Flat Earthers

Seems a rapper by the name of B.o.B. ascribes to the same notion. :)

Neil deGrasse Tyson's response to the esteemed B.o.B is priceless.

Day for Night Test III

Informal to the max, this is a hand-held test of the A7S II under a full moon using various lenses and ISO from 1600 - 16000, all clips shot @ 1/30sec, something unheard of just one year ago. Day for night is nigh with deep tech like that of the A 7S II. Enjoy

To be human

Blizzard 2016

Blizzard 2016 from Robert Moran on Vimeo.

The Blizzard of 2016 has come and gone and fortunately, CT got only 12 - 16", not the 3' plus of other areas. To that end, here is a short clip showing beginning, middle & glorious end of a storm that hit the East Coast at the best possible time. Enjoy.

Ether Or but Not Not :)

Either or but not not. :)

Night Walk - Rev I :)

Yours truly loves to take walks as, in a way, it's like cycling but on a slower and easier scale where your body moves but your head stays "relatively" still while being of the world but not in it. To that end, a brief clip showing the wonders of night and man's defense against it seems a fun way to pass the time so please enjoy the environs of a pretty cool little town in Fairfield, CT. :)

Fire on the Mountain

This pix, in some strange way, reminds me of the Dead's Fire on the Mountain, a jam of power and a subtle reference to the overwhelming indifference of reality vis a vis the existence of man. Powerful stuff indeed, something yours truly is sensing in America and the world in terms of where mankind is going when assessing the self inflicted wounds we have placed on ourselves as well as the inflicted wounds we have placed on Earth, the place we call home.

Until next time ...

Long distance runner, what you standing there for? (note 1)
Get up, get off, get out of the door (note 2)
You're playing cold music on the bar room floor
Drowned in your laughter and dead to the core
There's a dragon with matches that's loose on the town
Take a whole pail of water just to cool him down

Chorus
Fire, fire on the mountain
Fire, fire on the mountain
Fire, fire on the mountain
Fire, fire on the mountain

Almost ablaze, still you don't feel the heat (note 3)
It takes all you got just to stay on the beat
You say it's a living, we all gotta eat
But you're here alone, there's no one to compete
If mercy's in business, I wish it for you
More than just ashes when your dreams come true

[chorus]

Baby's in scarlet, her shackles in gray
If loves to love she's got it salted away
Out of the rat trap and under the wire
Out of the frying pan and into the fire
Put it down heavy, strip it down lean
Got to lay it down dirty and play it back clean

[chorus]

Fireman, fireman, call off your dog
This isn't a blaze, it's just a hog in the log
Cut up in sections, squirming alive
Lost to the world on that fifty-cent jive
There's a fire on the mountain, running around
What doesn't go up can never come down

[chorus]

Long distance runner, what you holding out for (note 4)
Caught in slow motion in a dash to the door
The flame from your stage has now spread to the floor (note 5)
You gave all you had, why you want to give more? (note 6)
The more that you give, the more it will take
To the thin line beyond which you really can't fake

[chorus]

Jamming @ The Meeting Place Pub

Yours truly has a great weakness for improv music whether it be rock, Bach, Bluegrass, Jazz & Irish, with a little bit of Johnny Cash to add to the mix. To that end, a good friend of mine did a BG jam at a nearby pub with some really talented young musicians by his side. Check it out, you won't be disappointed. :)

When you think about it ...

When you think about it, isn't it rather ridiculous to think about the smallness of earth's religions in comparison to the size of the known universe? Something to think about, don't you think?

Alan Rickman - A Class Act to the Max.

This charming video that saves lives by having us view it, was voiced by Alan Rickman, a class act to the max, who died this week at 69, the same age as recently deceased David Bowie a  musician whose work will stand the test of time. From all accounts, not only was Rickman an actor's actor but also was kind and loyal to a fault, traits all too rare in this dog eat dog world of 2016.

The world of stage and screen is in mourning for one of its most singular and best-loved stars. Alan Rickman died on Thursday morning aged 69 after suffering from cancer. His agent said that he died at home, surrounded by family and friends.

Emma Thompson, who had collaborated with Rickman on the likes of Sense and Sensibility, Love Actually and Rickman’s directorial debut, The Winter Guest, spoke of her immense sadness, having “just kissed him goodbye”.

“What I remember most in this moment of painful leave-taking is his humour, intelligence, wisdom and kindness,” she wrote. “His capacity to fell you with a look or lift you with a word.”

Alan Rickman

Like David Bowie, yours truly will miss him big time.

Astounding says it all. :)

Another amazing Cassini shot of Saturn's rings. Astounding says it all. :)

Had to add another. 

Pimping for $$

It's all about the money, a mantra expressed all too many times in BRT, certainly applies to congress where the name of the game is to get re elected no matter what the cost may be regarding governance, personal integrity or trying to actually represent the public who vote these people into office.

In the days after my first election to Congress, in 2000, I attended several orientation sessions in Washington, eager to absorb the lessons of history. I wanted to learn what Congressman Abraham Lincoln had learned, to hear the wisdom of predecessors like John Quincy Adams, Daniel Webster and Joseph Gurney Cannon. The romance was crushed by lesson No. 1: Get re-elected. A fund-raising consultant advised that if I didn’t raise at least $10,000 a week (in pre-Citizens United dollars), I wouldn’t be back. - Steve Israel (D) NY

Israel's retiring after the end of this term.

When reading this article, Jonathan Swift's A Modest Proposal comes to mind, not in dietary terms but in political including:

1. Term Limits: Two terms for senate, Three terms for house.

2. Public financing of campaigns. Eliminate Citizens United

3. When a person leaves office, benefits cease

4. Congress members pay for their health benefits

5. Congress members must obey the laws they pass.

6. Congress cannot vote themselves a raise. Raises only apply when keyed to inflation.

7. Eliminate gerrymandering

8. Ability to create referendums on policies that affect all Americans. i.e. Declaration of war etc., etc.

9. Limit time of campaigning. In Britain, it's 6 weeks.

This is just a partial list but at least it's a start. :)

Short Takes Of Various Things

From a train crossing to starlings flying in formation, this short clip shows a few tidbits of reality in this mild winter of 2016. :)

A Certain Sense of Style

“Look up here, I’m in heaven / I’ve got scars that can’t be seen,” sings a frail, blindfolded David Bowie from a hospital bed in his video for “Lazarus,” released four days before his death on January 10. In this haunting farewell, a bedridden Bowie writhes as he levitates above his sheets, then dances backwards into a coffin-like wardrobe. “Look up here man, I’m in danger / I’ve got nothing left to lose,” he sings, dropping hints at the 18-month battle with cancer he kept hidden from the public.

Named for the biblical character whom Jesus restored to life four days after his death, “Lazarus” is off Bowie’s last album, Blackstar, released last week to coincide with his 69th birthday. With this hyperintentional timing, the artist performed his own death. “His death was no different from his life — a work of Art,” wrote Bowie’s producer Tony Visconti in a tribute. “He made ‘Blackstar’ for us, his parting gift. I knew for a year this was the way it would be. I wasn’t, however, prepared for it. He was an extraordinary man, full of love and life. He will always be with us. For now, it is appropriate to cry.”

Extraordinary says it all regarding the kind of work this creative genius did in not being afraid to lay it out for all to see. Yours truly will miss him big time for his intellect, daring and above all else, his certain sense of style, an essence few will ever possess as we move further into 2016.

Memorizing says it all.

Had to put in this amazing version of Let's Dance. Smoking hot says it all. :)

The Looking Planet

Wonderful CG Short with a very cool take on science and creation. Douglas Adams would approve this whimsical notion on how universes are born without question. :)

Prophecy

Yours truly is not in love with Tony Blair or Muammar Gaddafi but at least Libya was a secular and viable nation under Gaddafi just as Iraq was when Saddam was the strong man in control before the US decided to do really stupid shit regarding both nations, first under "W" with his incredibly stupid attack on Iraq, based on a lie (WMDs) and Obama's equally stupid attack on Libya for the oil and gold. With this in mind, consider what is happening in Europe vis a vis a rather interesting set of conversations between the two, who had a comfortable working relationship beginning around 2001.

Colonel Muammar Gaddafi issued a 'prophetic' warning to Tony Blair that jihadists would attack Europe if his regime was allowed to collapse, phone conversations reveal.

Gaddafi's dire prediction was made in two desperate telephone calls with Mr Blair on February 25, 2011 - as civil war was engulfing Libya.

In the first call at 11.15am, Gaddafi said: "They [jihadists] want to control the Mediterranean and then they will attack Europe."

When looking at the needless destruction of Libya on the part of the US, the reaction of former Secretary of State Clinton regarding Gaddafi is most interesting to say the least.

  And we haven't even discussed Syria.

Stop making sense - Talking Heads

The Art of BS :)

We all know what BS is, right? Now, one can go to a very cool and funny site to generate BS digitally, courtesy http://sebpearce.com/bullshit/, a resource the great George Carlin would relate to without question. :)

Reaching Out

See above is the Hubble's reach into the universe. Pretty stellar but the best is yet to come. :)

This diagram shows how Hubble has revolutionised the study of the distant, early Universe. Before Hubble was launched, ground-based telescopes were able to observe up to a redshift of around 1, about half way back through cosmic history. Hubble’s latest instrument, Wide Field Camera 3 has identified a candidate galaxy at a redshift of 10 — around 96 per cent of the way back to the Big Bang. The forthcoming NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope will see further still.

Click here to see how techs are assembling the James Webb Telescope, the successor to the Hubble.

Precious Bodily Fluids :)

Not trying to pick on The Donald but I now know who Trump reminds me of. General Jack D. Ripper of Dr. Strangelove. Why, because of Trump's obsession with bodily functions and extramarital sex, notions the noted general discusses with Mandrake with great dignity and seriousness. :)

Facts don't matter

As a techie, yours truly really cares about the accuracy of data. Is it vetted?, is it correct?, something BRT tries to do as much as possible when posting these "wonderful" missives to you my loyal readers. To that end, The Donald posted a blast against illegal immigration with particular emphasis given to, you guessed it, Mexico, but in putting together this magnum opus, the geographical accuracy of said ad needs a little bit of adjustment as per Politifact, the watchdog site that vets the bloviations of the bloviators running for president. :)

In a new television ad -- his campaign’s first -- Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump shows footage of dozens of people swarming over a border fence. But the footage isn’t as it seems.

About halfway through the ad, a narrator says of Trump, "He'll stop illegal immigration by building a wall on our southern border that Mexico will pay for." Video footage shows dozens of people streaming across the border, as if they were ants fleeing an anthill.

The clear suggestion is that the footage is of the "southern border" between the United States and Mexico. But it’s not -- it’s 5,000 miles away, in a small Spanish enclave on the mainland of Morocco.

Here is said ad.

Here's where the actual immigration actually occurred.

Last time I checked, Morocco is not part of Mexico.

Last but not least, The Donald should check out this little factoid.

Regardless of Trump’s imagery, the Pew Research Center noted last month that "for the first time since the 1940s, more immigrants from Mexico are leaving the U.S. than coming into the country. The shift is due to several reasons, including slow economic recovery after the Great Recession that may have made the U.S. less attractive, as well as stricter enforcement of U.S. immigration laws, particularly at the border."

Any questions?

A 2016 Resolution to Live By :)

A good friend of mine turned me onto this amazing graphic showing the pH of various foods. Accompanying this graphic is his common sense approach to living one's life in concert with nature, something we all should do as we move further into the new year. 

À retenir en 2016 : It’s not rocket science. God puts stuff on the planet to keep the body healthy. The corporations hide this information and create synthetics to treat disease. The synthetic chemical creates other symptoms from its ingestion requiring another drug to combat these symptoms. Alors manger plus alcalin, naturel et bio : c'est l'une de mes 10 résolutions en 2016,

Not bad Serge, not bad at all. :)