Beach
Club - March 2007
29th
March, 2007: - FIRST- Today is Mom's Birthday!
Second: trip to Quest Air in Groveland, for some Hang Gliding
went EXCEEDINGLY WELL All three of us had TREMENDOUSLY
WONDERFUL LIFT, good friends, conversation, but most importantly GREAT
FLYING!... click here
for Mr. Bill's single-flight GPS-track-log in the new glider (Wills
Wing Sport 2) - very similar to the one he's ordered
Ms. May in her glider, on the launching cart and Mr. Bill
attempting to figure out what is going on...
and here's a short video (about 2.8
megabytes of QuickTime 'avi') of Ms. May's launching / take-off for her
afternoon flight - taken on Mr. Ray's (Canon) camera by Mr. Bill
Mr. Ray with his tandem instructor, Mr. Jim. - in the 'air' over
Groveland - this was their second flight of the day
and - lastly - a couple of more pictures of Ms. May (in her
harness, hooked to her glider - on the launching-cart (ready for a
take-off-tow-up)
(she's WAY MORE Photo-Genic than Mr. Bill) - small_image
- large_image
Today (Wednesday, 21st) I visited (and kited and sailed
(but no-track-logs - I mis-configured the GPS - sorry)) at USSCMC and
met the new staff member, since Mr._Peter is on vacation for the next
week - the 'management_board' hired this new guy to help_out...
Managed to mangle some ribs or something on a 'hard'
landing from kiteboarding - but I'm still walking around and breathing
with no problem(s)... There was A LOT of wind today -
20-30 knots and it was AWESOME good for about an hour but I suspect
that a smaller sail and/or kite (and/or both) are in our future - too
much wind, today, for the smallest things we have.
Today
is Sunday, 18 March: did some yard-work this morning and
kiteboarding this afternoon - track-log-file ( small
) / ( large )
Today
is Saturday, 17th March - went bicycle riding (15 miles - round
trip - first half against a VERY GOOD wind - wish I'd had my kiteboard
gear, but there are people who say that Lake Okeechobee has 'gators'
(with BIG TEETH!) at / on the "L.O.S.T." (Lake Okeechobee Scenic
Trail) ... - link to the
'GPS-Track-Log'
here
This
afternoon is 16th March (Friday) and Ms. May's off to visit family and
Mr. Bill is (when the cat's away) off boardsailing!...
this is a 'close-up' of a much much bigger-image...
- Full image -
small; Full image - large.
and - here's a track-log (small) and 'track-log (large) of the events
(speedy) of the afternoon-session (before the rain, thunder,
lightning!)....
Today
is the 15th of March... - (well actually EARLY the morning of
the 16th) -
Mr. Bill has maintained two power-boats this week (the old 'pay me now
or pay me
later' thing) - you can put in 20-40 minutes a month on these things or
give-up and do 1/2 day every six months - I guess that's what I did -
lots of battery-charging, new minimally priced parts, some fuel hose,
etc. etc. etc.
But they both run, now (the Boston Whaler (14 foot)
Jet-boat, and the SeaDoo (I took the Sea Doo for a ride out in the
Indian River and it runs TERRIFIC!...) Ms. May has a friend
coming from
Detroit in about 10 days and the maintenance was (at least ostensibly)
so that we would have a couple of alternatives for him when he comes.
However, I NEEDED to do this anyway - his impending visit was just an
incentive to quit procrastinating! - something I will do a lot of
without incentives!
ALSO - we are ready to go bicycling around Lake Okeechobee, and
kayaking and other such things are 'ready'. We could also expose
him to our poison ivy if he's interested, and/or weed-pulling and/or
other yard-work and beautification projects, but only if he's
interested....
New pictures of our emerging and ever-increasingly
delicious looking mangoes.
(click on delicious mango image for larger image (warning - if you
click for bigger image it is REALLY BIG and the mangoes in the picture
will make your mouth water AND they are way-bigger than the
'real-thing' - the 'real' size is about what you see above)
Every oncet in a while we have to 'stuff'
(almost) everything in the mini-van - ( larger
image
here! ) maybe we can get a larger van because all the
"Stuff" for everything we do is NOT in HERE... (BUT - you will
find: Bicycle (and helmet and shoes), Landsailor ( (board and
wheels and trucks) two landsailor masts-sails on the roof), 2
sail-boards (and two sails and two masts and one boom) and one
board-sailing harness) two kiteboard kites, and one (kite) board and
one kite-board-control bar and one (kiteboard) harness, to say nothing
of various GPS units, tools, water, food, granola bars, maps, 2-way
radios (one 2-meter amateur (for Hang Gliding) one VHF-marine-band etc.
etc. etc. etc. AND a "Dai Fui Tong" to hold wet-sandy gear
when we are done with whatever we are doing! OH
- and Don't forget Mr. Panda Bear - our "co-Pilot"
When Mr. Rays comes to visit we have to squeeze in another seat
for him - take out some gear and pack for only one sport at a time,
meaning we have to make decisions before hand!
And - Ms. May was gone the whole
month of February, - here's what she was up-to during that month, while
visiting her good friends Ms. Lily_Liu and Mr. John_Hasegawa, in
Emporia_Kansas. Ms. May was helping Lily & John and their
new young-son, Mr._Kiyoshi.
?
Here's a picture of Mr._Kiyoshi and Ms._Lily...
Today (5 March) Mr. Bill
went Kite Boardling
and it were GOOD!
And a brief Food Review:
Mr.
Bill's Wonderous After-BoardSailing (and after Kite Boarding)
snack! Click here for package
view or a BIG PACKAGE view
These are about the tastiest
things you can imagine. There are two flavours we like - Peanut
Butter
and Grape and Peanut Butter
and Strawberry (the grilled-cheese are
decidedly "BORING!" - don't worry about them).
I had found
out about these 2-3-4 years ago while helping-out at the (sailboat)
races at the
(above mentioned) US Sailing Center of Martin County
(USSCMC)... When they had
made-up lunches for volunteers helping-out with the races they had
frequently given us these little goodies. BUT I could NOT
FIND THEM in the
grocery store - and failed to think about
asking?! RECENTLY when
I was in Jacksonville, visiting my Mom; I was in a nearby
Publix - and
some lady was buying about 6 boxes of these things. So now I know
they are in the Frozen Foods section - 'Breakfasts' sub-section - so -
NOW I KNOW where to FIND THEM... They are not cheap (but -
then - again - they are not expensive, either) - 'about' $5.69
for a box of 10...
whoops - sorry - we had to have at least ONE PICTURE on the FIRST DAY
of the month - sorry - couldn't find anything else to take a picture of
so you'll have to suffer with this / these...
Though this picture-image isn't the best in the world - I've attempted
to enhance the contrast so that you can see the difference between the
sky and the 'clouds'. This is actually not clouds, but the
fire-plume of a HUGE forestfire not far (well 20 miles) from where I
was hang-gliding on Sunday, (25th February). It's an
island near the southwest shore of Lake Okeechobee which burned for 3-4
days and there wasn't much anyone could do because of the fact that it
is an island and the 'terrain' wouldn't support fire-trucks even if
they could have gotten them onto the island. The ash and smoke
went over 70 miles to the east - near Stuart (where we live) and other
nearby towns.. It was all over the radio and TV news for days...
ANYWAY _ click on the image for something (MUCH) larger. - but it was
stunning to see this fire in the making and then to hear about it on
the radio for 3-4 days...
This is March - Mr. Bill's going
to be OLDER this month - but I guess he doesn't feel, necessarily,
older (most of the time)...
On the other hand - last month
(Febraury) he did "" about "" 3 dozen foot-landings
during the scooter-tow clinic at Quest Air and maybe after that his
hips, knees, and especially right foot felt "OLD"...
But - Now he seems to have recoverd, mostly...
ALSO - he will begin, again, teaching (CAD) at IRCC (Indian River
Community College (nearby at / in St. Lucie West - about 30 minutes
away from home)). I'll be teaching Landscape CAD,
again, and I
have now put most of the materials on the IRCC web-site - and that's a
huge step for me, but I will still need to do more on that area.
I spent a couple of days at the IRCC campus where I'm to teach and the
IT department has 'munged' the computers-again - so I have to 'repair'
all 15 of them, now - change / make / copy some new files!...
ANYWAY _ March holds great potential, this year. More on this
site, later.!
Here is a recently discovered opportunity for BIG FUN: go to this
web-site: http://www.rgstudios.com
- - at the 'Home Page' click on 'Animations' -
- - once there - click on "Short Films" (the
left-most item in the graphic-window)
- - then download and watch the file "Contact 2" (apx: 12.5
Megabytes of QuickTime video - about 3 1/2 minutes worth of video FUN!
(RG (Animation) Studios is the home of Mr. " Bakkom " who is featured
in a number of EXCELLENT cartoons - one of which has to do with Hang
Gliding - that's where I first met him...
Kiteboarding in order for this afternoon (18-28 mph) - but
thunderstorms loom (I'm not really into lightning when I have four
pieces of wet-line 130 feet long in the air - so we'll have to see what
the weather holds...
Movie
Reviews:
There are several reviews here - two of them seem to have
the
actress " Claire
Forlani
" (a Wikipedia link) something I didn't realize when I got these DVDs
from the Library. This lady is the love-interest (of
"death" in
the personage of Joe Black) and daughter of the Anthony_Hopkins
character in the movie " Meet
Joe Black
" (another Wikipedia link).
Flightplan - 2005 - Jodie
Foster at her best as the neurotic & grieving Mom - this time she's
on a HUGE airplane and her daughter has disappeared...
(She's going home to America, with her daughter, after her husband was
killed in Berlin; and his body is in a coffin in the cargo-hold of the
aircraft) - I won't enlighten you to the details or the ending -
but - for a short movie (98 minutes) this one REALLY keeps you on the
edge of your seat and the concept is HUGELY moving.
What IF you are a Parent and your child disappears at 40,000 feet -
WHAT can you do - what is / are the legal, ethical, moral issues. -
this movie studies that - and in the end - we are all 'subject to' the
vagaries of the 'losing it' passenger on our next flight!
IMDB
link Wikipedia
link
(Caution - Plot and ending is
spelled-out in great detail on the Wikipedia web-site)
Official
movie
Web-site
Final Fantasy
(a Wikipedia link to the RPGs) - there is a series of RPGs (Role
Playing Games) - started in Japan in the mid-80s.
However what I am referring to here is a DVD-Movie
<==
Internet Movie Database link (with the voices of Ming Na (also the
voice of Mulan in the Disney Film) , Donald Sutherland, Ving
Rhames, James Woods, Alec Baldwin (amongst others)).
This is an amazing 'state of the art' (at least in
2001) that shows what FULL Computer Graphics could do (then) - the
'whole-human' (hair, eyes, eyelashes, blinking, skin, cloth-draping, as
well as machines, aliens, etc. all animated...) An
ENTIRELY FULLY_ANIMATED film - a bit on the lines of 'Toy Story'
(completely animated) but with humans instead of
toys. They have (at this point) the hair and many
other human features 'down-pat' but I hesitate to perceive the amount
of computing horsepower it took to 'render' this entire 100 minute
film!!! - The Internet Movie Database link above points to a lot of
information about the (basically) Japanese heritage of this (as well as
many other) of these 'Fantasy' and/or Role Playing games and/or movies
-
As a comp-u-geek - this represents where technology was - and why - in
probably considerably less than another 5 years we'll be watching more
and more movies with less and less 'real flesh and blood' doing exotic
things - it's WAY CHEAPER to have things done in the studio with
software than it is with real-humans?
The
Pentagon
Papers - With James_Spader and Claire_Forlani - about the
life and the mental gymnastics, the soul searching, and
decision-making-process(es) that Daniel Ellsberg went through before
releasing the 7,000 page " Pentagon
Papers
" (a Wikipedia link about the actual legal case (as opposed to the
movie)) through the New York Times in the early 1970s.
Though the movie is vintage 2003 - the subject matter is the Vietnam
Era which is - what - 35 years old at this point?
The Medallion -
yet another Jackie_Chan Movie about a small boy with super-human
powers that he holds (through his possession of the
"Medallion"). Apparently this movie was not
nearly as
successful, in the USA as Jackie's other US-audience-specific
movies,
but I believe it has more 'value'... I is definitely
a
contrast to the above mentioned Pentagon Papers movie - which
represents 'true-life' events of Daniel Ellsberg.
Catch That Kid
- a teenaged
girl "Maddie" (Kristen_Stewart) doing roped-climbing and go-karts
features in this movie about
stealing $250,000 so that the girl's Dad can get a back operation in
Denmark to
repair a spine-injury from a mountain climbing accident that has
paralyzed him. - pure entertainment - kid's movie - not a lot of
'thinking' required, BUT if you're interested in a cute young lady and
lots of 'action' then this is it... Sort of reminds one of
Jennifer_Garner and Alias on TV.
Foyle's War (TV-series) - Foyle's
War (They
fought in the fields (movie)) - a VERY engaging movie about the
'intricacies' of life 'at home' (in Great Britain) during the second
World War, and what it took to investigate murders, and find those
accused - this movie is not long but it is intricate in it's plot
development and 'who-done-it' weaving of various plot lines all related
to the murder of a single farmer... - VERY engaging! - one you do
NOT want to 'fast-forward' through various parts and pieces
Zathura - a movie (for kids (but
very much 'fun')) in the vein of "Jumanji" - found in the basement - it
takes the whole house into outerspace and - of course villians, robots,
and bad-guys (and a good-guy, too!) - Mr. Tim Robbins and Ms.
Kristen Stewart are 'stars of little note' but the 'key players' are a
pair of 'brothers' who are just awesome in this terrific - fun -
imaginative movie about life in the 'fast-lane' in outer space with
your house as your space-ship. - A LOT of Fun - but definitely
kid's entertainment.
Book Reviews:
Cold Moon by Jeffery Deaver -
another "Lincoln Rhyme"
(murder-mystery) novel - very good and it extends the concepts of the
'Bone Collector' (a previous work by Jeffery Deaver - made into a movie
starring Denzel Washington and Angelina Jolie)
Trap Line - by Carl Hiaasen and
Bill Montalbano - 1984 a REALLY OLD
Hiassen book that covers the drug-smuggling trade in / out of / around
Key-West - a VERY 'gritty' book about the real insides of
drug-smuggling - lots of people die grisly deaths in this
20-plus-year-old title. There are two other books
that Carl wrote
with Bill - "A Death in China" and "Powderburn" - our local (Martin
County) Library doesn't carry these, but the library in St. Johns
County (where my Mom lives near Jacksonville) does have these so I'll
get them when I'm up there, next...
Courting Trouble - by: Lisa
Scottoline - another lady-lawyer-book about
the Philadelphia legal scene, quite unique, though, in that one of the
lady-lawyers is mistakenly taken for dead. VERY well done, Ms.
Scottoline is an expert at bringing humor and intrique into her
plot-lines.
The evolution of useful things
- by: Henry Petroski (1992) enlightens you as to the history of things
like paperclips, spoons, can openers (removeable pop-tops (I stepped on
one of these, once, - went ALL THE WAY into my heel) forks, McDonald's
styrofoam hamburger containers, wheelbarrows, etc. etc. etc. -
VERY interesting, older, and somewhat esoteric book.
Powder Burn - Daniel Glick -
2001 about the fires at the Vail ski-resort area - same
basic name as another book by Carl Hiaasen and Bill Montalbano (noted
above) - just thought I'd see what this one is like... - based,
obviously, on true-events (1998 fires & such) but the subtitle
is: "Arson, Money and Mystery on Vail Mountain. - Kind of entices
one to want to go there and do some snowboarding or whatever?
in-process:
Tourist Season - 2004 - by:
Carl Hiaasen - excellent addition to his library - about - (as one
might guess) Tourist(s) in South Florida - specifically a missing
Shriner, amongst others
The Prize - by: Daniel Yergin -
1992 - about the oil industry - history - key originating
players, exploration, production, third world countries, etc.
etc. etc.
Coffin Dancer - another by
Jeffrey Deaver
last update: 08:16
a.m.
Saturday, 11 October 2013; revID: 2d
