Intel's Ronler Acres Plant

Silicon Forest
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Saturday, October 4, 2025

House of Guinness - Netflix Series


House of Guinness | Official Trailer | Netflix
Netflix

It's 1868 in Dublin Ireland and Guinness is a thriving operation brewing zillions of gallons of beer, putting it in barrels and shipping it all over Ireland and England. The old man dies and his kids have to pick up the slack. Only one of them has the will and ability to do so, the others are variations of flaky rich kids. Most of the show is about the contortions they go through to maintain their façade of 'respectability' in Victorian high society. Thinking about this for a bit, I realized they were just playing the Victorian version of political correctness. Now, thanks to the internet, everyone can play. Live by celebrity, die by celebrity.

The show has all the regular drama you might expect from a Netflix show about rich Victorians along with some fabulous sets. Talk about the divide between the rich and the poor, the Victorians had it in spades. It also has some bits of history and if you look a little deeper, trains.

Ireland has just endured a famine, and there are hard feelings about that.

Guinness Trademark
The Trinity College harp, also known as "Brian Boru's harp", is a medieval musical instrument on display in the long room at Trinity College Dublin in Ireland. It is an early Irish harp or wire-strung cláirseach. It is dated to the 14th or 15th century and, along with the Queen Mary Harp and the Lamont Harp, is the oldest of three surviving medieval harps from the region. The harp was used as a model for the coat of arms of Ireland and for the trade-mark of Guinness stout. - Wikipedia
Brian Boru (c. 941 – 1014) was the High King of Ireland from 1002 to 1014. - Wikipedia

The Train within a Train & the Railway Built for Beer - Guinness Brewery Railways
Train of Thought

Somewhere around the late 19th century the brewery was expanded to 50 acres and a narrow gauge railway was laid down to serve the plant.


Guinness Brewery, Dublin. William Spence
Model Trains & Planes Channel Steam Trains too

The business about having a carriage that allowed the narrow-gauge engine to run on standard width tracks might be unique. Someone thought it was worth building a live steam model.

Aliens

Dai Heiwa Kinen Tō, Japan.

The Great Peace Prayer Tower is a cenotaph tower in Tondabayashi, Osaka, Japan. . . . The tower is 180 m in height, white in color, and built by the Church of Perfect Liberty in August 1970. - Wikipedia

Friday, October 3, 2025

The Impossible Chinese Typewriter


The Impossible Chinese Typewriter
Julesy

Chinese is just nuts. It says something about the human mind that it is able to master such a complex writing system.

Thursday, October 2, 2025

Sheeple

Hannah More (1745-1833) - Henry William Pickersgill

JMSmith has a fine essay on meekness.

Building I-70 Through Colorado


How to Build a Road
Wendover Productions


I-70


Mobility OBellX
Idaho Transportation Department

I've heard about ski resorts using cannons and dynamite to set off avalanches, but I've never heard of the OBellX before.

Colonial Pipeline

Colonial Pipeline

This is what keeps the East Coast humming. 

The pipeline – consisting of three tubes – is 5,500 miles long and can carry 3 million barrels of fuel per day between Texas and New York. - Wikipedia

Fuel started flowing in 1964. I'm posting this just because I like the map.

Previous posts about the Colonial Pipeline.

Wednesday, October 1, 2025

Ford Explorer Crash Repair


Ford Explorer ST Crash Repair | Insane Collision Damage Rebuild
Peter K

I've never been one for doing bodywork. Straight forward mechanical repairs are more my speed. You need to be a special kind of crazy to do bodywork. I am crazy in my own way, but doing bodywork is like an alien religion.