Me and my Father’s Father
Posted by johnG on 7th February , 2009

Horizon Geometry
“The square root of your height (or elevation) in feet times 1.2 equals the distance to your horizon in miles.
So, how high would Sarah Palin’s house have to be inorder to see Russia?:
Wasilla, Alaska, is 1130 km from Russia.
How high above the Earth’s surface do you have to be to see a point 1130 km away along the Earth’s surface? If we start plugging numbers into myDistance To Horizon Calculator, we see that the answer is 101425.88 meters. You have to go 101 km (63 miles!) above Wasilla before you can see Russia. You can knock 104 meters off of that if you like to account for Wasilla’s elevation above sea level.
| Height (meters) | Distance (km) | Height(feet) | Distance (miles) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | 0.0 | 0.0 | 0.0 |
| 1 | 3.6 | 3.3 | 2.1 |
| 2 | 5.1 | 6.6 | 3.0 |
| 3 | 6.2 | 9.8 | 3.7 |
| 4 | 7.1 | 13.1 | 4.3 |
| 5 | 8.0 | 16.4 | 4.8 |
| 6 | 8.7 | 19.7 | 5.2 |
| 7 | 9.4 | 23.0 | 5.7 |
| 8 | 10.1 | 26.2 | 6.1 |
| 9 | 10.7 | 29.5 | 6.4 |
| 10 | 11.3 | 32.8 | 6.8 |
| 20 | 16.0 | 65.6 | 9.6 |
| 30 | 19.5 | 98.4 | 11.7 |
| 40 | 22.6 | 131.2 | 13.5 |
| 50 | 25.2 | 164.0 | 15.1 |
| 60 | 27.6 | 196.8 | 16.6 |
| 70 | 29.9 | 229.6 | 17.9 |
| 80 | 31.9 | 262.4 | 19.2 |
| 90 | 33.9 | 295.2 | 20.3 |
| 100 | 35.7 | 328.0 | 21.4 |
| 1000 | 112.8 | 3280.0 | 67.7 |
| 2000 | 159.6 | 6560.0 | 95.7 |
| 5000 | 252.3 | 16,400.0 | 151.4 |
| 10,000 | 356.9 | 32,800.0 | 214.2 |
| 12,000 | 391.0 | 39,360.0 | 234.6 |
| 100,000 | 1,132.7 | 328,000.0 | 679.6 |
| 500,000 | 2,572.0 | 1,640,000.0 | 1543.2 |
| 1,000,000,000 | 1,006,344.9 | 3,280,000,000.0 | 603,806.9 |

Windows 7 Ultimate Installation log
1. Burn copy of Window 7 Build 7000 ISO on Mac “just in case.”
2. Backup data files on Dell Inspiron laptop (Window Vista Capable) 1Gig Ram 1.87G Duo 140GHDD
3. Put Windows Disc in Machine and boot from CD
a. Select Upgrade Path
i. “Cannot Upgrade from Window XP. Can only upgrade from Windows Vista SP1”
b. Reboot machine from XP partition
c. Boot from Windows 7 Disc
i. “Do you wish to check for updates prior to installing – YES
1. This check took about 4 minutes to check and didn’t give any response or dialog back.??? (hmmm, is MS checking on us?)
ii. Create New Partition
1. Windows created two partitions
a. A 200MB “boot” partition
b. The remainder as “primary” partition
iii. “Installing Windows
1. Copying files Fast about 30 sec
2. Expanding files About seven minutes
3. Installing Features just about 10 seconds
4. Installing Updates seconds
5. Completing Installation it completed this after the below reboot
iv. First reboot
v. Setup is updating registry settings
vi. Setup is starting services
vii. Second reboot
viii. Setup is preparing for first time us
ix. Setup is checking video performance
x. Setup prompt for Product Key
xi. Displays list of wireless access points
xii. Do you wish to create a home group?
1. Select Libaries
a. Pictures
b. Videos
c. Music
d. Documents
2. Remember this key
xiii. Windows if finalizing
xiv. Start desktop
4. Finished!!!!
Summary:
Deja Vu: I remember installing Vista in the Fall of 2005 and having a “bear” of a time getting things to work. In comparison, I installed Windows 7 on an older Dell Inspiron (1.87Ghz Duo) and everythig including aero is working great. I haven’t found anything so far that is NOT working. I’ll keep you posted.
Overall: pretty darn good. Microsoft eventually gets things right.
Pondering about Holiday vernacular.
What is all this fuss about Christmas? Well, people say “Oh, you can’t say Christmas because it is offensive to other religions…” blah, blah, blah.
The politically correct crowd says “Happy Holidays.” That seems to cover it all, eh?
Well I did a bit of research this morning and found this list:
Now, as a mathematician I am fond of “X”mas because your can replace whatever rhetoric you wish with the lookup table above and replace; Normal, logical and efficient.
Further, than I thought well, isn’t it really a mechanism to generate consumption increasing the “C” component in Gross Domestic Product?
Hmmm, GDP = consumption + gross investment + government spending + (exports −imports), or,
GDP = C + I + G + (X-M).
That is it!
Therefore, the new name of Christmas will now be:
GDPMas or (rewritten)
C + I + G + X-Mas
Or
CIGXMas
Merry CIGXMas everyone!
Your mathematician Mr. Pretto…
Ocarina and the other virtual instruments on the iPhone will born an all iPhone band soon! You heard it here first!!
Windows 7
I’ve been reviewing the initial features in Windows 7 via the CTP. I remember this same phenomenon in the fall of 2005 when I received my first preview of Vista. (Longhorn)
So far I like this:
My Mother called and said “My computer keeps telling me to install “A Dopey Flasher” —Adobe Flash!!!! LOL
My observation of the day is kids that say “my bad.” Most of them think this is a recent trend. Well, get educated:
Mea culpa is a Latin phrase that translates into English as “my fault”, or “my own fault”. In order to emphasize the message, the adjective “maxima” may be inserted, resulting in “mea maxima culpa,” which would translate as “my most [grievous] fault.”

This is a first for me. I’ve seen the big reader boards here in Las Vegas “blue screen,” however, I’ve never seen a gas pump crash before.
LOL,
john…
I had a thought about ten years ago. How many U.S. kids are at home playing video games, especially online video games every day, 20, 50, 75 Million? Ok, here is what we do. We build low cost, restricted drones that can navigate within a conflict theater like Afghanistan and we allocate a drone to each online participant. Then we offer $1Billion dollars to the person who achieves our US objective like finding Osama Bin Laden. How a fast do you think the gamers will achieve our objective?
Are you kidding me? What a military force that would be, eh?
Cheers,
John…
Found this on www.digg.com:
http://www.mentalfloss.com/blogs/archives/14647
Funny how I use www.twitter.com as my MAIN source of news these days instead of www.digg.com or www.slashdot.org. The Internet is “a-changing.”
Cheers as I tip my glass of Pinot Noir to you — yes you!
john…