Friday, June 26, 2015

Star Trek episode 4

     Just an update for aany who missed it. Star Trek continues, with Grant Imahara as Sulu is now up to episode 4 folks. Here's the link for anyone that missed it, or lost track.

Avengers, Robots, and a very sad goodbye.

     Well, apparent;y I don't know how to hit the publish button, as this should have been up long ago. Oh well, here you go. The Marvel Avenger's part should have been, the others are new tonight here.

     Avengers 2, seems like nothing more than a fill in lead up to Thanos showing up. I'm not saying squat about this movie for a simple reason. Spoilers for any that haven't seen it yet. (Wife earned tickets for free movie, so we were there on opening day. Waited for all to see it, but then I thought again about it. If  you're like me, your cheap, and waiting for amazon or Netflix, so no spoilers from me there.) I give it a 7. Barely. But it truly does seem off, in a lot of ways. But I stand by my seven. (Saves me a smack from the wife.)

     Now here is something we should all like. I also doubt many if any of us can afford either of these. Anyone interested in buying a 6' tall, celebrity avatar robot? I won't even tell you the price, go be surprised. Here's the link to this one folks. I don't want to say much and ruin the surprise.
http://www.hammacher.com/Product/Default.aspx?sku=11931&promo=Toys-Games-Robots&catid=253
   
     And now for the second one. Remote controlled, 7' tall. Made from the original templates and blueprints. Probably the most famous robot in history, not counting my Giant Robot or Astro Boy of course. I am talking about none other than Robby The Robot. And yeah, the price matches the name. Not near as bad as the one above, but uhh, yeah. Pretty bad. Check it out if for no other reason than to amuse yourself.
http://www.hammacher.com/product/10921

     And if I had the money, I'd have them both.


     Now some bad news.
     (If only the dragonballs were real, I wouldn't be typing this. I hate writing this).
     Sorry folks, hadn't counted on this this week. We lost another great one, and he does deserve being mentioned here for sure, as his old series did a bit more than just walk the sci-fi border from time to time. It entered the area a few times. Not to mention what else he did.
     So in case you haven't heard, sorry to be the bearer of bad tidings, but we lost Patrick Macnee, the leader of the original Avengers. This man popped up everywhere though, and as always simply amazing. You could give him a 4 second spot, with two words, and this guy would have still been the star of the entire movie or TV show. And he did a lot of work in our genres as well. The Ray Bradbury Theater, War of The Worlds TV series, Waxwork 2, etc. Hell the guy was even in The Howling and the Nightman movie and TV series. A man of skill, of class, and of unlimited ability. What can you say about a man that slammed every role to perfection from his first major role in 1938 till his retirement from acting in 2003. He was also Count Iblis, and the voice of Imperial Leader on the real Battlestar Galactica.
     You know, for all my anger at this planet, and most of it's people, I just couldn't hold it at the front when watching this guy on screen. No matter what he did, he exuded an air of absolute stardom. And not that Hollywood stardom drivel. A real star. A burning star, burning as hot as any super nova that ever flamed.
     So it is now our turn. For you First Avenger, (and greater than any since, even marvels), we stand and tip our hats, and we say goodbye to you old friend. You will be missed, and your skill and personality will never be matched. Nor will your kindness. If ever a man lived that deserved eternal life and youth, it was you.

Monday, June 22, 2015

A Research Team Has Discovered 854 Ultra-Dark Galaxies

A color image made with multi-band images from the Subaru Telescope.     

A team of researchers from Stony Brook University and the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan, have discovered 854 "ultra-dark galaxies" in the Coma Cluster.  The team analyzed data from the 8.2-meter Subaru Telescope. The new discovery surpasses the 2014 discovery of 47 mysterious dark galaxies by more than 800 and seems to suggest that galaxy clusters are the key environment for the evolution of these mysterious dark galaxies.

A small region of 6 x 6 arc-minutes is cut out from large Coma Cluster images. Yellow circles show two of the 47 dark galaxies discovered last year, and green circles are the ones 
discovered in this new study.
Credit: NAOJ 


Read the complete Science Daily article, HERE

Saturday, June 20, 2015

Dawn Spacecraft of Ceres Shows Towering Mountain



Each orbit of Ceres made by the Dawn spacecraft tells us just a bit more of the dwarf planet. Earlier this week, NASA released a fantastic new image of Ceres’ terrain, with a resolution of 1,400 feet per pixel. The image shows some new features, including a 3 mile tall mountain!



Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDA