A really nice surprise...

A really nice surprise...  After we went to bed last night, but while we were still awake (reading, both of us), I got a text message from my friend Aleck L.  He wanted to know if I was still up (he knows about my early bedtime), and if I was interested in taking a Facetime (video) call with him and two other of my friends (and former colleagues): Frankie T. and Jimmy Y.  Of course I'd be interested!  It turns out they were all three back together in San Diego, and they thought of me. 

That call was a hoot!  The surprise factor made it even better.  It's so fun to get back together with old friends, and three at once is more than three times better!  My facial muscles still hurt from smiling so much :)

Bright black holes?

Bright black holes?  A fascinating read for anyone interested in cosmology...

Comet dust...

Comet dust...  Literally!  These tiny grains of dust from Comet 67P were captured by instruments on the Rosetta spacecraft...

The government is about to screw something up again...

The government is about to screw something up again...  That was my first thought when I saw this headline:

Curbside recycling may get scaled back in rural Cache County

Cache County is where we live.  But then I read the article, and it looks instead like common sense being applied in a careful, thoughtful way.  By a government!  Unbelievable!

A million people at risk?

A million people at risk?  That's one estimate of how many people might be killed if the Mosul Dam (in northern Iraq) collapses.  The official estimate is a half million people.  There seems to be a consensus by dam engineers who know the project that the collapse is something that could happen at any time, and only immediate action could possibly prevent it. 

The engineering behind this dam is particularly interesting.  The dam could only be built where it was if there was continuous maintenance, mostly for plugging holes in the bedrock it rests on.  The near-continuous state of war in Iraq since '91 – most recently the brief occupation of the dam by ISIS – prevented that from happening, and the result is a predictable disaster.  It's not clear at all that the Iraqi government will be able to muster the resources to save the dam, or all those people.

Wars have consequences, and some of them are really bad...

Maybe, just maybe, there really is a serious criminal investigation underway...

Maybe, just maybe, there really is a serious criminal investigation underway...  I speak of the DOJ's investigation of Hillary Clinton's private email server carrying classified information.  Yesterday's grant of immunity to a Hillary State Department staffer – one involved in setting up that email server – is a significant step, and one that's hard to imagine if there wasn't a serious investigation underway.  These grants of immunity are offered in exchange for open testimony, generally only when the testimony of an insider can get the information needed.  When someone has been granted immunity from prosecution, they can no longer rely on the right against self-incrimination – because they can't incriminate themselves when they have immunity.

It will be most interesting to see what comes out of this...