The Wobbulator

Make your own sci-fi soundtracks. Reminds me of the intro to The Outer Limits.

From the BBC c/o kottke.org.

"In the early 1960s, synthesizers did not exist. Instead the Radiophonic Workshop begged and borrowed as many test oscillators as possible from other BBC departments.

"The versatile 'wobbulator' was a sine-wave oscillator that could be frequency modulated. It consisted of a metal box with a few switches and one very large knob that could sweep the entire frequency range."

"Have a play with our simulation of the Wobbulator to create your own space-y sounds, then keep scrolling to find out how we built it using the Web Audio API."

Are you guys just incompetent, or what?

You tell 'em, Ms. Bartiromo.

Humbles other Bumbles

December 21

I guess it's too late to build an underground bunker or book passage to Pic de Bugarach to catch a departing flying saucer. But with my birthday the next day, I need to know.

Some believe the Mayan long count calendar, which "ends" December 21, 2012, predicts a twelveth planet named Niburu will collide with earth and destroy us all. Others predict an alignment of the sun, the earth, other planets and far off black holes, resulting in galactic cataclysm. Hollywood has already cashed in on the phenomenon with movies like 2012, Melancholia and Another Earth, to name a few.

Some people take this pretty seriously and have gone to great lengths to make their case in books and on the internet. Others do their best to debunk it all, and I mean all of it, like www.2012hoax.org.

Thank goodness for rational people like Neil Degrasse Tyson. A sense of humor helps.

Grief

Waking up this morning was hard, but then I found this photo of the Grief Monument at Rock Creek Cemetery by Augustus Saint-Gaudens on shorpy.com. It's the only thing that makes sense today.

Grief Monument ~ Augustus Saint-Gaudens

New York City Hand Drawn Map

Last year I posted about some really whimsical maps of Martha's Vineyard by watercolorist Preston MacAdoo.

Something quite different but just as intriguing and fun is this hand-drawn map of New York City by illustrator Jenni Sparks.

Thanks to Jason Kotkke.

New York City ~ Jenni Sparks

New York City close up ~ Jenni Sparks

Take Five

RIP, Dave Brubeck.

Ambient Gifs

I can almost hear them. 

It's the spending, stupid.

H.L. Mencken said "Democracy is the theory that the people know what they want, and deserve to get it, good and hard."

Well, get ready. And we're not talking about the feel good campaign rhetoric about "the rich paying their fair share" or evasive delusions about the economy and "bumps in the road."

In an editorial in today's Wall Street Journal titled "Why $16 Trillion Only Hints at the True U.S. Debt," co-authors Chris Cox and Bill Archer expose the real extent of America's looming spending and debt pile up. Buckle up, it's going to be a bumpy night.

"As Washington wrestles with the roughly $600 billion "fiscal cliff" and the 2013 budget, the far greater fiscal challenge of the U.S. government's unfunded pension and health-care liabilities remains offstage. The truly important figures would appear on the federal balance sheet—if the government prepared an accurate one.

"The actual liabilities of the federal government—including Social Security, Medicare, and federal employees' future retirement benefits—already exceed $86.8 trillion, or 550% of GDP. For the year ending Dec. 31, 2011, the annual accrued expense of Medicare and Social Security was $7 trillion. Nothing like that figure is used in calculating the deficit. In reality, the reported budget deficit is less than one-fifth of the more accurate figure.

"Why haven't Americans heard about the titanic $86.8 trillion liability from these programs? One reason: The actual figures do not appear in black and white on any balance sheet. But it is possible to discover them. Included in the annual Medicare Trustees' report are separate actuarial estimates of the unfunded liability for Medicare Part A (the hospital portion), Part B (medical insurance) and Part D (prescription drug coverage).

"As of the most recent Trustees' report in April, the net present value of the unfunded liability of Medicare was $42.8 trillion. The comparable balance sheet liability for Social Security is $20.5 trillion.

"When the accrued expenses of the government's entitlement programs are counted, it becomes clear that to collect enough tax revenue just to avoid going deeper into debt would require over $8 trillion in tax collections annually. That is the total of the average annual accrued liabilities of just the two largest entitlement programs, plus the annual cash deficit.

"Nothing like that $8 trillion amount is available for the IRS to target. According to the most recent tax data, all individuals filing tax returns in America and earning more than $66,193 per year have a total adjusted gross income of $5.1 trillion. In 2006, when corporate taxable income peaked before the recession, all corporations in the U.S. had total income for tax purposes of $1.6 trillion. That comes to $6.7 trillion available to tax from these individuals and corporations under existing tax laws.

"In short, if the government confiscated the entire adjusted gross income of these American taxpayers, plus all of the corporate taxable income in the year before the recession, it wouldn't be nearly enough to fund the over $8 trillion per year in the growth of U.S. liabilities. Some public officials and pundits claim we can dig our way out through tax increases on upper-income earners, or even all taxpayers. In reality, that would amount to bailing out the Pacific Ocean with a teaspoon. Only by addressing these unsustainable spending commitments can the nation's debt and deficit problems be solved."

Until Spring

It's always a melancholy experience to close the summer home and leave the island until the warmer days of spring.

Psst, General?

The New Yorker ~ Alex Gregory

Ding Dong, Twinkies's Dead

From today's Wall Street Journal:

"Hostess endured $52 million in workers' comp claims in 2011, according to its bankruptcy filing this January. The snack giant's 372 collective-bargaining agreements required the company to maintain 80 different health and benefit plans, 40 pension plans and mandated a $31 million increase in wages and health care and other benefits for 2012.

"Union work rules usually required cake and bread products to be delivered to a single retail location using two separate trucks. Drivers weren't allowed to load their own vehicles, and the workers who loaded bread weren't allowed to load cake. On most delivery routes, another "pull up" employee moved products from back rooms to shelves.

"This year management negotiated concessions from some of the unions, including the Teamsters, but the bakers rejected a last and best offer in September. Then the courts gave Hostess unilateral authority to modify collective-bargaining contracts, prompting the strike. So now it will liquidate, instead of attempting to emerge from Chapter 11 intact.

"The 18,500 layoffs are equal to about 11% of the net new jobs the entire U.S. economy created in October. The unions are blaming private equity, or Bain Capital, or capitalism, but the election is over. And so is Hostess."

Take a break!

Having had a nasty spell with sciatica last winter, I'm literally on my toes nearly every day stretching, practicing yoga, spinning, doing cardio/strength-training work outs, or just plain walking. Here's why . . .

What's next?

Hurricane Sandy, Winter Storm Athena . . .

No sooner had the lights come back on and we're outside shoveling 7 inches of snow. Oh yeah, and there was a national election in between.

What's next, the 2012 Mayan apocalypse?

Bolon Yokte' K'uh

The day after

Forward!

No matter whom you vote for, the Government always gets in

A neck and neck race, a polarized America, and two very different paths to the future.

Frankly, I don't understand why Obama wants to be President.

Look at the mess he'd inherit:

• 23 million Americans seeking employment and the highest unemployment rate this century, up to 7.9 percent last week. Another 8 million have given up looking for work.
• Nearly 50 million Americans on food stamps. In fact, the number of Americans on food stamps has risen seven times faster than employment.
• $6 trillion in new debt.
• Anemic GDP, lower than last year, and the year before that.
• Increased class tensions and divisiveness.
• Enemies who don't fear us and allies who don't trust us.
• $5 gas.
• Etcetera, etcetera

Voter turnout in a handful of states will be the deciding factor. Go vote! And please, only once.

Cloud Atlas

With no electricity or heat at home, we decided to spend our Saturday in White Plains, browsing books at the local Barnes & Noble, followed by a screening of the new Wachowski movie, Cloud Atlas, based on the novel by David Mitchell. Woo boy. My wife called it a "hot mess." She's right.

Like Terence Malick's Tree of Life, Cloud Atlas shifts back and forth in time and runs nearly three hours. The six story lines are enigmatic at best, but seem to converge around a parable about good and evil or, more precisely, bondage and freedom. I won't bore you with further cliches, I'm not a film critic. But go see it with an open mind.

What I did find especially illuminating was returning home around 8 pm to find our lights back on. More to the point, I went online, googled Lana Wachowski, and then watched a video of a recent speech she gave when accepting the Human Rights Campaign's Visibility Award.

Lana's story is inextricably linked to the movie's narrative and themes. In her acceptance speech, she quotes a line from the movie: "If I had remained invisible, the truth would stay hidden and I couldn't allow that." That's courage.

NYSEG Power Outage

This map shows how nearly all New York State Electric and Gas ratepayers in Westchester Country are now in day four without power. The utility's outage web site provides county and town statistics. NYSEG says they're still "assessing" the scope of the damage. No details other than "extended outage" are being forecast.

P.S. 5 pm - A NYSEG truck and crew just stopped out front to take photographs of downed trees and power lines. I asked them when we could expect our electricity to be restored. He smiled and said "They don't tell us."

Frankenstorm's Aftermath

More than 100 deaths along the Atlantic seaboard, millions without power, and property damage estimated between $10 and $15 billion.

We blew out the candles and went to bed last night around 9:00 pm, and awakened to fallen trees and power lines in our immediate Westchester County, New York neighborhood.

South Road, Katonah

Cottage Place, Katonah

South Road, Katonah

Martha's Vineyard fared no better, with reports that Wasque point on Chappaquiddick lost another 24 feet of shoreline overnight. Filling the tank in Menemsha now requires careful docking.

Wasque, Chappaquiddick

Menemsha, Martha's Vineyard

Meanwhile, in New York City . . .

NYC Subway

Noah Kalina ~ The Day after Yesterday

Frankenstorm Update

Well, the wind's picking up in the NYC area, but not much else is happening despite the mediagasm.

Jason Kotkke has assembled a number of Sandy-related links, covering the scientific, the artistic and the ludicrous.

This Wind Map is big data in action, these pictures of a closed and empty Grand Central Terminal and Times Square subway station are surreal, and Instagrammers are busy.

Attack Ads

Charles Barsotti ~ The New Yorker

Frankenstorm

Here we go again, trick or treat takes on new meaning.

Meteorologists are buzzing about different tracking models and potential outcomes.

One thing's clear, Hurricane Sandy's big and heading north.

Jeopardy

I remember the day in the fourth grade when I was home sick and watching daytime TV,  and the quiz show's original host Art Fleming asked this Final Jeopardy question:

Which lake is at the highest elevation?

I yelled out Lake Titicaca! I was right and felt like a genius.

Nearly 50 years later I'm still watching, shouting out the answers, often with our boys when they're home. We share the addiction.

So, this story  - - What it's like to be on Jeopardy - - really struck a chord. The author, tech journalist Glenn Fleishman, is featured below.



P.S. The web says Lake Titicaca isn't even in the top 10 of the highest elevated lakes, but it is world's highest navigable lake.

Martha's Vineyard Glassworks

Makonikey Fall

Gold Rally?

With investments in Krugerrands, I routinely monitor the commodity price of gold bullion. A one-ounce Krugerrand has had a spot price of more than $1,800 for several weeks.

 

My eyes popped when I saw this table on wsj.com a few minutes ago, showing the commodity price of an ounce of gold up more than 900 percent to $17,697.

Then I hit the browser reload button.

Poof, it was gone.

Income Disparity

2012 Salary

Raul Ibanez - $1,100,000
Alex Rodriguez - $29,000,000

Magnum Force

Barry Blitt ~ The New Yorker