All digital now

A round 2 a.m. (CEST) today analog TV transmissions via satellite will be switched off in Germany (maybe even all of Yurp?). Terrestial analog transmission was stopped a couple of years ago. So it's all digital TV transmission now. Those of you who didn't buy a digital receiver yet are going to be left with a snowy screen today ( aka No Signal). Ok, we can accept that, there has been plenty of warning, but some people are sure to have missed the deadline.

A magnificent piece of misplanning has put this deadline on the day before a public holiday, so that those addicted to TV may not be able to buy a digital receiver until wednesday :-(

The receiver is not enough either. The feed head on the dish has to be replaced too. People in rental apartments may have a problem here if their landlord didn't get the communal feed head changed.

I'll let you know what happens in my May blog.

Comments (1) :
Demeur (USA) wrote "A little info on the subject here in the U.S. We were given ample time for the conversion (nearly a year). During the lead up TV stations conducted tests to make sure those on cable would know if they needed extra equipment. Cable at the time was sending both signals through their lines. Those without cable had to switch to a new set to box and antennae to get a signal but the government provided a coupon that just about paid for the box. ( how nice of them no?). At any rate here's where we stand today. Those unfortunate enough not to have cable are stuck with the set top box and an over the air digital signal that gets converted to analog for their old analog TVs. The problem is that instead of snow or ghosts that we once experienced with rabbit ears the signal drops out altogether leaving the viewer with a black screen and the words "no signal". You can imagine how frustrating that would be when watching your favorite show or sports match and as fate always has it the picture drops at the most critical time. But over here with the cable rates increasing to stratospheric levels most people are turning to free internet options. That is until the government passes some draconian copyright laws preventing it." Why should the gummint provide free-TV coupons? You want it, you pay for it! We have to pay for a TV/radio license annually too.

Copyright ^© Stu Savory on April 30, 2012 permalink . Comments Email

1 + 1 = 2 ? ;-)

J enny asked (in the previous comments) for a maths posting here, keeping it simple and starting with 1+1=2. So here it is :-)

The mouse pad shown on the left arose from an internet cartoon (about 4-6 years ago, artist I've forgotten) showing a primary school child writing 1+1=11 on the blackboard and the teached sighing in frustration at the child's "stupidity". It's supposed to be funny because it is wrong. But I can think of at least three situations in which 1+1=11 is correct.

1) Assume they had just been learning about Roman numerals; then I+I=II is correct! I've covered Roman Numeral addition and subtraction as well as Roman Numeral Multiplication and even Roman Numeral Long Division elsewhen in this blog.

2) Assume the teacher had just been teaching them the use of positional notation with arabic numerals as "the digit on the left is worth ten times the digit on the right". He/she may have forgotten to mention that this only applies if the digits are juxtaposed but not if there is an operator (the plus sign) between the digits. Teachers often forget to mention this restriction, so it is really their fault if the child has 'misunderstood' the positional notation rule.

3) Assume the expression is in binary notation, the binary numbers encoded using the Gray code. The Gray code, named after Frank Gray, is a binary numeral system where two successive values differ in only one bit. It is a non-weighted code originally designed to prevent spurious output from electromechanical switches. Thus 01+01=11 (two) and 11+01=10 (three) etc. So 000,001,011,010,110,111,101,100 represent 0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7 respectively. Gray codes are also used in labelling the axes of Karnaugh maps and in clock FIFO buffer HW. I refer you to the Wikipedia article for more details.

So, dear Jenny, 1+1=11 sometimes;-) Was that nerdy enough for you? ;-)

Comments (5) :
Nick (UK) quipped "I have a record of Jenny's number - 867-5309 ;-)" Yup, a 30 year-old single by Tommy Tutone. I'm surprised that old joke is still going :-)
Renke (D) sent this link Great blog post about 1+1, mathematical proofs and Whitehead and Russel's Principia mathematica. Nerdy humour, for phat people wearing a Gödel ;-)
Brian (UK) grinned "Neat, Stu! I like to tease IT people by telling them that they can check the implementation of floating point algorithms on their computers (Excel etc) using the expression sin(60°) = e/π ;-)" U R eeeevil!
Renke (D) replies to Brian with "IT people and Excel in one sentence without any expletives? Does not compute."
Demeur (USA) wrote "1+1 =11 ; First thing I thought of when presented the problem and it's been since elementary school since I learned that. Wonder what fun you could have with a base 2 system? As for the google image search I believe I remain # 1 with "Friday beaver". What started out as a joke to get more site traffic has now become a tradition here at casa Demeur. Hey you got to do something for your 15 minutes of fame, right?" What really blows people's minds is the base PHI numbering system ! Re "Friday beaver" : I imagine how many tossers you have disappointed with "Friday beaver" ;-)

Copyright ^© Stu Savory on April 27, 2012 permalink . Comments Email

Burns' wish fulfilled? ;-)

Up at a lakeside pub/cafe´ last weekend a couple were showing off their new tattoos which IMHO left something to be desired, like some of those on the Failblog tattoo website. Asked to comment, I quoted our Scottish bard, Robbie Burns, in the poem 'To a louse', whose last verse begins

"O wad some Pow'r the giftie gie us
To see oorsels as ithers see us
It wad frae monie a blunder free us
An' foolish notion."

which, needless to say, did not go down well :-( However, a friend saved the day by pointing out that - I quote - "Google let's you do just that. Set Google to return 'images only' then do a vanity search for your given- and sur-names and your blog-name. You'll get back a collage of how others see you." So saying, he lent me his iPhone and did the aforesaid Google search on my blog.
Here's the result (first 32 photos returned) :-(

How deflating is some of this? Top row left : a whisky flavoured condom, top row 4th : a sheep in wolf's clothing, second row #2 : camel toe photo ;-), third row right : groping works of art. I think I need to be more careful what I blog about in future. Is this how others see me? I thought I came across as a science and maths geek, but no photos thereof :-(

But the rest are indeed representative, four motorcycle shots, three airplane shots, two photos with friends, two with the wife, and the occasional snide political commentary shots. Foolish notions indeed :-)

What do your Google collages look like?

Comments (4) :
Jenny (Ibiza) pleads "If you are going to do geeky maths posts again, please start with the simple stuff like 1 + 1 = 2 :-)" OK, I'll make even that nerdy ;-)
Doug Alder (CA) sent his Google collage. Surprise: I'm in it a couple of times :-)
Renke (D) wrote "I tried it - and the result is strange: search language DE shows as 3. result my ball pit (and dozens of bicycle pictures. WTF?!?), the third image with EN is my hammock. Weird cultural preferences?" The bike pix come because you didn't put you blog name in quotes, I suspect.
Cop Car replied "The search resulted in zero images being returned - not a surprise since my blog is closed to search engines. However, repeating the search with only my (real) name resulted in a bunch of images of people to whom I have no relationship, including a couple of obituaries and a grave marker, plus a lone photo that included me. BTW: There were thirteen images, at the very bottom, of people in identical shirts who obviously work for the same firm - in Germany. " A couple of obituaries and a grave marker? It's a poor (Google) memory that doesn't work in both (time) directions ;-)

Copyright ^© Stu Savory on April 25, 2012 permalink . Comments Email

Atomic Clock ;-)

Back on the 14th of March, I showed you a geeky table mat showing the periodic table of the elements in its traditional layout, 18 elements wide (for the 18 electrons in the outer shell of the larger atoms).

But yesterday I was surfing through Fail Blog - often a source of wry amusement - when I came across this geeky wall clock shown below. Unfortunately, they didn't give a source, but you can buy one from Teacher Source for about $35 + P&P. They are out of stock right now, but I want one :-)

It is a clockface for chemistry geeks (that includes you, Carl, old friend).

Instead of having numbers on the face there are the symbols of the elements sorted by atomic number, hydrogen(1), helium(2), lithium(3) up through magnesium at the 12 o'clock position on the outer scale. You then change over to the inner scale and read off :- aluminium(13), silicon(14) up through chrome(24). Personally I stumbled at scandium (21) because I couldn't remember what Sc stood for, probably because it had no known uses back when I was learning inorganic chemistry. Either that or I must be getting somewhat {Fe₂O₃·nH₂O and FeO(OH)·Fe(OH)₃}-y ;-)

Comments (5) :
Renke (D) points out that there are several local suppliers of personalised clock/watch faces and mentions one, whom I have asked for a quote :-)
Renke (D) also points out that "The Doomsday Clock (in German: Atomkriegsuhr) is about Pu₃ seconds to Cr :)" You mean 3*94= 282 secs = 4'40" to midnight? What a strangelove of clocks U have ;-)
May (from Flint, USA) says "You have inspired me to get Fe₂O₃·nH₂O and FeO(OH)·Fe(OH)₃ embossed on a leather belt, so I can claim that I too have a rust-belt ;-)" Send a photo if you do, May :-)
Cop Car (USA) wrote "Some of us are not {Fe₂O₃·nH₂O and FeO(OH)·Fe(OH)₃}-y, never having been learned enough in chemistry to have memorized all of the elements. Love the clock! P.S. I pity the younger folks who had even more elements to memorize. I know that there were 101 elements when I took 13 hours of (inorganic) chemistry; but, I can't get past the memory of there having been only 98." I usually stumble badly at the actinides and lanthanides, maybe because they're separated out in the table.
Jacques (CA) comments "I found superman hiding at 17-18-19 (Cl-Ar-K), but where's the Krypton?" Krypton is element number 36 and so not shown on this clock, which only goes up to 24. Really nerdy that you noticed Cl-Ar-K, I'd never seen that before. Thanks for the Hydrogen-Uranium ;-)

Copyright ^© Stu Savory on April 23, 2012 permalink . Comments Email

Bilingual Blooper? ;-)

Currently the Christian right and federal anti-terrorist forces are getting their knickers in a twist in Germany because an Islamic sect called the Sally fisters Salifists are distributing copies of the Koran for free. If you want one too, you can order in 10-packs from www.hausdesqurans.de. Freedom of religion, as guaranteed by the constitution, and as such not bannable, much as the bible-thumpers would like to do so ;-) It is an approximate translation into German afaik, to increase the chances of it actually being read by non-Arabs. Not for re-sale, merely passing on.

Their advertising T-shirts are in German too. The word "Lies!" on the T-shirts is the imperative singular of the verb "lesen", which means 'to read', so the imperative verb "Lies!" in German means 'Read this!'.

Seems none of the Salafists had sufficient command of English to understand what the international press and English-speaking people might make of their T-shirts ;-). But, - totally correct under the truth-in-advertising act, I suppose ;-)

Other religions could emulate this degree of honesty ;-)

Comments (5) :
Jack (USA) writes annoyedly "Here you go praising Islam and Allah but knock Jesus and God at every chance you get. Only God is real and can save you!" You do realise, Jack, I hope, that Allah and Jahweh and the Xian God (the father) are all the same Abrahamistic god? Just different names used, three from nine-billion names ;-)
Demeur (USA) wrote "I don't know if it's true or not, but I hear that the word Mormon in Chinese translates to something like 'the gates of hell'." Well Dom, Stephen R. Gibson has debunked this thoroughly already :- "This gross misrepresentation can be heard in The God Makers movie and from anti-Mormons parroting the falsehood which it foisted upon them. Robert W. Blair, professor of linguistics at Brigham Young University, is one of several scholars who have answered that charge. He explained that in the Chinese language foreign words are converted into characters which, when read aloud, more or less approximate the sound of the foreign word. In the case of "Mormon", it is represented by two characters that closely approximate the English pronunciation of "Mormon." The second symbol used for "Mormon" would mean "gate", "door", or "way" in the pure Chinese. Professor Blair said the same symbol would be used to represent the second syllable of the names Simon, Truman, Naumann, Gohrmun, or Seimen. The first symbol of "Mormon" could have been written with one or two syllables; depending upon the desired emphasis for the "R" sound. The two-syllable choice would have placed more of an accent on the R: "Mo(are)Men." Instead, the Church selected a symbol that reflects an "r-less accent" or "Mo-Men" sound. In selecting a Chinese character to represent the first syllable of Mo-Men, almost any one of 30 Chinese characters that are read as "Mo" could have been chosen. Let us quote from Professor Blair's research: The symbol that was actually selected is the character specifically used to represent a like sounding syllable in foreign words. When not used to render a meaningless syllable of a foreign word, this character suggests "smoothing something with the hand." (If one were to take this literal rendering seriously, one could explain "Mo-Men" as meaning "hand-smoothed Gateway, " or "way smoothed by hands." Further, interpolation might suggest that it was the bleeding hands of Jesus Christ that smoothed the way to Salvation!) What the crafty enemies of the Restored Church have done is to pervert the facts in such a way that only those knowing Chinese can see their fraud. From the thirty characters which have been reading Mo, they substituted the one which means "devil" (and which is not the one used by the Church) and then propagated the lie that in Chinese the word "Mormon" means "Devil's gate," or "Gateway to Hell.".
To which Demeur (USA) replied "Okay then have them take off their magic underwear and I might believe them. :-)" Joseph Smith was so patently a mountebank and charlatan that you have to wonder just how gullible Mormons must be to believe such crap. The same is true for L.Ron Hubbard, IMHO.
Renke (D) wrote "Yesterday some Jehovah's Witnesses tried to give me a bible. Their meeting place is called Königreichsaal, could this be one room in the Haus des Qurans?" Sure, their reference though is John 14:2 "In my Father's house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.", Like a heavenly version of Hilbert's Hotel ;-)
Brian (UK) grinned "As an SF fan, I loved the reference to Arthur C. Clarke's short story 'The 9 billion names of God'. Nice one :-)" Thanks, for those of you who don't know it, here is the text :-)

Text Copyright ^© Stu Savory on April 19, 2012 permalink . Comments Email

Statistical theorem in question?

When teaching an elementary statistics class, I get the students started thinking by telling them that "Almost everyone has more than the average number of legs" and having them explain this true statement. But now, with this recent 6-legged birth in Pakistan I need to check if my statement is still true. Cthulhu lives :-(

Comments (1) :
Demeur (USA) wrote "As for legs I have to wonder if that holds true given the present world conflicts and many of our U.S. soldiers coming home sans a leg or two." Yes, that's what brings the average down (to 1.9998 or so). Six-legged children help raise the average, but I doubt very much that it is beyond two :-(

Copyright ^© Stu Savory on April 17, 2012 permalink . Comments Email

1000 Geocaches found :-)

A minor geocaching milestone for me yesterday, I found my 1000th geocache since starting this geeky hobby :-)

And where? Surprisingly, NOT "Locus Deserta Atque ob Multos Paludes Invia" which used to be written on old maps to indicate a place of many swamps (and generally Terra Incognita). This one was in a river tunnel under a road, so I had to clamber down into the culvert and thread my way gingerly along the narrow toe-hold (to avoid falling into the water) while doing chin-ups to see if there was anything hidden on the top level overflow-shelf. Finally, I noticed an animal hiding up there which turned out to be a rubber toy animal containing the cache. Thanks to PappaPad for this amusing cache, far better than the usual 35mm film canisters amongst the roots of a tree!

I definitely prefer the more adventurous ones!

Copyright ^© Stu Savory on April 13, 2012 permalink . Comments Email

Kalashnik OFF ?

Izmash, the company that makes the world famous Kalashnikov AK-47 assault rifle declared bankruptcy on April 6th. In 2011 the company made a net loss of over $80 million and its turnover fell by almost 50%. Their new and improved rifle, named AK-12, has turned out to be a flop so far too. But I wonder why? After all it is claimed to have better range, increased fire dispersion, better ergonomics, usability and accuracy while maintaining the robustness the AK-47 is famous for (i.e. doesn't jam). The bankruptcy allows the brand name to be retained and 'most' of the factory assets, the CEO claims. That sounds like an expedient bankruptcy to me.

So, if you 'need' an AK-47, now is the time to buy, local laws permitting ;-)

However, be warned . . . Norway killer Breivik has been found sane ; a second psychiatric report declares Norwegian mass killer Anders Behring Breivik sane enough to face trial and jail, so watch your step.

Comments (4) :
Jenny (Ibiza) wrote "Here in Spain over Easter, 13 year-old gun nut FJF (one of the king's grandsons) has shot himself in the foot with a shotgun." Remembering 1956, seems it runs in the family :-(
Don (USA) writes "Glad to see George Zimmerman will be charged" Me too.
John (UK) jokes "Does 'second degree murder' imply that the suspect is an academic with a Master's degree? ;-)" Only if my 'third degree' (Ph.D) automatically makes me a top grade Wiccan and/or a master freemason ;-)
Demeur (USA) opines "Regarding the Kalashnikov I believe their economic failure is do to the fact that having been around so long they can easily be copied. Much like the Chinese have done to U.S. manufacturing there are places in northern Pakistan that can do a knock off of fairly high quality. " Probably true, the AK47 is a pretty straightforward gun.

Copyright ^© Stu Savory on April 11, 2012 permalink . Comments Email

Easter Eggs

D uring my primary-school childhood, we spent the weeks in the run-up to Easter traditionally painting chickens' eggs, usually with very simple (childish) patterns. As we grew up, our paintings got better and bolder, our grannies having taught us to suck eggs, so to speak. And the ladies of the village would paint some very pretty eggs - like those shown below - for proud display in the church hall and there would be a WI (Women's Institute) competition for the best easter egg.

Flash forward 35 years to the mid-1980s and I was on a photo safari in RSA (South Africa) - either Kruger National Park or Sabi Sabi, I can't remember - to try to get good photos of the Big Five (lion, leopard, rhinoceros, buffalo, elephant). It was there that I bought this magnificently painted ostrich egg, depicting the Big Five. In the first photo below, I have included a largish computer mouse so that you get an impression of the size of the ostrich egg. The artist's signature is hard to read, but I think it reads Henry Rous.

So, dear blogreader, what did your Easter eggs look like this year? :-)

Copyright ^© Stu Savory on April 9, 2012 permalink . Comments Email

Old Vinyl Meme, #10, 1969 :-)

Continuing on the weekly sundays' Show us Your Old Vinyl Meme which I started in February, in which we show old LPs we own and link to a YouTube video from back then. You can read the meme rules here, feel free to join in, the more the merrier, as long as the LP is 30+ years old.

This sunday's Old Vinyl LP is Goodbye by the unforgettable Brit supergroup Cream. The LP was published in 1969, and I got to see their final concert in the Royal Albert Hall (when I was in the throes of moving to Switzerland).

Here is the video from that very concert in 1968 Politician. Yes, I DO know I showed you a Cream in LP back in February, but they were so good, it's worth watching another video :-)

BTW, should you want to join this meme, the rules can be found here :-

... And thus do we learn of one another's eclectic music tastes :-)

That's the last of this meme, which is why I chose the LP entitled 'Goodbye' ;-) The meme is not being picked up by others, so I'm closing it down.

Comments (1) :
Jimmy raves about Judas Priest.

Copyright ^© Stu Savory on April 8, 2012 permalink . Comments Email

Putting DEAF on the Stage

This one went to Eleven!

Dr. Jim Marshall, OBE, 'godfather of LOUD', amplifier-manufacturer, who personally has been putting DEAF on the rock music stage since the 1960s, died of cancer this week. Wherever you go, Jim, may it be LOUD ! :-)

PS: Jimmy, FYI Lemmy also uses Marshall amps :-), and FWIW the factory is just down the road from BP (Bletchley Park), so you can combine two interesting visits.

Comments (2) :
Dave (UK) asks "The volume on the BBC iPlayer is calibrated up to 11. How loud is 11?" Dunno, Dave, 11 is an arbitrary number. And Marshall's JCM900 (first sold in 1990) has knobs which are are marked from 0 to 20. Known loudest band was 'Manowar' which once reached 139 decibels. But quantity does not replace quality, as I shall show you again on sunday's Old Vinyl Meme :-)
Renke explains the reference to 11 :- " 11 is not _completely_ arbitrary but an idiom coined in the movie 'This Is Spinal Tap'. http://xkcd.com/670/ is the obligatory XKCD making fun of this meme :)" Jim Marshall once said that the calibration is not necessarily even linear, but just there to make intermediate volume levels reproducible.

Copyright ^© Stu Savory on April 7, 2012 permalink . Comments Email

Good Friday Epistle to the politicians Xians

All stories have two sides. Now I think that all my blogreaders, Xians or not, would agree that is only fair to hear both sides of a story before passing judgement. Even if The One True Church^® does try to suppress the other side of the story. And so I present you with the recommended reading for today (75 KB PDF download) The Gospel according to Judas. When reading this Gospel, Xians, remember He is omnipresent (nsfchurch) ;-)

Comments (2) :
Jane (USA) doubts me "That's a leftover from April first, you're pulling our legs, right?" No, the Gospel according to Judas is a gnostic gospel, just as genuine as the others. You can read about in Wikipedia, Jane.
Barbara (UK) asks "What is the picture? Explain the ALT text too pls" The picture is of a silver coin dating from a contemporary 30 AD, scaled to show 30 of them (because I only have one), a visual play on Judas's 30 pieces of silver. Here's the best photo I have of it. The ALT-text "Many, many shekel up her sin" is a pun on "Mene, mene, tekel upharsin" (Thou art weighed in the balance and found wanting), which was the writing on the wall, OK? I'm doing the biblical-reference thing because it is Easter according to the OTC^®. YRMV.

Copyright ^© Stu Savory on April 6, 2012 permalink . Comments Email

Highway Robbery :-(

The price for petrol (what Americans call 'gas') in the minimal 'Super' quality (95 octane) now exceeds €1.75 per liter here in Germany. The picture on the right shows last sunday's prognosis for the summer of 2012 (naturally on the day the summer vacations start) :-(

But let's look on the bright side. My car consumes 8.8 ltrs/100km. My big bike (FJR1300) consumes 6.3 ltrs/100km. My smaller, agiler, 98hp fun bike, a Triumph Street Triple, consumes only 5.1 ltrs/100km. So the logical conclusion for this summer is - as far as possible - to go everywhere on the Street Triple. Thankyou, oil multis, I knew I could count on you for more fun^* ;-)

YMMV.

^* : Sarcasm is a dish best surfed ambiguously ;-)

Comments (5) :
Geoff (GBM) teases me "Aren't you getting too old for this biking thing? You never give up biking because you get old, but you get old when you give up biking ;-) Although.... my brain thinks it's still as lean and mean as it was at 22, but my body says 'fat chance' :-(
Cop Car writing from Kansas (USA) conveys these data " I usually try to be careful to say "gasoline" when I mean the liquid stuff that powers vehicles or "gas" when I mean the less dense state of matter; but, I can't speak for the entire US of A. I can tell you that, as of two days ago, the price of 87 octane (regular unleaded) gasoline, here in Kansas, was $3.759/gallon. My automobile achieves about 20 mpg in my normal, daily driving (suburban/semi-rural) and about 30 mpg in freeway driving. My previous vehicle achieved 22 mpg and 32 mpg, respectively; but, it "required" 91 octane gasoline. Two reasons for the difference: 1) the previous vehicle was stick shift and 2) the current vehicle has all-wheel drive.". Lessee, $3.759/gallon = €0.76/liter compared to our €1.70/liter. That's really cheap gas in the US of A. OTOH, the lowest octane rating here is 95 compared to your 87. And 22 mpg= 10.7L/100km (32 mpg=7.5L/100km), so your petrol costs are way under 50% of ours. OTOH, your distances are probably larger too. YMDV :-)
Klaus (Alaska) writes " As you may know Americans like trucks, gas guzzlers; besides other cars, we have a Ford F 150 the best selling truck in the US for the last 34 years, fuel economy: city/hwy = 12/18 mpg, regular gas is $ 4.28 (average in Anchorage) or 0.86 Euro/ltr., average range 15 mpg, after converting the F 150 burns 15.8 ltr./100 km, cost here in Alaska = $ 17.89/ 100 km, in Germany 27.65 Euro/100 km. Driving a VW Jetta over here, average range 30 mpg, burns 7.87 ltr./100 km, cost in AK = $ 8.90/100 km, in Germany 13.77 Euro/100 km Because the Germans drive more economic cars than the Americans (at least on average) the consumer has the same burden in each country, as you can see on the numbers, gas guzzlers versus fuel efficient cars. If one liter costs 1.75 Euro in Germany that would be $ 8.68/gal., but in AK it is $ 4.28/gal., roughly half what it cost over there, so 15.8 x 4.28 = $ 67.62 or 51.39 Euro per 100 km for my Ford 150, or 7.87 x 8.68 = $ 68.31 or 51.92 Euro per 100 km driving a VW Jetta in Germany... P.S. this is a proof that the "oil mafia" is controlling the price around the world" I hear what you are saying, Klaus, but your math is wrong in that last paragraph because you mix up the units you used. 100kms in the F150 in Alaska costs $17.89 = €13.69. 100kms in a VW Jetta in Germany costs €13.77, so the same price. OTOH, I drive/ride faster here and so have a higher fuel consumption (10-15%) than I would in the same vehicle in the US.
Klaus (Alaska) replies " Sorry I mixed up the units, it should say: 15.8 x (4.28/3.7854) = $ 17.86 or 13.58 Euro for my Ford F 150 ; or 7.87 x 1.75 = 13.77 Euro per 100 km driving a VW Jetta, for fuel economy I used the middle between City mpg and Hwy. mpg, my point is also that Germany get punished by the oil companies because they drive more fuel efficient cars and the Americans get a break because they drive gas guzzlers. I don't know that you drive much faster over there than here, on the German Autobahn the "Richtgeschwindigkeit" is 130 km/h, up here max speed on the freeway is 75 mph, most people exceed that to 80 mph that is 128 km/h, around monolpolitain areas in Germany there are most likely traffic jams all the time and not talking about all the construction sites in the summer that slow you down. But there are certain parts of the German freeways where there is no speed limit and you can go 180 or 200 mph, customers who drive such cars don't worry about the price of gas because they drive luxury cars and who cares about the price of gas." It's not just the oil companies,Klaus. A large portion of the petrol price here is taxation, the government 'motivates' us towards more fuel efficiency in its effort to reduce our national dependency on imported fuels.
Xtreme English (USA) uses public transport and writes " My oldest daughter, living in Scotland, just scoffs at what we Yankees call 'high gas prices.' It costs her something like 80 euros for a fill of gasoline. Her oldest boy, living in Chicago, just filled his gas tank for about $80 dollars (U.S.). Don't ask me what either of them drives. I hate to be smug, but when I went downtown yesterday, it cost me 75 cents one way to ride to the grocery store, and because I didn't spend a long time shopping and came right back out to the bus stop, the ride back was a free 'transfer.' Neither my daughter nor my grandson has the time or patience I do (ha...I'm retired!), but it doesn't take rocket science to figure out which one of us is burning through the next generation's fuel. I love the bus and the metro (which costs 2-3x more). If they can get the bicycle routes so they're safe, I can get around on my own power!" It used to be in Scotland that pensioners rode the bus for free; on Moscow's subway the fare was a few Kopecks and independant of distance. In London (UK) the subway fares are now exorbitant, almost 5 pounds for 4 stops (unless you have an 'oyster' card like the regulars). The disadvantage of public transport - especially out here in the countryside - is that it is not point to point; it doesn't go where I want to go. My fare into town would be €6 for 17 kms, one way. Over here Mary, these new-fangled electrically-assisted bicycles are becoming ever more popular.

Copyright ^© Stu Savory on April 4, 2012 permalink . Comments Email

Old Vinyl Meme, #9, 1982 :-)

Continuing on the weekly sundays' ´Old Vinyl Meme which I started in February. You can read the meme rules here, feel free to join in, the more the merrier, as long as the vinyl LP is 30+ years old :-)

Today being Fools' day, April first, I thought I'd show you a couple of LPs well outside the mainstream of my rock music collection. Apart from Jimmy Smith's Organ Grinder's Swing (1969) this is the only other jazz record I have, so I thought I'd show it to Cop Car, who is more of a jazz fan than I am.

This sunday's Old Vinyl LP is Two is Company, jazz by Albert Mangelsdorff (trombone) and Wolfgang Dauner(piano). The LP just scrapes in as 30+ year Old Vinyl having been recorded in 1982 :-)

I could find them only from 1998 on YouTube, nothing contemporary.

And for something even more offbeat, how about an LP of J.R.R.Tolkien reciting "Namärië" in Elvish Ai! laurië lantar... and reading other passages from his trilogy "Lord of the Rings" back in 1952 in this B&W video :-)

BTW, should you want to join this meme, the rules can be found here :-

... And thus do we learn of one another's eclectic music tastes :-)

Do this meme!

Comments (1) :
HaggisChorizo recommends the "Monsters of Rock compilation LP (1980)".
FWIW: ALL american Blogspot blogs give me error 503 [server down] tonight (sunday april 1st) , but HaggisChorizo's blog is based in Scotland and is OK.

Copyright ^© Stu Savory on April 1, 2012 permalink . Comments Email