Puttering in the Study

Apollo: The Race to the Moon - Murray, Charles & Cox, Catherine Bly

This book was recommended by Tom Tamlyn, who said it was his favorite of the many books he’s looked at on the Apollo program. After reading it I have to agree.  It is the engineers’ story of the development of the technology for the Apollo program, and it is riveting.

Most books leave me with a few key understandings that I didn’t have before.  For this book, it was that the Apollo program was not an evolution of Mercury and Gemini, but rather was developed by itself in parallel to what those programs were doing.  In other words, NASA was designing and building the Apollo spacecraft, the Saturn booster and the enormous facilities for supporting them while it was still learning how to successfully launch and recovery the first Mercury capsules. 

Of course they benefited from the techniques and experience that the earlier programs provided as they took place, but Apollo was not, as I’d often thought, just a drastically enlarged Gemini with different functions.

Again, Tom was right - this is my favorite Apollo book now, followed by Jonathan Ward's Rocket Ranch and Countdown to a Moon Launch about the activity at KSC - the first is about the technology at KSC, and the second is about the people.  Not that the astronaut biographies, most notably Andrew Chaikin’s book, aren’t great, but I’d rather approach the story of the program from the engineering perspective.

The Rising Sun: The Decline and Fall of the Japanese Empire, 1936-1945 – John Toland

Boy, did this take forever - over 41 hours.  The narrator’s stentorian tone and the tone of many of the interpersonal communications in the case made it seem longer, though.  For the completist on the Pacific War it’s probably necessary, and I did find the negotiations and internal politics of the actual surrender negotiations interesting, but otherwise, it’s one I wish I’d gotten in paper so I could  have skimmed it a little more.

First Man - the annotated screenplay - Josh Singer

I picked this up to see what decisions they made making the movie - how much was strictly accurate, how much was moved around or modified, and what was admittedly created for the movie. And I absolutely loved it.

As you’d expect, the book reveals the movie that was written, the movie that was filmed, and almost all of the movie as it was edited - the book wrapped four weeks before the film did so some final cuts aren’t reflected.  

First Man soundtrack - Justin Hurwitz

After watching First Man the second time, I realized that I really enjoyed the soundtrack and picked it up.  It’s somewhat non traditional, with theramin and Moog synthesizers to evoke a midecentury feel, and even the symphonic music is re-recorded to break it down a bit.  But the themes are great, and I am really enjoying it.

My favorites cuts are Houston, the launch sequence and the landing, but the end credits are getting to be a favorite as well.

The Perfect Pass: American Genius and the Reinvention of Football - S. C. Gwynne

I finished this book some time ago, and really enjoyed it.  It tells the story of Hal Mumme, the football coach that made the forward pass more dangerous, and takes him through his career at Texas high school football, then college, and explains how the offense - best known through the “Run and Shoot” of his assistant Mike Leach when he ran it at Texas Tech.

I heard the author speak on this book at the recent EDTX bench/bar and to my surprise got to spend some time talking with him afterwards.  Unfortunately I forgot to bring my copy to get it signed!

The Reading Stack Routine

I think I finally figured out how I have to read most books.  A few I still sit down and devour start to finish (mostly on the Kindle), but many paper books that I want to read I just can't spend extended periods with - my attention span is just too short.  A few years back I started keeping all the ones I'd started stacked by my chair in the study, thinking that would help, but I'd pick one and read it till I got bored with it and then, burned out on reading for the evening, quit.

A few nights ago I decided that I wanted to make a little progress on each, and read a section of each one.  In some it was a whole chapter, in others a section within a chapter, and damn you Stephen Hawking, I can only do a couple of pages of you before I have to switch to something I understand.

The results have been terrific.  I have enjoyed each of these books that I had previously dreaded, I don't feel guilty setting them down when I get to a stopping point - it's now a sense of accomplishment - and I'm actually making progress on all of them.  I finished the Annotated Frankenstein the other night and I'm getting close on a couple of others.

It's exactly the opposite of the reading "zone" I remember back in junior high where I'd get immersed in First Men in the Moon or Alan Dean Foster's Star Trek Log books, but ... I'm not the same person I was then, either.

My routine is also settled - I set the stereo to iPhone input and the iPhone to [email protected] - usually Spa, but sometimes Cinematic, turn on the fire, tell Alexa to turn off the desk and table lights, and start.  As someone who should have more appreciation for good music I do feel guilty listening to [email protected] for entertainment, as opposed to just concentration, but as noted above, I'm making compromises where appropriate these days.

After I'm done with these, most evenings I read the books I'm more interested in on the Kindle in bed upstairs, but I usually just pick one, and I'm not too badly backlogged there. 

But don't get me started on the horror show that is my Audible account.  I don't know if there's such a thing as an Audible hoarder, but I may be one. 

Dragon 1/700 USS Arizona (BB-39) - Post #2

I finished the parts on the Arizona tonight, which leaves photoetch and detail painting, and wanted to summarize things so far.

3-D printed parts

The biggest addition to the model was the mid-build decision to switch out the kit fighting tops and gun shields for 3D parts.  I had been very impressed with the 3-D printed Pearl Harbor mooring quays (shown painted at left), and was able to located 3D printed fighting tops , gun shields, and shields for the quarterdeck 1.1 inch mounts.

The tops and shields came in orange plastic (an odd choice) and the difference between them and the kit parts is striking.  The new tops are in front - the kit parts are on the ship and behind.  The photo also shows the size of the kits gun shields, which are short, thick, and without vertical bracing.

The last photo shows the boat deck sanded smooth of the old gun shields, and with the tops and shields painted and ready for installation.

Again, I was able to finish with the kit parts tonight.  The next steps is installation of the kit's photoetch, which consists mostly of railings, but also has some gangway and crane detail.  Then it's detail paint and install flags.

I am hoping to finish off the ship's Pearl Harbor appearance by adding the white awnings and extending the boat booms.  The ship's boats really ought to be removed, so I'll probably do that as well.

New model construction docks

Around the time I was finishing law school in 1992, Daddy cut half a dozen 1x6x20" boards for me to use as bases for the 1/700 carriers I was building.  

Several for used for that purpose (see far left) but I turned one into a model construction "dock" (second from left) with basswod strips with sufficient compartments around to hold my basic modeling tools - knife, glue, model paints, etc.  I used a second as a "dock" for models under construction (third from left), and for most the past 25 years they've held the Ticonderoga and 1940 Yorktown that I last seriously worked on when I was living with Mother and Daddy during my clerkship.  Both are almost - but not quite - finished.

As I am getting more efficient at getting 1/700 ships completed recently, I've decided that neither of these docks is really an optimal work surface any longer for a couple of reasons.

I don't need the docks to hold modeling supplies. The tackle box at right does that.  I've recently reorganized the tackle box so that the tools I use the most are all in the same tray, and I always put them away after use. The only compartments I need in the docks themselves are for temporary storage of parts and subassemblies for the model under construction.

I need the docks to be smaller and lighter. Several months ago I picked up a revolving spice tray to use as a base for the Saturn V launch umbilical tower (LUT) so I can rotate it as I work on it, and it makes an excellent work stand for model ships as well.  (It also holds the paints currently in use). The problem is that the existing dock at 20" is too large to comfortably rotate and still be within easy reach, and at 3/4" it's a lot heavier than it needs to be.  Using a half inch piece of poplar with dimensions reduced to accommodate Hood or Lexington - sized models is plenty. If I ever build a 1/700 scale nuclear carrier, I might need the old dock (it was originally sized for a 1/720 scale Enterprise CVN-65) but absent that, the smaller ones will do fine.

So this afternoon while working on the cradle at the workshop I did the necessary cutting and gluing to create two of the new, smaller model construction docks. I look forward to putting them to use in the near future,

Hellcat: The F6F in World War II - Barrett Tillman

I pick up Tillman's books whenever I see them as reference material, but decided to read this one as I'm getting close to building my first Hellcat model.  The book was surprisingly light on the design and origins of the F6F, and is devoted more to blow by blow, day by day accounts of the operational career of the aircraft.  It's dense, but interesting.  Frustratingly, the book is printed in sepia toned ink, so the photos are even less useful as references.

Lost Empress - Sergio De La Pava

What a mess.  I got the audiobook of this book because the principal story about a fictional female owner/manager of the Dallas Cowboys who gets kicked out and starts a competing league with the Paterson Pork franchise sounded really good.  And that plot line was.  It was enjoyable.  But the book has a dozen different ones going on and as magnificent as the full-cast audiobook performance is, it was excruciating listening to it for week after week as I waited for the eventual World Bowl between the Cowboys and the Pork.

This is one of those books that you need to read so you can accelerate through the plot lines you're less interested in.  It's great writing - don't get me wrong - but listening to it in real time was hard.