Category Archives: Administrative

Administrative, General

Not Quite Escaping?

3 Comments

I’m planning to leave for California from Boca around September 10th. I was hoping that I could avoid a hurricane, as we’re heading into the heart of the season, but Ericka has formed (sorry, not a permalink):

The cloud mass just east of the Windward Islands developed into Tropical Storm Erika late Tuesday afternoon. The storm was able to develop thanks to the overall flow plus warm sea surface temperatures between 83 and 86 degrees in that part of the Atlantic. Erika is moving slowly and will not threaten the Southeast coast of the United States before Labor Day. Before then, the storm will have some impact on the Leeward Islands, Puerto Rico and Dominican Republic before moving east of the Bahamas.

Will it continue through the Bahamas to “west of the Bahamas” (i.e., the Florida Peninsula)? Or head north, as everything else has so far? The models are all over the map, with some of them taking it through the Greater Antilles. Extrapolating the five-day track (again, unfortunately not a permalink), it looks like south Florida would be on the southern edge of the cone.

Will he manage to get away without shuttering? Will he manage to get away at all?

Stay tuned.

Administrative

An Edit Feature

15 Comments

Often, people post follow-up comments to fix problems with previous comments (such as here), and often, in doing so, they wish for an edit feature.

In order to have a comment feature that only allowed editing of your own comments (and surely, you wouldn’t want one that allowed anyone to edit anyone’s right…?), I’d have to set up a login of some kind, whether Google, or otherwise. I’ve never done that, and have always maintained a pretty open and freewheeling comments section here, and overall, it’s worked all right. I know that I don’t like to have to log in (or worse, set up an entire account) to comment elsewhere, and when I have to do so, it usually results in my not bothering.

So be careful what you wish for.

[Update late morning]

OK, it’s not exactly an edit feature, but I’ve added live preview.

Administrative

Back To California

4 Comments

I’m heading back to LA tonight, for the next week and a half. Not sure how much blogging will be happening.

[Evening update, about 9:40 CDT]

Well, I’m stuck at DFW, with my LA flight delayed until 11 PM local, which gets me into LA about midnight, and probably to my room over an hour later. Should have taken the non-stop from Miami.

[Bleary Wednesday morning update from the left coast]

OK, I was wrong. It wasn’t delayed until 11 pm — it didn’t rise the wheels until 12:30 AM (1:30 AM my body time on a day after I’d gotten up at 5 AM). We got into LAX about 2 AM Pacific (24 hours after I had first arisen). National had only two cars, both vans. The first one (a Kia Sedona) started beeping at me, and lighted an indicator saying that both front doors were ajar (no, it’s not a jar, it’s a door…) and the interior light came on and wouldn’t go off. This behavior continued, so I returned the car, to little rejoicing, and got the other one, a Dodge of some variety. I didn’t get to bed until after 3 AM. It’s now almost 10 AM, and I’m at work.

Hopefully, I’ll get caught up a little tonight.

Administrative

Good Times

2 Comments

Well, it’s windy, raining, with what looks to be a lot more to come on the Marathon radar. It looks like a low, verging on a tropical depression, as hurricane season really gets into the swing of things. So what’s the plan for today? Drive forty miles toward Key West, and get on a boat to go out snorkeling. Really. The captain says it will be fine.

Well, it’s no skin off his nose if we drive an hour each way for nothing.

[Update a few minutes later]

We cancelled, after looking at the radar again. Off to Key West instead. If this rain keeps up, it might actually be pleasant (i.e., not blistering hot) there today.

Administrative, Space

Bloggus Interruptus

1 Comment

I was over at the California Science Center this afternoon to hear a panel discussion with Buzz Aldrin and several other speakers, moderated by Howard McCurdy. And I’m on a red eye back to Florida tonight, so probably not much until sometime tomorrow.

[Friday morning update]

Back home, but sleep deprived. Maybe more later.

Administrative, Space

In CA

I had an uneventful flight to SFO this morning, and drove over to Half Moon Bay to see the Pacific before heading to my motel in Mountain View for the conference, which starts tonight. The room was supposed to have Internet, but it’s only available in the lobby. I’m unhappy, but I’ll probably be spending most of the next three days over at the conference, so I’ll just deal, I guess.