Ramblin' with Roger

J is for Just large enough, and Jupiter

My father painted, right on the ceiling in my room, the solar system!

When we were growing up, we lived on the first floor of a small two-story house, which was owned by my maternal grandmother; my paternal grandparents lived upstairs. On our floor was the master bedroom and kitchen in the back; the parlor, bathroom, and another bedroom in the middle; and the living room in the front.

I had two younger sisters, so they eventually slept in bunk beds in the second bedroom. To make a room for me, my father built a wall in the parlor that ran from the kitchen entrance about 2/3 of the way into the room, then another wall at a 90-degree angle from the first, leaving about an entrance to my room the size of a standard door, though I did not actually HAVE a door. Then he built a solid piece of wood – think one large shelf – held up by the two new walls and the existing wall to serve as the frame for my “bed”. On top of that was actually a foam mattress.

I did have room for my stuff under the bed, including a very low dresser. Around the corner was my bookcase, filled with my Golden Book Encyclopedias, my World Almanac, and other books.

In one of those books was a description of the solar system, and it gave relative sizes of the sun and the planets. The sun was a beach ball, Jupiter was a grapefruit; I forget the rest. So my father painted, right on the ceiling in my room, the solar system! This huge sun, and the various planets, including their known moons at the time. I specifically remember that according to the book: Jupiter had 12, Saturn 9, Neptune 5, Uranus and Mars 2 apiece, Earth and Pluto, 1 each.

And since the walls my father built didn’t go to the ceiling – there was a single ceiling light that illuminated the parlor, now essentially a hallway, and my room – anyone coming to visit us who came into the kitchen or bathroom was likely to see at least this massive star on the ceiling.

Incidentally, my father painted on the walls a lot. In my sisters’ room, there was a very good Tinker Bell and the head of Felix the Cat. In the living room, on one wall, was a stark snowy mountain scene. On the other was a marketplace in Europe done in the style, as I think back on it, of Monet.

Oh, yeah, Jupiter, named after the Roman god. It now has over 50 satellites; some may actually be asteroids, pulled in by the planet’s massive gravitational force. It appears that Jupiter has lost a stripe fairly recently, having something to do with dissipating gases. From a NASA Voyager recording, you can actually hear Jupiter. The planet 11 times the size of Earth was, on September 20, 2010, only 368 million miles away, as close as it will get for 12 years.

Finally,

Jupiter’s Two Largest Storms Nearly Collide, storms larger than the diameter of the planet Earth (Credit & Copyright: Travis Rector (U. Alaska), Chad Trujillo (Caltech), et al., Gemini Obs., AURA, NSF)

ABC Wednesday – Round 7

Change of Season MEME

At the bar sits a priest, a rabbi and a minister. A ten foot duck walks into the bar right afterwards. I know the perfect drink to order.

This is the welcome to summertime post from Thursday Thinks from the beginning of summer, but that’s largely irrelevant. I wonder if the site is defunct?

1. What’s your favorite part of winter?

The first measurable snow. Eventually, I tire of it, but early on, I like to walk in it, and don’t even mind shoveling it.

2. What was your worst summer vacation ever?

My father always took us camping. This is camping with a tent and Coleman stove and lantern, not in some fancy RV. One particular place had a bathroom that was so infested with flies that I literally killed seven with one blow with a rolled-up newspaper.

3. Tell us about the best job that you ever had.

Excluding the current job, it’s a toss-up between working at the Schenectady Arts Council (1978-79), where I ostensibly did the books, but got to be the partner for the choreographer when she needed a partner to teach the school kids disco, plus go sing at old folks’ homes with the secretary; and FantaCo (1980-88), where I got to write and do lots of different other things. SAC had the advantage of me never burning out because it ended too quickly when the funding ran out, whereas FantaCo was better for a much longer time, even though I needed to leave by the end.

4. Who is probably talking a load of crap about you right now?

Some guy who visits another of my blogs.

5. An alien appears and offers you the opportunity to repeat one year of your life. You will still know everything that you know now. He explains that no matter what you do differently when you are returned to the present nothing will have changed. What year would you pick and why?

Well, it’d be 1978, because it was a really fun year (SAC, among other things), after the VERY not great 1977. But what’s the point if I don’t get to change anything?

6. Name three things you have on you at all times. Explain why.

Bus pass, wedding ring, keys. Because.

7. When was the last time you wrote a letter to someone on paper and mailed it?

Wow. Probably to one of my sisters a couple of years after our father died in 2000 to clarify some issues.

8. If you could have everyone in the blogosphere read just one of your posts, which post would you pick and why?

I’m fond of my ABC Wednesday posts. How about E is for English language?

9. I recently read that the music industry continues to decline at an alarming rate. In the last year, it said the sales of Michael Jackson’s and The Beatles’ music are the only artists whose sales continue to climb. The article stated that the two are holding up the industry. Have you bought a CD or mp3 of either artist recently?

Actually, I bought a Michael Jackson greatest hits CD last year, and my wife got me the Beatles mono box for Christmas 2009.

10. What radio ad right now do you find so annoying that you’d rather have a tooth drilled than hear it again?

The great thing about not listening to the radio very often is that I have no answer. Though I must say that the Alan Chartock pledge drives on WAMC, one of our public radio stations around here, I find particularly unlistenable (sorry, Alan).

11. Berleen walks into a bar on a hot Minnesota day. At the bar sits a priest, a rabbi, and a minister. A ten-foot duck walks into the bar right after Berleen. What drink do you think Berleen orders?

A White Russian. I’ve read that ducks like milk, and having a drink named for a part of the former Soviet Union may signal detente amongst the clergy.

12. There is a knock on your door. It can be anyone in the world. Who would you want it to be?

There are about a half dozen people I’ve known, from college or later, but who I have totally lost track of.

13. What would be the worst entertainment or sporting that you could be forced to watch?

Extreme wrestling. I don’t care that other people watch it, but for me, no thanks.

Talk Like a Pirate Day

Those Hall of Fame Pirates must be rolling over in their graves.

Yeah, it’s Talk Like A Pirate Day. And fans of the team have reasons to go arrrrgh!

Here’s a list of players (with links) who played most or all of their careers with the Pittsburgh Pirates and who are now in the Baseball Hall of Fame:
Jake Beckley
Max Carey
Fred Clarke
Roberto Clemente
Ralph Kiner
Bill Mazeroski
Willie Stargell
Pie Traynor
Arky Vaughan
Honus Wagner
Lloyd Waner, pictured right
Paul Waner, pictured left

The Pittsburgh Pirates, a team with a long and storied history, has had 18 losing seasons – in a row. During that stretch, the Pittsburgh Penguins won the Stanley Cup and the Pittsburgh Steelers won the Super Bowl -twice.

The team has long used the excuse that it is a “small market” team that needs to keep its payroll down, and indeed, the Pirates do have the lowest payroll in Major League Baseball. But look at the next lowest team, San Diego Padres, who spent only $4 million more and are fielding a competitive team.

This article explains it all: Joe Sheehan: Don’t blame the Pirates, blame MLB’s revenue-sharing system (08.25.2010)
There’s nothing wrong with a baseball team turning a profit. What is wrong is a baseball team that cries poor while posting 18 consecutive losing seasons turning a profit. This difference is why the Pittsburgh Pirates, whose financial data from 2007 and 2008, the 15th and 16th of those seasons, was made public on Monday, are the target of such recrimination. While positioning themselves as the victim of “the system” and trading away an entire starting lineup, the Pirates have been one of the most profitable teams in MLB, pocketing $29.3 million in 2007 and ’08 combined, years in which they cashed revenue-sharing checks for a whopping $69.3 million.

The fans have rightly charged ownership with malfeasance for failing year after year to field a competitive team. If I were in Pittsburgh, I’m not sure I would continue to support such an organization. Those Hall of Fame Pirates must be rolling over in their graves; well, except Kiner and Maz who ae still alive.

Poll QUESTION

government gridlock is going to get worse in January 2011

The problem with a lot of questions done by pollsters is that the conclusion done by others is often fault. For instance, during the health care debate, a question might have been, “Do you support or oppose the President’s plan?” A majority would oppose at a given point, and his political opponents might conclude that the people felt that the plan was too “liberal” or “socialist”; the truth was some of the opponents might have thought it was not progressive enough.

So naturally, I’m going to ask the same type of question: do you think the United States is going in the right direction, and why? I say no. I fear a real push for a theocracy in this country by the Glenn Beck types. I think that the courts are not defending the rights of the underclass; yesterday, I could have talked about Miranda rights being chipped away. And government gridlock is going to get worse in January 2011.

How about you? And if you’re not from the US, feel free to add how you think YOUR country is doing as well.

The One Good Thing Is That We Learn About the US Constitution

There was a truly horrific ruling by the US Ninth Circuit Court in August 2010 allowing warrantless GPS tracking by law enforcement.

Hey, kids, it’s Constitution Day again! And boy, have we learned about the application of the foundation of the United States in the past year or so, or what?

Article I, Section 8. The Congress shall have Power
[8] To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries.

The notion of “limited” gets longer every revisiting of the Copyright law, contrary, in my opinion, to the original intent of the Founders.

Article II [5] No person except a natural born Citizen…shall be eligible to the Office of President

Yes, don’t hear as much about them lately, but the birthers, who claim President Obama is not eligible to be President, are still out there.

Amendment I Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof

This, of course, is at the heart of the so-called “Ground Zero mosque” debate; the usual line about this is that they have a RIGHT to build the Islamic center but that they OUGHT NOT TO.

There are some other interesting sidelights, such as some politicians suggesting that they should investigate the financing of the facility. This is right and proper as long as they likewise check out the funding of every new church, synagogue, and temple, and existing ones, while they are at it.

Amendment I Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of speech

Interestingly, action has been defined as “speech”; e.g. flag burning. So the Koran-burning controversy falls here. Again, people used the RIGHT TO/OUGHT NOT to conversation.

Amendment II A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

The Supreme Court’s ruling a couple of years ago protecting personal gun ownership, not just the militia part, has meant that jurisdiction after jurisdiction with gun control laws are having them challenged, forcing them to more narrowly define the restrictions on gun ownership, such as insanity of the would-be owner.

Amendment IV The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

There was a truly horrific ruling by the US Ninth Circuit Court in August 2010 allowing warrantless GPS tracking by law enforcement. Other courts have ruled otherwise, as this TIME magazine article notes. What’s REALLY irritating about the Ninth’s decision is this:

The courts have long held that people have a reasonable expectation of privacy in their homes and in the “curtilage,” a fancy legal term for the area around the home. The government’s intrusion on property just a few feet away was clearly in this zone of privacy.

The judges veered into offensiveness when they explained why Pineda-Moreno’s driveway was not private. It was open to strangers, they said, such as delivery people and neighborhood children, who could wander across it uninvited.

Chief Judge Alex Kozinski, who dissented from this month’s decision refusing to reconsider the case, pointed out whose homes are not open to strangers: rich people’s. The court’s ruling, he said, means that people who protect their homes with electric gates, fences and security booths have a large protected zone of privacy around their homes. People who cannot afford such barriers have to put up with the government sneaking around at night.

Judge Kozinski is a leading conservative, appointed by President Ronald Reagan…

The conflicting rulings at the Circuit level make this almost a certain Supreme Court case in the future.

Amendment XIV – The Fourteenth Amendment was proposed on June 13, 1866, and ratified on July 9, 1868.
Section 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.

This WAS initially all about slavery. This IS, suddenly, about illegal immigrants coming to the United States and have their babies here, making the children U.S. citizens. How frequently this is happening is an open debate.

There have been other fun Constitutional issues, such as Arizona’s immigration law, in probable violation of Article I, Section 8, but this has gone on long enough. US citizens: go read your Constitution, while you still can.