Lee.org

Today I put a classified ad in the local community’s monthly newspaper. This comes just one issue after I had a photo and 1/2 page article saying how I was the webmaster of the local community’s website.

——————–

I can help. I have 20 years experience helping people with computer troubles. I even make house calls! I can show you how it works or just make it work. From setting up your VCR to installing a new Operating System. I can help you fix your computer or help get a new one, install software & hardware, show you eBay, Amazon, online communities, bill paying services… Anything! Several happy clients in The Valley. Lee C. Sonko, [phone number], [email address]

That’s not to say I accomplished a -good- impossible thing… but my accomplishment is nevertheless impossible. But let me start at the beginning of this very eventful week.

I took my dad to Lakehurst on Independence Day. His father had worked there more than 50 years ago! We watched the indoor flyers for a few hours. We even got to see a record be broken. A man had driven down from Canada for the “good air” in Hanger 1. He was flying a large class plane (I don’t know the exact name) and broke the Canadian record for duration. I watched it take off and then land 34 minutes and 10 seconds later… All on rubber power! They took 5 seconds off the time because he had to use a balloon to steer it once, but 34:05 sets the Canadian duration record by about a minute! Cool.

We also went outside with Robert Romash to slope soar his Zagi Combat wing against the wall of the hanger. He let me have my first hand at soaring. Tré cool. It’s a much different experience than motorized flight. Before going outside, Rob showed off in his inimitable manner by flying the wing indoors… It’s like a high-tech boomerang! He’d give it a fierce throw and he’d bring it back with panache.

I met Julian (a new flying friend :-) at the RAMAC field on Sunday. Since my wing wasn’t completed yet, he let me fly his planes… an ugly stick 40 and a seagull. He tells me that he built the seagull in just a few days with no plans… just by eye. Very impressive.

We flew for a couple hours. A guy with two 70cc gasoline powered fighters came by, a guy with a helicopter, a guy with a trainer… unfortunately, the guy with the trainer left with more plane parts than he arrived with.

We tried out my new Zing Wings. They’re these cute little rubber band launched gliders. They actually are quite a bit of fun. They only go up like 50 feet but they spiral around in nice big circles, cruising around.. neat. The plan was to give them to visitors and kids to fly while I’m flying my plane. Yea, I’ll do that. Of course we had to attach one to his Ugly Stick. The best placement was by putting the Zing Wing with one wing above and one wing below the Ugly Stick’s wing. Then a bit of throttle held the Zing Wing in place. He got it up to 300 feet or so and did a hammerhead to release it. It was HIGH! I ran after it but the wind carried it pretty far pretty fast. I lost track of it a couple times and ended up just standing there scanning the beautiful partly cloudy sky for a sign of that glider. No luck. It was gone! I like to think that it went to airplane heaven. Now it’s out there playing with all the other lost airplanes… like the big camouflage colored fighter-plane that some guy lost a few weeks back. It was worth it watching it just soar away.

Julian tried a few slick landings after that. Since the field is on a sod farm, there are strips where the sod has been pulled up and sold. Those strips made nice smooth runways on this day. He tried landing on a strip just across the canal and into the wind. Nice. Though with no brakes the thing rolled for a really long time. Then he wanted to try a crosswind landing. That strip started 5 feet in front of and downwind of where we were standing and continued a good 100 yards to our left. It was bound by the grass we were standing on to our side and a sod tractor on the other, about 30 feet downwind. A tight fit but he’s that good. He brought the plane in on a pretty nice crosswind approach. He had good rudder action to compensate. Both our heads were turned toward the plane which was going to cross from right to left onto the runway. It flew by on approach. Both our heads turned to follow and then we saw it. The plane was too far downwCRASH! into the tractor. The right wing hit the big rubber wheel, it spun around like a top, banged the tractor once more for good luck and hit the ground tail first.

The damage was weird. The end of the wing got a good scuff but was ok. The fin of the tail broke out of it’s slot (happily an easy repair). Strangely, a 1/2″ x 1/2″ x 1/8″ piece of structural balsa that had been inside the plane was knocked out and then embedded somehow in the skin of the wing! It wasn’t just sticking out, it flew out and then flew back in again! Weird.

But that’s ok! That’s why you bring two planes to the field! They’re like classic Jaguar automobiles. You buy one for the road and one for the shop. He let me take control of the seagull for several short flights (air was getting in the fuel line or something). I made a couple textbook Immelmans, some very nice rolls (the wings have practically no camber) and had just a blast. I was doing these tight sideways inside loops around and around and around… weeee! When I tried to pull out of the loop, badness ensued. Apparently, even though I was still whizzing around as fast as can be (the plane has no throttle control. It’s full-speed ahead until you run out of gas!) I had gotten down near stall speed and the wings started performing poorly. I spiraled right into a ditch! No, not a ditch, a small canal!! When we reached the plane a few minutes later, it was 3/4 submerged. We drained it and brought it back right away. We were both really afraid that the 6 channel PCM receiver (read: expensive) was dead. Happily it was ok but we couldn’t get the motor started.

That ended our -long- day at the field. We went back to my house and worked on the Zagi. Julian helped me finish reconstruction. Click on the photo to the right for a good shot of Zagi 2.0. Sullivan #507 .032 Gold-N-Rod cabled elevons, a better Oracover job, a better cut tray and top… kickin’.

Unfortunately, I realized that the cables weren’t supported well enough at the ends. See the zoomed in photo of the cable… See how the wire is a little bent? Well, when I gave full down elevon, the wire would bend. Suckiness. I used some hot glue to create a strut beneath the unsupported cables. Inside, the wire was bending at the servo too. I bent two paperclips into croquet wicket-like things and glued them in place to hold the wire near the servos down. Done!

Well, not really. You see, that’s when I realized that I had performed the impossible. The controls are impossibly messed up. I threw it a couple times and the plane spiral wildly out of control. Even when I’d pull a hard right turn on launch, it rolled hard left. I checked the controls… up, down, left, right, elevon mixing. Everything was good. Scratching my head, I threw a couple test flights.

Launch --> pull back on stick    --> plane goes up

Launch --> push forward on stick --> plane noses in

Launch --> pull stick right      --> plane rolls left

Launch --> pull stick left       --> plane rolls right

This, as everyone patently knows, is IMPOSSIBLE! If up and down work correctly, and elevon mixing is set correctly (it is), then left and right HAVE to work correctly. I’ve only got two control surfaces! It’s like… you’re standing on a street corner in New York City. The Walk light comes on. You look left, you look right, and as you step off the curb, a car falls from the sky onto your head. It just doesn’t happen!

Hurumph! I’ve thrown the plane about as many times as I dare and it behaves quite predictably in the way I’ve described. I tried throwing it slow. I tried throwing it fast (ouch, I broke my new canopy), I tried to adapt and fly the plane with these wacked controls. No.

I’m gonna call Julian up and have him stare at it for a while.

I spent a couple days down the shore with my family this past weekend. We have the place for a whole week but I had to come back Tuesday to ace my Statistics quiz & test (but that’s another story). By far the best part of the weekend was playing Big Ben Riskopoloy with Jason and Derek on Sunday night. We were talking about favorite board games… Risk and Monopoly came up and wouldn’t go back down again. “Let’s play both!” We didn’t have a Risk board but an old Monopoly set materialized. So we used pieces from a Big Ben jigsaw puzzle and borrowed dice from a nearby game of Yahtzee that my mom and Dorothy were playing.

We figured out the rules as we went along and they worked out awesome!

Rules to Big Ben Riskopoly

Start with a Monopoly board, you’ll also need 3 extra dice (Monopoly only has 2) and a jigsaw puzzle.
Your playing piece acts as the General in your army… read on.
Pieces move around the board just like in Monopoly except
– The player may choose the direction of motion at each roll.
– If a piece ends up on a railroad, on the next turn, the player may choose to take the “underground railroad” to any of the other railroad stations. Changing stations doesn’t take-up any die-roll motion.

When you buy a piece of land (as per Monopoly), you can now buy armies to defend it (as per Risk). Armies cost $50 apiece. If you own a whole set of lands (IE Boardwalk and Park Place) you get a certain number of armies per turn:

Owning all of a set of properties on the first side earn 1 extra army per turn. Owning a set on the second side earns 2 armies per turn. Third side earns 3 armies per turn. Pacific, North Carolina & Pennsylvania will earn you 4 armies per turn. Boardwalk and Park Place will earn you 5 armies per turn.

If you manage to put hotels on a whole set, your properties earn DOUBLE the number of armies per turn (It’s strange how some of the guests mysteriously disappear from the hotel, isn’t it?)

Armies are represented by jigsaw pieces. Choose the color of the pieces carefully so there’s no confusion as to the owner of an army.

Armies can come onto the board on any property that you own. To attack, your armies must either be in a neighboring property or they can be paratroopered in to any spot that the General is currently on from anywhere on that same side of the board. To move armies normally, they use the railroads. Since they take the slow troop transport train, they take an extra turn to get through the railroads.

If you own the Electric Company, you can flip the power switch on the (electric) railways at the end of your turn. If you own Water Works, you can turn off all the water, dehydrating the world. This kills one army per player per turn.

The rules go on.. but you get the idea, don’t you? It was a riot playing and making up fair rules as we went along.

That’s just crazy talk! Weeeeee! I have seen the future of the web, and it is a talking dog.

William Paterson offers a 33 credit master’s program at $358/credit… That’s $12,000 (much cheaper than Centenary’s $600/credit or ESU’s $450/credit for PA residents. Actually, if I attended ESU full-time, the cost could fall to as low as $410/credit but I wouldn’t survive a 15 credit/semester course load).

That’s 2 full-time semesters and 1 full-time summer at William Patterson. Or if I’m working, 4 half-time semesters and 2 half-time summers. If I start in September 2003, I’ll have a degree in September 2005, just in time for my 36th birthday.

Subject: fefx Whät wömën say -vs- whät they dö!

regulate kQ-U8E cheek 1q–fml
[an image talking about an Herbal Viagra Alternative – Lee]
1c-RKNJ6 obviate Sa-S7RU-QuI lavage

Here’s a word definition to help you discover this poem:

Lavage: A washing, especially of a hollow organ, such as the stomach or lower bowel, with repeated injections of water.

The battle of the political titans continues!

I had written to the ARL moderator, CC:ing Paul:

>Paul , Lee, please take this offlne.

I apologize. I felt that Paul’s unprovoked attack on my character needed a rebuttal. My interest is still only in the topic at hand, H1215.

Paul writes back just to me, all politic-ing slick-like

With all due respect, I never realized that the following items were
personal attacks:

1. Residency in the State of New Jersey. (I moved here from New
Jersey in 1989, my mother’s family is from New Jersey, and I like the
state.)

2. Your political leanings, relevant in a political argument.

3. Your friendship with Travis.

All of which, I believe, are well documented by entries on your website.

I will not engage in long political discourse with non-residents on the
Arlington list, as I believe people should have the standing of tasting
the benefits or pain of the political decisions in order to engage in
the conversation. I also think it would have been fair to the list to
disclose your residency before engaging in commentary on Arlington
politics.

And, yes, I am a liberal. Please note that, as an officer in the
Massachusetts Association of School Committees, I advocate positions of
interest to a statewide constituency, regardless of impact on any one
municipality. H1215 is consistent with my association’s desire to have
stable and reliable funding for public schools.

All power to the main deflectors!

>With all due respect, I never realized that the following items were
>personal attacks:

Dude, we both know exactly what you were trying to do.

>I will not engage in long political discourse with non-residents on the Arlington list

Unless you disagree with my points specifically, my questions about the bill are valid, no matter where they come from. If you don’t address them, they will continue to drag your bill down. If you want to help Massachusetts schools and teachers get the money you think they should get, you’ll address the questions.

>H1215 is consistent with my association’s desire to have
>stable and reliable funding for public schools.

But if critics (like me) poke gaping holes in it’s language and you can’t mend the holes, then public opinion will likely turn against the bill. And that won’t help your cause.

I should also say that other ARL posters have written similarly critical messages about H1215 in the past few days. You’ve got to stand on your own here but you might be able to give this a positive spin… if you quit with the petty personal-character attacks and issue-dodging. Right now, it’s not looking so good.

So, take your time, think it through and answer the questions:
—————————-
– Didn’t the override vote fail? So what is Override v2.0 doing in the House?
– Doesn’t this bill take a major and permanent bite out of 2.5?
—————————-

I’ll be waiting for your response on ARL.

lee

Today’s spam poetry:

From: NitaiGouranga@aol.com
Subject: Gouranga

Call out Gouranga be happy.
Gouranga Gouranga Gouranga.
Say Gouranga my friend.
Gouranga….That which brings the highest happiness.

No, I have no clue.

I had a fun altercation on the ARL list today. In response to the override failing, Paul Schlichtman (President-Elect, Massachusetts Association of School Committees) introduced a bill in the MA House of Representatives (not under his own name of course). It would allow the 2.5% per year limit on MA government tax increases to be gotten around if the spending was for schools.

I wrote to the list:

Didn’t the override vote fail? So what is Override v2.0 doing in the House, besides taking up legislators’ time?

His terse response:

Mr. Sonko, you can write your legislators, though this is not a hotly debated issue in Trenton.

(his implication was: You don’t live in Arlington. You are irrelevant. Go away.)

So I turned on the heat and closed the windows:

We’re not talking about Trenton, we’re talking about Arlington. Paul, you seem to have a stake in this so I’ll ask you directly: why is is Override v2.0 in the House at all? Wasn’t the override defeated?

I suppose that your .sig. goes a significant way toward answering my questions.
>Paul Schlichtman
>President-Elect, Massachusetts Association of School Committees
>Vice-Chair, Arlington School Committee
>Population 42,389, 5.05 sq. mi., enrollment 4,470
>http://www.schlichtman.org & http://www.arlington-mass.com

I’ve been re-reading the proposed law. Although I’m not a legislator, it looks like it’s been designed to replace school money that “should” have come from the state, but didn’t… and instituting a local tax to replace that money.

But the whole idea of 2.5 is to prevent government sprawl by causing a budget crunch if government grows too fast. This budget crunch was directly caused by 2.5. In this case, schools were hit hardest. Local government could have moved a column of numbers, saving the schools and causing problems with police, fire, and library. SOMETHING had to give and it did. 2.5 did it’s job.

—————
So next year, when the police department wants a new cruiser, all the mayor has to do is take the money out of schools, declare a school budget emergency, raise taxes (via the new law), and bingo, a new cruiser.

Now I’ll grant that the new law can only be abused so much… “the difference between the minimum required contribution and the the town’s local contribution in 1993.” But this year, it can be said that the level of abuse would top $6 million dollars. That’s a lot of cruisers.
—————

That doesn’t sit well with me.

So I ask again:
why is is Override v2.0 in the House at all? Wasn’t the override defeated?

My source material:

Paul’s message:
> Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives in
> General Court assembled, and by the authority of the same, as follows:
>
> Paragraph (f) of section 21C of chapter 59 of the General Laws as
> appearing in the 2000 Official Edition is hereby amended by adding
> after the word “revenue”, in line 58, the following words:- plus the
> difference between the minimum required local contribution prescribed
> under chapter 70 for the current fiscal year and the municipality’s
> local contribution in fiscal year nineteen hundred and ninety-three as
> defined in chapter 70 section 2.

The current laws
http://www.state.ma.us/legis/laws/mgl/59-21C.htm
http://www.state.ma.us/legis/laws/mgl/gl-70-toc.htm

Paul turned on the Flame Thrower (in a closed room! The fool!):

Dear Mr. Sonko:

The reason you should be talking Trenton is that you appear to be a resident of the State of New Jersey. According to the journal on your website, you are complaining that you do not qualify to get a teachers’ certificate in New Jersey. (6/19/2003). Your journal also references a callback from Assemblywoman Connie Myers (a Republican from the 23rd district in Hunterdon County NJ). You state on March 26, 2003 that you joined the Hackettstown NJ Chess Club.

I do not think you have any connection to the Town of Arlington, except for the link to one Travis James Ignatius Corcoran on your friends page, fourth line:
http://www.lee.org/friends/index.html
Travis also has you at the top of his list of friends, described as, “A friend of the highest caliber. I’ve known Lee since fourth grade. He was two years older than me then. He still is. Grrrrrrrr..”
http://www.tjic.com/friends.php

According to your politics page, you are a Libertarian. Thus, you seem to be seeking to inject your political philosophy into a town and a state in which you do not reside.
http://www.lee.org/politics/index.html

So, I repeat, I suggest if you have comments on state legislation, you should feel free to call Assemblywoman Connie Myers, Assemblyman Michael Doherty, and Senator Leonard Lance; you can reach them in Trenton. Join the Hackettstown e-list. And have a nice life down there in the Garden State.

Silly Paul, I was already wearing my asbestos underwear from my last post!

>you appear to be a resident of the State of New Jersey.

I am at that.

Being a NJ resident bars me from voting in Arlington but does not bar me from discussing Arlington politics, Arlington bug spray, or whatnot.

My posts on the list have been and continue to be on-topic. I refer to the list’s FAQ, “…information relevant to the residents of Arlington, Mass…”. I also believe my posts to be reasonably well informed. If you disagree, please say so.

I think that your attempt at character assassination isn’t going so well.

Since you’ve taken the time to research my journal (found at http://www.lee.org/journal), cross reference my friendship with TJIC, and post a vitriolic letter about me, could also please take the time to answer my first question?

——————
Paul, didn’t the override vote fail? So what is Override v2.0 doing in the House?
——————

In my further considerations about House 1215, it occurs to me that this would be the equivilant of a PERMANENT override for EVERY town in Massachusetts when it comes to school budgets. Furthermore, it seems that it opens a loophole that takes a major bite out of 2.5. That’s casting a pretty wide net, isn’t it? Paul, could you please address those potential issues?

If 2.5 is so bad, then maybe a vote to repeal it should be put up.

lee

I followed up a little while later with a more personal message to the list. The last part is quite introspective:

Paul, I’d like to answer the more comments you made about me in your post:

>According to the journal on your website, you are complaining that you
>do not qualify to get a teachers’ certificate in New Jersey. (6/19/2003)

Yup. it’s been a career changing nightmare for me for the last year and a half.

>Your journal also references a callback from
>Assemblywoman Connie Myers (a Republican from the 23rd district in
>Hunterdon County NJ).

Actually, she’s an Assemblywoman in Warren County but I see how her homepage might make you think otherwise.

>According to your politics page, you are a Libertarian. Thus, you seem
>to be seeking to inject your political philosophy into a town and a
>state in which you do not reside.
>http://www.lee.org/politics/index.html

I don’t understand the connection that you make. “Thus” doesn’t make any sense in your argument. But I’ll go ahead and explain a little bit about my Libertarianism….
As my page says, I call myself a “soft libertarian”. When looking at a situation, I find myself keeping in mind the philosophical bent of libertarian thinking. I’m definitely not a strict Democrat or Republican. Mostly because falling into either camp picks up way too much baggage… I.E. being Republican means being pro-life and pro-death penalty, two contradictory things… and not for any solid reasoning. I like the “feel” of libertarianism added to the mix of political thought. It helps me think out my position on issues. I use libertarian thought as a tool to carefully think out my position on issues. But I definitely would not want to live in a country completely controlled by a libertarian government!

I could write a lot more about this, but again, as my politics page says, “I could talk for a while about this but I’ve got more important things to do than argue over the internet. I’d rather yell at you in person.”

>I do not think you have any connection to the Town of Arlington

I left my heart in Arlington. It’s a long story going back to 1987 when I started Tufts and found myself in proximity to some of the most lovely and historic cities in the country. Several friends live (or lived) there, a very serious (ex-) girlfriend lived on Cleveland street. Arlington has always been a state of mind for me. It’s important. I left Boston a few years ago but I still reminisce about it and think about going back. I think the main reason I haven’t is that there are too many ghosts of my past that reside there. I want to live in Boston but I can’t. ARL lets me connect with Arlington without the discomfort of staring-down those ghosts every day.

lee

So far, the feedback on the list has been a mix of positive and negative. I received a private message from someone saying:

I appreciate you pursuing an explanation from Paul. I am anxious to hear his answer.

It’s very nice to hear that my words are valuable! I thanked the author profusely. Another poster (Lori Vollers Uhland) wrote to the list saying that he hadn’t dissed me. Yea, whatever. And another (Jerri Newman) said, because I was geographically challenged, “I am not interested in this or anything else you have to say”. Yea, whatever.

I can probably become a teacher in Florida. Of course, the starting salary sucks. $25k to start, $38k average. NJ would have been $31k starting, $52k average.