It must be aliens.....

Ok - still fired up by from our recent trip to Egypt. How did they do all that stuff? The stonework alone is unbelievable. 

However, one thing in particular struck me - the hieroglyph of the Sun. Having spent a large part of my life studying the Sun (both academically and recreationally;) this image jumped out at me more than any of the others. 

Here it is...

So what made me so interested! 

Well, why are the Sun's rays drawn as rows of little triangles in 3 lines? If you ask someone to draw the Sun they will draw the rays as straight lines, not like a load of raindrops! Also why only 3 rays and not, as the emoji illustrates, 🌞 lots?

They are of course representing photons (or as Holly, one of our crew, pointed out, maybe neutrinos). Three rows representing photons (red, green, blue) or neutrinos (electron, muon, tau). Come to think of it I like the neutrino version better, much more elegant.

Anyway, something to think on. Has to be 👽....right?

Retirement activities - let me think.

 Well I gave up 'work' around 10 months ago - bit of a grey area on exact time. 

Felt a bit strage for a while but am now getting to grips with it. Difficulty is not having a routine to follow, so have invented a starter activity for most days - dog walking my son's dog! 

That at leats gets the day unerway. But I'm going to have to find some additonal activities, outside of all the travelling I've done. I do like travelling though. Especially now I have my free bus pass! 

I've been researching retirement books looking for inspiration. I could return to do some software programming of some sort but I can't raise enough energy to start. Probably means I need a change. Books say you have to keep your mind active. Books also say get a hobby. Unfortunately all my hobby ideas ended up sounding like work I'd done in the past, e.g. astronomy, programming and the like. Maybe I just don't have the imagination?

There is one thing worth putting on the list and that is, walking. I do like a good walk but not sure I'd fit into the ramblers association, me being a bit antisocial and all that! 

The activity list has started though, here we go;

1    Walking - lets see how that pans out, outside of dog walking that is.

2    Travelling - well I do like travelling outside of walking!

Will add to list as and when.....think 5 activities feels about right.

To brighten up this post here is a pic from our recent trip to Egypt - Abu Simbel, simply phenomenal.

Attempt at catching up

 Rest of 2022 activities

• Trip to Mardid and FOSSA to finalise the build of 10 SAIN units. 
• Attended Highways conference in Birmingham with Richard to try and scope out what others were doing on bridge structural health monitoring. Not a lot as it tuns out.
• Lots of trips to the static in Wales!
• Trips to London to investigate collaboration with a drone provider on bridge monitoring Aeongreen. No money though so it was back to DIY again.
• Attendance at the Glasgow Pocketcube workshop. Always a great bash put on by Alba Orbital. Some investigation into collaboration with Scotish remote monitoring outfit Krucial. Didn't come to anything.
• The issue with SAIN was, and still is to some extent, it needs an injection of money to the tune of £100k to take it to a production level. We (I) have already put that amount in through the consulting business. Didn't really want to go for VC money, probably a mistake, but hey, ho, such is life.

Then 2023

• Trip to London to discus SAIN with Jacobs engineering, David Bradley. Again no go, no money.
• Trip to Budapest
• Lots of trips to the static in Wales
• Bought new motorhome - Bessy!
• Trip to Costa Rica - volcanoe's the lot!
• Big trip to Scotland in Bessy to visit the Rasaay distillery and sign our barrel.
• Advisory business closed down completely!
• Trip to Tenerife - holiday - first time back in a long while!

Then 2024

• Fantastic trip to India - holiday.
• Trip to Berlin - holiday
• Lots of trips to the static in Wales
• Tenerife - again - holiday with Richard to celebrate final ending of Advisory business.
• Big trip to Costa Rica and Panama - holiday
• Lots of Bessy trips, Wales, Durham...big 1 month trip round France to visit friends!
• Brilliant trip to Egypt - holiday

Phew.....as you can see the work aspects have started to take a back seat to the holidays. Long may it continue. I will summarise the SAIN position at some point just to state where things ended up.

Dropped the ball

 Well the last couple of years have seen a few changes that have resulted in me dropping the ball on Fortran revival activity. Mostly good stuff, lots and lots of travel - need to summarise all that at some point. Retirement has kicked in fully! 

However starting to get a little restless, need to come up with some new projects now that I have all this time on my hands - also needs to be summarised at some point.

Frogs of the Osa Peninsular

 

What fabulous place - primary rain forest, birds galore and plenty of frogs to record.

See https://www.researchgate.net/project/Costa-Rican-Observation-and-Analysis-of-Calls-CROAC

For the recordings!

More frogs at Greentique Wildlife Refuge, Manuel Antonio

Sat outside or hotel room, pre-breakfast, near the site entrance. Was visited by humming birds and others!

Night walk at the Greentique refuge - fantastic!

Call can be found here - https://www.researchgate.net/project/Costa-Rican-Observation-and-Analysis-of-Calls-CROAC

The frogs are calling at Macaw Lodge

But which ones.....

Check out the recordings at,

https://www.researchgate.net/project/Costa-Rican-Observation-and-Analysis-of-Calls-CROAC