New Nexus 7

Here's a sad tale.  :(  I had my Nexus 7 ever since the beginning, and I took it everywhere.  Case - schmase, I went naked.  I read absolutely tons on it, and I was actually wearing out a spot on the lower corner where I flip pages.  Now that I'm retired, I could never afford my million dollar book habit, thank goodness for you-know-what.

Now, along comes the new puppy dog.  I'm sunning myself outside, when she sits nicely on my lap.  All of a sudden 'SQUIRREL!".  My tablet was in my hand, and it only dropped an inch on the patio.  Smash!  That glass is thinner than an eggshell.

So I have this fancy pleather case now.  I'm still watching out for puppy dogs...

ps.  Not so sad, the new one is a zillion times better, and I never could find anything cheaper on the Chinese market.  Happy birthday to me!

Trying the cell booster at the cottage again

I got a Wilson 50 db cell booster at Costco last year.  It was built like crap, all plastic, but it lasted for most of the summer.  Then we had a lightning bolt strike in the air, but real close, and the unit was gone.  I got my refund at Costco -- yeah!

This year I'm taking a chance.  I went to Aliexpress, which is link at the bottom (gets me money).  I just got it, a 65 db beauty built like a tank.  It's got 30 feet of that super-heavy coax, with fat N connectors.  It has a big, solid outdoor antenna.  This thing could fight off a direct hit, but I got an APC lightning protector from Costco with coax protection.  The good thing is that this is sacrificial and can melt.  I'll still turn everything off when I'm not there.

Checking all the prices, I feel that I have a 4x deal here over buying local.  I checked it out in the backyard, and it boosts by 2 bars in the city (to max).  I'm sure it will go up 4 bars at the cottage.

I went back to Aliexpress and bought another 10 m of super coax, and the necessary adapters for the extension and the conversion to standard coax for the lightning protector.  You generally pay $20 duty for the large items and nothing for the $2 things.

AECL Chalk River Gone

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The move to a “government-owned contractor-operated” (GoCo) business model for Canada’s largest scientific research establishment is expected to strip almost all of the 2,850 Chalk River employees of their federal jobs, pension plan eligibility and other public service benefits.

This place was dead a long time ago.  Now it is being buried.  Raise a glass to its former glory!

Extra Thought:  My dream was always for a nuclear research park at Wesleyville.  There could be an express train to Toronto.  The nuclear waste would be stored down there, and the park could do exciting research like fusion or quantum stuff.  You could attract brains there.  Why should the area west of Toronto have all the fun?  Right now the whole East is an intellectual wasteland.

Reflections on Turning 60

At the end of the week, I turn 60.  We'll have a big family party and everybody will make fun of me.

I'm having my second life, and I'm enjoying it.  The first was full of kids, depressions, and miserable work.  I wouldn't go back for another young life, if I could get a new body, like a sci-fi book.  I feel better at 60, and I don't have all those sexy women bothering me with their hormones.  I'm totally immune!  :)

We are entering an age of the return of the Citizen Scientist.  I think the last time was with Sir Isaac Newton.  Then we went into the phase of governmental and institution science, and the independent couldn't get access to all the labs and machines.  Now, for some reason, all the money for this has dried up, and the gov't scientist is dead.  The universities only think of patents and donations, so those scientists are totally muzzled.

This is bad for the conventional media, since they need an 'official talking head' to make a statement.  Then they totally butcher that, and give the poor guy heart palpitations.  No wonder nobody can do that any more.  Every person must now give statements through the PR department.

This leads up to everybody being ridiculously cautious.  Gone are the days when a scientist could go out on a limb and eventually be proven wrong.  That was J. Tuzo Wilson's favourite thing.  Now, no scientist can afford to offend loonies or be proven wrong.  Just like the army in 'Mars Attacks', you advance by not saying or doing anything.

But can the old guys fill in the gap?  The Internet now provides all sorts of data.  We independents can't get over the pay wall, but that is becoming total garbage.

One thing the CS's will never do is be a talking head for the media.  On that path lies madness.

Canada out of the earthquake biz

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Esquimalt Coun. Dave Hodgins said the earthquake highlighted a lack of preparedness in B.C.

“All of the information was coming from the U.S. or social media,” he said, noting a lack of updates from the provincial and federal governments.

“It was like no one was home,” said Hodgins, who helped establish Emergency Management B.C. in 2006. “It’s become an embarrassment. I’m shocked.”

John Cassidy is now with Victoria.  There has been no response from the Feds earthquake group.  I think they've all retired.  They were muzzled and starved to death, so moving on is a blessing.  :)

So, all you people, you won't have a nag like Dr. Lucy Jones any more.  Really, does John want to do this dirty job?  I don't really care that much about BC, and there have been no official nags in Ontario for a long time, except for me, and I swing with my moods.  :)

You're on your own, Canada.  Ha!

Google+ joins the others

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I'd like to go to town on this, since there are no earthquakes right now.  I've gone through a lot of social media things right from the beginning of the Internet.  Our first thing at work was Compuserve.  We only used it to get naked pictures at work.  Then we had Usenet.  I can still find the article where I exposed the Bank of Montreal with a big security error.  Boy, did everybody try to kill me for that!

Blogs were the next big thing.  I had a secret blog while I was at work.  When I retired, I opened this one.  It is still my main platform.  I went heavily into Wikipedia.  I never went into the teeny stuff like Facebook and Myspace.

I tried all the Google attempts, and now I forget them all.  I gave Google+ a run for its money, although there was a lot duplication with the blog.  The communities were a big failure, they got huge numbers but little participation.  I liked posting the pictures there, but there are other ways to do that.

I won't miss g+ much, but I hope they keep Blogger going.  When we had our Toronto earthquake, I had something like 10,000 hits.

Update:  Everybody is now writing the obits.  Some are going as far as writing them for Mr. Google himself.  I can piece together what happened.  Some years ago, the humans rebelled against the robots (see Internship).  I remember that the humans argued that G had to get more social, and the anti-socials disagreed.  Finally the argument was settled in typical fashion by pouring in billions of dollars and letting the humans have a chance.  But the humans have lost, and the chief human is kicked out.  Now the robots can pour more money into driverless cars.  To confirm that Mr. G is dead, take a poll of the super-hot Stanford MBA class and ask where they would work for the summer for free.  G can join MS on the seniors bench.

Update2:  The Secret Society of Mr. G has fought back saying they have a new guy in charge.  This is not the issue but rather the intensity of the effort, since the news said that thousands would be shifted.  Are they keeping up the money flow?  Are they going to Knolify G+?

Seismic Hazard and Risk for Vancouver

It occurred to me that Vancouverites might choke on their collective high fat and sugar breakfasts before their morning commute, when they read my 'predictions'.  This should not be the case.

 Geologists who want to make money for their organizations tend to go to the glorious big faults.  In California they believe in thin straight lines as the be-all of seismic hazard.  This was carried to the extreme by the Global Gorming crowd.

Sad to say, this is not reality.  The boring truth is that seismic hazard is a big ugly smudge, and no individual earthquake or 'discovered' fault is going to budge it.  The smudge is caused by overwhelming uncertainties.  It is just as likely that the most damage for Vancouver will come from a local M6.5, a la Christchurch.

So, if you are living in a big pile of bricks on a swamp, then the good news is that your insurance is under-priced by a factor of 10.  Top up on it, to leave money for distant relatives.  If you are on that BC hardpan that takes blasting to dig a foundation, then your fish tanks are safe, and you can keep that champagne glass fountain you set up at New Years.  

Those that live near the coast better keep running shoes handy, and watch those bridges.

Vancouver M6.6 earthquake and The Long March

Ha, I predicted this earthquake for last Christmas, although I thought the earthquakes were marching to the north, and not south. So, not much of a prediction...

The 'Long March" is the natural series of earthquakes along this huge strike-slip fault.  We had 2 M7+ earthquakes, and they were marching north.  The next one I predicted would be in the armpit of Alaska.  Three big M7.5's would clear the way for the M9, since this fault is very smooth and clean, and must have regular M9's to sweep the floors.

So, this earthquake is small, and has the usual odds of being a foreshock for an M7.5.  The aftershock zone is really tiny.

It's  pure strike-slip along the fault.

Some might think this monster fault stops right here and the subduction zone starts.  Not I!  This fault goes on and cleanly cuts the straight edge of the island,  and right into Seattle.  In fact, I consider this to be more of a threat than the subduction zone.

We'll find out soon why the aftershock zone is so tiny.  In the meantime, hold onto your hats!

Bruce Black Hole: Dilution is the Solution

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I am stunned that an expert group would come up with this.  They obviously have their eye on the prize, which is more money from this project.

I will now completely shut up on this project, and wait until the shaft sinking, which will make the Niagara Tunnel To Nowhere, look like a picnic.  Have fun everybody!

Ontario fruit tree spraying

In Ontario, there is fruit tree trouble in the backyard.  My cherry tree died, my plum tree is sick, and all my pears drop every year.

It's a real problem, since we must stay organic with the spray.  I've noticed that they've backed off a bit in the locked cabinets, since Malathion has showed up now.  I've kept my apples going by using Home Defence (pyrethin), with a copper wetable powder.  My crop is generally down to nothing.

Now, I got a huge amount of apples for drying last fall from the in-laws.  Their secret is to take a trip down to the States.  So does everybody around me.  I am sure that 99% of the fruit trees are benefiting from this.  Now, I'm not saying what they do in the States, since I have humourless people reading this all the time.

I don't want to go to the States, but I have found something.  Take a look at the bottom of the blog for a certain magic container which I have ordered through Amazon.  That's right!  No trip necessary.  I'll get it next week, since it is totally legal at the Canadian border.

I once researched all of this, and the magic stuff has something for fungus, but most importantly it has a 'sticker, spreader'.  This should mean that I don't have to manually thin the apples, and should keep the fruit on until it ripens.  If you click on the graphic and buy it, I get a few cents to make me happy.  It's expensive with the shipping, but beats a trip to Buffalo.

PS.  A package just arrived.  I won't say what it is.  My legal statement is "I don't have nothing.".  The secret code is "applesauce".

Update:  Went on well for first spraying.  I hope it will help with the raspberries, which get fungus and Japanese beetles.

Update2:  They have another magic organic potion that does the weeds.  It doesn't smell at all, so you can spot spray like you're putting on Roundup.

OPG takes its nuclear expertise outside

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“We encouraged OPG to explore new business lines and opportunities to the benefit of all Ontarians,” he said.

The old company did this once before, I think it was called 'International Ventures', or some such thing.  They were a very high-flying group with a nice building in Oakville.  We all desperately wanted to go there.

It died in some sort of internal Stalinesque power struggle.  I'm glad they started it up again, to give a path to the extremely ambitious.  OPG may have to hire more brainpower to staff this and Darlington, and this puts some upward pressure on wages.

There, see?  Not a speck of negative energy!  This is the new me.   :)

Challis Idaho earthquake cluster

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Now, we can say this is a perfectly natural cluster, of no fixed explanation.

It's absolutely in the middle of a nowhere even more nowhere than Oklahoma City.  Just ugly barren hills.

Does it mean anything?  Probably not, since it will be the 19 times out of 20 where these things just fade away.  It is almost always caused by some sort of fluid migration.

Extra note:  The big earthquake around here is the 1983 Borah Peak earthquake, M6.9.  It was an extension (normal) earthquake, so the ground motion PGV was tiny.  Really, I wouldn't get too excited about these earthquakes, unless you live in loose bricks on a swamp.  This is real earthquake country, so live in something decent.

No more OK earthquake coverage

It's just too sad.  When they start to have their big earthquakes, I'll just say quietly to myself, "Oh, dear."

I've never been right about the rate anyway.  I was always thinking they'd be well into the 5's by now, and it's only 4's.  Time to exit, stage left.

Bruce Black Hole gets into geoscience

Reference

I didn't even read the response, it would probably make me barf.  Anyway the panel went nuts on stress measurement.  Hello!  The reason this is the worst rock in the world is the fact that it has no stress!  It's right on top of the Grenville Front, and makes Oklahoma rock look good.

OK earthquakes totally natural and organic

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Yet the report added that "the majority, but not all, of the recent earthquakes appear to be the result of natural stresses, since they are consistent with the regional Oklahoma natural stress field."

I'm totally convinced that we can get to ridiculously high magnitudes with this.

Sell OPG Nuclear to Bruce

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Oh, I am so for that!  When they split all the engineers to the 3 sites, all the old ones went to Pickering, brain  dead middle people went to Darlington, and the poor unfortunate young ones all were shipped way off to Bruce.  Those that survived became the smartest of the bunch.

Bruce is unbelievably sneaky, which is what you want.  When they wanted to prop up AECL, they came up with all the phoney  plant proposals.  They whined and screamed until they got a sweetheart power deal.  Now they can do the same for Darlington and Pickering!

100,000 barrels a day being injected into Oklahoma fault system

State Impact

Looking that this map with some detail, you can come to this estimate.  The Azle sequence was caused by something like the same amount.  We don't know the percentage of fracking waste, but since OK is now the only place to inject this stuff, it is somewhere around there.

Now, consider New Madrid thousands of years ago.  How much can a natural seep inject into the rock?  I think something like 100 barrels a day.  So, the beauty of OK is that we are accelerating Nature by 1000 times.  It probably took New Madrid thousands of years to proceed to maximum.  Now we can do it in just a few years.  I am happy to be living this moment.  :)

Oklahoma earthquakes at intersection

An M4.1 and 3.7

This is the most interesting place to have an earthquake.  If the magnitude for the 4.1 stands, then it is shear, and it is sad that if they knock it down, we won't be able to see that it is thrust.

Anyway, a 4 a day keeps the doctor away!

Update:  Megathrust backslip

Absolutely the same as the recent series.  A weird shear with an extension component.  This produces a very low PGV, and is why people only felt it lightly.  This can happen when the principle stresses intersect a fault at an oblique angle.  I can't see this holding for very long.

One thing about identical earthquakes, is that they have a common stress driver, and will result in a very large shear earthquake.  The probability is simply greater than if the solutions were all over the map.  Get that earthquake insurance!

Air Miles Rip-Off

Sad, sad story.

We decided to get a ticket for Blue Mountain skiing from Air Miles points.  We were expecting the bar code right away like any other decent company, but it came in the mail too late.  It also had a very short expiry.  Naturally, we didn't get a chance to use it.

Phoned Blue Mountain, and said it had nothing to with them.  Phoned air miles, and they gave the snarky response that you should have read the Terms and Conditions.  Bitch!  Only when my wife said we were going to blow it on my massively popular blog, did they say they were going to a manager.  Only problem, it was near quitting time, and they just hung up.

I don't know why my wife slavishly is devoted to her Air Miles.  It's tough to use them.  I think it's silly and just use a cash rebate card.  They are bums.

Update:  Just like Toyota, they have no clue there's an Internet.  You can't get to them.

Clarification:  We ordered the ski tickets with 400 points.  That's the sad loss.  :(

Oklahoma hammered by M4 earthquakes

All right everybody, the earthquake insurance in OK is now underpriced by a factor of 10.  Get yours now, the deductible will be covered later through class action suits, and whining to FEMA.

Another M4 just exploded.  This will make my friend's house rumble again.  I will tell a parable about exponential growth.  Seems Mr. Smith had a pond and a very aggressive single lily pad.  It started doubling every day.  Mr. Smith thought he had lots of time before it would cover the whole pond and then kill his fish.  After weeks, one day it covered half the pond, and Mr. Smith was alarmed.  How did he have to clear the lily pads?

That's right, one day!  Exponentials sneak up on you.  And there is nothing more exponential than an earthquake.  The next one isn't 10% worse, it's ten times worse!

This all started out with a host of M2's.  Ha ha!  Who gives a poop?  Now we are getting a mega-load of 4's.  Still lots of fun.

I don't even think a flurry of 5's is going to bother anyone.  5's can't do any damage, right?  .....

OK M4.0 - Primary shear zone shoots back

Like I said before, that other earthquake was off the main zone, and the only thing it could do is load the primary shear wing.  That has just happened with this earthquake, and this then sheds stress to the thrust, which we haven't heard from lately.  Although no mechanism is posted, this one is most likely pure shear, and will not be downgraded.

Update:  Fault plane solution in.

Look at that sucker!  No wonder it won't be downgraded.  It's strike-slip with an extension component.  That is one seriously mucked up earthquake, since everything around is compressive.  I think our megathrust is back-slipping a little.  This really lets the strain energy drift towards the thrust.  We should see soon.

Bruce Black Hole Fantasy

New response to questions

Man, they can churn these out, just like Nora Roberts!  I love a good fantasy, you don't have to obsess over butchered physics (Is that only me?).

As usual, they are leaving out the huge environmental effects of grout and pumping.  They still live in the fantasy that they won't need it, although they leave all their options open by never mentioning it.  I can't wait until they get to that point and say:  "Ha!  You never asked that question!".

M4.2 earthquake Oklahoma

This is right where the other 4's have happened.  It will be strike-slip.  They seem to be offset, so they are marching down a fault.  These are secondary to the main mechanism, and all they do is shed stress to the main shear wing, which will respond in kind.  Eventually, this sheds stress to the thrust, where I am expecting a large earthquake.

My correspondent, right in the heart of things, says he is sick of them.  :)  Right now the earthquake insurance is under-priced by a factor of 10.  Get some!

There is some action on regulating these wells, but it looks very minimal.  If you look at a map of injection wells, it's totally plastered.

Update:  As usual, immediately thrown down to a 3.8, but they kept the focal plane solution.  A very strong thrust component aimed for the city.  The quakes are marching towards the transform fault, and this one has more thrust than the others.  Could this be the place for my M5 thrust?

Linux: Hammered by the Bell 'sync no surf' bug

Wow.  I have the openwrt router with the pitiful Sagecom Bell Fibe router (black one) acting as a bridge.  All of a sudden I am horribly sensitive to the amount of connections, especially running bittorrent.  Once that bug trips, you can ping, but you can't surf.  It won't let through large packets.

This bug has been around forever, and I think it favours Bell, especially with regard to things such as ip phones.  Why fix it?  Anyway, I've clamped down on connections, and I keep upping them until it crashes.  It is easily fixed by power cycling the modem.  Only the regulator could get them to fix this convenient bug.

Update:  Have confirmed that the bug is only activated during high congestion.  Very convenient.

Update2:  Actually triggered it early Sat morning.  Am now trying a totally choked down bittorrent (updates :)

Solved!  The bridge can only handle a packet size of 1434.  Set your MTU on the Linux machine to that.  So far it is stable.

Solved+1:  I can still crash it with a huge number of connections on bittorrent.  Cut those down, and it doesn't bother the speed.

Not really solved:  This is definitely an attack from Bell (intention or neglect).  I can't run anything reasonable without hitting the bug.  I can just hit it really fast or slow.

Blah:  I ended up severely cutting down the connections to 30, and gave up on all the extras like DHT.  Now it is stable, and I still get some good speed.  So I don't know if the MTU thing was relevant.

Up7:  As stated in another post, my complaint to the CRTC resulted in my being switched to a clean channel.  I can run it with factory default.  Won't last long.

January 17, 2016.  The final solution to this was to beg for the new 'white' bell 1000 modem.  I also have a fast router running openwrt, and when it connects to this modem, the modem automatically goes into bridge mode.  Paradise.

Linux: The new kernel 3.14 is good to go for Debian

I've had no problems so far, putting in the new kernel.  Details may come later.  :)

Caution:  As outlined above, this kernel allows jumbo packets which made the DSL bridge barf.  Set your MTU to 1434 for a Bell Canada Fibe bridge.

Linux: Panic with the Openwrt router

Blah, went to upgrade the router.  Thought I knew my password.

But when you upgrade, you lose the web interface, and you have to sign in with ssh to get it working.  Didn't work and I went gonzo.  None of the 'failsafe' mechanisms work.  You can't do a factory reset.  Doom!

Wait a sec, I had to do ssh with -l root    Duh!!!!  Then I could get in... phew.

M8.0 earthquake Chile

Offshore, maybe not a big impact, but this is one of those times where a lot of little earthquakes meant a big one was coming.  Happens 1 in 10.  Could have even a bigger one:  1 in 10.

Update:  Major impact, now upgraded to M8.2

Major Tom Update:

This earthquake is most likely at the max for this area.

We can see the subduction zone is extremely curved at this point.  I really can't see the physics of rounding this curve with a 9.

We have a classic reverse fault at the exact orientation of the fault.  Lest I forget how these beachballs work, I can always look at this.

Replacing a hottub water pump

I just did this video for me.  There are lots out there on repairs, but I have to remember how to do it next time.  :)

Anyway, the dog thought it was fun.

Everybody and their dog now on the Ontario Sunshine List

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This was always great for us in the old company.  At first it blew the cover on those who were milking phoney overtime, but now it's a race.  Get rid of it!