James Webb Space Telescope Must Live!


The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) will be the replacement for the Hubble Space Telescope. The JWST will be the coolest space telescope ever. Obviously, since it will represent the new and improved space telescope. The JWST will be larger, orbit further than HST, and have better optics and cameras. No telling what cool stuff…

Gold Standard 2012: A Foolish Folly


Rand Paul and his father, Ron Paul, have many quotes and attributions stating they favor returning to the stable economic days when the United States backed all of its currency with either gold or silver. I think before anyone jumps on this bandwagon to CrazyTown, we need to really examine the Gold Standard. Gold and…

Book Review: “Bad Luck and Trouble,” Lee Child


“Never mess with Special Investigators.” In the Army, MP’s have to watch their backs, and the back of the people they are teamed with. MP learn never to take anything for granted. With a population as numerous as some countries, the U.S. Army has its fair share of crime. And criminals of any sort do…

Book Review: The Enemy


Novels contain an immense amount of geography. The fifth book I’ve read by Lee Child in two months. The guy can put a story together.  Take equal parts of the best procedural crime novel you’ve read with parts of the Walking Tall movie series and that gives you Jack Reacher series of novels.  For series…

Movie Review: “The Green Lantern”


Not horrible. I give it 3 Lanterns out of 5 The Question: Is this comic book-derived movie worth seeing? The Answer: You bet. Yes, I know. Ryan Reynolds is Hal Jordan/Green Lantern, and people don’t think Ryan could pull off a comic book action movie. And, what about him being Deadpool, anyway? Or, a Vampire…

Movie Review: “Blood Car”


Let’s hope our love for driving does not come to this… When I was a kid, I would use my imagination to build a rocket-launcher. My rocket-launcher wouldn’t deliver an explosive charge. No, I didn’t really want to kill anyone. I simply wanted them to suffer some form of humiliation. My rocket-launcher delivered poop &…

Technology Review: HP Slate 500


  Last month, my boss inquired what we might buy with the little bit of money remaining from the current fiscal year. Usually, I have ideas. On this day, not so much. My Sphere of Influence (SoI) was pretty tight, and no particular goodies were needed. I stood there stumped. Like any good boss, he…

Technology Review: The iPad (Generation 2)


  At this stage of iPhone/iPad application development, I would have a hard time recommending the iPad device for use in the GIS/RS environments. I qualify that statement by exempting application development from the critique. The iOS development environment is sufficiently robust to allow for an immense variety of quality applications. The scarcity of GIS,…