Iridescent

Glamnetic Tweezers

This looks to me like these tweezers have either cadmium plating or a chromate coating, both of which can be iridescent. It also looks like the false color images you get from infrared cameras. In any case, I've seen this kind of thing on cheap metal parts, but I've never seen it used on tools. Leave it to the fashion industry to show us the way.

Kerosene lamps

I don't know about these two videos, at 30 minutes they are a little longer than the stuff I usually post, and there is something about the presenter that is a little off putting, but I watched both of them all the way through so he must be doing something right. He does do a thorough job of explaining kerosene lamps, including a molecular explanation of how they work, their history and the history of illumination in general.

Why do hurricane lanterns look like that?
Technology Connections

Kerosene lamps are widely used for lighting in rural areas of Africa and Asia, where electricity is not distributed or is too costly. As of 2005, kerosene and other fuel-based illumination methods consume an estimated 77 billion litres of fuel per year, equivalent to 1.3 million barrels of oil per day. This is comparable to annual U.S. jet-fuel consumption of 76 billion litres per year. - Wikipedia

How the gas mantle made lamps 10X brighter
Technology Connections

The book he mentions, Disenchanted Night: The Industrialization of Light in the Nineteenth Century, sounds like it might be interesting. You can get a paperback copy from Barnes & Noble for $30, or if you have money to burn you can get a hardback copy from Amazon for $900. Are you kidding me? Who shells out that kind of money just to get the hardback version? All I can say is that the world is full of strange and wondrous things.

He recommends a video about limelight, but I like this one better.

The Lime Light
Jonathan Bastow
The other video does mention the Charlie Chaplin film Limelight. Must be old comedians week.

Squid

I saw this line on Schneier on Security:

“When an Eel Climbs a Ramp to Eat Squid From a Clamp, That’s a Moray.”

and I immediately recognized it from the cadence. Thought that was a little odd, but the mind works in mysterious ways. The last word helped. Took me a bit to nail down just what the original was, but I figured it out eventually.

Dean Martin & Jerry Lewis That's Amore (Colorized)
Color History

Lily The Pink

Buster Keaton & The Bride
Possibly from The Cameraman

Looking for something to watch on YouTube and this image catches my eye. The tune isn't bad, but I've only heard it once, we shall see if it gets played again. It's the image that captured my interest. Screen shot, crop & Google Image Search doesn't get me any answers, but it does lead me to this story: A Mysterious Woman in Buster Keaton’s “The Cameraman” wherein I find this bit:

Who the heck is Lydia Pinkham?

You know, in The Cameraman (1928) when Buster goes to the MGM newsreel building, looking for Marceline Day and shows the doorman the tintype of her and asks about her. The doorman says:

["Maybe it's Lydia Pinkham"]

This usually gets a smattering of chuckles, just because of the incongruity of the answer. He could just have easily said, “Maybe it’s Greta Garbo”. But Keaton, or Ralph Spence or whoever wrote the titles for The Cameraman put that reference in because it was hilarious in 1928 and it would have been taken out or changed during previews if it wasn’t.

Why was a reference to Lydia Pinkham so darned funny? 

Lydia E. Pinkham’s Vegetable Compound

If Wikipedia and a few other websites are to be trusted, Lydia Pinkham was known for an herbal tonic, touted as a cure for menstrual cramps and other ladies’ ailments. A popular patent medicine in the late 19th century, and Lydia E. Pinkham’s Vegetable Compound became doubly popular in the 1920s. Because it was 18% alcohol. Remember how I mentioned reminding the audience about prohibition? The alcohol content of Pinkham’s is about mid-way between beer and gin.

There was even a folk song written about Pinkham’s elixir, a drinking song, called “The Ballad of Lydia Pinkham” also known as “Lily The Pink”, that was around during WWI.

And here we are:

The Scaffold - Lily The Pink
WiggyVideos

Lyrics, courtesy of Musixmatch:

We'll drink a drink, a drink

To Lily the Pink, the Pink, the Pink

The savior of the human race

For she invented medicinal compound

Most efficacious in every case

Mr. Freers had sticky out ears

And it made him awful shy

And so they gave him medicinal compound

And now he's learning how to fly

Robert Tony was known to be bony

He would never eat his meal

And so they gave him medicinal compound

Now they move him round on wheels

We'll drink a drink, a drink

To Lily the Pink, the Pink, the pink

The savior of the human race

For she invented medicinal compound

Most efficacious in every case

Old Ebenezer thought he was Julius Caesar

And so they put him in a home

Where they gave him medicinal compound

And now he's emperor of Rome

Johnny Hammer had a terrible st-st-st-st-stammer

He could hardly s-s-say a word

And so they gave him medicinal compound

Now's he's seen, but never heard

We'll drink a drink, a drink

To Lily the Pink, the Pink, the Pink

The savior of the human race

For she invented medicinal compound

Most efficacious in every case

Aunty Milly ran willy-nilly

When her legs they did recede

And so they rubbed on medicinal compound

Now they call her Milly Pede

Jennifer Eccles had terrible freckles

And the boys all called her names

But she changed medicinal compound

Now he joins in all the games

We'll drink a drink, a drink

To Lily the Pink, the Pink, the Pink

The savior of the human race

For she invented medicinal compound

Most efficacious in every case

Lily the Pink, she turned to drink

She filled up with paraffin inside

And despite her medicinal compound

Sadly pickled Lily died

Up to heaven her soul ascended

All the church bells they did ring

She took with her medicinal compound

Hark the herald angels sing

We'll drink a drink, a drink

To Lily the Pink, the Pink, the Pink

The savior of the human race

For she invented medicinal compound

Most efficacious in every case

Wikipedia links:

• Buster Keaton
• The Cameraman
• Lily The Pink
• Lydia E. Pinkham’s Vegetable Compound
• Lydia E. Pinkham

DC-10 Bombs Lava Fire

McDonnell Douglas DC-10 Water Bomber
Departing Medford for the Lava Fire burning near Mt Shasta.

Fire season is picking up.

The map shows heat on the Lava Fire detected by satellites.
The red dots were detected at 2:54 p.m. PDT June 29, 2021.

We seem to have a new technique for measuring wildfire. dailytimewaster will be interested.

French Trucks

Cool Truck in Vatry France

A photo of a 747 air freighter on the ground at Châlons Vatry Airport got me started as I had never heard of this place. Turns out it is not that exotic, it's about 100 miles east of Paris. I go poking around in Google's StreetView just to see if anything weird of interesting turns up. Didn't find anything, it's just a little farming community, and then I turn a corner and boom! There's this six wheel (or is it eight wheel?) truck staring at me, so I just gotta share.

The town is about 4 miles northeast of the airport. The airport got started in 1950 as the Cold War was getting started. It became a civilian airport in 2000. Passenger traffic was non-existent until 2010 when it started picking up, possibly because it's only 65 miles from Disneyland Paris.

Boeing E-3 Sentry

Boeing E-3A Sentry (707-300) LX-N90447
Zweibrücken, Germany

The Boeing E3 Sentry is an AWACS (Airborne Warning And Control System) aircraft developed from the Boeing 707 back in the 1970's. The last one was built in 1991, so the newest one is 30 years old. We think of the 707 as an airliner, but the first customer was the USAF (United States Air Force ) who bought the KC-135 aerial refueling tanker. So the first and last customers for the 707 were the military.
 

Boeing E3 (77-0355)
Fairbanks, Alaska

Half of the 68 units built went to the USAF, the rest went to other allied countries.

Boeing JE-3 Sentry
Fairchild Air Force Base, Spokane, Washington

Not to be confused with the E6 which is also based on the Boeing 707, nor should it be confused with the E4, which is based on the Boeing 747. Neither the E4 or the E6 carry the big radar dish on top. They are both more of a command and control kind of thing.

P.S. I added a new label, Aircraft Military Special, to cover military applications of what are essentially civilian airliners. There were getting to be too many and too hard to find.