The second one drew 1417 comments.

I think my browsers are just too old to work with the new hotness(es).

It all needs updating, drastically.

Rocket launch as seen from the ISS:



I was expecting more of a show, but, still pretty kewl.

https://www.facebook.com/94836357189...6547093279978/


the lengths some folks'll go to to get a bath

That water is going to get ripe. :rolleyes:

This will leave you saying. wtf did I just see... I'd embiggen it.

Weirdo. Irons his jeans?

Because at 230mph, inches away from other cars or the wall, the driver needs more entertainment.


Yes I know she is intelligent and highly skilled light years beyond anything I could achieve, but damn, she is pretty. :blush:

I noticed those for the first time last weekend.

Inside the Blackbird...

Seven minutes of joy!

It will bring a smile to even the most jaded cheek. :thumb:




Another one from Brendan, this time with vocal accompaniment.

What a voice!

I shall view that in conjunction with my copy of the pilot's notes.

No, I am not joking...

Attachment 68067

Still the most awesome-looking thing that's ever flown.

Sinister:devil:

I can thoroughly recommend Lockheed Blackbird: Beyond the Secret Missions by Paul Crickmore.
There's plenty of choice on Amazon.com from about $21.
I haven't linked to the page given that availability and pricing tends to vary from one day to the next.

Abebooks.com is also worth a look, but check which edition is on offer.
The latest edition was published in November 2016.

In the meantime, Google 'SR 71 Baltic Express'.

Those public music vids can brighten a morning.

Hey guys, women drivers:facepalm:, know what I mean?



;)

I love the maker corner of YouTube, like Adam Savage and Simone Giertz:

Simone spends more time babbling than working by a factor of six.:eyebrow:

This Nigerian kid is pretty clever...

Beekeeping, 1981, Atkinson and Cleese. Cleese ranks this as the second best sketch he's ever done (behind the Cheese Shop sketch)

Whaddaya know? They work together! Or, more accurately, against each other.


(just a promo for the show, not the whole thing)



Spoiler for the show: Simone wins.

My stomping ground...

When I talk about walking Carrot up Beacon Hill, or down in the valley, this is where I mean:

I'm not into the Hip-Hop scene, but very impressed with the physical abilities of these dancers. :eek:

I agree as to their athleticism, but St. Vitus also comes to mind.

Feeding the turtles watermelon...

Attachment 68260

Big Bad Bill likes watermelon, too.

We will NOT be hand-feeding this sumbitch.

No, no way, not a chance...

Evolution in beads. Embiggen suggested.

This morning I read a review of the book 'Confessions of a Bookseller' by Shaun Bythell. No, it's not what you think.

He owns a second hand book shop in Wigtown, which is Scotland's centre for the trade and, in the review, comes across as somewhat irascible, a Basil Fawlty type as it were.

I had a dig around and found his website and a video in which he reads an extract from his earlier book 'Diary of a Bookseller'.

It shines a light on his character quite nicely.

I did not know a country could have a center for the used book trade...

Hay-on-Wye, just on the Welsh side of the Wales-England border, is another regional centre for the second hand book trade.

Quite why is a bit of a mystery, although judging by the numbers of booksellers I think that they have probably established a breeding colony there.

Somebody get David Attenborough on the phone. He should be able to advise.:)

Chances are he already has.

A crazy rescue from an unknown world...

Wikipedia fleshes out that great story a little:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1945_N...Special_rescue

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glider...k-up_technique

Trying to figure out how two gliders can be picked up on one trip.

Here, too:
https://www.npr.org/2011/04/26/13571...-in-shangri-la

"...when you have no choice, you have no fear..."

They can't, at their altitude the could only fly out a glider with 5 people, then fly one in and fly 5 more people out. They did that three times as explained in minute 7 of the video.

From the second Wiki link above, about the technique in general:

"The steel wire was then winched in. It was possible for one plane to pick up two gliders in this way, in two passes."

Just for laughs.
 

There was another extraction technique available, from around 1943, as you can see about 20 seconds into this video. :lol:

It wouldn't become refined as the Fulton Extraction Technique for another dozen or so years though.



Setting up a pick-up zone, as seen at the beginning of the video, was part of my training. A CIA STOL aircraft with hook actually came in to make sure it worked.

I've seen an IRL Fulton Extraction. Better them than me.

Yeah I don't get it, the first glider is going to be a ways behind the tug so I can't see how that wouldn't get in the way of grabbing a second. Maybe the glider pilot flies it higher than the tug out of the way? After all it is a plane. :confused:

Arial view of an English gent working his garden.
Probably not typical as this garden is the 12,000 acre Warter Priory.

I liked that vid, thought it was Kansas.
The twin tracked tractor has one humungous muffler.
BIG bales of hay.
Do-si-do square dance move with the two discers.

Same place, part of a series, wheat not hay:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dMWJvxgHtmw

Those three string bales of straw are probably close to 150 lbs, man my back hurts just thinking about them. I preferred the 65 lb bales you could grab one with each hand to stay balanced.

Looks more like six string and probably 1000 lbs +.
But there has been a conspiracy over the years between balers and gravity to make them nearly impossible to raise off the ground, leading to stackin' 'em knee-high instead of shoulder.

I tried working with those small bales once, unloading the truck at a small farm. After a half hour, I had to quit, because my throat was closing and my skin was breaking out in hives. Allergic.

I spent an afternoon doing that too. Stacking them on the wagon as the tractor spat them out. Not the best work out there. I prefer being a desk jockey.

Good way to earn a little extra do-re-mi, though.

Done it way too many times. And sometimes for free. And by free I mean trading labor today for someone else's labor later.

14 hours a day at $.90 an hour 4 to 6 days a week, fair money for a 13/14 year old.

By the hour?!?! Fuck that.

We were paid by the bale. Damned if I can remember how much...no clue. But you could make a pretty good lick in a long day.

A dime/bale, maybe...

Stack 'em three wide, 12 high, 15 ft long on two trucks, and 22 ft long on two trucks. Two guys on the ground and one on the truck, we'd load the four trucks in just over an hour with Grandpa Lipshitz (came to this country in 1911 with 35 cents yada yada) driving. 90% of the time they would have to be roped down for over the road, CT po-po frowned on leaving bales on the road. You could smoke in the cab but not in the field, and had to spit on the dash and snuff it when you were done.

Almost all of my hay hauling (of my own cut and bale as well as bought) has been in my '60 GMC 3/4 long bed step side and most of that has been 33 bales a load.
Been at it 47 years.
Never lost one on the road (knock wood), but a bunch picking up in the field. God I hate to pick 'em up and stack 'em a second time. Those have mostly been from leaving the truck in granny and working at its pace.
Both glad and sorry that is behind me.

Stake body with no stakes and 12 high we had to rope and loadbinders, front to back on the two outside rows. They owned two farms about 12 miles apart plus leased hay fields as far as 20 miles away in order to feed 400 milking head plus the dried off, calves, and heifers. I don't want to go back but I wish I could still do it. ;)

Chaindogs.

Man, I used to think those things were manufactured worn out. I don't know how many I've pulled the hooks out of. Wanting to go too tight, I reckon

Fuck a bunch o' chaindogs. If I never see/use another one, I'll die happy enough.

Amazing Octopus is amazing...
embiggening recommended

That octopus dance needs an appropriate score.
He/she about 5 feet long.

Anything from 2001: A Space Odyssey would do.

Also sprach Zarathustra:



Start this bit, then start the octopus vid muted, and embiggened.

High tower crane building itself...

Supplements on crane building:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y39152VWCPk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WBRtatxhUq4

Climate Change Activists Use Fire Engine to Spray Red Paint at UK Treasury



I gather that there is a version with the Benny Hill theme as soundtrack but I haven't been able to find it as yet.

Anyway, if you want the story, as opposed to a cheap laugh, here you are:

LINK

Some nice video from the E/V Nautilus.

A whale carcass:





Better bigger. And in full HD.

It was never going to end well...