In like Flint - The Bruce deep thing hearings

Yeah, my comment made it.

Now, it can be safely ignored.  But it would be great if a few hundred of you repeated it!  Think of it as making history.

Note:  The original phrase is "In like Flynn"  which was WWII slang related to Errol Flynn.  "In Like Flint" was a silly movie.  I like flint because it is a hard silicate.

News Flash:  I was totally thrown out!

Leaving Hawaii

I don't think I'd make a good lottery winner. This has been very high class and hectic. Too much rich food and loud entertainment.  :)  Can't wait to go to the cottage. Now we got a long red eye to look forward to.

Update:  Safely home, whew!

'Nother:  G+ has made a nice story of the trip, which can only be seen on g+

Saving Oklahoma

At the party yesterday I was talking and my friend said "Why don't they treat the water so to not cause earthquakes?

So my brain clicked and it was so simple. All those other states can start injecting again. OK is saved!


**too simple to patent. M7 before they want it

Update. No offers of money yet. Hint:  You can inject all the deep rock water you want.

Arctic Vortex follows me to Hawaii

Cold and rainy. People here are wearing parkas!

Napa earthquake in a sheared mess

It was a perfect strike slip fault. Probably not on any known fault. That's why all that money spent on fault mapping is just a job program. No fault stands out to localize an earthquake in this mess in rock mechanics terms.

Aloha

In Hawaii.

California was a blast. I caused the biggest earthquake in the bay area for 20 years. 😊

But I didn't feel a thing thanks to jet lag.

Put away development plans for the North Pole

Reference

It would be great, a giant floating platform at the tropical North Pole.  In the summer you could party to continuous sunlight.  In the mild winter, you would be entertained by the Northern Lights.  Forget it!  As further proof that those climate guys were fooled by the Tricksy Binomial Theorem, the Arctic Ice Volume is clawing back.

This is the compensation for my cold summer, the knowledge that my freezing lake water also means happiness for Polar Bears.  --yuck.  

*The Tricksy Binomial Theorem

This always gets people who can't do math.  Basically, if you have a parameter that is the result of many variable inputs, you'll plot it and get a nice wavy line.  That is like the stock market or global temperatures.  It is also very important in manufacturing.  That is why you want 6 Sigma, which means you want this historic chatter to be several times below tolerance.  Binomial Theorem practically predicts that you will get an 'Unprecedented Excursion' that will be 3 times over chatter.  The worst thing you can do in manufacturing is try to over-steer this, because you make it worse.  That is what climate philosophers forced Europe to do.

Oklahoma earthquake - M4.2

Here I am a the cottage, with an old Linux laptop, and using my phone's Android tethering.

This is right on the cusp of the thrust and shear, and we've had a lot of M4's here.  The mechanism is not surprising, it is a mixture of shear and tension.  For some reason, the thrust zone has been showing these tension events which indicate a high-angle or rough thrust that doesn't want to let go.  You see this in rock testing machines.  Once again, the injectors will be laughing, as the pressure should have dropped.

Fairly low intensity, and the earthquake magnitude hasn't been dropped (yet).  This will probably start a whole bunch of these again.  The mechanism advances when we have a thrust, and we start a new round of high-four earthquakes.

Cottage report _ a19

Up here alone with the dog. Fine weather for late October. The water is cold. Nobody on the lake. I wonder how cold it has to get to laugh at those funny climatologists.

LInux sometimes too secure

I keep 2 Linux machines running, both are running the same Debian, maybe updates and the kernel are different.  I can get the latest gtk-gnutella running on one, and not the other.  It runs into some obscure memory error, which has been going on for 5 years now, with no solution posted.  It's a rare problem that's all in the configuration.  So, no matter what you do, sometimes things just won't install.

This makes it impossible for someone to run a bad program that hits a lot of Linux machines.  To break into one, you need a genius to spend an hour or two trying to crack each machine.  Not like MS bots!

Nobody in Oklahoma responding to USGS felt map

It's funny.  I guess after hundreds of these things you start to ignore them.  This was a sizeable M3.8 right under Medford, and nobody felt it (or actually bothered to report it).  Time to get some strong ground motion instruments there.  I recommend a broad-band, high range seismometer, but that would cost real money.

Update

Sunday Takes the Cake

11 significant earthquakes.  This beats the previous record of 7.  Again, the main mechanism is dead unless we get a large earthquake on the thrust fault.  I have faith that it will come, but who knows when.

Another typhoon starts spinning towards Hawaii

I am sooo buying all the summer stuff on clearance, since we didn't have a summer.  Soon I'll be in a fancy resort in Maui, with my new linen pants, which were $20 from $80.  Today, it's frickin' freezing!

Looking at the trade winds, we can see how the broad section off Mexico has just spun something that could be a typhoon.  Apparently, these things don't get over the mountains, so I should be fine.  I've done the twisty road on the wet side, and that's best done once.

Usually, the Atlantic side should get wider by now.  However, my thoughts lean towards major oscillations of this stream, which gives us our warm and cold decades.  The cycle time is probably determined by ocean currents, which can at least go from 10 years to thousands.

Update - looks like it's getting cut to pieces. :)

Canadians - Prepare for Winter

Ok, you've had a few days here and there.  It was actually warm enough to go out in shorts for the day.  Now comes our normal weather.  Forget Global Warming, that was just a statistical anomaly.  Sure, we had a warm spell for 16 years instead of our normal 5-10 years, but that's the thing with Binomial Theorem.  Look how the Vikings were fooled with Greenland!

I sure hope you didn't decide to plant a wine vineyard up north.  Now, that would be too much.  The ocean currents have reversed, and the gentle Trade Winds have shrunk to a trickle.  It's Mr. Arctic Vortex for you!

I'm getting ready.  I already had all my upper windows replaced, and now I'm doing the basement, with a new back door.  The old stuff was from 1967 when gasoline was 10 cents a litre.  Lucky for us, earthquakes in Oklahoma are keeping down the natural gas prices.  When that whole place gets devastated by M6's and 7's, expect a price rise, and everybody goes to propane fracking.

New windows make a huge difference, and you don't need a humidifier any more.  This time I decided to go with a quality contractor, Peter and Greg Walker.  It might be a little bit more than a sleazy sub-contractor, but it is soooo pleasant!  For the new house down the road, the owner decided to be his own contractor, and the thing is a half-finished abandoned hulk.  If you aren't part of the Local Maffi, don't do this!

Depression in the News

The death of Mork has left us all a bit sad, but he had more problems than mere depression.  He was a true Intellectual Depressive (IP), of which I am a member.  These people are brilliant and see humour in the stupidity of others.  But it comes at a price.

Nearly all IP's are bipolar to some extent.  Especially performers, since they have to really 'up' for a performance to overcome natural anxiety.  The higher you go the deeper you crash.

When I was young, I was brilliant at solving problems at school and at work.  I would latch on to the problem, and work on it in my sleep.  My brain worked at such a fever pitch, I'm sure it would burn out an MRI scan.  :)  Alas, this intensity only works for a young brain, which means that if you are a brilliant programmer with brain fevers, you better get into management at 30!  No brains needed there!

This all tends to fall apart at 40.  The main brain chemical is serotonin and somewhat vasopressin.  For most IP's you notice it with increasing anger and anxiety.  You get angry with your kids, and angry at the stupidity of the world.  A man will self-medicate with alcohol, which is the worst.  It directly stops symptoms by pleasant drunkenness,  but also knocks down the essential brain chemicals.  Like Mork, you can quickly become dependent.

I found myself with all those symptoms, and started drinking more.  I didn't know what was happening, and might have just gone on with drinking, when something horrible happened.  A family member with the exact same hereditary condition attempted suicide.  At the end of the whole episode, I evaluated myself and went to the family doctor.  Then I started seeing a psychiatrist, one who was purely a chemical specialist (no talky-feely).

I found that you just had to get those brain chemicals up before you could 'pull out of it'.  That's what all the great unwashed were always telling me.  Serotonin is an important nutrient for the brain, and a scan will show brain shrinkage, which is fixed with treatment.  And you can't use nutritional supplements because of the blood-brain barrier.  You have to use the special stuff.

I now take some pills every day.  Since I vary slightly with the seasons, I have a great opportunity to track my brain serotonin.  In the summer, I am fantastic.  I have moderate amounts of wine and beer.  I track the serotonin by dream quality.  If I am up, I have happy lucid dreams.  That means I totally control them (in third person), and can 'replay' if I don't like something.  If my s. goes up too high, the dreams become extremely detailed and coloured, and I remember them too much during the day.  Never remember your dreams!  Your brain is designed to forget them right away, and not mix with reality.   If my s. gets that high, I drop a pill, and drink more.  :)

Now, the end of summer starts my discontent.  :)  Today, my morning dream was first person, and getting somewhat depressive.  Blah, all my drinking must end.  In a few months, I get so sensitive that even the smell of alcohol hits me.  I am hoping for a reprieve on my Hawaii trip!

I need a blue light in the morning.  That is important, get a blue LED light from Costco, they work much better than white.  The light totally kills your melatonin in the morning, which is essential.

The most important lesson here is to review your family history for alcoholism and other 'moodiness'.  Then do a depression check list.  The pills won't help if you become an alcoholic.  If you actually think Rob Ford has quit, think again.  Quitting would leave you basket case.

Still not serious on Oklahoma earthquakes

The New Madrid seismic network just located an M0.9 earthquake.

Now, there's nothing happening there, so this great detection is a waste.  But it's run out of Memphis and they have money.  After all, nothing scares up government money as 'The Return of New Madrid'.

Now, despite the warnings that OK is the new California, they still don't report anything below M2.5.  Is that just because of the map I use?  I doubt it because their depths have a huge uncertainty.  If they could get down to M0.9 and depth accuracy of 1 km, then they would see something they don't want to see.  Well Mr. Senator?  Forget your task force, just cough up more money.  :)

Yeah, I entered something for the Bruce review

The following papers should entered into the review.


http://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/abs/10.1139/e94-025#.U-o1znWx3UY

Deep structure beneath Lake Ontario: crustal-scale Grenville subdivisions

http://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/abs/10.1139/e99-094#.U-o2RHWx3UY

A seismic-based cross-section of the Grenville Orogen in southern Ontario and western Quebec


http://www.nrcresearchpress.com/doi/abs/10.1139/e94-023#.U-o2oXWx3UY

Seismic images of a tectonic subdivision of the Grenville Orogen beneath lakes Ontario and Erie

I have been somewhat alarmed that there has been no study of the Precambrian beneath the proposed site.  As we know from the Oklahoma earthquakes, this is the zone that generates earthquakes, and it's complexity also reflects on deep karst features of the site.


*************
I emailed the above.  Probably didn't follow a thousand rules, and they'll reject it.  Maybe somebody else could take it up.

Update:

I just submitted the following as well:

I suggest the following trigger for the safety case.

--Collapse or significant water inflow.

I believe that the safety case for the shaft is based on stable, tight rock.  Excavation problems merit review.

I also suggest the following triggers for the environmental case.


--significant pumping - one million litres

The environmental case is based on the near-stasis of the deep rock water.  It is the equivalent of drain cleaner.  No provisions have been made for the storage or disposal of this water.  As well, the pumping disturbs the groundwater.

--significant grout injection - one million litres

Past excavation experience in the area suggests a 100% chance of pumping and grout.

Another update:

Actually, I should have included the famous USGS Oklahoma paper.

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/2013JB010612/abstract

But since I don't expect to hear from them, all is well....

Aug 13 - still no contact.

Aug 15 - nope

Nice link  - OPG profits from screwing up Bruce

Yeah, I'm on it.

Bruce Ugly Deep Thing Hearings

Reference

Additional hearing days have been piled on.  Those guys are making money!  This one is very specific so that US Senators who just want to bitch are being left out.

I am drawn to a certain item.

2. Updates to the geoscientific verification plan:
• Details (geologic and geotechnical) concerning specific methods, timing, 
and sequencing of sampling; and
• Triggers for changes to engineering design and benchmarks for verification 
of the safety case.

Here is time to hammer them Mr. Senator.  Specifically their sampling is so narrow as to defy belief.  Who has brought up the fact they are on the dang Grenville Front?

My big hope is to introduce triggers with regard to pumping and grout.  Specifically, if they exceed one million gallons of either, the whole plan is shit.  Since they live under the illusion that the excavation will be a piece of cake you should be able to slip this one under the radar.  How about more than 5 people killed?  If they they think that grout will hold back that water while they blast, well .... actually they have no clue.

However, I expect this whole thing to be a snoozer and I'll be just looking for some choice quotes.

When the whole thing gets going, I expect millions of gallons of salt water going into the lake, millions of gallons of grout, and casualties.  They will stop when too many people get killed.

When we did the tunnels we pumped all that rock water into the lake.  It's nasty stuff, pure drain cleaner.  And we pumped in trainloads of grout.  They were were very shallow tunnels so the water pressures were about a tenth of what is expected here.  Even so, we couldn't hold back the water and pumped like the dickens.

Qualification

It is obvious that I am a coward who only wants to egg people on.  :)  For legal purposes, I totally believe everything that everybody says.  GO OPG!  GO ONTARIO POLITICIANS!  You are so smart.

Cottage Report - A9

Sunny and cold at night.  The water is cold.  This is really late August weather, like the stuff we had in June.  So it really looks like a year without a summer.  You can see that our trade winds band is very narrow and still unable to support hurricanes.  On the other hand, the Pacific is very wide and hammering Hawaii.  We're going there soon, and I hope it settles down.

Update:  turned out to be a fine weekend, even with late August weather.  The water warmed up in the top 3 inches.

Hey, That's My Fish!!

I came back from the cottage for a day, and my fishing-fanatic neighbour snuck over to my dock, and gloatingly sent me this picture. (sans burglar mask, which I added).

That's one of my monster dock fish, which I carefully cultivate.  The other day that guy played with me for 10 minutes, since every day I spend exactly 10 minutes fishing off the dock with exactly one worm, small hook, and very small Walmart fishing rod.  It was a great fight, and my daughter almost got him with my net, but flinched at the last second, afraid to get fish-slapped in the face.  Daughters!  Then the fish opened his mouth and let go.  My tiny hook couldn't penetrate anything in that huge mouth.

So, Mr. Professional Fisher went in with a real hook, and got it.

Of course, when he's away, I go over to his dock.  He's got Pickerel there....

The Horrors of the Google Attic

I have now done many thousands of posts here, and I'm catching up on Google+.  All my pictures are on my phone, and I have automatic update.

But you think I can find anything?  My sister said that somebody said I put up pictures of my 60th birthday, and she wanted them.  Nope, no can do.  I just can't find them, and I can't remember anything about them.  That's the fun of 60!

We used to shove all the pictures and stuff in shoe boxes.  This new world is just the same.  :(  I suppose that better search tools would help, like staying confined to your own g+ posts, and not the world.  While waiting for things to get better, I just keep piling things in that attic.

Regatta movie

All the pictures of the regatta combined to the google movie.  I wasn't even going to go, but the neighbours needed my daughter.  :)

All the other pictures are on g+

August is the New July

It is said that Canada has two seasons - Winter and July.  That now changes to Winter, and maybe a few days in August.  Yesterday actually looked like Summer for a while, and then Old Man Vortex came whistling in.