January 10, 2018

Yesteryear
One year ago today: January 10, 2017, the gimp started it.
Five years ago today: January 10, 2013, no plastic parts.
Nine years ago today: January 10, 2009, on writing. Coincidence?
Random years ago today: January 10, 2012, banning “jury instructions”.

           Tablet times. This would be the first time in years I took the morning off to go use a computer at the coffee shop. This time it is a tablet, and far harder to use than the first portable computer I bought. That was back in the 1992s, a Tandy 1100FD, for floppy disk. That makes me the first person most people in Seattle or Los Angeles had ever seen using a “laptop”. It could create 108 files per disk maximum. It was stolen from my hotel in Caracas in 1993. And I wish I still had it. At was $1,100 back then but still a better bargain than anything on the market these days when you need to get actual work done.

           It used 3.5” floppies and even had a spreadsheet program, back when they were properly called programs instead of “apps” which require a specific OS. The office suite was called Deskmate and it did everything MicroSoft office could do that was practical. (I do not rate things like presentationware and playlists to be part of real office needs.) And it was quite graphical for the time, look at the picture. It was DOS, sure, but those were easy to use menus. And it booted up in less than 3 seconds.

           It was heavy, what I’d call transportable but not portable. It had a excellent keyboard. No USB, but there are adapters available. No WiFi either. There was no such thing yet. You know, I should take a look on-line to see if anything became of that puppy. I mean, the much-praised Argus 1600 is still for sale—if you are willing to pay 20 times the original price. Some may laugh at this old computer, but it did everything it was claimed to do without the massive overhead (and headaches) of Android or iOS. Six million of this type (but not necessarily this model) were sold via Radio Shack, and we are talking 1983, when you had to know what the fuck you were doing before you could even turn a computer on.

           Take a closer look at the Deskmate screen and notice a few things. There is a modem interface, though not really anything to connect it to back then, but it contains every essential feature of an office suite. The Internet was still finicky to use, so this was as complete a unit as I needed and this one took more trips to South American than most people who will ever read this blog. The agony for today’s “whiz kids” is that not one new notable feature has been invented since. I know what some are thinking, but music and color porno, however sold to some, are not anything new.

           You know, I’m 99% certain I still have the Deskmate 2 on floppy disk. If I recall, I bought the model where it was burned into ROM, but I recall the disks came with the package.

Picture of the day.
It’s a robot.
(Price around $900 USD.)
Remember to use BACK ARROW to return to blog.

           When I walked into the library, I knew by the display of books at the counter that Sue Grafton had passed away. One of my favorite authors, yet after a while I had a hard time telling her stories apart. She was never a role model for my writing because she was not a rags to riches person. Her father was an attorney and published detective novel author who taught her the trade. So she didn’t really even break into the business on her own. She was writing professionally in her teens while I was still hitch-hiking to jobs in the Yakima orchards.
           That doesn’t mean she had it easy, just that I can’t identify with the hardships of anyone whose father was a bond lawyer. She had the facilities study things like English Literature during her teens, so it’s futile to lecture me about hard times. I read maybe a quarter of her alphabet books over the years. Surprisingly, she actually did work a real job early in her career, that is, if you consider screenwriting a real job. Even then she did not have any of the real-to-life pressures to survive as she never sold the movie rights to her books. She hated Hollywood so bad, she even stated if her kids sold the rights, she’d come back to haunt them.
           Personally, I’m hardly surprised when I hear of rich kids who utterly hate things like a job after even their briefest exposure to one. She got through all the letters except “Z”. And she is now D as in dead.

ADDENDUM
           For the sake of saying I read on the topic, I looked through a book of kit aircraft. I suppose if I’d struck it rich, it would have been one of my hobbies. Since around 1970 I’ve noticed the better availability of small but powerful air-cooled engines, probably a response to how everyone felt jets would take over. I still feel there is a lot of room left for wood and fabric hobby airplanes. I just kept reading to see if there were design features I’d overlooked, and I found plenty. Here are the ones that interested or surprised me.

           Some planes have deliberate slow-responding controls to give the feel of flying a much larger aircraft. Many kits evolved because manufacturers were chary over litigation concerning factory built models. Makes sense. I note these kits are much cheaper than similar drones built for the military. The piston engines give pretty impressive performance with average top speeds to 180 mph. Carburetors still compete with fuel injectors.

           This picture shows the plane that gets my award for the most impressive and unusual. It is a pull-push in-line "center-thrust" design with two Mazda motors. It reminds me of the German Dornier 335 fighter. This is the best photo I could find. It is a kit, but not for the feint-hearted. Like the original, it is very large, but looks compact.
           It’s a beast, with a steel tube frame covered with fiberglass reinforced plywood. The propellers are nearly 6 feet across and designed for racing, it will hit 400 mph. Almost as fast as the real thing. I am certain it borrowed the Dornier design. One evident feature is the fin under the rear propeller. It is there to prevent the blades from hitting the ground when the pilot noses up for take-off. See, I really do have a degree in this stuff.

           There is an overall design similarity in the sport planes except for replica models. Modified Volkswagen and snowmobile engines are popular, but it is noted, wryly, that bigger engines are gaining because of pilots getting older and fatter. The popularity of biplanes and earlier kits is apparently due to the more complex metal work required trying to emulate WWII fighter planes. (Many of them were truly massive.) The most novel “plane” was the Flightsail, designed to fly or to be towed behind a ski boat for fun. The more efficient kit planes boast ranges of 3,400 miles.
           It seems there are even some hobby aircraft still flying using Ford Model A engines. Many of the kits recommend engines capable of lifting off from a standing start in 16 seconds, seemingly with less concern for the length of run. Most unusual fact discovered seems to be that nobody can build a true replica of the original Stuka (dive-bomber) because all the drawings have been lost. One of the least requested options is a baggage compartment, but when it’s present, the capacity seems to center around 66 lbs.

           In the same book, I also found out the Clipper flying boats, with sleeping accommodations for 36 passengers, had nine different sections. A galley, a lounge, a penthouse, and six different passenger compartments. Now that must have been air travel. At the other end of the spectrum was the Curtiss “Jenny” of 1914, the first mass-produced American plane of any consequence. In an amazingly early presentiment of millennial times, something went wrong with the engine roughly every ten hours.


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