2017 Winter February 6 Monday

54 degrees this morning, rain, no walk

Spring weather is likely to be here for several days. Light rain this morning, or maybe a very heavy fog, hard to say which.  Sometimes I think the changing weather is worse than if it just stayed cold all the time.  Probably not really, but….

Looking for another printer.  We went from one we’d had for years that was very dependable, but somehow the software became obsolete and although I tried to download the updates, it just never seemed to work the same, and just wasn’t reliable  anymore. 

We went with several inexpensive ones that just never seemed to work right, even though they had high ratings on Consumer Reports.  

Of course printers and I have never gotten along well anyway.  Aliene seems to have more of a touch with them.  

Anyway, spent part of the day yesterday, researching printers.  It is hard to find a good one.  The one I really liked had firmware that allowed you only to use their ink, and you know what that means ($$$$).  Also, just makes me angry they’d do something like that without a big notice telling you (I noticed it on several of the “1 star” reviews of the product).

No decision yet, I”ll let it set fro several days.

Read another article from the “future trend’ Newsletter.  

This concerned an experimental  engine (don’t think it has gone beyond the “ theory test stage” yet to see if it is even possible, an “EmDrive” engine.  Do not really understand it except it would allow travel at high speeds without propellent.  It is called an “electromagnetic Drive” (Em-Drive)  and I don’t have the slightest understanding of how it works, but then I don’t need to understand! 

Of course, there is a lot of scientists (and theory) that speculate it simply isn’t possible, but it is fun to think about.

If perfected, it would send a spacecraft to Mars in 70 days and open up the solar system to routine exploration.   

Not only could it make routine trips to the moon possible, it also could provide for for efficient flying cars with solar  powers the only electricity needed etc and speed up earth travel.  

Of course there are rumors China has built a working Em-Drive engine etc. 

It will probably be aa long time before something like that is built but it is fun to speculate about what the possible results would be.   

Kind of goes back to the batteries, if batteries could be improved to where they could power a house, or a car for long periods it would be a major advancement.

Interesting to think about, the computer, space travel, airplanes etc. were all dreams at one time also!

That’s it for now, Monday, February 6, 2017.