept on going.
After Egilsstaðir I continued south through the National Forest. Which is a bit like a forestry commission site with lots of pines in straight lines, occasionally interspersed with a clump of silver birch. The birches were looking quite impressive as their leaves gave the impression that half the tree was covered in cotton wool.
The road then continues - through the now-expected stunning scenery - another hundred and thirty kilometers to Höfn... unless you take the interesting pass at Öxsi. This is a three-figure road number, so it's one of those that is fine in summer but will close as soon as the snow hits, and I'm not at all surprised as it has 17% gradients in several places. The fifteen km of pass cuts over sixty km by avoiding a long coastal loop. In a country where spectacular scenery is the norm, this stands out.
It brings you out down in the southern fjörds to rejoin route 1. I thought that route 1 was supposed to be tarmaced right the way around, but there's a big section practically from Egilsstaðir to Höfn that isn't.
There is good reason for this in some places. For instance, while I am used to snowploughs I've never before seen a rockplough. Yes, on the southern coastal road rockfalls are so common that they have modified snowploughs patrolling the roads to clear them. When things get really bad they use bulldozers and lifting machines, but it was only windy today so there weren't any problems that the basic rockplough couldn't solve.
After that you start crossing the river deltas where the jökullhlaup happen. A Jökullhlaup is a flood caused by volcanic action under the glacier. There was a big erruption back in 1998 that swept away several of the major bridges - I crossed their replacements today. These river deltas are more beachlike than anything else, and when the wind funnels down the valleys it picks up the black sand and sandblasts your car, bicycle, bare skin, whatever.
The area is also home to literally thousands of swans. I have never seen so many swans, grouped in anything from tens to hundreds along the shoreline.
Höfn is the large town in the area... probably the size of Cupar. If that. To get to it from the east nowadays you go through a bright shiny new 1.3km tunnel which brings you out... face to face with three glaciers in valleys across the _fjörd. I'd begun to get rather tired with fantastic scenery (sad, I know) but these certainly got through to me.
I'm now esconced in the hostel at Vagnastðir; for the night. Tomorrow I plan to get a bit closer to one of these nearby glaciers.
0 comments
Tuesday, August 23, 2005
Making more things
Another day of completing things.
I've now completed the first half of the database course, all of the stuff on database design culminating in functional dependencies and normalisation. That's six weeks worth of lectures and labs, which is a good point to split the course as week seven of the semester is a reading week. There are still a couple of solutions I need to do but that's not a problem. This leaves me tomorrow to sort out a few changes to the HCI course and to print out the first set of lecture notes ready for Monday.
Other than that, I've changed the ADSL contract to Vodafone, as Siminn didn't even bother getting back to me when I emailed them for assistance. Vodafone, however, told me just to take the laptop and the router in to their shop and they'd fix everything, which is fine by me. I still haven't got the strange adaptor for the phone cable yet, and although I tried replacing the cable with the strange connector with one with a sensible connector it didn't work, so I'm going to have to go into the Siemens shop to try to find an appropriate connector.
It's also tempting, when I go into Siemens, to see what they have in the way of components as I've found several circuit diagrams online for theramins. Now I've always been fascinated by the theramin, an instrument you play without actually touching it, and experiencing a theramin concert at Worldcon has inspired me. It's pretty basic electronics so it should be within my soldering skills. Of course, I'd have to buy a soldering iron too, which might kill the project stone dead, knowing how expensive things can be over here.
Still in a making things vein, I did the first piece of table weaving earlier this evening. I think I need to experiment with the whole Z- and S- threading thing for texture and also the 2-colour patterning stuff, but the warping up around two posts is sooooo much faster than trying to individually thread the cards. So something good did come out of Coronation after all.
0 comments
I've now completed the first half of the database course, all of the stuff on database design culminating in functional dependencies and normalisation. That's six weeks worth of lectures and labs, which is a good point to split the course as week seven of the semester is a reading week. There are still a couple of solutions I need to do but that's not a problem. This leaves me tomorrow to sort out a few changes to the HCI course and to print out the first set of lecture notes ready for Monday.
Other than that, I've changed the ADSL contract to Vodafone, as Siminn didn't even bother getting back to me when I emailed them for assistance. Vodafone, however, told me just to take the laptop and the router in to their shop and they'd fix everything, which is fine by me. I still haven't got the strange adaptor for the phone cable yet, and although I tried replacing the cable with the strange connector with one with a sensible connector it didn't work, so I'm going to have to go into the Siemens shop to try to find an appropriate connector.
It's also tempting, when I go into Siemens, to see what they have in the way of components as I've found several circuit diagrams online for theramins. Now I've always been fascinated by the theramin, an instrument you play without actually touching it, and experiencing a theramin concert at Worldcon has inspired me. It's pretty basic electronics so it should be within my soldering skills. Of course, I'd have to buy a soldering iron too, which might kill the project stone dead, knowing how expensive things can be over here.
Still in a making things vein, I did the first piece of table weaving earlier this evening. I think I need to experiment with the whole Z- and S- threading thing for texture and also the 2-colour patterning stuff, but the warping up around two posts is sooooo much faster than trying to individually thread the cards. So something good did come out of Coronation after all.
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Monday, August 22, 2005
Completed
Completed today: four embroidered pouches and a tudor cap.
Actually it was just the lining of the final pouch and the hand sewing of the edges where the lucet cord comes out, but it was satisfying to complete them all the same. That's four down, four to go sometime in the coming four months.
The cap was a different matter. I had sufficient fabric to make three of the four necessary layers and a pre-existing cap I'd made for myself about a year ago. I was never particularly happy with it as it was too floppy. I've worn it once and now that I have my fencing ropa I'm never going to wear the skirt and doublet it matches again, so I decided that it was time to recycle it.
Which proved to be an excellent idea. I've covered the original cap with the extra layer of fabric which gives it the weight and stiffness it was lacking beforehand. The beaded brooch I made to attach the ostrich plume also matches the new fabric better than it did the old stuff.
Tomorrow - the tablet weaving. Hmm... didn't I say that the day before yesterday?
And, for your delectation, one of the completed pouches and the blackwork fleur-de-lys in purple and metallic gold that I was doing at Worldcon.
0 comments
Actually it was just the lining of the final pouch and the hand sewing of the edges where the lucet cord comes out, but it was satisfying to complete them all the same. That's four down, four to go sometime in the coming four months.
The cap was a different matter. I had sufficient fabric to make three of the four necessary layers and a pre-existing cap I'd made for myself about a year ago. I was never particularly happy with it as it was too floppy. I've worn it once and now that I have my fencing ropa I'm never going to wear the skirt and doublet it matches again, so I decided that it was time to recycle it.
Which proved to be an excellent idea. I've covered the original cap with the extra layer of fabric which gives it the weight and stiffness it was lacking beforehand. The beaded brooch I made to attach the ostrich plume also matches the new fabric better than it did the old stuff.
Tomorrow - the tablet weaving. Hmm... didn't I say that the day before yesterday?
And, for your delectation, one of the completed pouches and the blackwork fleur-de-lys in purple and metallic gold that I was doing at Worldcon.
0 comments
Sunday, August 21, 2005
Audio sometimes isn't enough
While there are many situations in which being an audio person is a good thing, it does also have its drawbacks.
And television in a foreign language is one of them. For instance. the first ever Turkish Grand Prix looked really interesting - a new track, with the result that none of the drivers knew it at all well - and seemed to provide a host of interesting events but I had absolutely no idea what was going on.
Why, for instance, did Michael Schumacher disappear for several laps? I saw the point at which he hit the Renault, and I saw him go into the pit land and thence the garage, but then a few laps later he's back out on the track again! I think...
On top of which I think I have to finally concede that I did indeed lose my Palm Tungsten T5 at Coronation in June. I didn't have it when I got back to Iceland with me, so I assumed that it must be in the stuff I left in Liverpool. It wasn't. So I've just had one last check of my stuff here and there's definitely no sign of it. I am annoyed, to say the least.
Grr...
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And television in a foreign language is one of them. For instance. the first ever Turkish Grand Prix looked really interesting - a new track, with the result that none of the drivers knew it at all well - and seemed to provide a host of interesting events but I had absolutely no idea what was going on.
Why, for instance, did Michael Schumacher disappear for several laps? I saw the point at which he hit the Renault, and I saw him go into the pit land and thence the garage, but then a few laps later he's back out on the track again! I think...
On top of which I think I have to finally concede that I did indeed lose my Palm Tungsten T5 at Coronation in June. I didn't have it when I got back to Iceland with me, so I assumed that it must be in the stuff I left in Liverpool. It wasn't. So I've just had one last check of my stuff here and there's definitely no sign of it. I am annoyed, to say the least.
Grr...
0 comments
Saturday, August 20, 2005
We love lucets!
It is a wonderfully therapeutic device.
When Mum was down in Portsmouth at the Festival of the Sea she came across a group of Elizabethan re-enactors and the associated merchants. One lady, it seems, was sitting there making cords with a wooden lucet which fascinated Mum. As a result, both Mum and I now have beautiful wooden lucets that are replicas of one recovered from the Mary Rose.
It so happened that I needed cord for some embroidered pouches that I've just finished, and when I couldn't find anything appropriate locally it occurred to me that I have a large amount of thick cotton thread (somewhere between 5 and 8 thickness) ready for my tablet-weaving class that could equally be applied to the creation of lucet cords.
The lucet itself makes the process much easier than using two knitting needles or pencils, so the process is quite relaxing and therapeutic. It takes about an hour and a half to make a metre or cord, so I can make a double drawstring for a pouch in two episodes of Stargate. Or Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased). Or Blake's Seven. :) Like embroidery, it's one of those things for which it's really useful that I prefer to listen to TV than to watch it.
Tomorrow I shall take more of the thread and do some tablet woven demonstration pieces.
1 comments
When Mum was down in Portsmouth at the Festival of the Sea she came across a group of Elizabethan re-enactors and the associated merchants. One lady, it seems, was sitting there making cords with a wooden lucet which fascinated Mum. As a result, both Mum and I now have beautiful wooden lucets that are replicas of one recovered from the Mary Rose.
It so happened that I needed cord for some embroidered pouches that I've just finished, and when I couldn't find anything appropriate locally it occurred to me that I have a large amount of thick cotton thread (somewhere between 5 and 8 thickness) ready for my tablet-weaving class that could equally be applied to the creation of lucet cords.
The lucet itself makes the process much easier than using two knitting needles or pencils, so the process is quite relaxing and therapeutic. It takes about an hour and a half to make a metre or cord, so I can make a double drawstring for a pouch in two episodes of Stargate. Or Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased). Or Blake's Seven. :) Like embroidery, it's one of those things for which it's really useful that I prefer to listen to TV than to watch it.
Tomorrow I shall take more of the thread and do some tablet woven demonstration pieces.
1 comments
Friday, August 19, 2005
Term approaches
It's becoming obvious that term starts soon.
To start with, there are students beginning to appear in the department. So far I've had three people ask about my HCI module and one person come to see me about a final year project.
The car park is also filling up during the day again, as staff begin to trickle back from their summer break in time to prepare for pre-sesh next week and their first lectures the Monday thereafter.
I have a fairly civilised timetable this semester. No 08:00 starts and Friday free, which means that it should be relatively simple to fly back to the UK for the weekend sometime mid-semester and also that I won't actually complete a two-hour lecture before dawn this time.
Today I finished writing another database lecture. It probably takes about eight hours hours to write the powerpoints for a ninety minute lecture, and another couple to sort out the associated lab. I run a practical rather than theoretical module, so the labs get equal run-time to the lectures.
I'm hoping to get two more done next week, although I'm probably not going to be in on Thursday and Friday as I'm off to Keflavik for the weekend and I've decided to drive the long way around and stay somewhere in the south-east on Thursday night. Expect more photos.
In the meantime, this weekend I have some preparatory needlework and dressmaking to do, as well as some tablet weaving. Busy busy busy!
0 comments
To start with, there are students beginning to appear in the department. So far I've had three people ask about my HCI module and one person come to see me about a final year project.
The car park is also filling up during the day again, as staff begin to trickle back from their summer break in time to prepare for pre-sesh next week and their first lectures the Monday thereafter.
I have a fairly civilised timetable this semester. No 08:00 starts and Friday free, which means that it should be relatively simple to fly back to the UK for the weekend sometime mid-semester and also that I won't actually complete a two-hour lecture before dawn this time.
Today I finished writing another database lecture. It probably takes about eight hours hours to write the powerpoints for a ninety minute lecture, and another couple to sort out the associated lab. I run a practical rather than theoretical module, so the labs get equal run-time to the lectures.
I'm hoping to get two more done next week, although I'm probably not going to be in on Thursday and Friday as I'm off to Keflavik for the weekend and I've decided to drive the long way around and stay somewhere in the south-east on Thursday night. Expect more photos.
In the meantime, this weekend I have some preparatory needlework and dressmaking to do, as well as some tablet weaving. Busy busy busy!
0 comments
Thursday, August 18, 2005
Sequins and more sequins
Shiny things!
I've never tried working with large numbers of sequins before. When I've worked with sequins it has generally been in the 'take one sequin and attach it with a single bead' sort of way. I've never done anything that has required long strings of sequins before. It takes rather longer than I thought it would, stitching each sequin in place individually. I now understand why Come Dancing used to make a fuss about dresses with fifty thousand sequins, each lovingly stiched in place by good-old mum. This is it after about 8 hours of work, five on the snowflake (a white layer appliqued onto a pale blue layer, then covered with sequins before the snowflake is itself appliqued onto the dark blue felt skirt and outlined in beads) and another three on the long swirls of sequins.
There are eleven snowflakes and lots of swirly bits on the design, and the snowflake I've done so far is one of the smaller ones, so it's not going to be a quick project. Nevertheless it is rather fun, and I'm tempted to get the other kit in the same set (snowmen instead of snowflakes) to do for my sister. That might have to wait until next year though, as I've yet to start on the Christmas cards for this year. Or the tree ornaments, for that matter. Hmm... these snowflakes would make very nice tree ornaments... I must trace the pattersn off the fabric before I cut it out.
While I've made progress on the tree skirt front I haven't made much on the ADSL front. I have the extension cable and signal splitter, but it turns out that the phone does indeed have yet another type of plug, larger than the US but smaller than the UK one, that doesn't fit into a normal adaptor. Nor have Siminn got back to me with the configuration file for MacOS X, and although I've got the latest version of the software from the modem site, it still doesn't allow me to set things up fully manually. Looks like it could be another disconnected weekend ahead.
2 comments
I've never tried working with large numbers of sequins before. When I've worked with sequins it has generally been in the 'take one sequin and attach it with a single bead' sort of way. I've never done anything that has required long strings of sequins before. It takes rather longer than I thought it would, stitching each sequin in place individually. I now understand why Come Dancing used to make a fuss about dresses with fifty thousand sequins, each lovingly stiched in place by good-old mum. This is it after about 8 hours of work, five on the snowflake (a white layer appliqued onto a pale blue layer, then covered with sequins before the snowflake is itself appliqued onto the dark blue felt skirt and outlined in beads) and another three on the long swirls of sequins.
There are eleven snowflakes and lots of swirly bits on the design, and the snowflake I've done so far is one of the smaller ones, so it's not going to be a quick project. Nevertheless it is rather fun, and I'm tempted to get the other kit in the same set (snowmen instead of snowflakes) to do for my sister. That might have to wait until next year though, as I've yet to start on the Christmas cards for this year. Or the tree ornaments, for that matter. Hmm... these snowflakes would make very nice tree ornaments... I must trace the pattersn off the fabric before I cut it out.
While I've made progress on the tree skirt front I haven't made much on the ADSL front. I have the extension cable and signal splitter, but it turns out that the phone does indeed have yet another type of plug, larger than the US but smaller than the UK one, that doesn't fit into a normal adaptor. Nor have Siminn got back to me with the configuration file for MacOS X, and although I've got the latest version of the software from the modem site, it still doesn't allow me to set things up fully manually. Looks like it could be another disconnected weekend ahead.
2 comments
Wednesday, August 17, 2005
More telephonic goodness
Well, sort of...
I now have an ADSL connection. I can't connect to it yet, because I don't have the modem disk and the appropriate configuration file for it. Even if I had the disk it wouldn't help, as Siminn only provide setup files for M$ Windows. Tomorrow, therefore, I have to google for the MacOS X files. Ho hum.
Not a lot else has happened today. I finished writing a lecture on relational data models, database schema and relational integrity constraints. I made 54 tablets for a tablet weaving class I'm giving at the shire meeting a week on Saturday (it's amazing what you can do with a pair of scissors, a hole punch and a deck of playing cards) and bought thread for said class. I tweaked the template and style sheet for my web pages to fix the layout problem.
That's it. Nothing of interest. So tonight I shall just sit and embroider - I have a christmas tree base cover to make in time to send back to the UK for Christmas. Or, if I'm organised enough, to take back when I go to Kingdom University in November.
0 comments
I now have an ADSL connection. I can't connect to it yet, because I don't have the modem disk and the appropriate configuration file for it. Even if I had the disk it wouldn't help, as Siminn only provide setup files for M$ Windows. Tomorrow, therefore, I have to google for the MacOS X files. Ho hum.
Not a lot else has happened today. I finished writing a lecture on relational data models, database schema and relational integrity constraints. I made 54 tablets for a tablet weaving class I'm giving at the shire meeting a week on Saturday (it's amazing what you can do with a pair of scissors, a hole punch and a deck of playing cards) and bought thread for said class. I tweaked the template and style sheet for my web pages to fix the layout problem.
That's it. Nothing of interest. So tonight I shall just sit and embroider - I have a christmas tree base cover to make in time to send back to the UK for Christmas. Or, if I'm organised enough, to take back when I go to Kingdom University in November.
0 comments
Tuesday, August 16, 2005
Telephonic progress
I now have a funtioning phone.
Or at least it seems to be functioning. Siminn - Icelandic Telecom - didn't bother telling me that I'd have to buy my own phone as well as rent the line. Nor did they mention that the phone might need a weird adaptor, although it turns out that I have one of those with the ADSL box.
I've never seen a telephone connector like it - I'm used to the standard wide BT connectors and, particularly with modems, the narrow US connectors. What I have here is a strange large circular thing about the size of a European power plug, with four flat metal protruberances angled to make a truncated diamond shape, with a plastic pole just below the centre which functions, I presume, to make sure that you put the plug in the right way up. The adaptor has another hole sized to fit either a US phone jack or an ADSL jack.
I don't have internet access yet. The ADSL box, when connected, keeps flashing in a manner that the instruction manual tells me indicates that ADSL has not yet been set up on the phone line. Yes, I know, resorting to the manual is a very lame thing to do, but I've never set up an ADSL line before. And it was only for troubleshooting purposes...
According to Siminn, I should have ADSL in about a week from when I ordered it, which was last Thursday. I'm not holding my breath, but at least it gives me time to get hold of a phone line splitter, otherwise I'm going to be stuck having to unplug the ADSL every time I expect or want to make a phone. In the UK this would be easy, but I'm a little less sure of it here.
Today I also visited my favourite local craft shop where I managed to buy several things AND ask for three metres of cord. I can now ask for things, manage basic pleasantries and get the gist of subtitles, but I'm no good at all at understanding most things that are said to me. One of the assistants in another shop, when my Icelandic failed as she asked something complicated, smiled and told me that Icelandic is the third most difficult language to learn in the world.
So once I've got the hang of Icelandic I'll try Navaho. :)
0 comments
Or at least it seems to be functioning. Siminn - Icelandic Telecom - didn't bother telling me that I'd have to buy my own phone as well as rent the line. Nor did they mention that the phone might need a weird adaptor, although it turns out that I have one of those with the ADSL box.
I've never seen a telephone connector like it - I'm used to the standard wide BT connectors and, particularly with modems, the narrow US connectors. What I have here is a strange large circular thing about the size of a European power plug, with four flat metal protruberances angled to make a truncated diamond shape, with a plastic pole just below the centre which functions, I presume, to make sure that you put the plug in the right way up. The adaptor has another hole sized to fit either a US phone jack or an ADSL jack.
I don't have internet access yet. The ADSL box, when connected, keeps flashing in a manner that the instruction manual tells me indicates that ADSL has not yet been set up on the phone line. Yes, I know, resorting to the manual is a very lame thing to do, but I've never set up an ADSL line before. And it was only for troubleshooting purposes...
According to Siminn, I should have ADSL in about a week from when I ordered it, which was last Thursday. I'm not holding my breath, but at least it gives me time to get hold of a phone line splitter, otherwise I'm going to be stuck having to unplug the ADSL every time I expect or want to make a phone. In the UK this would be easy, but I'm a little less sure of it here.
Today I also visited my favourite local craft shop where I managed to buy several things AND ask for three metres of cord. I can now ask for things, manage basic pleasantries and get the gist of subtitles, but I'm no good at all at understanding most things that are said to me. One of the assistants in another shop, when my Icelandic failed as she asked something complicated, smiled and told me that Icelandic is the third most difficult language to learn in the world.
So once I've got the hang of Icelandic I'll try Navaho. :)
0 comments
Monday, August 15, 2005
One giant leap... backwards
So the shuttle is grounded until at least November, and probably longer than that.
There is now a significant chance that the shuttle will not finish the ISS before its projected mothballing in 2010. Thankfully (I think) political considerations won't allow the ISS to be scrapped, although in its current state it is a pale shadow of what it was originally designed to be, and as such its scientific worth is considerably diminished. Particularly as at present, NASA is not allowed to buy further Russian launches because of US sanctions against Russia brought in to try to pressurise Russia into ceasing providing nuclear technology know-how to Iran.
The replacement for the shuttle, the Crew Exploration Vehicle, is now on the drawing boards at NASA and, while the design eliminates the 'falling foam' problem of the shuttle it is not really forward thinking.
One of the big selling points of the shuttle was that it could land like an aeroplane. OK, while gliding it flies like a brick, but it is still a spaceplane. The CEV design goes back to the old Apollo-style stick a capsule atop a booster and just let it fall back to earth under a parachute. Not exactly a giant leap forward, is it?
While I admit that a spaceplane is not perhaps the idea craft for a trip back to the moon or to Mars - the nominal aim of the CEV programme - it is surely the logical answer to getting people and things in and out of orbit. If space travel is going to become relatively inexpensive and commonplace, the one-shot capsule-on-a-booster model cannot the way to go. Surely NASA has learned enough from the shuttle programme to build an improved spaceplane?
Now, while I desperately want mankind to go to Mars, I'd really like to see us do space exploration as more than a series of one-off Great Adventures. Perhaps if space exploration actually got the 40% of the US national budget that many Americans think it gets then we'd actually get somewhere. :) In fact, the entire unmanned space programme worldwide (except for those bits the Russians won't release figures for) has been done on less than half of the cost of a modern US Navy Carrier. Admittedly, the manned programme is more expensive, but it's still peanuts.
Puts things into perspective, doesn't it?
***
Postscript: I've just watched a brand shiny new documentary on RÚV. It was the Horizon programme on Cassini at Saturn, telling me just how exciting the landing of the Huygens probe in January 2005 is going to be.
Sigh.
***
Postscript 2: The US governement has finally given the go-ahead for the technology transfers between Scaled Composites and Virgin Galactic that will make the operation of The Spaceship Company possible.
***
Postscript 3: Space.com has a nice concise history of how the shuttle came to be what it is.
0 comments
There is now a significant chance that the shuttle will not finish the ISS before its projected mothballing in 2010. Thankfully (I think) political considerations won't allow the ISS to be scrapped, although in its current state it is a pale shadow of what it was originally designed to be, and as such its scientific worth is considerably diminished. Particularly as at present, NASA is not allowed to buy further Russian launches because of US sanctions against Russia brought in to try to pressurise Russia into ceasing providing nuclear technology know-how to Iran.
The replacement for the shuttle, the Crew Exploration Vehicle, is now on the drawing boards at NASA and, while the design eliminates the 'falling foam' problem of the shuttle it is not really forward thinking.
One of the big selling points of the shuttle was that it could land like an aeroplane. OK, while gliding it flies like a brick, but it is still a spaceplane. The CEV design goes back to the old Apollo-style stick a capsule atop a booster and just let it fall back to earth under a parachute. Not exactly a giant leap forward, is it?
While I admit that a spaceplane is not perhaps the idea craft for a trip back to the moon or to Mars - the nominal aim of the CEV programme - it is surely the logical answer to getting people and things in and out of orbit. If space travel is going to become relatively inexpensive and commonplace, the one-shot capsule-on-a-booster model cannot the way to go. Surely NASA has learned enough from the shuttle programme to build an improved spaceplane?
Now, while I desperately want mankind to go to Mars, I'd really like to see us do space exploration as more than a series of one-off Great Adventures. Perhaps if space exploration actually got the 40% of the US national budget that many Americans think it gets then we'd actually get somewhere. :) In fact, the entire unmanned space programme worldwide (except for those bits the Russians won't release figures for) has been done on less than half of the cost of a modern US Navy Carrier. Admittedly, the manned programme is more expensive, but it's still peanuts.
Puts things into perspective, doesn't it?
***
Postscript: I've just watched a brand shiny new documentary on RÚV. It was the Horizon programme on Cassini at Saturn, telling me just how exciting the landing of the Huygens probe in January 2005 is going to be.
Sigh.
***
Postscript 2: The US governement has finally given the go-ahead for the technology transfers between Scaled Composites and Virgin Galactic that will make the operation of The Spaceship Company possible.
***
Postscript 3: Space.com has a nice concise history of how the shuttle came to be what it is.
0 comments
Sunday, August 14, 2005
Supermarket boycott
The two upmarket supermarkets in Akureyri are currently selling whalemeat, one of my colleagues tells me.
As a result, I am boycotting them until they cease selling it. If a dead whale washes up on your beach then I have no problem with it being eaten. There has been, however, no news of such an event - which would surely have made the front pages of even Iceland Review - and so I can only conject that the meat is a by-product of so-called 'scientific whaling'.
I shall continue to visit the supermarkets in question - Hagkaup and Urval - to see if they have stopped selling it, but until that time I will not be buying anything there. Which is annoying, as they have both the salad bar and the vegetarian sausages. And the Laughing Cow cheese. And the Icelandic cheddar cheese, although hard cheese is less of a problem as I still have two large blocks of Monterey Jack and Cracker Barrel from a recent visit to the base.
There is definitely a case of double standards here. Iceland makes a lot of tourist money out of whale-watching, yet there is still a significant portion of the population who are quite happy to hunt and eat whales.
I am told that whalemeat should be sliced thin and fried quickly in butter. Care must be taken not to overcook it, or it will turn leathery. The taste is supposed to be something like a fishy beef. Needless to say, I do not intend to try it.
0 comments
As a result, I am boycotting them until they cease selling it. If a dead whale washes up on your beach then I have no problem with it being eaten. There has been, however, no news of such an event - which would surely have made the front pages of even Iceland Review - and so I can only conject that the meat is a by-product of so-called 'scientific whaling'.
I shall continue to visit the supermarkets in question - Hagkaup and Urval - to see if they have stopped selling it, but until that time I will not be buying anything there. Which is annoying, as they have both the salad bar and the vegetarian sausages. And the Laughing Cow cheese. And the Icelandic cheddar cheese, although hard cheese is less of a problem as I still have two large blocks of Monterey Jack and Cracker Barrel from a recent visit to the base.
There is definitely a case of double standards here. Iceland makes a lot of tourist money out of whale-watching, yet there is still a significant portion of the population who are quite happy to hunt and eat whales.
I am told that whalemeat should be sliced thin and fried quickly in butter. Care must be taken not to overcook it, or it will turn leathery. The taste is supposed to be something like a fishy beef. Needless to say, I do not intend to try it.
0 comments
Saturday, August 13, 2005
i and me
Listening to Radio 4 science programmes is a dangerous pastime.
I have lots of MP3s downloaded from the BBC, including the Simon Singh series Five Numbers and Another Five Numbers, to which I was listening while pottering around the flat earlier. I've always had a soft spot for φ, the golden ratio, myself, but it was the programme on i, the square root of -1, that got me thinking.
One of the interviewees in the programme remembered i being introduced at school and immediately seeing half of the class slipping away, unable to handle the concept of an imaginary number. Strange that - I never had any problem with imaginary numbers. After all, they're just another axis at right angles to the normal x,y and z coordinates, right?
Yes, I know it's not really that simple, but it comes back to what I was saying last week about the universe being Pringle-shaped; it's a handy way of visualising something. Similarly, I don't have any problem with the idea of y-j and z-k planes corresponding to the x-i plane. I've never done any maths that needs them, but they seem a logical extension to me. Is there any reason why you couldn't have an j,j,k coordinate as easily as an x,y,z? Although I do admit to having no idea off-hand at how you would generate j and k.
This willingness to accept a large number of dimensions as a neat mathematical trick did cause one or two problems when I was doing my Masters degree. In one class we were split into groups and given a problem to solve. I failed miserably in persuading the rest of my group that it would be easier if we created one eleven-dimensional model rather than a lot of two-dimensional ones. All we would have needed to calculate was whether any point in 11-space fullfilled a set of conditions, rather than having to add a whole host of conditions to model the linkages between the two-dimensional models. For some reason the rest of the group (a chemist, a biologist and a dramatist) balked at this idea. :)
But back to the philosophical stuff. :) When can you say that a number exists? Certainly i doesn't fit in the set of real numbers, and so doesn't exist in that sense. It is, however, impossible to describe electromagnetism without it and so, in a way, i exists because light exists. Similarly, pi; and φ, being irrational numbers, exist only in physicals items such as circles and spirals. Philosophically, then, I see very little difference between the three numbers.
Please forgive this philosphical rambling... it's taking my mind off the karaoke party going on in the flat next door.
0 comments
I have lots of MP3s downloaded from the BBC, including the Simon Singh series Five Numbers and Another Five Numbers, to which I was listening while pottering around the flat earlier. I've always had a soft spot for φ, the golden ratio, myself, but it was the programme on i, the square root of -1, that got me thinking.
One of the interviewees in the programme remembered i being introduced at school and immediately seeing half of the class slipping away, unable to handle the concept of an imaginary number. Strange that - I never had any problem with imaginary numbers. After all, they're just another axis at right angles to the normal x,y and z coordinates, right?
Yes, I know it's not really that simple, but it comes back to what I was saying last week about the universe being Pringle-shaped; it's a handy way of visualising something. Similarly, I don't have any problem with the idea of y-j and z-k planes corresponding to the x-i plane. I've never done any maths that needs them, but they seem a logical extension to me. Is there any reason why you couldn't have an j,j,k coordinate as easily as an x,y,z? Although I do admit to having no idea off-hand at how you would generate j and k.
This willingness to accept a large number of dimensions as a neat mathematical trick did cause one or two problems when I was doing my Masters degree. In one class we were split into groups and given a problem to solve. I failed miserably in persuading the rest of my group that it would be easier if we created one eleven-dimensional model rather than a lot of two-dimensional ones. All we would have needed to calculate was whether any point in 11-space fullfilled a set of conditions, rather than having to add a whole host of conditions to model the linkages between the two-dimensional models. For some reason the rest of the group (a chemist, a biologist and a dramatist) balked at this idea. :)
But back to the philosophical stuff. :) When can you say that a number exists? Certainly i doesn't fit in the set of real numbers, and so doesn't exist in that sense. It is, however, impossible to describe electromagnetism without it and so, in a way, i exists because light exists. Similarly, pi; and φ, being irrational numbers, exist only in physicals items such as circles and spirals. Philosophically, then, I see very little difference between the three numbers.
Please forgive this philosphical rambling... it's taking my mind off the karaoke party going on in the flat next door.
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Friday, August 12, 2005
Iceland - Year One
It is exactly twelve months since I arrived in Iceland.
I arrived at Seyðisfjörður at about nine thirty in the morning, spent the next hour getting off the boat, then the next four and a half hours driving to Akureyri, arriving at about two thirty in the afternoon. By now - about three o'clock - I had just arrived at the house to unpack my single car-load and move in.
A lot has happened in the last year. I've been shocked at the cost of living and stunned by the sheer physical beauty of the place. I've loved my job and hated the politics that is now ruining it. I've made new friends both here in Akureyri and down in Keflavík and desperately missed old ones in the UK and further afield. I've learned a little Icelandic and passed on some of the more quaint and picturesque bits of English that aren't normally taught in English As A Foreign Language.
At times it's been a real pain; at others an absolute joy. Do I regret coming here in the first place? No. There are certainly times when I wish I was back in the UK, but if I had turned down the opportunity to come out here to work then I would, I'm certain, have regretted it for the rest of my life. There's a passage in CS Lewis' The Magician's Nephew that sums it up beautifully; it is inscribed upon a bell in the ruined city of Charn:
I'm pretty certain that I won't be here this time next year. University politics are likely to see to that. Nevertheless, I'm glad I can out here in the first place, as living in a totally different culture has proved to be an interesting experience, one I'd recommend everyone to try for a while.
If you do, though, I'd also recommend that you take someone with you. Parts of the last year would, I'm sure, have been easier with someone with whom to share them. But that's true of most things in life, isn't it?
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I arrived at Seyðisfjörður at about nine thirty in the morning, spent the next hour getting off the boat, then the next four and a half hours driving to Akureyri, arriving at about two thirty in the afternoon. By now - about three o'clock - I had just arrived at the house to unpack my single car-load and move in.
A lot has happened in the last year. I've been shocked at the cost of living and stunned by the sheer physical beauty of the place. I've loved my job and hated the politics that is now ruining it. I've made new friends both here in Akureyri and down in Keflavík and desperately missed old ones in the UK and further afield. I've learned a little Icelandic and passed on some of the more quaint and picturesque bits of English that aren't normally taught in English As A Foreign Language.
At times it's been a real pain; at others an absolute joy. Do I regret coming here in the first place? No. There are certainly times when I wish I was back in the UK, but if I had turned down the opportunity to come out here to work then I would, I'm certain, have regretted it for the rest of my life. There's a passage in CS Lewis' The Magician's Nephew that sums it up beautifully; it is inscribed upon a bell in the ruined city of Charn:
Strike the bell, mysterious stranger,
Strike the bell and bide the danger.
Or wonder, till it drives you mad
What would have happened if you had.
I'm pretty certain that I won't be here this time next year. University politics are likely to see to that. Nevertheless, I'm glad I can out here in the first place, as living in a totally different culture has proved to be an interesting experience, one I'd recommend everyone to try for a while.
If you do, though, I'd also recommend that you take someone with you. Parts of the last year would, I'm sure, have been easier with someone with whom to share them. But that's true of most things in life, isn't it?
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Wednesday, August 10, 2005
More terrible travel
Not long after writing yesterday's post, I headed to the departure gate to fly back to Iceland at 20:40. At 20:20 there was no sign of the plane and, when asked, the ServiceAir folks finally told us that it was delayed until at least 01:40 due to a technical fault and eventually took us back to the departure lounge.
We were told to go to the information desk, where we would be given food vouchers for the delay. The information desk was empty, and it took ServiceAir ten minutes to bother answering the phone, then another ten minutes to get someone to the departure lounge with the vouchers (which we could redeem at any food and drink outlet). By now it was 21:30 and both Garfunkles and Weatherspoons had closed, leaving Starbucks as the only alternative.
In a way, Stansted is quite pleasant at night, when there's only a single flight's worth of people around. Eventually only Starbucks, WHSmith and part of the duty-free shop remained open and the quietness was quite pleasant. I sat at Starbucks, drinking a raspberry iced tea and writing poetry.
We eventually took off at 02:20 BST, landing two hours and forty minutes later at 04:00 GMT. My quick dash through the airport was hampered by a number of locked doors and unnecessary queues, but I got to the transfer bus at 04:30. The bus then didn't move until 05:15, dropping me off at my hotel at 06:15. At least no-one had had to wait up to pick me up at the airport.
Time, I thought, to get a couple of hours sleep before my flight up north at 11:00. Except that the 'hotel' was completely unmarked and didn't bother answering the phone when I called to find out how I should get into what I assumed was the building. So at 06:30 on a wet Reykjavík morning I found myself starting what was to be a three-quarter of an hour walk to the airport with my luggage. I would have taken a bus except a) the buses don't start until 07:00 and b) there has been a major restructuring of the roads and bus routes near the airport and the bus stop timetables/maps haven't been updated to take this into account.
The woman at the check-in desk was really helpful. I must have looked pretty bedraggled by the time I got to the airport and, when I explained what had happened, she managed to get me onto the 07:30 flight rather than the 11:00. The 07:30 flight finally left at 10:10 when the fog lifted from Akureyri. Had I got the 11:00 flight I would have been delayed another two and a half hours while the plane did the return flight.
I finally arrived at the new flat at 11:20, at which point I got some sleep before starting the process of actually moving in. So far I have the TV, DVD, computer and embroidery lamp sorted out, so at least I can relax.
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We were told to go to the information desk, where we would be given food vouchers for the delay. The information desk was empty, and it took ServiceAir ten minutes to bother answering the phone, then another ten minutes to get someone to the departure lounge with the vouchers (which we could redeem at any food and drink outlet). By now it was 21:30 and both Garfunkles and Weatherspoons had closed, leaving Starbucks as the only alternative.
In a way, Stansted is quite pleasant at night, when there's only a single flight's worth of people around. Eventually only Starbucks, WHSmith and part of the duty-free shop remained open and the quietness was quite pleasant. I sat at Starbucks, drinking a raspberry iced tea and writing poetry.
We eventually took off at 02:20 BST, landing two hours and forty minutes later at 04:00 GMT. My quick dash through the airport was hampered by a number of locked doors and unnecessary queues, but I got to the transfer bus at 04:30. The bus then didn't move until 05:15, dropping me off at my hotel at 06:15. At least no-one had had to wait up to pick me up at the airport.
Time, I thought, to get a couple of hours sleep before my flight up north at 11:00. Except that the 'hotel' was completely unmarked and didn't bother answering the phone when I called to find out how I should get into what I assumed was the building. So at 06:30 on a wet Reykjavík morning I found myself starting what was to be a three-quarter of an hour walk to the airport with my luggage. I would have taken a bus except a) the buses don't start until 07:00 and b) there has been a major restructuring of the roads and bus routes near the airport and the bus stop timetables/maps haven't been updated to take this into account.
The woman at the check-in desk was really helpful. I must have looked pretty bedraggled by the time I got to the airport and, when I explained what had happened, she managed to get me onto the 07:30 flight rather than the 11:00. The 07:30 flight finally left at 10:10 when the fog lifted from Akureyri. Had I got the 11:00 flight I would have been delayed another two and a half hours while the plane did the return flight.
I finally arrived at the new flat at 11:20, at which point I got some sleep before starting the process of actually moving in. So far I have the TV, DVD, computer and embroidery lamp sorted out, so at least I can relax.
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Tuesday, August 09, 2005
A religious experience
Never again will I mock Paddy or Martin for standing in hushed awe in front of the Deltic.
Rather than head straight to Stansted, Fred and I stopped off at the Imperial War Museum at Duxford. This is the home of a wide range of historical aircraft and also the American Air Museum, in which the item of veneration is to be found.
I walked into the AAM building and there it was, standing at the far end of the hanger. A real, genuine, flown at Mach 3 SR-71 Blackbird. I have a very soft spot for the SR-71. It probably has something to do with the fact that it required the pilot to wear a vacc suit rather than a flight suit. And that it's black and stylish, and unbelievably fast. It first came to my attention some years ago in an article in the Readers Digest, and I've longed to actually see one ever since. Naturally I bought a very interesting technical book on the subject, one that even details the layout of the control panels (HCI geek speaking there).
So yes, I stood there and worshipped at the shrine of the Blackbird. Which was, of course, the highlight of the day for me. They also have a wide range of other aircraft, the hightlights of which were (for me) the Bristol Fighter, the BE2c, the FE8 (although I couldn't get a good view of that as it was hidden away being worked upon), the SPAD, of course the Spitfire and the Hurricane, the Vulcan and (surprisingly enough) the original development and test version of Concorde.
Interestingly, the leading edge of Concorde's wings were painted black and divided into numbered sections (using arabic numerals for the top edge and roman numerals for the bottom). We hypothesised that this was for testing the wear of the leading edge under hypersonic flight, but don't know for sure.
There are lots of photos (many of which are of a large black aircraft :) ) which I'll upload once I get back. For now though, I'm in the departure lounge at Stansted awaiting to board my flight. I've managed to get all of my luggage into hand luggage so I'm looking forward to a speedy exit from Keflavík and to the hotel for a good night's sleep.
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Rather than head straight to Stansted, Fred and I stopped off at the Imperial War Museum at Duxford. This is the home of a wide range of historical aircraft and also the American Air Museum, in which the item of veneration is to be found.
I walked into the AAM building and there it was, standing at the far end of the hanger. A real, genuine, flown at Mach 3 SR-71 Blackbird. I have a very soft spot for the SR-71. It probably has something to do with the fact that it required the pilot to wear a vacc suit rather than a flight suit. And that it's black and stylish, and unbelievably fast. It first came to my attention some years ago in an article in the Readers Digest, and I've longed to actually see one ever since. Naturally I bought a very interesting technical book on the subject, one that even details the layout of the control panels (HCI geek speaking there).
So yes, I stood there and worshipped at the shrine of the Blackbird. Which was, of course, the highlight of the day for me. They also have a wide range of other aircraft, the hightlights of which were (for me) the Bristol Fighter, the BE2c, the FE8 (although I couldn't get a good view of that as it was hidden away being worked upon), the SPAD, of course the Spitfire and the Hurricane, the Vulcan and (surprisingly enough) the original development and test version of Concorde.
Interestingly, the leading edge of Concorde's wings were painted black and divided into numbered sections (using arabic numerals for the top edge and roman numerals for the bottom). We hypothesised that this was for testing the wear of the leading edge under hypersonic flight, but don't know for sure.
There are lots of photos (many of which are of a large black aircraft :) ) which I'll upload once I get back. For now though, I'm in the departure lounge at Stansted awaiting to board my flight. I've managed to get all of my luggage into hand luggage so I'm looking forward to a speedy exit from Keflavík and to the hotel for a good night's sleep.
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Monday, August 08, 2005
Interaction - Monday
Worldcon day 5.
No matter that a Worldcon is twice as long as any normal convention, all good things must come to an end. We checked out of the hotel this morning and, thanks to some confusion on my part, I was delighted to discovere that it was hald the price I expected. Monetary matters so easily confuse a bear of little brain such as myself.
I managed to entirely avoid the programme today as well, spending my time in Ops, doing a last minute (and very expensive) dash around the dealers' room and sitting and chatting to people. I have now managed to get about half a dozen Christmas and assorted other presents, so I'm quite pleased with myself about that.
I caved in and gave a donation to the Macmillan Cancer Relief fund in order to be let loose (with Debby and Jan) on the Tardis and its control panel. These and the rest of the convention photos will appear as soon as I get back to Akureyri.
Hmm... I think that I've bought/acquired more t-shirts at this con than I have in the last twelve months. The volunteer t-shirt (the latest acquisition) is a rather nifty one, although I think that my favourite must be the Operations Team t-shirt, partly because I was involved with the design and partly because it's a very, very limited print run (only twenty-five).
It's been really good to see everyone (and a special big hug to The Magician who I've missed a lot). I can't make Eastercon next year as it clashes with Rent-A-Don, but I have a plan for Redemption in 2007 - it won't crass with Rent-A-Don then as I shall make sure that Gonz comes to Redemption. The masquerade item for that is already being planned. I'm also considering a masquerade (or at least a hall costume) for L.A.Con next year.
We drove back to the caravan in time for quite a good chinese (the Red Luck in Carnforth has improved since I last had a meal from there two years ago) and an early night. Post-con fatigue has definitely set in.
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No matter that a Worldcon is twice as long as any normal convention, all good things must come to an end. We checked out of the hotel this morning and, thanks to some confusion on my part, I was delighted to discovere that it was hald the price I expected. Monetary matters so easily confuse a bear of little brain such as myself.
I managed to entirely avoid the programme today as well, spending my time in Ops, doing a last minute (and very expensive) dash around the dealers' room and sitting and chatting to people. I have now managed to get about half a dozen Christmas and assorted other presents, so I'm quite pleased with myself about that.
I caved in and gave a donation to the Macmillan Cancer Relief fund in order to be let loose (with Debby and Jan) on the Tardis and its control panel. These and the rest of the convention photos will appear as soon as I get back to Akureyri.
Hmm... I think that I've bought/acquired more t-shirts at this con than I have in the last twelve months. The volunteer t-shirt (the latest acquisition) is a rather nifty one, although I think that my favourite must be the Operations Team t-shirt, partly because I was involved with the design and partly because it's a very, very limited print run (only twenty-five).
It's been really good to see everyone (and a special big hug to The Magician who I've missed a lot). I can't make Eastercon next year as it clashes with Rent-A-Don, but I have a plan for Redemption in 2007 - it won't crass with Rent-A-Don then as I shall make sure that Gonz comes to Redemption. The masquerade item for that is already being planned. I'm also considering a masquerade (or at least a hall costume) for L.A.Con next year.
We drove back to the caravan in time for quite a good chinese (the Red Luck in Carnforth has improved since I last had a meal from there two years ago) and an early night. Post-con fatigue has definitely set in.
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Sunday, August 07, 2005
Interaction - Sunday
Worldcon day 4.
I must repeat to myself a hundred times: I will not think ill of non-scientists and enthusiastic idiots. Although I've done some Ops stuff again today I also made it to a couple of the science items and got thoroughly frustrated by members of both the panels and the audience.
The Christmas shopping proceeds (hurrah!) and I've even taken out a supporting membership for Redemption '07. I must remember to threaten Gonz with serious mutilation if he even thinks of organising Rent-A-Don on the same dates.
Stuart and Diane have persuaded me to go visit them next year... as a result it looks like I'm off to Worldcon in LA next September. Pennsic may have to wait a year. :)
Dinner was pizza at Pannini, an Italian restaurant opposite Pizza Hut just beyond Central Station bridge. The pizza wasn't bad, and had pepperoni in chunks not in slices, but they offered an astonishing range of delicious milkshakes,
I'd almost forgotten how much fun conventions are. The two years prior to going to Iceland had been a bit hectic and I hadn't made it even to Eastercon. This weekend has reminded me that I really must do it more often.
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I must repeat to myself a hundred times: I will not think ill of non-scientists and enthusiastic idiots. Although I've done some Ops stuff again today I also made it to a couple of the science items and got thoroughly frustrated by members of both the panels and the audience.
The Christmas shopping proceeds (hurrah!) and I've even taken out a supporting membership for Redemption '07. I must remember to threaten Gonz with serious mutilation if he even thinks of organising Rent-A-Don on the same dates.
Stuart and Diane have persuaded me to go visit them next year... as a result it looks like I'm off to Worldcon in LA next September. Pennsic may have to wait a year. :)
Dinner was pizza at Pannini, an Italian restaurant opposite Pizza Hut just beyond Central Station bridge. The pizza wasn't bad, and had pepperoni in chunks not in slices, but they offered an astonishing range of delicious milkshakes,
I'd almost forgotten how much fun conventions are. The two years prior to going to Iceland had been a bit hectic and I hadn't made it even to Eastercon. This weekend has reminded me that I really must do it more often.
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Saturday, August 06, 2005
Interaction - Saturday
Worldcon - day 3.
Today has been a day for hanging around with friends rather than actually going to programme items. An Ops shift first thing - one of the advantages of being an early riser, I suspect - was followed by lunch, a tip round the dealers' room with Debby, Bob, Elizabeth, Steven and Katherine, coffee, much amusement and a trip out for dinner with a large and varying crowd of loonies, then ending up in the bar at the end of the day.
It's got to that point of the convention when I think Wow... that's a whole convention's worth of time already... and the same again to come...wow..." A Worldcon is definitely an endurance event.
The dealers' room is taking its toll on my bank account, as expected, but at least I'm getting various Christmas presents for people. Not being able to take books back with me has helped, I suppose, but the Christmas presents are evening out the score.
Dinner was at an Indian resteraunt called Charcoals near St. Vincent Street. Very modern, but the food was good. The peshwari naan is absolutely to die for, and the chicken patia was particularly tangy. Definitely worth a visit if you're in that part of the world. Starter, main course, naans, rice and beer for five came in at just under £100.
Top strange conversation of the day: Whether you can get kourou from eating the brains of vegetarians (I hold that you they wouldn't have eaten prion-infested brains in the first place).
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Today has been a day for hanging around with friends rather than actually going to programme items. An Ops shift first thing - one of the advantages of being an early riser, I suspect - was followed by lunch, a tip round the dealers' room with Debby, Bob, Elizabeth, Steven and Katherine, coffee, much amusement and a trip out for dinner with a large and varying crowd of loonies, then ending up in the bar at the end of the day.
It's got to that point of the convention when I think Wow... that's a whole convention's worth of time already... and the same again to come...wow..." A Worldcon is definitely an endurance event.
The dealers' room is taking its toll on my bank account, as expected, but at least I'm getting various Christmas presents for people. Not being able to take books back with me has helped, I suppose, but the Christmas presents are evening out the score.
Dinner was at an Indian resteraunt called Charcoals near St. Vincent Street. Very modern, but the food was good. The peshwari naan is absolutely to die for, and the chicken patia was particularly tangy. Definitely worth a visit if you're in that part of the world. Starter, main course, naans, rice and beer for five came in at just under £100.
Top strange conversation of the day: Whether you can get kourou from eating the brains of vegetarians (I hold that you they wouldn't have eaten prion-infested brains in the first place).
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Friday, August 05, 2005
Interaction - Friday
Worldcon day 2.
Today started off with an early rising in order to get out of the hotel by 08:00. The reason for this is not an un-natural urge to get to the con before anyone else, just a combination of Fred and I being early risers and the fact that you have to start paying to park outside the hotel at that hour.
After a light breakfast at McDonalds - I do like their hash browns, I must admit - we did arrive at the SEC before 09:00. This left us character generation time before the programme started. :)
Programme-wise today, I attended a rather wishy-washy panel on genocide in SF (which tried to argue that wiping out smallpox or tigers was the same as wiping out a sentient civilisation). Things got much better a little later when I went to the XCOR talk. XCOR are one of the private spaceflight companies based at Mojave Spaceport who are working towards commercial space travel.
This included a lot of video of a Real-Life Rocket Plane and its rocket systems. I found their footage of tests of the ignition system particularly interesting as you could clearly see the nodes and antinodes of the standing wave set up in the exhaust flame. I've seen the patchiness in a rocket flame before, but this was the clearest example of a standing wave in a column of gas that I've ever seen.
I had another wander around the dealers' room and managed to pick up a couple of wonderful Christmas presents but also caved in on buying a rather stunning moleskin cloak with a knotwork border. Oh yes - and I did a bit of SCA recruiting while I was at it. I have the email addresses of several people to whom I must send information as soon as I get back to Iceland. A quick snack and I was on a panel with Cuddles in the SF Music quiz. It was OK, but rather inconsistent. We lost, but were respectably close in the end.
Then it was off to Ops to do a radio base shift. That's my normal volunteer post at conventions, as I have a fairly clear radio voice. This involved hanging around Ops occasionally doing radio stuff and most of the time having a good natter with the rest of the team.
By the time the main evening's entertainment finished and folks reappeared I was definitely tired and hungry. Tired won out though, aided and abetted by a double chocolate muffin to keep the stomach from rumbling too much. Fred and Paddy have gone off for a meal, but I'm defintely too tired and am just about to climb into bed.
Which will leave me bright, cheerfull and energetic for another Ops shift at 09:00 tomorrow.
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Today started off with an early rising in order to get out of the hotel by 08:00. The reason for this is not an un-natural urge to get to the con before anyone else, just a combination of Fred and I being early risers and the fact that you have to start paying to park outside the hotel at that hour.
After a light breakfast at McDonalds - I do like their hash browns, I must admit - we did arrive at the SEC before 09:00. This left us character generation time before the programme started. :)
Programme-wise today, I attended a rather wishy-washy panel on genocide in SF (which tried to argue that wiping out smallpox or tigers was the same as wiping out a sentient civilisation). Things got much better a little later when I went to the XCOR talk. XCOR are one of the private spaceflight companies based at Mojave Spaceport who are working towards commercial space travel.
This included a lot of video of a Real-Life Rocket Plane and its rocket systems. I found their footage of tests of the ignition system particularly interesting as you could clearly see the nodes and antinodes of the standing wave set up in the exhaust flame. I've seen the patchiness in a rocket flame before, but this was the clearest example of a standing wave in a column of gas that I've ever seen.
I had another wander around the dealers' room and managed to pick up a couple of wonderful Christmas presents but also caved in on buying a rather stunning moleskin cloak with a knotwork border. Oh yes - and I did a bit of SCA recruiting while I was at it. I have the email addresses of several people to whom I must send information as soon as I get back to Iceland. A quick snack and I was on a panel with Cuddles in the SF Music quiz. It was OK, but rather inconsistent. We lost, but were respectably close in the end.
Then it was off to Ops to do a radio base shift. That's my normal volunteer post at conventions, as I have a fairly clear radio voice. This involved hanging around Ops occasionally doing radio stuff and most of the time having a good natter with the rest of the team.
By the time the main evening's entertainment finished and folks reappeared I was definitely tired and hungry. Tired won out though, aided and abetted by a double chocolate muffin to keep the stomach from rumbling too much. Fred and Paddy have gone off for a meal, but I'm defintely too tired and am just about to climb into bed.
Which will leave me bright, cheerfull and energetic for another Ops shift at 09:00 tomorrow.
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Thursday, August 04, 2005
Interaction - Thursday
Worldcon - Day 1
We had a fairly gentle amble up the motorway today, stopping for breakfast at Tebay and then into Glasgow just before 13:00. The journey took just over the length of my recently-acquired Star Wars soundtrack CDs.
We're staying in the Corus in Argyle Street, which is functional but grossly over-priced, even at convention rates. Unfortunately hotels have a tendancy to rip people off, particularly in large cities, I have found. The receptionist was particularly insincere when we arrived to find that through a mistake in the booking system we were expected yesterday. Oh well.
Even though it's only a half-day in effect, there already seem to be a huge number of people around, and I've already met up with a host of friends. Blogging seems to have been officially noted as I have a hanger on my badge with my LJ handle. I've also surprised several people by being here at all...
The programme looks reasonably good, although I think that the real science programme was stronger in '95. I've attended two items so far, one on RPG design and another on the realism of military SF. The latter caused some discussion amongst some of us as to the viability of a military SF con - I was involved in initial talks on one a few years ago but it fell through. Perhaps it's time to resurrect the idea.
The dealers' room isn't full yet - understandably - but is pretty expensive. I was particularly stunned into not-buying by a set of six dice for a tenner. Had the dice been cut crystal or titanium then maybe, but not for resin no matter how pretty. On the positive (I think) side though I got an encaustic art beginners kit. I don't know, it seems I can now find craft stuff even at SF conventions...
Dinner was at Pizza Hut in Argyle Street, which was slow and missing many options on the menu. I wonder if they'd realised they had a Worldcon in town and were therefore likely to do more business? If they had then they really mis-calculated the amount of pizza fans can eat.
Tommorrow: More programme, an Ops shift and (hopefully) a curry.
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We had a fairly gentle amble up the motorway today, stopping for breakfast at Tebay and then into Glasgow just before 13:00. The journey took just over the length of my recently-acquired Star Wars soundtrack CDs.
We're staying in the Corus in Argyle Street, which is functional but grossly over-priced, even at convention rates. Unfortunately hotels have a tendancy to rip people off, particularly in large cities, I have found. The receptionist was particularly insincere when we arrived to find that through a mistake in the booking system we were expected yesterday. Oh well.
Even though it's only a half-day in effect, there already seem to be a huge number of people around, and I've already met up with a host of friends. Blogging seems to have been officially noted as I have a hanger on my badge with my LJ handle. I've also surprised several people by being here at all...
The programme looks reasonably good, although I think that the real science programme was stronger in '95. I've attended two items so far, one on RPG design and another on the realism of military SF. The latter caused some discussion amongst some of us as to the viability of a military SF con - I was involved in initial talks on one a few years ago but it fell through. Perhaps it's time to resurrect the idea.
The dealers' room isn't full yet - understandably - but is pretty expensive. I was particularly stunned into not-buying by a set of six dice for a tenner. Had the dice been cut crystal or titanium then maybe, but not for resin no matter how pretty. On the positive (I think) side though I got an encaustic art beginners kit. I don't know, it seems I can now find craft stuff even at SF conventions...
Dinner was at Pizza Hut in Argyle Street, which was slow and missing many options on the menu. I wonder if they'd realised they had a Worldcon in town and were therefore likely to do more business? If they had then they really mis-calculated the amount of pizza fans can eat.
Tommorrow: More programme, an Ops shift and (hopefully) a curry.
0 comments
Wednesday, August 03, 2005
In praise of Pringles
And that, my lord, is how we know the universe to be Pringle-shaped.
No, I'm not about to wax lyrical on the texture and taste of the Pringle, but rather its use to the scientific community. In the current New Scientist there is a cosmology article that discusses the geometry of space-time. It uses the usual model of a sphere for a closed universe, that of a flat plane for a flat universe, but instead of having to describe an open universe in terms of a saddle, or a pass between two gentle hills, it uses the expression pringle-shaped.
Brilliant! Inspired! At last, there is an everyday object with both positive and negative curvature. The number of words it will save scientific journalists will be huge.
I do appreciate interesting analogies. This month's Scientific American has another one, this time on how the hypothetical Higgs boson causes matter to have mass. Imagine, it suggests, a beach occupied by children. A particle, represented by an ice-cream seller, passes across the beach. The nearer children - the Higgs bosons - are immediately attracted to him, slowing down the ice-cream-seller's progress. The crowd then attracts children from further away, thus slowing progress even further. The more children, the slower the progress in the same way that the more mass a particle has, the slower it moves.
Simple, understandable, effective. In my opinion a lot of education is about this - finding a simple analogue that the student can keep in his or her mind as a reference model upon which to build a mathematical model. Certainly I got through a particular applied maths exam thanks to the fly-potato-chopstick model of rotational frames of reference described by my friend Paddy.
This is definitely a good start to Worldcon weekend. I am looking forward to a weekend of real science and geek-related retail therapy. What more could I ask for?
0 comments
No, I'm not about to wax lyrical on the texture and taste of the Pringle, but rather its use to the scientific community. In the current New Scientist there is a cosmology article that discusses the geometry of space-time. It uses the usual model of a sphere for a closed universe, that of a flat plane for a flat universe, but instead of having to describe an open universe in terms of a saddle, or a pass between two gentle hills, it uses the expression pringle-shaped.
Brilliant! Inspired! At last, there is an everyday object with both positive and negative curvature. The number of words it will save scientific journalists will be huge.
I do appreciate interesting analogies. This month's Scientific American has another one, this time on how the hypothetical Higgs boson causes matter to have mass. Imagine, it suggests, a beach occupied by children. A particle, represented by an ice-cream seller, passes across the beach. The nearer children - the Higgs bosons - are immediately attracted to him, slowing down the ice-cream-seller's progress. The crowd then attracts children from further away, thus slowing progress even further. The more children, the slower the progress in the same way that the more mass a particle has, the slower it moves.
Simple, understandable, effective. In my opinion a lot of education is about this - finding a simple analogue that the student can keep in his or her mind as a reference model upon which to build a mathematical model. Certainly I got through a particular applied maths exam thanks to the fly-potato-chopstick model of rotational frames of reference described by my friend Paddy.
This is definitely a good start to Worldcon weekend. I am looking forward to a weekend of real science and geek-related retail therapy. What more could I ask for?
0 comments
Tuesday, August 02, 2005
The Garston Tapestry
No, not the Bayeux Tapestry - this one charts the history of the village of Garston.
In 2008 Liverpool is the European City of Culture and to celebrate this Garston is to be Village of Culture. Although Garston is now an outlying suberb on the east of the city, it was an independent village with its own council and town hall until some time in the 1920s. Even today, Garston docks are a seperate entity to the larger and more well-known Liverpool docks.
As part of the celebrations it has been decided to create a tapestry inspired by the Bayeux tapestry to tell the history of the town. In fact it will be more like the Quaker Tapestry, currently on display in Kendal detailing the history of the Quaker movement in a number of embroidered panels.
This has been discussed for about a year now, but finally it looks like it is going ahead at last with Mum at the helm. Most of the panels will be done by schools, churches and other groups, but some will be done by individual embroiderers in the area, including Mum and I.
I will be doing the first panel, showing the first appearence of Garston in the history books when "Adam de Guerston gave to the monks of Stanley all of the waters that fell from his land to the Mersee in order to build a fullery" in 1182. Given that he was an incomer norman lord it seems appropriate to do it in the style of the Bayeux tapestry.
The rough design is already complete, but I need to do a full-sized pattern - each panel will be just under a metre square. I will need an appropriate latin inscription - Here Adam gives the waters to the monks or something similar - but I've already identified the bits of the Bayeux taperstry that I'll be using as inspiration for the individual figures.
It's an interesting feeling to be designing and making an embroidery that is intended to be a historical artefact.
0 comments
In 2008 Liverpool is the European City of Culture and to celebrate this Garston is to be Village of Culture. Although Garston is now an outlying suberb on the east of the city, it was an independent village with its own council and town hall until some time in the 1920s. Even today, Garston docks are a seperate entity to the larger and more well-known Liverpool docks.
As part of the celebrations it has been decided to create a tapestry inspired by the Bayeux tapestry to tell the history of the town. In fact it will be more like the Quaker Tapestry, currently on display in Kendal detailing the history of the Quaker movement in a number of embroidered panels.
This has been discussed for about a year now, but finally it looks like it is going ahead at last with Mum at the helm. Most of the panels will be done by schools, churches and other groups, but some will be done by individual embroiderers in the area, including Mum and I.
I will be doing the first panel, showing the first appearence of Garston in the history books when "Adam de Guerston gave to the monks of Stanley all of the waters that fell from his land to the Mersee in order to build a fullery" in 1182. Given that he was an incomer norman lord it seems appropriate to do it in the style of the Bayeux tapestry.
The rough design is already complete, but I need to do a full-sized pattern - each panel will be just under a metre square. I will need an appropriate latin inscription - Here Adam gives the waters to the monks or something similar - but I've already identified the bits of the Bayeux taperstry that I'll be using as inspiration for the individual figures.
It's an interesting feeling to be designing and making an embroidery that is intended to be a historical artefact.
0 comments
Monday, August 01, 2005
Lammas
Lammas dawned bright and cheerful.
So it's been sunny - except when it rained - although not particularly festive. The parental Saab went for its MOT (several days late and with parents both blaming each other) which put something of a damper on doing anything active.
I was considering making a new corset in time for the fan party at Worldcon but eventually decided that the hassle of doing anything with a sewing machine here was probably not worth it.
Nevertheless, I finished the bayeux work heraldic embroideries I'm doing on several sweet bags (at least one of which is likely to serve as a dice bag), which was a satisfying moment. I do like bayeux stitch - it works up quite quickly and produces a good texture.
For now then, I have to find something else to do to keep me out of trouble. Something to prevent me commiting a double murder. A little blackwork, perhaps..
0 comments
So it's been sunny - except when it rained - although not particularly festive. The parental Saab went for its MOT (several days late and with parents both blaming each other) which put something of a damper on doing anything active.
I was considering making a new corset in time for the fan party at Worldcon but eventually decided that the hassle of doing anything with a sewing machine here was probably not worth it.
Nevertheless, I finished the bayeux work heraldic embroideries I'm doing on several sweet bags (at least one of which is likely to serve as a dice bag), which was a satisfying moment. I do like bayeux stitch - it works up quite quickly and produces a good texture.
For now then, I have to find something else to do to keep me out of trouble. Something to prevent me commiting a double murder. A little blackwork, perhaps..
0 comments