Blackberry REACT November Newsletter

Quick Clicks

Holiday Shopping Deals

Gizmodo is a website about gadgets, and they have links to some incredible deals, several of which have short times of availablity. I just ordered a $255 320GB external drive for $85, free shipping. Other items: Sharp 42-inch 1080p HDTV for $900 (was $1,400); Western Digital 1TB Caviar internal drive for $100 (was $220); select digital cameras at Amazon include a free 4GB SD card ($30 value).

One Million Dollar Rescue Vehicle Overturns During Training

"Airport officials said they did not know what caused the vehicle to overturn while going around a bend on the airport's inner perimeter roadway."

Raise your hand if you think the boys were going too fast.

Life's 100 Essential Skills

From Popular Mechanics. First the test.
I got 11 of 15 questions right, making me a man they want to subscribe - I'm their kinda guy.

Then the skills.
Some of their essential skills are absolutely essential (change a flat tire, jump start a car, perform CPR and a Heimlich hug, put out a fire), some are not on my list as essential but are definitely nice to know (carve a turkey, sew, remove bloodstains), and some are totally off my radar (weld, brew beer, check the trouble codes on your car's computer). Out of the hundred, I'd have to say they got most of them right - and they include making sure your kids know these skills, too.

Get your ham license

Getting a license to operate an amateur radio no longer requires knowing Morse code; in fact, it hasn't for years. To get a license as a Technician, you take a 35-question multiple-choice exam. The questions and answers are freely available online; this, for example, is a page that allows you to choose .pdf, MS Word, or plain text files to download and study. The correct answers are identified in the line giving the question number; the correct answer is a capital letter in parentheses. For example, T1A01 (A) [97.3(a)(1)] tells you the correct answer for Question T1A01 is (A).

You can take practice exams online. One place for practice tests is here. Click the button for Technician, and you're on your way. After you've taken the practice exam a few times, you'll know you will pass the test when you take it for real.

Most events where hams volunteer use 2 meters or 70 centimeters as the communications bands, and Technicians are allowed to use those frequencies, so a Technician license will give you the ability to work with other hams at events and in emergencies. Members of Blackberry REACT already know how to use radios to communicate at events and in emergencies, so even if you're not a ham, you're years ahead of new licensees who have never used a radio. Please consider getting your license and joining hams at events that require amateur frequencies.

How to fold a T-shirt

Perfect every time.

Pandemics and essential people

When the flu hit all over the world in the 1900s, it was a pandemic, not an epidemic. The bioethicists at Johns Hopkins have been thinking about pandemics, and they have decided who is worth saving when chicken flu hits. Guess what? We're on the list! If people are to survive, we'll need truck drivers to get food to the surviving masses, grocery store workers, utility workers, and communications personnel. So it's not just doctors, firefighters, and cops that will be given whatever treatment there is. If, of course, people follow these guidelines. The full report is not available without a subscription to the journal it is printed in, unfortunately.

How to retire your old TV set

Now that the stock market has crashed, you still have to have a new TV set for your personal retirement and analogue has gone the way of the dodo, so how to you get rid of your old TV set?

It's against the law to put it in the trash, but call your trash collector and see if they take TVs for recycling. Also, thrift stores are still accepting working TV sets (but check first - times are changing). If you haven't bought your new set yet, check and see if the store you buy from will take your old TV when they deliver that honkin' huge 65-inch digital LCD set you're getting to replace the old tube set.

Data thefts, part 73

Chain stores (restaurants, retail, everyone) use outside companies to handle their credit card processing and other tech functions. This means the primary store has no clue whether the employees of the contractors are reliable or not, and insiders at the contractors are often a part of the scheme to steal identities.

Outsourcing is not the only problem, of course. Where there's money, there's a will. And where there's a will, there's a way.

Rocket launches

Burnining Man is not the only event going on in the Black Rock desert. BALLS17 is an experimental rocket club that launches there after burners leave. These photos show the launching of various homebrew rockets, including a 52-gallon keg, and one rocket which claimed to exceed an altitude of 70,000 feet. Lots of spectacular failures, too.

Rocket lunches

Okay, so not rocket, but lunches nonetheless. I keep saying food during an event doesn't have to be utilitarian, especially if you bring your own. "Emma" has designed cardboard lunchboxes, and cleverly put them on the Web so you have to scroll to the right to see all the designs. More crafts here.

Coffee cup inverter

Okay, it's not really a cuppa java. It's a 12VDC to 110VAC inverter that looks just like a coffee cup with that no-spill cap you get at Starbucks. Fits right in your cupholder in your 12 cup holder SUV, so it's handy in the mornings when you need to charge your phone, laptop, and electric shaver.

Beer bottle telephone

If coffee's not your thing, here's an RJ-11 connector telephone for your landline - no power required during those pesky earthquakes. Looks like a warm bottle of Bud. (WOW! Already out of stock, but they expect more Real Soon Now.)

What you do after the disaster drags on for a month

This video gets off to a slow start, but eventually we get to see what the deal is. In England, street performers are called buskers because people in England used to know Greek. This busker is playing a violin with his hands and a guitar with his feet. Be patient and watch the video for how he does it and why.

Fewest number of sunspots since 1954

The link is to a series of photographs and one animation of the sun, taken over several years. We are at a long nadir of sunspots which means the HF radio bands suck. These are some of the best photos ever.

Are we there yet?

These links are to two articles on Ike and one on Katrina. New Orleans still has not recovered from Katrina and Gustav, and Texans are predicting two years to recover from Ike. Given the situation in New Orleans, I'd say two years is too optimistic for the Galveston area.

All the articles tell what it's like living in those areas, and I recommend reading them and looking at the photos. My worst case scenario for the Bay Area is a major earthquake followed inevitably by a major fire from broken gas mains.

In Galveston, the area is rural and there are few surviving hotels and motels. If the peninsula is devastated by an earthquake and fire, where will you stay? Louise and I were in Arizona and New Mexico when there was a major forest fire, and all the motels for hundreds of miles were fully booked by evacuees. I expect the same situation here. People in the Gulf of Mexico area cannot afford to stay in a motel and drive an hour back to work during the recovery. That assumes, of course, that your place of employment reopens.

Debris removal is stalled while officials make sure none of the still-missing persons in in the rubble; this is a situation which will arise here after a quake. Major power, gas, and water mains are restored to service, but not all homes have been reconnected. Hundreds are still living in tents, and many are still dependent of handouts for food and water.

Hurricanes and forest fires give some warning, so there is time to evacuate. That will not be the case in an earthquake. If the roads are damaged and evacuation after an earthquake is impossible, we will be here whether we have a home or not. And it will take years for recovery - and based on New Orleans, full recovery may never take place.

Today's questions

Assume a major earthquake hits at 3:30AM. Although your family and you escape your home unscathed, it is totally destroyed by the quake and aftershocks. You cannot get back in. The sun has come up, and you are looking at piles of rubble in your neighborhood.

What's for breakfast? Seriously. You've got to eat and to feed your family, so you need a plan to get cooking. If you can't get into your house, what's your plan for your first breakfast?

Second, there are no houses with working plumbing that you can see or find. What's your plan for a bathroom? How are you going to wash up afterwards?

You got out with your go-kit; was that everything you need?

Another reason not to drive across a flooded road

This is an interesting video. It starts out kind of boring: a stream floods and there some water going across a road. Nothing much, maybe an inch or two deep. Then the water stops going over the road, but the stream is still flowing. Hmm.... . That water's going somewhere. You know it's now going under the pavement. Boom! The road collapses.

Ham TV

We all know there's ham radio but here's a clip from ham TV and a link to the amateur TV repeater. The gear is under $400, not counting your home video camera and antenna. (You need a 1.2GHz yagi.)

New FEMA course

IS802 tells how communications fits in to the overall strategy for dealing with local, regional, and national "events." There are 15 Emergency Support Functions, and communications is ESF #2. According to FEMA, "This course is intended for government executives, private-sector and nongovernmental organization (NGO) leaders, and emergency management practitioners."

How the earth is made

A not-quite-five-minute video on how they make the earth.

PC problems

Some computer repair tech had the foresight to photograph some of the stuff he ran across: CDs jammed into floppy drives, credit cards stuffed into floppy drives, full-size graphics cards stuffed into half-size slots, and more. Read his comments below the photos for some explanations.

How to splint a broken limb

Louise broke her leg at a party years ago (we go to different parties than you do), and the EMT there (I told you we go to different parties than you do) put her leg in a splint he made from a cardboard box. I can't tell you how much difference having her broken leg splinted made. Her tibia was broken into two pieces, and the fibula had a spiral fracture; the nurse at the hospital said it resembled the broken leg from skiing (we go to _really_ different parties than you do). I highly recommend splints.

Results of FEMA probe

Steampunk Ergonomic Keyboard

What happens when you take an IBM M-15 Ergo Keyboard and recraft it in brass and wood.

Events

Our annual Christmas Dinner is on Saturday, December 13, at 6:00PM, at First Baptist Church of Menlo Park. The location is 1100 Middle Ave (at the corner of Middle and Arbor), Menlo Park. Phone (650)323-8544.

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