Real-time Mind Control Zombie Zot

http://www.MindControlUSA.com ^ | 12/23/06 | BibleBabe1

[NicknamedBob]

I was looking at domes today. None in existance is satisfactory to me, but this one has some intriguing possibilities.

http://www.borinvanloon.co.uk/pagemill_images/dome.gif

It's smaller scale, but we could upscale it. The advantage I see is the straight line architecture it imposes on a geodesic design. We could use that for internal cable strengthening of the arch supports, as well as more direct access to the girder crawlers for maintenace and repair.

[NicknamedBob]

"Holy underwire Batman."

Some chose to ride out the launch process in hot tubs.

[Professional Engineer]

That'll make an e-mail server beg for mercy.

[Monkey Face]

LOL!

Thanks, Fan!
When I was coming home from church, I noticed the hood was loose, so that means the perp was a heartbeat away from hot wiring it.
I went to Wally World and got a car cover, but realized after I got home that I also need a cable lock for it. Now I'll spend another night, watching out my window in the dark with the phone in my hand. For lack of a better weapon.
I need to get some firepower.
Dang. (Pickin' on old ladies...reminds me of Ruth Gordon in "Every Which Way But Loose.")

This neighborhood has really gone downhill. And the managers don't seem to care. I'll be glad when I'm out of here...(maybe next month!)

[Monkey Face]

Friends don't let friends drive any Ford but a Shelby....;o]
(If I had a car like that, I would have to park in the local cop shop parking lot.)

[Monkey Face]

Most of the perps here have first and last names that end in vowels, and they no "speeka angleesh."

I'm so sick of this neighborhood it's not funny, and I can't get out fast enough.

Good on ya for taking your neighborhood back. I wish some folks here would do that. Thank your folks for endowing you with a set of big..... morals. ;o]

[Professional Engineer]

Very nice. I've often thought a geodesic dome would be an awesome house.

[Professional Engineer]

(If I had a car like that, I would have to park in the local cop shop parking lot.)

I think the impound lot would get rather expensive after a while.

[King Prout]

well, that geodesic modelling app you(?) twigged me to does generate happy output - the F90 dome is perfect for the scale. of the main enclosure.

the only problem is it generates a skin that must be manually re-drafted into a solid object.

and that is only a problem for O.C. morons like me :)

as you pointed out, long ago - at any conceivable rendering scale, a solids lattice would appear identical to the simple polygon skin, so re-drafting as a solid constitutes needless effort.

how does the old saw go?
"good enough gets the job done, whereas "perfect" is almost impossible and seldom worth the effort"
it is something I'm getting more comfortable with.

and don't kick yourself over the various miscommunications and differences in concepts - you're easy: getting David Drake to concretely define the appearance of a hovertank was much harder, as he'd never really done so in any definite manner - unlike Clancy, Drake doesn't write tech-porn. He did say that, when he thought about it at all, he generally thought of them as looking like scaled-up T64s. so...THIS:

becomes THIS:

[Professional Engineer]

Friends don't let friends drive any Ford

I say the same thing about Dodge.

I have a 97 Explorer with 177K on the clock. It's one of the very deadly 15 inch wheel models. I still haven't been able to make it do back flips and such. Even with a flat left rear tire.

[King Prout]

well, the two bigass files are failed attempts at self-generated geodesic domes. you do NOT want them.

the ones which are (might be) of interest are far smaller - the one used to generate the pretty pictures above is only 13Megs.

[King Prout]

kevlar, saiga-12, training, and fed-up-ness.

[Monkey Face]

I think the impound lot would get rather expensive after a while.

You might find my current vehicle in the impound lot, but not a Shelby! That would go right in front of Star Fleet HQ!

[NicknamedBob]

"That'll make an e-mail server beg for mercy."

MSN. com offers Hotmail with good capacity and a free account, but some servers won't support certain file types.

[Monkey Face]

My ugly little truck will have 275000+ on it tomorrow. All I've done to it is a tuna, and tri-monthly maintenance.

[Monkey Face]

I have one out of four...fed-up-ness!

With a large dose of frustration!

[King Prout]

get the training and the boomstick.
leave kevlar and patrolling to dumb grunting hairy menfolk like me, ok?

[Monkey Face]

Gotcha! It really irks me (to put it politely) that some ne'er-do-well thinks he's entitled to something I had to work hard to get.

I've had enough set-backs in the last two months. I don't need my truck stolen into the bargain. When one is on a fixed income, any loss is hard to replace.

[NicknamedBob]

From the inside of the Castle dome, artificial lighting and atmospheric haze help to make the gridwork seem to disappear.

From the outside, at any appreciable distance, the metal gridwork would be almost indiscernible. So any rendering would really be wasting its time to try to draw specific lines.

An interesting scene would be a shot of a maintenance crew, repairing a damaged panel on the outside of the dome, with their crawler/supply craft in the background.

[Monkey Face]

I'm off for the night, gang. See y'all later!