Of course, it’s that Lego time of year. So, here is the first in a series of Lego models created.
It’s a Star Wars character. Today I would like a Princess Leia version, because sad shit has happened.
Lego 38 Model 75116
Local Radio
I have taken, again, to listening to local radio. Not local for Kent but local to New Orleans. Yep, that New Orleans. I have a bit of a thing for the New Orleans Saints NFL team and am looking forward to seeing them play next year versus my number two team the Dolphins.
About two years ago I spent time listening to WWL radio station because they broadcast commentary of the Saints’ games. I don’t think they broadcast the games any more but I do find it interesting listening to the other programmes.
I get information about local weather, the quality of the waterways and where the best fishing is. One day I ought to visit the place to get a proper appreciation of what I listen to.
WWL doesn’t broadcast to the UK via TuneIn, but you can find it and get Sonos systems to play it.
Hacking The Car
I recently purchased a new (ish) car. The name of the new vehicle has yet to be decided but some things did need to be sorted out.
As a safety feature the car beeps an alarm inside the car while in reverse. There aren’t parking sensors so this was purely to warn the driver that you aren’t going to move forward when you depress the go pedal. This beeping was annoying. Googling around soon led to two potential ways to fix it.
If the Prius is pre-2010 then you can use the following method:
Step 1: Depress the brake pedal and hold it there.
Step 2: Press the Start/Stop button to turn on the engine.
Step 3: Push the Odometer button. Push the button on your dash designated Trip/Odometer until “ODO” is displayed on the screen. If it is already displaying this, you will have to cycle through the options to refresh it by pressing the button a total of three times.
Step 4: Press the Start/Stop button. Press the Start/Stop button to turn off the engine of your Prius.
Step 5: Press the Start/Stop button again. With your foot still on the brake, press the Start/Stop button again, and your engine will restart.
Step 6: Push and hold the Odometer button: Push the Trip/Odometer button again and do not release it.
Step 7: Press the park button. While still depressing the Trip/Odometer button, put your Prius in reverse, then immediately push the Park button. Do not release the Trip/Odometer button until this is complete.
Step 8: Push the Trip/Odometer button. Instead of the usual miles traveled on the odometer display, there should be the text “b on.” Push the Trip/Odometer button until the dashboard displays the text “b off.”
Step 9: Press the Start/Stop button again. Press the Start/Stop button again to turn your Prius’ engine off. The reverse beep is now disabled, and you will not hear it again in future trips.
This, I think, is the car equivalent of ctrl-alt-del and using reg-edit and BIOS simultaneously. Now, I can follow instructions, but I wasn’t looking forward to doing this. My car is registered as a “59” but apparently it was a 2010 model as when I looked under the dash there was a OBD2 connector.
It turns out that car manufacturers have standardised the laptop connections to the car and its CPU. This makes sense and it also allows people to connect their own devices and customise or fix or break their own car.
So, I invited a friend over who tries does hack his own car and attempt to improve or fix it. He has a Bluetooth and WiFi connector and I downloaded the Carista app on my phone. After connecting the adaptor to the car and then getting the phone secure connection running the app decided to run some diagnostics tests.
After a short while I was able to pay for a week’s subscription to the Carista app and then able to change the settings.
My car no longer constantly beeps when reversing. It beeps once. Which is good.
I also turned off the seat belt alarm. That would beep constantly too if the driver didn’t have a seat belt on. I always wear my seat belt so this noise isn’t needed either.
Passengers
I’m a sucker for a space film. I love the possibilities, the stars, the tech. It just can look sooooo cool. Quite often these films leave something lacking and aren’t that good. I saw Rogue One and yesterday I watched Earthrise from Amazon Prime.
Earthrise Amazon Video ~ Casey Dillard https://t.co/pg833zrxiS via @AmazonUK
— Ian Parish (@iparish) December 24, 2016
Because I watched this at home it doesn’t get an Official Parish Rating. So it was with a nerdy interest in tech and space that I went to see Passengers, I wanted to see stunning vistas and how the film-makers had dealt with the ravages of space travel. As is custom I rated this film on IMDB and you should read my guide to the rating system.
I rated Passengers (2016) 6/10 #IMDb https://t.co/FyWAWAiUZq
— Ian Parish (@iparish) December 24, 2016
It was a perfectly enjoyable film and worth seeing, it had just the right amount of humour but I do feel that the moral issues could be covered more comprehensively in a separate film. This wasn’t a film about morals though. It was a space action thriller and as such it functioned perfectly well. Now, after here, there be dragons.
I had some minor issues with it, but not as many as with this film. So, if we allow hibernation, then we just need to look at the rest of the film to see what liberties they have taken. Mind you, coming out of hibernation looks a lot like CPR, so the travellers were more dead than deep sleeping.
The artificial gravity system seemed to be based mostly on centrifugal force [YES, I KNOW – this is why I don’t allow comments on this site]. The idea that a spinning thing in space would stop spinning when the power is switched off doesn’t quite ring true, momentum and inertia etc. But, then this does allow some pretty good visuals.
Why would little things go wrong if the spaceship was dealing with a big problem in the reactor core? I’m not sure this part of the film rings true. It bothered me a little. But, I was willing to let this go.
The swimming pool. I’m pretty sure that if the gravity was provided by the rotation of the ship then the stars outside the window were rotating the wrong way. I’ll probably have to take a few more looks at this scene but it upset something in my head and I spent a while moving my hands around in the air trying to get rotations correct. The hemispherical window was an awesome idea though.
Only one medi-pod for a ship that size? Bullshit.
When gravity suddenly turns off (?) most things will just stay where they are unless there is an impulse to them. The water in the swimming pool would have rode up the sides of the room when the spinning stopped. The sleeping characters would have moved very slowly if at all as they don’t have any forces acting on them. I refer you to Newton’s First Law Of Motion.
There are other bits and pieces but they are largely inconsequential and do not show off my understanding of sciencey shit. I do think that a film covering the morals of “living murder” would be very interesting if written by someone talented.
Oh, Arcturus. The space ship sling-shots around Arcturus. I don’t have a problem with that per se, but the ship did seem pretty close to the star. It would have fried to a crisp and everyone would have been killed by the intense radiation. While this allowed for pretty visuals [based on the SOHO observations of our own sun] the radiation shielding would need to be metres thick. Arcturus is a pretty darn big star coming in at 25.7 times the diameter of our piddly little star The Sun. It’s also 36.7 ly away and the spaceship in the film had been travelling for 30 years and had just reached 0.5c so the film makers could have done some better sums here I feel although we don’t know if the time measurement is absolute [physicists would laugh at that concept] or relative.
Last thing: The company that owns the starship made x quadrillion profit we are told. I am pretty sure that Aurora [!] then explains that a quadrillion is “a thousand billion”. I may have misheard this but a quadrillion is a million million using the US naming system. Aurora was talking about a trillion which is a LOT less money.
Quadrillion [US] – 10^12
Quadrillion [UK, but not common] – 10^24
Area 42
I had some wine the other night, which was not a normal occurrence as I have given up drinking at home. The bottle was labelled and on the label was a latitude longitude coordinates.
Clearly this had to be investigated. You can’t mention numbers that can be checked without someone wanting to check them. I remember watching an Aussie TV show called Rescue Special Ops where they mentioned a location and so I went on Google Earth to check out where it was. The writers had done their job properly as the location was definitely in the bush [there is an awful lot of it].
So, apparently Rioja is an area in Spain. These are things I don’t really know, it could have been a person or something similar but I guess it’s logical given that Bordeaux is also a place.
So, I have saved you the time of typing in the lat long. Here is the location:
It’s a vineyard. There’s also a vineyard about 506 metres away from my house.
VR Confirmed
The other day I had another go on a PSVR headset, just to see some more trailers and play another part of a game. See this communication about why I had to sell my PSVR. One of the trailers I watched was me strapped in a chair being attacked by what looked like a zombie. This was mostly fine.
Then I played a Call Of Duty demo where I was flying a space ship. I probably managed about thirty seconds before I had to stop as the feelings of sickness were rising.
It was a good thing that I sold the PSVR (which saddens me).
Rogue One
This feels like a hard communication to write and for people who are interesting in not knowing anything about this film please consider this a warning that there are going to be many spoilers.
I took a trip with some science type friends to see Rogue One, the stand-alone Star Wars movie set in between film episodes three and four. I went to the Odeon cinema in Maidstone which was fine. As is a custom now I rated the film after watching it on IMDB, you should probably read this communication about the rating system and you might also be interested in this one about Star Wars Episode Seven.
I rated Rogue One (2016) 6/10 #IMDb https://t.co/kZhNMLvUin
— Ian Parish (@iparish) December 19, 2016
I think I ought to explain this rating as a six is pretty low. Episode 7 got a ten by default but the more I think about it the more I feel I should have been more honest with myself. I’m not sure it would get a 10 now, even though I own a copy. Rogue One will probably be purchased which would default the score to a 10, but in reality the film was a little bit shit.
Do Not Read On (mostly because it is poorly written)
The best thing about this movie and quite likely the only good thing about this movie was the droid K-2SO. I would have quite happily listened to him much more throughout the film, he was the only character who seemed to have a sense of perspective, or even character. He was voiced by Alan Tudyk who has been in some of my favourite shows.
I was slightly bothered that there were no floating words telling me what had happened and that we didn’t get the Star Wars opening theme. Start with a child disobeying her father and then watching her mother killed, obviously you need psychological trauma and daddy issues to be a hero. Then we have little sequences on lots of planets that I couldn’t give a shit about and we learn that the Empire is making a massive weapon.
This film seems to be consistent with conspiracy nuts in that it believes you can have a massive infrastructure project and keep it secret from everyone, even though everyone knows this is being built. Also, it seems that the entire galaxy knows that a cargo pilot has defected with information and he needs to be debriefed.
I spent a large amount of the first act worried about intelligence gathering in a age when the whole galaxy has access to rumours and ideas. I just didn’t like it.
Then the heroine gets rescued and debriefed / interviewed in the Rebel fucking control room in front of the senators and all the bloody equipment. You DON’T put prisoners in the control room, what shit.
Then some stuff happens. I may have to come back and fill this in once I’ve seen the film again. Perhaps I can over my prisoner logistical problems.
Then we have a scene in the control room again where the Rebel senate appears to be discussing ALL the details about the secret plans in front of everyone including every pilot and vaguely important person. “The secret plans are held on this planet” etc. Arrrrrgh.
There’s a blind monk who chants shit about the force, but the film maker clearly shows him using his hearing to work out where things are, he doesn’t use the force. He’s a charlatan.
Let’s invade a planet and make it look like a Vietnam War film, that’ll keep the dads happy. I seriously felt like I was watching a ‘nam film. Bloody palm trees.
Why was there a random shutter opening and closing at the top of the data tower. WTF? It makes absolutely no sense that it is there, apart from trying to appease kids who watch and play computer games and need to get the timing correct.
So, you build a massive tower to store all your plans for every building in your Empire. Then you need a transmitter which you just happen to build on top of your tower. Finally, you place a data reader and transmit controls OUTSIDE at the TOP of the tower. Not somewhere safe inside the building. WHY would you do that? Why would you put a control system in a place where the weather will get to you? AND then you place some of the controls on the end of a platform sticking out from the tower. Fuck this movie.
I quite liked the ending.
It Says Nothing
I recently spent some time in the A&E department of a Kent hospital. This may or may not have been related to the previous communication. While waiting for the hours to pass I read every poster and most of the magazines in the minor injuries department. This is mostly foolish as none of it is interesting. I did see this though:
I will highlight some areas of this poster. You can click on the poster to see a larger version.
Apparently 72% recommend a service, maybe. We aren’t made aware of what those 72% are recommending. It could be the coffee from the machine [I didn’t see one]. Without knowing the question this set of data make no sense.
Next of note are the responses on a scale of 1 – 6.
The percentages for these have been given to two decimal places, just in case you were desperate to know. Again we don’t know what question was being asked. The poster doesn’t say.
As for the two charts, these tell us nothing new. Absolutely nothing. They replicate the data given in the list. They are utterly pointless. I’m not known for being a fan of pie charts and this one is terrible. In my opinion if you’ve used a pie chart you haven’t done the best you can in interpreting your data.
Then, most helpfully we get a list of the most recent types responses to a survey question WHICH WE DO NOT KNOW.
Now we can guess the question. We also have a pretty good idea of what all of this means, but we aren’t told. This poster could have been way more informative, way simpler to read and quite a bit clearer. It says the same thing THREE times.
I’m not really having a go at the hospital. I imagine that they have been told it’s a target to make sure they have these feedback responses pinned on the wall for all to see. The hospital doesn’t have enough time or money to do this well and so they rely on a bit of software or an external agency that then does a print run and these things are pinned up all over the place. If hospitals and the NHS could be left alone to get on with their jobs, if reform was stopped, if the staff were listened to then maybe, just maybe, things like this useless poster could be stopped and the service returned to the excellence it once was.
YES I blame the tories.
Much like the shit that is happening in education at the moment.
It’s A Concern
This is just a tiny communication to get over in a basic way my concern about the next four years with Trump as president of the USA. I’m going to quote the current POTUS, it is part of his response to being asked about being black and how he manages that when talking to people:
My general theory is that if I was clear in my own mind about who I was; comfortable in my own skin; and had clarity about the way in which race continues to be this powerful factor in so many elements of our lives, but that it is not the only factor in so many aspects of our lives; that we have by no means overcome the legacies of slavery and Jim Crow and colonialism and racism, but that the progress we’ve made has been real and extraordinary; if I’m communicating my genuine belief that those who are not subject to racism can sometimes have blind spots or lack appreciation of what it feels to be on the receiving end of that — but that doesn’t mean that they’re not open to learning and caring about equality and justice — and that I can win them over, because there is goodness in the majority of people; I always felt that if I really knew that and I just communicated it as clearly as I could, that I’d be okay.
Now compare that with PEOTUS response to a question about saying he would lock up Hillary Clinton:
Well, I’ll tell you what I’m going to do, I’m going to think about it. Um, I feel that I want to focus on jobs, I want to focus on healthcare, I want to focus on the border and immigration and doing a really great immigration bill. We want to have a great immigration bill. And I want to focus on all of these other things that we’ve been talking about.
And also what he said when asked about what the Bushes said when they called:
Well, it was very interesting. I got a call from Father Bush, who is a wonderful man. And he just said, “Congratulations. It was an amazing campaign.” And then I got a call from George and he said– “Congratulations. It was great.” And, you know, look, it’s– it’s a tough situation. I went to war with Jeb. And Jeb’s a nice guy, but it was a nasty campaign. It was a nasty campaign. And, I mean, I’m disappointed in one thing. He signed a pledge and I don’t know how you sign a pledge and then you don’t honor it. It was a rough primary. It’s a rough primary. Although I think the general was probably just as tough. Probably as a combination, it was the roughest ever.
I fear for the English language and I fear for the world.
SMP
Recently had a good weekend at SMP near Folkestone. It was a training weekend giving skills to the CCF so they are ready to get on and enjoy some of the activities we do. On the first full day the weather was pretty poor and although warm [ish] it was overcast and drizzly. The second day was much better with brilliant sunshine and a glorious sun rise. There now follows a gallery of some of the best shots I took.
One night at SMP I had to accompany someone to hospital. Arriving at 23:00 we finally left the minor injuries section at 03:15. Given that reveille was at 06:00 this was harsh, got into bed at 03:45. The following day was quite hard although I did manage a kip in the drone training room.