Living near a Canadian Air Force facility, we get occasional military helicopter flyovers, reminiscent of those times we spotted Marine One back in DC.
Here’s a Sikorsky CH-148 Cyclone over our house.
Eastern Passage
Spent a Sunday afternoon at McCormack’s Beach Provincial Park: walking the boardwalk, sitting on the the beach to picnic on some drive-thru chicken nuggets, admiring the view of Halifax.
We also browsed through Shore Things and bought a little buoy ornament, then took the kid to a school called Oceanview to play in the playground for a bit.
There was indeed an ocean view.
Lawrencetown Beach Hill
Last time we went up Lawrencetown Beach Hill we turned back partway; this time we made it all the way to the cliffs overlooking the Atlantic Ocean.
Ezra had a nice time exploring up there; we just had to make sure he didn’t get too close to those cliffs. More photos from Lawrencetown Beach Hill here.
Apple TV Update
(In case this post accidentally gets first page placement in search results: Here is how to update your Apple TV.)
We’ve been on the same refurbished 2nd-gen Apple TV since 2013 but I figured it was time to upgrade when the old YouTube app said it was about to stop working.
A funny thing happened when I ordered a refurbished Apple TV HD (I really didn’t need the latest 4K version and our non-smart TV is just a 1080 anyway): after it arrived I plugged it in and set it up–and was greeted by a notice that this Apple TV was a “supervised device” from Resignation Media LLC, parent company of The Chive, among other things. They hadn’t properly reset the unit before sending it back in, and Apple’s refurb department hadn’t properly checked it before sending it back out for sale.
Simple factory reset did not clear the corporate supervision lock, so I called Apple tech support to ask if there was a way to remove it remotely from their end. Support rep told me I’d have to take it in to a physical Apple store to properly reset the Apple TV.
“Can’t really take it to the store right now. COVID.”
“Okay, sir. Can you wait till after COVID?”
Ultimately I just did a simple mail-in return and reordered another refurb Apple TV HD, which arrived quickly and worked properly out of the box. There’s been a bit of an adjustment period as I get used to the new UI, swipey Siri remote, and actually being able to install apps from an app store.
(lol, lmao “after COVID,” like this is ever going to end)
Moody Beach Fog
Summer is officially over, and we spent a lot of it at the beach. Lots of days there was a wall of fog right off the shore, which reminded me of that Star Trek episode with Dr. Crusher trapped in a pocket reality where the universe is a spheroid region 705 meters in diameter.
Google Messaging Apps History
A decade and a half of instability: The history of Google messaging apps … Google seems content only to spin up an innumerable number of under-funded, unstable side projects led by job-hopping project managers.
I’ve watched XMPP-based Google Talk, Google Hangouts, Google Plus and now Google Chat and Meet march by in my Gmail sidebar. Never even bothered with Allo and Duo.
(But hey, ICQ is still around.)
Doogie Matrix
There’s a new Matrix movie and since it features Neil Patrick Harris of “Doogie Howser, MD” fame, I had to do this mashup:
Tangentially of interest, a new Disney series based on Doogie Howser, also about a young doctor: Doogie Kamealoha, MD.
MREs
Only just recently learned about Steve1989MREInfo (aka “Let’s Get This Out On a Tray, Nice” dude), who records soothingly comprehensive video reviews of military rations from around the world and through history.
I was especially interested in the Humanitarian Daily Rations, airdropped by the US to feed a wide range of civilian populations in crisis — how are they adapted to fit a variety of dietary restrictions? (The answer: lots of beans and lentils and rice. Interestingly they still include peanut butter packets; I guess peanut allergies aren’t much of a concern.)
- Year 2000 Yellow Pack review
- Year 2003 Pink Pack review (colour was changed because the yellow looked too much like undetonated cluster bombs)
Also thinking of getting some civilian MREs for emergency or camping use. And in case you were wondering, yes, there are Filipino MREs as well.
HaliPano
Quick iPhone panorama of Halifax from the Ferry Terminal Park in Dartmouth across the harbour:
Nearby, the fire rescue boat “Kjipuktuk”: true Mi’kmaw name of Halifax Harbour and the surrounding area.
Suborbital Tourism
July 2021 saw two major suborbital space flights, significant for being private commercial space tourism trips carrying the founders of their companies with paid or sponsored passengers:
Virgin Galactic Unity 22 [WP/YT] aboard SpaceShipTwo VSS Unity, air-launched from carrier aircraft VMS Eve, reached an apogee of about 86km (under the 100km Kármán Line but above the USAF threshold for space), with Virgin’s Richard Branson aboard.
Blue Origin NS-16 [WP/YT] aboard a New Shepard launcher and capsule, reached an apogee of 107 km (above the Kármán Line, so within the international definition of space), with Amazon’s Jeff Bezos aboard — and Wally Funk of the Mercury 13.
14 years after SpaceShipOne flew its historic X-Prize flights, it says something about how I’ve changed that I went from thinking “hey maybe I’ll have $250K for a suborbital hop” back then to “they should pay fair wages and stop evading taxes” today.
I guess it was too much to hope commercial space tourism would grow into more than a couple of billionaire junkets. But hey, I’m happy Wally Funk got to space.