Disney Imagineering’s Amazing New Animatronics
Disney is building a new Beauty and the Beast ride in Japan. Check out the absolutely amazing animatronics they’re developing. Magic at 1:45
First Pope to speak at the UN and how to create true peace
Excerpts from Pope Paul VI to the fledgling UN in 1965 that is just as relevant today as then.
As you know very well, peace is not built merely by means of politics and a balance of power and interests. It is built with the mind, with ideas, with the works of peace.
The edifice you are building does not rest on purely material and terrestrial foundations, for in that case it would be a house built on sand. It rests most of all upon consciences. Yes, the time has come for “conversion,” for personal transformation, for interior renewal.
The appeal to the moral conscience of man has never before been as necessary as it is today, in an age marked by such great human progress. For the danger comes neither from progress nor from science; if these are used well they can, on the contrary, help to solve a great number of the serious problems besetting mankind. The real danger comes from man, who has at his disposal ever more powerful instruments that are as well fitted to bring about ruin as they are to achieve lofty conquests.
To put it in a word, the edifice of modern civilization has to be built on spiritual principles, for they are the only ones capable not only of supporting it, but of shedding light on it and inspiring it. And we are convinced, as you know, that these indispensable principles of higher wisdom cannot rest on anything but faith in God.
It’s a reminder that efforts that reduce problems to just power, politics, money, etc are missing the root of issue and just playing whack-a-mole. Temporal tools like laws, money, and power dynamics are useful in guiding our courses – but unless hearts are changed – these efforts are at best a never ending practice of building sandcastles that are washed down with the next tide.
If you feel that politics can’t find the answer, if laws aren’t the answer, if controlling money or power doesn’t seem to bring peace – then you are right. It is the human heart where peace is made and to be found. Let each human heart seek to be reformed, and the rest will fall into place.
What am I doing this advent to reform my heart – especially with the work of peace?
Replacement fans on 2016 Razer Blade 14″ laptop
I recently bought a used 2016 14″ Razer Blade M970 (RX09-01652E22) gaming laptop for about 20% the price of a new one (seems the only things that lose value faster than a Porsche driving off the lot are gaming laptops with last gen technology). I needed this one since it had a high-end GPU that allowed me to do modern DX12/Vulkan work, while being in a nice transportable 14″ slim form factor (it had a M970 graphics card).
While a screaming deal, there was one other noise problem: the fans. Gaming laptops are kind of notorious for needing powerful fans to cool their graphics cards. Both the fans in this laptop were starting to make bearing noises. The temps were fine and the fans worked ok – they were just a little noisier than they should have been. I took them out and cleaned them, but same result.
The originals are Cooler Master FB07006M05SPA312’s. DC 5v 0.5A, 4 pin connector.
Unfortunately, finding these guys turned up next to zero hits. Best options I could find were:
- Live with it – but know the fans might be dying/making more noise soon.
- Send it in to Razer and they’re replace them out of warranty. They charged a flat $100 rate + parts (they quoted me about $20) + shipping. About $150. Ouch.
- Buy used fan/heat-sink assembly off eBay. They were still charging around $40, and the fans were definitely all used. They could have the same noise issues as I was having – or have them soon.
- Dig deeper.
Found:
I opted for #4 and found a company on AliBaba that hit the spot. I found this vendor selling off-brand versions that looked and speced out right. I took the gamble since the price was $32 for 2 fans – a SCREAMING deal:
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/2PCS-CPU-fan-for-GIGABYTE-Razer-Blade-14-RZ09-01161E31-RZ09-01161E31-R3U1-laptop-cpu-cooling/32841110492.html
They arrived about 2+ weeks later as I opted for the free shipping. I popped out the old ones and can confirm these look and fit identically to the originals – sans the CoolerMaster stickers. They appeared to be brand new. Temps all appeared fine after gaming for well over an hour. They revved up to full power and then back down to idle perfectly. Best of all – they were nice and quiet. Success!
Alternative:
If you are looking for originals, I found these at $65/each, but that’s pretty steep to me:
https://www.aliexpress.com/item/Emacro-for-Cooler-Master-FB07006M05SPA312-Server-Round-Fan-DC-5V-0-5A-4-wire/32887795069.html
Knickers – the 6’4 cow from down under
Also related – Aurochs
1.7 days – on average
Glad to know our doctors and academics are still producing lots of great papers. While some things like magnets are seriously dangerous if swallowed, the goal of this one was to get over-protective parents to calm down about the risk of many other commonly swallowed household items.
Six pediatric health‐care professionals were recruited to swallow the head of a Lego figurine. The professionals then examined their stool samples for the next few days to determine:
- If Lego pieces passed through their system or got stuck
- The time it took to pass the Lego piece.
Full paper here:
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/jpc.14309
SMB1 is unsafe
If you use samba and connect to it via Windows, you might get a message that says:
You can’t connect to the file share because it’s not secure. This share requires the obsolete SMB1 protocol, which is unsafe and could expose your system to attack.
The right solution is to update the Linux Samba share software/service. Unfortunately, that’s not always possible – especially if the server is not yours. The only recourse is to find another solution, contact the server owner to update it, or accept the risk. Installing support for SMB1 opens you to the risk of various attacks – including a brutal man-in-the-middle that exposes everything. It’s a good idea to do whatever you need, then disable the protocol, because a compromised server/man-in-the-middle might block safer SMB2.x/3.x protocols which might make your system fall back to the unsafe v1.x without you knowing it.
At any rate, sometimes you have to accept the risk. Here’s how to install/enable smb1 on Windows if all else fails:
- Run Powershell command processor in elevated mode (run as admin)
- Type the following command:
get-windowsoptionalfeature -online –featurename smb1protocol - Once SMB has been installed please type the following command to activate it:
- enable-windowsoptionalfeature -online –featurename smb1protocol
- Once done, press Y and hit enter to restart your computer.
Snowboarding from Camp Muir
I’ve climbed up the shoulder of Mt Rainier to Camp Muir (10,188 ft) and glissaded down; but I should have brought my old snowboard instead like these guys!
This clip brings back some memories for sure. I need to do that hike again.
Eric Chien’s magic
Without a doubt, Eric Chien is taking the magic world by storm. His movements are so smooth as to defy belief. I remember seeing an act of his just a few years ago and being quite astounded. It appears very clear he’s gotten even better.
Here’s his recent act at The Ace Assembly in Hong Kong in which he rightfully won the competition. To be fair, there is decent evidence that there was some post-processing done on the web footage so that if someone slowed down the video the tricks secrets weren’t revealed, but it would likely have been no less amazing to witness first-hand.
Garbage bag art
Two hundred and seventy white garbage bags hang like ghosts in the columned hall of Vienna, Austria’s Museum für agewandte Kunst (MAK) for the exhibition Sagmeister & Walsh: Beauty. The piece is by Nils Völker, and is titled after the number of bags present in the installation. Over 1000 precisely installed fans and 45 circuit boards keep their movement on track, helping to rhythmically inflate and deflate the hanging plastic objects.
Northwest Haunters
Do you like haunted house displays? Ever wish there was a map of the all the different Halloween displays? Now there is, and much more.
NW Haunter’s website has maps of many Pacific Northwest haunted houses and other Halloween displays. Not only that, but they have links to various resources for those that want to make such displays. They have links to various tours and local classes you can take to make scary tombstones, paper machete statues, animatronic displays, and even things called monster mud.
Check it out at the link below:
http://www.nwhaunters.com/